The morning of the exam finally came. Hyro used his final days to heal and continue brushing up on his abilities with the longsword. Only the staff of the academy, current adventurers, current students and applicants were allowed on the grounds so Hyros parents took him as far as they could, as did most of the other parents. “Be careful, remember if anything is too much for you we can always find another way or try another year.” Hyro’s mother said. His father put his hand on his son's shoulder, “I know you have what it takes son, like your mother said be careful but also, be amazing like I know you are.”
“I will be careful, mom, dad, and I will do my best!” Those were the last words Hyro said before hugging his parents, tears rolling down their faces. He went off on his way to the academy grounds. The walk to the entrance of the school did not take long, there were a handful of others, mostly young, boys and girls walking to the school, a mix of races present. Humans, elves, dwarfs, gnomes, and some Hyro could not even fully identify. Truth be told, even the ones he could identify he did not fully trust, they could easily be mixed races or just look like something they were not. Heck he did not even fully trust that what he perceived to be boy or girl was accurate. He did not want to assume anything going into the exam, after all any of these people may be a competitor in the coming tournament.
His hands and feet did not hurt anymore for the most part, they were just badly scarred. He kept white clothlike bandages on them anyway, both to hide his hands and, to be honest, he thought it made him look cool. Upon entering the front door to the Academy everyone was lined up. Hyro was not near the front of the line but that was okay with him, at the front seemed to be a few that were a little too eager. Most notably was what looked like a Human male with short spiky golden hair and a somewhat smug smile. Hyro was close to the end of the line, now that it appeared everyone was here he could tell there were twelve total applicants for the coming exams, on average one out of three made it into the school, so maybe four of them had a shot. This is going to be hard, Hyro thought to himself as a somewhat elderly gentleman wearing blue robes with a long white beard and no hair on the top of his head came out to greet them.
“Hello and welcome to this year's second Entrance exam for Terraqua Academy! I am the Head of the academy, you can call me Buck, we do not do that formal thing here, just names or nicknames, whatever. We will provide you all with more information on what to expect once we are inside so please, hold any and all questions until then. Once you enter these doors there will be no going back until the exam is over. You will find Tracy inside, give her your information and proceed to the first room to the right. I will see you all inside.” Then as quickly as Buck came, he was back inside and gone. The line started to move, one at a time everyone moved in and gave their name, race and age to Tracy. Tracy was what looked to be a little halfling woman, almost looked like a child but the way she held herself let everyone know she was older and more authoritative. Hyro was too far away to get the people towards the front's information but he was able to get the two in front and behind him. First was a tall, short brown haired Half-elf, he was rather soft spoken and seemed shy, or scared. “I am, umm, James, James Underling I am a Half human, Half elf and I am ummm fourteen.” Tracy just said “Next!” and moved the line along. Next was a short dwarf person with long brown hair, but no facial hair at all; they spoke with a somewhat gruff tone, but much more confidence than James. “I am Brutey, A dwarf, and I am fifteen.” Tracy nodded, “Next!”
Hyro stepped up, “Hryo Selk, Half Human, Half elf (he lied to go along with his birth papers), I am fourteen years old.” Again Tracy nodded and called for the next applicant, Hyro moved on but was sure to keep his ears open to get more information. After him was a very small boy about the size of Tracy with a pointy nose, “They call me Gribby, I am a Gnome thank you very much, and I just turned sixteen.” Gribby said confidently. Last was a feminine elf, a little taller than Hyro with fire red hair that flowed down her shoulders. “Cynthiana-Escolade, Cynthia for short, I am Elvan, fourteen years old.” Hyro could hear Tracy then close the book she was writing in and raced past him to the room they were all heading to. The room was set up like a classroom, chairs and desks filled most of the room all pointing towards the front. Almost all the seats were taken at this point so Hyro just grabbed an open one next to James and waited for things to start.
Shortly after Hyro took his seat Buck entered and stood at the front of the room next to Tracy and three other People. The man closest to Buck was a Tall, thin man with flowing blonde hair and long ears that pointed out of his hair. Next to him was a shorter, bulky man with a braided beard and short brown hair. Lastly was a fairly plain looking female, no makeup, black hair with a few strands of white poking through. Buck spoke up, “Welcome again, now that the formalities are out of the way we can really begin. The three Advisors next to me will introduce themselves in a moment, we will give a small layout of the day's events, most should be a recap of what you should already know but we always like to make sure everyone knows what to fully expect. First though, again, welcome to Terraqua academy, we take adventure education very seriously here, only the best and most cunning can gain entrance. For us Adventuring is life, and life is hard, that is our motto, live by those words.” Buck paused to allow everyone to grasp his opening words. “Today's events are split into three parts. First you will each be taken to our examination room one at a time for a basic physical examination. I will allow our examiner to explain more.”
