Fame smells like vanilla body spray and sweaty marker pens.
Soccer walked down the Northwood High hallway. It was usually a gauntlet of anonymity. He was the weird kid with the scars.
Today? It was a gauntlet of hands.
"Sign my cast, Soccer!"
"Dude, the backflip! Do the backflip right now!"
"Can I have your old shoes? The ripped ones?"
Soccer stopped. He blinked at a freshman holding out a biology textbook.
"You want my shoes?" Soccer asked, confused. "They have holes in them. And they smell like swamp."
"It's memorabilia, bro!" the kid insisted.
Luna appeared from the crowd like a shark parting a school of fish. She grabbed Soccer by the backpack strap.
"No shoes. No backflips. No signing babies." She dragged him toward the cafeteria. "He needs to eat. Athletes eat."
Soccer waved cheerfully as he was towed away. "Bye! Stay in school! Don't eat yellow snow!"
They reached the lunch table. The team was already there. They looked different.
Marcus wasn't slouching. Dylan wasn't shaking. Even Elijah was sitting with his chest out. They were wearing their team jackets. Not casually. Proudly.
"The King returns!" Marcus banged the table. "Two wins. Quarterfinals. Do you realize Northwood hasn't made the quarters since 2004?"
"2004?" Soccer sat down and immediately opened his bento. "Was the world black and white back then?"
"Very funny." Marcus stole a grape from Soccer's tray. "But listen. The hype is real. People are talking about us. They're talking about you."
Soccer chewed. "Cool. Who do we play next?"
The table went quiet.
Marcus looked at Luna. Luna looked at her salad.
"Tech High," Luna said. "They're big. Bigger than Westside. But..."
"But what?"
"They aren't the problem," Marcus said darkly. "If we win... if we somehow get past the quarters... we hit the Semis."
Soccer tilted his head. "And?"
"And the bracket says we play the winner of Block A."
"Royal Vanguard Academy."
The name dropped onto the table heavier than a lead brick.
Even the cafeteria noise seemed to dip. Royal Vanguard. The rich school. The elite school. The school that didn't just recruit players; they manufactured them.
"Kai Rivers," Dylan whispered. He looked like he wanted to hide under the table. "The Golden Striker. He's scored forty goals this season. Forty. In twelve games."
Soccer stopped chewing.
"Forty?"
"Yeah."
"That's a lot," Soccer admitted. "Does he play alone?"
"Basically," Marcus grunted. "His team is good, but he treats them like furniture. He wins games by himself. He's fast, he's technical, and he's arrogant as hell."
"Sounds fun!" Soccer reached for another grape.
"No, Soccer," Luna said sharply. "He's not 'fun.' Westside was brutal. Iron-Point was smart. Kai Rivers? He's... perfect. He doesn't make mistakes."
Perfect.
Soccer tasted the word.
On the mountain, nothing was perfect. The wind changed. The sun moved. The rock crumbled. Even the eagles missed their prey sometimes.
"Perfection isn't real," Soccer said, wiping his mouth. "It's just a trick."
"Tell that to the keepers he destroyed," Dylan mumbled.
Practice: 3:30 PM.
The Northwood field was buzzing. A small crowd had gathered on the rusty bleachers. Students. Some parents. A few curious locals.
Success draws a crowd.
Coach Cross was running a possession drill. Or trying to.
The team was giddy. They were passing with flair, trying backheels, laughing. They felt invincible.
"Focus!" Cross barked. "Tech High isn't a victory lap! They're going to grind you down!"
Soccer was juggling by himself near the corner flag.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Left foot. Right foot. Knee. Shoulder.
He was testing the Copa Mundials. The leather was scuffed now, broken in. They felt softer. Friendlier. He liked how they hugged his wide feet.
Suddenly, the noise stopped.
Not just the team. The crowd.
The chatter died instantly.
A low, purring sound filled the air. An engine. A very expensive engine.
A matte black sports car pulled into the gravel parking lot next to the field. It looked like a spaceship landed in a junkyard. The paint absorbed the sunlight.
The door opened. It opened upward. Scissor doors.
A boy stepped out.
He wore designer sunglasses. A tailored beige trench coat over a Royal Vanguard uniform. His hair was a perfectly messy blond bun.
