“Green shards introduce cooperative and adversarial diver interaction for the first time.”— Scavantis Green Orientation Packet, Rev. 9
“Am I even qualified to upgrade?” I asked as the rain kept hammering everything that wasn’t the half-meter of dry permacrete the twins had staked out. “And I don’t think I’m ready for a green shard.”
Cecilia’s smile held. “Nonsense. You unlocked an entire attribute subsystem. We’ll level you up, and you’ll take attributes to their cap.”
Taking my attributes to their cap was a beautiful idea that needed points I didn’t have, on a body the System had filed somewhere between a beetle and a coat rack. None of that was hers to worry about. “They’re not really in a state to—”
“I’m stronk.” Alice thumped a fist against her sternum as if she were testing it for cracks. “Level eight, but I fight like twenty! I can fight green all day and not even breathe hard. And,” she added, pitching her voice as if it were a state secret, “I begged Mom. No bodyguards. Just us three.” She glowed. “She said yes because, well, you’re you, Dash.”
“That’s… unexpected, honestly. But I guess good job?” I half-asked. “Still unsure, though.”
Cecilia let me finish, then laced her fingers together in front of Alice. “We don’t need you to clear it. We’d pass without you. I want to watch you work.” Her gaze dropped to the scabbard against my calf. “You practised the positions I sent, right?”
I flinched. I practiced a bit, but not as much as I wanted, and hopefully it’ll be enough for her. “Some of them.”
“Mm.” She’d heard exactly how thin that was and let it hang there for both of us to admire. “Trust us. You can bail anytime, but we’re capable of protecting you.”
The rain filled the gap where my dignity used to be. “Fine. I’ll go.” I leveled a finger, hoping it looked firm. “If—and only if—they actually let me upgrade. They take one look and tell me I’m not qualified, we go eat noodles, and you can lecture my grip another day.”
“They won’t, but deal.” Alice’s hand shot out and closed around my wrist, and she was already pulling me toward the doors.
I let myself be dragged in out of the rain.
The registration office had sat on the forty-eighth floor, for reasons no one in the building could have defended under oath.
So when Alice walked us past the public lobby entirely, past the dying wall, past the rows of tired people in scuffed gear waiting on their numbers, and through an unmarked door behind a planter to an elevator I hadn’t known the building owned, I gave up being surprised and started paying attention.
The elevator had a carpet. What was with rich people and carpets? Same was when I was arrested. Cecilia touched her license to a reader that lit gold, and the car rose without asking us anything, already certain of where we were going.
The room it opened onto had actual wood in it. A long desk of it, dark and oiled, grain running the length of the surface.
Was carpet with a wood in ‘how to look rich’ book or something?
The chairs in front of it were upholstered, and weren’t for sure a mere NullSit. The man behind the desk wore a suit that fit, and when the three of us came in and sat, he let us settle before he said a word.
“We’d like to upgrade.” Alice was all business now, sliding her license across the wood. Cecilia’s went next. Mine followed a moment behind. “Gray to green. All three of us.”
He drew the licenses in and turned to a display angled away from me, working through it in short, unhurried passes.
“I see.” This time the sound arrived with a nod. “The young ladies have cleared the volume requirement with room to spare.” His eyes came up and went over me once. “And you’ve cleared the strength requirement. Each of you is short exactly what the others have to spare.” He slid a single sheet of paper toward Alice. “Register as a party and I can waive the difference. Green licenses issue when you clear the dive. Good luck.”
I kept waiting for the second form, or a catch, or a waiting line to stand in.
There was nothing of that sort.
Alice was already standing, smiling. “Thank you, really. You’re a lifesaver.” Her holoband chimed against the desk reader as she passed it, and his band chimed an answer. Then we were back in the carpeted box, dropping floors.
“Okay.” I looked at the sheet, then at her. “What was that? Last time I came here it took like hours and a janitor to find the right desk. That was fast and… easy.”
Alice looked at me as if I’d asked why water is wet. “Of course it was easy.” She pressed the sheet flat against her chest. “We’re paying customers.”
She grinned as if that explained everything.
Green room differed from gray.
