Barbara Gawain shifted nervously in her chair as gladiatorial combat ensued.

The Grand Champion versus three Rev-8 combat golems outfitted with prototype armor and mana swords. The crowds cheered wildly for the match to begin, but the atmosphere in the skybox was decidedly chilled.

She glanced to her boss, R&D Manager Turr Williams, and to her CEO, Lord Gordon, both of whom stared down at the arena with disconcerting stoicism. Were they angry? Were they scared? She could not tell, and that only made things worse.

Down below, the Grand Champion, that heralded Hollis Hargrave, unsheathed her two split wind sabers and struck a mighty pose in her thick, black-plated battle armor. The crowd went wild, just as they did every week.

Her swords beamed under the lights above and made a sparkling show for onlookers, further incensing an already riled-up audience. The shiny white golems advanced towards her, each taking a different stance, but it was like Hollis did not even see them. Her eyes faced only the crowd. Even as the golems encircled her and came just within striking distance, nothing in her expression changed.

Part of it was surely the Grand Champion’s defeat at the hands of that child with the spiky hair, that Great Hero who saved the city of Fleettwixt and defeated its hero-warrior in the process. Twice, even. Humiliating losses like that, right in the Coliseum for everyone to see, always put things into perspective. But that hero was gone, peace had returned, and her supporters had come back around, all thanks to her tirelessly confident demeanor. More than making up for embarrassment, the Grand Champion likely saw her foes and decided they were not worth the effort of taking seriously.

And that kind of posturing made Barbara absolutely squirm.

Please, please let this be a good match, she begged to the heavens.

The golems each lunged, their mana swords flaring bright blue. Hollis moved with blinding speed and parried all three hits. Made it look like her armor weighed less than paper. One golem took the brunt of the parry and stumbled back a few steps; exactly the opportunity she needed to jab both her sabers forward—

Stab, right into its chest.

Mana sparked out from its body and made loud popping sounds that kicked the crowd into a frenzy. It tried to regain its position, but she knocked its sword aside and, with one more mighty thrust, knocked it off its feet. Before it even hit the ground, Hollis pulled back and struck once more, slicing its head clean off.

The other two attacked in-sync, trying to throw her off with the sheer speed of their swords. The weapons moved with such ferocious velocity that it looked as if they held up swirling blue vortexes against the Champion.

But she was not impressed. She blocked every strike but two, and those merely bounced off her armor as quick, meaningless grazes. It was only a few seconds before one of them made a mistake, and she pounced as always.

Only one left, and hardly three minutes had passed in the match. Barbara’s entire face became covered in sweat.

Please, please—

The Grand Champion was on top of the final golem as it squirmed its iron limbs around, desperately trying to get back up. She raised her swords up in the sky, turned her body to get good photograph opportunities, then stabbed down into her victim.

The match was over, and the crowd let out an upracious cheer.

The Rev-8s were worthless pieces of junk.

And as Barbara was the lead designer on their creation, all the executives in the skybox stared directly at her.

Many words were had in those next few minutes. Most consisted of curses and insults and cries of corporate ineptitude. Fingers were pointed at her. Manager Williams hopped up on his short legs and berated her dirctly to her face.

Barbara took them in stride as much as she could. Because she already knew she was out of a job anyway. No way could she survive embarrassing her boss right in front of Lord Gordon. She blocked out the sounds of her employers all the way until the final line: “You’re fired.”

So, with the angry commands to clear out her desk by the end of the week levied on her, Barbara left the skybox and made towards the bottom floor of the Coliseum. If she hurried, she could get down to the bars before the crowds filled up. She had a very important date tonight with an entire bottle of Doros Prime and sad songs over the jukebox, and she refused to miss it for anything.

The gray hallways of the Coliseum, empty save for Barbara herself, echoed with the faint sounds of jubilant camaraderie. The common folk, the spectators who flocked to watch their heroes do battle each week, cheered on the destruction that the Grand Champion had wrought. And just that glimmer of excitement off in the distance was enough to win her over a little bit.

It WAS cool. The Coliseum and all its battles.

Barbara had every right to rue the existence of Hollis Hargrave, the woman directly responsible for her crashing career. But why would she? It was hardly her fault she was so mighty a warrior that even the most advanced golems could not make her break a sweat. It was the North Sunwell Company’s fault for thinking they could debut their newest creations in public with the one half-elf who could make them look like children’s toys.

The Coliseum was not a place for noble battle tonight. It was an executioner’s stand, and Barbara’s head had just been lobbed off.

She walked and walked the distance of the hallways until she finally came to the public entranceway, where hundreds of people poured out in continued excitement. Still two more hours of fights, but the main event was over; after the Grand Champion’s round, there wasn’t much left to care about. No one paid attention to Barbara, and even if they did, they wouldn’t have known about her anyway. She was simply a designer, a golemancer with a flair for style whose style was certainly not enough to impress the world.

One person did take notice of her, though, and quickly approached her: The Grand Champion herself. Cheeks warm and armor replaced with a trendy blouse.

“Miss Gawain!” she shouted.

She came to Barbara from across the room, each arm wrapped around the shoulder of a dolled-up dame. Her feminine companions dressed up in fur and makeup, a stark contrast to Hollis Hargrave herself; even without armor, she exuded power from her staggering height, her boxy chest, her sharpened face worn down with scars. The women giggled just resting in such strong arms.

Barbara was immune to the Grand Champions’s charm, but she knew few women in Fleettwixt could say the same. And yet, as always, she came right to her.

