Will watched Master Mournings with pity. The man’s eyes turned into sunken ships when Sara asked him to put up his best work against her rusty axe and chicken scratch-drawn array.

“You’re going to give him bad habits,” Master Mournings argued.

“I’m just proving it’s not impossible,” she said. “Right now, he looks like I sent him on a suicide mission.”

Master Mournings looked at Will and then exhaled, picking up one of his lesser swords. The fact that he didn’t offer up his best work spoke volumes. Don’t destroy my work. That’s what the action said.

“What should I do?” he asked nervously.

“Just lift it.”

Master Mournings winced and held it up, looking away.

Sara rolled her eyes and looked at Will. “This is a sharpening array, Will. Mages put it on as many weapons as possible.”

She activated the array on the sword and pushed it against the blade. As if Master Mournings’s blade was made of foam, the blade sheared off, the second half clanking to the ground. Even Master Mournings was shocked.

“You have the power within you to kill a legendary demon king,” Sara said. “If you can’t overpower soldiers and mages, you’re pathetic.” She threw the rusty axe on the table and walked to the door. “Stop thinking so much.”

Sara walked out of the tent as fast as she came, and Master Mournings sat at the table with a frustrated expression. “Well, that was quite the demonstration,” he chuckled. “I don’t know what I’ve spent my whole life doing.”

Will watched his midlife crisis with pity. But he was curious. “Could anyone else pull that off?” he asked.

Master Mournings laughed sharply. “Are you mad? If anyone else did that, it would’ve just been a waste of mana.”

“Then why’d it work?”

“Brute force, that’s why,” Master Mournings said. “Absolute disrespect to the craft.”

Will swallowed hard as he looked out the door. He felt pathetic now, but…. Sara’s demonstration proved that the task wasn’t impossible. “So what do I have to do to ‘brute force it?’”

Master Mournings looked at him like a villain. “Absolutely not. I’ll teach you how to load an array, but if you dare try to scrawl trash on a blade, I will disown you as an apprentice.”

Will put up his hands. “Point taken.”

Master Mournings sighed and leaned back. “That’s for tomorrow. For today, work on your circles.”

2

A few years ago, Andy Trent was a slightly overweight teenager who spent way too much time playing Borderlands. He played until the game was pointless, restarting the game and playing just long enough that he’d find a good grind spot, and then farming for four hours straight until his eyes were red and scratchy, only to get that one legendary weapon that made the game pointless. Then, absurdly overpowered, he scoured every easter egg and captured every collectible, ensuring that he always had ample things to do to avoid his daily life.

Andy hated his life. It wasn’t that he was “misunderstood” or that he rejected the establishment and its rules. It was simply because his parents fought about everything: money, habits, responsibilities, obligations, and even what they should watch on TV. They argued during breakfast, dinner, and even into the night. They did so most of his life. When he was younger, he tried to intervene, but they always yelled Go to your room! or Go play video games! as an end-all solution to subtracting a mediator with inconvenient viewpoints. That’s how he became who he was, and why when teachers said, Andy is a remarkably bright student, but he’s not getting enough sleep to keep focused, his parents never did anything.

Then, the summoning happened.

Andy was certain that the summoning (or “the calling,” as he referred to it) would’ve been a psychologist’s wet dream. Despite students being uprooted from their friends, families, futures, phones, and games, most people adapted incredibly well. In a world without phones and impersonal online interactions, social anxiety problems disappeared. Students spoke of their depression easing and their ability to relax for the first time in years. It was the general consensus that social media, credit scores, college requirements, technology, and evolving trends had students drowning in stress, and they didn’t realize it until it all suddenly disappeared. Then, once they figured out that there were things that they couldn’t change—the inability to go home, to text people sorry, to send an email, to do work after hours, or to check up on people online—and learned that life continued on anyway, it gave people a sense of peace. And for Andy, just entering into a world where people weren’t neglecting him to scream at each other twenty-four-seven had remarkable effects.

Yet, the environment didn’t change who people were. Not exactly. Emma was still kind and caring, Jason was a self-righteous asshole, and the rest of his classmates had parts of them that carried over. As for him, he kept his addiction to leveling and a quest to find the easy button for life. So that’s what he did, learning magic, arrays, and sword fighting, always moving up for no reason in particular until something strange happened.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Can you help me with this? Helen had asked during training one day, a month after Sara’s coup. They were practicing balancing leaves with wind magic, and he didn’t really think much of it. It was just practice, and he practiced alone, concentrating on himself and not really thinking much of others. So, seeing one of the popular girls walk up to him was surprising.

Uh. Why me? he asked.

Helen’s smooth face frowned. Why? She looked at his leaf, still balancing, and then at the other students. Despite giving it their full concentration, their leaves were flying around, their clothing was jutting out all over the place, and a few females refused to practice, claiming that Aelia should’ve warned them not to wear skirts. He didn’t even notice. Aside from the bigs, you’re the best person here.

Andy blinked a few times, unsure what to say. Then, his eyes widened when he remembered he was supposed to speak and said, I’m not sure how to teach, but I’ll help you get to the next level.

Helen furrowed her brow. The next level?

Andy’s face heated up. Y-Yeah. Level. Like, the next stage. Level up. Get better…. He looked down. Or whatever.

She stared at him for a few seconds, grabbing a lock of her straight brown hair and rolling it in her fingers. You’re weird.

Yeah.

