He sat up in his bed. It was the final day before the tournament. He had spent the week redrawing his plans and changing them. He summarized each of the former teammates strengths and weaknesses as he observed them and where he feels they will perform with the most confidence. He also studied how to get himself into situations which will lead to them coming out on top. He had also researched the dungeons in the game and how they could be soloed the easiest. With firearms it would already be easier because they are scaled towards magic and medieval weapons, like swords and bows.

Rumors were being told of a Crimson Regiment who is a large school on the Australian continent run by the Elite for the Elite. The odds were high in their favor to win the tournament as they had much more training time and were aware of the tournament a lot sooner than the factory schools.

In the food hall, he saw Carlos and Ana and decided to try and talk to them. But they stood up and left the table as soon as he sat down, sending a clear message that he was still not welcome or forgiven.

He wrote a letter to his mother saying he missed her and he is sorry that he might have messed up their chances. But he promises he will be back soon and find a factory job quickly to support them.

The next day they were transported by buses to a nearby airport where they were flown to Tenerife, the main island of the Canary islands off the coast of North Africa. When they boarded the plane, he saw an open seat next to Ana and Carlos. He went to sit next to them.

“Listen, I know I am not welcome. I just want to say I am sorry. It wasn’t right of me to blame Emile. And it wasn’t your fault that we ran into Jose and his cronies. Please think about it, we can’t do this alone. There are going to be teams of hundreds if not thousands. Please Ana and Carlos. I don’t have anyone else. But this is my final plea, if you don’t want me near, I will accept it.” After a few minutes of silence he got up to look for another seat. He felt a hand pull him back into the seat.

“Sit your ass down and please tell me again how wrong you were.” Ana said sarcastically.

He looked at her and she was smiling from ear to ear.

“I am really sorry. I shouldn’t have drawn away.” She wrapped her arms around him and planted a kiss on his cheek which made him turn tomato red.

“Aaaaah shucks, I can’t say no to that cute face, come here brother.” Carlos wrapped his arms around them as well and the three of them spent a few seconds enveloped in each other's arms.

“I have a plan guys, but we’re going to need Turner and Emile back.” They were sitting behind them and Turner perked up.

“Already here sir, count us in.”

He flashed him a grateful smile.

“Okay so….” He spent the flight talking to them about his plan and asking whether they agree on it. They were impressed by the amount of work and information he had gained about them.

“You did all of this in one week? Imagine if you did something like this for our interacademy competition.” She rolled her eyes jokingly. “Thank you Luca, you have our support.”

“Good, but we have one missing piece.” He looked at his team which he had miraculously scrambled together again. “Jose”.

Luca could not ignore the fact that Jose has unrivaled charisma and support in the academy. He is going to need his support to gather all the other players into one team. Especially since most of them don’t even know who he is.

—--------

They arrived at the Tenerife airport and deboarded between two iron fences. He looked around him and saw everyone was proudly wearing their blue, black and white shirts. On either side of the fences there was a sea of red, The Crimson Regiment. They were jeering and booing the BlueBird academy as they walked down the lane. Plastic bottles and papers were thrown into the blue crowd from the sides. One red player even grabbed a blue player's backpack but was quickly pulled off by security. Another spat at Jose and he finally cracked.

He leaped into the crowds and started punching the red player and his cronies followed. A chaotic brawl ensued.

“Follow me!” Luca yelled. He grabbed Ana’s hand and pulled her through the crowd of security and blue and red players. A man latched onto Ana’s other arm and she screamed. Luca spun around and saw what was happening. WIthout thinking for a second he punched the man in the face, forcing him to let go of her arm and holding his nose. Not waiting to see what happens, he pushed on.

Suddenly there were gunshots fired into the air and everyone stopped.

“Next person to start a fight gets disqualified and goes to jail for disrupting the Elites plans.”

The crowd separated and the blue players were allowed through freely walking past the sneering red players.

Ahead of them they saw hundreds of long warehouses and in each warehouse were rows and rows of hospital beds.

“Yep! 20 000 of them.” Isabel suddenly said next to him. “How are you guys feeling? Are you guys okay after the fight? They are just intimidated and need to vent their frustrations. No one is in trouble, okay?”

