Eric readily accepted the quest that was offered to him. Patrolling the streets for other tower challengers didn’t really seem like such a difficult thing to do. Especially now that he was in the guards’ radar. And since he still needed to commit three more robberies before he was done with this floor’s trial, without much fuss, he agreed to patrol the streets with them.

  I can get a better view of how they move. This way I can also reduce their level of suspicion toward me and if I’m lucky, I might get to learn some interesting things. Like that thing that they did with the leaves, he thought to himself, remembering the leaves that circled around him.

  Eric had long since lost track of time. No matter how much he tried to do so, some trials made it impossible to do so by either obscuring the passage of time or confining him to a closed room.

  That wasn’t to say that he wasn’t aware of at least some of it. By his calculations, he had spent more than a month in the tower already. At least by the combination of the twenty some days of the seventh trial and the three odd days of the third trial.

  But just like there were trials that allowed him to somewhat keep track, there were those that made it difficult.

  The labyrinth of the ninth floor was completely sealed and no sunlight entered, if there even was a sun to begin with. The second and eighth floors had an unchanging sky, where the sun always shined.

  However, his situation was completely different this time around. The sun held a normal cycle, as did the moon, and by Eric’s loose estimation, they were similar to Earth’s. Also, this world, or city, that he was in, had a calendar that allowed him to easily keep track of the passage of time.

  During the time that remained of the day of Eric’s fight, the uniformed man that invited him to help with patrols, guided him to a small room within the barracks, that had clearly been a closet of sorts. Though, to someone like Eric, comfort didn’t matter. His evolved body was more sensitive to changes, no matter how minor, that could affect him. But it also made him tougher and capable of ignoring things with greater ease than before.

  After quickly moving a simple bed and a small dresser, Eric was brought outside by the uniformed man, with clear intentions to talk.

  “Name’s Lu Feng. Yours?” the uniformed man asked.

  He was about the same height as Eric, but leaner and older. Whatever hair he had was covered by a bandana and his eyes were an average brown.

  “Eric.”

  “You’re not a man of emotion, are you Eric?” Lu Feng asked, his face stoic. “I only saw you wincing in pain. You didn’t react to any of the dead bodies and even though you seemed to be flustered when I scanned you, you quickly calmed down when you came out clean. Like you weren’t flustered at all, but more gearing up for a fight.”

  The barracks had a wide hall in front and trees near the walls. The two were facing one of the walls and leaves began to fall before them. As soon as the leaves reached Lu Feng’s eye level, a wind appeared and carried them away.

  “This,” Lu Feng pointed at the leaves, “you can feel it, can’t you?”

  “The energy? Yes,” Eric answered flatly. “Is that why you asked for my help?”

  “Yes. Not many people can feel it. They know how to use it and even how to harness it to strengthen themselves beyond ordinary human limits. But sensing it…” Lu Feng shook his head. “Being able to sense the energy of the world is key for our job. And you very much seem like one of those travelers who only comes here to cause trouble. But your kind loves to do odd jobs. So, I’ll take advantage of you while I have you here.”

  “Let me get this straight,” Eric said with a smug smile. “You believe I’m a troublemaker, but you will still use me, because I’m useful?”

  “Exactly,” Lu Feng confirmed. “Not all of you do the same thing. Some come to steal, others to murder and some… well… they’re just strange. There was a woman once who snuck into the governor’s office and painted a very detailed snake that resembled a certain body part.” He let out a light chuckle. “I don’t know what your thing is. But I also have no doubt that you also have such a mission to accomplish.”

  “So, I help you and then what?”

  “You do your mission when you see fit. If it’s a crime and you get caught, I’ll personally decapitate you,” Lu Feng said casually. “But if it’s not a crime or you don’t get caught, then you can leave whenever you want. To make it a bit more enticing. You can use us as well.”

  Eric eyes focused on the floating leaves. “You’ll teach me how to do that?”

  “When I have time. Deal?” Lu Feng said, his hand outstretched.

  “Deal.” Eric answered, grabbing Lu Feng’s hand.

  ----------

  Stella descended the pagoda’s wooden stairs, leading the entirety of the Solace participants. All of them wore serious expressions, more than ready to face what was coming.

