Overlord : The Legend of Noa

The Walk of Shame

The evening air bit at Noa's face as he walked home through the Academy district, a three-foot goblin trailing five paces behind him like a particularly embarrassing shadow.

People stared. Of course they stared. Most summoners walked beside their companions with pride: massive wolves padding next to their masters, armored knights marching in formation, even the occasional drake circling overhead. Noa walked alone while his summon scurried after him, too terrified to get closer, too bonded to run away.

Perfect metaphor for his life.

They cut through Market Square, where vendor stalls were closing for the evening. A woman selling roasted nuts caught sight of the goblin and laughed outright. "Hey! Someone lost their pet rat!" Her companions joined in, their laughter sharp as broken glass.

Noa kept walking. Head up. Eyes forward. The trick was to pretend you didn't hear them. Pretend the heat crawling up your neck was from the exercise, not shame. Pretend this was all part of some grand plan that would make sense later.

The goblin whimpered.

"Keep up," Noa muttered without looking back. Harsh, maybe, but he couldn't afford softness right now. Couldn't afford to acknowledge that this creature was just as miserable as he was, that they were both victims of whatever cosmic joke the Array had decided to play.

They reached the residential quarter as twilight settled over the city. The Frost home sat at the end of a modest street: three stories of weathered stone, iron-barred windows, a garden that Noa's mother had loved before the sickness took her five years ago. Now it was just a house where three people lived separate lives under one roof.

Noa paused at the gate. Through the window, he could see his father moving in the study. Shoulders rigid. Glass of amber liquid in hand. Not looking toward the door.

The goblin bumped into Noa's leg, having been too focused on its own webbed feet to notice they'd stopped.

"Sorry," it squeaked. First word it had spoken. Voice like rusted hinges.

Noa didn't respond. He pushed through the gate, crossed the garden path, and opened the front door.

The house smelled like disappointment and old leather. Noa's father had retreated to his study, the door closed with a finality that spoke louder than words. From upstairs came the sound of alchemical equipment bubbling. Lyss, then. His younger sister, fourteen and already showing promise in potion-craft that didn't rely on summons at all. Smart girl. She'd chosen a path that didn't hinge on one ceremony's outcome.

"Noa?" Her voice drifted down the stairs. "That you?"

"Yeah."

Footsteps thundered down. Lyss appeared on the landing: dark hair tied back in a messy bun, amber eyes bright with curiosity, acid stains on her work apron. She took in Noa's expression, then looked down at the goblin huddled near the doorframe.

"Oh," she said. Not laughing. Not pitying. Just observing. "So it's true."

"News travels fast."

"Marcus Vrell's been bragging about his Flame Berserker all over the market. Said you got..." She gestured vaguely at the goblin. "Is it really E-rank?"

"According to the Array."

Lyss descended the rest of the stairs, crouched down to the goblin's level. It pressed itself against the wall, clearly expecting cruelty. She extended her hand slowly, palm up. Non-threatening.

"Hey there," she said softly. "I'm Lyss. What's your name?"

The goblin blinked its enormous golden eyes. Looked at Noa. Looked back at Lyss. "Name?"

"You must have a name. Everyone has a name."

"Goblins don't..." It trailed off, uncertain.

"Well, you're not in the spawning pits anymore. You're in our world now. You should have a name." Lyss smiled, and something in the goblin's posture softened slightly. "How about I call you Raze? You know, like raise the stakes, but shorter."

"Raze," the goblin tested the word. A pause. Then the smallest nod. "Raze is okay."

Noa watched this interaction with a mix of gratitude and resentment. Of course Lyss could make it look easy. She wasn't the one who'd have to explain this disaster to instructors, to classmates, to everyone who'd already written him off as the Academy's biggest joke.

"You eaten yet?" Lyss asked, straightening up.

"Not hungry."

"Wasn't asking you." She looked at Raze. "Come on. Let's see what we have in the kitchen. You like cheese?"

Raze's eyes widened. "Cheese?"

"I'll take that as a yes." Lyss headed toward the kitchen, and after a moment's hesitation, Raze followed. Noa was left standing in the entryway, watching his little sister show more kindness to his summon in five minutes than he'd managed in three hours.

Some hero he was turning out to be.

Upstairs, in his room, Noa collapsed onto his bed and stared at the ceiling. Somewhere below, he could hear Lyss chattering away, Raze's occasional tentative responses, the sounds of a kitchen being raided. Normal sounds. Pleasant sounds. Sounds that made the quiet in his own head feel louder by comparison.

He pulled out his slate (a crystal-screen device that connected to the Academy's data archives) and began searching: Goblin tactical applications.

The results were sparse.

E-rank summons: utility roles (pack-carrying, camp maintenance, basic scouting)

Goblin combat potential: minimal (recommend reassignment to non-combat tracks)

Notable goblin summoners: [No records found]

Noa scrolled through page after page of academic dismissals. Goblins were considered starter summons for the incompetent, or punishment assignments for students who'd cheated and been caught. No one serious worked with E-rank creatures. No one successful, anyway.

He tried another search: Overflow mana cores.

