Chapter 8
The clash of wooden swords rang out between them.
Even though it was break ti, two people were still sparring.
Both bore the nas of prestigious clans.
Amon and Belle.
The instructor flipped the evaluation sheet.
[Belle Red]
Belle exhaled a plu of smoke.
[Unique Magic of the Red Family]
“Whoa, hold up, Belle! We agreed you wouldn’t use that!”
Amon waved his hands frantically.
“If it’s not a one-shot kill, it’s not worth doing.”
The instant she finished speaking, her blade flashed.
Amon flattened himself and rolled under the strike.
Monts later Belle collapsed, limp.
“Huuuh.”
[Boasts One-Shot Kill, but Only Once]
With a helpless look, the instructor turned to the next page.
[Amon Coster]
“So falling flat on your face is cool, huh...?”
Amon caught Belle as she toppled and set her down gently.
[Unique Magic of the Coster Family (Never used during training)]
[Flawless Swordsman]
And, to be more precise—
[Top Candidate]
“Hey, Mago.”
Mago lifted his head.
“Belle’s out again. You want in?”
“Sure.”
Mago planted both hands on his knees and stood.
He caught Belle’s wooden sword the mont Amon tossed it.
Once Mago stepped forward,
the two took stance and focused.
Amon rushed first.
A thrust at the wrist.
Mago slipped past it and hooked Amon’s leg, sending him sprawling.
Amon hit the sand ungracefully.
Right beside his head,
Mago drove the tip of his wooden sword into the ground.
“One.”
“Ugh...”
Amon sprang up.
He swung the mont he was on his feet.
After several exchanges,
Amon raised both arms to block an overhead strike.
Then—
“Damn it.”
He realized he’d been baited; the blow wasn’t coming from above.
Mid-level, not high.
Mago had changed direction mid-swing.
The wooden point tapped Amon’s chest.
Amon froze with his hands still above his head.
“Two.”
“Hey, what are you doing since a minute ago!”
“You said it yourself: if that had been a real enemy instead of an orc model, I’d be dead.”
“What?”
“You’ve died twice now.”
[Mago]
The instructor poised his pen beneath that na.
For a long while he hesitated.
Only when the ink on the nib had begun to dry
did he scrawl a hasty line—whatever ca to mind.
—Could it really be Mago?
Just as the soldier who had delivered the enlistnt form once said:
—I’ve seen Mago fight in person. Marcello Arnes. The prodigy from the Special Task Force. They look incredibly alike.
[Maybe not a fake after all]
* * *
“First Exam event: race.”
Theory classroom.
The chief instructor hung a map on the board and began.
“This map is only an example. Don’t bother morizing it; it won’t be the one used.”
Race.
Amon rembered running laps of the parade ground with him.
Go further back, and—
of course—he recalled taking the actual first exam in his previous life.
“Listen carefully.”
The large map bore three colors.
First, black.
The whole map was black.
Second, red.
A jagged red line traced the route.
“The red line is Course A.”
After clearing his throat, the instructor began in earnest.
“There are a hundred of you, so we’ll split you into two groups of fifty—Team A and Team B. Team A follows the red line: they’ll circle the back mountain once and return to the Training Center. Understood?”
Every trainee barked a short, loud “Yes, sir!”
The instructor nodded and went on.
With a brand-new wooden rod he pointed to a blue line.
Of the three colors, the last was blue.
“Which ans Team B takes Course B.”
The blue line started from a different point than the red.
A path drawn in blue.
That was Course B.
Red for Team A’s Course A.
Blue for Team B’s Course B.
Simple.
“From here the difficulty rises.”
The instructor pulled a small scroll from his coat.
A red band encircled its middle—
the color of Team A.
“This is Team A’s map. And the people who will carry it are—”
He tapped the blue line on the big map with his rod.
“—Team B.”
A murmur rippled through the trainees.
“Quiet. Listen to the end. Each team’s map will be held by the opposite team—A’s map by B, B’s map by A. So how do you get back over twenty-one kilotres of mountain trail without your own map?”
The tip of the rod stabbed an X on the big map.
A checkpoint.
The one place where the red and blue routes, starting apart, crossed.
“Team A and Team B will et only once—right here. At that mont you may trade, steal, or snatch the map from the other team; I don’t care. Just get the right map and follow the right route ho. That’s all. Questions?”
Belle’s hand shot up.
“Belle Red.”
“If we make it back to the Training Center without a map, isn’t that still a pass?”
“Good question, Belle.”
The instructor scribbled on an individual-performance sheet—
probably a plus.
“A cadre waits at each route. Any trainee who fails to pass before their eyes is disqualified. So forget any ideas about leaving the path. Next?”
This ti it was my turn.
I raised my right hand high.
“Mago.”
“Do all fifty mbers of each team move together?”
“Another sharp one.”