  Since they had been at the top of the pagoda, having the entire floor to themselves, they were the last group to make their way out of the building.

  Under normal circumstances, Stella was sure that her group would have drawn in most of the attention, but these weren’t normal circumstances. Everyone, including her, was nervous to a certain degree after seeing how one of the attendants dealt with the rowdy teen.

  While the line advanced silently, the only sound being their footsteps, gasps suddenly joined in. Stella furrowed her brow, but she soon saw what the cause of the gasps was.

  At about the same spot that the teen had made trouble, but now toward the edge of the main road, there was an intricate altar.

  Within the altar there were a total of six bases that rose to different heights, all of them except the highest one had a slight inclination. On each of the bases was a body part of the teen, who was very much still alive and screaming.

  When Stella passed right beside it, she could hear the muffled screams from behind the glass that covered the entire intricate altar that rose to about her chest. The mere sight caused her, and everyone who passed nearby, to grimace.

  What somehow made it worse, was the attendant that stood beside the altar, a smile on their face.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  The line steadily advanced, with the silence remaining mostly uninterrupted. There was some murmuring, but nothing that could really be considered noise. Suddenly, without warning, more people began to disappear. Stella felt a hint of fear, but only for a moment as she saw that none of the attendants reacted.

  They must know what’s going on, and if I’m right, we’ll soon find out.

  Soon, Stella arrived at the central area of the tournament grounds, the arena.

  It was just like how she imagined it to be. The arena itself was enormous, and the white stone stands that surrounded them were more than enough to fit all of those that had decided to join the tournament.

  Two attendants stood, one on each side of the line, just telling those that entered the stands to find a seat.

  Stella did as she was told, guiding those that were with her to stay close. She wasn’t the only one that was keeping her forces close. The stands, at least on the human side, were completely segmented into various groups, big and small. There weren’t that many people that were actually free, and they were obvious to the eye.

  Making her way to a midpoint in the stands, Stella was about to ask herself where the people that had disappeared were, but her eyes fell upon a floating screen above the arena.

  The screens themselves were simple, at the top were a list of names that she guessed were the aliases that they had chosen when entering the System rankings.

  From what she could see, there were a total of 10 names, but considering the screen’s size, two of them were more pronounced than the rest. The particular screen she was looking at showed the battle between Solar Slayer of the Abandoned Oath’s team vs Jeff’s.

  “Jeff? That’s it?” she asked, mildly surprised.

  While she was intrigued at the sight, mostly due to the simple name, Stella had other things to do and quickly abandoned the screen, not even seeing the contents of the screen itself, only the names.

  Already in her seat, Stella glanced around the stands, looking for her friends. When she was about to direct her attention toward the arena itself, the barriers that had been erected, obscuring the other sections, completely fell, revealing the other sections.

  Everyone’s eyes, including those of the other sections, widened in surprise as they realized the same thing.

  The stands were large, easily able to accommodate thousands of people without issue. But even though there were still thousands of humans, about three thousand by Stella’s estimate, there was still a lot of empty space in the stands, more than half. So, it came as a huge surprise to find the two sections to their sides completely full, with even more people standing behind the already bursting stands.

  “Stella, Stella,” one of the few government workers that came said, nudging Stella on the side.

  But Stella was distracted as her sight quickly shot forward, to the stands opposite theirs. A small amount of relief washed over her when she realized that they, unlike the other two, were even less than the humans, significantly less.

  “Stella, Stella,” the government worker repeated.

  “Yes?” Stella said, finally answering.

  “Humanity is completely outnumbered.”

  “I know,” Stella said. The worker was about to speak again, voicing her worry, but Stella wasn’t finished. “It’s not as bad as it seems. Their increased numbers could just be a way to make up for their lack of quality. And even if it isn’t, it still might not be the advantage that you think.”

  Stella spoke with authority and confidence. The same way that she did whenever she was dealing with official matters back at Solace, and that somehow soothed those that had caught what she said.

  “How so?” the worker asked.

  “A higher number of participants means that they have a higher chance of fighting each other,” Stella began, explaining her reasoning. “I don’t know what the matching criteria will be, but from what little I’ve gathered from the Blades that hosted this tournament, I don’t believe that they will be unfair in the pairings.” She let out a small sigh. “And even if they were, the only thing we can do is try our best.”

