The air on the pitch was cold and clear—the charged silence before a storm.
Leo stood in his jersey with fourteen other unchosen players, his heart a frantic drum against his ribs.
Thump-thump-thump-thump.
Coach Arkady's selection had been precise. A pale finger, a judge's gavel, pointing: King. Max. Eight others—a mix of cool seniors and two terrifyingly fast juniors. The Chosen Ten.
Leo's name was not called.
He stood with the leftovers—fifteen of them. The stone of dread in his gut was so heavy he felt rooted to the turf.
"Forty-five minutes," Arkady announced, his voice flat as a blade. "Chosen ten versus the rest. No goalkeeper."
The unfair math hung in the air, a sick equation. Ten organized players against fifteen disorganized ones. And five of those fifteen, Leo included, were pure strikers. They were a surplus of ambition with no structure.
A hand shot up. Frank—the senior with the embroidered headband who'd slapped hands with Miller.
He had the face of a friendly brawler and a voice that carried. "Coach, hold up. They're ten, we're fifteen. No keeper? What formation do we even use? We've got too many mouths to feed up front."
Arkady looked at him with the mild disgust of a chef watching someone drown a perfect steak in ketchup. "Not all of you need to play. Remove five strikers. Problem solved."
The command echoed in the hollow of Leo's chest
If I'm subbed now, it's over. The thought cut through the fog of dread with a clarity that was almost painful.
Frank was a striker. He'd pick his friends. Leo had exchanged one sentence with him all year. That was not a lifeline.
Then it happened. A chemical cascade.
Adrenaline, cold and electrifying, flooded Leo's system. It wasn't fear; it was fuel. His vision tunneled, the periphery blurring into a green haze.
Before Frank could open his mouth to start the culling, Leo moved.
He stepped forward, his body acting on instinct. "Fine!" His voice sliced through the murmur, sharper and harder than he'd ever heard it. It didn't sound like his.
"Me, Frank, and you." He pointed a rigid finger at a random, lanky striker in their group whose name he didn't know. "We play. The rest of you strikers, sub out."
Silence. Then a low ripple of shock, like a stone dropped in a pond.
A burly kid with a buzzcut,Granger stepped forward, his nostrils flaring. "Who the hell put you in charge, rookie? Frank chooses."
Let go of this power now, and it's over. You become background noise. It was like someone was whispering in Leo's ear.
Leo didn't argue. He moved.
Three quick, predatory strides brought him nose-to-nose with Granger. He locked eyes and let every ounce of the cold, focused fury from the last forty-eight hours pour into his gaze—the phantom sting of Rin's steal, the weight of King's dismissive glance, the hollow echo of "you'll get a free ticket."
He channelled his father's analytical chill, Arkady's pitiless stare. He became a mirror of every intimidating force he'd ever faced.
The effect was instant and physical. Granger's bluster evaporated. His eyes, wide and suddenly unsure, flickered. A single, traitorous bead of sweat escaped his hairline and traced a shaky path down his temple.
His breathing hitched. He wasn't looking at a scrawny rookie anymore. He was looking at contained detonation.
Leo held the stare for one eternal, crushing second—long enough for everyone to see the senior defender wilt—then broke it. He turned to Frank, his own breathing unnervingly calm. "Do you have a problem?"
Frank's eyes darted from Leo's hardened face to Granger's, who gave a weak, almost imperceptible shake of his head.
A slow, intrigued grin spread across Frank's face. It wasn't friendly; it was the look of a hunter who's just heard a new, dangerous animal call in the woods. His own adrenaline was up now, responding to the challenge.
"Nah," Frank rumbled, his voice low and charged. "No problem at all."
From the sideline, Miller snorted around a mouthful of pizza. "Oh, this'll be fun. The runt's got teeth. King's not gonna like having another general on his field."
Coach Arkady's lips twitched in the barest ghost of something—not a smile, but an acknowledgment of a correct variable being introduced. "Good. Five minutes."
The five unselected strikers shuffled off, casting longing, pathetic glances at Miller's pizza box.
As they passed, he held out the last slice. Hands reached. With a triumphant, mocking grin, he shoved it whole into his own mouth, chewing with exaggerated pleasure.
────────────
The ten leftovers huddled, a knot of vibrating nerves. Panic was a sour tang in the air. Leo could smell it.
"This is suicide," a midfielder named Perez hissed, his hands trembling so badly he fumbled the laces on his cleats.
"King will pick us apart in three passes,"another moaned, his eyes glued to the opposite huddle where King stood, serene and regal as a statue.
"No keeper?One lucky punt from midfield and we're finished!"
Frank hushed them with a sharp, chopping motion of his hand that brooked no argument. He turned to Leo, his eyes gleaming with a battle-ready light. "Alright, psycho. You got us here. The floor is yours. What's the play?"
