Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Unprompted letters directly from high-ranking government offices are rare, so to say that there is a standard response would be stretching it a little. It can be inferred from the general reaction of each pro Glory player who received one, though, that Ye Xiu’s “shit, they found me” was nonstandard.

In fact, the reaction was shared by only one other person: Huang Shaotian, who was not, even to his own knowledge, being chased by anyone at all.

He’s just that kind of person.

Ye Xiu was absolutely being chased by someone. However, he greatly suspected (and was completely correct in thinking) that if the family and its associated department knew of his reaction, they’d lean forward on the mandatory large desk with their hands folded together ominously to say “we never lost you.”

But, given that he’d spent the last seven years playing games on his own, and his one “visit” home to fetch his ID—or an ID, anyway, since he’d had to borrow Ye Qiu’s instead—ended in a clean escape, he’d dared to hope he’d managed to give them the slip.

He was actually half right: Though his parents had their suspicions about the tyrannical and outrageously superior One Autumn Leaf for the name’s close relation to “Ye Qiu,” they didn’t know for sure where he was, those first years. Or even if he was playing Glory at all.

Because, in a move so excessive most no one in the general population would believe it, the Ye family had designed Glory for the main purpose of netting Ye Xiu back.

Well, on a personal level, they intended to net Ye Xiu back. Officially, they were using a game to ferret out highly-skilled operators from the massive Chinese public, claiming it was the fastest way to crowdsource improvements to the meta of remote-piloted battles and related equipment—and they weren’t wrong.

Just, the idea came from the fact that their eldest liked video games, and was sure to chase the proposed “Glory” so long as they made it good enough.

They justified this dual purpose with the belief that Ye Xiu was the best possible remote-operator the country could ask for, and three consecutive championships right from the start said they had a point. It was nice that the required signup meant they could be sure Ye Qiu’s ID was the one used for the captain of Excellent Era. They’d found their son, achieved rapid advancement in the ability and discovery of remote pilots, and even crowdsourced some excellent equipment improvements through the equipment editor.

All in all, a multilayered win.

The department was not one many would have heard of, which, given its responsibilities, was kind of the point. Though it had low exposure in society, it had high authority, being in charge of the aspects of national protection of which the public could not be allowed even a hint.

Most of the players went home for the summer and received a baffling letter from this government office telling them they’d been drafted, and must report to a given secure location within a certain timeframe. Ye Xiu received an unfortunate letter from this government office telling him he’d been drafted, and was required to return home. Now.

It was definitely a personalized letter. His father even signed it.

Ye Xiu sighed.

Gradually, the best players in the Alliance gathered in the assigned meeting place, a facility that looked completely average from the outside and completely unaverage from the inside, and discovered that not only would no one explain anything, they were now required to go through a “standard bootcamp” that was definitely only “standard” by the definition of this one, unknown department. The only highlight of their time there was that any agent running into Han Wenqing for the first time reflexively called him “sir.” It had been funny the first time, under casual conditions; now, on nearing the fifteenth, with Han Wenqing’s face set permanently in “murder” due to their less than optimal conditions, the harsh startle and barked response were fall-to-the-ground-laughing hilarious.

Of course, the falling to the ground and general giddiness may have had a lot more to do with their pervasive exhaustion than anything else, but the fact remained that watching their tormentors go pale with fright would always be amusing.

The only person not seriously suffering was Tian Sen, but Tian Sen was a bear of a man even as a teen. Obviously, he didn’t count. Han Wenqing and Zhang Xinjie did include workouts as part of their daily schedule, but the difference between “maintaining fitness” and “agent-worthy” was much too great. Even Zhang Xinjie despised their schedule, since it didn’t match his own. The emphasis on athleticism was completely unnecessary. They didn’t have any game time scheduled at all. Their activities included those that could damage hands.

In short, everyone was pissed.

Their combined disgruntlement (and Yu Wenzhou’s ability to figure out the weakest link) finally got them a response on how long this hell would last: “You’ll be able to move on to the next stage once Captain Ye Xiu shows up, which is why you need to put your all in now. It won’t be long before then, and you need to be prepared. He’ll undoubtedly be asking for more.”

This was both heartening and disheartening, in that their torment might have an end, but also might manage to get worse. To distract themselves from it, they talked about what their supposed captain’s somewhat-similar name brought to everyone’s mind: Where was Ye Qiu?

“He should definitely be here by now,” Zhang Jiale groused. Ye Qiu was the only top player who hadn’t shown up and therefore wasn’t suffering, which was just way too unfair.

“Yes, I can’t imagine they would have missed his ability,” Xiao Shiqin said, much more politely.

“Provided that the criteria for gathering us was, in fact, skill in Glory. Given that they have not asked us anything about the game, and Ye Qiu himself is not here, it may be that they were looking instead for public faces related to eSports,” Zhang Xinjie analyzed. “Or soon to be public faces,” he allowed, with a nod to the few there who hadn’t even debuted yet.

“But Mucheng isn’t here!” Chu Yunxiu refuted. As female rookies of the same year, the two of them had become quite close; naturally Chu Yunxiu would be concerned about her. “She’s obviously good enough on both fronts. You don’t think something happened to them on the way here, do you?” It was reasonable to assume they would have come together, since they’d likely be coming from the same place, so an accident that affected one would be likely to affect them both.

Unfortunately, they’d already used up their one chance at asking questions: The agent they’d pushed into giving them a response had been reprimanded and reassigned.

He was an asshole, anyway, scoffing at them for not wanting to waste their hands on pull-ups, or worse, punching. No one felt bad in the slightest.

The day finally came when they were gathered up to meet with their mysterious captain. Strictly speaking, it hadn’t actually been that long since they’d arrived, but with the schedule they’d been following it definitely felt interminable. The walked into the courtyard to find Ye Qiu talking to the man who’d been in charge of them this whole time, face blasé as usual. Less usual was the swiftly increasing uncomfortableness the officer was showing, but they forgot about it almost immediately.

It was perfectly normal for posturing people to end up feeling uncomfortable when talking to Ye Qiu.

“Oi, Ye Qiu!” Zhang Jiale called.

“Do you even know who that is?” one of their guards asked incredulously. “He’s willing to show up personally and you’re going to go around disrespecting him? That’s captain to you. And you’re saying his name wrong; it’s Ye Xiu.”

“Fuck off, you’re saying his name wrong,” Huang Shaotian piped up. “How long do you think we’ve known this guy? How often have you talked to him, to think it’s such a great honor? We talk all the time. We’re even pretty close. My captain isn’t any less impressive than him, anyway, so what are you going on about, huh? Is it just that you’re too low-tier to know impressive people? Is it? Is it? Is it?”

The guard was speechless. At Yu Wenzhou’s urging and due to his own general exhaustion, Huang Shaotian hadn’t previously subjected anyone to his usual prattle.

“They might have seen his twin,” one of the agents said, a largely amiable person who seemed to be mostly in charge of passing messages. “I only ran into the issue a few times when I was at the Ye Estate, but I’m pretty sure his twin’s name is Ye Qiu.”

Given that they would be meeting Ye Xiu himself, he assumed sharing this information wouldn’t cause any problems. After all, Ye Qiu had nothing to do with this side of the Ye family’s legacy, a fact oft-repeated to him when he started his work as a liaison between the main facility and the Ye family’s public domain. If he gave a message for Ye Xiu to Ye Qiu instead, there would be serious problems with a breach in security, so he was even able to tell the two apart under most circumstances.

It actually wasn’t that hard, though; they had completely different demeanors. If this group knew Ye Qiu so well, he couldn’t imagine how they’d have mistaken one for the other. Maybe it was just the stress?

“Ye Qiu had a twin in the military?” Lin Jingyan quietly asked the others in the group, dubious. It was the first he was hearing of it, but it wasn’t like they were particularly close, either.

“That sounds stupid,” Fang Shiqian said immediately. As someone who often argued meta on healers in Glory with Ye Qiu over the years, he had more background than most to draw a conclusion from. “Has that shameless bastard ever acted like someone from a military family? He barely has common decency, let alone military bearing.”

“He does know a lot about tactics…” Xiao Shiqin commented uncertainly. He and the two other tacticians who studied Ye Qiu had always felt like they were rushing to keep up with someone way ahead of them, on that front. Which hardly made sense, Ye Qiu wouldn’t have had any more schooling than them, normally speaking. Maybe a military family really would account for it?

The group traveled the rest of the way across the courtyard in various stages of disbelieving contemplation. Twins?

No way, right?

When they got closer, though, they had to assume it was a joke or some kind of misunderstanding: That was definitely Ye Qiu.

“Even the slightest amount of common sense would have told you no one wants pro gamers out in the field,” Ye Qiu was saying to the Lieutenant who had been in charge of their group. “You think the government bothers specially recruiting people for fun? Who’s going to take responsibility if someone’s hands get messed up due to your idiocy? Go call a medical specialist, immediately.”

“I—yes, sir,” the man said, saluting properly despite his humiliation.

“So, you’re finally here,” Han Wenqing said darkly. Or he was just saying it normally and his face did the rest. Hard to tell.

“Yeah, I was delayed by some other stuff,” Ye Qiu said blandly.

“So it is you!” On comfortable ground, Huang Shaotian’s voice could not be contained. “Did you know, they said ‘Ye Qiu’ is your identical twin? What kind of bullshit is that? Acting like we wouldn’t know who you were even though we’ve all had to put up with your smug face for at least a year—”

“He is.” Ye Qiu cut him off, knowing better than to let Huang Shaotian get on a roll when he’d decided he’d Experienced Grievances.

“He is…what?” Chu Yunxiu asked cautiously. She still hadn’t seen Su Mucheng, who she’d have assumed would be with Ye Qiu when he showed up. If he really had showed up. This seemed like him, but…

“Ye Qiu is my twin,” Ye Qiu—Ye Xiu?!—continued nonchalantly.

“So you have an identical twin that plays eSports?” Fang Shiqian asked incredulously.

“He’s not interested in games,” Ye Xiu replied offhandedly. “You all have your stuff together, right?”

“Yup,” Yang Cong said casually, raising the bag he held in one hand.

“Okay, then—”

“Are you the guy we know or not?!” Zhang Jiale yelled, throwing his arms up in the air. “What are you making it so confusing for?!”

“You’ve never met my twin,” Ye Xiu told them. “And probably still won’t, for a while yet. Come on, we’re going to a better facility.”

And with that, Ye Xiu simply turned around and started walking away.

“He didn’t actually answer,” Zhang Jiale grumbled to Sun Zheping.

“It’s him,” Sun Zheping replied with absolute certainty. “We’ve studied Excellent Era enough to know. Besides, look at Han Wenqing. He’s known Ye Qiu even longer, and he doesn’t have even the slightest bit of doubt.”

Wu Yuce, walking with Li Xuan behind the two, thought that it only made sense for two of the most aggressive and decisive players in the Alliance to have immediately come to a conclusion and stuck with it.

When Ye Xiu said “better facility,” he apparently did not mean “higher standard training,” but “a fully equipped villa for a full team of eSports players.” An Elysium, one could say.

“We could have been here?!” Fang Rui complained. “The whole time?! Captain Lin, why?!”

His pathetic wails may have been a little embarrassing, but everyone else couldn’t help but think the same thing.

“You couldn’t have, I was still setting it up,” Ye Xiu said blandly.

“That’s a lie, Mucheng was here,” Chu Yunxiu accused. Having finally found her missing friend, though, she was in a much better mood.

“Mucheng was helping.” Ye Xiu didn’t care.

“Is Ye Qiu really in charge of us?” Fang Shiqian asked Su Mucheng. He knew Ye Qiu was shameless; if he asked directly, he’d probably say “yes” no matter what. At least with Su Mucheng there was a possibility of a serious reply.

“He is,” Su Mucheng replied. “But it’s ‘Ye Xiu’.”

“You can think of ‘Ye Qiu’ as a stage name, if it helps,” Ye Xiu offered.

“Who uses their brother’s name as a stage name?!” Huang Shaotian couldn’t hold it in anymore. “No really, who does that? What kind of person would even think to? Why would you bother? Why not choose anything else at all, there are so many names in the world, so many things you could do, and you’d have all kinds of associations, too, taking your brother’s name would be so weird, what’s the purpose? What’s the point? Do you just like being confusing? Trying to annoy him? Is this the ultimate troll, the real long con? You want to act like a stage name is a good explanation, you tell me, who would do something like that? Is that a normal thing to do, that you’re going to say ‘just think of it as a stage name’ and be done?! Give that crap up, I’m not buying it, tell me the real reason right now!”

“It was convenient at the time,” Ye Xiu said, ignoring pretty much everything else he’d said. “Speaking of, this facility wasn’t originally designed for team living, so some of the rooms are definitely more convenient than others. If you want a good one, you might want to get a head start.”

“You think we didn’t guess that by the layout? Captain already went to secure us a room, you’re not getting rid of me that easy,” Huang Shaotian replied immediately.

Now that they were looking, it was true that Yu Wenzhou had disappeared.

Ye Xiu grinned. “Did I say they were two-person rooms?”

Huang Shaotian was gone before any of the rest of them could even process what Ye Xiu had said.

They met up in the unbelievably swanky common room, complete with multiple large screens, high-quality computers for gaming, and a ton of couches, to finally get their mission briefing.

“What are we here to do?” Wang Jiexi asked seriously. “Is there something they feel only we can combat?”

“Obviously,” Ye Xiu said.

“Well, what is it?” Fang Shiqian was not the patient type.

Ye Xiu raised an eyebrow at the unnecessary interruption. “Aliens.”

“Fuck off,” Fang Shiqian shot back immediately. “What do they actually want us for?”

“It could be aliens,” said Fang Rui from the side. As someone who hadn’t officially debuted yet, most people weren’t sure who he was, but the mere fact that he was there meant he had skill. The way he was closely following Lin Jingyan meant he was probably from Wind Howl.

His obvious familiarity with Huang Shaotian and Yu Wenzhou was a little weirder, but some of the captains who’d been on the lookout for new talent were aware he’d once been in Blue Rain’s training camp.

“No it could not,” Fang Shiqian said impatiently. “Ye Qiu, what’s your deal? If you’re supposed to be in charge of us, act like it!”

“It’s Ye Xiu,” Su Mucheng piped up from the side.

“Not exactly adding to his credibility, there,” Chu Yunxiu pointed out.

“Well, I’ve said what I can say,” Ye Xiu said, with an air of washing his hands of it. “If you don’t feel like believing me…”

“Who’s going to believe it’s aliens?!” Zhang Jiale yelled. “Don’t just dodge out of the question!”

“Look, it’s classified information,” Ye Xiu explained. “We can’t go yelling it out all the time, even if this place is pretty secure.”

“We still have to know what’s going on, or there’s no use,” Zhang Xinjie insisted.

“Well, you can take it as the country wants us to be very good at Glory,” Ye Xiu said.

This was hardly more believable, and yet such a step above aliens that most were almost willing to accept it.

Fang Shiqian was not ‘most’. “Why would this obscure military branch care if we’re good at Glory? Don’t think we didn’t notice the stupid bootcamp thing, this is definitely military.”

“Yes, well, remote piloting is the future of national defense. Mostly they want us for our hand speed.”

“Fuck, really?!” Huang Shaotian was not pleased.

“Well, except Yu Wenzhou. Unlike the others,”—with a significant look—“they want him for his brain.”

Huang Shaotian was speechless.

“Rude,” Sun Zheping commented, but he didn’t seem at all offended.

“No way, I got my mechanics this far just for Glory,” Fang Rui complained, absolutely offended.

“Well, they made Glory just to refine your mechanics,” Ye Xiu replied.

“They what?!” Everyone was thinking it, but it was Tian Sen who actually said something first.

“No…” The next to comment was, surprisingly, the as-yet-undebuted Zhou Zekai, who had been near silent throughout the entire time they’d been under the military’s jurisdiction. Whether it was because he wasn’t familiar with anyone or because he was naturally like that, he rarely even made noise, no matter how hard the training was or how the soldiers might have mocked him for being a “useless pretty boy.” He never seemed to mind anything, just diligently doing what he needed to and keeping his thoughts to himself.

It seemed even he couldn’t maintain his self-imposed silence in this situation. Anyone who loved Glory would be upset. Even Ye Xiu looked displeased, though he was the one saying it.

“Don’t worry, though, it really is just remote piloting. You all know how important weapons advancement is for the country, and this division is in charge of unorthodox defense measures. Things were always going to go this way eventually, and we still have Glory to play around in for now. As for later…well, we’ll see when it comes to that. We might be able to convince them.”

There was a collective, if understated, sigh of relief. The people here were all people who put their whole hearts into the game. For it to be nothing more than a sham was…too much betrayal to handle.

“In any case, we’ll have a schedule. We’re practicing to work together as a team, and some engineers will come in to help us out with Silver equipment as we go, too. I’ll talk more about what we’re expected to do tomorrow—for now, settle in, rest, probably end up on the computer anyway since I know it’s been a while for you.”

There were a few snorts, but no disagreement. It had been way too long since they’d seen a computer at all, let alone one with access to Glory.

The next day, Ye Xiu’s explanation of their duties began. “We’re essentially preparing for a tournament.”

“A tournament…with remote piloting?” Yu Wenzhou asked, skeptical. “Against whom?”

