The next morning, the sun decided to be lazy.
The light filtering through the window was soft and grey, the kind that makes you want to call in sick to life.
I was lying in a bed that probably cost more than my entire old trust fund.
Silk sheets, pillows stuffed with what felt like the happy thoughts of baby angels.
It was the most comfortable I’d been in years, and I hated every second of it.
Comfort is a trap.
It’s the quiet music that plays right before the ga lulls you into a false sense of security and drops a world-ending boss on your head.
I sat up.
The ritzy suite they’d given us was huge.
Fireplace, balcony, the whole nine yards.
A far cry from wearing a sha-cloth made of leaves and sleeping on a dirt floor.
Yael was already up, sitting by the window and glaring at the capital city like it owed her money.
They’d given her new gear—simple leather tunic and pants, practical and tough.
She looked like a rogue fresh out of the starter zone.
She also looked like she wanted to murder soone.
"This sucks," she said, her voice flat.
"The bed?"
"The clothes?"
"The fact that we’re not currently being used as an Ogre’s toothpick?" I asked, swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
My own new outfit—a dark blue tunic and black pants—was laid out on a chair.
Way better than leaves.
"I hate the quiet," she said.
"It feels fake."
"Yesterday we were grinding for our lives."
"Now we’re... guests."
"We’re not guests," I corrected, standing up and stretching.
My new body felt good, strong, with no permanent pain debuff.
That was a buff I could get used to.
"We’re assets."
"The King’s new favorite toys."
She finally turned, her athyst eyes narrowed.
"Don’t you get it, Quinn?"
"This is a cage."
"A really nice cage with good room service, but still a cage."
"The King didn’t make you a commander because he likes your pretty face."
"He did it because you’re a weapon he can point at things."
I walked over and picked up the tunic.
She wasn’t wrong.
Of course she wasn’t.
This is how these gas work.
You prove you’re not a total noob, and the main quest-giver slaps a shiny title on you and sends you on a suicide mission.
"I know," I said.
But it was deeper than that.
While she was worried about the cage, I was thinking about the ga chanics.
I closed my eyes and pulled up the system notifications in my head.
Overwhelming Pride.
Weaponized Charm.
Glass Cannon.
Echo of Sacrifice.
This wasn’t so random dice roll on a character creation screen.
The System had scanned my damn soul.
My whole life, I’d been a glass cannon.
All attack, no D.
I used my charm, my smarts, my everything to keep people away.
But the second soone landed a real emotional crit... I shattered.
And my pride.
God, my pride.
That was my main stat.
The thing that made refuse to lose, refuse to look weak, refuse to die quietly in that sad little courtyard.
It was why I hit the "Reforge" button instead of "Ga Over."
The System didn’t give that attribute.
It just put a na on it.
And Yael.
Echo of Sacrifice.
Requires a guardian figure to function.
That was us.
That was our whole screwed-up dynamic.
He was the at shield.
He took the hits for , right up to the end.
And the System took that final, desperate act and made it a core chanic.
Pact of the Anchor.
Shared Strength.
Symbiotic Growth.
The ga was forcing us to be codependent.
It was taking the unhealthiest part of our relationship and turning it into a power-up.
It was sick.
It was twisted.
And it was absolutely, brilliantly efficient.
This System wasn’t just a ga.
It was a mirror.
It took who you were and made it your class.
It didn’t want you to be soone else.
It wanted you to be more of yourself.
For , that ant being a proud, arrogant, strategic bastard who needed his at shield to survive.
Fine.
I could work with that.
"You’re thinking again," Yael said, cutting through my thoughts.
"I can sll the smoke."
"Running diagnostics," I shot back.
"Soone has to."
"We have a guild to build, rember?"
"You an a collection of cannon fodder for the King’s war," she grumbled.
"Who are you going to recruit?"
"The blushing fangirls who want to iron your new pants?"
A sharp knock on the door cut her off.
Not a servant’s knock.
This was the kind of knock that doesn’t ask for permission.
Yael tensed, her hand twitching for a sword that wasn’t there.
I just sighed.
I knew who it was.
"Co in," I called out.