"Listen up," Leo said adjusting the glasses, his voice unnervingly steady. "You're all right. On paper? We're trash. Coach knows it. They know it." He jerked his chin towards the Chosen Ten.
A few flinched, but they were listening. Brutal honesty was an anchor in their sea of panic.
"But that's our only weapon. They see a mess. They see panic. They see the guys Coach didn't want first."
He leaned in, his gaze a laser sweeping the circle. "My dad coached a player. Trevor Smith. Technically, he was a mess. Couldn't pass a fitness test to save his life. But on the pitch? He was a beautiful, brilliant, unpredictable mess. He played football like a jazz solo—you never knew the next note, and neither did the defense. That chaos won games when used well."
He saw a flicker of understanding in Frank's eyes.
"We have to surprise them. And to do that," Leo's voice dropped, conspiratorial and intense, "we have to surprise ourselves. Play the pass you think is too stupid. Make the run that feels insane. Forget the playbook. Your only job is to be a problem they didn't prepare for. Be a fire in their orderly kitchen."
He locked eyes with the trembling Perez. "And King? I've seen him rattled. He's the sun their whole system orbits. You knock him off his axis, just once, make him chase you, and the whole machine grinds."
A spark, faint but definite, caught in Perez's eyes. The trembling didn't stop, but it changed—from fear to a vibrating wire of potential energy.
"Arkady doesn't expect us to win," Leo finished, the final piece of the madness clicking into place. "He expects us to fight. To shine. Every one of you—if you get one moment, one flash of brilliance that forces him to look twice at his clipboard, you make the team. Play for that moment. Not the scoreboard."
Frank clapped a heavy, calloused hand on Leo's shoulder, the grip firm, sealing a pact. "Chaos. I can do chaos." His grin was all teeth. "I can tell King would go 3-4-1-2. It allows him to shine. So what's out formation?"
"We go 4-1-2-1-2. A tight, narrow diamond," Leo said, sketching it rapidly in the air. "Frank and I up top, as twin spearheads. We target the space behind their wingbacks—drag them out, make them scared to push up. Everyone else, stay compact. Make the field feel small and suffocating for them. Clog the middle."
It was simple. It was aggressive. It was a plan born of desperation and insight.
They piled their hands into the center, a knot of sudden, desperate belief. "On three!" Leo barked.
"Chaos!"Frank roared, his adrenaline pumping.
"THREE…TWO… ONE…"
"CHAOS!"they bellowed, hands exploding skyward, a brief, defiant eruption of sound.
The sound was raw, unfiltered, a primal roar that momentarily silenced the birds in the distant trees. For a second, the Chosen Ten across the field stopped their polished warm-ups and looked over.
────────────
Across the pitch, the atmosphere was one of serene, cold efficiency. A stark contrast to the frenetic energy of the Chaos Committee.
"3-4-1-2," King stated. It wasn't a suggestion; it was a deployment order. "Both of you are up front. Don't disappoint me." He pointed to a speedy-looking junior striker, Thomas and Max.
He looked over to the last striker. "You're right wing-back. If you have an issue with that, the bench is warm and your tryout is over."
King then turned his full attention to Max. A smirk, thin and cruel, played on his lips. "You're decent, Freeman. Quick. Don't be garbage today… like your friend Leo."
Max, who had been calmly stretching his hamstrings, went perfectly still. The easygoing, hustler's mask melted away. When he looked up, his eyes were flat, hard chips of obsidian. The friendly rivalry was gone. "If he is garbage, then you're brothers."
King's eyebrow arched, amused by the resistance, the spark of insubordination. Before he could verbally smother it, the air was torn apart.
The sound wasn't a whistle. It was the shrieking, otherworldly war-cry of Arkady's mouth-whistle, a sound that bypassed the ears and vibrated in the teeth.
Time was up.
The teams spread across the pitch. Leo took his place beside Frank at the center circle. The ball sat innocently at Frank's feet. Arkady stood on the sideline, a statue of silent, absolute judgment.
The second whistle blew, clean, sharp, and final.
Frank tapped the ball to Leo.
In that instant, the world didn't just focus—it ignited.
The system painted the field in a blazing grid of glowing tactical lines. Leo could see the whole field more clearly than ever.
Every sense was dialed to eleven. Every detail was a piece of the equation.
The slaughterhouse trial was over.
The real game, the beautiful, brutal experiment, had begun.
[MATCH PARAMETERS SET.]
[TEAM DESIGNATION: CHAOS COMMITTEE (USER-DEFINED). FORMATION: 4-1-2-1-2 DIAMOND.]
[OPPOSITION: CHOSEN TEN. FORMATION: 3-4-1-2. PRIMARY THREAT: KING VANCE (#10).]
[PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: FORCE COACH ARKADY TO RE-EVALUATE. SECONDARY OBJECTIVE: DISRUPT KING'S AXIS.]
[INITIATING REAL-TIME TACTICAL OVERLAY...]