Two mostly uneventful weeks passed since the championship’s announcement. During the morning, Nil and their friends attended classes, which had moved on from History to Battle Tactics to finally, ever since a few days ago, Mana Manipulation. The director didn't make any further attempts to speak to Nil after their fight. They weren't sure whether that meant they were in the clear or something else entirely, but Nil was thankful nonetheless. Something told them they wouldn't be able to leave the Academy without having another conversation with him, though.

Nil and their team spent the evenings training, but they agreed to practice separately at first, in order to raise their stats to a decent level. Nil themself did pretty well, raising their strength and endurance from F to E rank by simply exercising, and their mana capacity from D to C rank by repeatedly practicing with its use.

[Nil’s Stats: Strength: E. Agility: D. Endurance: E. Mana Capacity: C. Mana Conductivity: B.]

Today, with around a week left until the start of the championship, they decided it was time to see how well they could work together. As it turned out, the answer was rather simple: Not very well.

“Quit getting in my way, Ray!” Nova shouted.

[Nova’s Stats: Strength: D. Agility: C. Endurance: E. Mana Capacity: E. Mana Conductivity: E.]

“Sorry!” Ray said, jumping to the side.

[Ray’s Stats: Strength: D. Agility: D. Endurance: D. Mana Capacity: D. Mana Conductivity: D]

An arrow flew from Nova’s string to the other side of the field, narrowly missing Max, who cried out in response.

“Aren’t you supposed to be protecting me, Kai?” he yelled. “By the way, are we sure this is safe? I don’t want to get my skull pierced by one of those arrows!”

[Max’s Stats: Strength: E. Agility: E. Endurance: E. Mana Capacity: C. Mana Conductivity: D.]

“It’s fine!” Kai called out as he crouched under one of Nil’s swings and prepared to throw back a punch. “All our weapons are imbued with a spell to make them safe, remember?”

[Kai’s Stats: Strength: C. Agility: E. Endurance: C. Mana Capacity: E. Mana Conductivity: E.]

Nil managed to backstep quickly enough to avoid Kai’s fist, and made use of Insight to move around his next attack and land a hit on his side, causing him to fall over.

“Kai’s out!” Nil said.

They turned around just in time to see one of Max’s magic missiles hitting Ray, throwing him to the ground.

“So is Ray!” Max said.

It was Nil and Nova against Max. With Kai out, they were fairly confident in being able to pull it off. Nil rushed toward Max, who was already charging up another volley of missiles.

To make the bout fairer, since it was three against two, Nil wasn’t allowed to use mana, their best attribute. Insight had allowed them to compete against Kai, but that was only because it was a mock fight, and they just needed to make him fall. In a real battle, Nil would’ve needed to land a lot more hits without getting caught even once.

Max started firing his attack, and Nil only managed to evade two of the three missiles, the other hitting them on the shoulder. They managed to stay upright, however. With the distance now closed, it was over for Max.

Nil swung their sword at him, but it was suddenly stopped in midair. A thin translucent barrier had appeared between Max’s raised hand and the blade.

“That’s a new trick,” Nil said.

Max grinned. “What can I say? I’m a fast learner!” He pushed Nil’s sword away and dashed forward, dagger in hand, while they were still recovering from the clash.

Nil regained their footing just in time to block the attack with their forearm instead of their chest. They grunted as the blade dug into their skin, but soon waved their sword once more.

However, the hit never landed, as something pierced Nil’s back, causing him to trip to the ground.

“What the hell was that, Nova?” they cried out.

The girl was already preparing her next arrow. “I wanted to get the finishing blow on him, but you moved onto my trajectory at the last second!”

Max tried to block her next shot with his barrier, but the arrow broke straight through it and bounced against his belly with a loud noise. He fell over with a surprised yell, and Nova pumped her fist in the air. “We won!”

The rest of the team seemed a bit more dejected as they gathered together near the middle of the field. Ray lied down on the grass and sighed contentedly.

“This place is pretty relaxing,” he said.

