"To destroy without purpose is to wield power like a child with a club. True wisdom lies not in endless conquest, but in knowing when to stand idle and let others exhaust themselves in their own fury." – The Tao of Idleness, Book 2, Verse 41

It’s probably no surprise to hear that I wasn’t all that at school.

I twigged pretty much on day one that teachers had a limited reserve of patience and energy, and they spent it all on the two extremes of the social ladder. On one end were the headbangers, the kids who spent half their lives in the Headmaster’s office, chucking chairs and seeing how many rulers they could snap before morning tea.

In primary school, this was manageable—an occasional scuffle over crayons, a bit of wrestling that usually ended in someone’s face covered in mud. But they were unpredictable, wild-eyed little chaos gremlins who could go from happily colouring to reenacting scenes from ‘Gladiator’ with little to no warning.

And on the other end were the brainboxes. These were the kids who read ‘Lord of the Rings’ cover-to-cover in Year 3, casually mentioned “finite numbers” during maths lessons, and generally made everyone else want to kick seven shades out of them.

The teachers, of course, adored them. They’d cluster around them during recess, showering them with praise for knowing words like “omniscient” and “hypotenuse” while the rest of us looked on, baffled.

So, I settled myself solidly in the middle, right in that cozy sweet spot where you didn’t have to do the extension activities but also didn’t have to worry about dodging flying furniture. My entire approach was one of strategic slacking—just enough work to avoid scrutiny, just enough interest to keep the teachers happy, and, crucially, just enough freeloading to avoid ever breaking a sweat.

I honed a finely tuned instinct for when to look busy without actually doing anything. I was the kid who figured out early on that if you timed your questions right, teachers were happy to ramble through half the lesson without noticing you hadn’t lifted a finger. Solidly, relentlessly average—the ultimate camouflage.

But then came secondary school, and suddenly, it all ramped up like someone had decided to turn the whole thing into a reality show, complete with pyrotechnics, dramatic slow-mo shots, and a soundtrack of ominous drums.

It was as if every kid was handed a role on Day One: the headbangers took on new levels of violence, upgrading from minor classroom disturbances to full-on demolitions of anything remotely breakable. They weren’t just kids anymore; they were junior demolition experts with a personal vendetta against school property, launching textbooks out of windows and treating every break time as the final battle scene of an action blockbuster. By lunchtime, you half-expected a commentator in a tuxedo to start giving play-by-plays.

On the other end, the brainboxes had levelled up, too, morphing into miniature academicians, their skills bordering on the supernatural. These were kids who’d show up to assembly with armfuls of advanced reading material, who'd bring up Shakespeare in casual conversation, and who seemed to be studying for exams no one else had even heard of. Teachers practically carried them around on golden pedestals, and any attempt to get a simple answer in math class meant enduring an in-depth lecture about conceptual frameworks and number theory, which really killed the mood.

The headbangers were hell-bent on destroying everything in sight, the brainboxes were locked in a death-match for the highest grades, and there I was—happily in the middle, keeping my head down and watching the carnage from a safe distance, just hoping not to get trampled by either side.

The trick was to stay just compliant enough, handing in homework that wouldn’t stand out, answering just enough questions to appear engaged, and making sure I never, ever attracted the wrong kind of attention. Keep your head down, blend into the walls, and pray you don’t get caught in the crossfire.

I’ve gone on this little Memory Lane wander because one lesson I do remember vividly—especially vividly right now—is the day some poor, crushed supply teacher tried to guide my class through War Poetry on a wet Thursday afternoon.

It was one of those miserable days, too, where the rain rattled against the windows like it was personally offended by us sitting inside, and the teacher, who had the tired, hunted look of someone just trying to get to 3 p.m. alive, handed out copies of Dulce et Decorum est by Wilfred Owen.

Now, most of us were too busy trying to fold our worksheets into paper airplanes, but something in that poem cut through the noise.

At least for me.

I remember reading that description—“like a devil’s sick of sin”—and that image of the dead soldier, the poor soul lying there having coughed his lungs out, It hit me like a crack in the world. Like something ancient and raw had opened up just beneath my feet.

There was nothing grand about it, nothing like the statues and memorials and polished speeches you see on Remembrance Day. Just this haunting, battered figure, all life drained from him, left there like some discarded sock, ruined in a way that no one should be. The poem made it clear that dying in a war wasn’t about heroism or valour; it was just horror, stripped bare.

And it’s funny, because you don’t really expect that sort of thing to stick with you at fourteen, especially when half your mind’s on what’s left of your lunch and whether you might get to see up Sadie O’Reilly’s skirt during P.E.

But there it was, burned into my memory like a warning. I’ve thought about it more than a few times over the years, that image of the fallen soldier, “the blood come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs.”

Now, standing on the walls of Lazytown, I can’t help but see him echoed below, out there on the battlefield.

Bodies littered the ground at gates, a grim landscape of twisted statues, frozen mid-reach, like some dark artist had sculpted them in a single, terrible moment of unfinished desperation.

The world’s stopped for them. There’s nothing poetic about it, nothing noble—just corpses, faces frozen in the last gasp of life, as the sun begins to set and the smoke hangs heavy in the air. It’s the same horror, stripped of all the frills, all the myths of glorious sacrifice.

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I mean, of course, Wilfred Owen probably never anticipated Steam Cannons, authoritarian zealots or tiny, giant-breasted warriors wielding massive swords.

