Making Profit

In the game, if I remember correctly, Samael was one of the Cadets who made the first move during the Evaluation Exam. 

Because of that, he drew unwanted attention from nearly everyone around him, forcing him into an All vs. One battle right at the start.

He was reckless.

…But he was also terrifyingly strong.

Despite fighting more than twenty Cadets on his own, Samael not only survived the first four hours with almost effortless ease, but he also climbed his way into the Top 100 rankings.

Still, he was reckless. Extremely so.

Instead of fighting with strategy and carefully picking his battles by targeting weaker opponents, he went after anyone he thought was strong — as if to make a statement.

As if to declare that no one on this battlefield was his match.

By the time he dueled six back-to-back powerful opponents, defeating each one, he had strained himself beyond recovery.

As a result, he was eliminated by the sixth hour.

In the end, he ranked 66th.

Fool.

Absolute fool.

If he had played it smart, hunted the weaker Cadets first, then the strong, he could have easily reached the Top 10.

Top 5 even.

The exam was twelve hours long — a marathon. But Samael speedran through it like a sprint.

I wouldn't make the same mistake.

BOOM—!!

A deafening explosion rocked the coliseum, shaking the very ground beneath me.

Dust and debris rose to the sky in the distance, and the once-tense silence melted into pure pandemonium.

Cadets scattered, some instinctively diving for cover, others charging headlong into the fray with reckless abandon.

My eyes tracked the smoke rising from the blast's origin. A risk-taker had made the first move there.

The entire arena erupted in response, as if the mere sound of the explosion had torn down the fragile barrier of restraint everyone had been holding onto.

I heard a few more follow-up explosions flare up all around me. Some others had made their first move as well.

With this, the real game had begun.

I stood still with a smile on my face, watching the chaos spread like wildfire across the arena.

A group of Cadets to my left were already locked in a battle with each other.

Before the start of all this, they had made an alliance, thinking working in teams would give them a better chance of passing the test.

Now, they were hellbent on eliminating their former allies.

That's what happens when you try to team up with strangers in a high-pressure situation.

Idiots.

To my right, others darted for the edges of the arena, trying to hide in the shadows where they could wait for the right moment to strike.

But there was no safety left here.

Every corner of this coliseum had become a battlefield.

The countdown clock loomed large on the screens above, ticking down without mercy.

[11:39:45]

Twenty minutes. Only twenty minutes had passed, and this place already looked like a warzone.

Some weaker Cadets had already been eliminated, their orbs shattered, and their dreams of attending the Academy snuffed out before they had even truly begun.

But most of the strong ones hadn't moved yet. Not really. They were waiting, biding their time and observing the situation, just like me.

I scanned the battlefield, reading the flow of combat, scrutinizing my competitors.

Some were too eager, too hasty. They'd burn themselves out soon enough.

Others, like me, were smarter — conserving their energy, picking off stragglers while avoiding direct confrontations.

As I said, this was a marathon, not a sprint.

Sure, a decent strategy would be to fight the weaker ones first, rack up easy points, and save yourself the trouble of facing the strong ones until later.

That would work… if we knew who the weaker ones were.

But we didn't. Not yet.

I couldn't just walk up to someone and start fighting them, assuming they were weak. That would be foolish.

What if my judgment was wrong, and they turned out to be quite strong?

What if they had a Card that could counter my attack?

What if someone else attacked me while I was executing my own ambush?

Too many variables. Too many risks.

Right now, the safest, most logical option was to patiently wait and carefully observe.

Of course, not everyone shared the same thought process.

Juliana, for example, had already run off.

She had summoned her rapier the moment the first explosion hit and was probably on her third or fourth elimination by now.

She wasn't being reckless.

On the contrary, she could afford to take risks. 

Since she was my Shadow, she wouldn't be expelled from the Academy even if she lost all her orbs in the first four hours.

So, she had nothing to lose.

"How lucky," I muttered under my breath.

Just then, a sudden movement in my peripheral vision caught my attention.

Through the dust and smoke, a figure emerged from my right. It was a tall girl with blonde hair, gripping a sword as she charged straight toward me.

Her eyes were sharp, focused like a hawk zooming in on its prey.

Despite the chaos erupting all around us, she had chosen me as her target. How foolish.

This is exactly what I meant when I said one's judgment could be wrong.

She probably picked me to ambush because I wasn't moving. I bet she thought I was frozen with fear. 

She couldn't have been more wrong. She misjudged me. And now, she would pay for her mistake.

The girl stepped closer, and her blade sliced through the air, aiming for my shoulder. But she was too slow.

I ducked under her strike and spun, using the momentum to slam an open palm into her midsection.

The air was knocked out from her lungs as she staggered back, clutching her stomach, gasping in pain and shock.

Her grip on the sword faltered, but she wasn't down yet. To her credit – she was tougher than she looked.

But that wasn't enough to save her.

Before she could recover, I moved in, stepping around her weakened defense.

Thwaaam—!

She didn't even have a chance to react as my fist connected with her jaw. The force of it was more than enough to send her crashing to the ground.

Her sword clattered uselessly beside her as she fell. One of the orbs on her belt fractured slightly, but it didn't shatter.

"So, it'll take more than that to break these things, huh?" I muttered quietly.

The girl groaned in pain and tried to reach for her sword, but before she could grab it, I stomped on the back of her skull.

Thud—!

Her face slammed into the concrete, and I felt something break under my foot — not bone… but something brittle, like glass.

