Chapter 52: Garen Rezvolt & Isolde Rezvolt

Logan may not have seen Alice’s parents in the flesh before, but he’d definitely heard their names and seen their pictures, more than once.

Garen Rezvolt, the father. Ranked 13th on Earth’s Global Player Leaderboard.

Isolde Rezvolt, the mother. Ranked 9th.

Even among tens of thousands of Tier-9 Players, these two sat right at the frontier of what anyone on this planet had managed to climb.

"We won’t stay long. Let’s get straight to the point." Garen patted Logan’s shoulder with a smile, and Logan felt an entirely different kind of chill than the one Alice usually gave him.

"What’s the deal with you two? Be truthful."

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing." Logan shook his head, voice too clear, too careful, like he was worried Garen might mishear a single word of it. "She’s after me. I mean, she’s helped me a lot. And I’m just grateful."

"Dad..." Alice’s eyes narrowed scarily at her father.

Isolde chuckled. "Stop it, Garen. We promised we wouldn’t interfere, now that she’s turned eighteen."

"That’s right." Alice pouted, mouth working side to side. "Leave us alone already."

Garen’s grin eased into something more measured. "Alright, alright. One more thing, though, before we actually let you two be."

He looked Logan over properly for the first time since sitting down. "Alice tells us you want to step out publicly as Player L. Under a different name."

"Leon Flanke." Logan nodded. "That’s the plan."

"Good name." Garen nodded. "We can work with that."

"Join our Agency," Isolde said it plainly, no preamble to soften it. "Ascendant Circle. We back a good number of the strongest independent players on this planet, and we’re always looking for more worth backing. We have a strict policy and rules that basically boil down to ’don’t do bad things,’ and it should be easy to follow."

Logan hesitated. "What would that actually mean? For me. For my family."

"It means resources. Connections. A name people respect instead of question." Garen leaned forward and gave an assured smile. "And it means protection, for whatever that’s worth coming from us specifically."

Isolde’s expression sharpened, all the warmth from a moment ago tightening into something far more serious.

"Nothing happens to your family. Not while you’re under our name." She held his eyes the whole time she said it. "Our daughter likes you. Trusts you, even, which isn’t something she does easily or often. That’s enough for us to mean this properly, not just as a courtesy."

The knot that had been sitting behind Logan’s ribs since they’d sat down finally eased. "Thank you. I mean that."

"We’ll start putting your name out properly." Garen was already thinking ahead, Logan could tell. "Our connections carry weight. Player L climbing the Floor One leaderboard the way you did, that’s a story people will want to hear, and we’ll make sure they hear the right version of it."

"What game do you want to play next?" Isolde asked, eyes glinting. "You already hit Tier-4. That’s pretty bold, but you must have power to back that up."

Logan hitting Tier-4, having skipped previous tiers and their games, means he would enter a Floor 4 game as a level 10 player. Usually, level 30 players, who reached that level in Floor 3 games, would compete in Floor 4 games after increasing their tier.

"No worry, Mom. He got four Mythic-rank units. All of them can hit Tier-4 automatically when he enters the Floor 4 game, so he’d have plenty of starting power to get ahead of others even if they are level 30 players," Alice said with a grin.

"Four mythic..."

Garen and Isolde were surprised.

"Yes. And I’ll be playing Star Hunters." Logan smiled.

Both of their eyes showed clear anticipation. They were passive before, but now actively curious about Logan.

"Star Hunters, then." Isolde glanced at something only she could see, checking a schedule Logan had no access to. "Tomorrow. Noon. That gives us enough time to get the announcement out first."

"Tomorrow, noon," Logan repeated it, then looked between the two of them. "Thank you. Really. For all of this."

"Now you have to catch up to him fast since you wanted to play duo games." Isolde chuckled.

Since Logan hit Tier-4, he can only play games on the fourth floor, making it impossible for Alice to play with him until she reaches the same Tier as him.

Alice pouted. "I will catch up. Just wait."

"Also, take him to that place for a bit of publicity," Isolde said. "We’ll connect the trail ourselves, so it will help reinforce the narration of Leon Flanke."

"Alright, we’ll take our leave now. Be careful when you roam around." Garen patted Logan’s back again and turned to go.

