“We’ll be playing an old favorite of mine called ‘Bidding War.’ The rules of the game are childishly simple,” the general said, stressing on “childishly.”

Dallion’s fingers itched just to kill him off and be done with it. All that talk about city guard didn’t mean a thing in the real world. Granted, doing something as obvious risked ending the trial in failure, and Dallion couldn’t risk that.

“We’ll play a total of five rounds. The first one to win three is declared the winner. Are you following me so far?”

Gritting his teeth, Dallion nodded. His music skills told him that the general was doing all this to annoy him in order to gain the upper hand. The sad thing was that it was working. No matter how much Dallion tried, the general managed to get under his skin.

“I’m following,” Dallion managed to say.

“The first round we bid for bidding position.” The general placed a small golden sphere on the table. “As long as you have this, you can determine whether you want to be first or second. During the first round, both of us bid at the same time. Now the trick is that we can only bid things that we have.”

“Won’t that be unfair?” Dallion crossed his arms. “You’ve got an entire collection of items.”

“Yes, it would be, if that’s what we were bidding. Since we’re in a realm, we can only big our skills and stats. And before you start arguing about values, we can only bid an entire segment up to a gate.”

Dallion thought for a moment. The rules sounded confusing, but he was starting to get an idea of what would be going on. As things stood, the person with the greater number of skills didn’t have an advantage over someone who had developed their skills to the max.

“After our bids are revealed, each of us gets to make additional bids, until both of us drop out.”

“Both?”

Things were starting not to make sense. The whole idea of bidding was to outbid the opponent. If someone quit, that meant the other won by default. Apparently, that wasn’t the case for this game.

“That’s when the war part of the game begins.” The general leaned forward, his smile widening like that of a snake. “The person who lost the bidding war goes first and chooses one of his bids to use in combat. Respectively, the opposing party choses something to counter with. For example, let’s say that you’ve bid your firebird. Since it’s a pretty strong familiar, you can start the battle with it. I must then choose from my bidding pool—let’s say, ranged combat gate one—and use it to attack, or evade your bid, or firebird in this case.”

The confusion increased. It was starting to sound like the game was a mix between bidding and rock paper scissors.

“If we end here, I’d win. However, you can use something from your bidding pool to counter my counter. Let’s say you put your guard skills into play. Then it’s my turn, and so on, until both sides decide to pass. After that the battle is played out and the winner wins the round, and the initial prize that can be used as a bidding item.”

“Sounds simple enough,” Dallion lied.

“But here’s the catch—one you bid with one item you cannot use it in any other round. That includes all prizes won.”

Dallion felt his head spin. It wasn’t because the rules were complicated—after a few moments of logical reasoning, he had grasped those quite well. It was because he had begun searching for a perfect combo to victory.

“How do we determine which skill trumps another? Dallion asked.

“That—” the general rubbed his hands “—is the third element of the game. Through discussion. All it takes for a battle to be won is for the opposing side to concede. Take my example. In an encounter, if I am to fight your firebird with my crossbow, who will win? Ranged weapons can easily do damage to a flying guardian, but they cannot strike flame.”

“So, you lose.”

“Not so fast,” the general raised a finger in the air. “Crossbows were made specifically to fight such creatures, as you well remember. Hitting a firebird would easily pulverize it.”

“But what if the firebird evades?”

“But what if the awakened with the crossbow is such a good shot that he hits?” The man’s smile widened. “The crossbow hits an area not a single target, so it’s more likely that it will hit.”

“Not true! Lux can change position really fast, as you’ve seen.”

“Very good.” The general clapped. “I concede defeat. You would have won this round.”

The victory felt hollow. There were several things that the general could have done, for example, bid his reaction skill and argue that the shooter could react fast enough so as to negate Lux’s speed. Instead, he had simply ended the explanation round, in an attempt to give Dallion a false sense of achievement.

“Shall we begin?”

“One last question,” Dallion said. “What about splitting? It’s a skill, but it doesn’t have any representation.”

“You disappoint me. Splitting is linked to mind. As long as you bid mind, you can split. The number of instances is a matter of discussion.”

Dallion felt as if he had been punched in the guts. It was one thing to be corrected by Nil, Vend, or Eury. Hearing it from the general was the equivalent of physical damage. Dallion almost expected a rectangle to appear to reflect that.

“Alright, let’s start.”

On cue, a giant rectangle appeared in front of Dallion, displaying all the resources he had to bid with. There was a considerable amount of things: two levels of all his attributes, three of all his skills—with the exception of forging, which remained at the humiliating level 1—two familiars, five weapons and one shield. Dallion noticed that the armadil shield wasn’t among his things. He glanced up at the general to see whether the item was on that list, when he saw that his opponent had nothing displayed.

So, the game’s rigged from the very start, Dallion said to himself.