The tall man stepped forward, “Hello everyone” he said in a soothing voice, “I am Extrial. The physical examination is fairly simple, we see how much weight you can lift, check that you are medically in decent enough shape and lastly, check your magic lines to make sure your skill set is up to the task of life.” Extrial was brief and to the point. Buck spoke up again, “After the physical exam is the Mental aptitude examination.” He nodded to the shorter gentleman to take over. “I guess that is my cue,” he said stepping forward, his voice a gruff tone. “I am Hurly, I will be your proctor for todays’ Mental exam. Expect all sorts of stuff here folks, most are real world issues you could face out there, I hope ye are all ready!” Hurly took a step back and Buck took over again. “Lastly we will have everyone’s favorite part, the tournament!” Buck nodded to the last person and let her take over. Stepping forward she had a voice that had a sly tone to it. Walking forward she spoke up, “Hello, I am Valda, I oversee the tournament. This tournament is only to observe ability and potential. Medical staff will be on the sidelines in case of emergency and any acts deliberately meant to fatally wound or kill another applicant will be dealt with immediate disqualification and will be turned over to local authorities. The Tournament itself, with twelve applicants, each of you will have three matches, there is no real scoring or overall winner, but the winner of each match will fight the winner of another match and losers face losers, If you win your second match you’ll then face a winner and so on. Keep in mind, you could win all three or lose all three and still be accepted or denied nothing is guaranteed from the tournament. That is enough for now, we will explain more later.” Valda said, stepping back.
Buck took over the show once more, “Before we begin I am sure you all have plenty of questions,” He paused looking over the faces, “That is good, we all have questions in life, hold onto them and hope that they get answered as you go through the day's events!” He chuckled. “I am going to take my leave now, Tracy will call you one by one and Extrial will take you to the examination room next door. Good luck!” With that Buck, Valda and Hurly all left the room, leaving only Extrial and Tracy. Tracy opened her book back up, traced a line on her palm and quietly said Organizo. She then tapped the book and it glowed for a moment, “Good we will be calling you up in alphabetically order by the names you gave me, first we have,” She paused to look in the book, “Acadeles Brighton'' The kid with the golden hair that was at the front of the line stood up with confidence and left the room with Extrial. The room remained quiet the whole time they were gone, it must have been about ten minutes and they came back and the next person was called. It went like this for a while though no one was as quick as Acadeles with his exam. Hyro took as much information as he could from everyone who was called. Next was Brutey, then Cynthiana, then Gob, a green skinned muscular person with an underbite and what looked to be fangs coming out from his bottom teeth. After him was Gribby, then someone called Harvey Grutto, nothing stood out with him though he looked a lot like another applicant that had not been called yet. After Harvey was Holland Interly, another short fellow with a pointy nose similar to the gnome Gribby. After Holland, Hyro was called and he felt a pit in his stomach grow and suddenly, he was more nervous than ever.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Hyro followed Extrial down the hall, the walls mostly plain, a few doors, but all closed. Finally Extrial stops, “Ah here we are, Hyro, right in here we will start the physical examination.” It’s a fairly simple room, a weight bench in one corner and in the other was a Magical device Hyro has only heard about before, certain People with long lasting or permanent enchanting abilities can sometimes create wondrous things, this particular device allows one to run in place, as fast as they can and can throw hurdles or other obstacles at the runner. The only other item in the room was a chair along one wall. “Okay Hyro we will start simple, do you know how much you can lift? Without any magical enhancements”
The first two tests went very smoothly, Hyro is not the strongest but he can hold his own, and he is pretty fast and quick on his feet so the in place obstacle course was actually more fun than a test.
“Impressive dodging, the last thing that we have to do is examine the magic that resides on and in you. Please present your hands and or feet.” Extrial said, after which Hyro’s face went pale. Hyo was not sure how to respond so he did as he was told and started to remove his hand bandages. Upon revealing his hands Extrial looked down, was silent and in deep examination for a moment. “Yes, it appears that these scars make it nigh impossible to make out what lines you may have, have you been able to use any of your magic since whatever incident occurred?”
