A few minutes later, our merry band of twelve was traveling through a dried-up lake bed with the sun hanging high in the sky.

I was forced to travel slowly, so John’s companions could keep up, but, for once, I wasn’t so bothered by that inefficiency. At least, I tried not to be. There was nowhere for me to go anyway, all signs of crowns having disappeared.

Trying to make conversation, John ran up to me.

“So what’s your story, pal? Did ya’ join this tournament ta’ make a name for yourself?”

I turned to him, slightly bemused by his assumption. It wasn’t entirely wrong, I had to admit. I didn’t want the limelight, but felt I would benefit from it regardless. Furthermore, my affinity reinforced my need to win, to prove myself superior to others in my chosen field. I was sure of it. For people with the dark-affinity, a tournament like this was basically heaven. Conflict, struggle and dominance. It fit my predisposition to a T. The difficulty was to not let that define my being.

Of course, I couldn’t exactly share all of my feelings around this topic with a stranger, so I gave him a non-answer instead.

“I suppose you could describe it that way, though political affiliations have something to do with it as well.”

His brow rose, hearing that.

“Political affiliations? Did ya’ turn into a lawyer halfway through that sentence? Listen, kid. You’re young, powerful and smart. Use yer’ muscle for your own gain, before these ‘political affiliations’ become used to you laying down and rolling over on command. Give them an arm and they’ll take a leg. Look at Rictas’ case! I stuck with him for a while without any backtalk and he decided we should sacrifice ourselves for him two seconds later.” John’ explained, while struggling to get rid of the dry dust stuck in his beard. His scraggly, brown-haired bush of hair and beard would make him seem like beggar, if not for his well-maintained equipment, some scale-armor and a halberd.

I smiled in response to his rant, finding it to be true, but not exactly relevant to my position. I wasn’t a nobleman’s retainer, after all.

“You talk as if you’ve experienced exploitation, yourself… Care to talk about it?”

The older man sighed to himself.

“Ever heard of the Yulior war, kid?”

A war? But Roa hadn’t been at war in decades, and John didn’t look a day over thirty…

“No, I haven’t. Did Roa participate?”

John shook his head grimly.

“Thankfully not. We don’t need even more carnage. Let me explain. Yulior used to be an independent city-state. At a certain point, they found a jade mine. The stuff is nearly worshiped in the east, so Yulior quickly became one of the richest cities on the continent. Its bordering countries saw this, and decided to lay claim to the previously contested territory. All. At. Once.”

I whistled quietly. A conflict of that scale would tear the city apart, no matter how rich they became.

“Six decades later, that conflict still hasn’t stopped. It’s just a meat-grinder that countries use to find talents that distinguish themselves. To this end, only tier 1 classers are allowed, no, forced to participate. I was born in the warzone, and left at one of the many orphanages around the place. When I killed enough folk and reached tier 2, I ran for the hills, and eventually ended up here, in Roa.”

When he mentioned the people he had killed, he stared off into the distance. Like Cerion, he was affected mentally by his deeds.

“What was that like? Killing people for experience, I mean.” An insensitive question, I know, but my curiosity got the better of me.

John grunted, before turning to me and staring me in the eyes.

“Terrible. Tier 1, level 1 people give shit exp, so you’re looking at a few hundred deaths before you can leave. Most never do. No accessible dungeons in the area, either. I’ve killed a lot of people, son. None of them were willing to die. I don’t sleep no more, even when I'm this far removed from my sins.”

I didn’t look away from his stare.

John chuckled.

“You don’t seem phased, huh… I don’t know what you went through, kid. Keep it to yourself, I don’t wanna’ know.”

I just nodded and kept quiet.

The rest of the journey passed in silence. Eventually, we reached our destination: a mountain that would give us a vantage point over the rest of the valley.

As we reached the peak, the vast expanse below slowly came into view. A few of John’s goons made noises of surprise and wonder when they saw the view, but I was distracted by something else. The distinct lack of crowns that confirmed my suspicions.

I sighed and hardly noticed John walking up to me.

“What do you figure the organizers are tryin’ to pull here?” he asked.

“They’re either waiting for us to complete some threshold, or they’re deliberately leaving us in the dark. The other alliances down below will no doubt start fighting each other for points, since there’s no permanent knock out anyway. Some might even conspire to give each other points, like your previous leader suggested.”

John looked conflicted as he considered this.

“So what are you suggestin’? That me an’ mine either play their game or risk falling behind?”

I shook my head.

“There will definitely be more ways to gain points later in the round. Not to mention that we don’t even know how many points avenging our comrades nets us, anyway.”

I was about to continue my train of thought, when I saw a bright flash on the horizon.

“Is that a second sun?” John exclaimed.

“Close, but not quite.” I replied, grinning.

I turned to John, determined.

“Listen, John. We don’t need to play their two-faced game to get points. We could just interrupt their efforts, instead. All for the greater good, of course. I think mr. sunshine will have the same idea.”

Realizing this, John started to chuckle, but then, he frowned in thought.

