Chapter 8 · Dropped Into Witch Academy at Midnight - Chapter 8: First Match. Don't Die.

The arena smells like burnt ozone and fear sweat. I'm standing in the prep tunnel, hands shaking, while the crowd noise rolls over me like a physical thing. Rena's beside me, adjusting her gloves for the third time in a minute.

"Stop fidgeting," I tell her.

"Stop looking like you're about to puke," she shoots back.

Fair.

The tournament bracket went up this morning. Rena drew some fourth-year with a fire specialty. I got someone named Delacroix who apparently summons ice constructs. Neither of us is supposed to win. We're cannon fodder. The warm-up acts before the real fighters take the stage.

Except I've got this thing inside me that keeps trying to eat people at midnight, and Rena's been running interference for me for two weeks straight. If she gets hurt because I'm too chickenshit to use whatever the hell I actually am—

"You're spiraling," Rena says. "I can hear it from here."

"I'm fine."

"You're a terrible liar." She turns to face me, and her expression goes serious. Rena doesn't do serious often. "Look. You go out there, you do your fake light-show bullshit, you lose pretty. I go out there, I try not to get third-degree burns.