It was a cool morning after a night of rain. I was sitting on the stairs of Piraka’s hut and studying his booklet. Danek was with me, reading some book about how the village quotas worked.

“Father’s been talking about you a lot, you know,” the fat boy said suddenly.

“Good stuff, I hope?”

“Better than good. He and grandpa ran math on how much your potions are helping the village, and it’s big. They can’t believe someone so young is so valuable.”

“Valuable?” I laughed.

“You could generate a lot of quotas. Why won’t you?”

I shrugged. “I get to improve my Skills while I help. It’s a win-win.”

“But money is so important! Don’t you care about it?”

“I’m two, Danek. What am I going to do with money?”

“Hmmm…” he said and rubbed his chin so hard his jowls jiggled. “What you are saying is rational, but it feels wrong.”

I laughed. “Don’t you ever change, Danek. Follow what feels right, and let me just do my thing. You care about money, I care about magic.”

“Fair enough, I suppose. But what if you discover, you can use money to purchase magic?”

“Oh,” I said. “I hadn’t thought of that. “I guess I will need someone smart like you around then.”

Danek smiled and got embarrassed about that, so I scooted closer and clapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s continue studying.

We didn’t get far in our reading, before I saw Marek again. The wet mud squished under the man’s long strides.

The mountain of a man walked towards us. In his callused hand was a tall spear, and on his back was a massive chunk of fish meat, dangling from a rope.

He walked up the stairs in two strides, ignoring everything around him. Except me.

I looked at him instinctively. His jaw was tight and his dark eyes were hostile. I didn’t like that gaze, but I didn’t flinch. He held my gaze and was about to pass me without a word.

“Hello, Marek,” I said.

“Hello runt.”

“Luka,” I said. 

Marek grunted and went inside.

Inside, he spoke in a hard tone. “What are you giving to Jonaka and why?”

Oh, so that’s what it was. I shared a smile with Danek and we sniggered. He knew all about the arrangement I had about my father. It looked like my potions deal was making some waves.

My smile soured when I noticed a large boy glaring at me from the bottom of the stairs. It had been months since I had last seen Vorok, but from the look of his eyes, he hadn’t forgotten me. That kid had become way bigger than a boy that age had business being. He had actual veins in his muscular arms. He flexed them not so subtly as he sneered at me.

Not only that, but apparently he had started accumulating some kind of a posse. There were four other kids his age behind him, all looking at me with their arms crossed and their stances wide.

“Want something?” I asked.

“Come down here and wrestle me,” Vorok said.

“No thanks,” I said. 

“You are scared,” Vorok said.

“I’m busy. Unlike you, I don’t have time to challenge people for stupid games.”

He bared his teeth at me and stepped on the stairs. 

“Beat his ass!” one of the kids said.

“Yeah!”

Vorok looked at me hatefully. “You only have tricks. First sand trick, then you help your papa win fishing with potion tricks.”

“All I heard was two wins for me and my papa,” I said.

Another step closer. I reached for a small vial in my pocket. I had prepared for this. 

It seemed like Vorok didn’t have the vocabulary to do anything beyond growling menacingly, but honestly, it did the trick. He was two steps below me in the stairs, and was still already looming over me. But I would give him no quarter.

“Let me tell you something about life,” I said quietly. “Winning is winning. That’s all there is. Stop bothering me. Save it for the festival.”

Vorok grabbed the stair railing. It cracked when he squeezed.

“The Moon Festival is in ten weeks,” he said. “And you have nothing. In this competition you must wrestle, you must throw a spear, you must swim. Can you do any of this without tricks?”

I shrugged. “We’ll see. But I should be able to beat you.”

“Words and tricks. This is all you have.” Vorok said. “How about a bet? Loser has to give the winner what they want.”

I scoffed and slowly uncorked the vial in my pocket. “Why would I take a bet? You have nothing that I want. Just go away.”

The wooden rail he was squeezing exploded, and I immediately chugged the potion.

Vorok grabbed my shirt, but I could already feel the potion making my muscles tight. I exhaled, and could feel how hot my breath was. 

I pushed him and he tumbled on the ground. The posse behind him had completely shocked expressions on their faces.

Danek scrambled out of the way, when Vorok charged me, moving like a blaze. He crashed into me at the foot of the stairs. Despite the boost in my body, I needed to hold on with all of my strength for him to not overpower me. Our hands were locked between us. His grip was crushing and he tried pressing my wrists down. Fortunately I had the high ground and he was standing on mud.

“More tricks!” he growled. “What was that potion!?”

In a contest of raw strength, Vorok had me beat. But why would I contest him on his turf?

He was strong, but I had tricks.

It was extremely hard to concentrate on mana while I was struggling to keep my ground, but I had practiced enough. Only my high Skill levels allowed me to concentrate mana into a formation at his feet. The slick mud was already making Vorok skid when he pushed against me. Additionally I started overloading a superparticle right in front of his face. Fortunately that was easy for me at this point.

The tonic I had ingested was a short-term boost. Not only that, it would soon give me intense muscle pain and weakness. It wasn’t real magic, even though I had infused it with mana. It was simply a way to boost the body’s natural power beyond its limits. But it came with a cost and I needed to end this quickly.

I gasped in pain when Vorok took a step forward and twisted my wrist. I was going to fall on my ass any second now. But I managed to complete the spell in time. I materialized half a bucket of water and let it fall right at Vorok’s feet.

“What the?—”

He slipped and at that moment I overloaded the superparticle. A loud bang and a shockwave erupted right next to Vorok’s head. That was enough to startle the boy and give me the momentum.