“The aliens, obviously.” Ye Xiu’s tone was way too blasé.

Everyone groaned. “Is it just that you don’t want to tell us?” Zhao Yang, a man with very little presence, finally asked. Even he couldn’t put up with this forever.

“I’m telling you as much as I’m allowed to tell you,” Ye Xiu said, looking completely genuine. “In any case, isn’t teamwork and development important no matter what? If we want to convince them to let us go back to our normal lives, we have to show them there’s no more ‘training’ that needs to be done. You can do that much no matter what, right?”

Everyone begrudgingly agreed.

Training started simple. Anyone who’d had something to say the day before about their computer setup, preferred mouse or keyboard, got their new equipment now. Everyone was also encouraged to try a different set provided by the government, said to be perfectly in line with their own preferences—and they were. Eerily so, even. It turned out that yesterday, Ye Xiu had been taking notes on their stated preferences as well as the data on their play to determine what he thought suited them best, and the technology had been developed overnight.

“This is really creepy,” Wu Yuce commented. As someone who hadn’t debuted yet, and was even treated coldly by his team because he refused to change classes from Ghostblade, he’d never had something like a setup that completely, perfectly catered to his preferences—let alone in ways he’d never even considered before, and in less than a day. Who would care so much about one random rookie, no matter how talented he might seem?

The government, apparently. Or maybe just Ye Xiu.

“Show some appreciation.” Li Xuan felt obliged, as his captain, to scold him.

Wu Yuce glanced over at him. “I just did?”

“Yeah, I got it,” Ye Xiu replied, sending Li Xuan careening into incredulity.

Morning was devoted to combination play, lunch to complaining about the facilities they were in before—“Nutrient packets! Actual nutrient packets! Who allowed that?!” fumed Zhang Jiale—and enjoying the normal food available, afternoon to individual practice or whichever scrimmages they might want to set up themselves. Ye Xiu suggested they look over their equipment and see what they might want to change about it if they could, since there would be R&D coming in soon to talk to them about weapon and armor upgrades. They would have time later as well, so it was entirely optional.

All of this was fine, if a little surprisingly lax, until someone realized Ye Xiu was logging into the actual game.

“Hey hey hey, are you going to steal bosses without us?! You’re pawning us off to do whatever while you steal resources for your team, huh?! Too unfair, I’m not allowing it. If you log on, so do I! Do you hear me?!”

Everyone heard him; it was, of course, Huang Shaotian.

“I’m not getting bosses, I’m raising a character,” Ye Xiu said nonchalantly. “It won’t be on the main game server, don’t worry.”

“How can you raise a character outside of the main servers?” Zhang Xinjie asked. Like everyone else who had played a pro match, they were aware that the servers that ran their offline arenas were not the same as the ones for the main game; there was no outside world, game content, nor experience to be had.

“It’s mostly new content. We don’t have time for me to level a character the normal way, but they can’t just automatically make him max-level, either—leveling is an important part of stress-testing and development of the mech. The content is a bunch of dungeons designed to test the relevant aspects of the mech as fast as possible, set in an environment similar to a Fixed Field arena so there’s no need to worry about scaling based on level.”

“So, a series of high-difficulty dungeons that give high experience.” Yu Wenzhou had come over as well. In fact, basically everyone had come over. “A single-player instance?”

“If it doesn’t even need a healer, how difficult could it be?” Fang Shiqian said derisively.

“Well, if it’s a class that can heal itself a little, it might be possible.” Tian Sen, as a Priest-class player, was well-acquainted with the use of what low-level healing skills were available to him.

“And dodging!” Fang Rui said, leaning obnoxiously over the top of the computer from the other side to try to see the screen. There were only so many people who could crowd behind Ye Xiu at once and still see the screen clearly.

“Mm.” Zhou Zekai, still a near-silent presence despite how flashy he’d been in group practice earlier, nodded his agreement.

“You’re infecting the younger generation,” Fang Shiqian hissed at Ye Xiu.

“I didn’t say anything,” Ye Xiu said, but it was amused rather than defensive.

“Ooh, just dodging is fine, who needs a healer?” Fang Shiqian mocked, talking over him. “I am surrounded by idiots.”

“Are you all seriously going to ignore that he just said leveling a character is for the mech based on it?” Chu Yunxiu asked, incredulous. “You’re just going to skip over that? Does One Autumn Leaf have a mech too? Do we all have mech?”

“Didn’t I say they want us for remote-piloting mech?” Ye Xiu asked reasonably. “Of course they exist, and are based on your characters. Otherwise why would I still bother training you with Glory? Or telling you to look into Silver equipment?”

“How does the healing work?” Zhang Xinjie asked, immediately interested. He had considered the option that they might have mechs for their characters, but he couldn’t understand how they could translate Glory skills into the real world, so he’d labeled the likelihood as fairly low.

“It has something to do with nanites, but how it actually does the repair was unclear.” Ye Xiu sighed. “If you’re really interested, the R&D group and the developers of the game should be coming by later; you can ask then.”

“The game developers are coming, too?” Yu Wenzhou already had his notebook out, but now he had a somewhat concerning gleam in his eyes.

“Yeah, they had to do something kind of unusual with the new content to make sure it would sync up with the mech design properly and I could still level it. They only recently came up with the update that made leveling the character viable at all, let alone trying it in a private dungeon.”

“But you’re already level 20!” Haung Shaotian pointed out, followed immediately by “What the fuck, you’re that high already?! You aren’t just starting at all, you definitely played last night, too! Letting us mess around while you get to play new content by yourself? What a selfish asshole! Where’s our new content, hm? Where’s your spirit of sharing, hm? It’s no good to be all by yourself like this, aren’t you always saying something about how you can’t play Glory alone? Hypocrite! You shove over, give me a turn.”

“You can just join me with Troubling Rain,” Ye Xiu said, completely unmoved by Huang Shaotian’s pushing. “I never said it had to be a single-player instance.”

“What, now you’re willing to add us?” Huang Shaotian was complaining, but he’d already settled in at the computer next to Ye Xiu’s. No one had even seen him move. “Why’d you bother hiding last night then? Did you think we wouldn’t find out eventually? Did you? Did you? Did you?”

“I was in a public practice room,” Ye Xiu pointed out. “Anyone could have come by and joined if they wanted.”

“It had a closed door,” Han Wenqing said darkly. He, like any other pro Glory player, was not pleased to have missed out on exclusive content.

Ye Xiu looked up at him in what might have been genuine surprise, but probably wasn’t. “Since when do you care about closed doors?”

At least, knowing Ye Xiu’s background, they now had some sort of explanation for how he was able to so comfortably ignore and even further provoke Han Wenqing’s perpetual aura of violence.

“In any case, the door is unlocked. If anyone wants to see me at night from now on, I’ll be in there, probably doing the boring planning and paperwork I was meant to do in the afternoons.”

“‘Was meant to’?” Lin Jingyan asked.

“Apparently afternoons are now leveling Lord Grim time,” Ye Xiu said with a wry smile.

At that point, Lin Jingyan noticed that Huang Shaotian was not the only one set up on the computer. Yang Cong was sitting on the opposite side of Ye Xiu, the game already loaded on his screen—once again, no one knew when he’d gotten there. Zhou Zekai had quietly set up a computer as well, next to Fang Rui, who was waving at Lin Jingyan and patting the seat next to him pointedly.

“…How many players to a dungeon?” Yu Wenzhou asked, since Ye Xiu still hadn’t given a specific answer. Whether or not Yu Wenzhou had a computer, Ye Xiu hadn’t explained how to join his part of the game yet. When he did, who actually joined would doubtlessly come down to reaction time—a battle Yu Wenzhou couldn’t help but lose.

“As many as I want,” Ye Xiu said with an amused lilt to this tone; he knew why Yu Wenzhou would ask. “It scales difficulty by number and class composition, though it still doesn’t know what to do about mine. That is the purpose of the testing, after all. It’s good I do have some heals, or I’d have actually had to ask a healer to join me. Like Zhang Xinjie.”

“Fuck you,” Fang Shiqian said, lifting a middle finger over his monitor to make sure Ye Xiu could properly see it; the computer he’d moved to was on the other side of the table from Ye Xiu’s setup, same as Zhou Zekai and Fang Rui, and he didn’t want Ye Xiu to miss it.

Zhang Xinjie, after all, was both a rookie and a member of the team that had just beaten Ye Xiu to a championship for the first time, whereas Fang Shiqian had argued meta with Ye Xiu through dungeoning together on various classes for years. If he wanted to call someone to help when time was of the essence and coordination essential, not choosing Fang Shiqian was an obvious personal slight.

“Your character is of a Priest class, then?” Wang Jiexi asked. He’d long since become used to Fang Shiqian’s attitude, and even Ye Xiu’s riling of it. In his opinion, it was best to ignore the whole thing entirely.

“No class,” Ye Xiu said nonchalantly, like he had not just blown everyone’s minds. “I have a viable Unspecialized.”

“Bullshit,” Sun Zheping said. “Weapon-switching took ages, Unspecialized is only viable against noobs. Everyone knows this.”

Those of the younger generation kept quiet about how blatantly they were left out of “everyone.” It wasn’t like there were only a few of them, either, but who was going to argue with Sun Zheping? It was barely a step down from arguing with Han Wenqing on the list of Widely Known Terrible Ideas, which was in itself not too far below “antagonizing Ye QXiu or Su Mucheng on purpose,” the uncontested top spot.

“I have a transforming weapon,” Ye Xiu explained, again like this was not big news. “So it all works out. You’ll see it in a bit. The dungeon I’m in is an exclusive part of the Heavenly Domain they loaded my character directly into to save time, but it should be available to all of you, since your characters are coded to mechs as well. Just go to a portal in any city, it should show up as a possible destination for you.”

It took less than a minute for the global chat of the Heavenly Domain to explode.

“Holy shit! Desert Dust is on Second Street!”

“I found Troubling Rain in Center Hall!”

“Windy Rain?!”

“What the fuck! Is this the end of the world? Are the gods coming to save us?!”

The few undebuted characters made their way to the city’s portals unmolested, while those of the pros famous enough to be called out just ignored the public’s nonsense as usual.

It was funny, though, that this time someone had accidentally hit on exactly the truth of the matter: The gods had come to Glory as part of their duty to save the world.

As one does.

The first bit of “leveling up Lord Grim” was actually just a bunch of pro players standing around, watching his weapon transform.

“And they think that’ll work in real life?” Tian Sen asked, dubious.

“That’s another reason they’re coming tomorrow,” Ye Xiu replied, sending the umbrella from spear to tonfa and back again, too fast to be believed. In the game it looked fine, but in real life? Separating and combining stably aside, how could it possibly be staying up?! “They’re not sure how we did it, so they can’t tell if it’s a bug. We have reason to believe that Glory doesn’t have any bugs at all, but they still can’t understand this.”

“No bugs at all?” Xiao Shiqin asked incredulously. Then again, thinking about it, he’d never heard anyone say anything about a bug in Glory. Ever. With a game that big, it was practically unheard of.

“As far as the system itself is concerned, yes. Especially the equipment editor, which was directly ported into the game,” Ye Xiu agreed.

“Ported? Who made it, then?” Yu Wenzhou noticed the choice of words right away.

“Aliens, as I understand it,” Ye Xiu said with a shrug.

“You really shouldn’t call foreigners that,” Yang Cong said, leaning sideways to look at Ye Xiu’s screen. “So outdated. Besides, since when do they have this kind of ability?”

“I don’t know much about the standards for or timeline of extraterrestrial technological development,” Ye Xiu said, unbothered.

“Will you give it a rest?” Fang Shiqian was openly derisive. “The aliens made our games, too, hm? And how did they do that, magic?”

“Well, more like sufficiently advanced technology,” Ye Xiu replied. “Which is basically indistinguishable, so if you want to call it that, go ahead. Your team does seem to have a history of it.”

Wang Jiexi gave him an unamused look.

“Are we playing this dungeon or what?” Sun Zheping groused. “There’s no point in just looking at the weapon.”

Han Wenqing didn’t wait for a reply, immediately pulling a mob of NPCs over for the pros to deal with. It turned out that when Ye Xiu said this was a difficult dungeon that would scale up if they joined, he had not lied—even as pros, dealing with that many enemies at once was nothing easy. Within minutes, Zhang Xinjie actually sighed audibly at the unnecessary pressure he was now under.

Fang Shiqian, in a stark contrast of personalities, began his cursing 20 seconds in and had yet to stop.

That evening, Ye Xiu hadn’t been working for long in that same room as the night before when Zhang Xinjie politely knocked on the door and came inside to talk to him. Zhang Xinjie, as a person and a tactician, was the type to want to cover all his bases, so it was no real surprise to Ye Xiu when he solemnly asked to know if he should be taking Ye Xiu’s talk of aliens seriously—and, if so, what was to be done about it.

“There’s not much to be done,” Ye Xiu said, pushing back from his computer with a sigh. “But yes, it really is aliens.”

It wasn’t an easy thing for the common person to accept. If Ye Xiu hadn’t been fully aware of his family’s unusual career from a young age, he might have been inclined to disbelieve it as well. However, he did have that background—and, if he was honest with himself, there were several hints. He just…hadn’t wanted to see them, even when they appeared right in front of him.

Ye Xiu ran away from home at 15. It wasn’t because he wanted to play games and his parents wouldn’t let him. In fact, his parents let him do most whatever he wanted, outside of his training and homework, and Ye Xiu always completed his training and homework. Nothing was less pleasant than forcing oneself through the agent instructors’ morning tests unprepared. His parents expected him to learn to balance his work, rest, and recreation himself, and considered the gaming he did, relying frequently on fast and precise reactions, interpersonal interaction, and quick-thinking as it did, to be a perfectly acceptable aspect of his development. Ye Xiu was already one of their top operatives, if still unofficial due to his age, and his parents were quite proud of him.

Ye Xiu didn’t really appreciate being a “top operative” at just barely 15, but he was resigned. He got to see what a normal heir looked like in his twin brother, who would take over the Ye family’s public side. This was a tradition of the Ye family, in which the gene for identical twins happened to run: The firstborn in the dark, sworn to serve the government and continue their family’s all-important role in its protection, the secondborn in the light, keeping the family as a whole relevant and powerful outside the service no one was supposed to know about.

Not every generation had identical twins, so it didn’t always work out so easily. Sometimes a single child had to keep up both aspects, sometimes the first child would be hidden from the world early on and their younger sibling would be the only one the public ever really knew about, to stop anyone from asking where the elder had gone. Sometimes they’d even arrange a marriage and allow the unknowing spouse to manage public relations while the Ye heir practically disappeared entirely from both the public and their spouse’s life.

Ye Xiu didn’t think his parents were necessarily bad people, but designed to raise children, they were not. For all that Ye Qiu was likely to take responsibility for the Ye family in the future, outwardly an unusual case of the younger twin’s being favored for succession, in their eyes he was a bit of a spare, and it showed. Ye Xiu did his best to be a good brother to Ye Qiu, but what could he do? He couldn’t make their parents pay attention to his brother, not that their attention was such a great thing in the first place, and he didn’t have the time nor energy to shower Ye Qiu with affection of his own. He could only do his best to keep up with Ye Qiu’s plans and dreams, so he’d feel like at least one person in the house understood him.

When he ran across the packed luggage, he knew he hadn’t done enough. In his defense, his parents had been more stressed than usual lately, and there’d been a corresponding increase in Ye Xiu’s training. From what he could tell, something big was happening, something that would require all current projects to be suspended so they could devote their resources to this new development instead. They’d been hinting that he might be drafted early, even, and now Ye Qiu wanted to run. Ye Qiu, who had neither street sense nor profitable skills. Ye Qiu, who registered as a spare to their parents on a good day. Ye Qiu, whose family currently could not spare any of their considerable resources to go looking for him, should he disappear.

What if Ye Qiu died? What if Ye Xiu were really drafted, and Ye Qiu thought not even his brother cared to look for him? What if Ye Xiu were drafted to face whatever situation could be so dangerous it had their crazy parents looking worried, and he died before Ye Qiu could return? Wouldn’t Ye Qiu be crushed? For all that he pretended at being annoyed by his older brother’s mere existence, if he never got to see Ye Xiu again, it’d be a regret he might never fully recover from.

What if Ye Xiu were drafted, and he had to face whichever insanity while he didn’t even know where his little brother was? Wouldn’t he be distracted? If he died and let the country fall to whatever threat his parents were so sure they were under, wouldn’t that make everyone unhappy?

Their parents would not devote much energy to stopping Ye Qiu from running under these circumstances, and Ye Xiu couldn’t even promise he’d do better, with how much their parents were focused on him in what little time they had outside of their official work.

Unless Ye Xiu were not there to focus on.

Ye Xiu had all kinds of survival skills. Ye Qiu had a safe life at home, and their parents would know not to let him run if Ye Xiu ran first. They could handle this “great threat” on their own; they didn’t need a child to help them. Ye Xiu was absolutely certain they wouldn’t push Ye Qiu, who had none of the necessary training, to take his place. They probably wouldn’t afford him much more personal attention than usual, but they might at least look at Ye Qiu a little more often.

And Ye Xiu could dodge the madness, live his own life, maybe just play games for a little while. Eventually he’d have to come back, but it might be nice to live as he liked for at least some amount of time.

