bigabreads Chapter 124: ARMAND
Chapter 124: ARMAND
CLASSROOM 14 — SOME TIME AFTER THE TEST BEGAN.
Armand was explaining.
Not asking, explaining. The difference mattered to him. Asking implied other people could say no. Explaining was merely a formality before a decision that had already been made.
There were eleven people in the room.
All first-years, all from families with names, all wearing that expression of people who had grown up being told they were special and had come to believe it with absolute conviction.
Armand stood in the center, not on a chair, not leaning against anything. In the center, standing, like an orator or a defendant. The difference depended on who was watching.
Eighteen years old, one year older than most freshmen because he had deliberately repeated the Eldrath admission process. "Not because I failed. Because I wanted to enter in the right year," he would say. Which meant he had one extra year of information about the academy that the others didn’t.
Slightly pale skin, dark hair, light green eyes, the physique of someone who trained but didn’t overdo it. The carefully measured kind of presence that said, I’m dangerous, but I don’t need to look dangerous.
Armand’s family was new to nobility but old in wealth. Three generations of trading magical artifacts before buying their title. His father understood that money could buy doors but not respectability, and had sent his son to Eldrath specifically to buy what money couldn’t reach.
The reputation of someone who made it through merit.
Armand had made it through merit.
That didn’t stop him from using everything else.
"The test is simple," he was saying. "Information, not strength. Six fragments from the same sector, the correct location, and the crystal appears."
"How do we know the correct location?" someone asked.
"We buy it from someone who does," Armand replied. "Or we discover it. Or we follow whoever’s heading there."
A pause.
"But there’s a more efficient variation."
He looked at Dex and Morrow, the two he’d been watching since the meeting began, the two who already knew they would be.
"Someone reaches the location. Reveals the crystal with enough fragments," he said. "And when the crystal appears, you arrive at the same time... or run past, grab it, and leave."
"That’s stealing," Dex said.
"It’s simultaneous presence," Armand corrected. "The rules say points go to whoever is present when the crystal appears. They don’t say anything about arriving first."
"That’s against the spirit of the test."
"The spirit of the test isn’t in the rules."
Dex and Morrow exchanged a glance.
They were the two biggest in the group. Not the smartest. Not the most magically gifted. The two Armand had selected specifically because they were big and didn’t think too much before acting.
"This is going to blow up in our faces," Dex thought.
"Five hundred points per crystal," Morrow thought.
The difference between the two lay in that order of thought.
"And if someone reacts physically?" Dex asked.
"They can’t. Violence means disqualification."
"And if they shove us?"
"If you shove them back, you’ll be disqualified."
A pause.
"If they don’t shove back, grab whatever fragments they drop and leave."
Silence.
"He’s telling us to provoke someone until they hit us, then take whatever falls," Dex realized.
"Five hundred points," Morrow kept thinking.
"One more thing," Armand continued. "The permanent janitor. Did anyone see his poster?"
Two people raised their hands.
"He found something in Sector B," Armand said. "I know because Sector B is the only sector nobody’s contesting, and a permanent janitor doesn’t schedule a meeting there without a reason."
"How do we know it’s the crystal and not just knowledge of the terrain?" someone asked.
"We don’t," Armand admitted. "But if it’s the crystal, I want to know before he reveals it. I’ll send two observers at 2:00 PM."
He looked at the short-haired girl leaning against the wall.
She gave a slight nod.
"That was the plan."
"Information from Sector B through a spy. Forced presence in the other sectors through Dex and Morrow."
"Elegant enough not to look wrong. Aggressive enough to work."
THREE HOURS LATER — SECTOR F
Dex and Morrow had found the right group.
Five students with enough Sector F fragments, guided by an upperclassman who knew the crystal’s location. Walking together, confident, almost there.
Dex and Morrow followed from a distance.
They waited.
When the group reached the location and began placing their fragments on the ground, Dex and Morrow stepped in.
They simply walked in.
They stood in the middle of the group.
Arms crossed.
"Leave," the upperclassman said.
"We’re here," Dex replied.
"You don’t have fragments from this sector."
"The rules don’t require fragments to be present."
The upperclassman looked at the two of them, each outweighing and towering over her by nearly fifty pounds and eight inches.