The chamber where I’d taken my first exam had been braced to within an inch of its budget, plating bolted over every surface, an observation window in ballistic glass, the whole architecture built to outlive whoever failed inside it. This one was just a room with tiered chairs, a low platform, a man at the front, and a woman beside a containment unit no bigger than a lunch tray, the shard inside it turning over its impossible colours behind the glass.
Three other parties already had seats.
Fours and fives, gear squared away, talking low, none of them looking nervous. We came in last, Alice setting the pace, and the man at the front spread his hands the moment the door sealed behind us. “That’s everyone. We can begin.” His smile looked genuine.
“First—congratulations, all of you, on the upgrade. It’s a good day. I get to welcome a room full of experienced divers taking their first proper step, and that never gets old.”
“Cool guy!” Alice whispered as we sat down, me in the middle, and I just gave Alice a noncommittal nod with Ceci amused half-smile on the other side.
The man glanced at each group. “You’ve been diving gray, where it’s you and the shard and nobody else, ever. That ends today. Green is the first place you can run into another living person there.” His eyes moved across the room again. “Higher, shards start folding into each other, pocket dimensions, several shards stitched into one. Not low-level ones. And green just has the possibility of company, which is enough to be worth some ground rules.”
“So boring,” Alice complained and slumped in her chair. “Wake me up when we're finished.”
I leaned to her and whispered, “Alice—”
“No, I’m not actually sleeping,” she whispered back with a grin. “But soooo want to.”
“The space in a green shard can be large,” he said. “And the moment you enter, the System presents you with something called a scenario, steps on how to finish, and your rewards lock—nothing you gather goes out until the scenario clears. A real green dive runs anywhere from an hour to a full day, so divers learn to pack for an overnight.” He raised a finger. “You can leave whenever you like. Nothing holds you there. But walk out before the scenario’s done, and that’s a fail. In, until it’s finished. Or out, with nothing.”
“Did you practice overhead swings?” Ceci asked in a hushed voice. I chuckled nervously and nodded without explaining further that it had only happened once.
“Etiquette, since you’ll have neighbours in future shards. It’s short.” He counted it on his fingers. “First party to engage a monster or a node owns it. You don’t poach a kill that isn’t yours, and you don’t strip a body another crew put on the ground. Second—the System will not stop you from turning on another diver. It doesn’t care. The only thing between you and that is your reputation, and reputation in this work has a long memory and a short fuse. Scavantis take incidents seriously, and you should wear a recording device.”
“The Alliance requires me to state the following exactly. “He paused, and his voice flattened into something read off a card.
“Distress signals are to be honoured. Non-combatants in a shard—porters, cooks, assistants—are not targets under any circumstances. And should you bring a non-system user in to carry, to cook, or to assist, you are responsible for that person from entry to exit. Their physical health and their mental health are your liability in full. The Alliance is very clear that not knowing the shard would harm them is not a defence.”
“I won’t be snitching,” Alice whispered, and a chuckle escaped me, imagining Alice being undercover agent.
The card-voice clicked off.
“Back to the fun stuff. You’ll each be handed a plugin chip on your way. It installs your green diving tool. You can pick up partner plugins too, if you want them; that’s your call.” He gave us a small, dry smile. “Scavantis recommends the Palistra catalogue.” He said Scavantis the same way as Comma does when you wake her before ten.
Scavantis recommends.
Not him.
“As for today,” he nodded at the tray, “this one’s a tester. Level ten, picked because it’s exactly hard enough to tell me whether you’re ready for green and not one notch past it. You can’t meet other divers here; we picked not connected instances and the exact numbers of groups on purpose. Start to finish, somewhere between two and six hours, depending on how quick you are. To pass, each of you surfaces with a thousand sols of value, minimum.” He shrugged. “But pick drops, finish the scenario and you’ll clear that without trying. So don’t sit in there counting loot. Finish the scenario. Questions?”
Nobody had any.
Alice didn’t so much raise her hand as launch out of her chair, towing me up by the wrist before I’d decided to stand. Cecilia fell a pace behind, unhurried, letting her sister do the dragging. The woman by the tray held a chip out to Alice first.
It was a crystal coin, pale and faintly warm, humming against the skin like struck glass held a second too long. Alice closed her hand around it, and a moment later her face opened up. “Oh!” She spun to me, lit up over something only she could see. “Dash. Dash, there’s a streak counter.”