So, what if? What if.

Ye Xiu took Ye Qiu’s luggage and ran himself.

His parents wouldn’t have the resources to devote to a thorough manhunt for Ye Xiu, and Ye Xiu knew how to pretty much stay off the grid, if he needed to. They knew Ye Xiu knew how to do that, so they might not even bother searching when they had something else so important taking up their energy and focus.

Ye Xiu liked to believe he’d made a fairly clean getaway. He’d been enjoying himself, living with the Su siblings, playing games for money, talking with whomever he felt like talking to. It was good.

He should have known there was something odd about Glory. They’d fixed the lag issue? Ye Xiu knew enough about technology to have laughed at that outright if he hadn’t seen it himself; it simply wasn’t how distributed systems worked. The realism Glory showed, in environment and even elemental interaction, was completely unrealistic in terms of what anyone could expect of modern technology, and the equipment editor—it wasn’t at all subtle in being beyond what could count as reasonable technology. Then there were the choices that were plainly odd for a game—no mounts at all, in such a sweeping world? And they refused to compromise on this point, earning more ire with every update. Visual effects couldn’t be turned down? Minute control of individual aspects of characters, even individual fingers if you had the skill to pull it off, which practically no one did? Characters that absolutely could not overlap in space, no matter what? Environmental effects that went beyond aesthetic and could genuinely hamper the character? A completely different way of using skills underwater?

Glory was too good to be true, but it was so, so good. Ye Xiu probably couldn’t have given up on it even if he’d tried. The world was so full and complete, who wouldn’t want to immerse themselves in it? All weapons provided by the system and skills used by bosses were ones that could be made with in-game materials or derivatives of what players had access to. Why?

Well, in fact, because what the “Glory devs” put out was what they had, and they couldn’t afford to keep anything back for bosses just to keep players guessing. What weapons they made were themselves made through the same equipment editor they made available to the public. The whole system was a highly advanced battle, environment, and equipment development simulator, based on the alien technology they’d been lent when they came to tell Earth they’d been selected for this prestigious tournament.

They’d come to China to give this information because Chinese was the language spoken by the plurality of humans. Their universal translator couldn’t be used for every single language appearing on a planet, that would be absurd—so they always just chose the most-spoken language and culture to deal with. They were very polite, and offered to allow Earth to borrow their technology to put them on a more level playing field against the other, more developed planets participating. How kind, yes?

Except it was a betting tournament with a high ante, and Earth had been drafted, not asked. Aliens in their society, they explained to the blank-faced Chinese officials across from them, would not do something so barbaric as just attack planets, even ones so poorly developed as the “base-level” Earth, which hadn’t even successfully made faster-than-light travel, nor met even one sentient species from another planet before this. No, though they were interested in Earth’s resources, they would politely give Earth a chance to prove they deserved to be counted as “owning” the planet in intergalactic terms. They just had to win the tournament, to show that they were an advanced and intelligent species.

Although they could borrow alien technology, the interest would accrue every year they spent developing from that instead of joining in the tournament as required. If the interest accrued to the point that even the value of their whole planet, the only “real” asset they had, could no longer pay it off, they would be considered to have defaulted on the loan, and their planet would be forcibly seized.

The technology they showed, the clear military force these aliens wielded, what could Earth do? To reject was to die, so of course they had to accept. Accept, and work as fast as possible to come up with a team for this remote-piloting tournament, to pit themselves against an unknown group of other aliens in a competition for which they were absurdly underprepared.

The alien ambassadors were thoughtful enough to provide them with some data on some of the other aliens and tech they might be likely to face over the course of the tournament—the basis for Glory’s nonhuman NPCs. The idea behind Glory was that the world had so many people, surely they could get them to unknowingly contribute the genius of ten thousand united as one to save the planet they lived on. Talent could be found in such unlikely places, and a “game” this good would likely draw in all kinds of interested talent.

They were right. And, although they’d put in some amount of effort to release globally, just in case, it was obviously China that had the best suited people when it came time to choose.

(Whether it had been a fair contest from the start was, in the end, irrelevant. It was what it was, and being able to use the universal translator with ease was probably enough reason to have justified only looking in China in the first place. The Chinese government felt they’d already gone above and beyond just by offering the chance to foreign players at all.)

How lucky, that the player considered the number one in Glory was from the Ye family? It all worked out so well for everybody, didn’t it? Except that the best of the best in gaming, and therefore remote piloting, happened to be a bunch of children, many of whom had never thought of devoting their lives to something so grand as saving the planet.

So it went.

Ye Xiu didn’t explain everything to Zhang Xinjie, only pointed out the obviously inhuman aspects of Glory as a game, showed him what evidence he was allowed, and answered any questions he could for the serious and determined 19-year-old. When he’d finished, Zhang Xinjie was quiet for a long time.

“Don’t worry so much,” Ye Xiu said with a hint of a laugh. “You can come by and work out strategies with me as we go, if you want, but we aren’t so unprepared as it sounds. We haven’t run out of time on the loan yet, so choosing to go now is obviously because they believe we can win. We wouldn’t bet the Earth on a whim, right?”

Zhang Xinjie exhaled quietly, then nodded firmly. He’d only come because he couldn’t leave a possibility unexplored, but he hadn’t really expected it to be aliens. Even now, it was somewhat hard to believe. He’d have to think it over on his own, and come up with some ideas of how best to handle this before he’d be of any use in planning things in the future.

Knowing this, he left to go to his room. It was, in any case, his scheduled bedtime. Zhang Xinjie never abandoned his schedules, if he could avoid it, not even in the face of the possible end of the world.

Meanwhile, in the common areas, the rest of the pros were decidedly not going to bed yet. All that time away from their beloved comforts had given them more than enough reason to indulge in them now. That first day, they’d fallen upon the computers like the starving on food, but it wasn’t the only thing they’d missed.

“Couch cushions,” Zhang Jiale groaned happily, sinking into them. “I’m making myself a fort and no one can stop me.”

“What if I want to sit on the couch?” Chu Yunxiu asked, leaning over the back to look down on his sprawled form.

“Which couch?” he said, gesturing expansively at the various pieces of furniture scattered across the room. “Realistically, you and Mucheng couldn’t possible need more than one, right?”

“Watch us take up four, now, just because.”

“Go right ahead,” Sun Zheping said, picking up a cushion from a different couch and throwing it on the floor near Zhang Jiale. “There’s still more than enough.”

In the corner of the room, Zhou Zekai was quietly making his own fort to hide in. Fang Rui sidled over and started adding onto it, making room for himself. Zhou Zekai didn’t seem to mind, at least.

“You want to make one?” Wang Jiexi asked Fang Shiqian, who was pulling cushions off the couch.

“I’m not a baby,” Fang Shiqian said. “Like those idiots. And you. Don’t think I didn’t see you eyeing their structures already, probably thinking about how you could make yours more stable than anything they’re coming up with.”

As if to back him up, Zhang Jiale managed to collapse his whole fort by trying to put a second story on it just behind them.

“But you just wanted to watch TV,” Wang Jiexi pointed out; not a denial, as anyone might have noticed.

“Then I can do it from in the fort, can’t I?” Fang Shiqian said, rolling his eyes. “There is such a thing as being too straightforward and self-effacing, in case you were wondering. I don’t need your support, I’m your support. Now get some of Lin Jingyan’s pillows before he can go soft and join that Fang Rui kid, as he inevitably will. Why the guy wants to build a back entrance out of his fort is beyond me, since we aren’t actually going to get into a pillow fight, but his soft-hearted captain is definitely going to end up helping anyway.”

“Pillow fight?” Su Mucheng asked, from where she was settled with Chu Yunxiu—notably, on just one couch—with their tea. “Now that actually does sound interesting.”

“I am watching TV,” Fang Shiqian hissed. “Did you have to try to keep a bunch of idiots alive so they wouldn’t lose experience in the only dungeon we’re allowed to use right now? Of course not, or you wouldn’t have even made such a suggestion. I am watching. TV.”

“I want to catch up on my drama,” Chu Yunxiu said with a frown. “That’s what we’re watching on this TV, okay?”

“I actually, at this point, do not give the slightest of a damn,” said Fang Shiqian. “The less of my brain I use, the better. Stop trying to steal our pillows!”

The last was directed at Huang Shaotian, who had darted in for the kill when it seemed Fang Shiqian was not looking: a miscalculation, as he should have known that, regardless of direction or tiredness, a healer was always looking.

“Shaotian, we don’t need any more,” Yu Wenzhou said. His steady structure was of modest size but very well defended, and also rather obviously already complete.

“Aw, but I wanted to make a nest on the inside,” Huang Shaotian complained, making his way back with seeming contriteness. Of course, “contriteness” couldn’t stop the sudden snag of a pillow from the Blossom Duo’s collapsed pile on his way back.

In the end, there actually was a pillow fight, but the corner of the room with tea and snacks was an acknowledged safe zone. Wang Jiexi’s careful guard over the nearby fort housing a dozing Fang Shiqian meant that it was essentially considered part of the safe zone as well. Going up against the Magician, even alone and in real life, was asking to get dizzied, and no one needed that at this point. It was just a bit of fun.

A bit of fun that involved Yang Cong stealing the bottom corner out of three different forts, Su Mucheng sniping two idiots who got between the safe zone and the screen in the head, and at least one case of Wu Yuce bodily running through a fort to get away from Zhao Yang’s revenge for an earlier attack, fully dismantling it.

“Going to bed” turned into a sprawling sleepover on a mess of cushions. Ye Xiu had barely made it into the room when he surveyed the damage, found Su Mucheng’s curled form amongst the piles, and sighed fondly before turning around again.

“I could carry them to bed,” Tian Sen offered uncertainly. “I know we were supposed to sleep…”

“And aren’t they sleeping?” Ye Xiu laughed. “You can come get blankets with me, if you want. Old Han?”

Han Wenqing was leaning against the wall by the door. “Let’s go, then.”

Which was how more than half of the Glory pros woke in the morning to blankets draped across the room like they’d been caught in some kind of storm.

But it was, in fact, very warm.

When the R&D team came to handle the pros’ Silver equipment, several of them were shocked to find that the core gods of R&D from their own clubs were there as well. For most of them, this was because the government had sent out developers to help advance the Silver equipment players were familiar with as fast as possible. Guan Rongfei, though, was just a lucky break for the government; obviously they couldn’t send anyone official to the club that housed Ye Xiu, because he’d recognize them right away. Who could have guessed such an expert would turn up there on his own?

For Guan Rongfei’s part, he didn’t seem to have particularly noticed that he’d even been moved.

“Old Ye!” he called, bounding over to Ye Xiu the moment he saw him. “They gave me unlimited materials to test with! I finally got to try out that new design for Evil Annihilation we were talking about, you’ll have to tell me how it works for you. After, though. They said you have a transforming weapon, why is this the first I’m hearing of it?”

“It wasn’t viable until recently, and then I already had One Autumn Leaf…”

“How could One Autumn Leaf compare?” Guan Rongfei asked impatiently. “Well? Where is it?!”

Ye Xiu was unceremoniously herded by the shorter man to the nearest computer. Some of the rest of them might have been amused by this if they weren’t currently flabbergasted by the familiar faces in an unfamiliar environment.

“Yang Li?” Zhang Xinjie asked, full of disbelief.

“Unlimited materials,” the man last seen in Club Tyranny crowed. “I finished your Silver equipment! Come on, let’s try it out. Oh, wait, can we get Fang Shiqian over here too? I want his opinion on this Cleric setup…”

As it turned out, agent or not, the R&D group was pretty much the same.

Lunch was spent at the computers, because none of the R&D or game developers wanted to stop working long enough to take a proper break. When they finally left, they’d come up with at least the general designs for full Silver equipment for every single character. The game developers were much more serious than R&D at first, coming to Ye Xiu with questions about the dungeon and how Lord Grim was progressing, but were absolutely shocked to find that more than one person on the team was interested in knowing about how they’d designed Glory.

“There really are hidden conditions involved in all the ‘random’ aspects of Glory?” asked Yu Wenzhou.

“Well, yes, randomization isn’t actually a normal aspect of the system.” The developer was startled by his clear interest in this rather mundane aspect of turning the technology into a standard game. “Like other systems, randomization has to be synthesized, but especially for this one we couldn’t change anything fundamental about the simulation or risk affecting the synchronization with the mech. Rather than change the modeling of how attacks work to make them completely random, we added conditions for when the result would trigger based on the method the player used and counted on player inconsistency and imprecision to make the result appear random. It was a bit of a messy fix, but it worked out.”

“So cool,” Fang Rui murmured on the side. As someone especially interested in misdirection and triggered events, this very much appealed to him. It meant the system was something you could figure out, and your opponent would never see it coming.

“I—really?” The developer had never been praised that way for his work before.

“Absolutely,” Xiao Shiqin said, looking up from his own notes. “And would you say this was the kind of thing anyone could learn, if they found the pattern?”

He blinked. “Well, I suppose so… It is more true to life than genuine randomness in a skill the character is supposed to understand fully, so we aren’t likely to change it. Any pattern can be discerned with enough time and effort.”

“Stop pumping developers for information,” Ye Xiu told the pros, leaning over from where he was working with R&D and about half of the game developers on his quickly developing Unspecialized. “You can pick apart the underpinnings of the game after they get us the new content we need.”

“Yes, sir,” the developer said, still bewildered, if somewhat flattered. “And we’ll keep running the material combinations you suggested, too. We should be able to give you an idea of what kind of special effects are possible when we come back.”

After their visitors had left, the pros set up their stations to run through more dungeons with Lord Grim. “Didn’t we just finish the Silver equipment?” Tian Sen asked, having already logged in himself.

“In terms of what equipment we want for what we can expect from Glory and general PvP, yes,” Ye Xiu replied. “But they weren’t able to model everything we’d be up against in Glory, so they’re doing their best to get some other simulations up for us to fight, and maybe find some effects that are good for countering the more problematic aspects. It won’t be enough to cover everything, but it’s better than nothing.”

“What kinds of things will we be up against that they weren’t able to model?” Wang Jiexi had already finished loading in as well.

“Alien things,” Ye Xiu explained with an overly serious nod. “That’d have to be most of it. Wouldn’t really fit in the game, right?

“Stop making fun of my captain or I’ll fucking punch you,” Fang Shiqian said pleasantly.

Zhao Yang sighed. “You can just say you don’t want to tell us,” he told Ye Xiu. “There doesn’t need to be so much fighting every time.”

“I don’t know.” Ye Xiu let his mouth pull up on one side in obvious amusement. “It seems pretty good for us to me.”

That night, the one to show up at Ye Xiu’s door was Chu Yunxiu.

“What’s with all this stuff about aliens?” she asked, closing the door behind herself and making her lazy way over. “Normally I’d just ignore you, but you’ve got Mucheng trying to tell me about it, too, and she actually seems serious. You know how much she values your opinion, right? As jokes go, putting these kinds of thoughts in her head really isn’t funny.”

“It’s not a joke,” Ye Xiu said, pulling off his headphones to face her properly. “Would I joke with Mucheng about something like this?”

Chu Yunxiu scowled.

Ye Xiu sighed. “You’re here because you already know the answer, right?”

“I’m smoking,” she said abruptly, tapping out a cigarette. “If you have any rules in here against it, I don’t want to hear about it.”

Ye Xiu shrugged and let her light up. She took a long drag, blew it out over her head, and then turned to look back at Ye Xiu. “Fuck you,” she said, extraordinarily vehement for a young woman who often kept her emotions to herself. “None of us asked for this. Nobody asked.”

Ye Xiu smiled bitterly. “Neither did I.”

“Yeah, but clearly you knew about all this,” she said, gesturing to the practice room that was somewhat set up as his office at night, papers spread around him that none of the other players had to deal with. “You were in this from the start. Me? I was just playing a game. And Mucheng? Mucheng could be a fashion model right now, no one would turn her down. She’s in Glory for you. I heard what she said about your family, Glory was made for you. What right do you have, to pull the rest of us in?”

“To be fair,” Ye Xiu said, leaning back in his chair, “I don’t think anyone on Earth wanted an alien invasion. It’s your bad luck, that you’re one of the best. What else should you do, leave it to someone less competent? Wait to find out only too late that there’s no Earth left for you to live on?”

Chu Yunxiu was silent for a bit, quietly smoking the cigarette she hadn’t been allowed around the rest of the team, earlier. “You’re a piece of shit, you know,” she said, blowing her smoke out in his face. Ye Xiu didn’t even blink, long used to it from his own habit. “Sounding so reasonable when we face down the end of the world, like we don’t even have room to be angry.”

“What use is there in being angry?” Ye Xiu laughed. “It’s a little more complicated, maybe, but for the most part? It’s still Glory. Glory with new content, and one tournament.”

“One ‘tournament’ that it’ll cost us everything to lose,” Chu Yunxiu griped. “I don’t want to have anything to do with that.”

“There’s no point worrying about losing. We can worry after it happens, when we’d have nothing better to do. But, Yunxiu—you may not know, since you haven’t had time to do it yourself, yet, but there’s nothing impossible about winning a championship.”

Chu Yunxiu gave him a long look, then sighed and snubbed out her cigarette. “You want me to win a championship, just like that?”

“I want us to win a championship.”

“And you know how?”

