31 - Crown Game 1

[Kaleidus]

"Where did you guys go?!" Androssi asked loudly, glaring at us once we returned to the waiting area. "Sneaking off like that…" She looked suspiciously between us.

"The test administrator wanted to have a chat with us. That's all. It's nothing like what you're imagining," I said.

"Why don't I believe you?" She said, crossing her arms.

"Hahaha, Miss Androssi, it is true. I simply wanted to speak with your teammates because of some special circumstances they have," Yu Han Sung walked over from behind us.

"Tch, more special treatment?" Androssi said, shaking her head. "Well, as long as it helps me…I won't complain."

"That's a good outlook, princess. Well then, I'll take my leave now. Lero Ro will be here to take you to your next test," said Yu Han Sung before walking away.

After a few moments of awkward silence, Lero Ro came by.

"Hello Regulars. I'm here to offer you a great opportunity. A Bonus Game."

"Huh? Like an optional test?" Androssi asked.

"That's right. Attending it is up to you and there's no penalty for not attending. However, the winner of this game will be awarded the maximum points and instantly earn the right to move to the next Floor," Lero Ro explained.

"Hell yeah. Let's do it!" Androssi said right away.

Rachel and I both gave our assent as well.

Lero Ro clapped his hands. "Then that's settled. Follow me to the arena."

Lero Ro spoke again as they walked. "For the remainder of the tests on this floor, you three are being grouped with the previous cohort that came in. It's unusual, but it's even more unusual for only one team to pass the first test. Did you have something to do with that, princess?"

"I wish! It was this guy here that did it," Androssi pointed at me.

"It seems that this game will be very interesting. Two princesses, and several people who demonstrate an unusual reaction to Shinsoo," said Lero Ro.

"Two princesses? What?!" Androssi asked with a shocked face

"I thought you knew. There is another princess in the group. Having one is already incredible, but two is unheard of."

"For good reason…" Androssi muttered. "What's her name?" She asked aloud with a now suspicious expression.

"Anak Zahard."

Androssi's eyebrows scrunched up in confusion. "Anak? But she's…huh, whatever. Whoever it is, if she gets in my way, I'll crush her all the same."

We were ushered into a room with a buzzer and a window to a larger cylindrical room. Numerous other rooms like ours were arranged in a circle around the larger room. A huge throne sat in the center of the room, and Lero Ro went to the centre to begin his explanation.

"This is a game to 'steal the crown'. The team who holds the crown at the game's end, wins the game. But the rules are a little complicated. A game consists of five rounds and each round is five minutes long. Only the first five teams to press the buzzer are allowed into the round. The team that possesses the crown at the end of each round progresses to the next round where they compete against four new teams that press the buzzer. The true winner will be the winning team at the end of the fifth round."

"There is also a way to end the round early. That is to sit on the throne wearing the crown before the five minutes are up, ending the round immediately and the team whose member is sitting on the throne becomes the winner of that round."

"However, that person's movement will be restricted. If there was a winning team at the end of a round, that team may keep the crown for the next round, but they will have to stay on the throne, wearing the crown. If they lose the crown or get off the throne, they are eliminated from the game. If another team takes the crown and sits on the throne, that team wins the round."

Suddenly, Lero Ro shouted out. "Correct!" As if he heard somebody commenting on his explanation.

"The winner of the previous round assumes a big risk in the next round. But if you postpone participating because of the risk, you won't even be able to get into the game at the end! There's a lot of rules but ultimately you just have to steal the crown and keep it at the end of the game. Don't overthink it. Oh also, there will be a team from another test cohort participating. It's a long story. You can check the instruction book next to the buzzer too. Now let's start!"

It was a long explanation, but most teams should be able to understand the core dynamics. Everybody would want to be in the last round, and they'd want to give themselves ample time to get the crown. But they couldn't wait too long to start participating, otherwise they'd be unable to get in when everybody pressed the buzzer at the same time.

