67 chapter 67

The next day. 05:00 the morning. Lucas woke up upon hearing some knocks on the door. he got off his bed and opened the door. Standing next to the door was someone with seaman's outfit and doing military salute after the soldier saw Lucas, he handed a letter to him.

Lucas closed the door then he started to read the letter.

"Lucas Fernando. Your test of the elites recruits would start at 9:00, the location would be on the other side of this island,

You are allowed to bring your best weapon with you.

be there at 8:00 with this letter an....."

Lucas rubbed his eyes and yawned, he put his hand on his body and massaged it again, apparently, the internal damage is healing very fast with the help of his massage hands and the food made by the system.

"I have till 08:00. I should go there at 07:55, it's a commitment test " Lucas yawned, his eyes were a bit heavy. he activated his adrenaline boost and he felt totally awoke after the hormones rushed in his veins and the blood circled faster.

Unlike the other days where he used to wake up, kick the panda and then starting to run outside. Lucas today decided to spend his morning in a more traditional way. He took a shower, brushed his teeth, then took a healthy breakfast which was some rabbit meat steak. To fill time, he did push-ups and sit-ups while looking to the clock. After that, he wore his official uniform and walked to the door.

While holding the door and before getting out, Lucas turned his head to the left and looked to the spot where usually Pandalo, the humanoid Panda sleeping. Lucas had some itchy feeling in his leg, but the Panda was outside so Lucas didn't have the chance to (kick) wake up his roommate. Lucas sighed deeply ' I wanted to give him one last strong kick before I leave'

07:30.

Lucas already left the usual training spot and arrived at the other side of the Island. After crossing some common training grounds with some average-strength beasts, he finally reached his destination, where he is supposed to have his test.

Lucas stood in front of a three-stories tower, the walls were made of a silver stone, Lucas knew this as the famous matter, sea stone.

" Recruit, you arrived earlier " in front of the door, stood a quite tall blond middle aged-man with a cap of a commander, the seventh-highest rank. The middle-aged man took a note, arriving earlier it was a sign of commitment. Obviously, this was the first thing to take note of.

"Yes, commander " Lucas formed the military salute with a serious face, however, Lucas inside was laughing at his performance.

"Good, now follow me " the commander turned and entered the gates, Lucas followed and stopped in front of a wooden door '.

"Recruit. There is an optimal test, you have the right to take it or refuse it"

" What kind of tests"

"Written-test, " the commander said with an ugly face.

The written test is one of the toughest challenges for any elite.

Since this world has a very low education level, where there are no high schools or colleges, it wasn't rare for some people to show disdain toward writing tests, especially in such a world. The only way to get a good education here is through self-teaching or finding someone to teach you.

"I guess I can take it " Lucas replied.

The commander swallowed his saliva, then he said with a tone that has some pettiness: "Don't let it take your morals down, it's not important to know everything, strength is actually what matters"

"Yes, yes" Lucas yawned as he was guided to a locked room with one table and one chair.

Lucas took his place, he remembered the attitude that the commander made upon mentioning the written test, it made him believe it was hard to make someone show such a scared expression.

Lucas held the paper and started to read:" you have two units that must be divided into five teams, and you have 800 apples... What the fu**"

Lucas frowned, he used a pencil and filled everything in 5 minutes before getting out. After he finished the written test, he was taken to a large room, it was rounded and big. Lucas walked a few steps before finding the manager of the elites camp standing in front of him. It was the same old man with one arm.

Lucas knew what the old man would say as he saw the near future. So he knew what was coming.

"Welcome to your real test, now, here is a paper, you will find various ways to test yourself. All of them are equally dangerous and the final rank you get would be different, but there would be some high-rank elite to watch over you, which is me"

The rear Admiral handed a paper to Lucas with a pen. Lucas looked to the paper and he saw a list of a way to test his combat ability.

..... Fighting a group of beasts continuously.

... Catching a group of wanted criminals in the grand line.

..... Investigating various towns that are suspected to be under the rule of gangsters.

..etc...

There were many ways for Lucas to chose from, some would take a long time, even some months.

"Which one is the fastest," Lucas asked.

"Such an impatient youth " The rear admiral sighed deeply.

"Then I'll choose a group of beasts," Lucas said.

The rear Admiral's eyes became tight. " this way of testing is quite dangerous, as it will happen In the basement. You will fight a group of beasts starting from the weakest to the strongest. The weakest of them would even make a hard challenge to an elite officer, and each beast is very aggressive. Are you sure"?

"Yes," Lucas nodded.

If this rear admiral knew what Garp had done to Lucas, and what kind of beasts he fought, and which weather, then this old man would apologize for being ignorant.

***

Lucas was moved to the basement. Under the ground, he could see a large rounded yard, more like an arena.

*Grrr*

On the rounded walls of the basement. Lucas could hear beasts' voice. When he observed with more attention, Lucas could see some beasts from different kinds in cages, those cages were on the walls.