I successfully avoided a facepalm.
The woman pressed a second coin into my palm. Similar to the one a clerk had handed me before the Zerakai shard. Alice dragged me back to the chair, saying some plugin was so preem, and I let her do all the navigation as the list unrolled.
[An upgrade to a plugin detected! Scavantis Green Dive Tool v2.4][Install?]
[Scavantis Green Dive Tool v2.4]Current level: 1Max level: 1Function: Allows entry to Scavantis Chaos shards.Upkeep: 0.1ppAuthor: Scavantis IT Department
I confirmed this one because I actually needed it.
[A new plugin detected! Palistra Free Green Catalogue™ v3.1.0][Install?]
[Palistra Free Green Catalogue™ v3.1.0]Current level: 1Max level: 1Function: Information on common Green resources.Upkeep: 0.1ppAuthor: Palistra Engineering
Yeah, no. I learned my lesson, so I declined. But that wasn’t all; there were more.
[Aurelia Equilibrium™ v1.2.8]Current level: 1Max level: 1Function: Diver Wellness Companion, continuous vitals monitoring, breathing exercises, guided recoveryUpkeep: 0.5ppAuthor: Aurelia Medical
Yeah, I didn’t need a plugin to tell me to breathe, so I declined.
[Scavantis ShardMap Lite™]Current level: 1Max level: 1Function: Basic interior mapping.Upkeep: 1ppAuthor: Scavantis External Contractor
Here I was actually considering taking it, but the price was too steep, and I had my needle, which connected to a band, and I was sure I could get an app with sols to do the same job. And if not? The plugin would still be there in the chip, unlike the pp I would lose.
Pass.
[Vaultline DiveQuest™]Current level: 1Max level: 1Function: Turn every dive into a Quest! DiveQuest™ logs your clears, counts your kills, and keeps your Daily Dive Streak burning; miss a day and watch it reset, so don’t! Climb the Solar Leaderboards, challenge your friends list, and flex your stats with seasonal cosmetics pulled fresh from the Loot Vault: HUD frames, kill-banners, victory flourishes, and our community-favorite Sword Borders™ (new sets every Season!). Over 600 collectibles and growing. Share your highlight reel, chase the rankings, and show the ‘Verse who really dives.Upkeep: 1ppAuthor: BFF Kamyl from Vaultline
I glanced to the side at excited Alice and let out a long sigh. Of course she would get baited by the gacha plugin. Hopefully, her sister would explain how bad idea—
“Did you get Vaultline?” Alice asked. “I had no idea they had drops!”
Cecilia nodded. “The selection of sword borders is impressive.”
…I kept my mouth shut about it. “Done,” I said instead.
Alice didn’t bother with a countdown.
She took my hand, touched something I didn’t catch; the shard’s colours flared once behind their glass, and the green room folded away like a breath let go. Weight came back, and we were standing somewhere warm. Something that looked too much like a hive, built itself around us while I watched.
Bugs, ugh.
Which I wasn’t. Not at all.
The floor set first, dark resin, matte underfoot, and then walls climbed up out of nothing in long ribbed sweeps of chitin, amber and ash-grey, locking together along seams that glowed a soft, sickly green from somewhere deep inside the material.
The air thickened until I could taste it, wet and faintly sweet, the back-of-the-throat smell of a terrarium left sealed too long.
I forgot to build a breathing mask! Next time…
Light pooled in the joints of the walls and came from nowhere else. Above us the ceiling knit itself shut into a vault of the same ribbing, and that was the chamber: maybe twenty meters across, five walls of grown bone, no door anywhere in it.
A panel bloomed in the corner of my eye, the System deciding to grace me.
[Scenario unlocked: Become the Queen][Step 1: Hollow the Brood]
Far off, muffled through who knew how many walls of chitin, something buzzed, the noise a hornet might make scaled up past anything reasonable and handed a few hundred friends.
“Okay,” I said. “We’re in. Now what?”
“Now we clear the scenario, but I don’t see anything attacking us.” Cecilia turned a slow circle, cataloguing the chamber, and came back around to me with her gaze going down to the scabbard at my calf, then up. “Which leaves us time now we’re finally truly alone. So. Your attributes. When did you get them?”
