Arson tried to focus on the fight before him, but even while he watched the fight between Dashawn and Khalif grow more hectic, he began to receive notifications. The sensation of witnessing the fight occur while he read was confusing enough that he felt slightly unbalanced.

*From the edge of oblivion, to the peaks of Olympus:

You are one of the reasons behind this land's ascension. For raising, the Climbing Challenge of Adroit Academy from a Journeyman grade construction to Inventor grade, you have been selected as a potential candidate for Keeper of this land.

You are among only three current candidates, and may also offer a stand in for this role as long as that individual is directly linked to you or is seen as a subordinate. Any one of the three current options for Keeper of the Climbing Challenge has the same ability, and will be graded by how much their actions increase the overall difficulty of the Climbing Challenge.

This test will then be compiled into films that will be viewable to the students within the realm layer to be voted on by both biased and unbiased parties attending schools across the realms, as well as their friends and families.

Upon the final vote, a decision will be made and a new Keeper will be elected. This message will be shared with the local populist, without the candidates being shown until the final display of what had been done and by whom are shared to all viewers of the competition.

Good Luck!*

Arson was in that moment overwhelmed. He had a creeping suspicion that this competition had been started even before what he witnessed occurring all around him was completely finished to push Arson ahead in the competition.

That can’t be a coincidence? The system helps none, so why would it force me into a lead of any kind?

As Arson contemplated the questions running through his mind. The environment around him was being fully changed. Work the builders had started just before they’d all left, converged in ways that none of the group would have suspected.

The land near the Climbing Challenge mountain rapidly grew fertile. A self-reproducing seed that Autumn experimented with, started to reproduce at such a rate that soon an abundance of the seed would dry out, and turn into nutrients for the plants to eat. The grass seed that was successfully fed by nutrients pulled from the same sun that dried the abundance of seeds above, less ambient mana that it used to grow quickly and even produced itself, as well as rain water produced by a new creation from Auto, Xani, Autumn, and Moriarty, with slight design aspects from Arson, was thought to be a small accomplishment for the group.

Yet as Arson realized how the planters his team had created fed directly into Autumn’s creation, he knew why what was happening to the mountain had been pushed into overdrive.

Auto had long ago created a watering drone for his sister Autumn’s uses. Yet once the Builders of Godhood had created the perpetual storm system using the trees found around the Adroit Academy’s Climbing Challenge, recreating a long ago dead technology, Auto had suggested the use of his drones to continue their work, through a consistent watering sprinkler design that would stay active even after they left.

The sprinklers not only watered, but spread an abundance of storm and nature manas back into the environment through a habitat that attracted bugs, fed on the carcasses, using the life-force of dying insects to create a circular biorhythm which produced more mana to be used. Not only could this abundance of mana be used by the unnaturally occurring storm clouds, which powered the platforms the towers of the Climbing Challenge used to move around, but once the mixtures of manas were further broken down by the suns above, even more ambient mana was available for the cultivators of the school’s Climbing Challenge to use personally.

Arson struggled not to think of this as great for the school, but was more worried about how this would effect his grade for Keeper of the Climbing Challenge. He didn’t want to be Keeper of anything, with the exclusion of Almarine’s orphanage, or Jade’s Dump and Junkyard. These things offered challenges and resources, and the more he grew in age, the more he saw how untapped both unloved youth and things considered to be trash truly were.

Even Arson decided to open his eyes to look at what was happening on the mountain he had his back to, as the sounds of cheering and astonishment rained all around him. Both due to the notifications being shared with the students, and the vast changes emerging before the very eyes of every individual outside in that moment.

The grass grew more luscious. The land's density intensified; the mountain literally growing in size. The abundance of pure water, cleansed the remainder of the filth from the many waterways and fountains. Which made the illusionary elements that enriched the view shown to all even more grand than ever before.

A beautiful glow rippled constantly across the mountain. Almost from top to bottom what was seen by the naked eye were perfections reaching levels mortals would consider comparable to eden.