  “Then what do you think about those in front,” the worker gestured to those opposite of them. “There’s only a few hundred—are there even one hundred of them?”

  “The arena’s too big for me to see accurately. Regardless, I can think of a couple reasons why their numbers are so low. They could just be a low population species, so they don’t have the numbers to flood the arena like the other two. There’s also the possibility that they’re highly antisocial, and avoid situations like these,” Stella suggested.

  “There’s also a third possibility,” a male voice said from behind, approaching Stella and the worker.

  The worker quickly turned to see the speaker, but Stella didn’t react, recognizing the voice.

  “I never said there were only two possibilities,” Stella said, smirking as she turned. “Or did I, little Ed?”

  “When will you stop treating me like a child,” Ed protested.

  Ed was the young man that Anna had dragged along with her back in the administration building, when the urstigar was still keeping the people inside in check.

  He hadn’t changed much, or at all really. Short brown hair, thin but muscular and tall. And somehow, he still had that youthful air about him, the apocalypse seeming to have had no effect on him.

  “When you take some real responsibility and stop following Anna around like a little lost puppy,” Stella answered, bluntly.

  “I help her, I don’t just—”

  “What other reason do you think there is for their low numbers?” Stella asked, cutting Ed off.

  Ed hadn’t evolved yet, he was at the precipice of evolution, but he willingly halted his advance after receiving advice from both Alex and Anna.

  According to them, your path became more defined upon evolution, so he wanted to see how far he could go before he evolved. There were also some ulterior motives behind his actions, but he didn’t speak of those.

  But it was because of his lack of evolution that he wasn’t that good at hiding his emotions, the control over his body not being as high as it could be, and Stella grinned when she saw him try to hide his pouting.

  Letting out a small sigh, resigned to his fate, Ed answered. “Their population could have been decimated by the integration. Not everyone has a group of friends that just happened to decide to help a bunch of survivors.”

  Stella nodded at Ed’s words.

  “But if you don’t want to consider something so sad, then… there’s also the possibility that their species simply sees no value in joining the tournament and only sent a few to scout the rest of us out.”

  “Regardless,” Stella said, ready to bring the topic to a close. “Keep an eye out for any opportunities to create a relation to those two sides.” She gestured to the stands to the right and the one in front. “That one,” she pointed at the stands to the left, “seems too organized. They might be a force that consists of their entire species. Be careful around them.”

  “How can you tell?” the worker asked.

  “There side was completely quiet when the fights began. The ones in front were also quiet, but we can attribute that to them being few in number. Even if they did fight, the impact might have been too small for us to notice.”

  “Oh,” the worker said.

  Ed only nodded in agreement. “Now we only need to find—”

  “I’m pretty sure that they’re somewhere over there,” Stella said, answering Ed before he even asked his question, gesturing toward the arena.

  Underneath the screens, the arena itself was divided into ten equally sized smaller areas, in which ten fights were going on simultaneously.

  Turning her attention to Jeff’s, the screen she originally saw, fight, she saw how the matches were being conducted.

  “It’s a random pairing,” she said, not only to herself but also to those around her. “I guess it’s a way to reduce our numbers quickly. They didn’t even make any distinction between the species. But at least now we know what we’re up against,” she added as her eyes focused on a lightly armored fighter who was of a different species.

  Slightly slimmer than humans, with pointy ears and colored skin that went beyond the range of humans. Stella was sure that she knew what they were. She was trying to use her Inspect skill, but it wouldn’t activate.

  Though this did little in terms of unsettling her. It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, and she already expected it to be the case.

  “But I’m sure of it,” she mumbled. “They’re elves.”

  Ed chuckled. “Jeff’s team just won the fight.”

  “Huh?! He did?” Stella asked in surprise, not having paid attention to the match at all. Instead of seeing Jeff, she found another match about to begin. “I did not expect that. He appeared to struggle when I looked at his fight.”

  “From what little I saw, he barely did anything. And even then, he was trembling and covered in wounds by the end,” Ed commented.

  ----------

  In a small alcove, there was a normal looking young man, his name was Jeff, and he was terrified of everything that was going on.

  Amidst all his shaking and crying, a voice called to him.

  “Hey, do you want to win?”