Ye Xiu grinned. “Statistically speaking, I’m the best.”

Chu Yunxiu snorted. “Alright then. I’m going to go watch two idiots fall in love after a bunch of stupid misunderstandings. All night. I hope you’re happy.”

Ye Xiu waved her off. “Use a computer if everyone else wants to watch something else. Not everyone has your stamina.”

Chu Yunxiu casually flipped him off as she left the room.

Ye Xiu huffed out a laugh. He liked Chu Yunxiu. In stark contrast to Su Mucheng’s outwardly accommodating personality, she was very unapologetically herself. And, likely due at least somewhat to her friendship with Su Mucheng, she was not even the slightest bit wary of him. Not quite treating him as an older brother herself, but still far closer than many of the other younger players. For example, Ye Xiu wasn’t sure Zhou Zekai had actually directly addressed him yet, even once.

Well, things would progress as they would. He still had some time.

“You’re telling me your aim is as good in real life as it is in the game?” Fang Rui enthused.

“Mm…” Zhou Zekai agreed hesitantly; he didn’t look like he knew what to do with all this attention.

“Little Zhou is the coolest! Let’s play Pitch-pot, I want to see! Which do you think is more accurate, your aim or my golden right hand?”

“We don’t have the materials for Pitch-pot,” Lin Jingyan reminded him laughingly.

“Sister Mu, is that true?” Fang Rui’s voice took on a whining tone. “Surely in a place this big, there must be something we can use. I want to play!”

“Since we’re supposed to be sleeping, you should be a little quieter,” Su Mucheng told him, laughing a little herself. “But I might be able to find something.”

“Sister Mu is the best!” Fang Rui cheered, as if he hadn’t heard her at all.

Chu Yunxiu returned to the room to find half the group tossing pencils into what looked to be a decorative vase. The group turned to her as one when she opened the door, more than a few staring with wide eyes like they’d been caught out doing something wrong.

“I don’t want to know,” she said, holding up a forestalling hand when she saw mouths open to explain. “I’m going to sit over here and watch things, and you will be quiet enough that I can hear them. That’s it.”

“Sure,” Zhao Yang said. “We’ll keep it down.”

Li Xuan snorted. They could try, but Huang Shaotian was playing too. Even Yu Wenzhou couldn’t keep him quiet for long.

They needn’t have worried, though; Chu Yunxiu immersed herself in her dramas and didn’t look away again before every single other pro had either gone to bed or drifted off then and there. Su Mucheng had leaned into her side to sleep, so Chu Yunxiu had settled a hand in her hair and left it there.

When Ye Xiu finally came in himself, she was still watching. “All night,” she said, before he could say anything else. “All. Night.”

“Go ahead,” he said peaceably, tossing a blanket over her and Su Mucheng. “Wow, these guys don’t even have pillows to blame it on this time.”

“Hopeless,” she agreed, shaking her head. “They want to pretend at following the schedule, but here they all still are when you come back to check. Their game didn’t even use alcohol penalties, they’ve no excuse.”

Obviously they wouldn’t involve alcohol penalties, being pro players, but Ye Xiu had to admit their sprawled forms did a good job of mimicking drunken revelry. “How much longer is that drama?”

“All night,” she reminded. “If I have to start a new one, I will.”

“I know, just don’t wake them up. You all do actually need to sleep.”

Chu Yunxiu nodded and tossed another sunflower seed in her mouth. “I’ll keep it down.”

Although her promise had exactly the same level of sincerity as the pros’ before, in a similar manner, by morning not a single one of the sleeping pros had been woken.

After normal morning practice, the average drills a pro player would put themselves through as well as various combinations of players in practice matches, Ye Xiu put away One Autumn Leaf and took out Lord Grim.

“Even if the mech are based on our characters, is this all we need to do? Are we ever going to learn about our opponents, or practice fighting them?” Yu Wenzhou asked.

“Sure, we’re doing that right now,” Ye Xiu said, blasé. “They look exactly like Glory’s NPCs.”

“Really?” Xiao Shiqin asked, looking at the strange, vicious little goblins that showed up at the start of the dungeon they were running together. There was a spider boss in here somewhere, too. Really?

“Eh, some of them, probably.” Ye Xiu shrugged unconvincingly.

Su Mucheng giggled at the flabbergasted expressions that popped up around them, some of the further pros putting emojis up over their characters to make it clear what they thought about that; Fang Shiqian put up his standard middle finger.

Really, would it kill him to take this a little more seriously?!

During dinner the pros had started a conversation about the meta for Glory play in different classes that ended up continuing over into the evening. These meetings of minds had happened less frequently as the Glory pro scene progressed, but now they were apparently on the same team, and they didn’t really have anything better to do, or anyone better to talk with. Ye Xiu eventually left to deal with whatever he did in the evenings with a halfhearted reminder for them to sleep, but the conversation continued regardless. One by one they would eventually slip away to sleep, so when Yang Cong left no one thought much of it.

Yang Cong had no intention of going to bed, though; instead, he went to find Ye Xiu to talk about his playstyle, and therefore his place on the team.

“Life-Risking Strike?” Since Excellent Era lost this year’s championship due largely to this skill, Ye Xiu obviously had a strong impression of it. “I haven’t heard much about the implementation yet, but it should be something like a partial-self destruct. It might even be a sonic attack, I’m not sure. You want to use it?”

“It fits my style better,” Yang Cong said with a sigh. “As the captain, I have my own responsibilities, but if you’re in charge of this team… Anyway, it suits me. Could it work?”

“You want to play more as a hidden danger, then, in concert with a partner of some sort to protect you?” Ye Xiu spun his pencil around his fingers thoughtfully. “Yeah, probably it could. We’re somewhat short on defensive players, but maybe Zhao Yang? If we had the Ghostblade duo too, that would be ideal…”

“I don’t have to survive the strike,” Yang Cong told him. “I’m aware of its downsides. The main point of not using it in the Alliance so far is that I can’t afford to be off the field after. It’s too dangerous. But if I’m not the tactical core, losing me wouldn’t be a problem.”

“I understand.” Ye Xiu tapped the end of his pencil against the paper. “It’s not that I wouldn’t want to use you that way, it’s that we don’t have nearly enough information on our opponents to plan a strategy around a trade like that. If we could determine who their healer is…” He sighed. “It’s hard to even do that. They won’t look like us, as far as I can tell; we don’t even know what materials their mech will be using, or what abilities they’d have. If you want to make a true tactical change, better to plan around a long-term partnership, more focused on living than dying, okay? If you have something to hide behind or a safe place to return to before you make your moves, that would be better. In any case, if you feel you’d be best not fighting out in front, I’d actually agree that it makes best use of an Assassin’s skills to do so. Talk to Zhao Yang about it tomorrow, see what he thinks.”

The two of them went over his options for a while longer, what differences there would be between doing this as a mech and doing it as a character in Glory—most notably, the correlation of damage to mech function rather than just lower health—and even what other skills might be of more use than usual in a real fight, like Vitals Strike and its possible ability to cripple an opponent.

Just before he left, Yang Cong finally asked. “Is it really aliens? I mean, actually, really aliens?”

Ye Xiu gave him a wry smile. “Actually, really, genuinely aliens.”

Yang Cong paused for a moment, just watching him, then gave him a sharp nod and turned back to the door. “Got it.”

As troublesome as Yang Cong was as an opponent, Ye Xiu really liked having him on his team.

At breakfast the next morning, Ye Xiu told them they’d get to try out their full set of what he called “standard” Silver equipment—the ones, he explained, that had not been altered to counter any specific opponent’s attributes, yet.

“So we’re trying them out like this for now because we don’t know what kind of things we’ll be up against,” Fang Shiqian began acerbically, “but later we might be facing aliens so that’ll all change?”

“Yeah, they haven’t finished modeling the alien content yet, so we’ll have to check that part later. And maybe think up some new things to safeguard against, if we can, since our information is limited.”

“You want us to just make up functions for Silver equipment so we can better face the ‘aliens’?”

“It doesn’t actually matter why, so long as you do it,” Ye Xiu pointed out.

“Yeah, why not aliens?” Fang Rui said brightly through a mouthful of steamed buns. “At least that’s interesting!”

“You.” Fang Shiqian suddenly turned on the boy with remarkable fury.

Fang Rui yelped and half hid behind Lin Jingyan. “OT! What’s with this aggro system? One sentence is enough to shift it?!”

“Two…” Zhou Zekai said from his other side.

Fang Shiqian ignored them. “You are the one taking all the buns with stuffing! Put them back!”

Fang Rui immediately leaned back over his plate to cover his absurd pile of buns with his arms. “I’m a growing boy! I need these!” he immediately defended, then paused as he looked over at Fang Shiqian’s place on the table, baffled. “You don’t even eat buns?”

“I don’t, but I’m not the only one at the table!” Fang Shiqian gestured at Wang Jiexi quietly eating beside him. “He eats stuffed steamed buns for breakfast, but I haven’t seen him do it this whole time we’ve been here! This is why, isn’t it?! Put them back!”

“It’s fine, there’s other food,” Wang Jiexi said calmly.

“Shut up, idiot, you don’t even notice that you eat half as much if you don’t get your stupid morning buns. Bad enough with that Huang Shaotian kid sniping all the buns without stuffing the moment you look away…”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Huang Shaotian said righteously, and indeed there were none visible on his plate.

“Don’t put your food in your lap, it’s gross,” Yu Wenzhou said, nearly off-handed.

Ye Xiu looked like he was on the edge of helpless laughter. “I can just call for more…”

“Then he’ll just steal more! It’s the principle of the matter!” Fang Shiqian glared at him.

“I completely agree,” Wu Yuce said plainly, reaching a hand across the table to steal one of Fang Rui’s buns while he was distracted.

Thus another morning meal fell into petty squabbling, ending only when Han Wenqing finished his food and stood up like a massive tower of doom, saying he wanted to start playing now.

Reminded of the completely new Silver equipment awaiting them all, everyone hurried to finish up and rush after him.

The pros were too enamored of their new equipment to let it go at the end of the day, playing round after round against different opponents, figuring out where their limits were. They set up an ill-advised tournament amongst themselves with various snack prizes provided by Su Mucheng, who somehow had the ability to procure food at any time but wouldn’t say from where.

Zhang Jiale joined them too late to be part of the main event, and was a little quieter than usual.

“You okay?” Sun Zheping, as his close partner, noticed the difference right away.

Zhang Jiale was quiet for a moment, then asked a question of his own rather than answer. “Big Sun, we’re going to win, right?”

Sun Zheping didn’t know the exact context of the question, but he didn’t need it. “Definitely!”

It wasn’t the first time Zhang Jiale had asked this kind of question—not because he doubted their partnership or their capability, but because he liked hearing Sun Zheping say it. Sun Zheping was always so certain about his choices and his future, so decisive when he took action, it was enough to sweep anyone up along with him.

“Okay,” Zhang Jiale said, then again, louder, “Okay. Definitely!” His hands were clenched into determined fists under the table.

“Did you want to do a 2v2?” Sun Zheping asked him.

Zhang Jiale’s hands relaxed, and he shook them out as he pulled them up to the keyboard in front of him. “There’s basically no fun in that, right? Make it a 2v3, at least!”

Their playstyle, the Hundred Blossoms style, was considered one of the most difficult to beat or break in all of Glory. Today they’d spent a lot of time on their combination along with the new Silver equipment, and it was definitely in its best form. No matter how talented their opponents, if they wanted to beat Hundred Blossom’s pair off the cuff with a partnership any less developed, they would be waiting a long time.

Sun Zheping and Zhang Jiale settled together comfortably, ready to face all takers. The two of them together were never worried about victory.

When the first of the “new content” enemies showed up and everyone finally got to see them, they just stared in silence. It was…some kind of whirling, screeching madness made almost entirely of teeth.

“I can see why they couldn’t fit this in the game,” Ye Xiu said blandly. “Alright then, any thoughts about how to face it?”

“What do you mean, couldn’t fit this in the game?!” Huang Shaotian yelled. “What the fuck is this?! No seriously, what the fuck is it? Is this even an enemy? Can we fight this? The teeth spit venom! They make tornadoes full of fire and knives that go crashing around the arena! I think I’ve gone deaf just from listening to the screeching from here, you want me to do that with my headphones on? What is the point?! What is the fucking point?! You tell me, who wants to face this?!”

“Your suggestion of our own sound screen is noted, but we didn’t need a demonstration, too,” Ye Xiu said. “Anyone else?”

“Don’t ignore me!” Huang Shaotain shrieked.

“The poison works even on the mech?” Zhang Xinjie asked, ignoring him.

“Presumably. We aren’t sure what material the mech is made out of, but as far as we know all status effects are rendered faithfully. If it says it would inflict a poison effect, then it would inflict a poison effect. The mechanism for how might be different, but the result should be equivalent.”

“A paralyzing screech?” Yu Wenzhou asked. “Usually that’s supposed to have to do with an instinctual response. Would it affect the operator or the mech itself?”

“Hard to say, but we’re going to go with the belief that it’s the mech itself for now. Whether or not a screech capable of freezing up a player is capable of being relayed through our earphones is…uncertain. It might be caused by rattling the joints enough to freeze the mech.”

“The only part of this that takes any damage is the middle,” Wang Jiexi said. “I could fly close enough usually, but with all that wind…”

Discussion went on for a while, bringing up different issues and different possibilities to solve aspects of those issues. Eventually it petered out as everyone stared at the monstrosities, thinking of what they could do next.

“You’re all making great points and everything, but I just have to say,” Fang Rui suddenly piped up. “Do each of them actually have to be 18 times our size?”

No one answered, just staring at the jagged edges that filled the screen. Yeah, to be honest, 18 times their size did feel like a little much. There were already at least five of them; the size was just overkill.

Sun Zheping sat across from Ye Xiu and put his elbow in the middle of his desk in a way that absolutely could not be ignored.

“You could say hello,” Ye Xiu said, pulling his earphones off. “What’s up?”

“Do you want to tell me why Zhang Jiale has been a mess since he went to see you last night about the new effects on his weapon?” It was something both of them had noticed, that the light effects of his skills were a little different after he got his new Silver weapon, even though he hadn’t said anything to the R&D team about making such a change. For something so integral to his playstyle, Zhang Jiale obviously wanted to ask Ye Xiu what the discrepancy was about.

“A mess?” Although Zhang Jiale was a little quieter today, he hadn’t been any less capable in the test runs they’d done against the teeth monsters.

“He shouldn’t be so serious and anxious over some new Glory NPCs, no matter what you said to him yesterday,” Sun Zheping elaborated. “He’s insisting they really represent the aliens we’re going to fight, and he’s racking his brain trying to figure out how to counter them. I don’t know if you think it’s funny or motivating or what, but if this aliens thing is just teasing, you need to clear it up with him right now. And if you’re going to tell me it’s not, then I want to know absolutely everything about them.”

Ye Xiu sighed. “It’s not teasing.”

“Alright then.” Sun Zheping didn’t bother with questioning. “Tell me.”

“Are we fighting the shark teeth monster aliens again today?” Fang Rui asked over breakfast.

“The what?” Ye Xiu asked around a youtiao.

“You know, the things we were all drafted to fight. Aliens.” Fang Rui’s grin was irrepressible. “Unless we were drafted to fight something else, and you’re finally going to tell us about it.”

“Oh, yeah, that.” Ye Xiu went to grab another one. “No, it’s aliens. Totally. Definitely aliens.”

Sun Zheping rolled his eyes at him but didn’t bother commenting.

“Do they have a name?” Wang Jiexi asked. “If not…shark teeth monster aliens?”

“Mm, yeah.” Ye Xiu tilted his head consideringly. “Can’t say it, though. It sounded like a bunch of screeching metal. I’ve been calling them Overkill, though. For obvious reasons.”

Wang Jiexi hummed noncommittally and went back to his food.

“Sure, you just happen to be incapable of pronouncing the name,” Fang Shiqian grumbled under his breath. “We all absolutely believe you. Don’t listen to him,” he told Wang Jiexi.

Wang Jiexi was quiet for a moment, before finally saying, “I think, in these circumstances…”

“Not this again.” Fang Shiqian rolled his eyes.

Last night, Wang Jiexi told him that it might be the case that Ye Xiu’s insistence on aliens was not a joke. Fang Shiqian tried to convince him that Ye Xiu was just too lazy to come up with a better lie or actually fight over what should or should not be classified—he had, after all, seen Ye Xiu make blatantly false statements about who they were or what they were doing all the time when they’d dungeoned together; he knew what it sounded like—but in the end, Wang Jiexi had more dropped the matter than properly agreed.

“Look what you’ve done,” he scolded Ye Xiu. Su Mucheng choked on her soy milk at his stance, somehow reminiscent of an angry housewife. “You’ve got him buying your bullshit, too! Even though you’re all over the place with your ‘aliens’ story, half the time ‘oh Glory didn’t model them before,’ half the time ‘they look just like NPCs,’ you can’t even make up your mind! And now this lazy naming scheme, but you’ve got everyone so addled they’re still actually considering it. This is your fault, you know! Take some responsibility!”

“Okay, okay, it’s my fault.” Ye Xiu looked endlessly amused. “Let’s just go back to the game now, alright? It’s almost time to start.”

The words were placating, but the tone would make anyone want to punch him in the face. Fang Shiqian made the heroic effort to resist and counted it as his good deed done for the day.