But in a way, I kind of thought he might’ve understood the blood-soaked, ridiculous mess below.

At least someone might.

It’s all fun and games until someone commits a war crime.

“Fuck,” Scar said, looking down at the genocide the Steam Cannon had committed.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Kind of feels that might have been a touch OP.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Probably why that upgrade was so expensive. Maybe we weren’t supposed to have access to it until the bad guys would be mid-teens?”

“Probably,” I said.

Say one thing for being massively outnumbered by three armies attacking you from all sides; it creates somewhat of a target-rich environment.

“I know this feels like it’s not really the moment to mention this, but I’ve gone up three Levels,” Scar said, a note of awe in his voice. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone progressing that fast before.”

I didn’t look away from the field of . . . yeah, I don’t have the metaphor game right now. Do your own doom-scrolling. “Do you think that might be because no-one has ever thought to marmalise this number of people in one go before? I mean, I’m not anxious to get the ‘first’ achievement there, but I’m throwing it out there.”

“Yeah,” Scar said, but I could tell his mind was elsewhere. He was busily allocating his Progress Points and checking out his new goodies. The label above his head shimmered into existence as he did so – I still needed to learn how he hid it most of the rest of the time – and showed that he had reached Level 10.

If it had taken Scar, what, fifty years to reach Level 7 – during which time he’d obviously seen no lack of action – I could well understand that suddenly picking up three levels from a few minutes' work would feel like a trip.

I looked down at that ‘work’ again and did my best not to lose my lunch.

What was it the guy who invented the atomic bomb had said? ‘”I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”

Okay, maybe a touch of melodrama is sneaking in here.

I’d basically shelled out a wodge of gold for an OP weapon that had wiped out a thousand or so low levelled mobs. It was hardly the stuff of a Hollywood movie that would be massively overshadowed by a musical about an improbably proportioned plastic doll.

I was doing my best not to look at my own notifications. And there were a lot of them.

Too many, actually.

I closed them down and pulled up my stat sheet instead.

Yeah, I’d made out like a bandit, too.

Name: James Brook

Level: 15 (27% Idle XP Gains)

Class: Freeloader

Health: 160

Mana: 0

Stamina: 65

Strength: 20

Agility: 26

Dexterity: 25

Constitution: 30

Endurance: 15

Intelligence: 20

Wisdom: 20

Charisma: 20

Luck: 20

Class Abilities:

Borrowed Strength (Rank 5): Your stats now shift dynamically based on the power of allies nearby. At this level, your boosted core stats (Strength, Agility, Dexterity, or Constitution) increase by up to +30% when near stronger allies. The stat boost is recalculated continuously, so your strength waxes and wanes with those around you.

Lazy Aura (Rank 5): Enemies within range are highly likely to lose interest in attacking you if you do not engage. Disinterested enemies may drop minor Loot as they leave. Additionally, allies in range feel a slight reduction in fatigue and are passively motivated to continue fighting.

Loot Leech (Rank 5): Your ability to gather resources effortlessly has reached a new level. Nearby activities and fallen enemies now yield +40% more resources, and you siphon a moderate portion of loot from allies' efforts without impacting their gains. Valuable items are also more likely to drift your way.

Passive Assistance (Rank 5): You are now a beacon of passive support. Allies within range benefit from a small boost in damage and defence, and the Critical Hit buff for nearby allies now has a cooldown of only 15 minutes, ensuring they feel your indirect support more frequently.

Opportunistic Luck ( Rank 5): Your knack for stumbling into good fortune is almost supernatural. Whether it’s dodging a death blow or “accidentally” finding valuable items, your luck has sharpened. Small bonuses (XP, loot) may now also appear when an ally achieves a critical success nearby.

Lucky Bystander (Rank 5): Your presence seems almost charmed to those around you, enhancing allies’ performance significantly when they’re in close proximity. Allies seem to find inspiration, hitting harder and dodging more effectively when you’re nearby—though you remain blissfully unaware of why.

Freeloader’s Escape (Rank 5): Your instinct for survival borders on miraculous. You automatically dodge the first four attacks in any encounter, slipping out of harm’s way with minimal effort. Cooldown: 2 minutes.

Skills:

Stealth (Lvl3)

Game Player (Lvl4)

Dodge (Lvl10)

Vicarious Competence (Lvl 5)

Battlefield Observer (Lvl 2)

Punching Down (Lvl 6)

Unallocated points:

20

Okay, so all my abilities had ranked up to five, which was cool.

I’d also got another mountain of Progress Points, which was also cool.

The two new skills, though. The first one was okay. The second was . . . not.

Battlefield Observer (Lvl 2): Standing around and watching the carnage has given you a keen eye for spotting mayhem at its finest. Gain a minor perception boost in combat letting you zero in on enemy weaknesses and ally distress signals—even though you’re still mostly just lounging around and critiquing everyone else’s technique.

Punching Down (Lvl 5): Your knack for “efficiently handling” the little guys has evolved into something almost artful. When facing weaker enemies, you gain a colossal combat boost, turning you into a lazy whirlwind of devastation. Attacks hit harder, dodges are near effortless, and enemies are 20% more likely to flee before you even break a sweat. Maximum carnage with minimum effort—because sometimes, picking on the small fry is just easier.

Yeah, feeling judged there.