“Nice to see you,” Hollis said. “Are you good? How did you like the fight?”

“You were wonderful,” Barbara replied flatly. She attempted to move past the three-woman wall and exit the Coliseum, but they side-stepped to block her path.

“I just wanted to tell you how fun it was,” she said. “Your golems are getting better all the time. The moment you make one that’s worth a full match, you better let me at it, one-on-one.”

“I got fired.”

Hollis lifted her eyebrows in mild surprise. “Again?”

“For real this time. Lord Gordon was here. He watched the whole thing.”

Hollis smacked her lips. “Hell, if I knew that, I would have let the things fight me a little longer. I’m sorry if I was—“

“No need,” Barbara interrupted. “I’m done with golemancy anyway. We’ll never meet again.”

“Miss Gawain, what do you mean? We’ve—”

She finally pushed past Hollis and her companions. Stomped out of the Coliseum without another word.

In no reality would Barbara let the Grand Champion of all people take pity on her. That would break her heart more than anything else. “Miss Gawain” and all of that, as if Barbara were not two centuries younger than her.

And it was not really pity, anyway. Sure, Hollis cared in the moment. But she would hardly be sad about it. In a few hours, she would be back in her quarters with her two lady friends and she would forget all about that sad sack designer who constantly failed her whole corporation.

Soon, maybe, the whole world would forget about her.

So with that self-disgusted grief in mind, Barbara forsook her mental health and arrived at her favorite dive, “Last Stand at South Wall,” creatively named for being located next to the South Wall of the city. It had an orcish bartender, an exceedingly loud jukebox, and lighting so poor it might as well not have existed. Just her place.

She did not talk with others, or even with herself. Only took a bottle of hard liquor off the bar, saluted the bartender, and began drinking right then and there.

The bartender wrestled the bottle away from her before she got too far in, but it was enough to give her the buzz she needed. Enough of a buzz that she could laugh at her own failures, which were aplenty. So she sat down on a stool and leaned back.

What a disaster. She began giggling to herself.

“Rough night, huh?” the man at the stool next to her asked.

“Please don’t hit on me,” she said. “I don’t go with men.”

“I wasn’t... Wait a minute, you’re Barbara Gawain, aren’t you?”

Barbara eyed him. “How do you know my name?”

The man leaned in closer to her, and she got a closer look: light skin, light hair that glittered under the dim mana lamp that hung overhead; shiny, white eyes like every core elf had; thin, so much so that he lacked even the slightest bit of intimidation. Small, thin-rimmed glasses. Stylish earrings. He looked like he was better suited for a library, not a dingy bar in the rough part of town.

“I keep track of all the golemancers working for North Sunwell,” he said. “And I saw your Rev-8s tonight. They were beautiful.”

“Beautiful scrap.”

“But they’re getting better, aren’t they? I saw the Rev-6s last year, and they barely looked functional. These were marvelous.”

“Not enough to save themselves from the Grand Champion.”

The man shook his head in sympathy. “I guess things didn’t go over too well with your bosses?”

“Former bosses.”

He chuckled. “Oh, well, I think I have something for you, then.” He extended his hand as if to shake hers, but she did not return the favor. When he realized this, he beckoned to the bartender. “Can we get two, uh, what was it, Doros Primes?”

The drinks were served, and Barbara’s suspicions were confirmed. He had been watching her much more closely than he first let on.

“My name’s Castien Brielwa,” he said. “And I think I have a proposition for you.”

“Yeah, yeah, of course you do,” she said flippantly. She still took the drink, of course, but she was not going to let herself get taken up by a vulture. He was probably some two-bit rival subsidiary, like the Fourland Growth Corporation or Ironmade Industries. “Listen here, Castien. I’m done with the whole business. Out for good. And nothing you can say—”

“The beasts are back,” he said.

What? “What?”

Did he just say... She took another drink from the bar and hoped the alcohol would ease her confusion.

“The Great Hero defeated the Dungeon Core, purged the beasts, and saved the city. That’s what North Sunwell tells everyone, right?” He stared at her, smirking, as if he expected her to respond. “Well then, why are melanoid numbers still increasing?”

“They... aren’t.”

“Barbara, I’ve seen them with my own two eyes,” Castien said. “They’re entering the upper levels again. They killed my colleague before we could escape, and that was Floor 3. I’ve even seen them on Floor 1 from time to time. The North Sunwell Company is doing something very big down there, and they don’t want people finding out.”

“Okay, so, what does this have to do with me?”

“You’re a golemancer. We have souls. We can figure out what North Sunwell’s doing and maybe take advantage of it for ourselves. Save the city and all that.”

“That’s preposterous,” Barbara spat. “I don’t even know who you are, and you’re already spouting off treasonous nonsense. Just let me drink alone in peace.”

Castien smiled, nodded, and stood up from his stool. “I’ll leave you be. Just know that we’re waiting for you when you’re ready.”

“You’ll be waiting a long damn time.”

“Unfortunately, our leader isn’t quite that patient,” he said.

Barbara only had enough time to turn her head to the bartender before that man pressed his whole meaty palm to her face.

“Sleep,” the bartender said in a stoic spell-casting tone.

And in Barbara’s last moments of consciousness, she remarked that it was funny how the entire bar had been staring at her, and she never even noticed. Maybe she was still important after all.

Her head slumped over and fell onto the bar. Too heavy to move anymore. Too heavy to see anymore.

The last thing she heard was: “I hope you’ll be ready soon.” And then she fell into peaceful dreams.