In the end, they all had to agree that they just didn’t have the skill they needed to handle this. According to Ye Xiu’s suggestion, if they really didn’t have it, they should ask R&D to develop something based on what they did have.

“Paladins have a good number of skills that can block damage, but with the wind’s interference on movement and the poison debuff that strips all buffs, it’s just not going to work.” For all that Fang Shiqian complained about how Ye Xiu went about presenting these tasks, and what he claimed they were for, he tackled them seriously once they began. There was a reason he was known as the God of Healing, and it wasn’t because he was the type to slack off and whine about everyone else.

“You’re right,” Ye Xiu agreed; as much as he enjoyed riling Fang Shiqian, he was also completely serious when it came to Glory and his responsibilities. “I think we’ll have to go with something like Qi Guard, but with more effects on the environment, and possibly attached to another character rather than immobile. Like a combination of Qi Guard and Holy Shield with more emphasis on calming the surroundings, if possible. Would that work for you?” The last was addressed to Zhao Yang. It was Zhao Yang’s weapon, after all, so he would be the one using it.

“It’s a good plan,” Zhao Yang said, nodding seriously. “And I can think of several other instances where it’d be useful beyond just this opponent, so it’s no loss for my Mirror Moon to add it.”

Generally speaking, pro players wouldn’t spend this long thinking about something like which skill to add to their weapon, since it was so easy to change. However, Ye Xiu had made it clear before that these additional skills would not be like the skills in the game, added on with just scrolls. Their mechs didn’t have the same kinds of constraints, so this was purely adding whatever function they could manage to model to the equipment, at the highest level possible. When it came to defending the country, who was going to care about game balance? The game was just a recruitment tool, anyway. With R&D now allowed to do whatever they liked, they were very excited to see if they could add on more.

Unfortunately, everything that was in the game was in that way for a reason. If they wanted to keep the Silver equipment functional, they really couldn’t add more than one additional feature. This was the same kind of thing that stopped them from adding whatever skills they wanted to the characters now—the reason characters were divided into classes and could only use class-appropriate skills had to do with how much and what kinds of things the mechs could support at the same time, as well as just normal optimization. That was why they couldn’t just create a supermech with every single function, and the reason Lord Grim was still largely restricted to skills under level 20. To them, Lord Grim’s mere ability to develop to a higher level while still able to use so many contradictory skills was already a miracle.

Zhang Xinjie came by to talk to Ye Xiu about tactics and appropriate countermeasures that evening, as he had started doing as soon as he’d come to terms with what he and the rest of the pros would be facing. After he left, Yu Wenzhou made his way into the room, finger tapping thoughtfully on his ever-present notebook.

“You’re doing it on purpose, aren’t you?” Yu Wenzhou asked; always a promising opening, in Ye Xiu’s opinion.

“Hm?” He indicated mildly that Yu Wenzhou should go on.

“It really is aliens,” Yu Wenzhou elaborated, “but that’s too much for anyone to handle all at once, so you made it…something else.”

“I told everyone right from the start,” Ye Xiu said, mouth pulling at the side even as he suppressed his grin. “As ordered.”

“But who would believe it?” Yu Wenzhou shook his head. “You didn’t even try.”

“No need,” Ye Xiu said with an amused shrug.

“Better than ‘no need,’ Yu Wenzhou said, eyes full of sharp intelligence. Ye Xiu was reminded that there was a reason Yu Wenzhou was called to join them, despite his low physical ability and the near uselessness of his predictive skill against nearly unknowable opponents. “No one’s even panicked yet. Even though, at our age…”

“At your age,” Ye Xiu agreed. “Lucky, though, that most of you are still young enough to believe in your own invincibility.”

“You…” Yu Wenzhou didn’t seem to know what to say at first. “Are you okay?”

“Oh?” It wasn’t the question Ye Xiu had been expecting.

“It’s a lot to handle alone, and you aren’t that much older,” Yu Wenzhou pointed out.

“I’m not alone.” Ye Xiu grinned. “Don’t I have all of you with me?”

Yu Wenzhou hadn’t considered it, but maybe that would really be enough. Not a single-player game, wasn’t it?

In the end, no matter how it looked or what people believed from the outside, Ye Xiu never thought himself to be alone.

When Yu Wenzhou left, Ye Xiu still wasn’t done for the evening. Yu Wenzhou closed the door behind him, then turned around to face Huang Shaotian, who was hiding in the corridor.

“What are you doing?” Yu Wenzhou asked.

“Hide-and-seek,” Huang Shaotian told him. “We set up a whole jungle in the common area, just like I said earlier, right? There are blankets everywhere, and a bunch of different boxes, just a totally awesome environment. Since we did so much to make such a cool structure, wouldn’t we have to take advantage of it? Everyone agreed so we’re all doing that now. You’ve pretty much missed the whole thing!”

“…You’re ‘taking advantage of it’ by being in a different wing of the compound entirely?” Yu Wenzhou asked dubiously.

“Of course! With all the focus we put on the living room, who’s going to imagine I went somewhere else?” Huang Shaotian cackled. “Not to mention, everyone’s avoiding this room in case Ye Xiu comes out to scold us for not going to bed, as if that would ever happen. He’s not anyone’s mother! And in any case, haven’t we been so loud all the other nights, too? If he didn’t say anything when Zhang Jiale managed to knock over three tables at once and Fang Rui almost died of laughter or when Han Wenqing tossed that pencil into the vase so hard it exploded, he probably isn’t going to say anything if we thump around a little too much while playing a game, right? Right. So here I am. Anyway, how’d it go?”

Yu Wenzhou considered the talk they’d had, about what Ye Xiu was doing and what they were all facing. “As expected.”

“Damn,” Huang Shaotian replied, uncharacteristically short.

Yu Wenzhou’s pen tapped out a quiet but steady rhythm against his notebook.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

The next enemy the pros were provided was a pool of lava.

“Is this…an environment thing?” Xiao Shiqin looked at the lava pools uncertainly. They didn’t seem to be doing very much.

“Unlikely,” Ye Xiu said, sounding somewhat bemused himself. “I guess they don’t favor active assaults.”

“Health started dropping as soon as we entered the arena,” Zhang Xinjie commented. “It appears to be heat damage, but there seems to be a poison aspect as well.”

Lava in the game did a lot of damage and caught characters on fire if they touched it, but it didn’t act much like lava in real life. Lava in real life was too hot to get anywhere near, and certainly not the kind of thing one could fall into and jump out of in any meaningful way. Of course, if the characters were meant to simulate far sturdier mech, it would make sense for them to handle lava that way.

This, though, seemed much more like how lava would interact with ordinary humans.

“This species is apparently called Star Cores,” Ye Xiu told them. “We can probably assume that it’s not actually lava, but we don’t have much other information to go off of.”

“It’s moving,” Yang Cong said, eyeing the edge of the “pool.” “Or spreading, I guess.”

The lava stretched outward, slow but inexorable.

Ye Xiu hummed thoughtfully. “So it is. Well, any thoughts?”

Ice meant nothing to the Star Core, which ate through Ice Boundaries and passed through Blizzards without any sign of slowing down. Anything they threw at it disappeared within it, and still it crept closer, spread wider, took over more.

“We’re all gonna die,” Fang Rui said solemnly. “Each one of these things will be differently horrible than the last, and we’ll just expire here, at the edge of everything.”

“Stop being dramatic,” Wu Yuce said, rolling his eyes. They were, at this point, all backed up to the edge of the arena, but it was hardly cause for an existential crisis.

“It’s going to eat us all,” Fang Rui continued, and then, as an afterthought to Wu Yuce, “No.”

“I guess it is kind of eating,” Yu Wenzhou said thoughtfully. Swoksaar’s Chaotic Rain made the thing churn, but didn’t stop it. “I don’t suppose we could poison it.”

“I tried,” Fang Rui said mournfully. “It ate it just like everything else.”

“Then we eat it right back,” Fang Shiqian said, sounding incredibly annoyed. Having spent so much time fighting the continuous damage on so many fronts, he was not in the least pleased. “Lifesteal already!”

“Nothing we do gets close enough,” Yu Wenzhou sighed. His attempt to use Grasping Ghost, one of his highest-level skills, had gone…poorly, to say the least. When it started to come back to him it was covered in the strange, eating fire he’d cast it on, and he had to cancel the skill before it could touch him in fear of being consumed himself.

“Wave Wheel Slasher catches part of it for a bit, but the rest oozes around and it takes no damage,” Huang Shaotian reported.

The news was interesting to Ye Xiu for more than one reason—if Wave Wheel Slasher worked against something that ate most everything it touched, and the rest of the Star Core oozed around it, then the skill was probably a genuine dimensional rift rather than something that approximated one. In addition, if some of the Star Core could be separated from the rest and it didn’t take damage, then the Star Core itself was not a single entity, but a genuine pool of similar material with only the vaguest sense of intent.

“A dimensional boundary with lifesteal and freezing properties,” Wu Yuce suddenly said. As a swordsman, he was obviously familiar with Wave Wheel Slasher, so he knew its relevant attributes as well. “Can it be done?”

“That’s too many things at once,” Li Xuan said, but he didn’t sound scolding. “You have to make it a cohesive idea. What about a void boundary?”

“There’s such a thing?” Wu Yuce asked. Although he played a Ghostblade, he played as a hybrid rather than a pure Phantom Demon. He didn’t focus solely on boundaries the way Li Xuan did, so it wasn’t technically impossible for one he’d never heard of to exist.

“Not that we know of, but we could still ask R&D about it,” Li Xuan said. “Zhao Yang’s Eye of the Storm effect didn’t exist before, either.”

“A boundary that puts the opponent into a void dimension, almost like throwing them out in space, right?” Ye Xiu asked. “Except they’re still there, so we can still attack. Yeah, I can ask about it. All the individual concepts are in the game, anyway.”

By the time practice had ended, they still hadn’t come up with any other way to deal with the creeping advance of the Star Cores, so it had to be left at that.

Lin Jingyan showed up that night, looking a little uncomfortable but, if not determined, at least resigned.

“Can you talk to Fang Rui about the alien thing?” he asked. “It’s really not good to mess with him this way. He’s the type to always smile and joke about things, but I can tell he’s actually starting to get stressed. As a joke, even if you got him in on it at the start, by now it’s gone too far.”

“I didn’t get him in on anything,” Ye Xiu sighed. “But it’s not a joke. There really are aliens.”

Tian Sen, who’d just opened the door to the room, really, seriously thought about turning back around again. He’d really just come to talk about what they could expect for next season and interaction with their guild during this time; the subject of actual aliens was way too far beyond that.

But, if it was real, and he’d be involved no matter what…better to know than not, right?

Tian Sen blew out a single, heavy breath, then walked all the way into the room and closed the door behind him.

The living room was soaking wet.

“Mucheng,” Ye Xiu said, exasperated. As the enabler providing the rest with materials, whatever had happened, she’d facilitated it. “Was this really necessary?”

“Would I do something that wasn’t?” she asked, eyes wide and guileless.

Well, that was fair. He’d been asking the wrong question. “How funny was it?” Ye Xiu asked instead.

“Very.”

The overlay of similar skills—Wave Wheel Slasher, Ice Boundary, Grasping Ghost, Bloodthirsty, Blizzard—had not worked, but the new Void Boundary did. In a Void Boundary, allies walked unhindered by the world, but enemies were caught in an inescapable limbo, unable to move or affect others. The only drawback was the cast time, which was horrendously long in exchange for the overwhelming power and fairly large radius. Star Cores had very little directed movement, so it didn’t take them long to coast over these NPCs like there’d never been a problem at all, but for any other enemy it would be an issue.

“I can ask to put it on my Heavenly Crimson Lotus instead,” Wu Yuce offered. As the junior of his team and the one to insist on playing a class that overlapped with the captain, it would make sense for him to use his own Silver weapon for a necessary additional skill that wasn’t universally useful to free up Li Xuan’s Four Heavenly Wheels for a better one.

“Don’t be ridiculous. The cast time for me is already absurd, and I have that optimized. What would that look like for you?” Li Xuan immediately waved him off. The more he played with Wu Yuce, the more he liked this kid. He really did have some skill, and he was pretty smart, too. In any case, though, he was still undebuted, and played a hybrid Sword and Phantom Demon at that. Of course they wouldn’t put the Void Boundary skill on his weapon.

“Think about how you can protect him for the duration of the cast time instead,” Ye Xiu suggested. “If you can do that against any opponent, then the skill really won’t be a waste.”

Wu Yuce nodded seriously.

“You actually want to run two Ghostblades in the same team competition?” Li Xuan asked, surprised.

“Sure,” Ye Xiu said offhandedly. “Linking ghost boundaries is a good plan in the first place, if possible. But you’re also from the same team, playing the same class, so you should be able to coordinate fairly well. Having the two of you work in tandem definitely isn’t the worst choice.”

Li Xuan hummed thoughtfully. “Hm, yeah.” A drum of fingers on the table under Wu Yuce’s watchful eyes. “I guess it’s not bad.”

The Star Cores were not the last of the simulated entities they went up against by a long shot. No sooner had they completed one then the next appeared, though they got faster and faster at figuring out how to face them. In the morning with One Autumn Leaf, in the afternoon with Lord Grim, Ye Xiu led them through battle after battle against an absolutely bizarre array of enemies.

Their mornings had started the same way so many times, it was a surprise for some when Ye Xiu announced that they’d be looking over the data they had for the championship team, even though it was a few years old. At last, a few of them thought, they would be doing something serious.

But.

“This is just another group of NPCs,” Fang Shiqian said flatly.

Ye Xiu’s reply was just as bland. “Well-spotted.”

Fang Shiqian moved Wind Guard in front of One Autumn Leaf to make sure Ye Xiu would see when he filled the air above his character’s head with middle fingers.

Still, new opponents were new opponents, and they got down to the fight as usual.

They were absolutely thrashed.

Sure, they’d often lost before, but not like this.

“What the fuck was that?!” Huang Shaotian began, fuming. But it was Huang Shaotian, so obviously he couldn’t leave it there. “We’ve put up with a lot of things by now but tentacles is going too far! Tentacles is too much! You’re just making fun of us now, aren’t you? Aren’t you?! What other reason could there be for tentacles?! What is this supposed to be, a bad porno?!”

“Who cares about what shape the attack’s in? Did you not notice that the acid coating causes damage that can’t be healed?” Fang Shiqian complained, talking right over any further diatribe. “You can’t just nerf healers like that! Your stupid new NPCs are way too OP!”

“Perhaps the nanites are melted when they try to patch the damage,” Zhang Xinjie posited, sounding calm enough. Whether or not he actually was calm was anyone’s guess. “We can’t heal because as soon as they touch the acid, they’re taken out too.”

“Wash it off?” Tian Sen suggested uncertainly.

Xiao Shiqin sighed. “But it’d corrode the mechs all the way down.”

“What the fuck?!” Fang Shiqian reiterated with impressive vehemence.

There was nothing anyone could say to that.

“…So we need a specialized Silver weapon?” Zhao Yang finally asked.

Everyone groaned.

The answer was always a specialized Silver weapon.

Ye Qiu announced himself by calling “I finally found you, shameful older brother!” across the front courtyard, because apparently this house was one of the many guest houses owned by the Ye family, and he had not actually been informed that it currently contained anyone but Ye Xiu.

Ye Xiu, of course, didn’t care either way. “I wasn’t hiding, but hello to you too.”

“How were you not hiding?” In front of others, Ye Qiu initially intended to have a more refined appearance, but Ye Xiu always had a way of shaking his resolve. Though his voice had gone more proper, he still sounded fed up. “You finally come back home, but you don’t even show your face at the table before running off again?”

“I left your ID,” Ye Xiu pointed out.

“Not stealing my ID is the minimum! It took you this many years to give it back already, and you want me to praise you?” Ye Qiu wasn’t having it. “Even if our parents wanted you to work right away, you should have said something to me first. It’s been years, and you didn’t even say goodbye when you left!”

“Were you going to?”

Ye Qiu choked. Obviously he wasn’t…

“Besides, it seems I never actually stopped working for them. You could say this has all been one big away trip, like before.”

“Nonsense, we spent three years not knowing if you were dead or alive.”

“You didn’t know, and only because you’re stubborn. Our parents said I was fine, right?”

Ye Qiu had nothing to say to that. It was true that they had always been bizarrely sure of Ye Xiu’s ability to survive on his own, if extremely upset with his willful departure. After Ye Xiu had taken Ye Qiu’s ID, proving he was, in fact, fine, their parents had insisted it was good for him to keep it anyway, so they could track him. However, they never told Ye Qiu anything in particular about where to find him. Sure, Ye Qiu pretty much figured it out, in the end, but the reticence really was a lot like what happened in Ye Xiu’s frequent disappearances before he ran, too.

“What are you doing now, then?” he finally asked.

“Playing games,” Ye Xiu replied nonchalantly, inciting Ye Qiu all over again.

And that was how the rest of the pros finally got an idea of how Ye Xiu had come to be known as “Ye Qiu” all that time.