This was where we'd meet some of the other main cast. And Hwaryun was also participating as a Regular in disguise. With this game, our team would be subtly placed with the other Regulars while Yu Han Sung quietly covered up the results of our cohort, thus hiding my and Rachel's status as Irregulars, all the while convincing Lero Ro and Quant that he had an entirely different objective in mind, working for the Tower's ruling powers.

"So…when should we go in? I think we should probably wait and watch a bit first," said Androssi.

My purpose in the Tower was to nourish the water spirits, grow stronger, and perhaps acquire more useful items. Climbing the Tower would achieve all of that quite naturally, but the results of each test were less important to me.

For now, it would be better to keep things close to the canon storyline, and follow along with Headon's conspiracy, until I saw an opportunity otherwise.

"Agreed," I said to Androssi.

"You guys can decide," said Rachel.

O O O

When the round began, only two teams made their way into the arena.

One team consisted of a short green girl with the tail of a lizard, a brown haired average looking guy in a purple jumpsuit, and a black haired swordsman wearing martial arts robes carrying three swords.

They were Anak Zahard, Ship Leesoo, and Hatsu respectively, and part of the main cast. Anak was a fake Zahard's princess…sort of. She wasn't supposed to be born, but she was quite strong, similar to a real princess, and possessed the Green April, a powerful weapon that was awarded to her mother.

Ship Leesoo was a rather intelligent guy that figured out the door test through deduction. He looked like he was quite frustrated that his teammates pressed the buzzer so early.

And Hatsu was a very skilled swordsman that would gain quite a lot of notoriety as a Regular later on.

The other team, I didn't recognize. I assumed they weren't important characters, so I must've forgotten about them.

"Begin!"

"Leave it to me this time, don't interfere!" Anak said brazenly while stepping forward.

"Alone, you insane?" One of the other team's guys asked.

After some back and forth bantering, one of them decided to go alone against Anak too. He was promptly pushed into a wall and knocked out.

"…"

The other two charged at Anak angrily. She suddenly extended her weapon's hook and easily deflected one of them. The other one punched the back of Anak's head, but she was totally unaffected by the hit.

Then she grabbed his wrist, breaking it, and threw him bodily into the wall. When the last guy tried to attack again, she grabbed his fencing sword by the sharp edge without injury and similarly threw him into the wall.

After a while of getting toyed with, they tried to make a grab for the crown, only to see Anak dash there at extreme speed, hit them all by extending her weapon, and wear the crown.

Leesoo tried to take the crown from Anak, but she refused and sat down on the throne.

The round was called.

O O O

"So that's the fake princess," said Androssi. "What an idiot, sitting on the throne like that. She should've let her weak teammate sit on it instead. But that weapon…"

"You want it?" I asked.

"That's the Green April, if I'm not mistaken. There's no way a princess can get that without becoming a Ranker. How did she get it?"

I shrugged.

"What kind of weapon is it?" Rachel asked.

"It's an ignition weapon. They're like living weapons and the 13 months series are extremely powerful. It's an honor for a princess to receive one," Androssi said.

O O O

For the next round, two teams went in.

I honestly couldn't recognize any of them except the one with a sleeping bag, even though I thought I probably should've. The sleeping bag guy had really good Shinsoo control but was extremely lazy.

One of them was a creature with a featureless face, no mouth or nose or anything except a red eye.

It managed to talk without opening any sort of mouth, and exchanged some pre-battle banter with Hatsu about how nobody uses big swords with high friction on the higher floors as Shinsoo gets thicker, and that this would be one of their last opportunities to compare their swordsmanship.

"I don't think that's true. The Arie family uses swords and I'm pretty sure many of them use swords bigger than those," said Androssi. "They don't seem to be bothered by the Shinsoo on the higher Floors."

"Interesting. Perhaps, their swords are made of a different frictionless material?" I said.

"Hm…like suspendium? I guess that's possible. Making swords out of that would be really expensive though," said Androssi. "Personally, I think they probably use some sort of Shinsoo technique."