Nil nodded, looking around the pocket dimension created by the catalyst. It appeared as an expansive grassy field, overlooked by a clear blue sky. The only sound that could be heard was the gentle rustle of the wind. It was like a perfect summer day.

Max sat with his legs crossed and shook his head. “That was horrible. We were tripping all over ourselves.”

“You’re right,” Nil said. “We have a hard time coordinating our efforts.”

Kai laughed and threw his arm over Nil’s shoulder. “We’ll just have to keep practicing, then! For now, who wants to go get some grub?”

“I’m pretty hungry,” Nova said.

Ray sat up. “Yeah, we’ve been at it for the entire afternoon.”

“Fine, but we really do need to keep training afterward,” Max said.

Nil chuckled and fished their catalyst out of their pocket. They opened the portal and the group walked out and into Nil’s tiny room. The dormitories were pretty bare-bones, but at least each person had an individual space.

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They entered the hallway and headed for the stairs, since the room was located on the third floor. For a medieval construction, the Academy building was incredibly impressive. Between the five lecture halls, the huge dorms, the professors’ offices and the training grounds, it almost seemed boundless.

The architecture itself was basic, being more concerned with practicality than any type of aesthetic, but there was a certain charm to ancient stone structures, even if this one wasn’t quite so ancient from this world’s perspective.

After a short trek through the corridors, the group arrived at the cafeteria, which was yet another large area. If you added up all the tables and benches, there was easily room for a couple hundred people.

Nil and the others got served a bowl of dull yet nutritious stew and grabbed a table

Kai stirred his bowl with the wooden spoon they had been given, and frowned.

“No meat today either,” he said.

Ray chuckled and took a spoonful of the broth. “Don’t be picky, they already told us we’d only be getting pork once a week.”

Nova raised an eyebrow at Ray. “I still don’t understand how you can enjoy having this every other day.”

Max began downing the stew at a shocking speed. He put it down once he was about halfway through.

“It’s apparent none of you kids have ever had to go a week without eating a good meal,” he said.

Nova looked at him sideways. “There’s broth on your beard.”

“Shit,” Max said, quickly wiping his face with the table cloth.

Nil laughed, prompting an intense glare from Max.

“I’m sorry, it’s just…” They looked down at their food. “We’ve only known each other for a few weeks, and yet it feels so natural to be with all of you.”

“How corny,” Nova said, smiling nonetheless.

Ray patted Nil’s shoulder. “No better way to earn trust than going through a life and death situation together.”

“What about him?” Max said, pointing at Kai with his spoon. “He just decided to join us one day.”

Kai scratched his head and smiled. “Well, I wanted to team up with Nil, and they were with you guys, so…”

“I think it’s fair to say it worked out in the end,” Ray said.

Max sighed. “We’ve got a lot of practice ahead of us. Maybe training individually for the first two weeks wasn’t such a good idea…”

Suddenly, someone tapped on Nil’s shoulder, startling them into turning around.

“Asha?” they said. She was another student at the Academy, one who was doing quite well for herself.

She easily towered over Nil, and her long auburn hair and tan skin almost blended with the leather armor she was always wearing. In contrast with her otherwise straightforward outfit, she was wearing an emerald pendant that matched her green eyes.

A cursory glance with Insight revealed that all her stats had already reached C rank, placing her well above most others, including Nil and their friends.

[Name: Asha. Age: 30. Background: Office Worker.]

Huh. Nil hadn’t been expecting such a normal job.

“Nil, right?” Asha asked.

They nodded. “Did you need something?”

“You’re the one who broke that record on the first day, are you not?”

“I am, yeah…” Was she mad about that? Even if one of Nil’s stats was higher than hers, she was still more impressive overall.

Asha nodded, as if she had been expecting the answer. “I want to challenge your team to a mock battle,” she said.

Nil looked over to their friends. Kai gave an excited thumbs up, and the others didn’t look opposed to the idea either. “I’m sure it can be arranged,” they said. “How about you go get your teammates and—”

“No,” she said. “I want to fight all of you by myself.”

