"Well, if it was solely up to me, I wouldn't be at these exams at all. I'm doing it for the safety and well-being of my home region."

I raise an eyebrow at her words, and she continues.

"Every region has to enroll at least one applicant per year to stay in the good faith of the Association and continue receiving its aid and protection."

It begins to make sense why none of the other strong hunters from that region are here. I recall seeing dozens of worthy applicants strong enough to enter these exams in the Talton jungle.

She leans in closer to me.

"If by chance I do manage to pass the exams this year, I'm not accepting a license. I'm just here to show up and do my part."

"Makes sense. I guess we're all here at the B-class exams for our own reasons."

I scan her status again to double-check my findings as I remember them from when I did a brief scan of her in the Talton region and find interesting results.

The armor with mythic-grade body hardening and spear with a +300% strength buff plus all of the other boosts appear to be used and even have grown slightly.

Even in the past few days since I left, it seems she's trained and tested out this gear against some high-level adversaries.

She has advanced grade mana manipulation and a legendary grade body hardening skill. Despite being in the mid-level 600s, her skill upgrades aren't optimized. It seems like she either used an upgrade crystal before level 600 and wasn't able to increase her mana manipulation to extreme grade, or it automatically prioritized her body hardening skill.

I think about ways this could be optimized in the future, and wonder how her mana manipulation skill works without access to any other elements. I want to see it in action.

While pondering this thought, the line of group A applicants moves on and I introduce her to Ember under his false identity of Emrie and we both explain our fake backstory.

For the most part, I think Marcie believes us, but there is a fire burning beneath her eyes that sees this whole exam a lot differently than everyone else here.

I can't quite tell what's on her mind, but decide not to pry and keep the conversation very surface level.

The line doesn't move too slowly, but it doesn't move fast either.

It takes over a full 2 hours for everyone to make it through before the wind magic proctor with the golden collar comes out of the door and floats above us to speak again.

"Group B, please line up in single file according to your corresponding numbers. Stage 2, the physical exam will now begin."

We do as he says and line up, Ember and I agree that we will both go a bit above and beyond during these tests to make up for the lack of information we had in the previous stage. The goal is still to pass these exams and get as close to the upper management of the Association as possible.

I watch applicant 31 enter the door in the wall first, and the line slowly begins to move.

Ember is about a dozen people ahead of me in line. It takes another hour and a half before it's his turn to enter.

Once he leaves behind those closed doors, it takes almost another 2 hours for my turn to finally come.

As the doors automatically open, I'm greeted by the same collared proctor on the other side.

Once the door closes, he speaks up with a confident smile.

"I remember you."

His eyes lower down to a silver tablet in his hand, then down to my wristband.

"Number 59? I would have guessed you would rank much higher from your performance at the front gate. Top 20 or maybe even top 15 was my initial guess."

He shrugs.

"Well, there's still plenty of tests to raise those ranks. The written exam is weighted as a large portion of this exam, but there's still a chance for you if you are exceptional in the following stages. Please, follow me this way."

I do as he says and follow him toward a series of magic mechanical devices I see lined up across the massive room.

It's over 500 meters to the back wall where another door rests, and the room itself is at least a kilometer wide. It's split into a few sections, but he brings me to a large black cube that is heavily bolted into the ground first.

It seems very familiar, and it doesn't click in my head what this device is until he tells me.

"This will be a standard strength test. Use as much armor, running start, or mana as you wish. The only valid attacks on this machine will be a direct punch or kick, please do take your time."

He motions for me to make an attack on the cube then steps back.If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

I remember using one of these devices back in Valor city before being accepted into the fight arena. It will give a numbered score estimating my strength.

Back then, I had far less control over my power, but now I'm very capable of doing so and can make this device light up to whichever number I wish.

With very low written test scores, if I want any chance of making it into the top 12, I'm going to need to up my game quite a bit.

I step up to the black cube and get ready to punch it in its center.

I picture the mana control of the two strongest applicants in this whole exam, the lightning and water users from the Apex region, and tone my own strength down just a small amount.

I want to give a good score, but don't want to make it obvious that I'm the strongest hunter in this whole event, that would raise a lot more red flags than I want.

Once I can picture the perfect strength of a level 750 monster in my mind, I lunge forward and cover my fist in equivalent mana shielding imbued with lightning magic to match it.

A loud mana-on-mana twang echoes throughout the room as the instructor grins and looks down at his silver tablet where my number score must be.

He looks up at me with a more appreciative expression now while he points to the next strength test.

"That's more like it, I knew you were strong."

The next test is a long curved metal bar that is connected to the floor, the instructor tells me to pull it upward as hard as I can. It appears to be testing grip strength and leg strength, not only pure power of a strike.

The next test is a large crystal orb on a table, whenever the orb turns green, I'm told to send as much mana as possible into it through my fingertips in as dense wavelengths as I can.

