The Entrance exam was now about to begin; I was but a mere dot among the several hundreds of candidates that headed towards the main building. Allan had already left me to my own devices, as he, a professor, had his own duties to attend to.

With a head pat, good lucks and cautionary words, he dropped me off at the main entrance to the testing ground.

Our discussion about a particular elf girl replayed in my mind. The revelation of her being someone of high status had me stunned for a bit but after dwelling on the thought for a few moments it wasn’t all that surprising, although, my plan of going incognito on the paradise islands had been jeopardized since there was now someone close who might find out my secret.

After leaving my mental space and returning to reality, I noticed I was now walking over a large bridge; it went over a wide canal that surrounded this portion of the city. This lead to a large entrance and in it was a barrier that seemed to only let participants through.

I took this as an opportunity to look at the competition. The surrounding crowds were a soup of different individuals. The many races that gathered were something I never thought I’d see. Dracos, elves, dwarfs, beast folk, and even avians were present in this sea of people. I would also spot the occasional human or amphibia.

After crossing over the bridge, the enormous crowds of individuals dispersed.

Because of my selected professions, my first entrance test was to be on basic runes and their functions.

I did not know what the second would be as they would only reveal it after we go through the first test.

After I separated from the main group, I entered a large building with a man that stood at the front.

He offered to take my belongings and stamped my hands with a temporary ink tattoo, which read the number #776. I assumed it to be my candidate number.

“Greetings potential students,” said a short blue-haired merfolk man. “My name is Mickel Emrick. I will be the one looking over this section of your examination.”

After he listed the rules, he gestured for us to begin. He allotted us 3 hours to finish this portion of the exam, and any rules broken would disqualify us for the entire entrance exam.

Most of the stuff here, I had already covered with Allan. Just standard trivia about different runes and how they worked, as well as different functions certain rune types can have.

I don’t want to brag, but I breezed through this.

After participants finished, we were free to leave the room at anytime. I exited and entered what seemed to be a large waiting room. The room was already quite noisy, loud chatter and the occasional laugh bounced along the walls, leaving a slight echo.

The academy provided refreshments and lunch from the cafeteria, which was fortunate. The last exam left me rather thirsty.

I walked through the crowd, looking for a place to wait.

I sat in one the stall at the other end of the gathering room, a lot of foods I had never seen before, vegetables of different colors and meat I had never even heard of.

I decided I would settle on something I was familiar with, some apple juice and a tuna sandwich. After choosing out my snack, I scanned the area, looking for a place to relax while I wait.

Before I could fully turn around, I collided with a stranger.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, feeling embarrassed

“Watch where you’re going, damned human,” said the unknown person.

He had short blond hair, his exaggerated movements mirrored his attitude. His horns jutting from the sides of his forehead and branched out almost like miniature antlers. It was someone belonging to the Draco race.

Surprised by the sudden outburst, I backed away.

“I’m sorry I didn’t see you th…

“How dare you speak back to me ape, honestly know your place filth,” he continued. “Count yourself lucky, or else I would have you striped and thrown in a cell for speaking back to me.”

All eyes shifted to us. He kept on rambling about his status and some other nonsense while he stood close to me in an attempt to intimidate me.

I was extremely close to insulting this person on the spot, but decided it would be better to move on. I would rather not make enemies on the first day here.

I rolled my eyes, turned around, and walked away. If I had remained there any longer, I wouldn’t be able to control my tongue.

“Honestly, why they let these hairless monkeys in here is beyond me,” the draco said before walking away.

“The hell was his problem?” I said to myself.

This was the most bizarre encounter I’ve ever experienced. It was as if he was looking down at a stray dog. Is this really what humans go through encountering other races? I didn’t particularly care. It was just a bratty noble, but the feeling of bing berated for being yourself wasn’t exactly the best.

About 2 hours passed and most people were about done with the first section of the test.

“Alright everyone.”

A large artifact on the ceiling came to life and a female voice spoke out.

“All potential students, thank you for your patience. All participants must make their way to the stadium. There will be signs along the way to guide you.”

We made our way to a large stadium where many other entrances connected to and in the middle of the stadium stood 5 gates.

They instructed us to sit in the stands and wait for further instructions. It was not until 10 minutes later when another merfolk man walked out from the stands.

“Good day contestants, my name is Kall Lemuria, the current principle of the academy,” he said with a rather soothing voice.

“We are a bit behind schedule, so I won’t waste your time. This will be your last trial, compared to the first one you have taken. This one will be more.... practical.” He continued.

“Normally we would have three tests, but we decided that this way will be more effective. This test will be a survival simulation. It will test your ability as explorers. You will enter these gates as you would enter the planetary gates and will be given 5 days inside. The simulation will randomly form teams of four, and you must work together with your teammates and make it to a designated location within the five days. Obviously, it would be boring if that’s all it was. So during your journey, you will encounter cryptids. You must kill Five-thousand points worth of cryptids. The stronger the cryptid, the more points you get. Teams can also fight each, steal points or form alliances, note only two teams can form an alliance. You steal points by either eliminating your opponent or if they willingly transfer their points to you. If you die in the simulation, you will automatically return to the stadium. If that happens, the person who dies will not only fail, the points they have contributed to their team will be deducted.”

With the announcement of these rules, murmurs rose from the crowd. It seemed they had not expected this.

“My brother told me they went in on their own last year, now we have to form teams,” one girl who sat next to me said.

From what the principle explained, more emphasis was being placed on teamwork rather than on individual talent. I didn’t have a problem with this, as it allowed me to stand out less.

Upon observing the crowd, the man smiled reassuringly, waving his hands at us.

“Don’t fret we put these systems in place to address certain problems that have been occurring in previous test, your contributions will be recorded and teams in the top 10 will receive this special C grade body refinement pill, while individuals in the top 20 will receive a b grade body refinement pill and will be placed in class A.”

He clapped excitedly before gesturing to the portals that stood behind him.

“Well, with that out of the way, why don’t we get started?”

We waited as we were called in one by one and when it was my turn; they directed me to the center of the stadium where the gates stood.

This section exam made me very nervous. I knew it wasn’t the real thing, but my heart still pounded loudly in my chest, the lump in my throat throbbed and my hands were sweaty.

I took a deep breath and looked at the gate ahead of me.

“I can do this. I’ve fought cryptids before, so this should be cake.”

I entered the portal and was immediately hit with a wave of vertigo. I held my palm to my forehead and slowed down to prevent myself from falling over. All the hairs on my body stood and I could feel the mana warping, churning and changing. It was then when a bright light appeared ahead of me, which forced me to close my eyes for a moment. When I reopened them, the light was gone.

I found myself face down on the ground in a dark room. The transition from walking through the light to laying on the floor was so seamless I almost didn’t notice I had passed out. The air felt much warmer and the humidity immediately felt as it passed through my nostrils.

There was a single door leading out. I slowly got up, shaking off the residual dizziness. I intended to approach the door, but a rustling to my left drew my attention. It was a person, not just one person, but three others, two fast asleep and one hunched over in the corner rummaging through a bag.