I got back to the casino well after 10. They had given us MREs to eat on the transport back, but as soon as I was in my room, I dialed room service, then went to take a shower. I kept trying to stand up and reach for things. I swore under my breath every time it happened. I had spent the entire day with legs. Coming back and finding myself in my crippled body was like the day I woke up in hospital all over again.

I toweled off, pulled on my sweats, and retrieved my meal from where it sat outside the door. I was exalted and exhausted all at once. I ate the fish and chips slowly, savoring them even though I was ready to fall into bed. My ride tomorrow morning was at 0615 again. The rest of my team apparently left even earlier. The able-bodied got loaded into buses, shipped out in big groups.

Tomorrow we were to have our first match. We had four hours in the morning to prep a strat, including figuring out our classes and how to work together. Before leaving the simulation, we’d been allowed to send ourselves information packets about the classes we were considering as well as an overview of the ruleset. I'd gone over the support list on the bus and was down to three possibilities.

The first was [Bard]. It was a classic buff/debuff class, but they'd added a nice sideline of healing. It would allow me to empower my allies, distract my enemies and keep people alive. I didn't actually have to sing. I would get to choose from a set of instruments and would also be given proficiency with them.

It had utility, but looked a little too straightforward, which was also why I had vetoed the five straight-up healing classes that seemed entirely focused around keeping other people alive. While that was important, if my team was going to win against pro gamers with a full-strength group, we'd need more than just heals.

The next option I was considering was called [Supplicant]. That sounded a little more interesting to me. It allowed me to dispense both healing and some amount of damage. I could also call on various patrons to assist me. Depending on which patron I called on, I would have access to a different skill set for the duration of that patron's boon.

For instance, if I called on Lady Avasta of the Night, I could shroud my allies in mist, render my enemies blind and fearful, and also reduce any fire and light-based damage attacks by 50%.

There was a lot of potential there. I had spent several hours reading over the potential patrons and their skill set. The difficulty was that you had to invoke at least four different patrons before you could go back to the first you'd called on. If you went too long without calling on a particular patron, they might get angry and smite you.

Each patron's boon lasted only three minutes at a time, while the ability to call upon a patron had a five-minute cooldown. That would leave me with two minutes at a stretch with only my basic abilities. It sounded potentially really powerful, but also kind of a pain to micromanage.

I set that aside and called up [Oracle]. Now that one was interesting. While it had some straight-up heals, it had an ability called “Fate’s Grasp” that would immobilize an enemy for several seconds, and another, “Prophetic Vision” which revealed enemies on the map, stripping any camouflage or stealth from them. “Blessing of the Gods” let me cast various buffs on my party, though I’d have to choose between a couple options rather than stacking agility and health both.

I wavered. It was getting late. Maybe I could make my final decision in the morning. I finished off the last of my chips before checking my social media. My Discord had hundreds of new notifications. I groaned and closed it immediately. I'd need to deal with that at some point, but not now. Maybe on the bus in the morning.

Mum had sent me a couple of texts earlier saying she hoped I was doing well and to let her know. I did some quick conversion. It was about three in the morning, back home, so I didn't answer. I'd text her on the bus tomorrow, too.

I checked my email. The message from Patriona was still there. I'd had such a busy day today, I'd almost forgotten about it until I saw her name there. Now I opened it up.

It contained the contract text. At the top was a brief reminder with an active countdown. It had 46 hours left. If I haven't heard from you by then, I'll assume you're not interested.

I closed my phone, got into bed and turned out the lights. Today had been exhilarating. I lay there in the dark, staring up at the ceiling. I knew one thing: I was not going to lose my chance at legs. Would it be better to accept Patriona's offer? She would be able to get me to Ganymede, repair my legs, even give me a future. On the other hand, signing my life away to aliens gave me shivers.

I pulled up the email that Captain Williams had sent me. On a whim, I composed a message back to the address he'd used. I didn't even know if he checked it. Can you tell me if Proxima had our interests at heart? There's a lot of talk down here on Earth, like they do. They're running some good PR campaigns. I've heard good things about them, like they were trying to help us out of our ignorance and stupidity. I know they gave you and your friends a raw deal, but was that just because they don't understand us?

