Chapter 305: The Shape of the Games

Quin found the missing survivor in eleven minutes.

He did not enter the ruined street. He climbed the back of the starting shelter, crossed two roofs, and looked through a gap Max had left between the upper floors. The survivor sat beneath an overturned table with one leg trapped under a beam.

"There." Quin said.

Max stood below him. "Finding him is only part of it."

"I know. Come and hold the beam."

"I’m watching."

Quin examined the roof, the room below, and the ladder on the opposite wall. Then he sat down.

"You need a team for this test."

Max had expected to spend the morning testing the route. Instead, they spent it deciding what could usefully be tested by one person. Quin could identify shortcuts, check sight lines, and attempt to escape the course. He could not establish whether five ordinary competitors could carry six injured people through a street while monsters pressed them from behind.

They divided the work. Quin would test access and equipment. Max would run small groups of scenario inhabitants through specific tasks, with their strength and speed limited to the range expected of entrants. A full rehearsal would follow before anyone registered.

Anna arrived carrying the revised rescue instructions.

"Eight survivors. Six required to pass. Two hours from entry."

Quin climbed down to read them.

"Do they know there are eight?"

"Yes."

"Then they’ll spend half the time looking for the last two."

"They can choose to do that." Max said. "They know six is enough."

The course had three main streets and a passage through adjoining houses. Some survivors could walk. Others needed help. Two were trapped, and one refused to leave until someone found the person who had entered with him. Max made that refusal something the team could resolve through information rather than a compulsory detour. A survivor who learned his companion had already escaped would go willingly.

Anna walked through the houses while Quin tested a shutter.

"What happened here?" She asked.

"A caravan stopped in an abandoned settlement. The creatures moved in during the night."

"Then why are the injured people in separate houses?"

Max looked at the nearest room. He had placed a survivor there because the approach was interesting.

"They fled the first attack."

"Give them somewhere they fled from. A camp, wagons, something the rescuers can examine."

He added two damaged carts in the square and a cooking fire beneath an old awning. From there the scattered tracks made sense. A dropped water flask led toward one house; a strip torn from a blanket hung near another.

Quin opened the shutter and climbed through.

"Can they break these?"

"Yes."

"Then the building route is much faster."

"Is that a problem?"

Quin checked the room beyond. "Only if you wanted them to use the street."

Max left the shutter where it was.

They spent the afternoon in the second event’s grounds. A low ridge divided woodland from a group of abandoned works. A stream passed a mill, an old tower stood beside the eastern track, and several ruins offered different kinds of challenges. Max placed sixteen medal stations across the area.

Anna studied the distribution.

"Only eight teams advance."

"I don’t want the last teams fighting over the last available medal. They should have choices until the places are filled."

Each station would award one medal. Reaching it was not always enough. A team might have to clear a guarded chamber, recover a component, or repair the mechanism that opened its case. They would receive short descriptions at the start, with distances and broad indications of the work involved.

Quin pointed to the stream.

"Who owns the ferry?"

"An operator."

"Can I buy every crossing?"

Anna wrote the question down.

Max considered it. Claiming transport ahead of a rival was fair interference, but one wealthy guild should not be able to buy the entire event before taking a step.

"You can pay for your party’s next crossing. No advance purchase of empty trips."

"Can I bring the boat back myself?"

"If the operator agrees and you’re willing to spend the time."

Quin nodded toward the tower. "Then I might."

Max made a note to test how long the walk around the stream took. The ferry should save time, not decide the whole qualifier.

At the mill, the medal case stood behind a locked screen. A wooden wheel controlled the latch. Quin tried the handle, inspected the channels feeding the wheel, and walked upstream without being told what to do.

Anna watched him go.

"Will all the practical tasks be obvious to the Five Knots?"

"Some. Some of the fighting tasks will be obvious to Rod."

"You don’t want one perfect route for a particular team."

Max opened the map again. The mill was close to the start, but its repair needed parts from a shed farther along the bank. The tower took longer to reach and required climbing before work could begin. A nearby ruin offered a direct fight against powerful defenders. Each saved time in one place and demanded it somewhere else.

He moved the mill shed farther inland.

Quin called from upstream.

"The channel’s blocked. Is moving the stones the challenge?"

"Part of it."

"Then somebody strong can do it."

"Yes."

"Good."

They left the mill before Quin found the damaged axle. He would have a fair attempt later, and Max wanted him to approach the complete problem rather than help build every answer into it.

