The sixth call came and the room changed in a way that was harder to explain than the previous five.
It wasn't louder. If anything it was quieter—a specific kind of quiet that had less to do with absence of sound and more to do with the suspension of breath. Five fights had passed. Five names had advanced. The bracket's first round was almost complete and everyone remaining in the observation space had been watching, absorbing, cataloguing, building their read of what the floor asked of a person once you stepped onto it.
Now the last first-round name was being called.
"Jelo. Nylen."
The reaction to Jelo's name was the same as it had been when Olmo first announced the selections—that fractional pause, that small collective adjustment that moved through the room before anyone had consciously decided to make it. Students who had been still became slightly more still. A few eyes moved to him before moving away, as though looking too directly felt like a commitment to something.
