Location: Fake Training City, Team Three Base

Time: 9:45 AM, 2/14/08

That sneaky little wall runner made an enemy for life. Actually, I think he made at least four. The next time I see Kazuko sitting on a windowsill I might just push him out.

After breakfast, Ms. Kaldsen divided us into our teams and sent us into the fake city. We were given a flag and told to pick a location for our home base. My team didn’t really have any great ideas, so we just kind of settled on a two story house in what looked like a residential district.

By the way, that training facility, if you could even call it that, really was like an entire city, built just for that purpose. I’m not sure how much of the infrastructure really worked, but just going on appearances, it looked like a fully functional city.

Except, you know, it was empty.

Anyway, that’s not the important thing.

The teams. The teams that Kazuko created.

Team one: Acht, Nuen, Jacob, and Devesh.

Yeah, that one might cause a problem.

Team two: Hana, Kathrin, and Grant.

A bit strong, but I didn’t really want any of them on my team anyway. Hana threw a major fit about not being on Oakley’s team, but that’s not my problem.

Team three: Oakley, Olivia, and me.

Yes, of course. I was on the absolute worst team imaginable. Why did he put me with the two Oldridge girls? Was he trying to pick a fight? What was I supposed to do in that situation?

Not that the rest really matter, but let’s move on for now.

Team four: Allison, Emelia, Henry, and the man of the hour himself: Kazuko.

He really must not have any shame. Despite putting himself on a four man team he still felt the need to stack the members.

Team five: Cynthia, Nolan, and Blake.

Not that it matters at this point, but team five is probably the only one that my team three actually has a chance of having a fair fight against.

“Hello! Is everyone ready to start?”

Ms. Kaldsen’s voice reverberated throughout the city. She was still relaxing at the dorm building where we spent the night. I’m assuming because it was designed as a training facility this fake city is full of cameras and speakers. So Ms. Kaldsen can watch everything from the comfort of the administrative room she’s been using as an office.

Must be nice. The rest of us are running around in the summer heat.

No, sorry, the temperature never really bothered me much, I was just complaining because I could.

“I’m sure everyone is ready to start, so let’s just go with that. As for rules, remember, try not to hurt anyone beyond what a dose of Demon’s Blood could fix. And also, make sure to keep those bracelets on. They’re constantly giving me updated information on your conditions. They are also programmed to announce whenever anyone’s physical status falls below a certain threshold. If the system says you’ve been eliminated, that’s that. Don’t try to keep participating after that point. If anyone breaks either rule I’ll turn them into an ice sculpture and escort them back personally.”

I took a moment to look over the metallic bracelet on my wrist. Is it working? How was I supposed to know?

“Hey, Jacob, I heard that! These cameras have microphones built in!”

Huh? Ms. Kaldsen was yelling about something.

“But, well, I guess you’ve got a point. Alright. The winning team will get a reward. How about, no classes for a week? And not just my extra augmentation training classes. I mean all classes. Wait, can I actually do that? Technically speaking I’m not even sure if I’m a real teacher. Eh, yeah, no point in worrying about it now. The winning team has no class for a week. It’s been decided. Congratulations! Alright, I’m going to start the system up. Let the games begin!”

My bracelet started pulsing with a soft green light. I looked toward the others to make sure their bracelets were doing the same thing.

[Alert. Participant Henry Henderson has been eliminated. No life signs detected. Immediate medical attention is necessary.]

Each of our bracelets vibrated slightly before giving us that announcement in a robotic voice.

“Ahaha! Ignore that. I forgot about Henry’s, you know, medical condition. Let me remove his elimination parameters. Alright, Henry, you’re good to go until you can’t anymore. And I guess that means you guys can go wild on him. No need to hold back.”

After Ms. Kaldsen’s voice cut off, the three of us waited in silence for a moment.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“Wow! I hate to say it, but we’re screwed!”

“Totally! I’m an idol, I’m not supposed to be involved in dangerous things like this!”

Okay, well, for Olivia and I it was a rather short moment.

Oakley nodded her head along with us.

“Oh! Oakley, are you okay? Can you understand me?” I never really talked with Oakley, so it was easy to forget she was deaf.

Oakley nodded her head again and pointed toward her glasses.

“Don’t worry about Oakley. Those glasses have a built-in language processor. Everything we say is being displayed across the lenses. It’s pretty much like she’s got real life subtitles on!”

Olivia gave the explanation that Oakley was unable to.

Cool. I didn’t even notice she had glasses on. Next to Olivia’s incredibly flashy appearance, and attitude, it’s easy to overlook Oakley’s bookish looks and calm demeanor. I suppose that’s partially my fault as well. I’d be lying if I said I paid much attention to her. Not that I’ve got a personal problem with her or anything, but it’s not like getting close to Oakley could ever help me with my mission.