Suspendium was the material that allowed the Pocket and various other things in the Tower to float in a Shinsoo environment. Androssi was right that it was very expensive, and generally only used in small quantities. But what other uses it might have or where it came from, I didn't know.

Hatsu completely crushed the team that tried to face him in short order with his three sword style, and did it just in time to help out Leesoo who was about to be defeated by the other team.

Then he noticed the sleeping bag guy.

"I don't like killing, but there's an exception for trash. If you don't want to fight, wake up, and buzz off. Or else, you'll be the first to die."

"What a big softie," Androssi said with a smirk. "He left all those other guys alive. But he's got a cute face."

"I think the sleeping guy is going to surprise us," I said.

"Yeah, he's just pretending to be asleep" Androssi said confidently.

Immediately after her assertion, the sleeping guy got up, hands raised and light gathered in his palms.

"!" Hatsu turned around. "Anak, get away! It's Shinsoo!"

A blinding beam of light lanced towards Anak, who dodged upwards. She kept one hand touching the throne while she scaled up the backrest to the top of the massive throne.

During the distraction, the other two members of the team charged towards Anak and engaged in close combat. Leesoo and Hatsu joined the fray soon after.

Then another massive beam of light crashed directly into Anak.

"Damn it!" Leesoo shouted.

While smoke obscured Anak, the Shinsoo controller spoke. "Give us the crown. I can attack you from anywhere."

Anak's voice rang out. "The bait was not for you…" Then her form was revealed, completely unharmed. "You jerk…who do you think you are?"

"Hoh…that was an impressive attack for a Regular," said Androssi. "But it'll take more than that to hurt a princess, even a fake one. Thanks to the powers we received from Zahard, our bodies are as durable as a Ranker's."

"She said something about bait…what is she trying to do?" Rachel asked.

"Ignition!" Anak shouted while holding up the Green April. "I will kill all of you!"

Her weapon suddenly extended and enlarged at a barely visible speed even to my eyes, and she swept it across the arena through where the Shinsoo controller was and all the way into the wall, cratering it.

"Laure! Are you okay!" One of his teammates shouted.

Laure had successfully dodged, but looked concerned.

"You say you can attack from anywhere? Then I can attack everywhere from this throne!" Anak shouted.

Then she did just that, her weapon split apart into numerous segments and seemingly multiplied, attacking everywhere at once while the other team desperately dodged.

After a while, she stopped and looked to her left towards one of the observation rooms.

The other team took the chance to run away, and the round ended with their forfeit.

But instead of returning to her position on the throne's seat, Anak left the throne entirely, and crashed through the window to another team.

I had Agate follow her in agatespace.

O O O

"The hell is she doing?" Androssi asked, not being able to see what was going on. "She's disqualified, right?!"

"It seems that somebody has the Black March, and it resonated with her Green April. She noticed, and now she wants it," I answered.

"The Black March? Another of the 13 month series? But how? Is there another princess here?!"

"No, it's a boy," I said.

"That's even more ridiculous! What is going on here?" Androssi stomped on the ground.

Just when Anak was about to take the Black March by force, Lero Ro interfered. He easily froze her, and forced her to back down.

But then she proposed adding a new rule. Lero Ro seemed to be fighting off a smile as he heard the proposition. What exactly did he have to be so smug or happy about? He wasn't participating in the bet, so what did he have to gain? I wracked my mind and couldn't remember anything about this.

"Hm…looks like they're betting the Green April and Black March," I said.

"You can still hear what's going on over there?" Androssi asked. "So it's not only sight…what a useful ability."

"ROOOARRR!" The voice of Rak Wraithraiser thundered through the arena. One of Baam's current teammates, a very large alligator-like species, almost five meters tall. "OF COUUURSE! THIS GAME IS NOTHING WITHOUT ME! DOESN'T MEAN ANYTHING!"

Quite a prideful character too.

