The atmosphere in the hall was tense. Not quite as tense as a piano wire, but closer to a suspension bridge cable. The kind that wasn't likely to snap, but when it did, all hell would break loose. We locked eyes with Josh for several seconds, until I inhaled deeply, straightened my back... and dropped my shoulders with a groan

"Oh, come on, man! Don't do this to me!" My earnest plea fell on deaf ears, so I did my best to regain my momentum by asking, "Can you even tell me why you want to have a tournament?"

"Why don't you?" my friend shot back with a single brow raised high.

"Because it's a tournament!"

"That's still not an answer," Josh stubbornly stood his ground, and we would've probably continued to stare daggers at each other if not for my Snowy meekly raising her hand.

"I... don't really understand why it’s a bad thing either."

"Same here," Angie echoed her sentiment with a huff.

"Can you explain?" Ammy piled on, one hand already at her temple and tweaking her glasses.

With the front row arrayed against me like that, I had to admit I was stumped for a moment.

"It’s because... How should I put this...?"

"Do you even have an answer to that?" my dear, if currently just a touch trying, assistant whispered to me, and I sent her a disapproving frown in return.

"Hush, Dormouse. Let me think," I whispered back, and after successfully collecting my thoughts, more or less, I explained, "Listen, tournaments are just bad news, okay? They are long, drawn-out affairs that are entirely predictable and bring things to a halt."

"Bring what to a halt again?" Angie pressed me, drawing a shrug out of me.

"Everything."

This time nobody responded, but the funny looks they were giving me felt a little prickly. It was at this point that Judy grabbed my hand and tugged on it to get my attention.

"Give it up, Chief. If you keep going like this, everyone will to realize your aversion to tournaments is irrational."

"No, it’s not," I denied flatly, but my girlfriend squeezed my hand harder.

"Then can you logically explain everyone why we should avoid this one?"

I exhaled through my nose and leaned down to whisper, "I can’t, because it’s a meta thing."

"Then can you explain it to me?" When I didn’t respond, she stressed, "I’m in the know, so you should be able to tell me."

"It’s just a cliché, okay?" I responded just a touch indignantly. "It’s a dead horse of a lazy plot-device that temporarily stops the main plot. It's what writers do when they want to showcase a bunch of characters and their abilities without any of the legwork of creating a scenario where it would happen organically, and most of the time it ends up as just cheap filler that nobody really cares about."

"How is that applicable to our situation?"

"What do you mean? It is a tournament arc. It's just going to be an absolutely mind-numbing series of battles mostly featuring newly introduced Draconians, and it's guaranteed to drag on forever. I mean, who in their right mind would want to see a bunch of one-note people they don't even really know just fight, fight, and fight for who knows how long, without any stakes?"

"Then don’t watch them."

I was about to press on, but then her response registered with me and my response turned into a baffled, "Excuse me?"

"I said, 'then don't watch them'. While it's certainly a trope, we aren't a passive audience. Nobody is forcing us to view the fights. What's stopping us from just ignoring them altogether?"

"That’s... erm... I mean..."

While I was definitely on the cusp of coming up with an elegant, all-encompassing, and completely foolproof response to her words, Josh ran out of patience and interrupted our hushed discussion.

"You know, back when Robatto over there kept ambushing us with the Sprockets, you told us not to worry about it and just use them as an opportunity to train and prepare for more serious threats. You said it was good for us, because it was real combat, but without any serious danger.  How is this tournament any different?"

"That’s right" Penny joined the fray by standing up and pointing at Josh. "This guy might be annoying, clueless, and a bit of a dimwit, but he hit the nail right on the head this time!"

"Stop undermining my point with your approval." Josh glared at her, and then faced me again. "We’ve been training for like two and a half months by now. Isn’t a sanctioned tournament like that the best opportunity to see how much we've improved? It's not only a great learning experience, but there are even rewards!"

"Yeah! One million Jens!" Angie exclaimed. "That might not be a big deal for you, but it's huge for us lowly commoners!"

