Chapter Twenty-Two – Chaotica

  It was the next day when Settie took Gray and the rest of the Squad 23 out of the house and down the block. We kept the wall to our left as he made our way through the silent streets. It was a section of Old Town Gray had not seen before.

  There was an open space of hard packed dirt and weeds.

  Settie started to chuckle. It was so strange to see her so happy. “The old bastard is having us play Chaotic. He’s doing this on purpose, that fucker.”

  They hadn’t gone to First Field, so Gray didn’t know if Crewel was mad that they’d broken into his office. Settie hadn’t thought twice about them getting into trouble. If all was the Testing, and all was the Test, if was the squad smart enough to break the rules that would be the rest.

  Tomi was kicking herself that she’d left the window open. She did appreciate how well Gray had handled the situation, though.

  Settie held up the oblong ball made from animal skin. She threw it to Gray. “There is literally no better place to play Chaotica on Midmere than Old Town. Because the very nature of Chaotica is chaos.”

  She ran at Gray, and then, at the last minute, she shifted into her dragon form. Soaring up, she flew to the south of them, and breathed fire in a straight line. She roared at them from the air. “That is one goal line. The Chaotica field is divided in half. Let me draw the midfield line.”

  She flew down and breathed fire in a line down the middle of the field. “That’s about fifty yards from the goal line. Now, let me draw the other goal line.”

  She created another line of fire and smoke fifty yards from the midfield line. So it was basically two fields divided in the middle.

  Settie flew down and shifted back. “Gray, I would appreciate a bit of mana from you.”

  He found her core and refilled it with mana. They’d experimented with distance—touch worked best, but he could still channel mana from nearly ten feet away. The farther he was from his target, the more magic bled away in the transfer.

  “Toss me the ball, Precious Gray.”

  He threw her ball, and she caught it deftly. “The entire point of Chaotica is to move this ball from your own territory and into the territory of your opponent and get it across the goal line. You cannot throw or even pitch the ball forward. In order to move it forward, you have to carry it. You can pitch the ball to people behind you, but they must be behind you. That is very important.”

  “What about to the side?” Gray asked.

  “No. You can’t throw or pitch the ball to anyone in front of you or to the side of you. They must be behind you. And you cannot throw it overhand. You have to throw it underhand. That is critical. For the entire game, you must have at least two squad members in your main field, playing defense all time. You also must have someone in your kill strip, which is the ten yard strip along the goal line. I didn’t want to waste your time creating the kill strip line, but I trust you can imagine what a true Chaotica field will look like.

  “When you go on the offensive by entering your enemy’s territory—”

  Gray couldn’t help but cut her off, realizing why Blythe had been so smug. “We’ll only have two offensive players. We’ll need three of us to stay behind.”

  “That is correct, Precious Gray,” the captain said, not at all upset that he’d interrupted her. “This is a problem. This is why we need you to master your meridians, for you will be integral to our offense.”

  “Will all seven of our enemy’s players be playing defense?” he asked.

  She nodded. “It will be two of you against their seven. Scoring will be difficult, which means we’ll have to rely on our defense. When they take the ball into our territory, it will be their four against your five. See? On a normal team, this could be an issue, but you five are extraordinary.”

  Then their captain turned salty. “Now, no more interruptions. Let me finish. Chaotica is a violent game by its nature, but the violence is very specific. You can only attack the person who has the ball, and so, there is no random fighting. You can block others getting the ball, but cannot hold them, or beat them. You merely have to get in their way. Tripping is allowed, but unless they have the ball, no spells, no claws, no swords.”

  The captain anticipated their questions. She had to, since she didn’t like them. “Yes, Chaotica is played with weapons. We’ll get to that in a minute. Defensive spells can be used, but no missile spells, and so Midjara’s mana hands will play an important part of the game. If you have the ball, you can attack anyone that is in your way or trying to grab you. However, if the ball comes loose, and the other team recovers it, they can then charge the goal. Many times, runners will drop their weapons to hold onto the ball more tightly. At the same time, a good defense is a strong offense, and having a sword, beating back your opponents, and then, if tackled, pitching the ball to another player is an option.

  “Like I said, the whole point of the game is to get the ball across your enemy’s goal line. If you are tackled, then the pile on begins, and the ball is stripped, and the other team has it. They will start running down the field to try and score. In that way, it’s a very simple game. Run the ball into across the midfield line, through the defenders, across the kill strip, and then, into the end zone for a point. Once that happens, the ball is taken to the other team’s end zone, and then, the running starts all over again.”

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Gray and Rynn exchanged glances. It seemed simple enough, but it hadn’t really earned the name “Chaotica” at least to Gray’s way of thinking. He had other questions as well.

  Settie saw that. “Yes, Gray, let’s hear your question.”

  “Can the opposite team enter their enemy’s territory when they have the ball there?”

  “Players can be anywhere as long as the three home territory players are in their positions—one in the kill strip and two in their main territory.”

  “Why the swords?” Tomi asked. “And I know this is First Field, so murder is part of the game, but I’m assuming we can only use bloodless blades, charged so they don’t cut off people’s heads.”

