Diana and Kira both flinched slightly, the involuntary response of people encountering something genuinely unpleasant despite years of exposure to various unpleasant things.

From twenty meters back, Lily made a sound that was trying to be quiet and failing.

Bernita, standing beside her, was entirely unmoved. She raised one hand and released a controlled gust of wind into the cluster, her expression serene.

Lily stared at her. "How are you fine right now?"

"ICU ward," Bernita said, in the tone of someone explaining something obvious. "Six years."

"I knew it."

Don had already moved. He circled behind the zombie cluster while the frontline held attention, triggered killing intent, and drove the Huron dagger into the nearest neck. His weak-point accuracy wasn’t Lily’s, he couldn’t thread the cervical vertebrae with the consistency she’d developed, but his raw damage compensated for the imprecision. Each killing-intent strike stripped over two thousand health from whatever it connected with, weak point or not.

Diana’s Heaven and Earth Strike moved through the cluster like a statement, five thousand damage without a critical hit, five-figure numbers when it critted, the kind of output that reorganized a fight around itself. Don watched her footwork between strikes and thought, not for the first time, that she made it look effortless in a way that required an enormous amount of effort to achieve.

Yates was taking the worst of it. The zombies had identified him as the most immediately threatening thing in range and were applying that conclusion systematically, biting, clawing, the Heavy Strikes landing for three to four hundred at a time, manageable. The Corrosive Strikes were the problem. Each one drained both health and mana in a slow, accumulating bleed that Bernita had to actively manage rather than just periodically address. Yates bore it with the stoic expression of someone who had accepted that this was the role.

Lily, from her position at range, found her rhythm. One in five arrows hit the neck cleanly, then one in four. The shots that connected were definitive, the head separating from the body in a clean mechanical break that produced a fatal damage number and one less zombie to worry about. Don watched her consistency improving in real time and felt something that was probably pride, though he wouldn’t have used that word for it.

The first batch went down in under five minutes.

Yates kicked a detached hand off his boot with visible distaste. "The experience is terrible. Twelve of them and barely two-tenths of a percent."

"Even distribution across six players," Don said. "And they’re enhanced, not elite. The numbers improve on the lower floors."

Diana surveyed the hall, which remained populous with shambling figures in the middle distance. "There are enough of them to keep us occupied for a while."

"Equipment durability is going to be a problem before the floor’s cleared," Yates said. "I’ll need a repair run before we go deeper."

"Plan for it."

They settled into the rhythm of it, pull, position, burn, recover, repeat. The cave hall was generous with its zombie population and stingy with everything else. The drops were insulting: twenty or thirty silver coins per kill, no equipment of any grade, nothing that suggested the mine had opinions about rewarding the people clearing it. Don noted this without surprise. Realms Online had made its position on drop rates clear from the beginning. Real returns came from bosses, and bosses required luck as much as skill.

The first floor had no boss.

It had thousands of zombies, a staircase at the far end, and a lot of silver coins that added up to something modest when you collected enough of them. By the time they’d worked their way across the hall, the morning was gone, experience bars had moved a comfortable half-level, and Yates’s Qimu set was displaying the accumulated evidence of close combat with several hundred undead miners, bite marks, claw scores, and the particular green staining of corrosive attacks that no amount of in-game cleaning addressed aesthetically.

"Female zombies," Cappuccino said, with the gravity of someone proposing a serious hypothesis.

Nobody had the energy to argue with this.

They logged off in sequence, the instance flagging their exit but preserving their position, one of the dungeon’s more forgiving design choices. Don pulled off the light-sensing glasses and set them in the rack, feeling the particular mild disorientation of reentry.

Downstairs, the studio had the quiet of mid-afternoon. He found Lily and Kira already gathering their things at the elevator, and they went down together.

Kyle materialized from somewhere near the entrance with the reliable enthusiasm of someone who had been waiting for an opportunity.

"Heading out for food? Perfect timing, come down the road with us, I’ll get everyone KFC."

Lily gave him the look she reserved for statements that didn’t require a response, and continued walking.