I ignored the friendly neighborhood Celestial's complaints and mulled Josh's point over in my head. I really wanted to deny his words, but after weighing the pros and cons, I ultimately couldn’t. Judy also seemed to be on the other side of the fence about the topic… and so did practically everyone else, now that I thought about it. Was I the weird one? Was I really the only one who saw this as an unsavory development?

"Okay, I admit, you’re not wrong, at least on a technical level, b—"

"Then let’s do this!" Josh exclaimed with a satisfied hum, and my hand rose to massage my temple on its own.

"Why the heck are you so fired up anyway? Are you really that desperate for the reward money?" I griped, and my friend froze up like I just poured cold water on him and hastily averted his eyes.

"No. I mean, yeah, that kind of money would be life-changing, but my life changed quite enough lately, and… I have other reasons."

I waited for him to elaborate, but apparently he didn’t plan to, as he kept avoiding my gaze. My eyes skimmed over the rest of the crowd next, and to my mild dismay, I found that more or less everyone shared Josh’s enthusiasm for the competition. On one hand, I knew that I should’ve been happy that our resident protagonist finally asserted himself, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little peeved by the moment he chose to do so.

Was it the Narrative again? Was it making everyone excited at the prospect of a tournament just to spite me? Or maybe it went even deeper than that? Maybe the tournament was more pivotal to the so-called Plot than I originally imagined? But then again, considering half of our group consisted of knights, ninjas, and a magically engineered race of warriors, maybe it was just them itching for a fight. Or maybe everyone was just out to get me, and the only way to prove I wasn't paranoid was by burning the whole world down?

…

Nah, it was probably either the Narrative or that Watsonian explanation. One or the other.

"Just give up, Chief," Judy advised me, and I couldn’t help but sigh.

"Fine. You win," I admitted just a touch morosely. "You can have your tournament."

"Yes!" Josh cried out, but fell silent again when I held out a palm at him.

"However, let’s be clear on a few things. I won’t participate. I won’t bail you out if you get over your head. I won’t watch the matches, I won’t listen to them, I don’t even want to hear anything about them unless absolutely necessary. Do you copy?"

"Um... Yeah, I got it," Josh replied a tad uncertainly, but then all of a sudden Judy grabbed the reins.

"In that case, I believe it’s time to discuss who will to participate."

"Do we have to?" I objected, but the annoyed glance Judy was giving me made me roll my eyes and add, "Fine, do whatever you want. I’ll be over here, wondering about where everything went wrong."

I was summarily ignored by my dear assistant. She cleared her throat and gestured for Galatea, and the projected image on the whiteboard changed into a different set of brackets divided into two parts.

"I'm now going to explain how the double elimination tournament is going to be structured." She used her laser pointed to highlight the upper brackets and continued, "Since every Draconian family, plus the local School, will have two slots, the number of contestants will be even. The first round of matches will be decided by drawing lots. The winners move onto the next bracket, while the losers enter the second branch. For the sake of simplicity, let's call these the upper and lower branches. During each round, winners in the upper branch progress to the next round, while losers move to the lower branch. Winners in the lower branch progress to the next round, while losers get eliminated. Are we clear so far?"

The majority of the audience nodded, which was apparently satisfactory enough.

"Since the Dracis family can nominate two contestants, one of them is obviously going to be Elly. As for the other, I propose we nominate Penelope."

"Excuse me?" I blurted out in surprise, and Judy emphatically nodded.

"Since our ultimate goal during the conference is to convince the Draconian families that it’s possible to work together with the Brotherhood of Most Heroic Bloodlines, having Penelope participate would serve as great advertisement for the cause. I believe you also mentioned that her Uniformer will be complete in a few days."

It took me a long moment to realize she was talking to me.

"Yeah, but it will be prototype version 0.9 at best. I still have a hard time replicating the physical enhancement arrays without the whole enchantment collapsing in on itself."

"Is it going to be usable?"

"Sure, but even if I jury-rig it, it’ll be at fifty percent of her original gear's effectiveness at most."

Judy turned a questioning gaze at my newer sister, and she declared, "I can work with that!"

"Good. I already floated the idea to Emese yesterday, and she said she’ll convince Abram. I believe that covers the Dracis family’s participants. Now, let me explain the third party contestants."