"Okay. I'll interfere when there is a need to. But don't count on me, there is a chance that you would... " The rear admiral said.

"die, lose a limb, serious injury, I know" Lucas walked forward. The ground beneath him was made of soil instead of any building matter, Lucas could smell the nature here while looking to the lambs above him, it wasn't bright but it didn't affect his vision.

Lucas stood in the middle of the arena. his weapon, the two scimitars were hanging on his back, one was black and the other was silver in color, Lucas's hand reached behind and grabbed the silver one.

The rear admiral saw that Lucas was ready. He took his sword from the sheath, then he waved it to a direction of some cage, as he did that, a compressed air blade crossed 50 meters and cut the lock of that cage.

*Roar*

As the cage was opened, a lion with red fur and blue eyes, 4 meters height, got out and stared at Lucas as he was a delicious meal. The animal was tortured and kept locked by the humans, so it held a grudge against anyone of their kind.

'Let's see how he deal with it, well, the beast isn't strong but he can't take lightly ' The rear admiral closed his eyes and thought deeply, then he frowned at the same moment he started to think when his Haki alerted him.

"Next" Lucas waved only his right hand, and the beast was cut in half. Lucas had an expressionless face, compared to Garp's beasts, this is nothing.

*Cough*

"Not bad swordsmanship, guess you are in master level " The rear admiral coughed few times before opening the second cage using his sword. He thought that this beast should pose a challenge, or at least take some time, even if Lucas is swordmaster, this shouldn't end fast and take 15 minutes at least.

The beast was a huge ape, 4 meters in height, full of muscles and seems to have a very agile body.

However, before even Lucas says it, his Haki told him.

"Next"

Lucas said as he was standing next to the corpses of the ape, Lucas apparently, used storm legs to cut the throat of this ape.

The rear admiral sighed while trying to cover his shock, the recruit didn't even use Haki in this fight.

After some seconds, someone came and lifted the two corpses, then he got out leaving Lucas in the arena alone.

"This is the strongest one here" The rear admiral decided to skip other five beasts and cut another cage, it wasn't very big, just two meters with the head of a monkey, next to the cage, there were two swords, the monkey picked them up and looked at Lucas. The animal was trying to detect any fighting intent before fighting.

"Oh really, don't you have stronger " Compared to Garp's standards of beasts, those beasts look like timid kittens

"This monkey in front of you was a pet of a fallen pirate crew, it took two commodores to capture it and bring it here, also it has the level high swords master, so prepare yourself "

The monkey looked at Lucas and waved the two swords at once, a compressed air blade flew toward Lucas. But as the swords energy hit Lucas, it made a sound that was similar to metals clashing.

[Iron mass +500 XP]

'I felt that one, not bad' Lucas turned his head to the old man, he felt his interest was up a bit when he heard about the two commanders. "Tell me more about it"

"Shouldn't you focus on your fight "

"Don't worry about that, at worse, you can use your Haki to know anything, now tell me "

Lucas activated Kami-E, his body became limp, but it didn't appear on his face, Lucas looks like he was taking a relaxing stance.

The old man saw this as a sign of arrogance and ignorance, but he began to explain anyway. "Well, to begin with, 40 years ago...."

While Lucas was listening and looking to the old man, the monkey with swords got closer and attacked him, for sword users, direct contact with blade is ten times deadlier than compressed air blades.

Lucas's body was limp, it reacted the same way the paper would react to the winds since Kame-E is level 10 now, Lucas reactions seemed more natural and Lucas is able to use his muscle memory to make better reactions and use some techniques to dodge. The swords in the monkey's hands turned into streaks of light as it headed toward the blonde, but Lucas took a step back and bent his body, the monkey attacked again but Lucas's reactions were fast and he unconsciously used moonwalk to jump up and flip.

".... As you can see, this monkey required two commanders to capture it, so we kept it here to have it for the test, but you are the first one who fought it since most of the recruits would choose more traditional ways or fight weaker ones" The rear admiral seemed to be impressed while observing Lucas's moves. seems he can use Observation Haki perfectly while keeping talking with him.

Lucas nodded while the monkey jumped on him. The sword passed through Lucas as he used feather footwork to leave an after image, Lucas appeared behind the monkey " I see, so it would be waste if it died ". Lucas pointed with his finger to the back of the monkey and used a finger-gun a bullet made of compressed air hit the monkey from the back and made a deep wound. The monkey turned with painful expression to hit Lucas, but then, Lucas took his sword and slashed the monkey.

[finger gun +400 XP]

[Swordsmanship +10 XP]

[+3000 XP].

The test was officially over, and Lucas was called out the tower by a rear admiral.

" let's go"

"Where," Lucas said looking to the ship.

"To the HQ, your results are exceptional, and I don't have enough authority to give you your rank. to get your rank, the HQ would observe you personally, "