He checked a gold watch on his wrist.
Then he walked toward the field. He didn't walk on the pavement. He walked right onto the grass.
Coach Cross froze. "You have got to be kidding me."
Marcus dropped the ball he was holding. "Is that...?"
"Kai Rivers," Luna whispered. "What is he doing here? His school is three towns over."
Kai walked with a lazy, cat-like grace. He ignored the whispers. He ignored the stares. He walked straight past the entire Northwood team like they were ghosts.
He stopped in front of Soccer.
Soccer caught the ball on his neck. He looked at the stranger.
"Nice car," Soccer said. "Is it electric? It sounds like a angry cat."
Kai took off his sunglasses. His eyes were icy blue. Bored. Disinterested.
"So this is the anomaly," Kai said. His voice was smooth, polished. "You look smaller in person. And dirtier."
Soccer shrugged. The ball rolled off his neck, down his back, and he caught it with his heel. "Dirt washes off. Who are you?"
The Northwood team gasped.
"He doesn't know," Dylan wheezed. "Oh my god, he actually doesn't know."
Kai smirked. It was a faint twitch of the lips. "I'm the guy waiting for you at the top of the mountain. If you ever climb that high."
Soccer's ears perked up. "Top of the mountain? Which one? Grey Ridge?"
Kai laughed. A short, dismissive sound.
"You really are a savage. Primitive." Kai looked around the field. "Rugged turf. Rusty goalposts. A team of rejects. It's quaint."
"Hey!" Marcus stepped forward. "Watch your mouth, Rivers. You're on our turf."
Kai glanced at Marcus. He didn't even turn his head fully.
"Captain Kane, right? I watched your tape. You step too late on your tackle. Your hips are stiff. I'd turn you inside out in three seconds."
Marcus flinched. His face went red.
"But I'm not here for the trash," Kai said, turning back to Soccer. "I'm here for the treasure."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a key fob. He clicked a button. The trunk of the spaceship car popped open.
"Gunther," Kai called out.
A massive man got out of the car, carrying a bag of balls. Pristine, white match balls. Champions League quality.
Kai took a ball. He dropped it on the grass.
"They say you have control," Kai said, toeing the ball. "That you handle bad bounces. Bad terrain."
"I do okay," Soccer said.
"Show me."
Kai kicked the ball.
He didn't wind up. He barely moved his leg. It was a flick of the ankle.
BOOM.
The ball launched straight up. Not fifty feet. Not a hundred.
It went so high it became a white dot against the blue sky. It hung there for an eternity.
Then it started to fall.
Terminal velocity. A falling object accelerates at 9.8 meters per second squared. By the time that ball reached head-height, it would be moving fast enough to break a nose.
"Trap it," Kai ordered. "Dead."
The team watched, necks craned.
Soccer looked up. The white dot grew larger.
"Okay!"
Soccer stepped forward.
Standard trapping technique: Lift the foot, match the speed, cushion it down.
Soccer didn't do that.
He jumped.
He met the ball at chest height in mid-air. He rotated his body flat, catching the ball on the bridge of his foot while horizontal.
Zero-Gravity Cradle.
He fell to the ground with the ball glued to his shoe. He landed softly, rolling backward to disperse the momentum, and stood up holding the ball in his hand.
"Fun!" Soccer beamed. "Like catching a falling hailstone!"
Kai didn't clap. He didn't blink.
"Crude," Kai criticized. "Flashy. Wasted energy."
"Your turn?" Soccer tossed the ball to Kai.
Kai didn't wait. He punted it up again. Same height. Same terrifying speed.
The ball plummeted.
Kai stood perfectly still. Hands in his coat pockets. He looked like he was waiting for a bus.
The ball fell toward his head.
He didn't jump. He didn't crouch.
He extended his right leg slightly. The leather of his expensive designer loafer met the ball.
There was no sound. No thud.
The ball just... died.
It hit his toe and stopped instantly. It didn't bounce. It didn't roll. It simply ceased to have momentum. It sat on his shoe like an obedient dog.
The Golden Touch.
Total negation of physics through supreme technical perfection.
The Northwood team went silent. That level of touch belonged on TV. In Europe. Not here.
"You fight gravity," Kai said, letting the ball roll onto the grass. "You wrestle with it. You survive it."
