Haneve's biggest Elemental Café hummed with energy, as usual. A handful of customers lounged in the main area, some watching the screens mounted on the walls displaying users' VR sessions (streaming was allowed for those who wanted to), while others sipped their drinks.
I headed straight for the counter where a woman was tapping at a tablet.
"Room three is available," she said before I could speak, sliding a key card across the counter. "Thirty minutes, usual rate."
I paid and picked up the card and the slick VR headset. Some of the staff occasionally recognized me from my frequent visits. I guess she did too, since she knew which room I wanted.
Room three was lit in a high-tech glow, with soft lo-fi playing in the background. It was big enough to simulate combat but compact enough that the headset didn't need constant recalibrating. Blue neon cut across mirrored walls beneath a ceiling that looked like a dark night sky.
I locked the door behind me and put on the VR glasses.
"Okay," I told Penguin, still wrapped around my wrist. "This is where people pretend to have Elemental powers. While I have the VR set on, you won't be able to see what I'm seeing, so don't get alarmed by all the running around. We're perfectly safe. And please, no Elemental Magic in here."
No reply from Penguin except for a faint blink. I just hoped he'd got what I meant.
I turned the VR headset on.
The café's logo flashed up, then melted away into a grid of neon lines.
I grabbed the controllers and scrolled until I found the game I wanted: Elemental Stage.
As always, I checked the global leaderboard before starting—and froze.
My name—or rather my username, OffPeakGod—had been bumped from third to fourth place. Some player called yeetgeometry had edged me out by exactly two points.
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🏆 Current Rankings:
#1 PrismDiver: 710,948
#2 EarthQuack: 407,415
#3 yeetgeometry: 202,809
#4 OffPeakGod: 202,807
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Two. Points.
Well, this wouldn't do. I scrolled through this user's stats. His clear time was decent, but his combos were definitely worse than mine.
I selected the last stage I'd got to—2247—and dropped into the arena.
The fictional monster materialized with a roar, ready to fight. I immediately rolled to the right.
Though the potion had helped, my muscles still ached from the real fight against the Hydra. However, this was now a matter of principle.
The VR room felt warmer as I ducked, rolled, and landed combos.
Finally, with the last hit, my score went up by 90 points and I got back in 3rd place. Ha!
I was still celebrating when I noticed that yeetgeometry was online too. His score jumped up another 93 points.
"Are you serious?" I hissed, wiping sweat from my forehead. "Who even are you?"
By my eighth attempt, I'd shed my hoodie, kicking it into the corner and thinking that if I chained the Earth-Water combo into a ground pound, I'd get at least a 1.5 multiplier—maybe higher.
I finally pulled ahead: 203,623 to 203,619. Yes!
Victory lasted exactly thirty-five seconds before yeetgeometry responded with a jump to 203,630.
Seriously?!
"Right. That's it. I'm getting my spot back if it kills me."
I paid to extend my room usage through the in-headset menu and gritted my teeth before launching the next stage.
Penguin's watch face was now blinking rapidly in what I could only interpret as alarm.
"Don't worry," I told him, launching another attempt. "I've almost got this jerk."
The stage loaded. I skipped the cutscene and went straight in.
With a clean run, fast clear, and solid combo bonus, the score ticked up and I was back in third.
For fifteen seconds.
Right. So he was keeping an eye on me.
I immediately started the next stage.
Another run. Slightly better. I hit 203,802—92 points ahead.
Thirty seconds later, he bounced up another 88 points to 203,798.
This bastard.
The top-up prompt to extend the room usage appeared again. I paid.
We kept fighting and trading places on the board. Every time I got ahead, he'd catch right back up almost immediately.
I stopped paying attention to anything but the score, forgetting even about my aching muscles.
Eventually, I pulled ahead by thirty-eight points. Yes!
Half a minute and he matched it exactly.
I stared at the number with a frown and checked his breakdown.
"You're copying my strategy, you absolute fungus!"
I should not be this mad. I was very mad.
I started the next stage. Final result: +98.
He gained +72. Ha!
Stage 2267.
Max bonus, zero damage, clean execution... +94.
I pulled his profile again. As expected, he didn't have enough Attack points to pass 2270. I only had to hope he couldn't gain them quickly.
I paid for more time and proceeded with more stages.
Stage 2268: +97
Stage 2269: +91
Stage 2270: +96
I moved on to 2271 and kept an eye on the leaderboard.
No more points from yeetgeometry.
...I knew it!
I kept going to grow our gap.
2271 through 2281, 2282, 2283...
I pushed the lead to three hundred, then four hundred…
I was breathing hard. Sweat trickled down my neck as I blinked at the leaderboard.
Still nothing. Good.
Feeling triumphant, I ran several more stages, now focusing more on fighting itself, rather than the leaderboard.
Llewellyn wasn't wrong when he scoffed at people who thought of Elemental VR games as training for actual Knots rather than just entertainment. For one, there was no real Magic involved—no perception of it or chance to learn how to modulate Elemental power. None of that could be learned here. And obviously—this wasn't life-threatening. Except for maybe slamming too hard into a wall if you didn't calibrate your VR headset properly.
Still. Even though I knew this wasn't real combat, it was quite a workout on my muscles—especially after having faced a Distorted Realm and a Celestial Hydra within the same week. And it was not the worst way to sharpen your reflexes. Or... well, that would have been the case if I wasn't so tired now.
Once I had a 1,120-point lead, I logged out and collapsed against a wall, taking off the VR headset.
I blinked. The room felt small and cozy after the open landscapes of the game stages.
My eyes stung a bit, and I could feel how much my muscles really ached now.
Damn, maybe this had been a really bad idea.
...Not to mention how much I had spent.
Shit.
I grabbed my stuff and went to the bathroom to clean up.
One of the older staff members looked over, like he wasn't sure if I was okay or about to collapse. I grinned at him, still feeling triumphant, and he shrugged and moved on.
Honestly, I felt exhausted, but elated. Victory is victory, however you dress it.
Penguin blinked feebly.
Suddenly I felt a bit guilty.
"Yeah," I said. "We're done. We're going home."
Penguin blinked again.
As I washed my face and grabbed a towel, the last thing I wanted to see was a new System notification.
Unfortunately...
[System Notification: Emergency! Partner requires immediate assistance!]