Between each green light, I'm provided a high-grade mana potion to regenerate my MP if needed. I accept, even though it's not necessary.

Next, I'm timed running a 100m dash, and a 2km run as well, starting on one end of the room the long way and touching the far wall before coming back.

The final test is a reaction time and accuracy test.

I have to dodge floating mechanical magic metal orbs that attack me at faster and faster speeds. Dodging the incoming attackers turns the orb from plain metal-colored to green.

Once the orbs turn green, I'm allowed to attack them back.

For this portion of the test, I'm allowed to take out my daggers and I send small lightning crescents at the orbs to hit them with very fine accuracy.

I don't miss a single target, and I hold total concentration to suppress all of the wind magic in my blade to make sure I only use one element at a time.

The proctor resets this test a total of 3 times.

On the second round, I feel the orbs get much faster and more unpredictable.

Despite this, I don't let a single one hit me and don't allow any of them to escape.

On the 3rd round, however, I do feel the difficulty of a test like this is nearing levels that should not be possible for a hunter like me, so I allow a few of the orbs to graze me instead of upping my speed to levels I didn't show were possible during the raw testing earlier.

Still, my movements are near perfect. Every time I'm grazed, I only allow them to get near non-vital areas and position myself to always be perfectly aligned for a counterattack once the orbs turn green.

I disarm all of the orbs, and the proctor claps slowly while walking over to me keeping the silver tablet floating in the air with his wind magic.

"Very nice job. Only three other people managed to clear that difficulty level on the agility test with similar accuracy to your own. Not bad..."

The tablet comes floating over to him and he notes down a few more things on it.

Then, I watch the number on my wristband shift from [59] to [32] in a faint flash of white.

He points to the exit door once it opens.

"It's a live updating ranking system. As I said before, the written test is weighted pretty heavily. Even though the system sees you're one of the highest graded on the physical, there's still a long way to go before you move all the way up the ranks. That's quite the impressive jump there. One of the other Bedrock applicants did pretty well on the physical too, he made it into the top 30 actually."

He motions for me to leave.

"There's still plenty of stages left, best of luck hunter."

Then, he turns to the other side of the room to go and starts testing the next applicant while I walk through the exit door.

As it closes behind me and I take in the view of this room, I catch the presence of a hunter that is also very familiar but not someone I was expecting to see at this stage of the event.

An A-class hunter with a light magic skill greets me at the door.

"Welcome to stage 3 of the exams, hunter Ray Anderson. My name is Rodrigo, I'll be the proctor that guides these next tests."

Behind him, there's a wide open lounge.

It looks similar to the gaming room from the pre-trials, but all of the hunters that accept drinks and order food at the bars and restaurants seem much less on edge than they did before.

At the back wall, there are many large gold doors. Each of them is labeled 1-13, and it looks like 7 of them are already occupied because I see names above them that correlate with the names that are shown on a projector on the ceiling.

Every member's face from their ID and live ranking is shown for everyone in the room to observe.

Many of these names are grouped together in teams of 4, 5, or 6 hunters. The groupings are all very close now.

Some groups share a common region, but the most common pattern is that most groups are very close in ranking.

One group is all Apex Region Elites, and they hold rankings 1-6 all to themselves.

Three other groups each contain all of the hunters with rankings between 7 and 21 as well.

Rodrigo speaks up, and his words confirm my suspicions.

"For this next stage, you may create your own team because you will be facing a series of trials together. The minimum a team must have is 4 hunters, and the max can be 6. The recommendation is to have a versatile lineup to be prepared for any challenge that comes your way in the next stage. I hope you've mingled with your fellow hunters during the exam so far, because connections will be very helpful moving forward."

He gives me a thin smile.

It looks very professional and fake, however, I'm fairly certain he knows exactly who he's talking to right now and is playing the part.

To many hunters, this description is very vague and can't mean much, but thanks to my unexpected roommate in the pre-trials of this exam, this perfectly describes the simulation tests she has already explained everything about and prepared me for.

So, I reply and walk past him.

"Thanks for the advice, I'll do my best to make a team. Looks like being last in line doesn't come with any good perks."

I chuckle to myself and spot Ember and Natalie talking to each other on a long red couch that creates a wide semi circle near the back of the room.

Ember's wristband says [24] and Natalie's reads [30].

She looks pale and weak, similar to how she did after she'd healed up an entire team of hunters in the pre-trials.

My best guess is that she healed the Apex Region's applicants that were injured during the agility tests of the physical and then they left her to form their own Elite team once they were finished.

Considering she was ranked [7] before stage 2, it seems the physical aspect of these exams isn't her strong suit at all. However, considering the recommendation Rodrigo gave me at the door that we should have a versatile team for the next upcoming event, I see a promising future teammate in front of me.

While I walk over to the two of them, I begin to brainstorm who else I should try to bring onto this potential squad for the 3 remaining slots.