Entrance Examination

Eris had been scared when she saw the old man kill someone, she was just about to run when Shiro held her hand. It was just a small motion but that was enough to calm her down.

Once they were inside the gate, the three saw a stair way that looked to be unending, looking around, they saw other participants each bearing the same confused face as them.

'Were they supposed to climb this stairs?'

Shiro thought when he noticed his cultivation dropping, his martial awareness was instantly deactivated rendering him unable to see.

The other children also seemed to notice something was wrong as a lot of them had pensive expressions on their face.

Suddenly a voice resounded through the sky, the voice sounded distant yet close at the same time, and it was like it was talking to them through their minds.

'This is the first test, you are to make it to the top of this mountain with all your cultivations sealed. We only need three thousand people to pass this phase, good luck!'

Once the voice ended a lot of people were still trying to discern what happened while the quick witted ones began running up the stairs.

Shiro dragged Eris and Shin and began heading up the stairs, they were moving comparatively slower if compared to the other candidates, since there did not seem to be an end to the stairs from what he saw when his martial awareness was still active so he was not sure how far they will need to run so conserving energy was key in this test.

Shiro was blind right now but the image of the stairs were still embroiled in his head, he made a quick calculation of how long each stair was before progressing to avoid slowing down Eris and Shin, he couldn't let his blindness become a burden to the rest.

Shiro's group progressed slowly and rested after every one thousand stairs, they had been doing this for a whole day when they saw the 500km mark, and beside the mark was a small hut like structure which looked like it was a checkpoint.

A lot of participants were going in and out of the hut which made Shiro wonder just how big the hut was. From what his ears told him, more than half of the people that were ahead of them were inside this hut.

The three went into the hut and was greeted by an assorted view, the inside was large and spacious with an all you could eat buffet on a massive table, when Shiro used his sense to check how large the inside was, he realized that his senses could not discern the whole size of the building.

"Let's take some fruits and leave"

Shiro said to Eris and Shin,

"We will only take energy giving foods inside the hut and rest for only twenty minutes"

Once he had said his piece, Shiro went around and started picking up fruits that were easy to carry about, he then went to another side of the table and began stuffing his mouth full with sugar concentrated foods and water.

Following Shiro's lead, Eris and Shin went around and did the same thing, once the twenty minutes time elapsed, they left the hut.

Not long after they left, screams and shouts were heard from the hut, inside was a group of people numbering five, each wore a white robe and trousers which were held together by bamboo ropes, around them were rows of dead bodies.

*

Shiro's group didn't stop at any of the other checkpoints and when Shin and Eris asked why, Shiro just answered them with an 'I don't know' face.

Few hours later, Shiro's group began to pass by a lot of participants, most of the participants had drained looks on their faces. Eris looked at the participants with confused faces.

'Why were they tired?'

However, Shin who had a better understanding of the situation looked at Shiro in awe, this guy had accurately controlled their walking pace to avoid exhaustion, although they were not the fastest, the pace at which the other participants were exhausting themselves would undoubtedly lead them to the top.

'At this pace getting into the top three thousand is possible'

They continued their journey for another half a day, Shiro couldn't tell if it was day or night, neither could he tell how long they had been walking but he was sure that they were among the top two hundred people.

After a long time of walking, Shiro's group could finally see the top of the stairs. Once they reached the top they encountered a large crowd blocking their parts, Shin looked ahead and saw a group of people of people who covered their faces with masks, and around them were numerous bodies which Shin guessed to be participants.

Shin went back and reported his findings to Shiro.

"Show me the way"

Shin then led their group to the front of the crowd were the masked people were standing.

"What do you want?"

One of the masked person asked

However, Shiro didn't respond, he simply drew his sword from behind and stabbed the person's face. The action was so abrupt and unexpected that the others didn't have time to react before their teammate was killed.

The other participants looked at Shiro with shocked expressions.

This guy didn't even hesitate to kill someone.

Seeing their teammate die in front of their eyes, the group of masked people all jumped towards Shiro with killing intent.

Shiro didn't think it was necessary to kill the rest, he only killed the first person to make an example and show the rest that he was not ready to play games with them.

The group of masked people heading towards Shiro suddenly stopped and retreated as if receiving orders from someone, seeing them retreat, Shiro decided not to attract unnecessary trouble and just let them go.

Now that the people blocking the road had been cleared, Shiro's group no longer faced any obstruction as they climbed the remaining stairs to the top.

On the top of the mountain was a small receptionist like building, inside the building sat a woman who showed Shiro's group a list to sign on before entering. The list was numbered one to hundred and the numbers up to fifty eight had names already written on them. Shiro didn't think much of this before signing his name on number fifty nine, the others followed suit.

Shiro's group had officially passed the first phase of the exam. After signing his name Shiro went through a small passage near the receptionist building which led him to were the other participants that had finished where.