The dirt, the lingering scent of ozone, and the massive paw prints from the Beast Taming event were cleared away in a matter of minutes. A specialized squad of Academy proctors swept across the arena, their hands glowing with synchronized earth magic, flattening the scarred sands back into a pristine, level surface.

The crowd buzzed with an electric anticipation. During the first round of the Wargaming Event, half the stadium had nearly walked out, expecting to suffer through a dull event of theoretical chess. But after witnessing the sheer, unpredictable chaos of the astral immersion, the bitter betrayals, the visceral combat, and the psychological warfare, nobody was leaving their seats today. In fact, spectators who had stepped out for refreshments were actively rushing back from the concourses, cramming into the aisles just to get a good view. The physical brutality of the previous Beast Taming event was about to be replaced by cold, calculating intellect, and the audience was absolutely starved for it.

The ground rumbled, a deep, resonant vibration that rattled the seats in the stands.

From the center of the arena, four metallic monoliths rose slowly from the sand. They were sleek, silver obelisks, each the size of a small room, humming with ancient, high-density mana. The smooth surfaces of the artifacts reflected the afternoon sun, standing like silent sentinels on the battlefield.

“Behold! The return of the Echo Chambers!”

Bruce Doyle roared, his floating platform drifting over the center of the arena.

“These are not board games, ladies and gentlemen!”

Bruce explained, his magically amplified voice echoing off the stadium walls.

“These are Astral Immersion Conduits! For the Second Round of the Strategic Wargaming Event, our participants will not be moving pieces on a map. Their consciousness will be transported directly into the illusionary world!”

Above the arena, the air shimmered and fractured. Four massive ‘Scrying Panes’ materialized, floating curtains of hard-light mana that would broadcast the viewpoints of each participant’s perspective inside the illusion to the audience.

“Let us welcome our surviving commanders to the field!”

From the southern gates, four students marched out onto the sands.

“From the prestigious College of Statecraft, we have Eliza Vance, a Tier-1 Scribe! Luke Herrington, a Tier-3 Magistrate! And Bazba Bordon, a Tier-3 Magistrate!” Bruce announced, pointing to each in turn. “And representing the minor College of Codes and Detection (Statecraft), Marie Isolde, a Tier-2 Iron Key!”

As the four participants took their places beside their respective silver monoliths, the tension in the air was palpable. It was a freezing, bitter hostility. Luke, Bazba, and Marie stood as far apart from each other as physically possible, refusing to even make eye contact. The alliance they had formed in the first round was dead and buried, replaced by a deep-seated paranoia. Bazba had been the first to plunge the knife into the alliance’s back, and none of them had forgotten it.

“Now, those of you doing the math might realize we have a slight discrepancy.”

Bruce said, tapping his chin theatrically.

“As you know, five commanders passed the first round. But the Second Round requires an even number of participants so team vs team format!”

Bruce pointed a finger up toward the VIP boxes.

“Therefore, the tournament committee looked at the final rankings of the first round. And as the only commander to secure two enemy commander flags, Ray Croft has been granted an official ‘bypass’! He is exempt from today’s carnage and will automatically proceed to the Third Round!”

A mix of cheers and groans rippled through the audience. Down on the sands, Luke and Bazba scowled.

“And for those of you who missed the first round, allow me to show you exactly how Ray Croft secured that exemption!”

Bruce grinned, a wicked glint in his eye.

The massive Scrying Panes above the arena flared to life. A highlight reel began to play, instantly projecting high-definition footage of the first round’s events.

The crowd watched in awe as the massive projection showed Ray executing a brutal, surgical decapitation strategy against Gunther Draven, eliminating him alone disguised as a common foot soldier. A heartbeat later, the footage cut to Ray successfully ambushing Arturo Saveed’s rushing troops.

Up in the stands, the magical cameras perfectly captured a live reaction shot of Gunther and Arturo sitting among the spectators. Both eliminated commanders from the first round went violently pale, their faces twisting in absolute, humiliated fury as their defeats were broadcasted to the entire academy.

But Bruce wasn’t done. The climax of the montage didn’t show a glorious cavalry charge or a brilliant spell.

The projection shifted to a quiet, serene clearing. Sitting on a fallen log were Ray Croft and Eliza Vance. They looked incredibly relaxed, casually eating the nutribar rations and sharing a canteen of water.

Then, the Scrying Pane’s perspective slowly rotated, panning away from their peaceful picnic to show what they were actually looking at.

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Down in the muddy ruins of the ruined fortress, the remaining seven commanders and their troops of the alliance, including Luke, Bazba, and Marie were actively tearing each other apart. It was a paranoid frenzy of friendly fire, broken lines, and screaming soldiers. Ray and Eliza had quite literally orchestrated the collapse of their enemies, walked away, and sat down to eat lunch while watching the fireworks.

A heavy, stunned silence fell over the Grand Arena. Then, Cassian let out a booming laugh that broke the tension, and the stadium erupted into hysterics.

Down by the obelisks, Luke Herrington’s face turned a dangerous shade of crimson. Bazba Bordon gripped his longsword so hard his knuckles turned white, and Marie Isolde stared at the screen with an expression of pure, unadulterated murder. They hadn’t known. They had thought they were fighting a desperate war of survival, completely unaware that they were the evening entertainment for a picnic.

Eliza Vance, standing by her pod, simply looked up at the screen and smiled, a wistful, highly amused expression crossing her face as she recalled the memory.

Up in the spectator box, Ray was entirely unbothered by the glares directed at him from the arena floor.

“Oh, you are an absolute menace, a catered picnic date while the rest of the Statecraft nerds murder each other? That is peak psychological warfare.”

