Aurin walked up and down his lineup of Minakai as though the general of an army. The monsters all paid him attention, especially Steambot and Sunny who had been publicly reprimanded before all of their comrades for playing around moments prior. Today was a day to be serious.

“My friends,” said Aurin. “We are on the precipice of a new paradigm. We sit upon the eve of the third ever Hazelton Tournament. Now, we have shown what we can do in the past, but now we are much better and more numerous. Chopchop, Zenoman, Sunny, Glacibot, Budescent and Quetz. This will be your first ever organised tournament before a crowd, so you need to be prepared.”

Aurin’s latest Minakai, the winged yellow serpent, Quetz, hissed excitedly. She threw back her head so that her red hair feathers flowed back elegantly. Aurin had ventured into the tower solo in February—his first trip inside since sealing the roof of the tower—and found her egg on the twenty-second floor.

“Our registration day is tomorrow and, sadly, we have still not added Zeera to the team, but we don’t need an epic Minakai to be victorious, do we?”

Aurin’s Minakai screeched, roared, beeped and clicked in agreement. Every single one of them had been training hard through the winter and early spring to prepare for the tournament, Aurin included.

“There is one last order of business we need to attend to,” he said quietly. “One of you has been waiting for many months to be allowed to evolve. I believe that now is the time for that. Budescent, step forward.”

The green wolf bounded towards his tamer excitedly as Aurin pulled out a Lunar Shard along with the Full Moon Gem he had been gifted by Tobias. He knelt beside Budescent and held the gem to his Minakai, followed by the shard. Both Budescent and the evolutionary items began to glow green as the metamorphosis began.

Budescent grew larger and leaned back on his hind legs as his front legs became more arm-like. His tail lengthened and sprouted a flower, while the hair on his chest grew thick and two of his buds sprouted as thick vines with sharp petals at their tips. As the light faded, the pink flowers were revealed and Budescent’s proud eyes were now a dark and fierce black with long red pupils.

“Welcome to the team, Lycavine,” said Aurin, admiring Budescent’s werewolf-like evolution. “Feeling strong?”

Lycavine howled loudly, making the birds in the nearby trees scatter. He swung his long claws through the air to test his speed and then did a black flip, landing adeptly on his feet without as much as a teeter.

“Fantastic,” said Aurin. He looked towards the Minakai pens to see if all of Luna’s Minakai were still there—they were, save for Innogon. “Late again,” muttered Aurin, looking back to his team. “No matter, we’ll march down there ourselves.”

“You’re bringing all of them at once?” asked Kyle, wandering over from his house.

“Yes,” said Aurin. “The team have earned the chance to show off a little.”

“You must be crazy, Aurin,” said Kyle, shaking his head. “How many do you have now? Thirteen Minakai?

“Fourteen,” said Aurin, pointing at Sunny who had been thrown across the yard by Steambot and was gleefully floating back to her teammates.

“There’s showing off and making an absolute spectacle. I refuse to be seen with you if you take up half the line by yourself.”

“Fine,” said Aurin. “I’ll bring three. That’s the best I can do.”

The Minakai all stood at attention, each of them wanting to be picked, but none more so than Spikruption who held back his usual puffs of smoke.

“Alright, Spike,” said Aurin, relenting to the red dinosaur who seemed so keen. “It’ll be you, Chopchop and…hmm…Lycavine. We’re going for maximum intimidation points, my friends. Psyche out our opponents before we even set foot on the battlefield.”

Shamtile threw up his hands in despair and ran round in circle, screeching wildly. Ignoring the green lizard’s tantrum, Aurin turned to Kyle.

“Are you bringing any of your monsters with you?” he asked.

“Nope,” said Kyle. “I’ll summon them when I need them and that’ll do.”

“Alright, shall we get going?”

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Aurin walked down the path with three of his larger, more violent-looking Minakai following. Spikruption stomped along, Chopchop swung his arm-blades and Lycavine’s sharp petals hovered on their vines menacingly.

“Have you even seen a Lycavine?” asked Aurin, smugly.

“Once,” said Kyle, “but that was when I was in a tower in Eiranth. It’s native to some of the towers over there.”

“Oh,” said Aurin, disappointed. He had half-hoped to show off.”

“If it makes you feel any better, it defeated my pair of Sproufloat with ease.”

“That does make me feel better,” said Aurin before what Kyle had said registered with him. “Wait, pair of Sproufloat?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Presuming that Wingbloom is one of them, where’s your other one?”

“She was my Wingbloom’s sister and was a Wingbloom herself. They were hatched together and evolved together, but let’s not talk about this. She’s long gone and we’re going to defeat our opponents in her memory.”