Then she looked at the students in her group.
Then at the fragments on the floor.
"If I pick the fragments back up, the crystal won’t appear and I lose everything I invested today."
"If I leave them there and continue, they’ll get part of the points."
"If I react physically..."
One of the students shoved Morrow.
Not hard.
Not violently.
Just the impulsive anger of someone who had spent the entire day working for this and refused to lose it.
Morrow shoved him back.
The student fell.
The coin displayed a notification:
[RULE VIOLATION]
◊ Name: Morrow
◊ Violation: Aggressive physical contact during test
◊ Penalty: IMMEDIATE DISQUALIFICATION
◊ All user fragments: DROPPED
Dex saw the notification.
He looked at Morrow’s fragments falling onto the floor.
He grabbed the Sector B fragments that had dropped.
Then ran before the system could process whether he had also been involved.
The student who had shoved him remained on the ground, staring at everything.
[RULE VIOLATION]
◊ Name: (Student)
◊ Violation: Aggressive physical contact during test
◊ Penalty: IMMEDIATE DISQUALIFICATION
◊ All user fragments: DROPPED
Two disqualified.
The Sector F crystal revealed itself without them.
The group continued with four people.
The points were divided among four.
Morrow stood frozen in the hallway.
"I’ve been disqualified. Armand is going to..."
He never finished the thought.
GENIUS — SAME TIME
Genius was in the library.
Not looking for fragments.
Not negotiating.
Calculating the complete map based on observed movement, who had gone where, how long it had taken, and how traffic density by sector created a probabilistic model of the crystals’ locations.
He had mapped four sectors with ninety percent confidence.
The fifth was the problem.
No one was going to Underground Two.
No data.
No useful observations.
Sector G was invisible in the movement pattern.
"Either there’s no crystal there."
"Or there’s a crystal no one has discovered yet."
"The second possibility is more interesting."
He was tracing a route across his mental map when someone sat across from him without asking.
Genius didn’t look up from the paper.
"There are eight empty chairs at this table," he said.
"I prefer this one."
The voice belonged to a teenager.
Confident in the wrong way—not the confidence that comes from ability, but the confidence of someone who had never been contradicted by consequences.
Genius looked up.
Armand.
Genius didn’t know his name yet.
He only saw: eighteen years old, money woven into the quality of his academy uniform, eyes that evaluated before a single word left his mouth.
"He came with a purpose."
"Genius Genials," Armand said, not asking, confirming.
"Yes."
"From House Genials."
"Also yes."
"Your father is sick," he said. "Gravely, from what I hear."
Genius stopped writing.
"He isn’t," he thought. "But this guy thinks he is because in the original game, Genius Genials falls ill around this time."
"So either he’s a Gamer who recognized the character."
"Or he got information from a source he never bothered to verify."
"My father is doing fine," Genius said.
Armand stared at him.
"He expected me to confirm it," Genius realized. "He was going to use it as leverage somehow."
"Without leverage, he’ll try another angle."
"You’re the youngest student to install what you called... ’electricity’ in a building of this class," Armand shifted topics. "Anonymously, but people find these things out."
"People talk too much," Genius agreed.
"Or listen too little."
A pause.
"I want to make a deal."
"I don’t have fragments from your sector."
"I don’t want fragments," Armand said. "I want a partnership. You calculate where the crystals are. I have the resources to get there first."
Genius looked at him.
"He’s proposing that I work for him."
"Not a partnership. A service. He provides muscle, I provide intelligence, he controls when and how we use both."
"And he’ll probably keep most of the points because ’resources’ usually mean the structure belongs to whoever paid for it."
"No," Genius said.
He went back to writing.
Armand remained seated.
Genius waited for him to speak again.
Armand stayed silent for ten seconds, the kind of silence that came from someone who wasn’t used to hearing no and was still processing it.
"You know who my family is," he finally said.
"I do."
"And even so."
"And even so."
Armand stood up.
He straightened his clothes, an unnecessary gesture, simply giving his hands something to do.
"You’re going to need someone like me sooner than you think," he said.
"Maybe."
"And when you do..."
"I’ll handle it myself," Genius interrupted. "Like I do with everything."
Armand left.
Genius returned to his calculations.
"Enemy successfully created...."