Well, after the cool kids got into murder, she said, referring to Jason, Mary, Raul, Sara, and Brandon, I’m cool hanging out with weirdos. So will you… help me level up, or what?

Andy’s eyes widened at her slight blush, and he chuckled, Sure.

That acceptance kicked off a strange shift in Andy’s life. It started with teaching Helen, then her friends. Then, when they were getting good, other people joined in, filling in the void that Sara left behind. Even Emma and Raul showed up between their practice sessions with Sara, building friendships and bringing people together. It was kinda surreal, a situation where the good guy gets the girls, even if it were only platonic friendships.

Then things shifted again when Helen took his virginity, kicking off his first real relationship and solidifying his acceptance into the new murder-abhorring “cool kids,” adults as they were. Soon, he had forgotten about his old world, the depression, loneliness, and isolation, and found himself going out into Lamora for drinks and food with friends. Yet through it all, he never lost his love for leveling or the yearning for the easy button, and as of that week, he had partially gotten his wish.

The unlimited leveling opportunity came with the onset of war—

—but the easy button disappeared with it. Sara Reece’s challenges were like playing Dark Souls on impossible mode. Seriously. His team was tasked with building a bridge despite having zero architectural experience, and they were supposed to make it stronger than a Nokia. It was frustrating.

“What are we going to do about this?” his friend Darius asked. Andy was surprised the man chose the engineering corps instead of the hero-seeking infantry. He was a strong, buff black jock that probably could’ve given Raul a run for his money if he had half the motivation. Yet… Andy wondered if his surprise was because Darius was a legitimate jock or if he was mildly racist. He didn’t know. Either way, he was a welcome addition. Having a bunch of people who were all brain and now brawn trying to build a bridge was like getting lions to eat a salad.

“Dude, I have no clue,” Andy said. “I don’t even know how to build a bridge.”

“Neither do I,” Wiles said. The lanky teen wore glasses and a mop-top haircut on earth. Now, he didn’t need glasses and had tanned muscles, but he still acted like a self-conscious nerd, something he took flak for daily. “How are we supposed to do this?”

“This is probably the test,” Andy said. “This is a war scenario, right? We don’t have time to make a stone bridge. We just need something that’ll hold.”

“So, what do we do?”

“Get reinforcement specialists and just….”

“Do some castaway shit?” Darius asked.

The engineers burst into laughter.

“Yeah, probably,” Andy chuckled. “Well, let’s try. It’s better than waiting for Sara to show up.”

“I feel it,” Darius sighed.

Andy turned to trees on the other side of the river. “Get some rope and tools. We’ll start cutting down some trees.”

Darius looked at Andy and then at his muscles. Then he looked at the previously geeky heroes and the trees. “Seriously?”

Andy swallowed. “Seriously, what?”

“You want me to get the rope instead of cutting down the trees?”

Andy coughed. “Someone needs to do it.”

Darius stared at him blankly. “Have someone else get the rope.”

“R-Right.” Andy turned to Wiles. “Get the rope.”

Wiles saluted awkwardly. “On it.”

Darius sighed and looked at the blacksmithing tent. “I’ll get an axe.” He left minorly annoyed, but when he returned, he had a wild smile on his face. “Yo. Check this out, bro. This is some Full Metal Alchemist shit.”

Andy examined the blade. It had an array scrawled in blood. “What the hell is that?”

“I don’t know, but Master Mournings treated it like black magic.” Darius activated the blade, and it lit up with vibrant light and expelled intense magical pressure. “Oh, fuck yeah.”

“Wait. Let me see that.” Andy grabbed the axe and examined it with wide eyes.

“What is it?” Darius asked curiously.

“This is fresh blood, but….” Andy presented it to him. “I’ve seen this array before, but it looks like a child drew it.” Andy’s heart fluttered, and his hand trembled.

“Yeah…. And?”

“Quick. Go use it.”

“You want me to use this shit? If I lose an arm—“

“Or you can get the rope.”

“Whatever, bro.” Darius chuckled and grabbed it. “I was going to, anyway.” With a running head start, he bounded over the river in one jump and ran into the forest like a little kid.

3

Darius rushed into the woods, feeling like a blood sorcerer. When he reached the first tree, he skidded to a halt.

“Okay,” he gripped the axe with a grin. “Let’s do this shit.” With a mighty swing, he chopped the tree, and the craziest shit happened. The blade sheared through the tree as if there was nothing there. The momentum he put into the swing carried him forward, and he crashed head-first into the trunk, causing the half-cut tree to snap forward.

4

Andy watched the tree crash down with a pounding heart. The other heroes were screaming around him, and in a fit of bravery (or stupidity if he died), he tried to jump over the river. He failed—hard. He landed in the water, nearly getting swept away by the rapids before swimming to the other shore. After choking out water, he rushed into the forest, screaming, “Darius!”

To his chagrin, when he got to the forest, he could hear nothing but cackling laughter.

Andy frowned as he walked up and saw Darius laughing like a maniac on the ground. “What?”

“Bro. Bruh. Bruuuuuuuuh!” Darius laughed, gripping the axe against his chest and rocking back and forth. “This is some evil omen shit!”

Andy’s chugging heart slowed as he looked at the array on the circle. “It’s true…” he whispered. “That’s how we’ll do it.” Andy understood the nature of the test. He turned back and found Sara staring at him in the distance. He couldn’t see her expression, but if he had to guess—she was smiling.