More dead ends. Overflow was a defect, a genetic abnormality that caused mana to pool incorrectly. It created strange readings on summoning arrays, occasionally resulted in unusual summons, and generally marked you as defective goods. There were medical treatments (suppressants that dulled your magical capacity to more "normal" levels) but they were expensive and, according to the forums, made you feel like you were living underwater.

No thanks.

Noa was about to close the slate when he noticed something in the overflow mana research section: a footnote, barely visible, leading to a restricted file. [Access requires Instructor clearance or special research permissions]

He clicked anyway, expecting to be denied.

The screen flickered. Then: [Temporary access granted: Student ID #2847. Duration: 10 minutes. Courtesy of Professor Seris Vale]

Noa's breath caught. Seris Vale. His combat theory instructor. The only teacher who'd never looked at him like he was wasting her time. She must have flagged his ID, given him access to something she wasn't supposed to share.

The file opened. It was a research paper, decades old, written by someone named Dr. Kieran Thorne: "Anomalous Summoning Patterns in Overflow Mana Subjects: Evidence of Hidden Variables in Array Calibration"

Noa skimmed the abstract. His pulse quickened.

...analysis suggests that overflow mana creates resonance patterns incompatible with standard Array configurations... subjects consistently summon below their theoretical capacity... possibility of Array misreading... recommend recalibration protocols...

He read further. Thorne had documented seventeen cases of overflow summoners who'd been assigned E or D-rank creatures despite showing high tactical aptitude. In his follow-up studies, he'd discovered something interesting: when these summoners used direct channeling (bypassing the Array entirely), they could access different results. One subject had even managed to...

The file ended abruptly. [Remaining pages classified by Director's Office, Year 487]

Valen's office. Of course. Any research that suggested the Array might be flawed, that the system might be wrong, would threaten the entire power structure. Better to bury it.

Noa sat back, mind racing. Hidden variables. Misreading. Direct channeling. What if his "failure" wasn't failure at all? What if it was something else, something the Array couldn't properly measure?

What if...

A knock at his door interrupted the thought.

"It's open."

Lyss poked her head in. "Raze is asleep in the spare room. Curled up like a cat. It's actually kind of adorable." She paused, reading his expression. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Just research."

"Find anything useful?"

"Maybe." He closed the slate. "Lyss, what do you know about Array calibration?"

She leaned against the doorframe. "Not much. They taught us basic theory in prep class, but the actual mechanics are proprietary. Academy secret, you know. Why?"

"Just curious." He couldn't tell her more. Not yet. Not until he understood it himself. "Thanks for being nice to Raze."

"He's sweet. Scared, but sweet. I think he'll grow on you."

"Maybe."

Lyss studied him for a long moment. "Noa, what happened today it doesn't define you. You know that, right?"

He wanted to believe her. Wanted to think that one ceremony couldn't determine his entire future. But the look in his father's eyes, the laughter in the Hall, the weight of forty-seven successful summons pressing against his one spectacular failure.

"We'll see," he said instead.

After Lyss left, Noa tried to sleep. Couldn't. His mind kept circling back to the research paper, to the hidden variables, to the possibility that the Array had been wrong. That he wasn't broken.

Just misread.

Around midnight, he finally drifted off, dreams full of equations and error codes and golden eyes staring at him with a mix of fear and desperate hope.

He woke to knocking. Not on his door. On the front door downstairs. Urgent, official knocking that made his stomach drop before he was even fully conscious.

Noa stumbled down the stairs in his sleeping clothes. Through the frosted glass, he could see the silhouette of an Academy courier. He opened the door.

The courier (a bored-looking woman in official uniform) thrust a sealed envelope at him without preamble. "Noa Frost?"

"Yes."

"Delivery from the Director's Office. Requires immediate acknowledgment." She held out a data-slate for his signature.

Noa signed, numb. Took the envelope. Heavy paper. Academy seal pressed into red wax. The kind of correspondence that changed lives, never for the better.

The courier left without another word.

Noa stood in the doorway, envelope in hand, dawn light just beginning to creep over the city's eastern walls. Behind him, he heard movement. Raze, padding down the stairs, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

"What is?" the goblin asked.

"Don't know yet."

He broke the seal. Pulled out a single sheet of official letterhead. Read:

TO: Noa Frost, Student ID #2847

FROM: Office of the Director, Ardent Academy

RE: Academic Placement

Due to your summoning results, you are hereby assigned to Probation Class, Section D. This placement is reserved for students requiring additional support and observation. Report to Training Yard Seven tomorrow at 06:00 hours. Failure to attend will result in immediate expulsion.

Class survival rate (five-year average): 34%

Director Valen extends his sympathies for your difficult summoning and wishes you the best in your remedial education.

The letter slipped from Noa's fingers, drifting to the floor like a death sentence disguised as academic policy.

Probation Class.

Survival rate: 34%.

Behind him, Raze picked up the fallen paper, studied it with those too-large eyes, and whispered, "What does survival rate mean?"

Noa stared at the brightening horizon and knew with perfect clarity that the real ceremony hadn't been yesterday in the Grand Hall.

It would be tomorrow, at dawn, in Training Yard Seven.

Where two-thirds of students didn't come back.