Standing in the middle of the run-down city streets, the woman blinked, looking us up and down after my declaration of interest in this tournament she’d been talking about.

“You wanna know more?” she asked.

“‘Course we do,” I said, stepping forward. “We’ve been trying to find a place where we can get more information on it. You can point us in the direction of where we can sign up?”

“I’ll walk you there personally. I get paid commission,” she said with a grin.

It seemed that the guard wasn’t totally able to navigate these streets, herself. As we walked with her, she would occasionally start heading down a path only to find it was a dead-end, or realize she was leading us in the wrong direction and turn around to start backtracking. Though, she didn’t look totally lost. At the very least, we seemed to be getting somewhere.

We soon arrived at a nicer building that’d been stuck in between a couple run-down shacks. It looked much more professionally made than everything else, standing wider and taller and without the half-crumbled, lopsided walls that characterized everything else that’d been built out here. Instead, its smooth stone exterior, while not exactly pretty, was clearly made to last.

She led us inside, where there was a man standing at a desk with a couple pieces of paper on it, each covered in information.

“Ah!” he exclaimed, face lighting up at our entrance. “Are you here to sign up for the army?”

“Uh, the tournament thing, actually,” I said.

“Right, perfect, you can read more about that here,” he said, pointing down at one of the papers. “The two of you look like powerful Classers. You’ll fit right in.”

“Good,” I said as Erani walked over and picked up the paper, glancing across it. “So, if we win this thing, we get invited to join some sort of special military program, right?”

“Exactly. Great to see someone well-researched! Essentially, by entering this week’s Conqueror's Tourney, you’re setting yourself up for the opportunity to become a preferred contractor, which comes with plenty of benefits and upsides when compared to becoming a normal soldier. We’ve also got a special Leveling program for anyone under Level 10 to catch them up to our typical standard, and—“

“The program wouldn’t be necessary for us,” I said. “But these ‘preferred contractors’ get access to military resources, right? Specifically Enchanters?”

“Of course. The full might of the empire will be given to you in your assistance fending off the Demon threat!”

“So if we want a specialty Enchanted item made for us, that would be possible?”

“Depending on the item, yes, most likely.”

“Great. And we wouldn’t be getting shipped out to battlefields against our wills or anything, right? It’d be up to us what we do?”

“Er, effectively, yes,” he said.

“It says here that we’d be mandated to go on at least one mission from a selection per week in order to receive continued benefits,” Erani said, pointing to the pamphlet she’d been reading. “And if we ever neglect to do that, we lose our benefits?”

“Ah, yes, that’s true, but it’s not hard at all to do the missions, really,” he said.

“It’s not like it’s criminal to stop though, right?” I asked. “We won’t get punished, we’d just lose our benefits?”

“No, no, you wouldn’t be jailed or fined or anything like that.”

I looked at Erani. “So we can just play along for enough time for our item to be completed, and then we’re done.”

The man chuckled nervously. “Ah, I’m sure you’ll see it isn’t as difficult as you seem to be anticipating. And besides, I find that it is extremely enriching to contribute to the fight against the Demons.”

“Right, right,” I said. “Anyway, I think we’d like to sign up, as long as we don’t find anything else in this pamphlet to convince us not to. So then, for this tournament thing, what’s up with it? What all does it entail?”

“The Conqueror's Tourney is a multi-round single-elimination contest of wit, skill, and fighting ability,” the man said, getting back into the groove of his pitch. “The opening elimination round will consist of a challenge you will need to complete before a time limit runs out, and then once that has been completed, you will be entered into the main combat challenge, fighting against your opponents one-on-one in a specialty arena.”

“What is this challenge?”

“They change every week, that way you can’t prepare ahead of time. But it often includes things like killing monsters or collecting certain items, meant to test your general abilities as a Classer. You’re allowed to complete them as an individual or as a group, but each person has to complete their objective, meaning a pair of people would effectively have to do twice as much.”

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“And the time limit?”

“Again, it changes depending on the challenge, but it’s typically a number of days. As long as you can do whatever we ask in that time, you’re entered into the combat rounds.”

Erani tapped on the paper again. “It says here something about winning fame and glory during the tournament. This is spectated by the public?”

“Ah, yes, you must be new here if you weren’t aware. The arena combat draws in thousands each week to watch the fights, especially once you get into the later rounds.”

I frowned. “Wait, so is this tournament for recruiting or is it for entertainment?”

“It’s a method of finding the best soldiers around. But we can’t help it if people like to watch. I mean, high-Level Classer combat is something that many don’t get to see their whole lives, so why not show it off while we have it happening legally?”

