Saurai walked toward Ring Five with a slow, steady pace. The faint hum of the dummy bots charging up echoed across the dome, their sensor-eyes blinking red in unison like a war drum about to begin. Around him, first-year cadets whispered, adjusted grips on their weapons, stretched, or stared down the metallic opponents waiting in silence.
He quickly surveyed his team. A boy with dark blue hair and sharp eyebrows spun a staff around expertly. He is clearly from a martial lineage. Another boy, lanky and nervous-looking, fiddled with his gauntlets, which looked far too large for his arms. A stocky girl with her hair tied back in a tight braid practiced sharp forward lunges with a spear. Then there was Vani and some other students.
Saurai's eyes rested on vani a bit longer.
She had drawn a short, curved sword which more akin to a jungle machete than a standard training blade. Her grip was light but confident. Her movements were swift, low to the ground not flashy, but efficient. Her dark eyes remained locked on the bot across from her. As If she noticed Saurai's gaze, she turned towards him and gave a small nod.
The bots in their ring were already beginning to float, slowly moving in graceful figure-eights. Saurai gripped his staff, trying to ground himself. He didn't know these teammates but instinct told him he'd need to trust them if they wanted to survive ten minutes in the ring.
A sharp buzz signaled the start.
The bots activated immediately. Their single eyes flared a brighter red, limbs snapping to life with machine-like precision. One surged forward toward the blue-haired boy.
Saurai stepped into a low stance and met the bot's swing but he dodged it easily, as if his body already knew exactly how to move. The bot tried to hit him again, but he evaded instinctively. It felt so easy, like a practiced movement. For a minute, he just focused on getting comfortable. Then he decided to retaliate and tried to strike the bot. He missed. He tried again, but the bot dodged his strike.
He realized the problem.
Whenever he tried to attack, it wasn't instinctive it felt like he was trying to take control of his body, and that made him slow. His attacks seemed uncalibrated, clumsy. He needed more practice. For now, dodging was no issue so he focused on that.
Saurai also realized that he was unusually aware of his surroundings, even without looking. It felt as if there were no blind spots from which the bots could attack him. He began to take advantage of this heightened awareness.
Then he began observing his teammates.
The blue-haired boy was redirecting the bot's attacks with a twist, then countering with a precise blow to its shoulder. A burst of sparks flew, followed by a mechanical whirr as the bot stepped back slightly. Then the boy was already shifting position to dodge another bot. The gauntlet-wearing boy was struggling.
Saurai realized he didn't have time to get adjusted. For now, only one bot was targeting him but if his teammates were knocked out, he didn't know if he could dodge multiple bots at once.
A thought struck him. He couldn't overpower the bot not yet but maybe he didn't need to.
Instead of trying to land a blow, he started baiting it.
He stepped toward the ring's edge, feinting clumsy footwork, making himself look like an easy target. The bot lunged. He sidestepped. Again, he circled to the edge, taunting it. This time, the bot charged straight at him with a full-body dash.
Saurai rolled sideways cleanly and the bot couldn't stop its momentum. It flew right through the boundary, triggering the blue shimmer of the field. The moment it passed the edge, it powered down and collapsed into a crouch, inert.
+10 points.
Saurai stood up, exhaled and began looking for his next target.
One bot lunged toward him. He started dodging its attacks and, while doing so, instinctively turned to its teammates. They were all struggling while he was trying to focus back to its bot his eyes went past in Andy's direction.
Their eyes met. Saurai hadn't meant to but to smooth out his relationship with andy he just gave smile an innocent one.
Andy's jaw clenched tighter. He looked like he'd swallowed a lemon.For some reason He felt like samurai was mocking him.
A bot lunged at the nervous, gauntlet-wearing boy. He yelped and ducked too early. The bot's sweeping leg caught the edge of his boots, but he scrambled back inside the boundary line just in time. Saurai shouted a warning, and the stocky spear girl stepped in, jabbing the bot in the side. It staggered slightly, giving the gauntlet boy a chance to recover.
Then there was two bots went straight for Vani.
Saurai's attention snapped to her. She pivoted to avoid the first strike and ducked under the second. Her movements weren't fluid in an artistic sense, but they were honed and pragmatic. She used her short blade's curved edge to catch one bot's arm and twist it, slashing at its torso and stepping back before the other could follow up. One clean strike to the neck, and it paused, reset, then came again.
