An Excellent Performance

Getting up from his seat, Jake got up from his seat and began walking to the building.

"I'll be waiting for you." Cat said to him.

"See you soon."

Stepping into the building, Jake saw the huge cube in the middle of the room.

"Please step into the cube." an examiner said to him.

Going into the cube, Jake saw the nanobots in the air creating a holographic display. The examiner explained everything Jake needed to know and the scenery for his examination inside the cube began to change.

Standing on a shore, Jake looked around him and saw a large expanse of water with nothing but dry land surrounding it.

In the room not too far away from the cube, the examiners were talking amongst themselves.

"Looks like this one drew the short straw." said Henry, a soldier of Veda sent to check out the performance of the students.

"He sure did. Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide." an examiner said.

Shifting one of his legs, Jake saw a seashell with a curved edge a little bit under the sand. Picking it up, Jake removed the sand from it and took a fighting stance as he saw the three hostiles the examiner told him about running towards him.

Jake knew there was no point in running away. Although he could probably outrun them, surviving for five minutes by running sounded pathetic to him so he decided to at least try to fight them head on.

Running towards him, one of the hostiles fired out laser beams from the tips of his forefingers, while another hostile conjured up a vortex of wind and sent it to Jake.

"Whoa come on guys." Jake said while dodging the laser beams that were ahead of the vortex of wind. "All this for little ole me?"

[System Quest: Take out all three hostiles]

[Reward: +2 stat points]

'This is the first time I'm seeing stat points as a reward.' Jake thought. 'Usually the system puts the points in an attribute itself.'

Jumping up with an uppercut from the under the ground was the third hostile.

Blocking the uppercut with his hands, Jake grabbed the hostile's hand and put it in the path of a laser beam. The hand of the hostile disintegrated and the vortex of wind was now close to Jake drawing him in.

Trying to resist the pull of the vortex, Jake was slowly pushing his way out of the range of the vortex until a laser beam hit him on his arm and the seashell he was holding fell out of his hand and got pulled into the vortex. Grabbing the hostile that had come from underground, Jake flew into the vortex with his arms around the neck of the hostile.

Making one of the hostiles disintegrate by strangling him, Jake was now whirling in the vortex of wind by himself.

'It's gotta stop at some point right?' Jake thought to himself trying to give himself hope.

Slowing down and eventually stopping after some minutes of whirling, the vortex dematerialized and Jake fell on the sand slightly dizzy. "Glad I was right." Seeing the hostile about to conjure another vortex, Jake picked the seashell from the sand again and threw it directly at the hostile and it passed through his head cleanly killing him on the spot.

"That's two down, one more to go." Jake said looking at the last remaining hostile. As the hostile shot multiple laser beams at Jake, he tried to dodge them and carefully move closer to the hostile but not without a few hitting him.

Making his head the most important thing to protect, Jake started running around trying to make himself a hard target to hit while still trying to not get exhausted quickly. Taking a very quick look at the timer on his wrist, Jake saw he had just one minute left to survive.

Hurrying things up, Jake ran faster than before no longer caring about exhaustion. Running in a zig zag movement towards the hostile, Jake made sure to protect his head because in his current state, after being hit by so many laser beams, all it would take to kill him is one hit to his head.

Reaching the hostile, Jake broke his forefingers that were pointed out then jumped and punched his head from above ensuring he killed the hostile in that one hit.

Falling on the sand, Jake took deep breaths and closed his eyes for a bit. Looking at the system messages he had just gotten, Jake was wondering where to add the stat points.

[Quest Completed: Take out all three hostiles]

[Reward obtained: +2 stat points]

In the room where the examiners were, they were shocked that a student actually managed to take out all three hostiles.

"It's never happened before." Henry said with wide eyes. "What's his name?"

"Jake Cayden." an examiner answered.

"We must keep an eye on him." Henry said. "If he's this good now imagine how he'll be in a few years and with him using magic, he'll join our elite team in no time. This kind of addition to our forces will do us a lot of good when it's time to face the Werts."

Leaving the cube, Jake was surprised to see a person wearing a crimson coloured vest waiting for him along with an examiner. "Are you also an examiner?" Jake asked.

"No I was sent here to check out how you all performed."

"Well what do you think about mine?"

"I think it was excellent." Henry answered. "Have you ever thought of joining the Veda army?"

"No. Was I really that good?" Jake asked surprised.

"Yes you were. You would make an exceptional addition to the Veda army. Here's my contact card." Henry said and handed him his contact card. "Think about what I said, then give me a call."

Walking out to meet Cat now sleeping on the chair where he had left her, Jake booked a Glist to take them home. Lifting her in the princess style, Jake took her to the Glist and sat her down with her head resting on his shoulder.

On the way to Cat's house, she woke up and was surprised to find herself in a Glist next to Jake who she thought was sleeping because his head was rested on the headrest and his eyes were closed. When she removed her head from his shoulder Jake opened his eyes and looked at her.

"Sorry." Cat apologised. "Didn't mean to wake you."

"I wasn't sleeping." Jake told her.

"How was your simulation?"

"It was good. One of the people there actually said that I'd make an exceptional addition to the Veda army."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Apparently my performance was excellent."

"That's great Jake. So are you going to become part of the Veda army?"

"I don't know yet. Let me graduate first."

"What time is it?" Cat asked.

"It's uh, nine forty five." Jake answered. "You should have gone home Cat. Why did you wait for this long?"

"I didn't want you to go home alone. Your brother had already gone, your friends too, so I decided to wait."

"Thanks but next time, go home."

"No promises Jake." she said as she leaned in and kissed him.