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  Before the games begin from Shiro's perspective.

  "you know Titania, Ren is quite a hard worker, he's one of the strongest people I've ever known, but he tends to have an awkward way of fumbling into things, and his luck with people isn't great, he's quite straight forward, so he can get caught up in schemes pretty easily, so I'm hoping he has a good time here in Dragons Nest."

  "You reached out to him because he's important to you right? you even had me tamper with his boss so that he would end up getting fired, it felt pretty scummy to do that Shiro"

  "It will work out Titania, I have faith that this project will be for the better rather than the worse"

  "Yea.. I just feel bad for him, I hope his partner is better than mine"

  "Hey come on that's not nice, look at how strong we are now, its thanks to my strategy we've gotten this far"

  "I still don't.."

  "oh look there's Ren the upload started alright so let's see what kind of partner Ren gets, what do you think, Titania? He seemed to think size-types were pretty cool?”

  “Your companion isn't based on what you think looks cool. There are a number of factors. Hmm, if I had to guess, I would say I'm pretty sure he'll be paired with a woman. As for the type, maybe something with fire?”

  “Hm, how do you figure that?” Shiro asked with a raised eyebrow

  “Well, I can't tell you all the details of how pairings work, but most of the time, guys get paired with girls and vice versa, as for why I think he might get paired with someone with fire, ehh it's a hunch”

  Shiro opened up a tab on his D-Vice opening a custom stream of the upload Ren was in, getting a view of the beginning of Rens's first contact with his companion It was a unique benefit he had as one of the top players for the current testing period.

  “looks like I guessed right, Fire element, and it's a woman”

  “How can you tell it's a woman?

  “Intuition”

  He gives her an eyebrow raise

  “Uh-huh, and that ring on his hand? A spirit type?”

  “Yep Fire spirit, firebird shape, from what I can tell at first glance it seems she's got the combustible body skill”

  “So it's a flying bomb, huh, wait, look at the flames spreading and setting the forest on fire, I thought the forest of beginnings was immune to status spread?”

  “Guess she’s got spirit fire as well though I don't think either of them knows what they're doing but they're about to anger a lot of mentors”

  The fire begins to spread, and Shiro swipes on the screen of his D-Vice, going through the perspectives of the different new players. The Forest of Beginnings was the name of that forest. It was the first zone that all of the new players were dropped into. Naturally, it was flush with resources for new players and had plenty of space for those who wished to just be peaceful and look for items or plants to give them a bit of a boost, but now…

  Scenes of spreading flames, unaware newbies playing with their new companions caught up in flames and then quickly consumed by the blaze, plants, and fruits made for weak new companions to grow were turned to ash, and ruby red crystals were left in their wake as the fire expanded and the blaze intensified. More and more players were consumed in the fire until nearly all of them had been eliminated.

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  Shiro looks up at the big screen where scene after scene of confused or panicking new players and companions caught flame and were quickly disconnected. The fire had grown to be too much for these new players who didn't know what they were doing.

  Then the screen focused on one player whose beast created a wall of clouds and wind before it leaped out of the trees and began running through the air on a path of clouds as it pursued the arsonist who had set the whole starter zone aflame

  Then the lion landed in front of Ren and his bird

  “Ah he might be done for here, that bird of his has no defensive capability, and its basic offensive isn't strong enough to win head-to-head. Shiro, can't we head over now?”Titania looked impatient as she worriedly glanced at The footage of Ren avoiding a bite from the lion as he ran into the smoke

  “We can't yet, and let's just watch I have confidence in Ren he might be able to figure something out”

  Several veteran players were yelling in the stands.

  “That's not fair, setting fire to the whole starter zone, nobody had a chance!”

  “All of the fruits and enhancement plants are burnt up now my trainee is going to be put behind”

  “Lilly! Damn it damn, now she's probably going to hate the game, I'm going to kill the guy who set that fire and whoever his damn mentor is”

  “The spirit trees are supposed to be immune to flame effects how could a fire spread like that, this has got to be a bug”

  …

  Shiro sat back down after he had surveyed all of the upset players

  “Ah looks like he chose to run away from the lion, well I can't blame him, he doesn't have many options against it, his bird is more of an area Denial Damage over time specialist for now, he would have gotten munched if he tried to win in a straight up fight, it was a good move using the smoke screen though, we will have to see how much time it buys him.

  “It will be nice to have a friend to fight alongside, though my vines aren't gonna like fighting alongside her fire, I hope she's at least a team player. I've heard firebirds tend to be hot-headed and stubborn, "Hey Shiro, what will we do if we don't get along? that Ren guy already seemed like a headache?”

  “You'll just have to figure that out if it comes to it, you're her senior anyways so just stay calm and communicate with her, it's not like she poses any threat to you just think of her like a new co-worker or something as for Ren well he's just tired don't worry about it”

  Then Shiro quickly focuses back on the footage

  “Oh! she detonated herself, she's quite the serious loyal type to blow herself up for a guy she just met, guess Ren's not going to be able to do much more, hmm though I don't think there's going to be any more people coming for him until they lift the restriction. If she's that self-sacrificing she will probably listen to Ren pretty well which is good, unlike some companions… “

  he gives Titania a look of judgment

  meanwhile, I almost died the first time because you wanted me to swear to serve you and never look at another woman the first time we met.”

  “Well you looked like a wimp so I was disappointed, with you, but I guess his little firebird liked what she saw”

  I looked up from the screen and as I did an announcement was made that it was finally time for the regulars to join in. Normally the ten-minute head start was so the newbies could harvest without any worries and settle any fights amongst themselves before stepping out onto the more advanced areas if they chose to. This time it was simply a buzzer announcing that Ren was about to be hunted, by all the annoyed veterans who just had their trainees destroyed

  “We better get in there. He's going to be defenseless now that his little birdie’s all blown up” Titania said excitedly, jumping up and down on the screen.

  Shiro stood up and walked over to one of the capsules, plugging his D-Vice back into the chair to re-upload Titania's info into the game.

  “Time to go protect Ren from anybody who's out for blood, heh my buddy sure knows how to make an entrance”

  Shiro walked down to a pod along with the other veterans, a few recognized him as one of the long-time players.

  some were intimidated knowing he was going to be joining the upload session, and a few whispered spreading ideas of what it meant that he was joining a new player Upload.

  "Does this mean, one of the top players, Shiro the guy called The Tree at the end of time, has chosen someone as his duo partner, for the tournament?"

  "do you think, they were already eliminated? or could it be that the one burning all of the competition is Shiro's protege?"

  "well that's not hard to tell, look at his grin, we should team up and try to kill him and his little arsonist."

  Shiro lay down in the pod, plugging Titania into the system once more.

  "I can't wait to see the surprise on Rens's face when he sees our fortress."