-Chapter 17- The Adventurer Test

Arthur Leywin P.O.V.

Jasmine and Adam had arrived to bring Lilia and me to become adventurers. We say goodbye to our families and get into the carriage that will take us to the guildhall in Xyrus.

Upon arrival, we enter and Jasmine and Adam bring us directly to the front desk. While passing by I can hear people talking about us already, since they couldn't see our faces that only brought attention to us.

"Who are they?"

"I don't know, probably some midgets are getting signed up to become adventurers."

"One of them is wearing expensive items, are they nobles?"

I sigh, I really should be used to this by now after being a king but you can't just ignore people talking about you.

Jasmine walks up to the receptionist and says, "I'd like to sponsor these two for a rank examination." She gestures to me and Lilia.

"Oh, sponsor of course. Please come over this way." She says. She gets up from her seat and opens the door beside us from the other side. We were brought to another room, on the far side of the room was a dark wooden desk facing us. A slender man whom I had recognized sat at the desk neatly organizing the papers.

The man looked up from his papers to see us enter the room, the man was Kaspian Bladeheart my old mana teacher from not too long ago.

"Ah, Jasmine. What brings you here today?" Kaspian asks. He looks at me and Lilia with a skeptical look before his eyes widen for a moment in realization. 'Had he already recognized me?'

The clerk speaks to her, answering his question, "A-class Jasmine Flamsworth has requested these two to partake in rank evaluation." She stumbles over her words not knowing how to refer to us.

"Ah, I see," He smiles. "May I know your names?" He asks us both.

"I go by Note," I responded. I had chosen the name because of the music half-note on the mask.

"Um-um, I am... Flow." She stumbles over her words. Had she not thought of an alias? It seemed like she had simply chosen flow because of her affinity with water.

"Ok, Note and Flow. I will lead you both along with Jasmine and Adam here to the testing arena. Do you both know how this will work?" Kaspian asks.

I shook my head and he began to explain, "An adventurer of B-class or higher has the right to sponsor a new adventurer for an examination. After the examination, we will place you in a suitable rank. This way, you can avoid the struggle of starting from the very beginning. The rank exam consists only of the practical portion. Now, Judging by your weapons you Note must be an augmenter or fighter, and Flow you must be a conjurer?"

"Yes, you are correct," I answered.

"Good. usually, there would be a quick application along with an inspection of your mana core before the exam but since it is Miss Flamesworth here sponsoring you, I will waive those steps." We arrived at the examination hall.

I squinted my eyes to adjust to the brightness, the examination hall was a brightly lit indoor arena with standard theater seats for spectators, there were people scattered around sitting watching the current examination.

Everyone was watching the current examination where a larger bald man swung around a polearm against a black-haired man with a scar running down his cheek.

"You all can sit here while you wait for your examinations," Kaspian tells us. He then walks off somewhere out of my sight.

I sit down and begin to watch the current fight.

"Hah!" the bald man roared as he swung down with his weapon, he was obviously weaker than the man he was facing with a lack of skill and wide attacks.

The scarred fighter had an apathetic expression reminding me of Jasmine. He wielded a Broadsword he carried in his right hand, easily dodging the bald man's attacks.

In an act of frustration, the bald man prepares for a big attack, "Take that!" he yelled. He raised his polearm above his head and it began to glow a dim orange as a heatwave surrounded his weapon. He swung down yelling "Hell Smash!"

This left the scarred man unimpressed and simply lifted his broadsword to block the pitiful attack. The sharp ring of the metal meeting metal echoes and the sight of the bald man's polearm being launched into the air gave away the clear winner of the fight.

"Your skill with a polearm is nonexistent a child could do better. Your battle senses are lousy, and that's nice. You depend too much on your physical strength compared to your mana reinforcement, which throws your attack balance off. You are thirty-five but you are a dark-orange stage augmenter. I would normally place someone of your caliber in E-class, but seeing how you can use fire magic, even if it is comparable to a little heater, I will place you in D-class... barely." The examiner was curt and to the point. (Don't worry bald man, keep following your dreams)

He looks at his clipboard and reads off, "Up next... um- Flow?"

Lilia who was sitting next to me stands up and heads down to the arena.

The scarred man who had examined the bald augmenter had taken a seat, being replaced by a woman who looked to be a conjurer.

The conjurer examiner speaks when Lilia was in the arena. "Let us begin."

Instantly Lilia began to mumble a spell and summoned a sphere of water surrounding her as some kind of shield.

"Sandstorm!" the pale examiner shouted, and a gale of wind whirled sand around the water shield.