Just as things are in real life, Nil said. Some people have the resources to pay spies to find out everything about you, while you must do your best to guess. Either that or do some spying on your own.

I’ll remember that.

“How do I choose without you seeing?” Dallion looked the general straight in the eye.

“Hmm, that would be tricky, won’t it? How about this?” A golden box appeared on the table in front of the man. “I’ve made my choice and put it there. At this point, it doesn’t matter what you choose. I promise I won’t change things or add new ones.”

That sounded fair. Dallion’s music skills told him that the general wasn’t lying.

“Or remove,” Dallion added. “You can’t remove anything either.”

“Nice catch. I promise not to remove or meddle with my selection in any way. And that will go for all rounds in future, both bidding and combat. Happy?”

“For the moment.”

The box was rather small. Instinct told Dallion that there could be one or two bidding items at most. That’s why he knew that wasn’t the case. In the realms, everything was metaphor, so size was not a factor. Any container could hold anywhere from one to a thousand, or even more.

Why am I worried? Dallion wondered. This is just the initial bid, after all. As long as he put something insignificant, even if he lost it later on, it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Dallion’s hand moved to one of the representations of his guard skills and tapped it. A minuscule shield of silver promptly appeared on the table in front of him.

“I’m done,” Dallion said, although he did wonder why his bidding tokens were of silver. Possibly that was made to distinguish them from the general’s?

The golden box on the general’s side disappeared, revealing three items: a glove token, a sword token, and an eye token.

“Three?” Dallion asked.

“What can I say? I like living on the edge. Since I have the advantage, it’s your turn. Concede the bidding phase or add more.”

There was the option that Dallion conceded the entire round altogether. That was, he’d only lose one bidding token, while his opponent would waste three. However, that wouldn’t help much, since Dallion had no idea of his opponent’s resources. He could try to outbid him and gain an advantage in the battle phase. However, he had to be careful not to get dragged in.

“Attack, acrobatics, and perception,” Dallion said, adding some confusion in his voice as he spoke. To his surprise, a harp token appeared on the table in front of him.”

“I should have mentioned that any skill used while playing the game is considered a skill in the game,” the general said, quite amused. “Good play, though. Music is almost sure to win any battles.”

Instead of an answer, Dallion summoned a dartbow and shot straight at the general’s chest. The opponent didn’t flinch. The moment the bolt left the dartbow, a dartbow token appeared on the table.

“Good to know,” Dallion unsummoned the dartbow. “What happens at a draw?”

“We continue as now. I select my first action secretly and put it in the box, then you select yours.”

So, ending things here would still put Dallion at a disadvantage. After some consideration, he finally chose to bid perception. An eye token appeared on his side of the table.

“Your turn,” Dallion said.

“Interesting. I think I’ll pass. You win the bidding phase, which means I get to choose my first action.” He picked up the sword token and placed it in the middle of the table. “I choose to attack. Boring, I know, but I have always admired the classic moves.”

“I guard.” Dallion pushed his shield token forward.

“Starting slow? I expect that’s the way to go for someone who’s never played before.” The general pushed his eye token forward. “I use my perception to find weaknesses in your defence.”

“I use my perception to defend against your new attacks,” Dallion replied in turn, earning a chuckle from his opponent.

“I stand my ground.”

“Since there isn’t anything else I could do, I use my athletics to attack you from above.”

“I use my music skills to make you dizzy.” Dallion pushed the harp token forward. “Then I attack you with my dartbow.”

“Bravo.” The general started clapping. “You win.”

Everything on the table disappeared. Once it did, the golden sphere appeared on Dallion’s bidding rectangle. The remaining tokens he’d used didn’t.”

“So, what do you think? A simple and enjoyable game, right?”

Despite the general’s attempts, Dallion had already seen that it was anything but that. This was far from a game, even a complex one. This was negotiating. All the skills involved—knowing the skills and assets of your enemy, putting up a fake front, bluffing, then using everything you had to gain the desired goal. This might have been the first time Dal moved tokens on a table, but he had been playing this game ever since he’d met the general and so far, each time he’d lost.

“How many times can I use the prize?” Dallion asked.

“Once, of course. That’s why it’s a prize. By bidding it, you force my hand. I have no choice, but to respond, and you lose nothing of value.”

Definitely not as powerful as Dallion initially thought. His gaming mind had tricked him into thinking that he’d gain a permanent benefit. As it turned out, he had gained something far less. As in real life, prizes were only useful if a person knew how to properly use them.

“The first round goes to you, and the prize to the second round is…” The general paused. A golden pyramid appeared in the center of the table. “The ability to swap. Simply put, you can switch this for any other token on the table. It can be used at absolutely any time, even after you lose. Personally, I tend to retrieve things that I consider valuable.”

Dallion narrowed his eyes. The fact that the general was explaining the use of the item meant it served an entirely different purpose. The question was what.

“Let’s go on.”