Chapter 154| The Night Before

Chapter 154: Chapter 154| The Night Before

"So we’re at 2–1, with me leading," Zane said as they reset, ten paces apart.

"One more hit and you win," Dex replied, cracking his neck. "Good thing I’m not planning on letting you."

Zane didn’t rush him. He kept Overdrive idling at C-rank and waited. Dex had shown he’d act first, so Zane let him.

Dex crouched, pressed a palm to the ground, and fired two waves behind his heels. He shot across the field like he’d been thrown.

’There it is,’ Zane thought. ’He’s committing.’

He dropped low and slammed his palm into the earth, sending a short wave straight under Dex’s incoming step. The ground bucked. Dex’s rhythm broke by half a beat, and his palm caught Zane’s shoulder as he stumbled through.

"Hit!" Dex shouted. "Two–two!"

"That was a stumble."Zane said.

"That was a hit." Dex probed.

"Fine," Zane said, grinning. "Next one decides it."

They went at each other again. This time they landed at the same instant, Zane’s fist on Dex’s ribs and Dex’s palm on Zane’s chest, and both of them froze with the contact still warm.

"That’s a draw," Zane said.

"That’s a victory," Dex said.

"We hit at the same time."

"I hit first. You just felt it second." Dex said.

"That’s not how time works." Zain replied.

"It’s how Super Dex’s time works," Dex added, and flopped onto the grass with his arms spread wide.

Zane laughed, bent over with his hands on his knees.

"Why do I feel like you went easy on me and made us draw?" Dex said, rolling onto his side.

"I might have," Zane said. "There was no use in winning."

"What the fuck?" Dex sat up. "I know you’re bluffing, asshole. That’s why your type are girls with small asses."

Zane laughed it off. "Anything that helps you sleep, Dex."

They sat on the low stone wall at the edge of the field, passing a water bottle between them.

"About Wednesday," Dex said.

Zane tensed slightly.

"I’m not going to tell you how to fight him," Dex said. "I’d just get it wrong. I’m not the one who has to stand there."

"Okay."

"I’ll tell you what I saw at the rank trials, though." Dex turned the bottle in his hands. "He’s good. Properly good. He didn’t make fourth place by accident. He’s strong, he’s patient, and he’s got room to grow. People talk about him like he’s all mouth, and he’s not." He glanced sideways. "He’s a hero in the making who’s got a real problem with you."

"That’s it?" Zane asked.

"That’s all I’ve got."

Zane thought about that for a while.

It wasn’t advice. It wasn’t a map. It was just honesty from someone who clearly didn’t want to hand him a false sense of safety.

’He trusts me to work it out,’ he thought.

『 Dex — Familiarity +1% 』

『 System Note: Genuine, unforced advice. The system recognises it. 』

"Thanks," Zane said.

"Don’t thank me yet." Dex stood, stretched, and clapped him on the back. "You owe me breakfast. I won the first round."

"We drew."

"I won the first round." Zain said.

They walked back across the wet grass toward the dormitory, Dex narrating every highlight of the spar in increasingly generous detail.

Halfway there Zane pulled out his communicator.

He thought about it for a long moment. About Vael’s warning. About the annoying Ryan he had a score to settle with. About the fraud with a voice saying his father’s name like it was a punchline.

He typed.

Wednesday. Arena One.

He hit send before he could change his mind.

The reply came in under a minute.

Ryan: Smart.

Zane put the communicator away.

"Who was that?" Dex asked.

"Nobody."

"Liar."

"Breakfast first," Zane said. "Then we’ll talk."

_ _

Zane arrived at the cafeteria at exactly 7:10 AM .

The cafeteria was nearly empty, and Dex was still narrating.

"And that was the moment I realised I’d made a terrible mistake by not wearing the headband to every spar," Dex said, jabbing a fork at his tray. "It gives me focus. It gives me aura."

"It gives you a dent in your forehead," Zane said.

"Aura leaves marks."

Zane pushed a plate of eggs toward him and went back to his rice. He’d paid for both trays, which was the deal. Dex hadn’t mentioned that he’d called it a draw earlier. Neither of them brought it up again.

Halfway through the meal, Zane noticed the looks.

A table of second years glanced over and whispered. Two first years from 1-B slowed down on their way to the counter. A girl he didn’t know nodded at him, once, like she was marking a name on a list.

"What’s with these stares it’s as if they all know," Zane said quietly.

"Everybody knows," Dex said with his mouth full. "Ryan told half the block himself. Wednesday, Arena One, open gallery." He swallowed. "Congratulations. You’re famous."

"I don’t want to be famous." Zain chuckled taking a spoon of rice.

"Nobody gets a choice."

Zane stared at his rice.

’A day,’ he thought. ’In just less than a day.’

『 System Note: The host’s duel is now public knowledge. The system recommends sleep. 』

’I’ll sleep.’