Don fell into step beside her and said, over his shoulder, "Some other time, mate. We’re in the middle of a run."

Outside, he patted the top of Lily’s head lightly. "You could be slightly less brutal about it."

"Don." She turned and looked at him with the expression of someone about to deliver information she considered self-evident. "Do you actually not know who that is?"

Don thought about it honestly. "I genuinely don’t."

"The one ranked 699th out of the 700 underlings of the Gon Alliance," Lily said casually.

"Looks like an unremarkable fellow!"

Lily nodded. "It’s precisely because he’s inconspicuous that he can lurk among us. I never expected a studio this small to have players from the Gon Alliance."

"That’s not surprising," Kira said. "The Gon Alliance is mostly made up of young troublemakers from the greater Liverpool area and the surrounding cities. And you’d better not believe a word of Elias Finch’s nonsense about wanting nothing to do with them. Half their players are embedded in mid-to-upper-tier studios across these cities, waiting for the right moment to poach talent for Warfire."

"How do you know so much?"

"Because my guild was one of the ones they poached." Kira’s voice was calm, almost detached, as though she were recounting someone else’s story.

Lily stuck out her tongue. "I used to be pretty close to players from Warfire. You won’t hold that against me, will you?"

Kira chuckled and pinched Lily’s chin. "If you don’t want me to, then sleep with me tonight."

Lily’s face flushed scarlet. "You’re terrible! It would be my first time!"

Don dragged a fingernail across the goosebumps rising on his arm. "Are you two ever going to stop? Keep this up and I’m skipping lunch."

"Best decision you’ll make all day, it’s my treat, and I’m only ordering stir-fried ramen."

"Can I at least get two dishes? One’s not going to cut it."

"Don, I despise you."

"..."

Kira’s smile faded. She took Lily’s hand with quiet seriousness. "If anyone should be worried about being pushed out, it isn’t me. Think about it, Diana’s Sword Song team and Warfire are mortal enemies. You’ve been close to Warfire players. By all logic, Diana should want nothing to do with you. But she doesn’t."

Lily glanced sideways at Don, her words laced with theatrical jealousy. "Hmph. Sister Diana treats Brother Don like a priceless gem, so of course she extends that goodwill to everyone around him."

Don grabbed her by the collar. "You little brat. Say that again and see what happens."

"Ow, ow! Don, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Kira, help me!"

Kira raised both hands in surrender. "You two have been teasing me all afternoon. You’re on your own."

After a hearty bowl of stir-fried ramen and a generous serving of beef soup, the three of them patted their stomachs contentedly and made their way back to the studio. But when they arrived, they stopped short.

It was two in the afternoon. On any normal day, the studio’s 120 seats would be more than eighty percent full. Today, barely half were occupied, and the atmosphere was subdued, almost hollow. As they entered, two players a few years younger than Don were setting down their second-generation optical glasses and shaking their heads as they headed for the door.

Don knew them well enough to reach out and catch one by the shoulder. "What’s going on? Where are you headed?"

The young man looked at him with hollow eyes. "Got eliminated, brother. Time to go home."

"Eliminated? It’s not even over yet, what happened?"

He turned and pointed to a printed form pinned to the wall, a bold red line drawn across it. "The receptionist just came by. Everyone below that line is out."

Don walked over to look. His stomach dropped. Out of 120 players, every one below level 20 had been cut. More than fifty names fell beneath that line.

The young man managed a tired smile. "Honestly, this studio treated us well. Me and my buddy each walked out with a hundred and fifty dollars, thirty a day for meals. The girl at the front even said they’d reach out if the team expands. The boss here knows how to do right by people. If they open up spots again, I’ll be first in line." He glanced at the ranking board and straightened slightly. "You’re sitting at number one up there, brother. Work hard. Maybe we’ll fight side by side again someday."

Don pulled out his phone. "Give me your number. Reach out if you ever need anything."

The two nodded, and they didn’t leave until phone numbers had been exchanged on both sides.

Kira watched the exchange with quiet admiration. "Not bad. You’ve got the manner of someone who actually knows how to lead people."