“Get some, foo!” Arson looked away from the mountain and toward his friend, still doing his best to defend the passengers that rode the tram alongside them. It seemed Dashawn couldn’t exactly throw Khalif around in the same ways he kicked through the others onboard, but Khalif had still been struck more than a handful of times from what Arson could tell. Bruises and a laceration marking the young man’s face.

“That all you got, pretty boy,” Dashawn said with a glance toward Khalif’s left, before the Cultivator, kicked to the right with a straight kick that would have sent another plummeting out of the tram if it wasn’t for Khalif’s avatar catching the young man, and dropping his shaking form on top of the tram.

Dashawn waggled a single finger in the air before Khalif. Before once more moving at speeds Arson knew even he would have trouble with, especially after his fight with Troy.

The dread-head’s kick became multiple kicks all making contact with a multitude of targets at once. In a blink Dashawn’s body had seemingly split into a dozen. Yet Arson knew the truth, Dashawn had moved so quickly that it seemed as if he’d cloned himself. He had moved quickly enough that what Arson's eyes saw as one movement was in fact many separate actions performed a fraction of a blink apart from one another.

The first burst of motion caused many to be sent airborne, while the second sent 8 separate students flying out of the tram all at once. All of this done even though Khalif stood before the young man.

When Khalif glanced in Arson’s direction, Arson gave him a nod. He knew his friend was being overwhelmed, and at that point even Arson had had enough of Dashawn’s sudden blitz of the tram.

“Come on Ego, I think it's time to get messy…”

…

Amorra rushed through the dump as fast as her stolen hover chair would allow. The floating cathedra was a luxurious model acquired by one of her still loyal servants, and now aided in her retreat from an battalion of robots. The chair was made for a king, and even housed many remarkable features, many still unknown to the queen of the Mana Monarch kingdom, but had been mostly repaired for her day to day use while she recovered.

Amorra thought she would have been on her feet by now, but didn’t let her handicap slow her down. Instead, she currently protected a large group of civilians that had been on her ship, but fled during the attacks on her ship after their crash. They now needed her protection once more in the aftermath. Many scattered parties of Monarch citizens hiding within the Dump and edges of the Junkyard, barely survived, making Amorra feel responsible in a way that she never had before.

“My queen!”

Amorra raised one hand toward the citizen that had slowed down in front of her out of worry, and another behind herself. Identical runes spawned, twin symbols for a fusion of fire and earth twisting before magma spewed out behind the queen. A group of the robots slain in a blink. Magma bursting through the bodies of all the robots caught in the spray, their bodies heating drastically before their electronic components burst into shrapnel and sparks.

“Move now, or feel my wrath at your defiance of my commands!” The citizen gave her a shake of the head, refusing to move.

“I’m sorry, my queen, my honor will not let me,” yelled the young man. Amorra grumbled under her breath, annoyed at the sudden courage of the young man who’d obviously run in the face of the Hive Titan attack, but now dared to stand brave against a horde of robots, for her…

“Fine, have it your way.” Amorra turned her chair around, now lifting both hands to fire, even as the young man behind her chose to pull the floating chair backward as quickly as he could manage.

Amorra had been annoyed with the young man at first, but hadn’t decided to fully make a mental connection to the chair, which would allow her to move the floating cathedra with her mind. So the fact that he’d stepped in and helped her move without the need to interact with the chair at all, helped drastically, but not enough.

“Leave now!” Amorra yelled, not looking away from the robots surging over the bodies of their dead, only to be shocked in the next moment.

A beautiful blonde jumped from the side of a nearby trash heap, directly in the path of Amorra’s magma beams. The young woman’s body covered in a pink energy in the shape of a regal armor even more lavish than her own armaments.

The magma splashed harmlessly across her body. The twin beams slowed drastically as they moved around her. Becoming more rock than heat as the momentum was stripped when entering the young woman’s range.