The door swung open.
Gandalf stood there, filling the doorway.
Still in his scuffed leather armor, looking as out of place in our fancy suite as a wolf in a petting zoo.
He didn’t say hi.
His cool, grey eyes swept over Yael, then locked on .
It was the sa look he’d given before.
A veteran sizing up a fresh-faced recruit who got a lucky crit.
"The King made you an offer," Burton growled.
"You said yes."
He stepped into the room, his boots heavy on the polished floor.
"So let officially welco you to your new command."
He stopped a few feet away.
"Welco to the war."
Yael crossed her arms.
"We heard your speech yesterday."
"Wasn’t dramatic enough for you?"
He ignored her, his eyes still glued to .
"The King sees you as a scalpel."
"A clever little tool to solve a problem he can’t smash."
"He thinks you’re special."
He took another step.
"I don’t."
"I think you’re a man who survived one fight."
"A mage who got one lucky shot."
"I think the King just handed a legendary sword to a level-one scrub and told him to go slay a dragon."
My jaw tightened.
My Overwhelming Pride attribute flared up like a bad debuff.
"You got a point?" I asked, my voice dangerously quiet.
"Or did you just co here to grief the new Commander?"
A flicker of sothing—not quite a smile—touched his lips.
"I have a point."
"The King wants you to build a clan?"
"You can’t lead an army if you can’t command a squad."
"And you can’t command a squad if you can’t even stand on your own."
He jabbed a thick finger at my chest.
"You think you’re a leader now?"
"Because of a title?"
"You’ve given orders to one person your entire life, and she only listens to you half the ti."
He glanced at Yael, who actually looked offended on my behalf for once.
"You want to be a commander, Quinn?"
"You have to earn it."
"Not in a throne room."
"Out there."
He jerked his head toward the window.
"In the mud."
"In the blood."
This was it.
The mission prompt.
"The King has given you a task," Gandalf said, his voice dropping.
"I’m giving you your first mission."
"Your first real test."
He stared down.
"You have one month."
"Build your army."
My mind raced.
One month?
Where do I find warriors?
"Your recruits are waiting for you," he said, like he’d read my mind.
"In a place called the Whispering Canyons."
"An outpost on the edge of the kingdom."
Yael snorted.
"What’s the catch?"
Gandalf’s gaze finally shifted to her.
"The catch," he said, his voice empty, "is that they are the outcasts."
"The exiles."
"The desperate."
"The people my own guard won’t touch."
He turned back to .
"They are the elves that society has thrown away."
"Artists who refused to be archers."
"Scholars who were useless for the war."
"Pacifists and cowards who broke in their first battle."
"They are the King’s garbage, sent to the edge of the world to be forgotten."
He wasn’t offering soldiers.
He was handing a pile of broken, useless parts and telling to build a war machine.
An impossible task.
Designed for to fail.
"If you can forge that trash into a fighting force," Gandalf declared, "I will be the first to recognize your clan."
"I will personally endorse you before the King’s council."
His voice turned to stone.
"If you fail... you and every single one of those pathetic souls will be transferred to the front lines."
"You won’t be a special unit."
"You’ll be cannon fodder."
"The first wave."
"A at shield for the real soldiers."
He stared at , waiting.
Waiting for to break.
I thought of the hopeless faces in the courtyard.
The ones who had given up.
He was sending to lead them.
I looked at Yael.
She knew this was a death sentence.
But then I looked back at Gandalf, and that hot bubble of rage and pride boiled in my chest.
He thought I’d fail.
He thought he could break .
He thought I was just so pretty-faced noob who got lucky.
He was wrong.
A slow smile spread across my face.
Not a friendly smile.
It was the smile of a raid leader who just figured out the boss chanics.
Gandalf’s eyes narrowed.
He hadn’t expected that.
"An army of misfits?" I said, my voice dripping with confidence I didn’t entirely feel.
"A bunch of broken toys and rejects?"
I let out a short, sharp laugh.
"You call that an impossible task?"
I shook my head, my smile widening into a grin.
"That’s not a mission, Captain."
"That’s a tutorial."
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