  “You are correct. Only Bloodless blades.” Settie smiled, and it was chilling. “But you’re wrong, Tomika Ka. There is murder in this game. Game play is divided into four fifteen-minute quarters with an extra fifteen minutes allowed for half-time. If the magistrate decides to play by traditional rules, demons will be released at different intervals during the game, generally, once a quarter beginning with the second quarter. Most of the time, the number of demons depends on the score of the game. The higher the score, the more the demons.”

  “Mother’s oven!” Midj’s mouth dropped open. She’d been holding Ames’s hand even before the shocking news, but now she was holding the Quelling girl’s hands so hard, Ames winced.

  “You’re hurting me, Midj.”

  “Sorry, Ames.”

  “No worries. It can’t rain all the time.”

  Settie had turned as dour as ever. “What is your question, Midjara?”

  “You’re joking about the demons. You have to be.”

  “I’m not,” the captain said. “This is why it is called Chaotica. Anything can happen. There have been deaths. How could there not be? You’ve all fought demons before. You know the dangers. And remember, the for the demons, this isn’t a game. They don’t care who has the ball or what the score is. All the demons want is to find you, devour your core, and absorb your mana. And that is all they want.”

  Gray shook his head. “So there’s a chance that even if all five of us are there to defend our goal line, a few of us will have to be fighting off demons. Good thing I’ll have my stick.”

  “No,” the captain said. “You will have a sword, and you’ll charge it with mana when you’re facing off against an enemy opponent, and you’ll discharge it to kill demons. But you have to remember who you are fighting. Many of the deaths occur when players forget that their swords have an edge, and they end up killing an enemy opponent. And then, they are killed. For that is the only rule at First Field. If you murder, you are murdered in return.”

  Rynn let out a breath. She looked so scared and uncertain.

  Gray had another question, and it seemed Settie was open to them at this point. She was in such a good mood, and Gray had no idea why. “What if I break a rule without murdering anyone? For instance, I attack someone who doesn’t have the ball.”

  “Very good, precious Gray. Excellent question and one that needs to be stressed. If you break a rule, you are ejected from the game. And then, we would have only four players, which means, we would only have one person at a time who could play offense. How effective would that make us?”

  “Not very.”

  “Agreed.” Settie threw the ball into the air and caught it. “But we understand the rules, there being so few, and we will follow them. The Fieldkeepers will be tracking everyone, and they have powerful sorcery. Best of all, they truly don’t care about the winners and losers. This is to our benefit, since we are not very popular.”

  “That’s an understatement,” Tomi muttered.

  And Gray knew that a large part of that was because of Captain Sette Sevanya herself. Why was she still running squads at First Field? It sounded like she could be doing any number of things. Too bad he couldn’t simply ask her.

  Rynn raised her hand.

  Settie nodded at her. “Nice, I’ll answer one question, but you had better make it a good one. I want us to practice today and not just talk.”

  “Yes, Captain Sevanya, I understand. You mentioned that this is the classic way to play Chaotica. What are some other variations?”

  Again, the dragon woman tossed the ball and caught it. “I just might give you another question, Rynnanatha, for you are right. There is no guarantee that the magistrate won’t do something dastardly. His version of Final Hold was diabolical. And his rules for Sixblood nearly undid us.”

  She paused. “He might not include demons. He might send demons out every time a team scores. He might include invasion rules, which gives each team the ability to send all of their players, once a quarter, into enemy territory. Sometimes, in the fourth quarter, all rules are suspended, especially if the game is close. There was one year where even murder was allowed during the free-for-all, but then, they had a very skilled resurrectionist on the staff then. Now, I don’t believe there is one. It won’t matter because none of you are allowed to die.” She said it as joke. Captain Settie joking? Was the world coming to an end?

  Gray had to ask. “And why are you in such a good mood?”

  Her eyes turned hard. “Are you sure you want to waste a question on that, Grayson Fade?”

  Like he was going to turn tale. “Oh, I’m sure, Captain. I have to satisfy my own curiosity.”

  Was that a grin that flashed across her lips? “Oh, you are in a spicy mood yourself. If you must know, I am thrilled that you broke into the magistrate’s office to retrieve the plans. I applaud your audacity, precious Gray.”

  “It was Tomi, actually. I told her about what I’d seen there, but it was her plan and her agility. I merely acted as a watchdog. I did talk with Crewel for a long time, about First Field, other squads in the past, and found out some interesting things.”

  Again, Settie turned cold. It was like she had a switch inside of her. “The past is the past. Other squads don’t matter. My history doesn’t matter. We are here to win Soulshred Week and then to win the Reckoning after that. It will then give us the clout we need for enchanted items, money from families to fund the Training phase, and then the Hunting phase as well. When I am done, I want Squad 23 to be legendary.”

  “So you can retire?” Gray asked.

  Settie glared at him. “I will never retire. And I will not be sharing my plans…at least not right now.” And then, not only did her stare soften, a smile curved her lips. “If we do as well as I hope, I would like to include you perhaps. If you are worthy.”

  She didn’t look at anyone but Gray.

  He had the distinct idea that she wasn’t much interested in their squad as a whole but was very interested in him and him alone.

  But if that were the case, what about Rynn?

  Gray was even more concerned when after practice, Settie announced that she and Gray would be going into town alone that night.

  And not just into town, but to the Pleasure Market.

  Gray was surprised that Tomi didn’t make a single joke. She probably thought Rynn wouldn’t take it very well, and she would’ve been right.