“So instead of creating an artificial meat grinder, you want to create a meat grinder with the ones already doing the former. What’s the point, then?”

“Well, look at it this way. Rictas wanted to boost certain classers, while sacrificing the rest. No doubt, these other alliances will be doing the same. All we have to do is disrupt their fight, forcing an all-out brawl into existence, giving everyone a fair chance to be the first to avenge their comrades. It’s about the morality of the whole thing, John. Giving everyone a fair chance.”

He started to stare at me again, before he burst out laughing.

“I think I’ve finally got you figured out, pal. You just want a challenge, don't you?” he accused half-seriously.

“You wanted points, didn’t you?” I defended myself.

John sighed resignedly.

“Something tells me you’d have had less trouble growing up in Yulior than I did, kid. Fine. However, this is where we part ways, mate. I can’t leave my people’s backs to a possible threat.”

I nodded. “Fair. I wanted to visit mr. sunshine anyway, see what he’s up to. I’ll see you in the final round, John.”

He laughed.

“Ya’ seem so sure I’ll make it there.”

“Something tells me…” I teased, before launching myself into the sky with aura step, sending John tumbling into the dirt from the shockwave. Heh.

~scene break~

A few minutes later, I was letting myself fall from the sky, down to where Arcellus was rampaging. Surprisingly, his target was Karon, who was desperately trying to defend himself and his alliance.

A rogue miniature sun made contact with the oily barrier Karon had hastily put up, and created a giant ball of fire that engulfed a few of Karon’s people regardless of his resistance.

As both parties noticed my arrival, their reactions differed.

Arcellus seemed indifferent to my presence and continued to hammer Karon’s side with a blank look on his face.

Karon, meanwhile, was shouting at the top of his lungs, asking me for something I could hardly make out.

As I neared their location, I started to understand what he was saying.

“Block…Arcellus…ten minutes…favor”

Now, normally I would’ve refused to spend ten minutes completing a favor. This time, however, that favor was something I actually liked doing, not to mention that I didn’t have anything better to do.

As I neared the ground, I redirected my fall and used my maelstrom skill, which surrounded me like a tornado coming into existence.

Before Arcellus could react, my writhing mass of dark mana had buried him ten feet below ground.

Arcellus broke out of the ground moments later and shook off the dust that had accumulated on his robes.

“Why are you helping that weakling? He’s killing his own teammates for points like a coward.” he said angrily.

I shrugged. “I made a deal with him. I don’t renege on my word.”

Arcellus grunted.

“I wanted to face you in the finals, but I suppose a little appetizer isn’t out of the question. Prepare yourself, Arthur.”

Without any hesitation, Arcellus went all out. His skin, veins and eyes started to glow bright yellow and orange, flames dancing where his irises should be.

I grit my teeth. Shit. He was already going straight for that skill? The skill that had left the arena a charred mess at the end of the semi-finals?

Flames washed off of his figure, covering the dry, cracked ground around us. The heat around us skyrocketed. Even Karon and his goons, who were already a kilometer away from us, would be able to feel the heat singe their skin.

Then, Arcellus used a new move. He lifted both palms to the sky and created a single, tiny orb, that hardly emitted any light. All of the flames started to be sucked into a single point, and the heat around us was absorbed as well. Sensing the danger that this tiny orb represented, I started to charge up my own overloaded orb, with a twist. [Overloaded orb] was a skill that created an orb out of overloaded mana. This orb would be inherently unstable and explode on contact. They were reasonably powerful, but at a certain point they would destabilize, so the amount of mana I could charge them with was limited.

This time, however, I had no other choice. I started to gather all the overloaded mana around me in a single point, just like Arcellus was showing me how to do. Instead of letting it all gather into one orb and causing it to dissipate, I gathered several small ‘stars’ of power near the center of the orb, without combining them.

A few moments later, we were both ready. Arcellus threw his arms forward, causing the small marble of flame to rumble toward me, as it slowly grew to reflect its true mass and power. Before I knew it, my vision was engulfed in flame, as if the sun itself had been pulled from the sky and was thrown at me.

Right before it reached me, I countered with my own collection of little marbles. I chucked the small orb forward. Right as it was about to leave my aura’s range, I combined the little marbles, destabilizing the orb. They all gathered and melded into one another, before the new, central marble started to shake and rumble, unable to keep all that mana under control. I jumped backwards with aura step, trying to make as much distance between me and the blast.

Then, the two skills made contact. Everything turned black. No, now it was white. Now it was black again. I was flying, no, being flung away. I was catapulted into several boulders, each of which broke before I did, until I eventually came to a full stop, at the edge of the largest crater I had seen so far. From the smoldering hole on the other side of the crater, I knew that Arcellus wasn’t much better off, at least.

Then, something strange happened. With no prompt of our own, a golden light appeared in the sky. Then, a golden circle was drawn in the air. The light slowly started to form a crown-shaped illusion.

Shit.

Then the ground started to rumble.

Double shit.