Aurin wasn’t sure what to say, but things started lining up for him now. Kyle had long-retired from being a competitive Minakai tamer, but had never mentioned why. He hadn’t progressed past the thirty-seventh floor of Harmony Tower, despite being more than capable of doing so. Had it been because his second Wingbloom had died that he chose to be a rancher instead of an active tamer?

As the tamers walked through Hazelton, neither of them said much, but eventually came across Luna and Innogon running towards them as though they were heading to the ranch.

“I’m sorry I’m so later, I—”

“It’s expected at this point,” said Aurin.

“Eugh,” sighed Luna, furrowing her brow.

“Well, Luna, you wouldn’t have that reputation if you were on time, would you? Did you sleep in again?”

“No, it’s not that!” she cried. “I ran into Gardner and he said that Hunter isn’t going to be competing in Hazelton this year.”

“What?” asked Aurin while Kyle looked confused.

“Where’s he competing then?” asked the rancher.

“Ludonia,” said Luna. “He’s going all-in and shooting for the toughest qualifier in the country to test himself.”

“Huh,” said Aurin, slightly disappointed. “I was looking forward to having the chance to fight him again. I guess that will have to wait until the national championships.”

“If you get that far,” joked Kyle. “Maybe I’ll knock you out in the very first round.”

The trio and the Minakai continued through the town, which was abuzz with tamers excitedly making their way to the newly revamped Hazelton Stadium. Over the last few months, the Zodiac Squad’s base that had been built underneath was repurposed as an intensive training dojo for tamers, but Aurin had never bothered to make use of it, preferring to train at the ranch with friends.

He was curious, however, at how this had benefitted the tamers in town. Before the Zeera Crisis, a lot of them were complacent, but things had taken a radically different turn in the days since. Tamers had doubled, tripled and quadrupled their efforts to get strong, fearing that disaster would strike again.

The trio joined the long queue outside Hazelton Stadium as the tamers awaited their registration. Aurin had hoped that he would have found a way to hatch Zeera’s egg before the tournament, but he was satisfied that his team were ready even without the aid of an epic Minakai. Taking the lessons he had learned from Kyle, Hunter and Tobias, he had upped the intensity of both the Minakai’s training as well as his own, both physically and mentally.

“Gentlemen. Lady,” came Gardner’s voice as he walked over with his Vinewolf beside him, but Lycavine caught his eye. “Aurin, you sneaky little…”

Aurin couldn’t help but laugh. “You thought I would go against you with a Vinewolf of my own, did you? Not happening, my friend.”

“Where did you get a Full Moon Gem to evolve your Budescent along this path? You have to tell me!”

Aurin grinned smugly. “It was a present from a friend of mine. His name is Tobias Hawthorne, you may have heard of him.”

Gardner frowned and shook his head. “How in the world am I supposed to compete with connections like that?”

“Tell you what,” said Aurin, “I’ll introduce you when we get to Ludonia. I’ll have knocked you out of the tournament by that point, but it’ll set you up for next year.”

Luna and Kyle laughed at Gardner as he threw his arms up in exaggerated despair. He made a goofy face like a Desparee and imitated its cry before laughing himself.

The morning rolled past quickly and, by ten o’clock, everyone was inside and registered. It took more time than ever with such a large team of monsters to be inspected and signed up, but things went smoothly. Aurin was itching to begin the fight, but there was still the opening ceremony to go and the brackets would be announced shortly after that.

“Ugh,” he groaned as he, Luna, Kyle and Gardner sat by the river outside the stadium. “I want to start the fighting now!”

“Have some patience,” said Kyle.

“I’ve been patient since the last tournament!”

“You’ve fought in Ludonia and the Palace Royale since then,” said Kyle, “don’t be such a spoiled punk.”

“Won the Palace Royale, Kyle. Won it. I didn’t just fight in it.”

Luna looked around to make sure Shamtile wasn’t nearby. “Your head is getting big again.”

Aurin looked around, also fearing that Shamtile was beside him, but was relieved to see that none of the other Minakai had squeezed his head to try and keep it at a regular size.

“I’m with you, Aurin,” said Gardner. “After everything we’ve gone through between the different tournaments, the Zodiac Squad, the Zeera attack…it’s been a long year. I’m looking forward to having some back-to-basics fights in the early days of the tournament before things get too wild.”

“See?” said Aurin to the others. “That’s exactly what I meant.”

“If that’s what you meant, then why didn’t you say that?” remarked Kyle.

“Good morning,” came a familiar voice from behind them all.

All four tamers turned around quickly and their jaws hit the floor upon seeing who was addressing them.

“Frederick?” asked Aurin, the first one to compose himself enough to speak.

Standing before them was the former Zodiac Squad elite with his favourite Leonite accompanying him. He did not look his usual smug self, rather he was stoic.

“Isn’t it a nice day to enjoy the sunshine?” he asked.