An explosion rang out in the very next moment, Amorra’s eyes widening as her brows rose. The young woman’s armor exploding with each punch or kick used, only to regrow in an instant and be used once more.

The young blond was a complete blur as she both drained the momentum of anything within her range, infusing herself with the energy she drew from her enemies, and redirecting it back into her powerful blows. From Amorra knew, the young woman was a princess, but she had only seen the young woman in passing while attending the court of realms in the past.

“Enough!” The princess' powerful voice rippled out and stopped the movement of all the nearby robots, just before she punch downward. An explosion of plasma bloomed out from where she struck and everything around her exploded. Old equipment, the robots, and even atoms in the air separated causing carnage in the wake of their eruptions. Amorra left trembling at the sight, knowing that this young woman hadn’t been nearly this strong just a few seasons prior.

“Sparks…”

…

Chozen took a deep breath, slowing her rapid heart rate as she turned around. The lava that stretched across the distance now pelting her chest with small glowing rock fragments was confusing, until she noticed the drop jawed young woman she knew to be the new queen of the Mana Monarchs staring back at her.

“Hey aren’t you the queen of the Mana Monarch kingdom?” The young woman closed her mouth and nodded slowly, still being dragged backward in that moment by a young man struggling to pull her large flying chair with his eyes closed, seemingly mouthing a prayer in an endless repetition.

“Do you mind?” Amorra pointed down at the beam harmlessly splattering her with rocks that flew off as they bounced away, burning so hot that they sank into the ground rather than setting fire to all the surrounding trash. The young queen’s spells were snuffed out, and she blushed in embarrassment.

“I apologize, we were fighting for our lives, and when you entered the battle, I lost myself in the sight of the display,” said the queen with a waved hand to dismiss her careless actions.

“No big deal,” Chozen said, before she started to look around for more to fight on her way to the dungeon she was in search of. She wanted to grow stronger. For the man, she had within her sights, was infatuated with a young woman who Chozen knew could squash her like a bug, quite literally in fact.

“Well good luck in here. It's dangerous, be careful, and don’t enter any fields that are seemingly empty, or have single armor sets standing within them,” Chozen yelled with a wave starting to turn around, only to be stopped by the still retreating queen.

“Wait, aren’t you Lilith Crown?” asked the young queen. Chozen stopped, and gave her a smile.

“Born and raised, but most call me Chozen,” Chozen said using her title rather than her name. Though blessed, her name was seen as divine in scale and often she decided not to use it out of respect for the First Demon Mother. Though she was powerful, she wasn’t renowned enough in her own mind, to share a name with any godly beings or immortal or even fallen angels and the like.

“I see, well, Chozen, if it is not to much to ask, I’d like to ask you for a favor for a favor?”

“Well, that depends on the favor. I have a lot to do in a short amount of time, and even this short conversation could stop me from achieving my goals, so please keep that in mind.” Chozen turned back to face the queen who fumbled for her words. Chozen wondered if she realized that Chozen may choose not to help, if she took too long to get the words out, let alone requested something outside what the princess was willing to help with.

“I umm, I was hoping, I mean wondering, no, I am requesting your services both in the protection of me, and my people... and maybe even your help, as I’d like to maybe train alongside you, if that is umm possible…”

Chozen thought for a moment, then a moment longer. She was only in the dump under the permission of Carter, and at the queen’s request, Chozen began to wonder if the queen of the Mana Monarch kingdom had the same permissions, asking as much, only to receive an answer she’d never expected in her entire life. An answer she had heard pushed intrusively into her mind by her own wild thoughts and passion for her own desires recently.

“Permission to be here, absolutely not, I am here for a few reasons, to become stronger, purge this land of this growing evil all around us,” started the queen. Chozen’s mouth dropped open at the young woman's—she’d only just remembered was named Amorra—final words.

“As well as claiming my future husband, Arson Omni, known to this realm as Sovereign, or the criminal, Carter Gestalt. To accomplish all of these things, I believe I will need as much help as possible.”