Karlos was already walking toward them before Rudra had fully processed the number on the ball.
Rudra's first instinct was to move — not dramatically, not obviously, just a small repositioning that put Arjun slightly between them and gave him a moment to think. He was, genuinely, grateful to Karlos. Without the exam sheet — without that one act of resigned generosity from a complete stranger — Rudra would not be standing in this field right now. That was simply true and he acknowledged it.
But gratitude and wanting to spend four days in a forest with someone were different things entirely.
There was no repositioning available. The number was seven. The ball in Karlos's waving hand was seven. The universe had made its position on this matter very clear and was not accepting feedback.
"Hey, brother! I've been looking everywhere for you!"
Rudra arranged his face into something that was approximately a smile — slightly stiff at the edges but functional — and told himself that Karlos was probably not as chaotic in a forest as he was in conversation. Probably.
"Hi," he said. "And — thank you. For the exam."
Karlos's smile widened to a degree that seemed to involve more of his face than should have been available for that purpose.
"No need to say that, brother! Stay with me and you will become a Deva." He said this with the calm, complete certainty of a man who is not joking.
Rudra heard it. Processed it. Thought about the score that had made Edward use the word "embarrassing." Thought about the fact that Karlos had answered a hundred questions essentially at random and by some mechanism that defied straightforward explanation had arrived at a passing mark.
'I take back my words.'
He looked at Karlos with the expression of someone reconsidering a hypothesis they had just formed.
Either this was a joke — which did not look like a joke from the outside — or Karlos genuinely believed that his presence in a team was something close to a guarantee of success. The confidence required for that belief, given the available evidence, was a specific kind of extraordinary.
"Which number did you get?" Karlos asked, craning to see the ball.
Rudra held it up. "Seven."
The expression on Karlos's face shifted into something that could only be described as joy of a personal, deeply felt variety — the expression of someone for whom this outcome represents a meaningful improvement in the quality of the day.
"Same team as brother! This might be my luckiest day!"
Rudra stared at him for a moment. Something was bothering him — something that had been bothering him since the bench outside the exam hall, and had been bothering him through every subsequent encounter, and had finally arranged itself into a question specific enough to ask.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Anything, brother."
"Why do you keep calling me brother? You add it to almost every sentence. I've been trying to understand if it's a habit or if—"
Karlos looked at him with an expression of mild puzzlement, as though the question had arrived from a direction he hadn't expected.
"I call you brother because everyone in this world is my brother and sister," he said. "That is simply how I see people." A brief pause, and then, with complete sincerity: "I won't judge you if you have feelings for me beyond that, of course."
Rudra stared at him.
"Just call me whatever you want."
'Everyone who walks around with that kind of philosophy is at least partially unhinged.'
Arjun appeared at his shoulder — whether by choice or instinct it was hard to say — and suggested, in the mild tone of someone changing the subject for everyone's benefit, that they should find the remaining members. Three down. Two to go. The team was not taking shape in an encouraging direction but the last two slots remained open and Rudra was choosing to maintain optimism about them.
They found the fourth member near the edge of the forming clusters — a young man, short, standing slightly apart from the nearest group with the contained stillness of someone who was either very calm or had learned to look like it. Black hair pulled all the way back. Round glasses that occupied most of his face in a way that suggested they were as much a feature as a choice. He had the general presentation of someone who had arrived at this exam primarily through preparation rather than physical presence — neatly arranged, carefully still, nothing about the surface of him that suggested easy confidence.
The yong man speaks.
"Nice to meet you I'm Javier."
Rudra extended his soul awareness toward him without making it obvious.
The soul reading came back dim. Not absent — Javier had made it this far, which meant something — but faint in the way of someone whose strength lived elsewhere. Whether that elsewhere was an astra Rudra couldn't see, or simply the understanding of someone who knew where they stood in a physical fight and had other plans, remained to be determined.
Arjun, who had come to the same reading through the same method, arranged his face carefully into a polite expression and introduced them both.
The young man looked at them. Then looked more carefully. Then introduce themselves.
"Wait." His voice was quiet, precise. "Arjun and Rudra? Are you the ones — is Rudra the new holder of the Power Stone?"
'Not again,' Rudra thought.
He nodded.
What happened next was different from the crowd murmuring in the registration field. That had been distant and evaluative, the assessment of strangers who had formed an opinion from across a space. This was up close — Javier's hands finding Rudra's and gripping them with the particular intensity of someone overwhelmed by proximity to something they had previously only heard about.
"It is genuinely an honour to meet you, sir Rudra. I will do everything in my ability during this exam."
Rudra thanked him and gently recovered his hands.
The team stood at four. One slot remaining. And Rudra was allowing himself, by this point, the specific hope that the last member would be the counterweight — someone strong enough to tip the balance of the team into something genuinely competitive. Arjun was reliable. Rudra himself was reliable. Javier was an unknown with a weak soul signature. Karlos was Karlos.
The math required something significant from position five.
They found her near the back of the field.
She was standing alone, which itself said something — either she preferred it or people had instinctively given her space, and both were informative. Her soul signature reached Rudra before he was close enough to see her face clearly — a dense, controlled blue that moved with the settled quality of something trained and directed, not the restless reach of his own or the faint flicker of Javier's. It was the same category of reading he got from Arjun. Someone who had put in serious work and had the results to show for it.
He tried not to let his relief be obvious on his face. He failed slightly.
She noticed them approaching and looked at Rudra with the direct, assessing attention of someone who reads situations quickly and forms conclusions at approximately the same speed.
She also noticed him looking.
"What are you staring at?"
"Sorry — I wasn't trying to be strange about it." Rudra raised a hand. "Your soul. It's very strong. I was reading it."
A pause. The directness in her expression shifted slightly, recalibrating.
He extended his hand. "I'm Rudra. I think we're on the same team. Let's both give it everything."
She looked at the offered hand for a moment, then took it. The handshake was firm, the kind that comes from someone who has never seen the point of a weak one.
"Nice to meet you, Rudra. I'm Sophia."
Team 7 stood complete in the shadow of the Hungry Forest — Rudra, Arjun, Karlos, Javier, Sophia. He looked at each of them in turn, quickly, the way you take stock of resources before committing to a plan.
Arjun — reliable, capable, probably the best tactical mind in the group.
Sophia — strong, controlled, the physical counterweight the team had needed.
Javier — an unknown quantity with a dim soul signature and careful eyes that suggested he was running his own assessment of the team right now.
Karlos — waving at nobody specific in the middle distance, apparently having spotted something interesting.
Rudra exhaled slowly.
'This is going to be a very long four days.'