One of the orbs on her belt shattered into fragments.

"I see," I murmured to myself. "So that's how they work. These orbs generate a form-fitting invisible barrier."

Despite the force of my attack, her skull didn't fracture.

At the very least, her nose should have become a bloody mess from being slammed into the ground that hard.

But there was no blood. No visible injury, either.

She was hurt – I could hear her muffled cries beneath my foot – but the damage was minimal.

The orbs had cast a barrier that absorbed the worst of the blow. They shielded her from what would've been a fatal injury.

Now I understood how they worked.

This wasn't explained in the game. And I wasn't paying attention to Vereshia's speech earlier.

Anyway, the score on my bracelet ticked up: [01pts].

But I had no time to savor it.

THWOOM—!

Another explosion boomed to my left, much closer this time. The shouts and clashes of Cadets locked in their own skirmishes echoed across the arena.

I sighed, lifting my foot and stomping down on the girl's skull again.

Thwaam—!!

Once.

Thwaaam—!!

Twice.

After a few more stomps, her body went limp.

No, she wasn't dead. Of course not. I wasn't a monster! She was just unconscious.

The last two remaining orbs on her belt shattered with a faint crackle.

One down.

"That's what happens when you misjudge your opponent," I shook my head and rechecked my score.

It was now [03pts].

And the moment I glanced at my updated score, a faint rustling sound behind me caught my ears.

I sighed. Of course.

Whoosh—!

I twisted just in time to narrowly avoid a blade aimed at my side and jumped back a few steps.

A few nearby Cadets must've noticed my guard was dropped for a moment and decided to take advantage of it.

There were four of them. All closing in on me from different sides with their weapons drawn.

The first came at me with a spear, thrusting it toward my chest with a cocky grin plastered on his face.

I sidestepped effortlessly, grabbed the spear's shaft, and yanked it out of his hands, sending him stumbling forward like a drunk.

The second Cadet, a short girl with twin daggers, darted in from my left.

I ducked low, sweeping her legs out from under her with a quick kick. She fell to the side and hit her head on the ground hard.

That looked painful.

The third one, a huge guy wielding a battle axe, charged at me head-on, like a bull shown red. He was big and bulky, with huge muscles bulging under his vest.

How this guy was only seventeen years old, I'll never understand.

I waited until the axe was nearly on me, then stepped aside at the last moment, grabbing his wrist.

Using his own momentum, I threw him off balance. He careened forward and crashed right into the spear guy.

The fourth one hesitated, hanging back, clutching his sword nervously. He probably realized I wasn't as distracted as they'd hoped.

"Well… this is awkward," I huffed, straightening up to look down at the pile of bodies sprawled in front of me like a work of art.

The spear and axe guys were tangled up on the ground in an embarrassing mess, and the dagger girl was groaning, struggling to sit up.

She seemed to have a minor concussion.

Meanwhile, I was still holding the spear.

The fourth Cadet, seeing the mess his friends were in, mustered a shaky breath and raised his sword.

Determination blazed in his eyes, and he made the dumbest decision he could've made just then.

He rushed at me.

I mean, why? I would've liked to ask him why?!

His friends attacked me together in coordination, and they failed to bring me down. Then why did he think he – a mere side character – could do it?

Another sigh slipped out from my lips. These guys really had no sense of self-preservation.

Without blinking, I hurled the spear at him and began summoning my Origin Card.

His eyes went wide with panic, but he managed to deflect the incoming spear with the flat side of his blade.

That was enough time. A flash of golden light flared above my shoulder, and my Origin Card materialized.

Realizing things were about to escalate, the sword guy tried to activate one of his own Cards.

But it was far too late by then.

Before he could do anything, I dropped to one knee and touched the ground.

The concrete rippled like water, shifting under their feet. They barely had time to process what was happening before the ground under them turned to something akin to quicksand.

"What the—?!" the fourth Cadet yelped, his feet sinking into the unstable ground.

The others, already down, also found themselves trapped and sinking faster with every frantic movement.

I got up to my feet and strolled over, hands in my pockets like I was out for a casual walk.

"Now, now," I gloated scornfully, crouching beside the axe guy, who was already knee-deep in the quagmire. "This doesn't look too good for you guys. Don't bother summoning any Cards, by the way. I can harden the ground back to concrete in a second. You won't die... but I imagine the bone-crushing agony would be excruciating."

"You bastard!" the dagger girl spat, thrashing around as she sank deeper.

"Bastard?" I raised an eyebrow. "That's a bit rude. I was minding my own business when you all tried to gang up on me. Doesn't seem very fair, does it now?"

The fourth Cadet, now chest-deep in the quicksand, looked at me with a mix of panic and desperation. "Please, man! Let us out!"

I tapped my chin, pretending to think it over. 

"And why would I do that? You guys are disarmed and trapped. I could just eliminate all of you right now."

A sly grin crept across my face.

"Unless, of course, you can give me a reason not to. You know... everyone has a price."

Their eyes widened in disbelief as they understood the unsaid implications of my suggestion.

"You want us to... pay you?" the spear guy stammered, utterly dumbfounded.

"Well, I could just eliminate you," I stated with a lazy smile. "But I figure you'd like to stick around the Academy a bit longer. So, how about you all give me ten thousand Creds each. That's not too much, right?"

"T-That's robbery!" the axe guy barked, sinking faster as he struggled.

"Not really," I shrugged. "Robbery… is what happens after you say no."