My Class is Null, But I Always Get the Best Outcome

Chapter 154: The People Behind The Rankings

They stayed at the arcade until evening without realizing how much time had passed. It was Raze who eventually said something, which surprised no one.

"Food," he said.

"You’ve been eating since we arrived," Lily said.

"That was preparation."

"For what."

"Dinner."

Lily looked at him for a moment. Then she looked away without saying anything, which in this context communicated more than the alternative would have.

Mira had already identified a restaurant. This was not surprising. Mira had apparently been planning this day for longer than she had told anyone, which explained why Kai had been dragged across the city with almost no warning.

The restaurant was large enough for all of them around one table without the configuration being awkward. Also not surprising.

The city was moving into the evening by the time they settled in. The light through the windows had shifted from afternoon to the specific quality that came when the city’s own lights were starting to matter more than the sun’s.

For a while the conversation stayed where it had been. Arcade scores that were still being contested. Raze’s ongoing and so far unsuccessful effort to have the racing game outcome categorized as something other than a series of wall collisions. The question of whether Mira would have beaten Lily at the shooting game under any circumstances, which Mira declined to answer directly, which was itself an answer.

Food arrived in stages. The conversation continued across it.

Then somewhere between the first round of drinks and the second round of food, the atmosphere shifted. Everyone relaxed and the conversation became more honest.

Elden looked around the table. "How old were you when you awakened?"

Nobody answered immediately. The question had landed between everyone equally.

Raze said, "Sixteen."

"Early," Elden said.

"Significantly early," Raze said, with the energy of someone mentioning something they have mentioned before.

Lily looked at him. "You bring this up constantly."

"It was notable."

"It was one time."

"The awakening happened one time. The notability is ongoing."

Lily shook her head with the expression of someone who had made peace with a situation they could not change. The conversation drifted from there.

Lily had expected something specific and gotten something different. She said this without elaborating on either half. Elden had expected something unremarkable and gotten something unremarkable, which he seemed entirely at peace with.

Mira had not had expectations. She had had contingency plans for several possible outcomes. "You made contingency plans for your own awakening," Sera said.

"Three options," Mira said. "One for combat class, one for support class, one for anything unusual."

"What counted as unusual."

Mira considered this. "Anything that required a fourth plan," she said.

Raze had apparently broken three training weapons in the same week after his awakening, not from controlled practice but from adjusting to output levels that were higher than anticipated. He described this without apparent embarrassment. Two were someone else’s weapons that he had borrowed. He did not return them.

"Did they ask for them back," Lily said.

"Eventually," Raze said.

"What did you do."

"I told them about the Blood Tyrant class."

"And?"

"They seemed to feel that was a reasonable explanation."

"For breaking three weapons."

"It was a difficult week."

Elden mostly listened. When someone asked him something, he answered simply. He preferred repairing gear to replacing it and had been doing it since before the gate phase.

"Why," Mira asked.

"It’s satisfying," Elden said. "Something that was broken working again."

This landed differently than he seemed to intend it to. Sera was looking at him with a small expression. Kai noticed Lily’s posture shift slightly.

Lily looked at Sera. "How do you know all that?"

"I pay attention," Sera said.

"That sounds like surveillance."

"Observation is different from surveillance."

"Is it."

"Surveillance implies intent," Sera said. "I just notice things."

"You noticed things about each person at this table."

"You’re all notable people."

Lily looked at her for a moment. "That was almost a compliment."

"Almost," Sera confirmed.

Raze found this extremely funny. Elden’s expression communicated he was also finding it funny but was not going to demonstrate this.

The dinner conversation moved through a long easy stretch. The city outside the windows had completed its transition to evening. The restaurant had gotten quieter around them. A second basket of food appeared and disappeared.

Mira looked around the table.

At each person.

One by one.

"We’ve been lucky," she said.

The table settled into quiet.

"The things that should have killed us," Mira said. "The operations that went sideways. The moments when one decision going differently would have changed the outcome entirely." She folded her hands. "We keep getting through."

Nobody interrupted.

"I don’t want to lose any of you," she said. Coming from Mira, those words hit harder.

Lily rolled her eyes.

Mira blinked in surprise and a faint blush. "What?"

"You’re being dramatic."

"I’m being honest."

"They’re the same thing sometimes."

Mira stared.

Lily leaned back in her chair and looked at the table and then looked up. "We survived Mythical gates," she said. "We survived the territory. We survived things that had not been survived before because nobody had been in the position to survive them." She looked at Raze. "Including somehow him."

"Thank you," Raze said.

"It wasn’t a compliment."

She looked at Kai. Then Sera. Then Elden. Then back to Mira.

"We’re all still here," she said."So stop acting like we’re already dead."

The last part came out slightly different from the rest of it. Quieter. Less the delivery of a point and more the delivery of something she actually meant.

Mira blinked.

Then she said, "That was surprisingly emotional."

Lily’s expression changed immediately. "It wasn’t."

"You care about us."

"I stated facts."

"Emotionally."

"I stated facts without emotion."

"You looked at everyone at the table."

"For emphasis."

"With feeling."

"With clarity," Lily said. She pointed at Kai. "Tell her."

Kai looked at both of them and made an immediate tactical assessment. "No," he said.

Sera was laughing. Not the controlled version.

Elden had found something very interesting about the grain of the table.

Raze said, "That was emotional," with the confidence of someone who felt the record should reflect this.

"It wasn’t," Lily said.

"It was."

"Raze."

"Measurably."

Lily looked at Mira. "Tell him."

Mira said, "You are emotionally insensitive."

"You just called me emotional."

"You are both," Mira quickly recovered. "It is possible."

"Those things cancel each other out."

"They don’t."

Lily pointed at her. "You’re pouting."

Mira was not pouting.

Except that she was, slightly, in the specific way of someone whose face was doing something they were not fully aware of.

Sera made a sound that communicated the drink she had just taken was now partially in her nose.

Everyone laughed.

Elden’s was quiet but present, Raze’s was loud and Mira looked around at everyone. Before then a faint smile spread across her face as she also joined in.

Outside, the city had finished becoming night. They stayed until the restaurant started doing the things restaurants did when they were ready for the final customers to leave.

On the street afterward Mira raised her phone.

The collective response was instant.

"No," from multiple directions.

"Stand closer," Mira said.

"Mira," Sera said.

"That wasn’t a request," Mira said.

They arranged themselves. Raze complained about the angle. Lily made a comment about not needing documentation. Elden moved where he was directed. Kai stood where Mira told him and wondered how he’d ended up here.

The photo was taken.

Mira look at before a grin appeared.

"I hope we stay together," she said. Low enough that it almost got lost. "Whatever happens."

Lily said, immediately, "Of course we will, you idiot."

Mira looked at her.

"We’re protecting this city." Lily raised a brow. "Where exactly do you plan on going?"

The group split apart gradually after that. People heading in different directions. The natural end of a long day.

Kai had gotten half a block when he heard steps behind him.

Elden.

He slowed.

Elden came alongside him. The easy quality he usually carried was present but running at a different register. Something underneath it that had not been there earlier.

"Got a minute," Elden said.

It was not quite a question.

Kai looked at him. "Sure."

Elden nodded once. Looked at the street ahead rather than at Kai. "I’ve been thinking about the future," he said.

Something in the way he said it communicated that this was going somewhere specific.

Kai waited.