He made another note.
“No. Each team of fifty is further split into two-person cells.”
I’d already known; I asked for the sa reason he was writing—
to earn a line on my own evaluation.
“A hundred trainees make fifty pairs. While we’re at it, I’ll call the pairs now.”
He produced a prepared list.
“Starting with Team A. When your nas are called, step forward and take your cloth.”
Two big baskets.
Each brimd with strips of fabric—
red and blue.
Armbands marking team mbership.
He called the nas in pairs.
I wouldn’t be with my previous-life partner this ti either;
the extra cadet, Kinjo Shua, had scrambled everything.
A last-minute dropout from the last exercise, now recovered and reinstated, he’d tangled the roster beyond recognition.
Nas rolled past.
“Team A—Mago.”
I stepped forward and draped the red cloth around my arm.
The next na—my partner—
“Kinjo Shua.”
Kinjo ca out grinning.
I hadn’t expected to be paired with him, but the result was perfect.
“Now for Team B.”
The instructor swallowed and read on.
I wasn’t the only one with a new partner.
“Amon Coster.”
Everyone had been shuffled.
“Belle Red.”
Amon and Belle stood confidently, tying blue cloths to their right arms.
“Looks like the two people who absolutely shouldn’t et are on the sa team. Team B’s starting off rough.”
Kinjo whispered.
When all pairs were set,
I raised my hand again.
“Mago, what now?”
“If only one mber of a two-person cell reaches the finish, what happens?”
“You’re on fire today.”
The instructor nodded.
“When only one arrives, how is the score calculated? First, the basics: the first pair back earns a perfect hundred points.”
The instructor thumped his staff against his shoulder as he spoke.
“Thanks to you lot, the field’s been whittled down to the proper hundred. Second place earns ninety-nine points, third gets ninety-eight, and we keep dropping by one. Then we split that score in half—one half for each teammate. See what that ans?”
“Even if only one of us crosses the line, the team still gets the points?” I asked.
“Exactly—provided you beat the clock. If either partner misses the cutoff, that trainee scores zero, no matter where the other finishes. Any other questions?”
He waited a few beats; only silence answered.
“Right. You’ll each carry a dagger for ergencies, but using it on another trainee is an instant disqualification.”
A ragged chorus of “Yes, Instructor!” echoed back.
“Then let’s begin.”
* * *
First Exam.
Three hours to start.
Team A.
We finished packing our kits and assembled on the drill field. From this mont, Teams A and B would take separate roads. Chief Instructor himself would lead A; another instructor marched B off sowhere else.
“Hold here until B is ready.”
Team A scanned the ground for anywhere to sit.
“And keep your bodies warm while you wait.”
Of course the Chief Instructor drew us.
No rest for the unlucky.
We dropped for push-ups.
Down: “We are!”
Up: “One!”
Only after we’d sweated buckets did the Chief Instructor hand each squad a map bound with a blue string. Team A received the map for Course B. Kinjo claid ours.
A mont later he leaned in.
“Mago, that map the Chief flashed during briefing—pretty sure it was the A-route. He never unfolded it, but it’s gotta be the real one, yeah?”
“Probably.”
“No point showing us a fake he’d never reveal.”
“Fair. So?”
“I morized it. The whole thing.”
“...You what?”
“Shh.”
He pressed a finger to his lips, then tapped the corner of my eye.
“Just in case, I crept through it with clairvoyance—slowly, bit by bit. No downside, right? And look, we actually drew Team A.”
“You really rember every bend?”
“The others don’t even know I can use clairvoyance; they’d never expect to steal the map.”
“Still could be a decoy.”
“True. But if we hadn’t gotten a map at all, my mory would be worth trying.”
“When you put it that way...”
“Plus, instructors will be posted along the way. If what I recall matches what we et, we’ll know it’s legit.”
Kinjo eased back.
“We’ll puzzle it out as we go. For now, a real map is easiest.”
Kinjo Shua.
With the exam bearing down, he beca soone else entirely. Among the 66th class, he’s the only one who’s already finished university, and it shows. I wanted to applaud—future knowledge and all that.
He already had Team A’s route locked in his head. I knew it too; I’d walked it in my last life.
Which gave a brand-new option: send Kinjo ahead and block the path myself.
“Smooth so far.”
Last ti I’d placed forty-third. My partner had been Belle Red. When we reached the checkpoint—
—The rules banned attacking with the dagger, not carrying it.
Amon drew his and shoved the blade under my nose. Back then the whole class knew my weakness; subduing was child’s play.
“Drop the map, Mago.”
I obeyed.
“Sorry, Belle.”
I grabbed her ankle and held her back.
“Don’t worry; we’ll nail it next ti,” she said, looking angrier than anyone I’d ever seen.
That was the first ti I blocked soone’s path.
The first taste of sha and guilt.
I still taste it.
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