The Private Training Hall smelled of crushed stone and ozone.

"Move!" Ashe roared.

She was a blur of motion. A kinetic missile wrapped in a Red Tower training vest. She launched herself off a concrete pillar and bypassed the flank she was supposed to be guarding. She dove straight into the center of the arena.

In the middle of the room, Valerica Sol stood like a monolith. Her amethyst eyes were glowing and her hands were raised as she maintained a crushing field of gravity. It was [Authority: Celestial Heart]. Within a thirty-foot radius around her, the air was heavy enough to flatten steel. Three massive clay golems were currently pinned to the floor. Their reinforced ceramic bodies groaned as the gravity slowly compressed them into dust.

It was a controlled demolition. It was perfect.

Until Ashe arrived.

"Mine!" the Oni shouted.

She didn't care about the gravity field. She reinforced her body with a dense coating of red mana and plunged into the pressure zone. The gravity seized her and yanked her down, but she used the downward force to accelerate her swing. She brought her heavy wooden training sword down on the head of the Golem Valerica was currently crushing.

CRACK.

The wooden sword shattered on impact, but the force was enough to drive the Golem's head into its chest cavity. The construct crumbled.

The problem was that Ashe didn't stop there. The gravity was too strong. She lost her footing on the shifting rubble. She slipped and slid violently across the floor before crashing into the back of Valerica's knees.

The sudden impact broke Valerica's concentration. The gravity field flickered and died.

The remaining two golems were suddenly released from the crushing weight. They surged to their feet with their heavy stone fists raised. One of them swung a haymaker at Valerica's exposed back.

"Cycle interrupted," Isole's voice drifted calmly from the rafters.

A wall of translucent white hard-light, [Samsara: Lotus Barrier], snapped into existence inches from Valerica's spine. The stone fist slammed into the barrier with a deafening gong sound.

Vane was crouching in the shadows near the entrance. He sighed and lowered his spear.

"Stop!" Vane yelled as he stepped into the light.

Valerica spun around. Her eyes were blazing with amethyst light. She didn't look at the golems. She looked down at Ashe who was currently tangled in her legs on the floor.

"Get off me," Valerica hissed. Her voice was cold enough to freeze the sweat on Vane's neck.

"I got him," Ashe grinned. She scrambled to her feet and pointed at the crushed Golem pile. "Did you see that? Used your gravity as a booster. Bam. Crushed."

"You broke formation," Valerica said as she brushed dust off her pristine uniform. She waved a hand and the remaining two golems were slammed back into the floor by a renewed pulse of gravity. They shattered instantly. "You abandoned the perimeter. You entered my Kill Zone. And you tackled me. If this were Sector 9, I would be dead and you would be court-martialed."

"But I got the Elite," Ashe argued. She crossed her arms. "You were taking too long. It was boring. I'm not going to stand on the edge and watch you hug rocks for twenty minutes."

"Boring?" Valerica's eyes narrowed. "Warfare is not entertainment, you savage. It is the application of force to achieve superiority. You are a chaotic variable that cannot be integrated."

"And you're a stuck-up statue who stands in one spot!" Ashe shot back as she bared her sharp teeth.

"The geometry is flawed," Isole added helpfully. She dropped down from the rafters and landed soundlessly beside them. She adjusted her glasses. "Ashe's trajectory intersects Valerica's orbit 43% of the time. The probability of friendly fire is nearing certainty."

Vane walked toward them. He felt a headache building behind his eyes.

This had been happening all week. Individually, they were monsters. Together, they were a disaster. Valerica wanted order. Ashe wanted chaos. Isole wanted geometric perfection. They were oil, water, and fire trying to share a bucket.

"We're taking five," Vane said.

"We are not taking five," Valerica snapped. She turned her glare on him. "We have not completed a single successful rotation. If we enter the Hollows like this, we will die on the first floor."

"We aren't dying because we lack skill," Vane said. He leaned his spear against the wall. "We're dying because you two are competing."

He looked at Ashe.

"You want the Elites because they're fun."

He looked at Valerica.

"You want the Elites because you want to prove you can solo the room."

Vane reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, leather-bound notebook. He clicked his pen.

"I realized something," Vane said as he opened the book to a fresh page. "I can't order you to follow orders. Valerica is a High Noble, so she doesn't take orders from a commoner. Ashe is a Warlord, so she doesn't take orders from anyone."