Shortly after, Lero Ro announced the change to the rules, but only to Baam and Anak's teams. "If Baam's team wins the game, the Green April will go to him and Anak can't steal the Black March from him. If his team loses, the Black March goes to Anak. There will be no other changes, so that means Anak's team lost this round and the next round begins without a winning team. Now let's continue, Regulars!"

I relayed this information to Androssi.

When he retreated to his observation area, I heard him mutter to himself. "This crown game will be the best crown game in history."

I frowned at hearing that. He had me thinking he had some devious plan but it turned out he was just getting a lot of entertainment from this bet.

"Tch, so nothing's changed for the rest of us in the game. The bet's just between them. On the other hand, that means there's nothing stopping me from stealing the Black March during the game!" Androssi said with a grin. "Hey. You guys don't mind if we let Baam's team win, do you? Otherwise, if they lose and Anak's team wins the bet, the Ranker might make me hand it over to them when the game ends."

"No problem. It'd be stupid to pass up on such a valuable weapon. Besides, Michelle and I didn't want to move up to the next floor so soon anyways, right?"

"Yes. Even though advancing sounds nice, we can learn a lot staying on this floor. The test administrator told us they'll have tutors for us," said Rachel. "If we skip ahead, we'll miss out on that and be forced to pay for our own training later."

But Rachel gave me a glance to which I returned with a barely perceptible nod. Although we didn't want to advance, we couldn't let Baam's team advance either. So we couldn't let them win the Crown game, despite Androssi's request.

"Tutors? Interesting. So this bonus game is actually a trap for the overeager? Why didn't you say so sooner?" Androssi asked.

"Because it won't matter. Even if we win this game, we can just request to decline the reward. Rather than a real bonus game, this is actually just a front to move us in with the other cohort. They can't run the next test with only three of us because it's a group thing," Rachel explained.

"Oh. Huh, so this is what it's like to have special connections," said Androssi with a smirk. "I like it."

O O O

[Interlude]

Lero Ro's advanced hearing picked up on the conversation between the three Regulars from the other testing district.

'What? I thought Quant said Yu Han Sung wanted to send these three up to the next floor quickly…who could've told them about the tutors for the Position Test? There's no way Quant would do that, so it must be Yu Han Sung…'

He opened his Pocket and looked up the information on the three Regulars. Androssi Zahard, Michelle Light, and Kaleidus Axion. A Zahard princess and two Regulars with no background information from Unknown areas.

Well, the Tower was huge and there were indeed many unknown areas not mapped out by Zahard's empire yet, sometimes there were those who hadn't even heard of Zahard's empire.

If he hadn't seen their unusual abilities during his barrier test, he wouldn't think anything of them.

It was obviously the princess of Zahard that was receiving special treatment. Corruption at its finest. And the princess had complained about his test being unfair…

Now he was starting to get the picture.

An entire group of Regulars massacred, resulting in only a single team passing.

It had obviously been planned. To give the princess two exceptionally powerful teammates while making the process look random, as if it happened naturally.

Lero Ro didn't like it. This way of running the tests…it was contrary to what he had been told. To find the most worthy, when the game was rigged? He resolved to talk to Yu Han Sung after this.

'Why was this even necessary? All the previous princesses dominated their tests easily with their own abilities… Anak was strong, but disappointing compared to Yuri. Although…Androssi calls her a fake, despite the name. What kind of strength will she show? Moreover, why hold this Crown game? They could've simply been grouped with this cohort for the Position Test.'

Not once did he suspect that the information he was seeing had been altered. That in fact, the two Regulars had been Irregulars, and the princess wasn't the one getting special treatment at all.

O O O

A/N: I'm happy to announce that a new ToG beta reader has just joined the team, NS666. And the story continues...in this chapter the battles themselves are essentially canon, so it's mainly a look at MC's team's reactions and thoughts.

Other than that, most reviews were about the doublepasting last chapter, and that's been fixed, so no responses this week, but thank you to everyone who pointed it out to me.