The crowd of boys gasped. “What was that?”

“Another trick!”

I pushed and the mud under Vorok gave way. He fell down on his back in the mud and looked at me murderously. After the confusion he got up and looked behind him. His posse looked confused and he was red with embarrassment. He took another step forward, but I sensed hesitation. He didn’t want to make a fool of himself in front of a crowd again.

“You really want to go again?” I asked and crossed my arms.

“Fight me fair!” Vorok said.

“I don’t think so,” I said.

“You little—” 

“What is going on here?” Konako said and marched between us. “There will be no roughhousing here.”

Vorok gave him a nasty glare, but then turned and told his posse to leave. Konako turned to smile at me.

“Thank you,” I said.

He placed a hand on my shoulder and went inside. Suddenly a wave of lethargy overtook me and I managed to drag myself back inside too. Nirama made fun of me, but I didn’t mind. It had been a close call, but I had won again.

The Strength Surge Tonic’s aftereffects were pretty nasty. They resembled a flu. Shortness of breath, muscle pain, weakness, nausea. I was feeling pretty shitty, and didn’t want to use this kind of a trick again. Any use of potions was prohibited in the Moon Festival anyway.

Vorok was dangerous. I had been fortunate enough to have a trick or two up my sleeve to deal with him until now, but I really needed something more to beat him in the competition.

At the rate I was advancing my magic, it just wouldn’t be enough. The festival was in two months. He’d snap me like a twig in wrestling, and I couldn’t swim or throw a spear to save my life.

I would need a breakthrough.

*

Danek had watched the exchange. He liked Luka and he was glad nobody got hurt. Vorok was a bully and he scared Danek. 

Luka was Danek’s best friend and they were very similar. Both of them were weird and liked to study and think. But Luka was bold. Bold, but stupid. Or was he…?

That was how Danek initially had felt. But maybe he thought that because he was a coward. Cowardice was the rational response to Vorok’s overwhelming power. The big boy was truly System-gifted in a way Danek could only dream of. He must have already had level 10 in Wrestling. 

Danek knew for a fact that Luka didn’t have Wrestling. Not a single level. From the look of it, he didn’t even have any physical attributes. Vorok must have had double-digit Strength.

And yet… 

Yet Luka had won.

Danek looked at the group Vorok had built around him. He recognized those boys and didn’t like them. They were all bullies and cowards just like him. They had chosen Vorok because he was big and would dominate their generation. They were betting on him being the strongest. 

That was the rational choice. But it was a choice that wasn’t available to Danek.

“What are you looking at?” one of the boys asked.

Vorok gave him a glance that made Danek flinch, but then he simply turned his head and walked away from the Elder’s hut. 

But the other boys stayed with their arms crossed and looked at Danek, as if daring him.

Something called him to speak up. It wasn’t a rational choice. Danek wondered if he did it because it was his only available choice. It was a scary choice. But maybe just once… He would like to not be a coward.

“I’ll take that bet,” Danek said with a wavering voice. “I’ll bet twenty quotas Luka wins the Moon Festival contests.”

One of the boys snorted. “What, all three of them?”

Danek hesitated, but mustered on. He had a good feeling about this. “Yes.”

The boys laughed at him. “Are you stupid? Just because Luka can do some tricks, doesn’t meant Vorok won’t crush him.”

Danek forced himself to shrug nonchalantly. It was hard, but fortunately fooling four year olds wasn’t. “If you’re so sure, take the bet. Or are you scared?”

This was a line he had seen adults tease each other with when it came to bets. Betting quotas was pretty common, and Danek was rather excited about this.

“Scared?” one of the boys sneered. “I’m not scared! I was just making sure you understand what you’re betting.”

Danek suppressed a smile. Goading seemed to be a good negotiation tactic against emotional opponents. “So are you accepting the bet?”

“Okay. But that’s twenty quotas with all of us.”

Another boy joined in. “So he pays us each twenty if we win, and if he wins, we pay him twenty. Right?”

“Sounds good to me,” a third boy said.

They all watched Danek hungrily. “Well?

Danek considered it. He had a good Skill called Discernment for making judgments. It was an Uncommon Skill that gave him intuitions about people. He had developed it to avoid bullying and arguments, but after spending time with Luka, he had learned other applications. That day when Luka had claimed an apprenticeship, was the day Danek had understood what he was good at.

And right now he was using the Skill to tell that the other boys were overconfident and didn’t have the full picture. They were confused about Luka’s win here, but they didn’t understand what had happened. Additionally, the Skill told him, he could squeeze more out of them. Betting was odds and odds was mathematics. That was his turf.

“No,” Danek said to the boys the first time. It felt exciting and scary. “It’s four against one and the bet is lopsided, because Vorok is so powerful and Luka isn’t. I will bet twenty quotas with all of you, but if you lose, you must each give me two hundred.”

“Two hundred… How much is that?”

“It seems like a lot.”

“Who cares, of course Vorok will win!”

“True.”

“Yeah!

“Fine, I’ll take that bet!”

“Me too.”

“Danek is so stupid!”

If Danek lost, he would lose eighty quotas. That was painful. His father made thirty in a month, and he was very valuable. It would take years for Danek to pay off the debt if he lost this bet.

But if he won…

The boys would have to pay him a total of 800 quotas. That was indenture. The Elder might resize the bet, but Danek would insist on the ten to one odds. Even if the bet would be half as much, he would never be bullied by these four again.

Maybe he wasn’t such a coward after all. Maybe his bravery was just different.

Danek suppressed a smile. “Let’s go inside with Elder Piraka to formalize the bet.”