Tom looked in the direction the rock had half rolled toward. The pot plant was talking to a bright yellow plastic plant.

“Got to fix this. Meddlesome things.” The rock muttered.

He glanced at it, and then it vanished.

There was a loud thump and his eyes shot up to see the rock firmly embedded into the ground where the hideous yellow plastic plant had previously been. Then there was a long pause as the two of them were looking at each other and clearly having a conversation that Tom couldn’t hear at all. He had already deduced that sound couldn’t cross the area barriers, so he wasn’t surprised that he couldn’t listen in. After thirty seconds, the pot plant was abruptly propelled forward and toward the central area in the same undignified manner that Tom had been.

Curled into a little ball - a posture that showed frustrated annoyance - it was forced to stand next to Tom.

“Great, now that you’re both here, we can continue with lecture. Unless...” The rock paused, and a pulse of energy radiated out for it. “Unless, of course, there are more.”

Almost on cue, like the rock had personally timed it, a cloud of red mist expanded, and the contender Tom thought of as the big guy was deposited. A very anaemic mushroom-looking person, one that was a head over Tom but would only have come up to an adult’s shoulder, seemed to have been the one to have brought him here.

“A big welcome to the three of you. I’m here to give you a rundown on how things are going to work. First introductions. My name is Amkhael, and I’m a member of the open section; my friend here is Esedhuil. Don’t feel required to listen to anything she says. She’s pretty new around here.”

“What do you mean? I’ve survived four cycles, and I have the debuffs to prove it.”

“And I’ve been here for five, so, as I said, ignore her. She’s too inexperienced to give good advice.”

The anaemic looking person puffed out to be twice her size, which he interpreted as her rolling her eyes. The seamless certainty that came with his interpretation of the other species body language was incredible.

Amkhael ignored her. “As we are open contenders, our responsibilities are different from yours, young ones. Not only are we expected to be the strongest - we’re required to mentor the newbies. So, I’m going to show you the resources we have. The data archive is the most important part of your being here.” The stone rolled over to the central boulder, which had a roughly cylindrical shape and the size of a small house. As Amkhael approached it, the entire thing lit up. “This is where we record all of our lists. If you don’t spend a significant part of the next four days studying it, you’re not doing things right and are likely to fail.”

The two other child one category people next to him immediately became more attentive.

The rock jiggled, clearly pleased. “There’s an expectation that, after every fight, you are going to record the details of the battle. The more information we gather about the opponents, the better, and, if you’re not recording every detail possible, we’ll kick you out. We may fight individually, but winning is a group effort.”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“DEUS is not using this in the same manner as the other GODs,” Esedhuil interrupted. “MAKROS and FAMES use it to eliminate emerging powerhouses. SUPREME, GOBUS and WADOR focus on winning and building strength, and the other two barely participate. Only DEUS, and, to a more limited extent, WADOR use it as a macro-economic tool to save civilisations in the wider world. That means our candidates, like you,” she looked straight at Tom, “are often weaker than those representing the other powers.”

“I’ll hold my own.” He promised.

Esedhuil fluffed herself in amusement. “How you can say that so confidently given your weakness stuns me. But the fact you’ve made it through must mean you’ve got some hidden trump cards.”

“It’s obviously like Corrine,” Amkhael interceded. “It looks a fair bit different, but it’s probably the same species.”

“She’s a giant. She’s taller than me, and her hair goes to her shoulders, not short like it.”

“You know we can ask it?” the rock said. “But I’m betting it’s from her species.”

“Yes, I’m human, and my name is Tom, and I use he pronouns.”

“Sorry,” the rock apologised. “It’s always hard with your weird shapes and furry mating rules. What’s the distinguishing features? Is it the white streak in the hair? Is the lack of that what makes one of you male?”

Tom laughed at that. “No, it’s not. There are lots of clues, but I guess you’ll need to have a skill or to be human to be able to tell. About Corrine, is she around often? I know her, but I don’t get to speak to her as much as I would like to in the real world.”

“Wait. You have two of the same species here?” The pot plant interrupted, looking dazed, something it expressed by letting all of its leaves hung limply. “Two at the same time!?”

“Yes, we do, and do you have a name?”

“Baptiste and I guess I’m what you would call male.” the pot plant said, introducing itself.

“Gruh Mul,” the large hulking creature said after a moment.

“Yes, yes,” Esedhuil continued, sounding frustrated at the interruption. “Some species like names. As I was saying. DEUS’s champions are often weaker than others, and we offset that by sharing data and compiling lists.”

“Exactly,” Amkhael interjected, his rock body bouncing up and down on the spot. “And these interfaces,” the central boulder glowed as he said that. “Allow you to access that data.” Abruptly, a list of names appeared - thirty-one of them, to be precise. Tom could see his own at the very bottom of the list. “This here is the DEUS child one list. It’s currently sorted by combat prowess.”

Tom devoured the information. There were three people with a general combat rating of above ten, and then Gruh Mul was in the next clump of names with an eight point three, while Baptiste was a bit below midfield with seven point four. Below Baptiste, the scores dropped steadily through the second worst had a combat ranking of four point nine.

“Our friend Tom is not very good on this metric,” Amkhael unhelpfully pointed out.

“I’ll grow.”

“I have no doubt.” The rock shivered on the spot, its equivalent of grinning.

Then the list changed abruptly with a new set of names, with the second place highlighted.

Adam – 9.6, 700

This list had been sorted by the number of coins rather than combat ranking, and Adam was there because he had gotten seven hundred of them. The general combat rating was far higher than the average in child one, so Tom deduced that this list came from an older category.

“Adam was a human,” Amkhael told him.

The list shifted again. This time, the person highlighted was Corrine. She had two hundred and sixty-one coins to her name, and, once more, her combat rating was far below everyone around her level of success.

“I have no doubt you’ll do well, because I’ve seen it before.” The rock said smugly. “It’s clear that you humans punch significantly above your weight. Is it a racial ability or is it a special skill you’re all taught?”

Tom glanced at him, sharply. “No. I’m not answering that. I’ve spilled that secret once. I won’t do it again.”