“Hm,” I said. Seemed like a slight conflict of interest, with them trying to genuinely see who’s the best fighter while also trying to make the rounds as entertaining as possible, but I supposed what he said was fair. “Anyway, this isn’t to the death or anything, is it? Just, like, fight until someone can’t physically fight back anymore? Or…”

The man looked at me, horrified. “To the death?! No, of course not, that would be horrible. Participants will only fight until they fall to a certain Health threshold, and may forfeit at any time if they feel they are in danger. Plenty of safety measures are provided as well, including Clerics on-site with active healing as well as preventative Spells such as Feign Death, which will keep you from passing below that threshold in the first place.”

“Feign Death only keeps you from passing below 100 Health for a single instance of damage, after which its effect ends, though,” Erani said. “So damage-over-time effects could still easily kill. I assume you have measures in place to keep that from happening? And accidental killings will not result in legal persecution?”

“I’m sure they won’t occur in the first place,” he said. “And yes, as I’ve said, Clerics are also on-site to begin healing the moment Feign Death is triggered, meaning it would be extremely difficult to kill someone during the tourney.”

“And what are the Levels of the winners, typically?” I asked

“There have been a variety of different Levels among winners, and their exact information is of course classified. However, I will say that, since the tourneys have been going on for some time now, the strongest competitors have already competed and won. So now is a perfect time to enter!”

“Will we know anything about our future opponents?” Erani asked.

“You’ll know their names ahead of time, so many competitors go and watch their future opponents’ matches to research their fighting styles. However, you can always keep some of your methods hidden to reveal them later in the tournament so your opponents don’t know as much about you. Some of our most exciting moments have come from final-round revelations!”

More and more, I was getting the feeling that this tournament’s focus on entertainment was greater than the recruiter was letting on. But that was okay; as long as we got Erani that new arm, I was fine with some public combat.

“How many total rounds will there be?” Erani asked.

“Seven,” he answered. “One each day.”

She frowned. “I thought you did these each week? And several days are taken up by the elimination round?”

“Next week’s elimination round runs at the same time as this week’s final rounds,” he said. “So, technically, for the competitors the tournament runs for a little longer than one week. But the spectated rounds only last seven days”

“When is the elimination round starting, then?”

“Tomorrow.”

I blinked and looked at Erani, suddenly glad that we’d come here as quickly as we did. “Well, I guess we shouldn’t hesitate in signing up.”

He grinned. “Perfect. Just come into the back room with me and we can get all of your necessary information.”

While signing up, I had a brief moment of panic when they asked for my specific Class and Level—something I definitely would have trouble telling them when they would be watching me fight. But Index gave me the quick recommendation to just tell them I was a Wizard. Since that Class got a new Spell every single Level, by Level 21 there were so many different combinations of Spells to choose that it was effectively impossible for Humanity to document every single one that’d be offered. So if I cast something they didn’t recognize, they’d just assume I’d gone down an undocumented path. Certainly an unorthodox thing for a Wizard to do, but not unheard of.

Once we were signed up and everything was sorted, I thought of something and turned back to the recruiter. “Hey, where can we go to get permission to bring a monster into the city?”

“There are a few government offices in the outer circle of Precipice. One isn’t too far from here. If you give me a moment, I can write down some directions for you.”

“Good, thanks. And one more thing. Entrants into this tournament don’t have to be specifically Human, right? If a monster gains citizenship, then it can participate as well?”

“Yes, though that doesn’t happen very often. There aren’t too many sentient monsters around this area that like to interact with Human society.”

“Perfect, thanks.” I turned and walked away.

Erani looked over to me as we left. “Are you thinking what it sounds like you’re thinking?”

“I mean, Ainash would probably love to have the opportunity to beat some people up, right?”

“It might be hard to explain to her that she’s not allowed to kill them. Also, getting not just a pet license, but full-on citizenship in a single day will be tough.”

“We can probably figure something out. Can’t hurt to try, right? We need as many people as possible so we have the best chances to get access to those Enchanters.”

“I suppose so. I’m just worried about her.”

“She’ll be fine. She’s strong.”

“Yes, that’s precisely the problem.”

“Sure, a problem for her enemies.”

“It could cause issues if her main method of interaction with people other than us continues to be violence-based.”

“Then we’ll make her some friends once she can enter the city. Boom, problem solved.”

Erani sighed. “You’re really eager to do this tournament. Do you like risking your life that much?”

“Oh, our lives aren’t at risk at all.”

“I’m not sure if I entirely trust their promises of this being totally safe, and it’s a bad habit to rely on your Talent that much. Their countermeasures don’t protect against plenty of things, like—”

“No, no. We’re not in danger,” I said, “because we’re going to win.”