Cassian howled, wiping a tear from his eye as he slapped Ray on the shoulder.

“It was an efficient use of downtime.”

Ray replied smoothly, though a small smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“I have to ask,”

Rina said, leaning over Cassian, her eyes wide with genuine academic curiosity.

“When you ate that nutribar… was the illusionary world able to copy the taste and the texture? Or did it have a random taste?”

“It copied it perfectly, The Astral Immersion Conduits possess incredible fidelity. The nutribar was tasty, and the water tasted faintly of iron from the canteens. It’s a terrifyingly perfect copy of reality.”

Ray confirmed, nodding.

Behind them, Svane didn’t laugh. The massive warrior simply looked at Ray, crossed his thick arms, and gave a slow, deep nod of absolute approval. War was not about fairness; it was about efficiency. And Ray had been flawlessly efficient.

Down below, the Scrying Panes wiped clear, returning to a neutral blue glow.

“Alright, let’s get down to business!”

Bruce announced, letting the laughter die down.

“The format for today is a team vs team battle! The team is assigned at random! They will know who their team-mate is once they are transported to the Illusionary world!

Bruce gestured to the four monoliths.

“The Scenario is ‘The Shattered Citadel,’ a massive, ruined fortress-city. The objective is territorial control! Spread across the city are Strongholds of varying sizes. A Small Stronghold is worth 1 point and requires a minimum garrison of 50 troops to hold. A Medium Stronghold is worth 2 points, requiring 75 troops. And the Large Strongholds, the central keep and the cathedral, are worth 3 points, requiring 100 troops to secure!”

Bruce raised his hands, his voice reaching a fever pitch.

“In the first round, you commanded a mere squad of a hundred. Today… you command an army! Each commander will each have 1,000 troops to draft! Step to your consoles and build your legions!”

The four participants stepped up to the glowing runic interfaces on the exterior of their Echo Chambers.

Ray leaned forward, his eyes tracking their rapid selections.

Commander: “Their psychology has fundamentally shifted. The trauma of the first round’s betrayal is dictating their draft. They don’t know who their ally is, which means they trust no one. Watch. They are abandoning their hyper-specialized formations.”

The Grizzled Commander’s voice echoed in Ray’s mind, a phantom cigar flaring to life.

Eliza Vance, who had previously run a pure, vulnerable line of offensive, defensive and support mages, was adapting. She still drafted a heavy core of spellcasters, but she spent a massive chunk of her 1,000-troop limit on a Phalanx of heavy infantry, meatshields specifically designed to lock down chokepoints and protect her glass cannons.

Luke Herrington completely abandoned his arrogant, all-heavy-cavalry rush. He drafted a classic ‘Hammer and Anvil’ composition, five hundred heavy spearmen to hold the line, and five hundred mobile heavy cavalry units to flank. It was a safe, self-sufficient army that didn’t rely on an ally to bail him out.

Bazba Bordon, predicting a grinding siege in the ruins, drafted heavily into combat engineers and destructive siege weapons, pairing them with heavy infantry to crack the strongholds open.

Marie Isolde kept her core of highly mobile, ranged light rangers, but Ray watched her bulk up her frontline with heavy shock-troops, ensuring her archers wouldn’t be instantly overrun if her unknown ally abandoned her.

“The drafting phase is complete!”

Bruce announced.

Eliza, Luke, Bazba, and Marie stepped into their respective Echo Chambers. The heavy doors hissed shut, locking with a definitive, pressurized clack. The external runes shifted from blue to a glowing, active gold. They were physically isolated, their consciousness ripped from the arena and projected into the digital ruins of the Shattered Citadel.

For a moment, Bruce Doyle stood in silence. He looked around the Grand Arena, ensuring the participants were completely deaf to the outside world.

Then, Bruce’s exaggerated, showman smile vanished. It was replaced by a solemn, deeply serious expression. He leaned into his amplification crystal, his voice dropping an octave.

“The participants cannot hear me, they know the rules of the strongholds. They know how to capture the map. But they do not know the hidden mechanic of this trial. A mechanic that we, the organizers, call the Preservation Protocol.”

Bruce told the hushed crowd.

Up in the spectator box, Ray’s eyes narrowed.

“A commander’s job is to achieve victory, but a butcher’s job is to simply feed bodies into a grinder. Solhaven Academy does not train butchers. Therefore, there is a secondary point value in this match. One that operates entirely in the background.”

Bruce said slowly, pacing his platform.

Bruce pointed to the Scrying Panes, where the digital armies of 1,000 troops were materializing around their commanders.

“Every single troop that survives this simulation… is worth exactly one point to their commander’s final score.”

A collective gasp rippled through the stadium.

Cassian sat straight up in his chair.

“By the Founders… it’s a trap. A mathematical trap.”

“Think about it, if a commander throws two hundred men into a bloody, suicidal charge just to capture a Large Stronghold worth 3 points… they haven’t gained a tactical advantage. They have effectively lost 197 points without even realizing it. The true cost of war is the price of life. And today, we will see who treats their soldiers like gold… and who treats them like dirt.”

Bruce announced, his voice echoing over the stunned silence.

In Ray’s mind, the Grizzled Commander let out a low, deeply satisfied hum.

Commander: “Finally. A test of actual command. Any fool can throw a thousand men into a meat grinder to take a hill. It takes a General to take the hill and bring his men home.”

Ray crossed his arms, leaning back in his chair with a cold, predatory smile. This was no longer just a game of capturing points. It was a psychological dissection of leadership. And Ray had a front-row seat to watch four brilliant strategists potentially bleed their own scores dry, completely blind to the true cost of their ambition.

“Let the Battle of the Shattered Citadel… begin!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep