The editor of the games does not fight, does not bleed and does not lose. He sits under the awning with a stick of chalk and sets the ten of them against each other, two names at a time, and that is the whole of his labour.

No man here chooses who he meets on the sand.

He chooses only which of his fighters come up out of the dark.

Beneath the arena there is a corridor of cages and a lift on four ropes, and a winchman who raises whoever he is pointed at and leaves the rest where they are.

Daniel went down there before the gates opened.

He walked the corridor with a lamp, past men who stood up when the light reached them, and he stopped and pointed at Jayden Daniels.

Two cages further along, Shedeur Sanders had both hands through the grille.

The lift went up. The bolt shot home behind it.

Daniels came out into the noise and gave Daniel 3.22.

Under the floor, in the dark, Sanders was worth 35.96. Between the two of them lay 32.74 points, one boy in the sunlight and one boy behind iron, and Daniel had personally decided which was which.

He was not finished. All along that corridor, when the sand was raked at the end of it, there was 51.54 left standing in cages.

What came up top was 98.76. Least of anyone in the building. Put him against every other man on the card and he loses to all nine of them, one after another, without a single reprieve.

The man the chalk had actually given him was Eric/Blakey, who have lost this pairing six times out of eight across their lives and who took him apart by 30.54 without ever appearing to hurry. Second win running. Still 5-9, still ninth, but they walked off the sand and Daniel did not.

Then the editor came down the steps himself, carrying the belt.

It is old bronze and it does not shine any more, because it is not given for defeat. Losing is ordinary here. The belt is for the man who arms the wrong half of his household and then goes out to die in front of a crowd. Bolek had worn it exactly one week. He handed it over without a word and Daniel stood there while it was buckled on him.

Justin's cages were empty.

All of them. The winchman went down after and had nothing to do; every door stood open, every man had been brought up into the light, and there was not one point left under that arena belonging to Justin.

He fought with the whole of what he owned and it came to 100.02.

Only one man in FantasyWorld did less. Against the field he goes 1-8. A morning of absolutely flawless preparation, and it was the second-smallest thing on the sand.

The man opposite him was Nate, who had 130.18 and rather a lot riding on it.

Because there is a wooden sword in this place. It hangs behind the editor's chair, and it is handed down to a fighter on his hundredth victory, at which point he is finished with the sand for good and everybody stands up.

Nate now has ninety-nine.

He has been walking toward that thing all autumn with the crowd getting quieter each week. He has it in his sight. He took the ninety-ninth off a man who did nothing wrong at all, which is how these things get taken.

Justin is on ninety-seven and went out through the far gate with a clean record and a beating.

Bryan's champion went down before the crowd had settled.

Jalen Hurts is worth better than twenty on an ordinary week. He fell in the opening moments, in front of everyone, and contributed 0.4 to the rest of the day.

Bryan won anyway.

By 0.7.

Understand what that is. For a season and a half this column has watched Bryan bring the tidiest, hardest, most complete work in FantasyWorld onto this sand and be sent home in the dark. He is now winning. He is winning with the seventh-best showing on the card, three men in the arena beat what he did and he still went to the gate. Third straight time.

The man he stepped over was Jack, who leads FantasyWorld at 9-5 and who, set against the whole card, goes 2-7.

Bill had the best morning anyone had.

147.52. Nine out of nine against the field. There was nobody in the building who could have stood in front of him, and the chalk had given him Bolek, who is 3-11 and who fought better than his season and lost by 30.1 for the trouble.

For three months Bill picked the wrong man out of the cages and was waved through regardless. Then he started bringing everything, and was beaten twice for it. This time he brought everything and it was rewarded, and at the end of it he is 7-7 and fifth, which is what this place pays for competence when the chalk is not in the mood.

Mario killed more than anyone again — 138.36, with 33.2 of it off Puka Nacua alone, and 1976.78 for the season, a number no other man in this arena can see the back of. It buys him third.

Gabes brought the fifth-best of the ten, which is more than he has brought in a month, and this was the week he was set against Mario. He lost 120.02 to it and stayed second.

When the crowd had gone, the winchman went back down with a lamp to open what was still locked.

He let Sanders out last. Thirty-five points and change came up the ramp into an arena with nobody in it, blinking at the light, ready.