She aimed her pointer at the bottom brackets and told everyone, "For a double-elimination tournament to work seamlessly, the number of participant should ideally be a number to the power of two. That way, each round has an even number of contestants, and the brackets are ordered cleanly like this. However, since that’s not likely this time, grand elder Xinji proposed the following: third party participants can enter the tournament through a referral process, but they do so by filling out the ranks in the lower branch. In practice, it means that for them, this would be functionally a single elimination tournament. The question is this: who’s going to participate this way?"

"I guess that’s my ticket," Josh said and raised a hand. "Who else is coming?"

"I will," Ammy raised her hand, throwing me on a loop.

"Come again?"

"Grandfather said the School isn’t going to participate, so I have to enter as a third party competitor."

"That wasn’t why I was asking," I pointed out, but my comment was lost in the cackling of a certain mad scientist.

"Kihihi! You hear that, Galatea! One million Jens! Imagine all the new equipment we could buy! Imagine all the rare materials we could purchase!" Seeing that his android assistant/daughter/whatever remained completely unmotivated, Fred exhaled a sharp sigh and wearily added, "Imagine all the exotic fish you could get then."

Galatea’s eyes lit up at once.

"Imagination in progress. Forty-seven percent, seventy-nine percent, one hundred—" She paused and clenched her fists. "Master, I request authorization to participate in the tournament."

Fred responded with a simple ‘granted’, though with much less enthusiasm than before.

"Kin we an' a' participate?" came the next question from the big oaf in the back, and I categorically denied him.

"No way. I’ll have enough trouble getting Penny’s Uniformer working, I won’t have time to finish yours too."

Mr. Minotaur let out a displeased ‘Bah!’, and my sister gently patted his shoulder.

"Don’t worry, Duncan. There’s always a next time."

"No, there won’t be if I can help it," I griped under my breath, and Judy gently nudged me with her elbow.

"Hush, Chief. Stop being a party pooper."

"Watch your language, young lady. Also, I maintain my constitutional right to be miffed by this entire situation."

My dear assistant rolled her eyes, and completely disregarded me in favor of addressing the crowd again.

"Does anyone else want to participate? Rinne?"

Mountain Girl in the back twitched in surprise when she was directly addressed, but quickly shook her head.

"No. If Leonard-dono does not wish to take part in the contest, Rinne must follow his example and also decline."

"You really don’t have to be so considerate of the Chief."

"That’s right!" Angie cut in with a knowing smirk. "He might play tough, but Leo is a big softy. If you tell him you want to join, he’ll groan and moan about it, but he won’t stop you. I guarantee it."

"Hey!"

My protest was completely ignored, as everyone was focusing on Rinne’s reaction. She glanced left and right like a startled cat, and after her eyes settled on me, she straightened her back and declared, "Thank you for your encouragement, but Rinne still doesn’t wish to compete."

"Well, I don’t mind," Josh noted with a shrug. "One less adversary to worry about."

"Aw. I really wanted to see her fight for real," Penny complained in the company of an exaggerated sigh, but she bounced back and turned to the front row. "Hey, Snowy? What about you?"

My other sister jolted in surprise, and so did I. I mean, since when did Penny start calling her Snowy? Granted, they were in the same class, and had plenty of opportunities to socialize, but the informality still struck me as an odd development, though not necessaries an unwelcome one. Sisters getting along with each other was a good thing, after all.

In any case, my Abyssal sister waved her hands around in a panic and exclaimed, "No-No-No! I don’t like fighting!"

Ah, thank goodness. A rare island of rationality in this sea of annoyance. After making a mental note to give her a whole apple pie later, I cleared my throat and backed her up.

"You’ve heard her. That’s a about as clear as a no can get."

"Aw. I really wanted to see her fight for real too," my other sister echoed her previous complaints word for word, but as far as the others were concerned, they seemed more relieved than anything else.

"Good. I mean, if Lili participated, things would’ve been a little unfair."

"Right. It’s best to at least keep up the appearances of a fair competition," Angie followed up Josh’s comment with a big nod, and Ammy also huffed in agreement.