The treasury occupied the rest of the day.

Before leaving the qualifier grounds, Anna asked Max to place the finish where every returning party could reach it from more than one direction. Quin had already demonstrated how five people could occupy the only bridge and make passing impossible without contact.

Max widened the finish approach and added a second path through the trees. Then he tested the medal itself. It registered the party that earned it, not the hand carrying it. A competitor could pass it to a teammate, but another group could not claim a stolen medal as its own.

"What if they drop it in the stream?" Quin asked.

"Then they should retrieve it."

"And if another party finds it?"

"They can return it, leave it, or tell its owners where it is. They can’t carry it away to hide it."

Anna read the rule twice. "Make the cases explain that before anyone starts. Someone will otherwise spend an hour trying to earn a medal that’s already gone."

The emptied stations would display a clear notice. Their remaining mechanisms and defenders would cease offering a qualifying reward. Competitors could see that from the entrance without repeating a completed task.

Quin walked to the nearest station and read the new notice. He moved left, then right, checking how soon a person approaching through the trees would spot it. Finally he asked Max to lower the sign so someone crouching behind the broken wall could read it too.

Max had raised its lower walls and left the rooms open to the sky. Anna walked through the delivery court while Quin paced the outer boundary. The complex had public counters, storage rooms, work areas, guard posts, and eight secure rooms distributed across two inner wings.

"Who runs it?" Anna asked.

"A treasury office."

"Someone has to be in charge of the guards."

Max created a commander, then stopped before giving the man a fixed set of orders. He would need routines, authority, and reasonable limits on what he knew. Hearing an alarm in the western wing should not tell him that five thieves were hidden in a pipe on the east side.

The commander appeared beside a bare desk, looked at its empty surface, and asked for a map.

Max furnished the room before answering. A working office needed somewhere to keep reports and somewhere to sit through a quiet night. The commander tested the chair, moved it away from the window, and placed his sword within reach of the desk.

Quin smiled.

"He’s already ahead of us."

Max provided the map and explained the assignment. The commander listened without interrupting, then asked whether his guards could abandon a stolen treasure to protect the remaining vaults.

"Yes."

"Can I move guards between wings?"

"Yes."

"Then competitors will not face identical opposition after the first alarm."

"They’ll start with equal chances." Max said. "After that, what happens here matters."

The commander accepted that. He requested a reserve, a clear chain of command, and somewhere to hold captured intruders. Max provided a holding room with a release option that withdrew a competitor from the event. Escape remained possible, but captured equipment stayed secured nearby rather than vanishing from play.

Anna checked the distance between the vault wings.

"Can someone steal another team’s target?"

Max had considered allowing it. The more he pictured the result, the less he liked it. A team could spend days preparing, only to discover that another party had taken its object purely to prevent it finishing.

"Only your assigned treasure counts. Other targets remain secured against removal by the wrong team."

Quin touched an empty pedestal.

"Can I stand in front of it?"

"You cannot physically restrain or block competitors with your body. Close the door if you want. Move the furniture. Give them something they can work around."

"But I can’t nail their boots to the floor."

"No."

"What if they aren’t wearing them?"

Anna wrote damage to competitors’ equipment in firm letters.

The treasury commander watched the discussion with growing interest. When Max finished, he asked whether the competitors understood that a door closed by rivals might still be opened by guards.

"They will if they try it." Max said.

They tested the first alarm at dusk. Max placed an intruder in the delivery court and had him strike a guard. A bell rang above the gate. The nearest guards moved toward the fight, but the commander kept his reserve beside the inner doors.

Quin slipped through the unattended records entrance.

Three rooms later, a clerk saw him and shouted.

He fled into a narrow stairwell, found the upper door locked, and returned to discover two guards waiting below. The fight ended quickly. Max stopped the test before Quin needed to decide whether to break a window.

"That stair is useful." Quin said, breathing hard.

"You got trapped."

"This time. Give me a key and a reason to be there."

The commander marked the stair on his map and asked for better lighting near its lower entrance. Max approved the lamps but refused a request to brick up the records door. It served workers, and the treasury still needed to function.

Anna gathered the test notes while Quin tried the locked door again. He had found a length of wire somewhere.

"Are we finished?" She asked.

"For today." Max said.

The lock clicked.

Quin opened the door and leaned out onto the upper landing.

"You’ll want to put a guard up here."