The gauntlet rules let a challenger choose his own order, which the Association had included as a courtesy to weaker entrants. Most hunters climbed from the bottom, since ten fights in ten days rewards anybody who banks easy wins early.
Vell spread the ten names across the workshop bench and did not sort them by rank at all. He sorted them by what each one held, which took him most of a night and produced an order nobody else would have chosen.
Four of the ten held office positions rather than reputations, which is a distinction the rankings do not record anywhere. Gate inspection rights, a market weighing licence, a district scoring seat, plus a training-hall certification that had failed eleven independent applicants in two years.
"You are not climbing a ladder," Luna said, reading the order over the relay, "you are taking specific things off specific people."
"A rank is an opinion," Vell answered, "an inspection right is a door that opens for somebody every morning."