『 The system is satisfied with your response. 』

_ _

Vael found him between classes.

She stepped out of an empty classroom as he passed, one hand holding a tablet against her hip. She didn’t call his name. She just fell into step beside him, and the corridor seemed to thin out around them.

"You accepted his challenge," Vael said.

"Yes, Instructor."

"I heard from Ryan’s side before yours." She kept her eyes ahead. "That’s the order I’d prefer it to be the other way round."

"I wasn’t hiding it," Zane said, glancing at her sideways.

"I know you weren’t." Vael kept her eyes on the corridor ahead, her heels clicking in a steady rhythm. A pause. "I’m refereeing."

Zane stopped mid-step and turned his head. "You?"

"The duel is registered as a practice match." She tapped the tablet against her hip. "It needs an instructor on the floor and I’d rather it be someone who knows what they’re looking at." Her voice dropped to a flat, careful level. "I told you not to run unsupervised tests. This is supervised. You’re welcome."

"Thank you," Zane said, his shoulders easing a little.

"Don’t thank me yet. If anything unusual happens in that arena, I’ll be the first person to see it." She finally glanced at him, and for a second her expression softened by a few degrees. "Stay inside your own limits, Calloway. Win clean or lose clean. Either is survivable."

She turned off down the next corridor without another word.

Zane watched her go.

’She’s making herself the witness,’ he thought. ’So nobody else can be.’

『 System Note: Instructor Vael has placed herself between the host and the field division. This is not accidental. 』

’I know.’

_ _

By evening the school had settled into its usual rhythm of dinner noise and distant doors.

Zane sat alone on the floor of an empty practice room on the fourth floor, back against the wall, a notebook open on his knee. He’d skipped the last lecture. Nobody had asked where he was.

He drew a rough diagram. Two circles on opposite sides of a field. An arrow between them, curving.

Pressure Wave. B-rank. Long-range.

’Ryan charges before a big wave,’ he thought. ’I saw it at the rank trials. Half a beat of loading, then the push. A wall of compressed air that hits like a punch from a cannon.’

He tapped the pen on the paper.

’Dex beat Afterimage because he moved first. He never saw through it. The skill was never tested against a real attack.’

He drew a second figure, faint, a few inches behind the first. The echo.

’If I trigger it during Ryan’s charge, the wave goes toward the copy. He fires at where I was. That gives me a window.’

He drew a third arrow, short and sharp, straight into Ryan’s chest.

Impact Breaker. B-rank, ten percent. Close range.

『 System Note: The host has a plan. The system has no confidence in it. 』

’Why not?’

『 Afterimage has been tested against a stationary target, a fence, a football and one fast opponent who acted first. Against a real ranged attack, the window is unconfirmed. 』

’So I’ll find out tomorrow.’

『 The system is aware. It does not recommend finding out in front of an audience. 』

Zane closed the notebook.

’I’ll take the risk,’ he thought.

Nobody answered that.

_ _

His communicator buzzed three times in a row while he was walking back to the dorm.

He checked it under a lamppost.

Nyx: Don’t die in front of an audience. Not before I figure you out.

He stared at it. Then he laughed, short and quiet, and typed back: I’ll try not to.

Nyx: Try harder.

Another buzz.

Maren: I’ll be in the stands. Front row, if Nil doesn’t take the seats first. You’ll be fine. Get some sleep.

He read it twice. The "you’ll be fine" sat there a little too neatly, the way she wrote things when she meant more than the words.

He typed: Thanks. See you there.

A third buzz.

Sera: Heat reading’s all set. I’ll be high left. Look up if you want a signal.

Zane typed: Signal for what?

Sera: Whatever you need.

He put the communicator back in his pocket and kept walking.

Four people, he thought. Four different ways of saying the same thing. He didn’t know what to do with it, so he didn’t try.

_ _

His dorm room was dark when he got back, and Dex was already asleep with his headband still on.

Zane crept past the bed and dropped onto his own. The vent wheezed. A strip of lamplight crossed the ceiling and slid slowly down the wall.

He lay there with his hands behind his head and checked the corner of his vision.

『 Slot 1: Overdrive — B-rank, 40% ceiling 』

『 Slot 2: Impact Breaker — B-rank, 10% ceiling 』

『 Slot 3: Kinetic Force — B-rank, 0% ceiling 』

Three Sigils. One of them still wouldn’t wake up.

He tried the third slot anyway, a soft pull in the dark. Nothing answered. The seam he’d found in Arena 3 was still there, but there was no power behind it.

’I won’t use it tomorrow,’ he thought. ’Not unless I have to.’

『 System Note: The host has made the correct decision. 』

’I’m always correct.’

『 The system will log it as unverified. 』

Zane almost smiled.

His communicator lit up one last time, throwing blue light across the ceiling.

Ryan: Don’t be late.

He looked at it for a long moment.

Then he turned the screen off and closed his eyes.