"I’m also not sure how well the Feilongs would’ve taken if we tried to enter an Abyssal Lord into the competition," the princess added, and when everyone gave her odd looks, she hastily defended herself. "I-I mean, she is! Maybe not in name, but definitely in that league!"

"So she couldn’t have entered the tournament even if she wanted to?" Penny muttered in disappointment, and even my other sister started awkwardly fidgeting in her seat.

"Snowy?" I spoke up a touch forcefully, suppressing the commotion without really meaning to in the process. "For the record, I want you to know that so long as I’m around, no one could stop you from participating." I noticed that Judy was giving me a ‘I don’t get it. Why are you encouraging her now?’ kind of look, to which I responded with a ‘I’m doing a big brotherly thing here’ kind of eyebrow before concluding my declaration with, "Conversely, if you don’t want to do something, just remember that there’s nobody on, under, or above this island that could try to force you to, and get away with it."

"I... Thank you, big brother."

Snowy flashed me an immensely satisfying smile, and even though I was a little worried my other sister would get jealous, she was giving me a thumb up instead. So did the princess, now that I glanced at her. Those two were on the same wavelength at the weirdest of times.

"Anyone else?" Judy asked, probably out of courtesy and, to my dread and trepidation, Karukk raised his hand. He probably noticed my mood, as he tried to back down, but by this point the others also followed my line of sight to him, and he had no choice but to come forth.

"Asking for sure. We can’t fight. Can we?"

"I sincerely doubt it," I told him flatly, but before I could move the conversation along to get this whole topic over with, Penny, let out a loud ‘Ah!’ and snapped her fingers.

"Brother! I have a great idea!" I had sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, but it wasn’t like I could just ignore her at this stage, so I took a deep breath and, against my better judgment, I gestured for her to speak up. "Why don’t we have a tournament too?"

"... What?" I let slip, but the excited girl continued on without paying me much attention.

"That way we could have us, the Fauns, and Rinne, and even Snowy compete! We can use the training arena here!"

"Now wait just a—"

"Question!" Josh cut me short while raising his hand high into the air. "Can someone competing in the Draconian tournament also do it in our internal tournament as well?"

"I don’t know..." Penny responded with a frown, then glanced at me. "Brother? What do you think?"

"You..." After forcefully swallowing down my initial response, I took several measured breaths, and ultimately settled on. "You can do whatever you want. You can organize it however you want. In fact, you can do anything you want."

"Really?"

My sister’s eyes lit up in excitement, so I raised a palm and emphatically stated, "However, there are a few rules."

"I’m listening!"

I wanted to make the first rule ‘Stop being excited!’, but thought better of it, and instead settled on, "First, I’m not getting involved. Second, don’t even try to get me involved. Third, do it when I’m not around, so I don’t even have to see it."

"O... kay?" Penny agreed a touch hesitantly, so I nodded and gestured for Judy to take the limelight again, and she did so after giving me another sideways glance.

"Let’s return to the topic of the Draconian tournament then. In conclusion, Elly and Penelope will be entering in the upper branch, while Joshua, Amelia, and Galatea will enter as sponsored third-party contestants in the lower branch."

"I guess that Zihao guy is going in the upper part, huh?" Josh mused with a determined expression, but then it crumbled when his childhood friend poked him in the side with a finger.

"Why do you keep asking about him?"

Josh appeared stumped for a moment, but then he gruffly crossed his arms and declared, "No reason. I just wanted to make sure I understood the rules."

He didn't say anything else, stoically bearing Angie's pokes, and when no one else spoke up either, Judy closed the meeting.

"The topic of the internal competition will be discussed next time, once Penelope tallied up the participants and decided on the time and venue."

"I'm on it!" our appointed tournament-organizer exclaimed with boundless enthusiasm.

"As for the main event, we'll discuss our preparations on an individual basis. Does anyone have any comments or recommendations?"

Since the hall remained silent, the gathering was officially brought to a close, the lights came back on, the projector disappeared into whatever trap-door it was hidden behind on the ceiling, and I pulled Judy off to the side. Nobody followed us, since the core of our group was too busy with discussing their plans for the tournaments, so I drew her assistant out of sight, and once I was sure nobody could hear us, I let out the mother of all groans.