She wasn't overpowering them but she was smartly gaining points with every critical strike.
But you can only earn strike points from a bot once per specific body part
Saurai took a breath. The bot in front of him floated forward on its hover-disc, arms twitching as it read his body posture. Saurai readied his staff, legs bent. When the bot attacked, his body moved on its own. He sidestepped, almost elegantly, letting the bot's swipe pass harmlessly by. The crowd gasped at how fluidly he moved.
But when he tried to retaliate with a staff jab, he missed again. The bot shifted its body faster than his mind could predict.
He tried again thrust, sweep, strike but every move either missed or was deflected by the bot's twitching arms. His dodges were graceful, but his attacks were ineffective. It was almost comical.
He became aware of how he must look from the outside like someone dancing around danger but failing to fight back. His staff wasn't a weapon; it was a baton in the hands of a showman.
Still, he dodged. And dodged well.
Then he felt it there was a burning glare
Saurai noticed Andy's gaze. The way Andy stared at him like Saurai had somehow insulted his existence and it was unnerving. He remembered what Andy had said before: "You won't even be able to touch a bot."
From Andy's perspective, Saurai looked smug, like he was toying with the bot. His dodges weren't frantic but they were calm, measured. Too calm. Even while dodging bots, Saurai was helping teammates and somehow had time to smile.
Andy was angry not just at Saurai, but at himself.
Saurai looked away, focusing back on his bot. He used the same trick and knocked the another bot out of the ring.
Saurai returned to the center of the ring, staff in hand. The rest of his team was still struggling. The gauntlet boy had finally managed to punch a bot's head only to get shoulder-checked into a corner. The spear girl was limping slightly but still thrusting her weapon like a professional.
Vani had one of the bots locked into a backstep rhythm. She was drawing it in and slashing shallow cuts.
Saurai made a decision.
He moved toward Vani. The second bot was closing in from her left flank. Without a word, he stepped between them, letting the bot swing.
He ducked, pivoted on one foot, and jabbed its midsection not with power, but with precision. The staff connected. +5 points.
The bot reeled, and Vani finished it off with a clean upward slash to the head. +10 points.
She nodded at him. Just once.
Saurai actively started assisting the others.
He wasn't a hero charging ahead. He was an opportunist in a field of chaos. He used the same trick again and again to knocking bots out of the ring.
He guided bots toward teammates who were better at hitting than dodging. When a bot locked onto someone vulnerable, he intercepted its attention. He used his staff as a lever, not a weapon but for disrupting balance, causing small stumbles, opening windows for others to strike.
The gauntlet boy landed a solid head-blow and grinned at him. The spear girl, now panting heavily, leaned into his feints to finish a bot with a sharp downward stab.
The rhythm of the fight changed.
They weren't individuals anymore. They were a team. Not perfect but more coordinated.
As the minutes ticked down, Saurai's ring became noticeably quieter. Fewer bots remained.
With thirty seconds left, the last bot in their ring lunged at Saurai one final time.
He dodged under it, pushed it sideways with his staff and Vani leapt forward to finish it off. Her sword hummed through the air and struck the bot's neck cleanly.
It dropped.
The arena rang with silence.
Then the buzzer sounded.
+50 points for survival.
Saurai was sweating lightly, but not breathless. His team looked exhausted—but proud.
He stood tall, staff by his side.
Andy was still staring at him.
This time, Saurai didn't return the glance.
He'd made his point.
None of Saurai's teammates had been knocked out. That, too, was an accomplishment.
---
Saurai followed his team out of the ring as Bruce began calling for the end of the combat excercise for the last group.Bots rolled back to recharge stations, and auto-cleaners moved in. Many bots reassembled themselves, joining damaged parts to become whole again.
Saurai's steps were steady but his mind spun like a wheel.
He wasn't strong not yet. He hadn't even managed a proper offensive technique. But he'd survived. He had helped. And maybe, just maybe, he'd found the rhythm he needed.
Andy's hatred wasn't something to laugh at. Seems like It was a seed of future trouble. But for now, Saurai had something to balance it his first small victory.
He looked at Vani again. She wasn't flashy, but she'd knocked out two bots. The blue-haired boy had taken down two.
Saurai had knocked out three bots by himself and helped with two more and last was knocked out by other teammates collaboration.
Even though he couldn't land a proper blow, he was happy.
Because for the first time since arriving at Artemis-5,
Saurai didn't feel like an outsider.
Not entirely.