Chapter 291: A Reason to Choose Him

At eleven, Marris put the recording of Quay’s gusts on the practice-floor display.

Jin sat beside Glitch and watched Renn stop the replay at the moment Sledge’s foot shifted. Two instructors had set up padded targets nearby. One controlled the target while the other interfered with the students’ approach using small, timed disturbances.

Bex Arno watched the first attempt fail and frowned.

"Verdance doesn’t have Quay."

"No," Marris said. "They have other ways to interrupt you. Watch when the mistake happens."

The next student stepped around the disturbance, gave a command, and stopped moving while speaking. Jin recognized it immediately. Sabel had caught him doing the same thing often enough that his ribs seemed to remember before he did.

He practiced the footwork slowly beside the wall. Glitch followed his short commands without having to accelerate, and Marris left them to it until the break.

Jin spent the afternoon at a table with Corin and two other delegates, working through Verdance’s recordings.

Their usual fifth fighter was Yusra Deane, a third-year with a Slateback Tortoise called Bulwark. They had occupied that position in six of the seven contests Jin could find.

Bulwark was nine-Star, Silver (Peak). She and Deane had been together for two and a half years.

Jin opened the first recording. The tortoise planted her feet and raised a short ridge from the arena surface. After another few steps, she made a second. The gaps looked generous until Jin watched her opponent try to use them.

Corin leaned closer to the screen.

"She’s leaving that opening on purpose."

"Looks like it," Jin said.

The approaching beast entered between the ridges. Its hind foot sank, spoiling its stance, and Bulwark struck it with the edge of her shell.

Jin replayed the fall. The surface had loosened only beneath a small patch, almost invisible from that camera angle. Before it changed, Bulwark’s shell dipped as she settled onto all four feet.

He checked other recordings. Each change required that planted stance. Turning took time, and making repeated changes left the tortoise breathing harder. Deane managed it carefully, sometimes leaving an opponent room rather than spending energy to close every route.

Jin wrote down both details. He didn’t want to arrive with a plan that depended on her wasting herself.

Corin pointed at another paused frame. "Your lizard could get around that side."

"If she leaves it there." Jin advanced the recording. Bulwark turned, and the route closed behind a new ridge. "That’s the bit I need to make happen at the wrong time."

Marris had arranged movable barriers and taped patches on the practice floor by four.

"The tape represents loose ground," she said. "Step on it and we pause to account for the lost footing. Varra controls the barriers. Her ironhide gives you a moving opponent."

The broad practice beast waited beside its instructor.

"It won’t reproduce Deane’s decisions," Marris added. "I want to see whether you can keep making your own when the route changes."

The first attempt ended with Glitch carrying too much speed around a barrier. Jin called him back, but his hind foot crossed the tape before he stopped.

"Reset," Marris said.

The second went better until Jin looked at Varra instead of the floor. He walked directly into the route he’d told Glitch to take.

Glitch stopped and stared at him.

"I know," Jin muttered, moving aside.

He wanted to do well so badly that he kept trying to solve the entire arrangement before moving. Varra changed it while he was still deciding.

On the third attempt, he gave Glitch a simpler job: approach the open lane, but stop short of entering it.

A barrier shifted. Jin immediately sent him around the outside, where the ironhide had begun turning toward the original threat.

"Better," Marris said. "Again."

Varra didn’t move the barrier on the next attempt. Jin let Glitch advance another pace, making the threat real enough to demand a response, then redirected him when the opening changed.

By the break, the lizard’s braking was more reliable. Jin checked his breathing and offered water while Marris reviewed the sequence.

"Deane has seen your Rush," she said. "Expect her to offer you a straight route."

"I don’t have to use it."

"No. Show me how you keep pressure without it."

Jin looked at the space beside the barriers. There was room for him to move there while Glitch approached from the other side.

On the next pass, he took it.

Varra glanced toward him, and the ironhide’s turn began late. Glitch reached its rear quarter before the instructor called a halt.

Marris beckoned Jin over.

"What were you trying to do?"

"Make the tamer guard while Glitch moves. Just for a moment."

"Deane reinforces herself. She’s capable of hitting you back."

"I wasn’t planning to stay there."

"Then show me the way out."

They practiced the approach and withdrawal at a walk before repeating it with the barriers moving. Once, Jin retreated directly backward and Varra cut him off. He reset, stepped diagonally on the next attempt, and kept giving commands as he moved.

When Marris ended the assessment, Glitch was tired enough to welcome the rest but still turning comfortably.

"Fifth," she told Jin. "I’m submitting you fifth."

He looked at her before he could help himself.

"You’ve shown me a useful answer," Marris said. "That earns consideration. Your condition and your adjustment today are why I’m willing to use it."

"Thank you, Coach."

"Verdance may change their order. We’ll review the pairing when it arrives. Until then, care checks and dinner."

Jin collected the chalk markers because he needed something to do before he started grinning.

The lineups went in at nine. Half an hour later, the official notification reached his phone.

[Meridian vs Verdance Hall — Arena 3 — tomorrow, 10:00]

[Team report: 08:45]

[5. J. Astor vs Y. Deane]

Jin read his name twice, then opened the opponent’s profile again. His own now showed nine-Star. Deane would have the update too.

Marris gathered the selected students briefly before releasing them for the night.

"If either academy reaches three wins before the fifth bout, Astor doesn’t enter," she said. "Until that happens, all five of you stay ready."

Jin understood. He still hoped to fight, and felt guilty about wanting a close contest when the others would probably prefer an uncomplicated win.

He went upstairs and called home.

Elsa answered almost immediately.

"Why are you calling this late?"

"I’ve been selected."

"For tomorrow?" She sat forward. "An actual match?"

"A possible match. I’m fifth."

Elsa was already calling for their parents. Jin waited while the picture shook, someone complained about the volume, and his mother came into view still drying her hands.

"Tell us again," Elena said.

He explained the order and the possibility that the contest might finish before his turn. His mother listened, then smiled.

"They chose you. Let us be pleased about that first."

Jin rubbed the back of his neck. "I’m pleased too."

Arthur settled beside her and asked about the opponent. Jin described Bulwark’s ridges, the loose ground, and the way Deane waited for a committed approach.

"Nine-Star?" his father asked.

"Same as Glitch. Since this morning."

Elsa made an outraged noise. "You left that out?"

"I was getting to it."

Arthur’s smile widened before he leaned toward the screen. "How did he take the advancement?"

"Comfortably. We spent most of the day adjusting. The medic checked him."

"Good." His father listened while Jin described the practice, asking where he would stand when Glitch went around a barrier. Jin used his free hand to show him.

Elena interrupted when he started explaining the fourth variation.

"Have you eaten?"

"Yes."

"And you’re going to sleep after this?"

Jin glanced at the recordings open behind the call. "Yes."

Elsa narrowed her eyes. "That took too long."

He closed the recording where she could see him do it, and she nodded in satisfaction.

Before they said goodnight, she asked whether he was scared.

"A bit," Jin admitted.

His father nodded. "You can be scared and still do what you’ve practiced."

Jin looked down at his wrapped hand, then back at their faces. "I’ll message after. Even if I don’t get called."

"We’ll be waiting," Elena said.

After the call, he set the phone aside and lay down. He could still hear Glitch shifting in the stall below, and for once he was glad the hotel walls weren’t entirely soundproof.