“Since our identical faces have managed to create a security breach yet again,” Ye Xiu told the pros later—“Yet again,” Zhang Jiale mouthed incredulously—“you are all allowed to call out today if there’s someone you want to notify of your relative well-being. Don’t mention what you’re doing in particular, but you can say you’re not in trouble and will be away for a while. You can really just say you’ve been drafted, or even called in as a consultant, it’s good enough. Or at a Glory training camp, if you want to be less alarming.”

With his family being the way it was, Ye Xiu didn’t have a lot of experience with toning down life updates. The closest he got was in keeping Ye Qiu out of all this, which had a lot more to do with riling him up than calming anyone down.

“How did the two of you end up so different?” Chu Yunxiu asked him later. The drama of the whole thing very much appealed to her.

Ye Xiu didn’t even have to think about it. “Different focuses. He got trained as a sophisticated heir, I got trained to take charge.” Then he paused as he considered what more he’d seen of Ye Qiu today, since he hadn’t otherwise personally interacted with his little brother in the seven years previous. “And our environment, I guess. He’s styled like someone who needs to make a point of how well he lives. It’s a very upper-class thing.”

“Yeah, you’re definitely not trying to make a point of that,” Chu Yunxiu said, eyeing Ye Xiu’s sloppy dress and generally casual demeanor.

Ye Xiu shrugged. “What audience do I have to make a point to? Everyone who comes by is also working or lives here with me, there’s nothing to see.”

Which was what made it so incredibly weird when Ye Xiu appeared the next day in uniform, looking well-groomed for the first time in pretty much anyone’s memory of the man. There were actually a few who thought his twin had returned, but even Ye Qiu didn’t seem to carry himself like this, like he was a man in power and used to wielding it.

It turned out Ye Xiu had let them all make their calls the day before because they would be moving out anyway. Ye Xiu’s scheduled report on their team’s progress—yet another thing no one else had known about—had ended with the order for them to move to the next stage of the project, a result Ye Xiu had clearly anticipated.

“You don’t have to worry, the facilities are still comfortable, and we’ll be doing a lot of the same things,” Ye Xiu explained casually. “This is just about officially registering as the remote-piloting team. I knew from the beginning you’d all be fine for it, but there’s still an order to these things, and it’s better not to officially count in anyone who might be a problem when things get serious later.”

“Can you tell us what we’re up against?” Fang Shiqian asked. Despite how he seemed, he was actually a fairly organized person who was quite good at compartmentalization, so it hadn’t taken him long to pack.

The edge of Ye Xiu’s mouth quirked up. “I can tell you it’s aliens.”

“Mm, go die.” For a conversational response, it sure managed to convey a lot of hostility.

Ye Xiu laughed. “You’re the one walking right into these, you know. Nobody told you to keep asking.”

“Nobody told you to keep saying it’s aliens, either,” Fang Shiqian groused.

“I have my orders,” Ye Xiu said solemnly, earning himself another half-hearted glare. For all he kept asking, Fang Shiqian wasn’t really expecting much of a response, anymore.

The implication of “I have my orders,” in Fang Shiqian’s mind, was obviously that Ye Xiu was not allowed to tell them. So he still managed to be immensely shocked when, upon meeting up with other uniformed people just outside of their new facility, the agents started throwing around words like “alien overseers” and “intergalactic tournament.”

“Are you serious?!” Fang Shiqian said. The pictures they were showing them were either incredibly realistic CGI versions of the NPCs they’d fought, or actual aliens. This was very clearly a military setup, though, and that would be quite a lot of effort to go to for a prank.

The man giving the presentation frowned at the interruption. “Captain Ye, you said you’d brief them? We could have done this presentation much sooner.”

“I did.” Ye Xiu didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed. Losing face? As far as anyone else could tell, Ye Xiu hadn’t even heard of the concept. “If he didn’t want to believe me, despite all this evidence, how is that my fault?”

“You—your delivery is so shitty,” Fang Shiqian hissed. “How is anyone ever supposed to believe you?!”

Ye Xiu sighed, sounding incongruously woeful and put-upon. “A little application of trust—”

“Get the fuck out,” Fang Shiqian snarled.

Grinning, Ye Xiu actually went. “It’s up to you,” he told the flabbergasted agent, patting him on the shoulder as he passed. “I have to go report to the general.”

“Uh.” The poor man didn’t seem to know how to get back on track. “Well. Can I…continue?”

“Yeah, go ahead,” Fang Shiqian waved his hand dismissively. “That guy just likes pissing people off, I’m fine.”

Indeed, he seemed more disgruntled than actually horribly shocked, but the agent himself had to take a moment. “That guy” was the heir to the Ye family, who’d already made a name for himself in this department at fifteen. Absolutely nobody called him “that guy.”

Why did he feel like this group of gamers was practically incomprehensible already?!

Fang Shiqian was not actually the only one who hadn’t previously asked Ye Xiu about the alien issue, but he was the only one vocally against it. Among the others were those who understood Ye Xiu well enough not to need to ask, like Han Wenqing, those who basically respected him enough not to question anything, like Zhou Zekai, and those who’d come to their own conclusions but kept to themselves, like Wang Jiexi, Wu Yuce, and Li Xuan—although Li Xuan had a bit of not wanting to appear foolish either way mixed in. Zhao Yang had come to the somewhat unique conclusion that it actually didn’t matter, so long as he was doing his best.

Xiao Shiqin had seen Zhang Xinjie and Yu Wenzhou going to meet up with Ye Xiu in the evenings and hadn’t wanted to be left out, so he ended up joining them for strategy meetings. At first he still didn’t quite believe the whole thing, but over time he could tell that the other tacticians were absolutely serious. It was a little worrying, but honestly speaking, the three younger tacticians had long since grown used to learning from Ye Xiu and following his lead. If Ye Xiu didn’t seem particularly worried about all this, despite the stakes, then it must still be within the realm of what they could control, right?

Once he’d been sure it was really aliens they were up against, and ones far more advanced than humans at that, Xiao Shiqin had asked if the tacticians or even some of the others should join him for these evening practices as well. Ye Xiu only laughed and said that the schedule was very important, and set up as it was for a good reason. Other than when they wanted to come talk to him, they should continue to follow it as usual.

Ostensibly, this meant they should sleep during these evening times, since that was what the schedule said, but Ye Xiu obviously knew the pros usually didn’t. In fact, the schedule was designed that way to give the pros time to interact casually and, rather importantly, in a way that seemed outside of any formal plans. Natural interactions couldn’t be forced, and keeping up a constant atmosphere of stress would only tank their collective performance, in the end. If they wanted to stay up half the night having a water balloon fight Ye Xiu definitely knew nothing about, then they absolutely could and should.

Provided they didn’t damage the electronics, but honestly, these were pro gamers. Ye Xiu was completely confident that they would never dream of it.

And, if he was wrong, they could always get more. Unlimited government sponsorship sure was nice.

Though most of the pros had settled themselves emotionally by the time they were led into the base proper, there was a sick sense of vertigo that came with actually walking into this building they couldn’t so easily walk back out of, when they would leave having saved Earth or else, most likely, not at all.

They were allowed to settle into their rooms, set this time as bunk-like almost-pods instead of luxurious guest rooms.

“They’re good for constructive rest,” their guide explained. “And can fold out of the way when not in use to give you more space.”

More space for what, no one bothered to ask. Their rooms were not equipped with their own computer setup, irritatingly enough, which meant regardless of the answer no one was likely to spend any time there.

Once they’d done that, they were meant to meet up in a room where Ye Xiu could give them a better idea of what they’d be doing in the near future. Ye Xiu, they’d come to understand, was either the leader of the whole venture or of a similar rank to the leaders, so most of the departments were actually reporting to him. Those of the pros that had gone to visit him in the evenings might have guessed this from all the information he seemed to have to handle, and his ability to just order new Silver equipment whenever he liked, but nothing had ever been explicitly said beyond his being in charge of their team when it came to playing.

“Isn’t that Ye Xiu out there?” Zhang Jiale asked. The pros had to pass along a hall with large windows on the way to wherever they were going. None of them had any reservations about coming over to look out, since they knew from the time they’d spent outside the facility that the windows were all thoroughly mirrored.

It was, in fact, Ye Xiu, still dressed in the uniform he’d had on earlier with the addition of a sleek earpiece curving along his jaw to his mouth, speaking seriously to someone standing across from him. The person across from him seemed to be wearing something like a cloak with a high collar, but the back of their head was a single smooth curve streaked with color, as if someone had smeared a greenish dye across abnormally saturated yellow-orange skin.

Zhang Jiale had already stopped to look, so Sun Zheping did as well. “Seems so. Who’s he talking to, though?”

“That would be the liaison from the tournament’s organizers, and the person in charge of our loan,” their guide said calmly. With seven years to get used to the idea, no one on the project thought the alien’s appearance was anything to get worked up about.

“An alien?” Fang Rui asked, leaning toward the window with interest. After Lin Jingyan’s talk, he’d slowly settled back into his previous casualness about the aliens they were going to face, though how much of that was affected was hard to say. “What do you think they’re like? Is that their clothing, or maybe a hat? Oh, are they bald?!”

At that moment the person talking to Ye Xiu suddenly twisted in their direction, as if it could see or hear them, though they all knew that couldn’t be the case.

A few of the pros gasped sharply, stumbling back from the window in horror. The thing didn’t have a face at all, or even a front of the head. Instead there was a gaping void, almost like looking into the bell of a trumpet or the opening of a gourd, the inside completely hollow and nearly, disturbingly enough, translucent.

“Looks like a pitcher plant,” Wang Jiexi said musingly, as steady and unflappable as always.

“How apt,” Yu Wenzhou commented blandly. Indeed, from what they’d been told, this group would bait populations with claims of reasonable treatment and fair trades, or even with winning acclaim, into giving up their planets without a fight; very much like a pitcher plant in nature, humans mere insects before their superior means.

The thing turned back to Ye Xiu again. Ye Xiu cast a glance in their direction, but the way his eyes passed over their group, it was clear he couldn’t see them.

“This way, please,” their guide reminded them, and the pros continued on in an unsettled mood.

Ye Xiu could tell something was up when he came to meet the team later. Undoubtedly, it had to do with the time that the liaison had asked after his team, since it could tell they were there—not see or hear, but it just knew, which was always unnerving.

Speaking of seeing and hearing, the alien did seem to do so, though he could find no proper sense organs that did it. Where the vibrations came from couldn’t be certain—though the division had made some guesses about the species perhaps having liquid on the inside, in much the same way a pitcher plant did, that could cause them—but with the earpiece in what anyone heard from the plant was flawless Chinese.

Without equipment, none of them could properly detect any sound at all. At most, a quiet drone.

No matter how many pictures or simulations the group had seen, it wasn’t the same as truly seeing an alien in person; this, Ye Xiu understood well from his own experience. Though he had the training necessary to continue on without a hitch, it had still been a disconcerting experience. For the others, who hadn’t been put through increasingly bizarre experiences throughout their childhood, it was likely much worse.

“The matches will be set up the same way we’re used to,” Ye Xiu explained. “Three individual matches, the group arena, and the team competition. Tiebreaker matches will be handled through a single full-team Last Man Standing-style competition, meaning the entire team, rather than our normal 5-player configuration, will go up against the opponent’s entire team, and whichever eliminates the other first wins.”

“How likely is that to happen?” Yu Wenzhou asked. He hadn’t missed the fact that many of their practices were in a somewhat similar format, although it was undoubtedly useful to let them work together on figuring out the new NPCs and naturally form their own combinations instead of pre-selecting five-person groups, regardless. Which was to say, it hadn’t seemed out of place before, but the parallel to how a tie-breaker worked would explain why Ye Xiu didn’t force them into working with specific 5-person teams more often as their practices went on. Provided, of course, that it was likely enough to happen that they should be specifically preparing for it.

“More likely than we’d usually see,” Ye Xiu confirmed. “A ‘tie’ consists of winning one matchup and losing one matchup against the same team, rather than getting the exact same number of points. Cumulative points are still kept track of by team, but only in order to determine which team gets to be the home team first.”

“Only…?” Xiao Shiqin asked. Points were how the teams selected for playoffs were determined. Was Ye Xiu excluding that because it was obvious, or because it wasn’t the case?

“Only,” Ye Xiu affirmed. “The tournament itself is set up like playoffs, a home and away game against the same team determining which is eliminated, right from the start.”

The pros’ uneasiness increased. They already knew they couldn’t afford to lose this tournament, but this was really giving them no leeway at all. With an elimination format, it was all too easy to lose it all with a couple bad days.

No one liked losing the playoffs, but this was much worse—should they lose, they’d lose Earth, too.

“What’re you looking so grim for?” Ye Xiu said, breaking into the somber mood. “It’s just winning; it’s not that hard.”

There was a collective eye roll. Only Ye Xiu.

“It’s not just ‘winning,’ though, it’s winning every single round,” Xiao Shiqin pointed out. He was used to being the underdog, but that also meant he understood what it was to lose. He had no confidence in his ability to win every time, no matter how much they were underestimated.

“It’s winning every matchup,” Ye Xiu corrected. “But even if it were winning every round, so what? You remember season two, right?”

“Oh, fuck you,” Huang Shaotian said, unusually succinct. Obviously, they all remembered season two. A 9.2 average. It was just offensive. “This isn’t like that, we aren’t going in with cheat weapons or a clear character advantage.”

“I’m just saying,” Ye Xiu continued, still absolutely assured, “while we can’t be sure we’ll always win, it’s certainly not impossible. Every year, someone makes it through the playoffs to be champion. That’s how it works; it’s inevitable. This year, in that tournament, it’ll be us. That’s all there is to it.”

It was extremely annoying that, coming from someone like him, it actually wasn’t too hard to believe.

“I think it’s the uniform,” Lin Jingyan later said on the subject, thoughtful. “The aesthetic really does something for his words, you know?”

“Shit, you’re right, it’s totally the uniform. He looks completely different, I almost didn’t even recognize him. It could have been his twin, right? I mean it still could be his twin but I doubt it, they seem so different. And I think he said his twin had nothing to do with the military, anyway. But put Ye Xiu in a uniform and suddenly he really looks the part, right? Messing with our heads, that outfit is too strong.” Huang Shaotian never said just a few words when he could say a speech.

“Damn, when do we get ours?” Li Xuan said enviously.

Fang Rui slammed the table emphatically. “Right? I want to posture like a hero too!”

The next day, they did, in fact, get their own uniforms. Though they wouldn’t need to wear it normally, to register properly for the tournament and meet with the liaison, they were expected to look like a proper branch of the military.

The outfitting went better for some than others.

Tian Sen and Han Wenqing fit right in, and even Zhang Xinjie managed to look like some kind of officer.

Fang Rui, on the other hand, was unimpressed. “Why doesn’t it work?” he complained, twisting to look at himself in the mirror at different angles.

“What did you expect? It’s not like you work out,” Wu Yuce said. He looked okay in the uniform, but that was really the extent of it. It hadn’t done anything particularly magical for either him or Li Xuan, who was currently frowning and tugging at the hem to get it to settle better.

“Neither does Ye Xiu!”

“Tailored,” Zhou Zekai commented. Zhou Zekai, of course, looked great, but it had long since been understood that Zhou Zekai looked good in everything.

Fang Rui paused for a moment. “Okay, fair point. But I want to look at least as good as them, is that so much to ask?!” He gestured expansively at Zhang Jiale, who was excitedly posing in the mirror, fingerguns and all, and Sun Zheping, who was being pulled in to join him as well—fingerguns not included.

In fact, most of the older players looked fairly good in the outfits. The younger players largely didn’t have the right look to fill it out, since they hadn’t finished growing and weren’t particularly active in the first place.

However, it wasn’t to the point where the uniforms actually didn’t fit, just that they weren’t necessarily dashing in them, so the pros made their way to the same hall they met in the day before to get their instructions without further protest.

The instructions were simple, though, with the universal translator earpiece they’d seen on Ye Xiu yesterday the only truly necessary addition.

“This little thing will let us understand any alien language?” Zhao Yang marveled. It didn’t look like much.

“Not any,” Ye Xiu said. “Only the language spoken by the greatest number of people on the aliens’ home planet, unless they’re rich and developed enough to have added more to the universal language bank it’s connected to. For example, the Overkill aliens we researched before don’t speak the major language of their planet, which is why what they call themselves comes across only as metallic screeching.”

“Inconvenient,” Yang Cong commented.

“Lucky we speak Chinese.” Ye Xiu’s reply came with a wry twist of the mouth. “Well, that’s pretty much it. Show your face, register, be polite. Nothing more to it. Does anyone have any questions?”

“Yeah, I do,” Huang Shaotian said into the otherwise agreeable silence. “I’ve been thinking about this since yesterday and I still don’t know, so at this point I might as well ask, right? Is there a reason this place looks like a lecture hall?”

The room really was highly reminiscent of a lecture hall. A few rows of curved, tiered desks faced a large, slightly curved wall screen, a podium in the middle of the floor for a presenter—usually, in their case, Ye Xiu—to stand at with a swiveling monitor to control the screen on top. Even the seats set up at the long desks folded up when no one was sitting on them to make travel through the rows easier, obviously meant for quickly changing seating, as you’d expect of rooms meant for classes with short passing times. The overall aesthetic—elongated interlocking hexagon ceiling tiles to shield the lights giving the room a sleek and modern feel, with just a hint of sharpness behind it—matched well with the rest of the facility, but it still felt far more suited to a university than a military base. Maybe it was usually used for mission briefings?

