After reading the message that Hastam had sent. Novis quickly realised that he had reviled something to Hastam that the rest of the world didn't know.

Before Novis knew about Arthur being a bid deal to the VSW community, while logged in as Pendragon he had stated that he still went to school.

Novis was worried that if this information was reviled, he would ever be able to live a normal life. Novis didn't mind the fame but he hated the idea of being famous for something he never did.

If he ever did join pro teams sure he could live a luxury life but it would never be because of his efforts.

However, Novis had sent that message to Hastam about a month ago, yet there hadn't been any other messages and the world still had no idea where this mysterious player was.

Form the information Novis could gather they were still searching several university teams around the world, after releasing it wasn't any of the current pros.

With nothing left to lose, Novis thought he would go ahead and ask Hastam himself.

"Hey I was just wondering but why did you decide to not tell everyone that I was still in school. Surely you could have gotten the bounty for helping find me that everyone is talking about?"

Hastam was actually expecting Novis to send something like this sooner but never did. Hastam then came to the conclusion that Novis must have just been a naive boy in school. Not knowing what the information would have done to him. But the truth was Novis had no idea of his fame at the time.

"The bounty, I don't need money like that I'm already a pro player. Besides, when I realised you were a schoolboy, I decided that it would be best for you to grow and go at your own pace. Not many people can handle becoming a pro and continuing practising at a young age."

This actually wasn't true. Although Hastam felt this way slightly, the truth was when he watched Noivs play the game where George took over for one match and then Arthur the next, Hastam had a theory of his own.

That one of these people were the real player while the other might have been a spirit like Hastam had. What Hastam didn't know was that Novis had two spirits.

But Hastam was in no rush to solve this mystery of his and it was only something he was curious about. When he went to England he would try to meet with the boy.

Reading the message, Novis felt like Hastam was a nice guy. Novis wouldn't go out of his way to meet Hastam but if he was offering him free tickets to a VSW event. Novis felt like why not.

He would be surrounded by plenty of people in a public area and Hastam was a well-known public figure. it was also the chance for him to watch some other players.

"You're a nice guy Hastam, thank you for keeping my secret. I would love to get tickets to the VSW tournament you mentioned as long as it doesn't conflict with my schedule. And hopefully, we can meet up and you can give me some tips."

"That's good to hear, I look forward to seeing you. I'll send over the tickets now, don't worry if you can't come you can give them to a friend or something, just send me your email address and I'll send them over."

After waiting for a few moments, Novis had received an email for a couple of tickets and he spotted something straight away. On the top right-hand corner, it said the tickets were for the Berkshire semi tournament match next Saturday. The same match where Novis's game was to take place.

Novis realised that everything he said so far was a terrible mistake. It was fine Hastam knowing he was Pendragon, after all, it didn't mean the two of them were going to play a match against each other and even if Hastam wanted to, it would be fine, Novis would just switch out with Arthur.

But if Hastam knew who Noivs was and then saw him playing in the game. Surely Hastam a pro player would question Novis about his skills.

Why was he worse than when he played online? It wasn't exactly like Novis could tell Hastam the truth and say, "Hey I have a spirit that's really good at using swords."

With that, Novis had no choice but to lie, he felt kind of bad after how Hastam had treated him but there was nothing he could do.

"Hey, unfortunately, it looks like I got something going on that weekend, maybe next time."

"Ahh that's too bad, if you can't catch the event live in person tune in on Tick, I will be acting as a guest commentator on their platform."

For a brief moment, Novis felt like his hard was thumbing incredibly loud. Keeping a secret as big as this was crazy and hard and it was truly a shame he wasn't able to share this with anyone.

Novis wondered if he was the only person in the world going through something like this now.

****

The next day the Montem team had decided to meet up at Alex's house to watch the match live. Alex had the biggest house out of all of them as well as the biggest T.V Screen.

The six of them were all sitting inside the living room on a single long sofa. In front of them was a table with several snacks and the TV screen was displaying Tick media's live broadcast.

"Hey, are you sure your mum is all okay with this now?" Frank asked.

"Yeah, ever since we had a talk, she had a complete turnaround. It's like I don't even know who she is anymore. She returned all my things and is even supporting me now. I'm happy I can finally play with all you guys again."

"Well I'm glad to, I don't know how you managed to take this kind of team so far but there going to need your help in the next game."

Just then the crowd on the TV screen cheered as the members of the Westgate team walked in.

"Look Novis, is that the Lucas kid you were talking about."

As Novis looked at the screen and the camera gave a close up of Lucas, he felt like something had changed.

The expression on his face used to be that of determination but the expression Lucas carried now, he didn't know what it was.

"I wonder how much better you've got," Novis said.

****

Special thanks to Abhijith_Ramesh and AsuraNineThoughts for the gifts and supporting my work.