“You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy,” Luke said as his eyes got used to the dark of the Undercity.

  “What? No. This is the Undercity. It’s the playground of the rich and aristocrats. There are no villains here,” their guide said, slightly offended.

  Luke wanted to clap back about them being the same thing, but that probably wouldn’t go over well. “No, sorry, that was a quote from a play. I was trying to be silly. Don’t worry about it.”

  The guide sniffed and looked up at Luke’s mech towering over him. “Well, see that you keep your jokes to yourself. There are many here that would be offended if you were to say something like that to them. Come, follow me.”

  Bosa and Luke followed the snooty orc into the catwalks of the Undercity. They were walking a few stories below the city streets, but still well above the ground. Enormous pillars were holding up the city, which looked like it had been dug out of the bedrock, not built up. The entire area was in the shade with minimal light bouncing in from the edges. All along the stone roof were thick tendrils of bioluminescent lichen. Catwalks formed a network of aerial pathways several stories above the ground.

  Their guide quickly escorted them from the southern edge of the city towards the middle. They passed over forests of flowering ferns and hills of moss, which transitioned into mushrooms and lichen the farther they went from the sun. The mushrooms grew taller and taller the farther they walked, until they reached thirty or forty feet tall. Some had wide caps and thin trunks, others the reverse. The musty smell they gave off grew more earthy and damp as they walked on.

  Now that Luke’s eyes had adjusted, he could see what he had been hearing all along. There were a lot of monsters below. Way more than normal. Instead of a monster or two every square mile, there were a dozen every few hundred feet. In one place it looked like the floor was moving because the troop of Crab Apes were so dense. In another, a flock of Lightning Bats were turning a mushroom tree into a Christmas one.

  “Those crowds of monsters are half the reason the Undercity is restricted. Nowhere else on Kalibutan are they as abundant. Mother Kalibutan spawns them all across the outer edges. They fight amongst their own and the strongest survivors make their way towards the center, where we are heading. Fascinating, isn’t it? The Church teaches us that we are blessed, the very world itself gifts our nobility with strength.”

  Luke nodded, but figured the truth was just the opposite. His Memory stat brought back the conversation he had with Seer Theobaldine. The planet was alive and using magic to autonomously create monsters as part of its lifecycle. It was their blood or immune system or something. Maybe the monsters were so dense here because the world didn’t like a densely populated city. It was like a zit, a blemish on the face of the planet.

  “I can’t help but think that even if you survived the fall from the catwalk, you wouldn’t last long,” Bosa said as she looked down.

  The guide scowled at her. That was the reaction that most people had to Bosa since they left the apartment. It had taken a bit to track down the process to get to the undercity. The whole time, Bosa had been ignored, insulted, and bullied. A cyclops had even spat at her.

  The whole process only solidified Luke’s desire to get Bosa back to a normal amount of glory. And the fastest way to do that would be in the undercity, competing in one of the arenas. The best option would be winning a tournament and there were two happening today. Their guide had already warned them that they were unlikely to accept her this late. Normally contestants signed up a week or two in advance.

  A more realistic way to gather glory would be to run one of the gauntlets. The monsters that survived the free for all that was the outer rim were funneled into one of six different cave systems. When someone wanted to run the gauntlet, the monsters were let loose into a narrow canyon and the contestant had to attempt to get from one end to another.

  The majority of the people running the gauntlet used a mix of stealth and speed to make it through. If they failed, there were attendants that would attempt to rescue you. But they couldn’t always get there on time and a few people died every month.

  Luke decided he was going to use a different strategy. He wanted to see how far he could get with overwhelming offensive power before he was forced to switch to running to make it the rest of the way through.

  The snooty orc stopped in front of one of the central pillars and said to Luke, “I take my duties as a guide seriously. Although I do not believe your domestic deserves to be here, I will fight for her. The best chance for her to be accepted is for you to enter with her in the Doubles Tournament at the Obayangbon Arena. Your higher standing in society might convince them to overlook her failings.”

  Luke bit his lip. He was getting real sick of these jerks assuming they knew something about Bosa just because their glory sense told them something. Did this society hate anyone that went to court? She had been on the winning side, she should have gotten extra glory for that. He shook his head. This was dumb, but there was a solution. He just had to pay the exorbitant entrance fee and hope that they won. Because if she lost, she would be banned from the Undercity for a month. She would have to earn back her glory the slow way, by sewing an amazing robe or something. Maybe a cool cape.

  “Fine, we’ll enter the Doubles Tournament. I just hope we win because I would hate to get my armor all scratched up for a loss,” Luke said.

  Bosa slashed her hands down, “Please don’t risk your life for me, Master. I can run a gauntlet instead.”

  “No, you lost your... You were defending me. It’s only fair that I make you whole. Come on, let’s go.”

  The guide gave them both a look and wiggled his hands in assent. “Good. Luke of Machines, I recommend you do all the talking and have your money ready. Maybe underpay slightly. Letting the attendant make up the difference in the entrance fee will put them in your debt.”

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  Luke smiled when he realized the guide was suggesting the opposite of a bribe. By underpaying, he was giving the attendant the chance to gather glory by making up the rest of the fee. “Alright, I can do that. Lead the way.”

  The orc spun on his heel and led them around the thick pillar. They finally caught sight of their destination. It was an enormous arena, reminiscent of the colosseum at Parthenon. It was a stone arena four stories tall. The stone was white with green flakes that sparkled in the dim light. It was constructed out of large blocks set on an angle so they were in a diamond shape. Instead of mortar, silvery metal had been melted into the cracks and gave the impression that the whole building was wrapped in the world’s most expensive chain link fence. The top level’s roof was even with the catwalk, so the guide led them right onto the top of the arena and down a single set of stairs. A dwarven guard nodded to them and motioned them to an attendant nearby.

  A young elfish woman in tight fitting silvery clothes sat behind a low metal desk and smiled at them as they walked up. “Welcome to the Obayangbon Combat Complex. We are the third best arena in all of Kalibutan. What adventures do you have planned today?”

  Luke popped open his visor and stepped forward. “We’d like to enter into the Doubles Tournament for today. What is the entrance fee?”

  She gave the three of them a once over and said, “Well, the fee is twelve whites, but there may be a few obstacles we would have to overcome in order to get you entered.” Luke pulled out eleven tier one monster cores and placed them on the indent in the middle of the table while she continued to talk. “The tournament is for those below the fifth threshold. Are you both below level thirty-six?” When he said yes, she continued, “There is only one spot free for today’s Doubles Tournament and there are two other entrances. If one of my colleagues admitted someone just now, you could pay and still not get in.”

  “I think we’ll risk it. Can you please enter us into the competition?"

  “Perhaps. There are limits to how much armor you can wear, it must fit through a fairly narrow door. Your armor is too bulky to compete. Are you able to fight without it?”

  “I can. Luke of Machines and Bosa of Domestic. If you could help us out, I would be most grateful. It would be both of our first arena fights.”

  She looked at him and gave Bosa a small frown. Her eyes slid over to their guide. She clearly thought he was going to compete with the guide. Luke didn’t correct her.

  Eventually she came to a decision and swept the cores into a bag at her side. “I will help you. I can cover the rest of your fee and help you enter the bracket. We’ll put you in as Luke and Bosa, no one lists their full title so your competition has no hints about your class. Come on. The Tournament doesn’t start for hours, but we need to register before anyone else gets to it. You are actually lucky that no one else has snatched up the final spot. Usually they are gone days in advance. Everyone wants singular glory with the Shuffle coming up so soon.”

  Her steps faltered as she realized Luke and Bosa were following her and the orc guide was staying behind. Luke gave her a guileless smile and motioned for her to continue. She frowned and realized she had been played. It would be worse for her to change her mind now, so she continued.

  The process of signing up was fairly boring and strongly reminded him of a similar experience on Earth. Bureaucracy was the same regardless of the world. Luke didn’t want to reveal his exact level, but the Seer they had on staff blurted it out anyway. They used that information to make the fights sort of fair. At least for the first few rounds. Once the registration was done, she stuck Luke and Bosa into a locker room and told them to wait there until the Tournament started in three hours. Luke suspected that the other contestants didn’t get locked up like this, but the attendant was getting back at them for tricking her.

  At least the room was nice. It was made of white quartz with gold inlays, an ornate but understated design. There were lockers all along the outer edge of the room, and several comfortable chairs of different sizes. It also had privacy runes so they could speak freely. They discussed tactics at first, but eventually moved on to other topics.

  “Thanks for doing this, by the way. You didn’t have to risk your life for me, just so I can feel better sooner.”

  Luke shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. You’re a friend. Besides, I want to help your mission. You won’t be able to do any spy work the way you are now.” Without glory, she couldn’t get into any of the places she needed to investigate.

  “Thanks again. I wouldn’t say I’m a true believer, but I do want to accomplish my mission.” She leaned back and adjusted the armor Luke had bought her earlier in the day. The armorer hadn’t wanted to sell them something that actually fit.

  Luke was much more comfortable, his inner set of armor was well padded. “How did you get into this if you weren’t a true believer? I know you said you were only in it for the sexy body, but why did they trust you with it and the mission?”

  “I kind of fell into it. It’s like most things in life, right place, right time. I was in college and got a chance to study overseas in Taiwan. My thesis was on American-Taiwan relations and in particular how tariffs affect trade. My host family actually had some good connections and they got me an interview with the Chief Trade Officer, John Chen-Chung Deng. It made my paper super popular. The next year, the CIA approached me and offered me a job because they had read my thesis.

  “I accepted and did a few years of political analysis, just writing papers for the upper management to ignore. Right after the invasion, I wrote another paper on elvish mentality. It was kind of a fangirl thing, I’m super into Lord of the Rings. The paper was mostly about the few things we knew that were different about Thenubians and fantasy elves. When I did my update a few years later, boom, got the job offer and potion.”

  “That’s so wild. The trajectory of your life, your very body, hinged on who your host family knew.”

  She nodded. “I feel a little guilty about it sometimes. Maybe there was someone out there who deserved it more, but they just didn’t have the connections. The only thing I can do to honor them is to live my life the best that I can.”

  A short while later, there was a knock on the door. An elvish page opened the door and said, “Two minutes to showtime. You are the first ones on the docket, up against another new team that calls themselves the Hammer and Anvil. Try not to lose in the first minute, give us at least a bit of a show, please.”

  Luke stood and grabbed his chainsword. “We’ll give you a show, assuming they last long enough.”

  The page rolled his eyes. He led them out of the locker room and through the arena to the combat stage. It was a three hundred feet wide stage that hovered in the middle of the arena. It had a metal floor with numerous hexagonal pillars and low walls to provide some cover. They had to slide through a narrow doorway to enter the stage. It was actually kind of brilliant on the part of the elves. Orcs would struggle to get through wearing any armor at all, while elves could wear fairly bulky armor and still be fine.

  Their competition was already on the metal floor, gesturing and posing for the crowd. Hundreds of people filled the stands, shouting for a local favorite. One was a dwarf, wearing thick metal armor, two shields, and glowing gold boots. The other was an elf, with equally heavy armor and a maul that was almost as big as he was. He twirled it around as if it weighed nothing and did tricks with it before dropping it to the floor with a deep clang. He turned and stared at Luke and Bosa, giving them the evil eye.

  Luke stared right back. He had a feeling that he could beat them without even revealing his class. Regardless, he was going to take each fight seriously. He lowered his stance and got ready to run.