He stepped closer to Soccer. He smelled expensive—sandalwood and arrogance.
"I rule it."
Soccer stared at the ball on the grass. Then at Kai's loafer.
"You killed it," Soccer whispered.
"Excuse me?"
"The ball." Soccer looked sad. "It wanted to bounce. It had energy. You just... turned it off. It looked boring."
Kai's eyebrow twitched.
"Boring?"
"Yeah." Soccer looked up, his grey eyes piercing. "The mountain isn't perfect. The wind isn't perfect. If you kill the chaos... where's the fun?"
Kai stared at him. For a long moment, the two monsters looked at each other.
One was a polished diamond, sharp and cold.
The other was a rough flint stone, capable of sparking fire.
Then, Kai smiled.
It wasn't the fake smirk from earlier. It was a genuine, terrifying smile. A smile of a predator that found something that wouldn't die easily.
"Interesting," Kai murmured. "You prefer the mess."
He turned on his heel. His coat swooshed.
"Survive the Quarterfinals, savage. Meet me in the Semis."
He walked back to his car.
"Oh," Kai stopped and looked back over his shoulder. "And bring shin guards. Proper ones. Because when we play? I'm not going to aim for the ball."
The scissor door closed. The engine roared. The black car sped off, kicking up gravel dust into Marcus's face.
Silence on the pitch.
"We're dead," Dylan announced. "We are actually dead. Did you see that trap? He did it in dress shoes."
Coach Cross walked onto the field. He kicked the ball Kai had left behind.
"Technique," Cross muttered. "Pure, crystallized technique."
"He's a robot," Marcus spat. "A rich, arrogant robot."
"No," Luna said, hugging her clipboard tight. "He's not a robot. Robots have patterns."
She looked at Soccer.
Soccer was juggling the ball again. But he wasn't happy. He was frowning. He was trying to replicate Kai's move. Dead stop. No bounce.
He couldn't do it. The ball always had a little spin. A little life.
"He's the standard," Luna finished. "He's what perfect football looks like."
Soccer kicked the ball hard into the net. WHOOSH.
"Perfect is a lie," Soccer said. His voice had a new edge to it. A sharpness.
"You can't control everything. One day, a storm will come that he can't stop with his fancy shoe."
Soccer turned to his terrified team.
"And I'm gonna be that storm."
Quarterfinal Morning.
The bracket was set.
Northwood vs. Tech High.
St. Mary's vs. Eastlake.
And in Bracket A... Royal Vanguard had just won their quarterfinal.
The score flashed on everyone's phones in the locker room.
Royal Vanguard: 10 - Blue Creek: 0.
Goals by K. Rivers: 6.
"Six goals," Elijah whispered, looking pale. "In one game. He pulled the starters at halftime."
"Stop looking at him," Cross snapped. "Tech High is today. Focus on the obstacle in front of you."
But it was hard.
Tech High was a good team. They were big. They were fast.
But after seeing Kai Rivers? They looked like ants.
Soccer was lacing his boots. He taped his ankles with extra care today. Not because he was hurt.
Because he wanted to be faster.
"Soccer," Marcus sat next to him. "You okay? You've been quiet."
"I'm thinking."
"About Kai?"
"No. About rocks."
"Rocks again?"
"Yeah." Soccer stood up and jumped, tucking his knees to his chest. He landed silently. "Kai stops the ball. He freezes it. That's his power. He pauses time."
"Okay... sure."
"So," Soccer grinned. "If I want to beat him... I have to move so fast that time can't pause."
Coach Cross opened the door. The roar of the Regional crowd spilled in.
"Time to go, gentlemen. The bracket gets harder from here."
Soccer walked to the front. He put his hand on the door frame.
The friction tape on his fingers scratched against the metal.
Tech High. Big players. Strong players.
Just boulders on the path.
"Hey Coach," Soccer asked.
"Yeah?"
"If we win today... we play Kai on Friday?"
"Yes."
Soccer stepped out into the tunnel. The light hit his face. The scars on his arms stood out white against his tan skin.
"Then we better win quick," Soccer said. "I don't like waiting."
The Assassin walked into the light.
And for the first time, he wasn't just hunting for fun.
He was hunting for the crown.