I thought about explaining my dilemma with Patriona and decided against it. If the government weren't already monitoring us, I didn't really want to draw attention to me having talks with a possible enemy of the species. I hit send, then rolled over and tried to sleep.

My mind kept going back to the different classes. I finally sighed, grabbed my phone, opened it up, and looked at the Supplicant class again and how it leveled up. At level 2, the boon lasted 3 and a half minutes, while the cooldown remained 5. At Level 3, it lasted a full 4 minutes. Level 5, the boon lasted 5 minutes and had a reduced cooldown.

I checked. Yes, I could have 2 boons at once. How fast were we going to level up? Would it be continuous between sessions?

I sent a quick text to Pete asking if he knew. I had the answer back quickly. Level ups stay around between our matches. We earn points based on killing enemies. Looks like anybody who wins their first match will probably reach level 2. Lose the first match, you're stuck with level 1. It's going to end up being a case of the haves get more and the have-nots get out. So we've got to make sure to hit the first ones hard and fast.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

I thought about it. What would you say if I'm picking a high risk, high reward strat with my class?

I waited eagerly for the reply. I'd say, that sounds like the Colin Trev that I have watched. Keep calm and cheese on, remember?

I groaned. Thanks, see you tomorrow.

I rolled over and this time I went to sleep.

My team were halfway through our morning practice session and it wasn't going particularly well. Alpha had a Lone Wolf class combining a sort of shadow stalker rogue with a berserker warrior, giving us a hugely spiky melee DPS. If he was in his berserker mode he had lots of health but no dodge. In shadow stalker mode he had high dodge, low health.

Rose had picked paladin. Straight up boring predictable paladin. She was leaning on a glowing battle hammer taller than she was, wearing a suit of golden armor and grinning as we considered the dragon we had just slain together. Its fire hadn't even singed her shining armor.

"Why paladin?" I asked.

She shrugged, flipping her hair. "Why? You don't think it's a good choice for me?"

"Not really," I said honestly.

She rolled her eyes. "Oh please, you're getting the real me confused with my online persona. Just because I did social engineering in order to do my hacks instead of spending hours and hours trying the same level over and over again. Some of us had a social life, Colin."

"Yeah, whatever," I said. I'd been through all of my twelve current possible patrons in our two hours. After level five I would gain access to other patrons. I was looking forward to that.

"It's fine," said Pete. "You did good," he told Rose.

Pete was a Switch Hitter. The class literally gave him a baseball bat and baseballs as his weapons. He could lob the baseballs and they'd explode with various different effects, or as per the name he could switch into Angry With The Ump mode which would let him use the bat as a melee weapon. He'd donned a uniform, white with stripes and bright red socks under his trainers.

Sam, who wasn't saying much, rounded us out with an elemental mage. He could switch builds between fights but not during them. He had frost, fire, earth or air. Our team had a ton of versatility, but required us to be playing at our absolute best and to communicate well.

That was the part I was worried about. I had respect for my teammates' abilities but no great trust in them.

"Alright," said Pete. "Now we can try another of these simulated fights or we can discuss strategies for our upcoming match."

“Let’s talk,” Alpha said immediately.

Sam nodded. I agreed. Rose scowled, still leaning on her war hammer. "Fine, whatever."

“Okay, our first opponents are a team of mostly Call of Duty and Fortnite players. They have one kid who's got a lot of Minecraft experience. This first match is a straight up death match. Let’s get into the arena.”

The world around us vanished, replaced by the Roman Colosseum. Six wooden pillars, each about 4 meters tall and 2 feet across at the base, were spaced in two lines of three down the middle of the arena. The crowds were full of roaring spectators. Pete waved and the spectators vanished, leaving us in silence.