The trio nodded. They could see each warehouse had a flag with a color flag underneath it. Canada was green, USA was purple, Australia was red. They followed the crowd until they reached the Spanish flag and entered the warehouse. Each player was given a tag which showed them their bed number.

They found their beds, and Ana and Luca were next to each other but Carlos was a few rows away. Luca could see panic in his face.

“Don’t worry Carlos. We will find you in-game. Okay? We will meet at the same house we hid in in the interacademy competition. How does that sound?”

Ana and Carlos nodded and he looked visibly more relaxed.

Attached to the long warehouse was another building which Isabel pointed out is the food hall. They will have dinner there and breakfast tomorrow before spawning in.

A siren rang out across the island.

“All competitors, please make your way to your designated food hall. The Elite would like to have a final word with everyone.”

Luca felt nauseous but was careful not to show anything. He had to be strong for Carlos. For Ana.

They found Turner and Emile in the food hall and they all sat together. An intercom beeped and a woman's voice started the announcement.

“Welcome everyone, to the first of many, The Modern Domain world tournament. Well done for getting here. As you may all know, there are a few changes in the final virtual world compared to the inhouse tournament worlds. It will have full LifeSim functionalities like stamina, hunger, thirst, heat and cold. Cities are also up for grabs like the normal Shadow Domain world. Should anyone suspect foul play feel free to open the ingame moderator chat which will contact one of our moderators and they will be in contact. That is all from us. May the best hero win. Good luck.”

There was applause in the food hall with a high tension in the air. The intercom went silent and a ripple of excitement washed through the crowd. Ana, Luka and Carlos went to get food and sat down at their table with Isabel.

“Are you guys ready?”

“Nervous,” Ana said sheepishly.

“Just remember your training and do your best. That is all you can do Ana.” Isabel said reassuringly.

“We trained hard for this Ana, we will be fine. The only luck I see involved in this is the starting frenzy. We don’t know how many teams start in each city, do we?” Turner turned to Isabel.

“No, and he is right. You should have a rendezvous point to meet outside of whichever city our academy spawns in where you could meet as soon as everything settles down. The start is going to be mayhem and it is crucial to survive through it.”

They spent the remainder of dinnertime talking about their plans and making the final changes with Isabel. Luca looked around at the people he had gathered. They had made such a big impact on him in such a short time.

The next morning sirens went off all over the island. Everyone quickly gathered in the food hall and gulped down their food.

“Enjoy your food boys and girls, it’s your last meal for three months.” the dean announced.

Luca glanced at Ana and they made eye-contact. “Ready?” He asked,

“Yep!” she shrieked.

As they finished their food, doctors had begun coming into the warehouse with soldiers helping them set up each bed with the necessary equipment. Large machines and screens had been set up around each bed.

“Whoa, awesome! It looks like a spaceship!” Carlos said.

Luca looked at his bed nervously, he did not trust the Elite with his body for three months, who knows what kind of experiments they could be doing while he is unconscious.

As Ana and Luca got to their beds, Luca couldn’t help but think this was the right time to tell her how he really feels about her.

“Ana, I wanted to tell you something.” But he was interrupted as a doctor walked up to them.

She had long brown hair and had a long white trench coat. Her smile sent shivers down Luca as he realized this is the closest he has come to an Elite. And he hated it.

“Please get into your beds.” She asked, smiling again.

They did as she asked and put a drip in both of their arms. Luca winced, he hated needles.

Luca looked around trying to break the focus from the drip in his arm as she connected him to all the monitors. He saw Isabel walk out of the warehouse and around the corner. She came running back in, with the dean shortly behind her.

An intercom sounded “Launch Tournament in 3…2…1…”

A wave of blackness washed over Luca as he tried to see what the commotion was about.

“It’s a trap! There are only two ways out of this, you win or you die!” the Dean yelled.

He tried fighting the wave of tiredness but was unsuccessful as it dragged his eyes closed.

Right before his eyes closed, he saw a soldier run up to the dean and hit him with his firearm and he fell to the ground.

He was whisked away and felt his body being pulled into his character's body.