Hyro knew this was coming, he prepared for this moment, “Yes but it is easier if I can replace my bandages.” Hyro worked some chemical reaction with diluted alcohol and the juices of a rare flammable forest fruit, Chebui, onto the cloth of his hand wraps, when ignited from a spark he can make up his sleeve it will hopefully appear like he is holding fire. The Chebui juice should make the flames easy to extinguish with a pat or two. With any luck seeing one of Hyro’s ‘magical skills’ will be enough to verify his abilities on his record. Extrial nodded at Hyro allowing him to reapply his bandages, after he was done Extrial awaited the demonstration. “It appears from your birth certificate and your application information you provided you have Minor Strength Enhancement, Increased Perception, Fire Manipulation, Increased Endurance, Tracking, and a few other more mundanes, what can you show me now just so I can verify that you at least have some control over your… Abilities.” Hyro wasn’t surprised at his somewhat demeaning tone. He knew the magic list was meager, he needed the list to be stuff he could prove, use less strength until a spell is cast, pretend to not notice everything until he casts his perception spell, simple things like that. Hyro’s plan is simple but hard; play slightly dumber, slightly weaker, slightly less agile and aware, without a ‘spell.’ Fire manipulation he added as a risk and due to his experiments, he needed something to stand out at least a hair.
Finally prepared, using everything he worked so hard for, mixing his sleight of hand, his alchemy knowledge, his prepared materials and a good bit of luck, Hyro ran a finger over top of where his ‘Fire control’ line of power should be on his palm, traced a short curved line and said the word of power, “Ignis Imperium.” The small match slid down his sleeve, ignited as he rubbed his wrist forward after tracing the ‘line.’ As it ignited the chemical cloth on the bandage did its work making Hyro hold a ball of fire, displaying his own brand of magic. Hyro was so impressed with himself, so excited, he could not believe he was holding a ball of fire! He was so excited he didn’t hear Extrial, as he repeatedly told him he had seen enough, and eventually stepped forward to shake him. Hyro was startled; he jumped, causing some of the flames to set his clothes on fire. Hyro was back in control though, quickly playing it off as lack of perception, he extinguished the flames and then ran his finger over another ‘line’ saying “Sensus.” Hyro then paused for a moment then continued, “Sorry I should have increased my perception before playing with fire, It won't happen again.” Extrial just nodded, “Very well, return to the other room and wait, I will be in shortly to gather the next applicant.”
Hyro was overall ecstatic with how his physical examination went. He felt he did just well enough to show he had some strength, speed, skill and even control over his ‘magic’, he might actually stand a chance at getting accepted. He returned to the room everyone was waiting in, sat where he was before and continued waiting. Extrail returned, one at a time he took the four remaining, James Underling, a kid with slight elvish qualities, Petunia Eisen, a human with long straight black hair, Terry Grutto the person who looks like Harvey, they even have the same last name. Then lastly was an almost sickly pale green tall and bulky man named Wenel. Hyro now at least knew all the names of his competition, and could roughly judge their physical skills by how long they were away with Extrial. Acadeles and Gribby having some of the best times, Harvey, Terry and Petunia taking so long Hyro almost fell asleep awaiting their tests. Either way they all were finally done and for the first time it was not Extrial who entered but Hurly.
“Well now I am positive you all had a wonderful time with old Extrial there and his fun little physical missions for ye, but let's see what those noggins of yours can really do! Everyone follow me!” He led everyone two doors down the hall to the left. This room had twelve chairs spaced out with small desks, each desk had a piece of parchment with writing, a quill and a vial of ink. Hurly spoke up once they entered, “Everyone take a seat, lets see how quick ye can think through these questions. You may NOT use any magic to help with the test or otherwise.”
A written test, reading and writing was not uncommon, but not everyone could do it, but it does make sense, to be an adventurer they are vital skills to have. Hyro was slightly beaming however, he knew he needed to stand above the rest in at least one category and this was it. He took a seat and started what he basically trained his whole life for, reading about situations and answering questions about magic.
The exam was honestly, at least to Hyro, easy. It was four questions long, each asking about a different trap, creature or scenario and asking how you would solve it. Since Hyro spent so much time learning all he has he knew so many ways to solve each issue, a tribe of Goblins is becoming overgrown and expanding near a civilized town, easy, create a poison, sneak in and dose the communal pot of gruel that all goblin tribes have. Hyro added some flair and said that he would use his magic line and power word Silentium to not make a sound, but still, easy for him. All of the questions he answered in a similar way and by the time he was finished everyone else was still vigorously writing. A few moments after he was done he saw Acadeles finish and look around, almost angered to see that Hyro finished before he did. Slowly one by one everyone else looked up as they finished their test. When it appeared as though everyone had finished Hurly spoke up again, “Very good everyone, Leave yer exams where they lie, go right out this door, Valda be waiting to take ye to the outside arena. Good luck.”
