The alliance's officers did not hesitate to include Kaiden's party in the newbie track. While his level at 46 might not have been the highest of the highs, as he and his party only started leveling a couple of months ago instead of the full year, none doubted their competence.

Somehow, they always pulled through.

By this point, no one among the two guild management wanted to question their ability, even if they logically did not understand most of what was going on with them.

And those few who might've raised a few arguments were already under orders to shut it down by their two leaders. Tessa and Talia knew better than anyone that it was best not to begin such dumb arguments. Their belief in Kaiden was that firm.

Talia clapped her hands once, sharp enough to snap the discussion back into order. "Alright. With Kaiden's six, we need fourteen more who qualify as newbies to round out the team of twenty."

"I'm sorry," Kaiden cut in. "But we're seven now."

A ripple of confusion passed through the officers.

Tessa blinked. "Huh?"

Before anyone could follow up, the dark halo floating above Kaiden's head pulsed before erupting with a clean burst of white radiance. Then a voice, bright and girlish and absolutely unbothered, chimed through the hall.

"Hehe! Sorry, I care too little about you for a proper greeting, but you can just call me Kai's Guardian Angel!"

"…"

Silence.

Absolute silence.

Then the entire hall reacted the exact same way.

Not with shock… not fully.

Not with confusion, though there was plenty of that.

What dominated the room was exhaustion.

Tessa's hand slid down her face.

Talia pressed two fingers into her temple like she felt a migraine forming.

Several strategists slumped in their seats.

A handful of crafters muttered curses in three different languages.

Someone in the back audibly said, "Not again…"

It wasn't that they weren't surprised, of course, they were, but the people who knew Kaiden had passed the point where 'shock' was an active emotion. They were drained. Spiritually. Existentially. Emotionally. Every time they thought they were beginning to grasp the outer edges of Kaiden's nonsense, he returned with a brand-new development that slammed all their understanding straight back to zero.

A talking halo.

Sure.

Why not.

Of course.

One man finally gathered what remained of his sanity to raise a question.

"Uh… wait. Are… talking artifacts counted as awakened? And the two monster ladies… are they even qualified to participate?"

Aria had an answer locked and loaded. "I asked the Association on our way here. Because the two of them underwent a unique transformation during their subjugation and since their power level is close to ours, they fall under the same classification as newly awakened humanoids. They're cleared for combat participation in the newbie track."

The man slowly nodded, relieved that at least something in this group had paperwork behind it. "Alright… alright, that makes sense. But then, what about the…"

His eyes drifted upward toward the rotating halo.

He hesitated.

He looked at Kaiden.

He looked back at the halo.

His lips parted.

His question died.

Because Kaiden had already said it.

"We're seven."

*Sigh…* Nobody in the hall argued with that.

Alice was in her late months of age sixteen, letting her qualify despite being awakened for over a year and having also been killing monsters for a long time.

She was one of the bigger beneficiaries of the association's 'geniuses deserve to be rewarded, not punished' mentality.

The hall didn't stay frozen for long. Once the shock of Kaiden's seventh member settled into the collective bloodstream of Runewoven and Nova Circuit, things snapped back into motion. Talia, ever the professional, clapped sharply and redirected the room's scrambled attention.

"Good. The rest of the squad has been decided as well." She pointed toward the far half of the hall, where several veteran captains were gathering. "We'll proceed with the veteran-track roster. Tessa, please take the rookies for a briefing. I'll handle the veteran track."

The woman nodded, gesturing for Kaiden's group and the other qualifying youths to follow her. Before long, twenty bodies stood before Tessa, forming a rough semicircle.

Kaiden's seven anchored the left side.

On the right side stood Nova Circuit's trio, Vaelira with her puppet-strings smugness, Jack looming behind her like a wall of metal and muscle, and Sasha idly twirling an arrow that glowed at the tip. Leon was missing, well, dead, because Vaelira killed him when he got infected in the undead dungeon.

The remaining ten were Runewoven's own rookies, all qualified through one rule or another. Diaz stood among them with his characteristic stoic posture, nodding once at Kaiden in acknowledgment.

Tessa wasted no time. "Listen up. We're going to divide into sub-teams. Routes will be chosen based on speed-clearing potential, risk of high levels turning up, and large-density regions-"

She didn't get any further.

Kaiden stepped forward.

"I apologize, Tessa, but we're going to go on our own."

Silence slammed the hall so thoroughly that even mana hums seemed to quiet in discomfort.

Tessa slowly turned to him. "Why?"

Kaiden didn't hesitate. "Efficiency. I believe the thirteen of you are competent. If we go our separate ways, we'll gather more points than if we stick together as twenty."

A few Runewoven rookies straightened with pride.

Vaelira's eyes narrowed sharply. "Unless we die," she said coldly. "Have you already forgotten the penalty? Negative ten thousand points per death. We need to kill ten thousand level 25 or below monsters to break even with a single death. If anyone screws up, the entire thing crashes. Splitting up increases the risk."

Kaiden met her stare directly.

"I believe in you."

The puppeteer's narrowed eyes turned into fiery slits.

In truth, yes, he preferred hunting only with his girls. But that wasn't the core reason.

He still didn't know who had sent those masked men and women into his dungeon.

Someone had betrayed him. And the odds pointed squarely at one of the two guilds he was working with.

Even if the Association had built this competition with layered protections, from overseers to remote observation constructs, and more, Kaiden wasn't about to give anybody the chance to stab him in the back.

He wouldn't trust the unknown, luck, or "probably safe."

Tessa's gaze hardened as she processed all this. She didn't have insight into his real thoughts, but she had enough political experience to read between lines, and she could see the stubbornness there, the immovable nature of his stance.

Kaiden sighed at the woman. "I'm sorry for being problematic. But I won't budge on this. If you feel this is unacceptable, then we will withdraw from the competition entirely. You can field seven other members in our stead. We will just fight monsters at our own pace, ignoring the competition."

Tessa stared at him for a long, weighted stretch. Something inside her soon shifted, subtle and resigned. He wasn't bluffing. She knew it. And she knew damn well that pushing Kaiden into something he refused would only backfire.

Finally, she exhaled and lowered her shoulders by a fraction.

"Fine. Have it your way," she said. "I bet New Dawn will not huddle their awakened together either. If we want to win, we must take risks."

Just like that, the argument died.

It was time to begin the giant competition that would have resounding implications for the rest of Kaiden's and his girls' lives.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.