“Obviously it was made for something else and repurposed,” Ye Xiu said blandly. “Any important questions?”

“No,” Yu Wenzhou said, cutting Huang Shaotian off before he could go into a rant about how rude Ye Xiu’s response was. “I think we’re good over here.”

The room really was well-suited for lectures, which Ye Xiu proved later in the day when he went over the actual designs of their various mech and weapons on the large screen, preparing them for the visit to R&D they’d be making the next day. The group’s interaction with the alien had been short, efficient, and absent of panic attacks, so it could easily be counted a success. The most unsettling thing about it, since they were already aware of the hollow head, was realizing that the “high collar” they’d seen on the cloak the day before was actually just in line with the rest of the alien’s body, since they didn’t have a neck-like structure.

It was odd, which features really drove home the point that this creature was entirely inhuman.

The creeping uneasiness of the interaction faded under the light of the big screen, though, showing them real versions of their beloved characters and weapons, familiarizing them with the design.

“Implementation doesn’t always look exactly like the game, because,” Ye Xiu explained, switching to a close-up of Dancing Rain’s futuristic but obviously functional Devouring Sun, “in the end, these conflicts are not in the game world. They are in fact, genuine, remote-piloted, mech battles, and there’s certain aspects of realism that the wide-scale simulator couldn’t cover—for example, low health means lower function. Damage to one part of the mech means damage to just that part, and even losing bits of the mech is not out of the realm of possibility.”

The slide changed to a magnified view of Dancing Rain’s shoulder joints, on which Devouring Sun would occasionally rest. Without it, Dancing Rain would be nearly useless. “Your mech is considered ‘dead’ when it can no longer move, regardless of the reason. From here on, we will be using a server the simulation team developed that will more accurately reflect the nature of the battles, so it’s a good time to become familiar with the realistic functions.”

“How different from the specs can we expect the implementations to be?” Tian Sen asked. One of the best features of an Exorcist was Spirit Guidance, their ability to throw their weapon without actually having it considered out of their control—meaning, no one else could pick it up. In addition, many Exorcist skills were Talismans: If he couldn’t rely on their effects, he’d be armed with only paper, and therefore practically useless.

“Not that different,” Ye Xiu assured. “The skills were created with use during these battles in mind: They wouldn’t have made a specification they couldn’t implement. The material our mechs are made of, and consequently what they can confirm our skills work on, is the industry standard for this kind of mech. It’d make more sense to consider any opponent on which our skills don’t work as having hidden resistances than the skills themselves failing in any way.”

“Will we know in advance about these resistances?” Zhang Xinjie asked. Planning around an enemy that didn’t match their own understanding of the game would be difficult at best.

“Other than what we’ve faced so far, no.” Ye Xiu brought up the the list of aliens and their NPCs they had data on; it wasn’t short, but in comparison to what they knew of the tournament’s scope it certainly wasn’t long.

Zhao Yang frowned. “That doesn’t sound good.” As a Qi Master, most of his ability relied on skill effects alone. A cloth armor class couldn’t afford getting physical, even if Qi Masters were in the Fighter superclass.

“It’s not ideal, but we’re working on it. For now, just think of it as new content. We have lots of practice dealing with new content, right?”

It was reluctant agreement, but they did agree. Beyond pioneering through Glory’s updates as most of them had done, their previous exercises together were obviously set up in a similar manner.

The feeling behind this and that were unavoidably different, but in pure execution, they had to admit it really was the same.

Though what they did for preparation had changed with their location, the blocking of their schedule itself hadn’t changed significantly, much to Zhang Xinjie’s satisfaction. Ye Xiu would no longer set himself up in an easily accessible room, since he had to physically attend to things more often—what things, he hadn’t said, but the general consensus was that it must be meetings.

Whatever it was, it had no bearing on their evening plans, and the night started out high-spirited. Ye Xiu had told Su Mucheng how to access the large screen, and everyone decided to watch a show with this fancy new setup; given they just wanted to experience the incredible immersive quality of the system, it didn’t really matter which. No one objected when Chu Yunxiu insisted they start this new drama she’d heard about but hadn’t been able to try before being dragged off to the military.

Actually, any arguments for a different choice that may or may not have existed were destined to go unheard, as Su Mucheng was the one in charge of setting up the system. She didn’t mind trying Chu Yunxiu’s new dramas together, so that was what they’d be doing. If Ye Xiu’s partiality made things a little unfair, well, Ye Xiu never claimed not to favor Su Mucheng.

In any case, Chu Yunxiu’s dramas should have been a safe enough experience for everyone. Which was why Ye Xiu was surprised to return from his duties to join what appeared to be a large-scale freakout in progress.

“What’s going on?” he asked, not particularly expecting a response.

“Ye Xiu! Save us!” came the nearly unrecognizable screech of Huang Shaotian.

“Hm, no,” he replied. Su Mucheng didn’t seem distressed as he settled down next to her, so it was probably fine.

With the clamoring of the other audience members around him and Su Mucheng’s occasional comments, Ye Xiu was able to determine that Chu Yunxiu’s drama leaned much more heavily toward “horror” on the spectrum of “supernatural romance” than anyone had predicted. The screen was a window into a pit of despair; around them, the soundtrack vibrated through the air like a living thing.

Ye Xiu glanced over to find Chu Yunxiu’s face completely dead as she shoved a handful of seeds into her mouth.

“I will see these two idiots get together or so help me—” was her response to his inquiring look.

“Alright then,” he said, grabbing some seeds to start shelling for Su Mucheng; her pile of previously shelled seeds was getting low.

Blood, gore, and anxiety radiated from the screen, driving several of the other pros to wail in despair, but Ye Xiu only focused on his task under the screen’s intermittent flashes of light. Being able to feed Su Mucheng had become a sort of focus for Su Muqiu and himself back when they’d all been living together, the reward for their work in turning gaming into money—for all their skill, still not the easiest thing. Her bright smile as they split their boxed dinner or handed over a snack to tide her over never failed to warm their hearts. Though they hadn’t been in any great need of procuring food in years now, the association was still strong.

Someone sobbed incoherently in the background, but Su Mucheng was smiling and, again—Ye Xiu had never claimed impartiality.

They met with the Glory devs more than once, as their practices moved from facing new NPCs to fighting in increasingly strange environments, along with getting used to the new style of simulation when it came to “health” and the functionality of their characters. The players and the researchers got along quite well, almost no complaints.

Almost, because of one little thing.

“Can you ask them to stop calling us Glory devs,” the head of the department finally asked.

Ye Xiu didn’t pause in his perusal of the reports he’d received. “Why?”

The man was stumped. If nothing else, it just wasn’t their name… “Well, it makes us sound like we’re just some normal game developers,” he finally said.

“And?” Still no interest.

“And we’re agents?” He didn’t even know how it ended up coming out a question. Of course they were agents! They were agents even before they’d been tasked with turning alien technology into a game!

Ye Xiu looked up, as if prompting him to go on.

“Doing important…agent work?” the man went on, baffled.

“Like?”

Here, the head of the department was on surer footing. “Research, simulation, weapons management, resource allocation—”

“Did you develop Glory?”

“…Yes,” he finally said. In fact, everything he’d listed was an aspect of developing Glory. He rallied. “But that isn’t what the department is called!”

“Is that the main issue?”

“Yes!”

“Just that?”

He paused. “Pretty much?”

“Are you under my jurisdiction?”

“Yes…?” Once Ye Xiu returned, he’d been put in charge of pretty much the entire operation.

“Your department is now called ‘Glory devs.’ Own it. It’s an impressive achievement.” Ye Xiu went back to the papers, satisfied that the problem was settled.

The man opened his mouth, then closed it again.

He was actually…surprisingly okay with that.

As the time of the tournament’s beginning drew nearer, training grew less focused on piloting in general and more focused on the competition in particular. Ye Xiu explained the match setup to them, though it didn’t take much explaining: It was all quite familiar. The same soundproof booths for competition, the same monitor for the rest of the team to watch the match on together, the same lack of voice communication within the game. The public and team chats were the same as well, and they’d been assured an impeccable real-time translator would allow them to see their opponents’ messages there in their own, native Chinese.

“How impeccable is ‘impeccable’ really, though?” Fang Rui asked. “If I used dirty slang, or Zhang Jiale tried to talk about fighting again—”

“One time,” said Zhang Jiale through gritted teeth. Was it his fault everyone thought his dialect’s word for arguing was something not suitable for public channels? Obviously not! This was discrimination!

“The yellow and red card system should be as usual, too,” Ye Xiu said. “This is your debut, though, so just remember to keep in mind that what you say is publicized. If you affect ratings, they won’t let it slide.”

No one felt that calling this the rookies’ debut was weird. In the end, other than the change of teammates, it didn’t feel that different from any other season in Glory.

“What’s the plan for the first round, then? How do we win?” Sun Zheping got straight to the point.

“We don’t.”

The declaration was followed by baffled silence.

“We’re going to lose,” Ye Xiu continued, not distressed in the least.

“What?!” Li Xuan’s outburst broke the veneer of calm.

“Think about it rationally,” Ye Xiu said placidly. “We don’t know what we’re going into, we have much less preparation than the other teams, we could be up against anyone first, even previous champions, and we know nothing at all about them or what to expect. We won’t win.”

“What the fuck is the point then?! From how you’re talking, we might as well give up now!” Fang Shiqian was furious.

“I’m telling you now so no one is surprised when it happens.” It wasn’t unusual in the least for Fang Shiqian to be the one to voice wider discontentment, so Ye Xiu was prepared for his kind of response. “Remember we don’t have to win every time; we have to win enough. For this first round, we need to go in with an information-gathering mindset, or we’re going to waste our time and fall apart. To that end, our lineup needs to maximize the data and experience gained, while anyone who isn’t going up should be taking notes and coming up with strategies.”

The overall idea wasn’t unfamiliar to the others: Over the course of their practices, they’d gotten very fast at analyzing, sharing relevant information, and coordinating with each other. They didn’t always win against new enemies, but they almost always were able to think of some sort of counter before the end of the match. Regardless of what they were up against, it never took them more than that first encounter to figure out their opponent.

“This is just like all the other new NPCs we’ve faced before,” Ye Xiu concluded, once they’d all agreed on a strategy and division of responsibilities. “The same pattern as always. We’re going to lose the first round—

“We won’t lose the second.”

The booth was a sleeker construction than the Alliance bothered with, overseen by the alien tournament officials to ensure there’d be no cheating, but on the inside it really wasn’t much different. A chair, a computer, a desk to hold it, soundproof walls, minimal ambient lighting. The air was cool and dry, the keyboard and mouse were the same ones R&D had designed for Ye Xiu at the beginning of this whole project, checked for alterations and approved before the match began. There had never been any doubt that Ye Xiu would be Earth’s first player; he never intended to push that responsibility on anyone else. In any case, it wasn’t something he felt he needed to run from.

They were here to gather information. Ye Xiu had given his pre-match talk to the team before he’d gone up. A quick reminder of what they should be looking for, how much attention they should pay to their own survival in order to maximize information gathering, a simple overarching idea: The second round started now. That was where they’d be counting wins and losses.

None of it was a lie, but Ye Xiu knew how pressing a psychological shadow could be. As their leadoff, his first priority would absolutely be gathering information to pass to the next player on their way to the booth, and the rest of the players after, but he had his own plans as well. If he could manage to win the first round, the morale boost would be exceptional.

Battle Mage was a good class for it, too, a balance of magical and physical damage, close- and mid-range fighting. No matter what he was up against, there shouldn’t be a problem.

Deep breath.

The slide of a familiar card into a familiar card-reader.

One Autumn Leaf loaded in.

His partner over these years, nearly seven years of Glory, stood tall and undaunted with the newest iteration of Evil Annihilation at his side. Flat ground loaded under his feet; in the distance, plain walls.

Arena?

Not quite, but close enough. Were the opponents looking down on them, or was there some other purpose? He wouldn’t rule out the existence of hidden attributes to the arena, but it really did look like the absolute basic. In One Autumn Leaf’s view came the opponent mech: an enormous, almost entirely featureless, metal sphere.

Not what he was expecting, but better than it could have been. At least it wasn’t visually aversive, smooth surface marred only by what appeared to be a series of intertwined etchings, and in fact it looked a lot like the training round of any given video game. Complete with, he now noticed, the huge weapons folding out from its surface, aimed at him in a way that obviously meant business.

The fight was a series of cataloguing notes—low general magic resistance, high CC resistance, outsides reminiscent of Glory’s plate armor, joints that held the extended weapons most vulnerable, was this seriously some kind of giant battle sphere—that remained strangely methodical. Ye Xiu knew why his own approach was so regimented, but what were their opponents planning? Each weapon rolled out in succession, each time he did enough damage or proved its ineffectiveness the “battle mode” would switch, it would almost feel like a tutorial if it did just a bit less damage, this fight was completely unbalanced. Too fast, too big, too heavy-hitting, this battle was nothing easy. But it had method, and anything with a method could be taken advantage of.

The moment the sphere pulled back to stow its previous weapon, Ye Xiu threw One Autumn Leaf into the air above it. Old weapon in, new weapon out—but before it could complete the extension, Ye Xiu stabbed Evil Annihilation into the opening. The weapon jammed, gun juddering in place as it tried to move, and Ye Xiu fired off the skill he’d added to his weapon: Petrifaction.

The concussive burst of the skill shook the sphere’s shell from the inside, rattling in place, and the mech ground to a halt with an unearthly screech.

Ye Xiu had seen Petrifaction work on other targets before, and it was truly a sight to behold. The shape of the target would freeze as its insides crumbled away, forced out by rapidly expanding nanites. Close to the opposite of a healing skill, the nanites pushed to rebuild what was already there, eating the original material and setting up shop instead, a perfect and useless replica of the original structure, completely solid. The remnants of old materials clouded and fell like ash around the target, creating the surreal look of an evil spell or instant decay.

Used inside the battle sphere, it was not nearly so impressive, but also significantly less comprehensible. Job complete, the nanites solidified as if turned to stone, and outwardly the mech only shuddered into uselessness.

One Autumn Leaf was a bare skeleton of a mech, but its core and its weapon had moved to the end. The logo Earth had chosen to represent their team spread across the arena, wings extended behind crossed blades. Glory. Ye Xiu had insisted on the logo’s inclusion; no political agenda could top the comfort Earth’s players would receive from this bit of familiarity. Indeed, even Ye Xiu could feel the tension ease out of him. Another game, another win, another battle to prepare for, same as always. On screen the image of a giant sphere spitted on Evil Annihilation disappeared as the system monitoring these clashes took the mech back. They didn’t get to see the mech between battles, so Ye Xiu would have to wait until the team competition to confirm that all damage would be reset before then.

Ye Xiu met Lin Jingyan on his way to play the second individual match and gave him the fastest possible rundown of his observations. “As a Brawler, don’t expect to win,” Ye Xiu concluded. “They’re too tanky, and they didn’t show us everything, there. They might also have specializations for each player, but with that look there’s likely outward standardization—expect customization to come with the weapon choice.”

Ye Xiu was right. The next opponent was another battle sphere, different specialization. With the limited ability to cause physical damage and his CC skills rendered largely useless, it was no surprise that Lin Jingyan lost. He returned to the team as calmly as he left it, not rattled in the least. This was, in fact, why Ye Xiu had chosen him to go second in the individual round: Lin Jingyan had the kind of steady personality that wouldn’t infect the atmosphere of the team, should he lose.

“It’s definitely methodical,” he reported. “But they aren’t feeling us out. They showed a new function even before I found a way around the old one. If I didn’t come up with a new counter within a certain period of time, they changed it, regardless of how much damage it was doing.”

“I thought so,” Ye Xiu said, looking up at the screen. Yang Cong was dodging his opponent with remarkable ease, using Air Jump to get “behind” the sphere and Cut Throat on the neck of the weapon—without a proper health gauge, it was hard to tell if it had worked at peak efficiency, but certainly Scene Killer executed the command. When the sphere’s weapon tried to retract after Yang Cong darted away, it couldn’t fold in completely. Regardless, the next weapon extended and turned on the Assassin.

As the Shadow Follows, Ankle Break. The gun swiveled brokenly on its joint as if dislocated before it swung back into something like alignment. Still, it couldn’t follow Scene Killer’s quick movements. The next weapon folded out to join it.

Another Air Jump, Diving Arrow to kick off the weapons and stomp onto the sphere’s top, and underneath the echoing clangs came the subtle whine of a skill charging.

The sonic boom shook the arena, rattling the two mech to bits. Yang Cong had charged Life Risking Strike to its maximum, a completely undirected explosion that dealt damage to both sides crumbling the area between the two weapon’s ports. Vitals Strike had analyzed the best place for him to hit, and it wasn’t wrong. The sphere fractured along the line that looked like no more than etching even as Scene Killer’s hand, arm, shoulder were wasted. Still, Yang Cong piloted the remains to take a stumbling fall off the top of his opponent, staggering a few steps away. The battle sphere slowly rolled after him before thumping awkwardly onto the opening in its broken shell, the twisted limbs of weapons it could no longer retract making any attempt to roll elsewhere impossible. The mech itself might have life left in it, but it was going nowhere, and it was out of workable weapons.