"You see, Dormouse? That’s what I was talking about. Tournaments are like cockroaches. You let one get away, and before you know it, they are everywhere!"

"You complain, Chief, but we both knew this one was inevitable," she told me flatly, but then after some pondering she added, "Or rather, the first one was inevitable. The internal one was up to you, and you agreed."

"I didn’t agree," I fumed. "I was backed into a corner, my big brotherly character exploited, and left without any choice in the matter. That’s not agreement."

My dear assistant looked entirely unconvinced.

"So what are you going to do? Are you going to sabotage the tournament arc anyway?"

"I can't," I admitted in defeat. "I mean, technically, I could. I came here with this whole plan at the ready. It had all kinds of sneaking around and clandestine sabotage operations and just a hint of Bel of the Abyss, but at this point it would do more harm than good."

"I agree. The presence of the tournament arc confirms that the information you gathered during your out-of-body experience is reliable. If you sabotaged the tournament, it could tip the people running the Simulacrum off about a leak, and we can't risk that over something this silly."

"What? No, that's not what I'm talking about," I denied on the spot. "I mean, sure, it's a valid concern in principle, but those star-people and their plans can go to hell for all I care. The reason I can't do anything about the tournament arc is because of Josh."

Judy remained silent for a while, and I could practically see her connect the dots in real time before she let out a thoughtful hum.

"You're right. His behavior was very peculiar. Do you think he's being influenced by the Narrative?"

"I'll be damned if I know, but in any case, this was the first time since forever that he stood up to me and took initiative on his own. The fact that he did it over a bloody tournament of all things is mildly infuriating, but it's still a step in the right direction for him to reassert himself as a protagonist."

"That explains the main event. What about our internal tournament then?"

"I told you already; I was backed into a corner there. I couldn't let Penny down. Plus the Fauns. And Rinne looked pretty interested too, even though she tried to hide it. In fact, why the heck is everyone so hyped about tournaments anyway?"

Judy let out a soft chuckle, a rare even in and of itself, and told me, "Admit it, Chief. Even you're at least a little interested, and just went ballistic on principle because you think it's a cliché."

"I don't think it's a cliché, it is. It's also boring, gratuitous, and completely predictable." I stressed, but she remained visibly unconvinced, so I muttered an exasperated 'Fine,' under my breath and held out my hand. "Can I borrow your notebook for a second?"

Even though she always used her phone, Judy still had her old-timey spiral pocket notebook on her, just in case, and she handed it over to me without any hesitation.

"What do you need it for?"

"To prove my point," I answered as I flipped to the last page and used the attached pen to jot down a couple of lines. After I finished, I closed the notebook and handed it back to Judy with the words, "Don't look up what I wrote until the end of the tournament."

"Is that a challenge?" she inquired with an unusually amused voice. "I'll take it."

"Just don't be surprised when it proves once and for all that tournament arcs are the worst, most useless thing ever invented since the air-conditioned motorcycle."

"Yes Chief, I'm already aware of you dislike of the trope. There's no need to repeat yourself," Judy complained while she put the notebook away, but then she looked me in the eye and said, "Just bear with it for now, and then we'll engineer a different arc after it."

"Engineer?" I repeated after her. "Do you have something planned?"

"Since it's still in the middle of winter, going to the beach is out of the picture, but we looked into things with Elly, and we think a hot springs episode should be doable."

"Oh, come on. That's such a fanservice-magnet cliché," I grumbled, but then I mulled it over a bit. "That said, on second thought, spending a few days away from the usual suspects and relaxing in a hot bath under the stars might not be so bad."

"… You just imagined the three of us together in a mixed bath, didn't you?"

"No, and even if I did, you can't prove it," I told her flatly, and my dearest assistant slowly shook her head with just a hint of a smile and grabbed hold of my arm.

"Come on, let's go back before the others think something's wrong."

While I would've liked to point out that there's plenty of wrong with the current developments already, I didn't want to appear too obnoxious about this, and obediently followed my girlfriend's lead. And for the record, no, I definitely didn't wonder whether Timaeus's hot springs even have mixed gender bathing options. Not at all.