The water soon became mud making Lilia unable to see outside of the sphere. She releases the spell and has the sphere explode outwards to blast back at the examiner.

The examiner jumped back to prepare another spell, but Lilia had prepared one sooner, raising her staff and summoning several balls of water around her. She launches a few at the examiner to keep pressure on her.

The examiner dodges each of the balls of water sent her but Lilia has them burst behind her as a kind of surprise attack. Several small explosions occur behind the examiner threatening to hit them. But the examiner uses the spell she had prepared to make a wall of earth around her making her unable to be seen even by us in the audience.

Suddenly the examiner bursts out of the ground behind Lilia and places the tip of her wand on the back of Lilia's neck. "I must say your control and manipulation of mana is really good, but your lack of experience and judgment in battle lead to your loss. You have great potential but are still untapped. I would place you in B-class if it weren't for that, therefore you will be placed in C-class.

Lilia was relieved to hear she got a good ranking. She was then sent back to her seat while they called for the next person to be tested.

"Next, Lucas Wykes!" The scarred man announces.

A boy around my age stands up upon being called, I was surprised to see someone around my age maybe slightly older here. He flicks back some of his hair to reveal his elf-like ears. 'Is he a half-elf?'

"Finally," he says while he picks up his staff and walks on down to the arena.

The scarred man looks down at his notes, "Lucas Wykes, eleven years old. Conjurer at the light-orange stage! Single specialization with fire."

Lucas stood there waiting for the battle with the female conjurer examiner to begin.

Upon hearing the words "Let us begin." from the examiner, Lucas started chanting a spell.

"Arise my protector!" A pillar of fire erupted in front of him, then faded to reveal a humanoid form, more than six feet tall and made of flames.

"Ah, flame guardian. Looks like we have more than one special talent today." The examiner says.

Next to me, I hear Jasmine say "To be expected from a member of the Wykes family."

The flame guardian began to sprint towards the examiner, leaving burned footprints in the dirt in the arena. Lucas then began to cast another spell.

The examiner, impressed, responded with a spell of her own chanting the spell for Earth Tomb. Three triangular planes of solid earth shot up from the ground trapping the flame guardian. It was naturally extinguished. Lucas had finished his chant for his next spell in that time, summoning a spark to fly into the air to then explode, raining down several tendrils of fire.

Lucas then raised his staff and yelled, "Expulsion!" and the dozens of fire tendrils concentrated and shot out beams of fire at the examiner. The examiner aimed her staff at the ground and chanted a spell, the surface began to glow and several pieces of earth emerged from the ground making the spell, Stone Shard Field.

The glowing rocks darted together into a shield to block the oncoming lasers of fire. Lucas in a panic tries to release the spell but it only gets rid of the fire tendrils in the air and not the lasers. In a panic, he makes a spell with fire in an attempt to combat the laser only for it to blast off in the wrong direction into the audience.

I can see the fire spell launch into the audience towards a girl with red hair. I leaped from my seat faster than anyone else could react to get in front of the girl, I then used wind to disperse the spell to go around me and the girl who I stayed close to so the fire didn't hit them. The fire spell eventually dissipated. Looking back onto the field I can see the examiner had Lucas in a position he had to surrender ending the examination.

I turn my attention to the girl I had just saved, I see she had already gone to grab a rapier that sat next to her to try and react to the spell. I had gotten there sooner so her effort went in vain.

"Thanks," She says.

"No problem," I say with my mask lowering my voice.

I see Kaspian walk towards us, "It seems you had protected my niece, lucky you were there Note." He says.

'Wait this was his niece?' I look back at her trying to spot any kind of resemblance.

I hear the scarred examiner call out my alias, "Next up Note!"

I begin walking towards the arena when suddenly behind me I hear Kaspian say, "No worries, I know him. Just place him in A-class."

'This guy.' He knew the entire time I was Arthur, didn't he?

The examiner, astonished, fumbles over his words, "O-ok then. Note will be ranked A-class!"

I and Lilia were then brought to the front desk by Jasmine and Adam. We were then given out adventurers cards. Lilias was bronze while mine was silver. After receiving my card I spotted Kaspian walking toward me.

"Enjoy your time as an adventurer Art. Don't put my teachings to waste." He then walks off smiling. He didn't even bother to say my alias that time since it was just him around.

I ran back to my group who had walked off ahead. We walked to the nearby teleportation gate. We showed the guards our adventurer's cards so we can be teleported to the beast glades. With the portal opening up we all begin to walk through it.

Here began my journey as an A-class adventurer.

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