Not the Hero, Not the Villain — Just the One Who Wins

The air was thick with a tension so profound it felt like a physical weight, a suffocating blanket of anticipation that settled over the two factions gathered at the edge of the Obsidian Forest. The towering, black-barked trees loomed like ancient, skeletal sentinels, their gnarled branches clawing at the bruised, pre-dawn sky. The morning sun, still hidden behind the distant mountains, painted the horizon in hues of gold and crimson—a fitting, bloody palette for what was to come.

Floating mana-crystal cameras, their lenses gleaming like the multifaceted eyes of insects, buzzed overhead, capturing every nervous glance, every whispered word for the academy's spectators. The professors, their faces grim and impassive, moved between the ranks, handing out the so-called "safety gear"—thin, silver suits that clung to our bodies like a second skin, their surfaces shimmering with the faint, pulsing light of emergency teleportation runes.

"Pathetic," I muttered, rolling my shoulders as the suit adjusted to my frame with a faint, magical hum. It was a flimsy illusion of security. It wouldn't stop the pain of a well-aimed spell. It wouldn't stop the flow of blood from a blade that found its mark. It would just yank us out of the battlefield moments before death claimed us.

A small mercy, perhaps. But a mercy that felt more like a mockery.

The head professor, a grizzled, battle-scarred man named Garnet with a voice like grinding gravel, stepped forward. His gaze, sharp and unforgiving, swept over us.

"Listen carefully, maggots!" he barked, his magic-amplified voice making the very ground tremble. "This is no training exercise. What happens in that forest stays in that forest. Your safety suits will activate if you take life-threatening damage, but let me make this perfectly clear:"

His magic-amplified voice made the ground tremble as he raised three glowing fingers, each one a stark, luminous warning against the gloomy backdrop of the forest.

"Rule One: No killing blows to the head, neck, or spine. The suits can't protect against instant death. Any student caught deliberately aiming for these areas will be tried and executed by academy law. Do not test me on this."

The floating cameras zoomed in on his stern face as he raised a second finger.

"Rule Two: The forest is your battleground, your shelter, and your larder. You'll find no prepared food, no clean water, no comfortable beds. Only what you can hunt or forage. Starvation is a valid and, I might add, entertaining strategy."

A third finger joined the others, his magic projecting a massive, shimmering countdown timer in the sky above us: 72:00:00.

"Rule Three: You have exactly seventy-two hours. When this timer hits zero, whichever faction has more members still standing on the battlefield wins. No other victory conditions. No flags to capture. Just pure, brutal attrition."

Murmurs of unease spread through the ranks until his heavy, iron-shod staff slammed down, creating a shockwave that silenced us all.

"Final warning," he growled. "Your communication spells will be jammed. No messages. No long-range coordination once you enter that forest. The cameras may watch, but no help is coming. This..." he grinned savagely, his teeth a flash of white in his weathered face, "...is war."

The floating cameras suddenly zoomed in on individual faces—Layla, her expression calm and focused; Rayne, his eyes burning with a fierce, competitive fire; Rin, a mask of serene confidence; Nyx, a predatory smirk playing on her lips.

"Commanders!" Garnet concluded. "Approach for your faction's starting coordinates. Everyone else... prepare to learn what real combat feels like."

The oppressive silence of the Obsidian Forest was broken only by the crunch of our boots on a thick carpet of dead, black leaves. The towering trees blotted out the sun, casting the forest floor in a perpetual twilight. The air was heavy, humid, and smelled of damp earth, decay, and something else, something ancient and metallic—the faint, lingering scent of old blood. Every few steps, the forest would seem to exhale, a sickly warm wind carrying whispers that sounded unnervingly like our names.

Rayne's faction, Galat's Vanguard, moved parallel to us about fifty yards to the east, their formation tight and disciplined. Through the dense, gnarled foliage, I caught glimpses of their final strategy session—Rayne gesturing sharply while Rin nodded in agreement, Kali testing the potency of her poisoned blades on passing branches that withered and died on contact. Their efficiency was almost admirable.

"Gods, this place stinks like a slaughterhouse," Lucielle muttered, wrinkling her nose in disgust. Her vibrant crimson hair seemed to burn against the forest's gloom.

I stretched lazily, rolling my shoulders until the joints popped, deliberately breaking the tense, nervous silence that had fallen over our own faction. "So," I announced, my voice loud enough to startle a flock of razor-beaked birds from the canopy above, "anyone here actually know how to cook?"

The incredulous stares I received could have melted steel. Aurelia fidgeted with the hem of her silver safety suit before raising a tentative hand. "I-I can prepare basic meals," she offered, her voice barely above a whisper. "My father believed every noble should know the culinary arts, in case of an emergency."

"Perfect!" I clapped my hands together, the sound unnaturally loud in the quiet forest. "Because the thought of eating whatever mutated, multi-limbed beasts live in this cursed place is already making my stomach revolt. I'd rather not spend the battle puking my guts out."

Nearby, the Nowa sisters exchanged loaded glances. Liora's grip on the hilt of her sword tightened until her knuckles bleached white. "He's treating this like some damned picnic," she hissed to Layla, her voice a low, furious whisper.

Our commander's violet eyes, however, tracked me with an unsettling, analytical intensity. "No," she murmured back, her gaze sharp and focused. "He's playing a game we don't understand yet." ThistranslationispoweredbythereadersatM|V|LE9MPYR.

Lucielle smirked, her arms crossed over her leather armor. "Just wait. When has my brother ever not had a plan?"

"A plan to get us all killed, maybe," Liora shot back, her patience clearly worn thin.

The fortress emerged from the gloom with a sudden, jarring finality—a crumbling monument to some forgotten war. Its obsidian walls seemed to absorb the weak, filtered sunlight, making the entire structure look like a gaping, festering wound in the heart of the forest. The rusted iron gates, twisted and warped by time, hung crookedly on their hinges, squealing like a dying animal as Garrick and Eren forced them open.

Inside, the main hall yawned before us, its vaulted ceiling webbed with thick, dusty chains from which a shattered, crystalline chandelier swayed ominously. Dust motes, thick as insects, danced in the sickly green shafts of light filtering through the broken, stained-glass windows. The barracks held rows of rotting cots with moth-eaten bedding that might have been white a century ago. In the armory, we found only rusted, useless relics—swords pitted with age, their edges long gone dull, and shields that crumbled to dust at the slightest touch.

The central courtyard was an overgrown nightmare of thorny, black-leafed vines that seemed to twitch and writhe in our peripheral vision. At its center, a deep, stone well exhaled a damp, earthy breath that made the hairs on my neck stand up.

Gathering the team in the cavernous, echoing main hall, I knelt and began sketching in the thick layer of dust on the floor with the tip of my dagger. The map took shape quickly—our fortress, the surrounding terrain, and a rough perimeter marked by a circle of fallen, moss-covered monoliths about half a mile out.

"Here's the deal," I said, my voice calm and authoritative as I tapped the boundary line. "For the rest of the day, you will hunt within this zone. You will eat. You will rest. You will do whatever you want—but you will not, under any circumstances, cross this line before tomorrow morning."

Standing, I brushed the dust from my knees and turned toward the groaning gates. "I'm going hunting. Alone. I'll be back by nightfall with dinner."

The murmurs of protest were immediate, a wave of confusion and dissent rippling through the team. But it was Layla's voice, sharp and clear as a blade, that cut through them all.

"You're our strategist," she said, stepping forward, her violet eyes narrowed, the fading light catching the sapphire threads in her braided hair. "You can't just abandon us. What if Rayne attacks while you're gone?"