“Nice. For a minute I thought I’d have to rely on you to translate everything we said into sign language.”

“Me?”

Olivia pointed at herself while tilting her head quizzically.

“Who else?”

“I’m an idol, you know? I don’t have the free time to learn something like sign language. We’d need to rely on Hana for something like that.”

“Listen, Olivia, we need to protect those glasses at all costs.”

“Haha, yeah, totally. I’m the same though. Without my headphones I can’t do anything.”

Unlike with Oakley’s glasses, I wasn’t surprised by Olivia’s headphones. I don’t think I ever actually saw her without them.

“I really hate them though. No one can ever see my cute piercings.”

Forget the piercings, I’ve never even seen her ears.

“Ah, well, if we’re being honest, I’ve got the same problem.”

I held up my gloved hands.

“Without these gloves my power becomes pretty much uncontrollable. I’ll end up making everything go boom.”

How they worked? No idea. It’s not like I made them. But from what I understand, the fabric that they’re made of is some sort of smart fiber. The weave can independently shift itself, creating small gaps in that section of the glove. Those gaps allow enough of my skin to touch something in order for me to prepare it for boom time.

The gloves themselves are always in contact with my skin, so I don’t have to worry about them ever getting blown up.

The flame design on them was my idea though.

The only problem was they were super expensive. That’s why I made sure to only wear them during combat training. If I damaged them in my daily life I’d never hear the end of it.

“So all three of us are dependent on an aid, huh?”

Olivia seemed a little disappointed about that, but it’s not like using an aid is that uncommon. In actuality, it’s safer to say most augmented need to use some kind of tool to properly control their augmentation, or in cases like Oakley’s, to cope with their stigma.

“Yeah, well, I’m sure we’ll be alright.”

I tried to sound positive, but I couldn’t even convince myself we actually had a chance.

“Yeah, okay, we’re screwed. Does anyone have a plan?”

Oakley pointed to her watch, toward the floor, and then made a hugging motion.

“Hmm?” I was never very good with charades.

“Oakley is saying that we should just protect our base. Our only chance is for all of us to stick together.”

Oakley nodded her head along with Olivia’s explanation.

“Yeah, she’s probably right.”

I mean, what else could we do? The other teams were probably dividing their members into offense and defense, but we didn’t have the human resources for something like that.

Actually, thinking about it, hadn’t I already completely given up on my initial goal? It’s not like I could recruit either of these two, so what exactly was I trying to do here?

“But I’d really like this game to end early. Apparently there’s some big new idol making a debut on Thursday, and I really don’t want to miss it.”

“New idol?” What was Olivia talking about?

“Exactly. How dare someone make their debut in my city before me! I’ve got to scout out the competition! I won’t let her gain more popularity than me! The tickets were impossible to get! I only managed to get five backstage passes!”

Huh? It was starting to sound like she just wanted to see the show.

[Alert. Participant Acht has been eliminated. Bodily stress has surpassed training parameters. Medical attention is unnecessary.]

[Alert. Participant Nuen has been eliminated. Bodily stress has surpassed training parameters. Medical attention is unnecessary.]

What? It had only been a few minutes. How did two of the strongest students on one of the strongest teams get eliminated so quickly?

“Hey, it’s me again.” Ms. Kaldsen’s voice was once again being broadcast throughout the city. “This time, with those two, it wasn’t a technical issue like it was for Henry. Saying anything else would probably ruin the integrity of the game, I just wanted you all to know that the bracelets are functioning properly. Alright, back to it.”

I was curious if there were going to be any more sudden eliminations, but for the moment it seemed like things calmed down.

“Woah. I wonder what got those twins eliminated.”

Olivia posed that idea to no one in particular.

“Certain. Acht and Nuen wouldn’t have been defeated that quickly by anyone except themselves. Disappointed. They must have gotten into a fight and eliminated each other.”

But an uninvolved party answered her!

The three of us watched as Hana crawled out of Oakley’s shadow.

“Hold on, what, what are you doing here?”

I was the only one who seemed alarmed by her sudden appearance.

“Prideful. Mistress Oakley was here. Where else could I have been?”

“With your team!”

“Uncertain. I told Rin where I was going. She’ll probably get here eventually.”

“Oh no! Kathrin is on her way here? That’s not good, our team really isn’t suited for combat!”

Oakley shook her head in agreement with Olivia’s outburst.

“That reaction is too late! We’ve already got an enemy here.”

“Where? Who is it?”

Both Olivia and Oakley looked behind their backs in a panic.

“Are you guys just messing with me?”

Were they actually that used to Hana’s presence? Did she not even count as an actual enemy?

“Reassuring. Don’t worry Mily, I won’t let any enemies sneak up on Mistress Oakley.”

I’m pretty sure one already has though!