The third individual match went to Earth, based solely on the fact that Scene Killer was still, to at least some extent, mobile.

“An excellent use of loopholes,” Ye Xiu said approvingly upon the man’s return.

“Thanks.” Yang Cong grinned. “That was fun. Vitals Strike is really something.”

The moment he’d activated it, the image of the sphere had lit up beneath him, almost as if he could see all the way through. He knew then that his Life-Risking Strike wouldn’t be wasted, stress points and fissures right there in front of him, waiting to be exploited.

Huang Shaotian was first in the group arena. Underneath his bright and chattery outside, Huang Shaotian was a cold and ruthless opportunist, which was exactly the kind of person Ye Xiu wanted to field this first round. It was, in fact, the same reason he’d chosen Yang Cong as well: The assassin mindset was one that fit this stage, and Huang Shaotian was the most assassin-like Blade Master to ever have graced the Alliance.

They’d guessed that the map might be the same, arena-like one that’d appeared in every match so far, given that the flat planes were advantageous for the large, rolling mech, and they were right. However, from the beginning of the Group Arena, it was clear something about this match was different. The mech was larger, more weapons came out at once, and while Huang Shaotian searched for his opening—

“Are you testing?”

For the first time, a message appeared in the public chat. Not a single exchange had occurred with the previous three opponents, and a few of the pros startled at the sudden contact, having forgotten their opponents could communicate at all.

“We are testing,” came next as Huang Shaotian used all of his skill to try to escape the plethora of weapons focused on him. “How is this?”

Every single weapon darted forward or fired at once. Huang Shaotian used an Assassin’s Shining Cut instead of his usual Triple Slash, but it still only barely got him out of range in time.

“How is this?” the thing repeated, disconcerting in its strangely stiff speech pattern. The weapons extended outward rather than toward Troubling Rain, then bent all at once, and suddenly the Blade Master was forced to the ground under an immense, invisible pressure. For just a second he was down, and the bounced into the air, and the many weapons began firing, stabbing, or slashing in concert to keep him there.

“How is it?” Huang Shaotian suddenly responded; there was nothing he could do to escape for now, so he might as well. “Well actually, I have a lot to say about it you know? First of all, having so many weapons at once has to be some kind of cheat, nobody said we could get away with that, how cool would it be to wield a sword and a gun at the same time, or better, a bayonet, maybe a spear—”

Shaken by the continuous attacks, mech degrading with every second that passed, and typing out an absolute essay of a response, it was incredible that Huang Shoatian noticed the moment of hesitation his opponent had, let alone that he was able to take advantage of it.

“They’re collecting data,” Yu Wenzhou said, tone absolutely certain, as Huang Shaotian’s Falling Phoenix Slash crashed Troubling Rain into the surface of the sphere, sword a streak of cold light as it hit every weapon where they were weakest. “Not on us, but on themselves. They’re testing their ability.”

Yu Wenzhou’s main and most important job was to figure out the motivations and thinking pattern of their opponents, since they would be completely unfamiliar with both for every new opponent they encountered.

“The previous opponents might have been new; this one definitely has experience, and isn’t just going through its weapon options one by one. Still, they’re looking for data, and Shaotian gave them too much at once. It couldn’t process it.”

“Not only are they collecting data,” Ye Xiu agreed, “they have a strict process to it, and they aren’t willing to let any go. If it weren’t still trying to follow Shaotian’s monologue, it wouldn’t be doing nearly so poorly.”

Huang Shaotian was able to, just barely, edge out a win, but the close result meant Troubling Rain fell within moments of the start of the next match.

Xiao Shiqin, used to being the underdog, was up next. He was as calm and observant as Ye Xiu could have hoped, but it was his bad luck that their opponents didn’t seem the least bit fazed by any of his skills. Whether it was shooting them out of the air, off the ground, or outright ignoring skills that should have, by all rights, had an effect, the opponent completely steamrolled over Life Extinguisher and his robotic helpers. It was clear that in both technology and general mechanisms, Earth’s side was wildly outclassed.

Wang Jiexi stood up, a pillar of calm as always—one of the main reasons Ye Xiu had chosen him to anchor the group arena. His opponent was nearly full-health, but he showed no sign of anxiety as he took the stage.

“Electromagnetic coil had an effect,” Xiao Shiqin told him as they passed each other. “Not much, but it was there. Area of Effect skills should work fine.”

Wang Jiexi nodded, then settled himself into the booth and loaded Vaccaria. His opponent was at almost full health, but he didn’t hesitate. Lava Flask, Acid Rain, Frost Powder, he struck from unexpected angles and the sphere somehow managed to convey dizziness with its featureless body and swiveling weapons. The spheres’ operators were clearly logical, but the Magician playstyle followed no pattern. Vaccaria struck again and again, a dazzling array of attacks hitting before the Witch swooped away again.

It was an impressive showing, but Witches had low defense from the start, and the damage output of even a single attack from one of the spheres was nothing to scoff at. Wang Jiexi made it through about one and half opponents before Vaccaria fell.

All in all, they weren’t doing poorly, and the team competition would put forth a combination of players never before seen in the Alliance: Ye Xiu, Han Wenqing, Zhang Xinjie, Sun Zheping, and Zhang Jiale taking the stage together, with Su Mucheng as their sixth player.

The intent of this construction wasn’t so much balance—although it couldn’t really be called unbalanced either, a split of physical and magic damage, two long-range classes available if necessary and the main fighting force close-range powerhouses—but maximizing the level of synergy between the players and general strength of will. That the three most tyrannical players in the Alliance were fielded at once was no accident, that more than half were veteran pros even less so. They played together beautifully, able to anticipate and support each other’s movements through years of experience, but it wasn’t enough. The spheres were able to activate some strange kind of formation, feeding synergistically off of each other as they caught the players in a web of damage. Wang Jiexi had given them some idea of what it was like to fight against multiple opponents, what differences there were to take advantage of, but the spheres were really too hard to tell apart when they pinballed around the arena. In the end, Earth lost.

“What are you looking so down for?” Ye Xiu said to the others once the team retreated from their booths. As he’d hoped, none of the actual players had taken the loss too hard, although Zhang Jiale was walking closer to Sun Zheping now than he was when they’d walked up. “That went better than expected!” he reminded them. “Not only did we get all the information we set out to, an unusual result, but we even won a few points. Certainly they aren’t unbeatable.”

Yu Wenzhou nodded seriously. “I have the notes, Captain. We have a few different ways we could take this.” Yu Wenzhou was the only Master Tactician who hadn’t played, and thus the one with the best overall view of the match; aside from figuring out motivations, he’d been taking notes on their opponents’ strategy and possible counters.

“Good.” Ye Xiu clapped him on the shoulder before leading the way out of the team’s waiting room. “Let’s go plan our victory.”

They had a week to do it, and nothing better to do but practice against what simulation the Glory devs could cook up for them in time. In fact, though, much of their discussion was on map selection, and even more, player choice.

“Are you okay to go up?”

One that they’d all pretty much agreed on, despite how young and untested he was, was Zhou Zekai. A Sharpshooter would be perfect to target the joints of the battle spheres, their main area of vulnerability. Still, they’d put him in the Group Arena first, in the hopes that if he didn’t have the confidence to go up against the admittedly intimidating opponents with so much on the line, it wouldn’t necessarily doom them. They still had Wang Jiexi anchoring the end.

Aside from what was most practical, though, Ye Xiu wanted to be sure his overwhelmingly quiet teammate wasn’t being unduly pressured, especially now that it was almost time for the match to begin. If the pressure was getting to be too much for him, it wasn’t like Ye Xiu didn’t have backup plans.

Zhou Zekai just nodded, though, silent as ever.

“Nervous?”

Zhou Zekai was silent for a long time. “No,” he finally said.

Usually, a pause like that would be the sign of a lie, but Ye Xiu knew by now that he was just genuinely thinking about it. Zhou Zekai struggled with words, but his performance in Glory proved he wasn’t the type to waver.

“Good, you needn’t be.” Ye Xiu gave him a grin. “Play your best. For the rest, there’s us; your seniors are with you.”

“…Mm.” Zhou Zekai smiled a little, a small, sweet thing.

Ye Xiu nodded his approval. “Alright, then, let’s go.”

Zhou Zekai gripped Cloud Piercer in his hand and followed after him.

Ye Xiu won the first match, fighting in an enclosed space and knocking aside weapons before they could even aim at him. Battle Spirit activated and raised his stats significantly, battle aura glowing gold around him as he battered the enormous target beneath him. Due to his repeated dodging and careful approach in the previous round, Battle Spirit hadn’t had the chance to appear, so it took the opponent completely unaware.

With that win, the team could be assured that a win in the team competition would bring them overall victory, significantly reducing the strain on the other players until then. With the map advantage and the lowered pressure, Chu Yunxiu brought them a win, but Yang Cong brought a loss. As they’d thought, their opponents had studied them as well, and Yang Cong’s tricks were much less effective against an opponent that was prepared for them.

“We can expect some countering from the repetition, then,” Yu Wenzhou concluded. “But in cases of overwhelming skill or, I’d bet, a significant class advantage, it won’t affect the outcome too much.”

Since CC skills didn’t seem to do too much against this opponent, Yu Wenzhou’s Swoksaar wouldn’t be taking the stage this round, either, but he was as active with his analysis as ever.

“We’ll be relying on those of you that didn’t take the stage yet for the third round, then,” Ye Xiu said to the team. “Even if your class isn’t well-suited for the task, you’ll be joining the battle, so think about how you can be most effective. You might want to work in combination with another player to make up for each other’s weaknesses, or act as support to those who’ll have a class advantage. Against opponents who have an advantage, working in combination is the best way to achieve results.”

The players nodded seriously. If they hadn’t believed it before, the practices they’d done over the month before would have been enough to show them how necessary cooperation was. Without it, almost half of the new NPCs they’d been up against would have been unbeatable, no matter what skills they might add to their weapons.

Zhou Zekai was the first of the undebuted players to take the stage, but it didn’t show at all in his performance. He took down almost two whole opponents on his own, despite spending the second half of his second opponent navigating almost exclusively through Aerial Fire: The second battle sphere had pulled out, to everyone’s shock, an actual spinning saw and cut Cloud Piercer in half at the waist in a single motion. Before Cloud Piercer was truly destroyed, though, he got his revenge, blasting the saw off of the sphere entirely with a well-placed explosive shot.

Zhao Yang was their second player, easily taking care of the second sphere with a single, well-placed Flash Burst. Despite having some difficulty with using his largely mid-range attacks against a surprisingly nimble opponent, he was able to almost completely take out the third sphere before Boundless Sea became inert. When Wang Jiexi made it to the arena, he barely had to do anything at all to end the battle in their favor.

The team competition consisted of Ye Xiu, Zhang Jiale, Zhou Zekai, Wang Jiexi, and Fang Shiqian with his Paladin Wind Guard, with Su Mucheng again as their sixth player. There’d been long discussion about this setup for team play, Zhou Zekai undebuted and weak at communication, Wang Jiexi’s Magician style hard to coordinate with for most, but Ye Xiu was confident they could pull it off, and they did. Wind Guard acted as the hub of their team, a center of protection for the long-distance classes and a safe place for the midrange classes to return to, while One Autumn Leaf knocked back the enormous spheres with Evil Annihilation, almost looking like was batting them backward. His use of chasers changed his attributes in ways the opponents couldn’t quite predict, bombarding them with magic blasts that never missed.

The options other than long-range gunners and mid-range magic classes included sending out the two Ghostblades, but since CC skills were hit or miss, even with the elemental attribute, and the battle spheres were highly aggressive, they’d elected not to go with the rather low-defense Swordsmen. On the other hand, tanking might do them no good, and neither would largely support classes. The result was that everyone agreed to this mix of largely individual players as the best option, relying on Ye Xiu’s shotcalling and the split nature of their map, a series of cave systems the battle spheres were too large to properly enter, to make up for any deficiencies.

The battle progressed much better than the previous team competition. No matter how many times nanites tried to repair the spheres’ weapon joints, as they had the round before, Zhou Zekai unerringly shot them out again. Without their weapons, the attack power of the battle spheres was significantly reduced. Zhang Jiale and Wang Jiexi worked together to baffle the spheres’ sensors, bringing them damage they didn’t know how to counteract and isolating key players to avoid the overpowered formation they’d pulled out the round before. Ye Xiu guarded the cave entrances, rendering the spheres’ attempts to pull out their healer useless. When Vaccaria fell in the process of destroying the central tower and arsenal that acted as the battle sphere’s healer, Su Mucheng began working with Ye Xiu to provide screening and support, allowing him to take over the position as main attacker without worrying too much for Fang Shiqian’s safety.

Their opponents were clearly at a loss when dealing with this piecemeal setup and guerilla warfare, and it wasn’t long before they lost.

“You hover more than Jiexi when he’s being particularly annoying,” Fang Shiqian complained to Ye Xiu once they’d left the booth. “Do you think I don’t know how to protect myself? Paladins are not Clerics, you know! They are built for defense!”

“You’re just whining because you wanted to have a go at the battle spheres,” Ye Xiu said dismissively.

“Your lies are as dirty as your heart,” Fang Shiqian groused as they rejoined the team. “It’s not a crime to want to be involved.”

“So what I’m hearing is you want to go over what we’re doing for the next round, all against all, half our terrain and half theirs, right now.”

“And what I’m hearing is that you want to have a contest on who knows how to play a healer better. Paladin against Paladin, just grab a random account, shall we?” Fang Shiqian was always ready to fight, let alone get into a fight he knew he’d win.

“Your lack of planning—”

“Your insistence on limiting my contributions—”

“We can go sleep,” Wang Jiexi told the rest. “They’ll be at it for a while.”

“No planning tonight?” Xiao Shiqin asked, slightly apprehensive.

Yu Wenzhou laughed and stood as well. “No planning now. We can go over it tomorrow.”

There would be time.

It really didn’t take long for them to decide on what setup to go with, and they were fairly confident in it. It was a unanimous agreement, and they’d had no problem situating themselves appropriately and working together, so there wasn’t much they actually needed to be worried about. Still, there were some things that people can’t be expected to take calmly, and being pushed to win a war-like game with Earth itself on the line was absolutely one of them—especially since a format like this was one they were completely unfamiliar with.

Zhang Jiale was the first to give up on the serious atmosphere. “Let’s do something stupid.”

“I’m not doing hairdressing.” Sun Zheping’s reply was immediate.

“I said something stupid, hairdressing isn’t stupid,” Zhang Jiale said huffily. “Also, shut up.”

“No getting drunk,” Zhang Xinjie said firmly.

“Not that stupid.” Zhang Jiale rolled his eyes. They were all pro players, there was no question of casually having a drinking party.

“Do you have any suggestions?” Wang Jiexi asked, the topic somewhat odd coming in his incongruent, perpetually serious tone.

“Sugar high?” Lin Jingyan offered.

“Oh, that—That might be too stupid,” Yu Wenzhou said uncomfortably.

“No no no it’s a great idea, I love doing that, sugar highs are the best!” Huang Shaotian said brightly.

“I’m absolutely serious,” Yu Wenzhou continued around him. His eyes spoke of deep experience with the horrors of the world. “That might be too stupid.”

The good thing about bedding was that it blocked out noise. People might not think about that feature often, but it was truly an amazing, genuinely miraculous aspect of bedding, that it could block out sound. The lecture hall was now a wonderful nest: comfortable, cozy, absolutely no more echoes.

“Where did we get this much bedding?” Han Wenqing asked, looking over the mountains of fabric and pillows.

Ye Xiu was as blasé as ever. “Unlimited resources is not a joke.”

“No one asked?” With the amount of material he was seeing here, he couldn’t imagine anyone would let it pass unmentioned.

“We’re up against aliens. Does anyone dare ask me why about anything at all?”

“…Fair point.”

“He’s going for the caffeine!” Fang Rui shrieked in the distance.

“That’s your cue, Old Han.” Ye Xiu said. “Have at it.”

Han Wenqing sighed and went to bodily remove Huang Shaotian from the snack table yet again.

In the third round, despite taking a new format to the stage for the first time, the pros’ coordination was impeccable. They had a good grasp of the features the battle spheres had shown so far, and even if there were opponents they had yet to see, Earth hadn’t shown all its cards yet, either. So many spheres bouncing around were a little hard to keep track of, but not impossible. 25 versus their 20; it seemed their team was a good size, even if they were a bit outnumbered.

The opponent’s map was still an arena, just a flat plane that seemed to stretch on into infinity; Earth’s map was a craggy labyrinth, complete with trees. The Ghostblade duo turned the edges of the opponent’s field into their own domain, layered boundaries dyeing featureless gray with their own colors. The close-range fighters set themselves up between overlapping arcs, ready to block further advancement; behind them, a bit raised on slowly piling boulders, the mid-range—in the trees, their gunners.

Plain spheres, no matter how weaponized, didn’t stand a chance.

The weight of the world was a lot of pressure, but they’d practiced their group coordination this way so many times it was practically habit. They won, Earth saved, and they weren’t even surprised.

(They were relieved, though.

“We won,” fell out of Fang Rui’s mouth, almost giddy. “We won!”

“And we’ll keep winning,” Han Wenqing said, not a shadow of doubt in his voice.

“Of course,” Ye Xiu said with a laugh. “This is only the start.”)