Nova scoffed. “A bit overconfident, aren’t you? You may be strong, but it’s five against one.”

“I’ll drop out of the championship if I lose,” she said.

The entire group was stunned by the declaration.

Ray chuckled. “Her team is the favorite to win. If we can get her out of the picture, it will make things a lot easier for us.”

Nil was concerned about the unfairness of the situation, but in the end they accepted the deal and headed over to the training grounds, which had become a lot less densely populated ever since they had been given the catalysts.

Asha grabbed a scimitar from her pocket dimension and calmly positioned herself on one side of the arena, while Nil’s team got into the formation they had come up with: A pentagon, with Kai as the vanguard, Nil and Ray as flanks, and Max and Nova at the back.

“We should try to overwhelm her from the beginning,” Ray said. “It’ll be bad if she starts to pick us off one by one.”

The others nodded as Asha started counting down to signal the start of the match.

Kai, Ray and Nil rushed at her in an attempt to surround her, but she jumped over the trio by enhancing her legs with mana, landing right behind Kai and slashing at his legs, tripping him over before any of them could react.

She turned sharply toward Ray and lunged at him, powering herself up with mana again. However, her trajectory was cut short by one well-placed arrow coming from Nova, which took away her attention. She seemingly decided the back line was higher on her list of targets, as she dashed at Nova at an unbelievable speed.

When Max bombarded her with magic missiles, she easily deflected them by creating a barrier with a wave of her hand and kept going, knocking out Nova before she got a chance to prepare another shot.

Fearing Max was next, Nil used mana to close in on him, hoping to protect him. Their mistake was made apparent when they glanced to the side and saw Asha leaping toward Ray. With no chance for either of them to react, he was swiftly eliminated as well.

With that, in less than a minute, Asha had annihilated most of their team. Her stats weren’t the only thing in her favor—her quick thinking and her ability to use her options to the fullest were what truly set her apart.

Nil approached her cautiously, their confidence all but shattered. Max started charging another attack and nodded at Nil, indicating them to distract Asha in order to find an opening.

Gulping, Nil ran toward her and screamed in an attempt to hold her attention. Their blades clashed, and Nil began pouring all their mana into their sword, trying to overpower her if only for a brief moment. The plan seemed to work and she was pushed back, but suddenly she let their blade slide right off of hers, and all the power of their swing caused them to lose their balance for a brief moment.

As she was about to deal the finishing blow, Max’s missiles finally arrived. Asha swung her mana-charged scimitar at them and they were reflected straight back at Max, who was thrown onto the ground. Only Nil was left.

Even so, the brief distraction was enough for Nil to recover, and they breathed deeply as they faced Asha again. It was time. They activated Insight and focused on the flow of their mana, bringing it to their eyes.

[‘Insight’ has temporarily evolved into ‘Precognition’.]

Asha’s shadow immediately shot forward and sliced at Nil’s legs, so they stomped on the real blade’s path and forced it to the ground, causing Asha to stumble forward and grunt in shock. She tried to use the position to her advantage by letting go of the scimitar and lunging directly for Nil, but they simply dodged out of the shadow’s way before she got to them herself.

Nil was ready to bring the sword down, but they felt a sting of pain in the head and prematurely cut off the flow of mana to avoid falling unconscious again. Asha took advantage of the opening and swept their legs, ending the fight as Nil fell on their butt.

“You’re way too strong,” Nil said, panting.

Asha smiled. “You surprised me back there. I almost thought I was dead meat.”

She offered a hand and Nil took it, getting up on their feet.

The rest of their team soon gathered around the two as well.

“Damn,” Ray said, chuckling. “We suck.”

Kai, Nova and Max looked pretty defeated. It had certainly been a shameful display.

“I’ve made up my mind,” Asha said. “There’s only about a week left, but I think there’s enough potential here.”

Nil cocked their head. “What do you mean?”

She put a hand on her hip and smiled. “I’m going to help you all train for the championship!”