"And Alice, don’t do anything stupid. You know the safety rules." Isolde said it directly at Alice before looking at Logan. "Take care of her, Logan."

Logan smiled wryly. "I’ll do my best. Though she’s the one taking care of me, for now."

"Soon, you’ll be the one doing that."

"Haha, that’s right. Good luck, boy."

The parents left.

...

After Alice and Logan finished eating and talking about some things, they left.

"Come on." She was already pulling him along by the arm. "We are going to a fun place."

"The one your mom told us to go?"

"Yep."

The Arena Tower sat near the edge of the Hub, impossible to miss once Logan actually looked for it, nine distinct rings stacked on top of each other like something built by someone who’d never heard the phrase too much. Noise rolled out of it even from a distance, crowds packed into every visible level.

"Each floor’s tied to a Player Tier." Alice led him toward the entrance, weaving through the crowd. "You only fight people at your own level. Keeps things fair, mostly."

"The good thing is the Spirit Armor system." She tapped her own chest. "Everyone gets one, a hundred HP, purely cosmetic outside of a fight, but it takes real damage inside one. First person’s armor hits zero, they lose. Nobody actually gets hurt."

They found the first ring without much trouble, a wide circular arena ringed with stadium seating already half full, a massive floating screen overhead cycling through names and odds for whoever was fighting next.

"I’m fighting." Alice was already rolling her sleeves up.

Her opponent turned out to be a young man about Logan’s age, dressed in clothes that cost more than Logan’s entire old apartment building probably had, flanked by an entourage that looked more decorative than useful.

```

[ Corren Ashvale ]

Level: 10 | Tier-2

Vs

[ Ruby Starviel ]

Level: 10 | Tier-1

```

Alice naturally gave a false name. A name she had used publicly multiple times, and was associated with the girl who awakened the Mythic-rank class.

The scanning device that judged her physique showed her level and Tier only, as the arena management only wanted that information for fairness.

"Let’s make it interesting." Alice’s grin turned sharp. She held up something that shimmered faintly even in the arena’s bright light. "Tier-5 Legendary armor. On the line."

Corren’s eyes flicked toward it, his jaw tightening for half a second while he ran the numbers, before the confidence came back in full. "Fine. My father’s Tier-5 blade, then."

The fight opened with Corren already moving, some kind of enhanced dash closing the distance in a blink, a spear leveled straight at Alice’s chest.

Comet Step!

She blinked clear of the spear’s reach before it finished closing, already circling to a new angle before Corren had fully registered she was gone.

Starpiercer Volley!

Three arrows loosed in the same breath, and Corren barely got a shield construct up in time to catch the first two. The third slipped past the edge of it and clipped his shoulder, his own Spirit Armor number ticking down on the overhead display.

Corren pressed forward anyway, spear thrusting in a series of fast, practiced strikes, clearly someone who’d trained properly and not just bought his way into confidence.

Alice met every thrust with just enough movement to avoid the worst of it, never quite where the spear expected her to be.

Meteor Nock!

The shot took him square in the chest, and his Spirit Armor number dropped hard, more than half of it gone in a single hit.

Corren tried one last desperate lunge, and Alice simply wasn’t where he aimed anymore.

Comet Step!

She landed behind him, bow already drawn, and put the last shot square between his shoulder blades before he’d even finished turning around.

```

[ Corren Ashvale’s Spirit Armor: 0 ]

[ Ruby Starviel wins. ]

```

The crowd roared. Somewhere in the stands, a lot of people had apparently bet correctly.

Corren’s Tier-5 blade materialized in Alice’s open palm a moment later, the system settling the stake automatically, and she tossed it once in her hand before tucking it away like it was nothing at all.

Alice turned and pointed straight at Logan, grin widening.

"Come on. Let’s have one."

Logan’s pulse kicked hard against his own ribs.

’A real one, this time.’ Last time he’d had nothing but a sword with a Normal-rank class behind it. But now, it was different. ’Mythic class against Mythic class. Bow against sword. Let’s see how this actually goes.’

He stepped into the ring across from her, and the crowd noise shifted, curious now, sensing something different about this particular matchup.