“Before breakfast, basically.”
Behind me, Alice had found the wall fascinating and was pressing one knuckle into the chitin to see if it pressed back. “What’d it give you?”
Cecilia raised one hand, palm up. “A-tier in the Solar System? Or A-tier in the Milky Way?”
I looked at the floor.
The poking stopped. Alice scooted around into my eyeline, head cocked, every watt of her landing on me at once. “Dash?”
I bit the inside of my cheek. There was no easy way to say it. “...It’s A-tier universe.”
“NOVAAAAAA.” It cracked off the chitin and came back doubled. Both her fists went up. “There’s no public universe one. Ceci, tell him—there is no—”
“Some of the tutorial-takers hold A-plus, and are rumored to advance into S-tier” Cecilia said, even and dry, the way you’d correct a price.
Alice stuck her tongue out at her. “Meh. Old geezers. Museum pieces.” She spun back and folded both arms around my neck before I could lean clear, all her weight on it, nearly walking the coilgun off my shoulder. “Not Dash.“
“Which one, though?” Cecilia hadn’t moved. “Palistra’s attributes are somewhat known, but for a fighter Aurelia’s are better tuned, so if you—”
“I—” And there the sentence died, because the true answer was that I’d been handed a manual written for a three-sided species that had never heard of me, run through a translator that thought Wallop was a word and a carapace came standard, and I had no idea how to say any of that out loud without sounding like a liar or a concussion. “Uh.”
“Tell us, tell us, tell—” Alice was bouncing on the spot.
Cecilia’s hand came up again and settled on her sister’s shoulder, reeling her back a clean step off me. “You don’t have to,” she said. “We understand. It’s a secret.” She glanced at Alice, and a whole conversation passed between them in that look. Alice grinned and nodded.
“So we’ll trade you one.” Alice was sold on it before she’d finished saying it. “A secret for a secret. Fair.”
I snorted. “Bad deal for you. I’m terrible at this—keeping things. My counter-intel guy told me I couldn’t hold a secret if you stapled it shut.”
“Same,“ Alice said with deep feeling, and threw a hand toward Cecilia like she was entering it into evidence.
Cecilia let the buzz land. “You’ve read your great-grandfather’s notes. Do you know one of the rewards Auntie Syntavelli took back in the tutorial?”
Great-grandpa’s notes ran deep, but I wasn’t that interested in grumblings about Palistra taking his apples. “A crafting one. Tailoring, or near it. He never wrote it down, but that’s my guess.”
“That’s your guess, and it’s right.” She tipped her head. “Then, do you know how Syntavelli fights? In the field. Best-cut clothes in the Alliance, and not a plate of armor between them.”
I leaned against the wall. It held. “There’s a line people quote. That a Syntavelli family member would sooner die than get caught in armor, looking like everybody else.”
Alice laughed, a bright bark that went around the vault and came back.
“That’s the line, and it’s wrong,” Cecilia said, patient. “Or it’s the joke they let everyone keep. The truth is, Auntie Syntavelli was a fan of—”
“Xianxia?” I tried because I’d spent a whole season getting the Kallum cut of that sermon out of Uncle Dot.
“No.” Alice’s grin turned into weather rolling in. “Close, though.”
“Magical girls,” Cecilia said.
The buzz droned on past the walls. I blinked. “...Sorry. What?”
“Magical girls.” She said it as if it answered itself, and for her, it did. “Every Syntavelli, when they turn twenty and the System settles in, gets an outfit. Auntie designs each one herself; the theme, the colours, the activation words, all her call, and you don’t get a vote. You get a penalty fighting without it,” her nose wrinkled, the first dent in the composure all day, “and a bonus with it on.”
“Wanna see?” Alice was already moving, three quick steps back, opening a clear stretch of resin between us.
I nodded slowly. I didn’t have a better plan.
“Watch.”
She set her feet, threw one arm up in a flourish built for a stage that wasn’t there, and the sick green light of the hive caught every tooth in her grin.
“Lunaris Phoenix—Ignite!“
And the cold green box, all at once, went very warm.