"We'll be entering here, they'll be entering there," he pointed across the dusty arena through the rows of columns to a door like ours. “We've got these obstacles. With the composition we're making up, I expect they'll try to use cover and concealment and snipe us. We’ll need to counter —”

I was shaking my head as I strode forward. "This first win is going to really matter. If we can get a level, it'll help us a lot staying on par with other teams. If we are behind in level and one man down, we're not going to be able to take another fight. We've got to win this. Let's think about a strat here."

I bent and touched the sand of the arena, feeling like Russell Crowe in Gladiator as it drifted between my fingers. "Do we know what their builds are?"

Pete shook his head. "No clue."

"Right, so we'll be prepared for whatever. I think Sam should be an air mage for this one. We'll blast the whole Coliseum with the biggest gust of wind you can manage, pushing it at them. That'll hopefully blind them, throw them off. Then I call on my Darkness Patron and cloak us all in shadows. Alpha, if you're in Wolf mode, you get a double damage for being in stealth and a double damage for being in shadow. Do they stack?"

Alpha paused. A moment later, they said, "Yes," in that flat, monotone voice.

"I will use one of my always-available buffs, buff you up as we go out the gate. You should be able to one-shot someone if you hit them from behind. We're going to expect that they're trying to use the pillars as cover. We'll swoop around from this side," I gestured, "and pin them against this pillar by their gate. After that, we'll be on an even footing, but we'll have the momentum. We'll need to roll into them."

"Yeah," Sam said. He looked excited for the first time I'd seen. "I can use tornadoes to keep corralling them in the direction we want.”

“Which will be," Rose raised her weapon, "right into me.”

"What would be key is if we can find a way to get Pete to the top of one of those pillars. He'll be able to hit them with balls from up there." I walked around each of the pillars. They were smooth wood, offering little in the way of handholds. "I have a patron that would let me levitate him, but it's a five-minute cooldown, and if we're using the stealth, I won't be able to do that."

Pete eyed the pillar. He gave a quick hop as if to check whether or not he could make it on his own. Of course he couldn't.

Rose sighed. I had been waiting for her to make this contribution. I'd already studied up on everyone else's classes. "Fine. I'll give him my angel's wings buff. That'll let him fly up there and shoot."

"Why so grumpy?" Pete asked.

"'Cause if I use that on you, I can't use devil's foot on myself, which gives me resistance to being pushed around. But it's for the good of the team, I guess."

"Awesome," I said. "Pete, with you up there, you'll be our best shot caller. We'll want to try to keep the chatter to a minimum. Rose, once we've taken down the first and are trying to tornado people into you, I'll stick close and serve as dedicated healer until I'm able to call on a second patron. We'll have to play that by ear." I bit my lip. "If we're lucky, it won't even take five minutes."

We weren't just lucky. We were fucking awesome. It took two minutes, fifteen seconds from the start of the match, for all six of our opponents to lie bleeding in the sand.

Sam whooped. Pete leapt down off of his pillar, landing with a sickening crunch as he twisted an ankle.

"Ow," he said, then limped over to the rest of us. Alpha said nothing, just standing there. Rose was glowing. She tossed her warhammer in the air and caught it.

"Yes!" she said. "It worked."

I was feeling smug. "Perfect execution, guys," I said. "Was that enough XP?" I pulled up my menu to answer my own question. It was. I'd made level two.

"Alright, guys," Pete said. "We've got two hours to our next fight. Shall we pop over to the next arena while we're choosing our talents?"

Everyone agreed to this.

"How many of these arenas are there?" I asked as we materialized inside the bowl of a volcano. We were standing on a stone walkway, hundreds of feet over the lava. Heat poured off of it. A spiral of stone traced the inside of the crater. If this were real, we'd all be dead from the heat.

The walls of the crater soared forty feet above us. The stone pathways were about six feet wide, and I realized as I walked them, it was not one spiral, but two interconnected that crossed over and through each other.

"Six," Peter said. "Says that in later rounds, they'll be adding other complications."

"Six," I said. "That means memorizing them and looking for glitches might be valuable."

"Good thinking," Pete said. "Right, you and Sam are on glitch detail. The two of you will have a talent for that. Everyone else, with me, let's check out the center of the room. Go!”