"Correct," Ashe said. She picked a splinter of wood out of her knuckles.

"So we're changing the system," Vane said. "We aren't a military unit anymore. We're a business."

The three girls looked at him. Isole tilted her head. She was intrigued.

"A business?" Valerica repeated. Her tone was skeptical.

"Mercenary work," Vane corrected. He drew a quick diagram in the notebook and turned it around to show them. "I call it the Ledger."

He pointed to the center circle.

"This is Valerica's Zone. The Sun. Anything inside this circle belongs to House Sol. If you kill it, you get the points. If you crush it, you get the glory."

He drew an orbit around it.

"This is the Perimeter. The Comet. This is Ashe's territory."

Vane looked at Ashe.

"Here is the deal. I am assigning a credit value to every monster in the dungeon."

Ashe's ears perked up. "Real credits?"

"Academy Contribution Points," Vane lied smoothly. Technically they were his points, but he had plenty to burn from his Rank 3 stipend. "Trash mobs are worth 5 points. Elites are worth 50. The Floor Boss is worth 500."

"Okay," Ashe nodded. "So I just kill everything."

"No," Vane said. He tapped the paper. "Here is the Tax."

"Tax?" Ashe frowned.

"If you enter Valerica's gravity well," Vane said, his voice hard, "you are poaching on her land. That's a 50% tax on the kill. If you kill an Elite inside her zone, she gets half the points. Plus, a 100-point fine for disrupting the formation."

Ashe's jaw dropped. "That's a rip-off!"

"That's capitalism," Vane shrugged. "However, if you stay on the perimeter and kill the enemies trying to escape Valerica, or the ones trying to flank her, you keep 100% of the profit. And if you spot an Elite and lure it out of her zone to kill it solo? That's a 20-point bonus for Isolation Tactics."

Ashe looked at the diagram. Her eyes darted back and forth. Vane could practically hear the gears turning in her head. She wasn't thinking about tactics anymore. She was thinking about high scores.

"And me?" Valerica asked as she crossed her arms. "I do not need your points, Rat. I have wealth."

"You don't care about points," Vane agreed. "You care about perfection. So if Ashe enters your zone, you are legally allowed to crush her. I won't stop you."

Valerica's lips twitched. A dark, pleased smile touched her face. "Acceptable."

Vane turned to Isole.

"Isole, you're the Auditor," Vane said. "You track the kills. You track the positioning. If anyone cheats, you dock their pay."

Isole pushed her glasses up her nose. Her mismatched eyes gleamed. "I enjoy counting sins."

Vane closed the book. He picked up his spear.

"Load the next wave," Vane called out to the control room operator behind the glass. "Heavy Infantry. Ten units."

The floor grates opened. Ten fresh Clay Golems rose from the depths. They clanked heavily as they moved.

"Begin!"

The change was instantaneous.

Valerica slammed her hands together. [Celestial Heart]. The gravity field expanded. It caught the central group of six Golems and pinned them to the floor.

Ashe launched herself forward. She saw an Elite Golem struggling at the edge of the gravity field. Her instinct was to dive in and smash it.

But then she stopped. She skidded to a halt right at the edge of the purple distortion.

"Fifty percent tax," she muttered to herself.

She waited.

The Elite Golem groaned under the pressure. It managed to crawl one inch out of Valerica's zone.

Ashe grinned.

"Payday."

She swung her fist, which was reinforced with [Warlord] density, and took the Golem's head off clean. She didn't stop. She spun and sprinted along the perimeter of the gravity field like a shark patrolling a reef. She wasn't protecting Valerica. She was farming.

"Point! Point! That's fifty!" Ashe laughed as she kicked a flanker Golem into the wall.

Valerica stood in the center. She was undisturbed. She tightened her grip and crushed the Golems in her zone into cubes. She glanced at Ashe who was tearing through the outer ring with frightening efficiency.

For the first time, Ashe wasn't a liability. She was a filter. Nothing got through to the center because Ashe was too greedy to let any points slip past her.

Isole stood on a high pillar. Her fingers twitched as she tallied the score.

"Efficiency is up 300%," Isole noted dryly.

Vane stood in the back. He leaned on his spear and watched the carnage. He watched the "Sun" hold the line and the "Comet" burn everything that came close.

It wasn't friendship. It wasn't loyalty. It was just business.

And business was good.

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