After a short water break—and a much-needed chance for the bruised and battered students from the labyrinth to get medical attention—the announcer stepped forward again, his ever-present grin already making the crowd buzz with unease.
"Trial Two is a long-time favorite of many students…" His voice dipped theatrically before he roared, "The WRITTEN PORTION!"
The words echoed through the stadium like a curse. His grin widened into something wolfish, and though his tone dripped with sarcasm, the effect was chilling.
Next to Elijah, Tim's face drained of all color. He looked like he'd seen a ghost.
Elijah rolled his eyes. "Oh, come on. It can't be nearly as bad as the labyrinth. It's just an exam. Sit down, fill in a few bubbles, done."
Tim whipped his head toward him, eyes wild. "Easy for you to say! This portion always tanks my rank. You know I can't sit still for three hours. My brain just—" He waved his hands like a man drowning. "Gone. Poof. Useless."
Elijah tapped his chin in mock thought. "Maybe try some katas beforehand. Might help you focus."
Tim blinked, then snapped his fingers. "That… that might actually work. Shut up, I gotta try this."
And right there, in front of thousands of spectators and during the announcer's speech, Tim launched into a kata sequence. His stance dropped low, arms slicing the air with sharp precision. A ripple of murmurs spread through the crowd.
The announcer, not missing a beat, simply raised his voice. "The written exam will cover all fields of study: military strategy, philosophy, mathematics, science—you name it. Each exam is unique. There is a pool of over a thousand questions, randomized for every participant. No two of you will face the exact same test. Some may get lucky. Others may… not."
He let the pause drag, his grin widening as if he fed on their dread.
"Our answer to this imbalance? Luck is a skill. Life is unfair, war is unfair, survival is unfair. You adapt, or you fail. It is not always the strongest who lives the longest, but often the luckiest."
Elijah heard a few students groan softly. Even Claro, who usually looked smug no matter the circumstances, wore a pinched expression.
"Ground rules are simple," the announcer continued. "No cheating. Complete the test in the allotted time. Do your best. Anti-cheating tech is already prepared. For all intents and purposes… consider this just a normal exam."
None of the students laughed.
The announcer clasped his hands. "No questions? Good. Then I wish you all… the very best of luck."
He bowed, and in a flash of light, both he and the students vanished.
Elijah staggered slightly, the teleport leaving his vision blurred for half a second. As his senses cleared, he realized he was standing inside a transparent glass cylinder. Hundreds of others stretched around him in a vast circular chamber, each holding a student, a desk, and nothing else.
So this was the anti-cheating measure.
Across the chamber, Elijah spotted Tim, who had apparently been mid-kata during the teleport and stumbled headfirst into his desk. Despite the embarrassment, Tim sat down quickly, closed his eyes, and forced his breathing steady. Elijah smirked. At least the katas seemed to be helping him stay centered.
Shaking his head, Elijah lowered himself into the chair. He took a long, slow breath. Alright. You've got this. Years of sitting out ability training left you with nothing but books to chew on. All the theory, all the history, all the weird scraps of lore you stuffed into your head—they'll pay off now.
A flash of light deposited a thick exam booklet and several sharpened pencils onto the desk in front of him. The weight of the booklet alone was intimidating. Elijah felt his stomach twist, but he caught himself.
Above, a colossal timer blinked into existence, counting down from 3:00:00. A booming voice filled the chamber.
"You may begin."
Elijah flipped the booklet open.
History Section
1. How many years were the Hyuman race under Sylari rule before managing to break free from near-slavery? Provide reasoning for additional points.
Choices:
52 years
111 years
157 years
236 years
Elijah's pencil hovered only briefly before scratching out his answer.
This one's easy. It's D. Mana arrived on our world roughly five centuries ago. Hyumans couldn't harness it right away—it took generations of experimentation to even begin awakening cores. The Sylari, of course, had no such handicap. They bent mana the moment it appeared, and with that power, they subjugated their nearest neighbors: us.
His hand moved faster as his thoughts spilled onto the page.
It took more than two centuries of failure before Hyumans finally learned how to awaken cores properly, train them, and push our strength high enough to throw off Sylari chains. Only then did we claw our way into the World Accord, not as slaves but as a recognized power. On paper, anyway. The truth is uglier. Even now, wars simmer constantly. The races compete endlessly, all fighting to prove themselves worthy of ultimate dominion over the planet. And where do Hyumans sit on that ladder? Dead last.
Elijah leaned back slightly, exhaling. Too much detail, maybe, but laying out the context would help with later questions.
He flipped to the next.
2. What are the seven races that make up the World Accord, and what are the basics of their mana usage? (Free Response)
Elijah smirked faintly. Perfect follow-up. He'd already primed himself.
He began writing, his thoughts structured and deliberate.
The Hyuman Coalition. The Veyrith Hive. The Drakhal Swarms. The Sylari Concord. The Goliath Tribes. The Cybranian Nexus. And finally, the Unspoken.
Hyumans wield an array of random, diverse abilities, amplified by drawing mana from our environment. Our strength lies not in specialization but in variety.
The Veyrith Hive obeys the singular Law of Assimilation. What we know is limited, but terrifying: they fuse powers, override minds, and draw others unwillingly into their Hive. Rumors suggest entire villages have "joined" overnight.
The Drakhal Swarms embody the Laws of Consumption and Entropy. Their powers rot, decay, unmake. They can neutralize abilities outright, heal by feasting on the energy of those around them, and reduce battlefields to husks.
The Sylari Concord follows the Law of Time. Their people age slowly and reproduce rarely, but their control of temporal flow is unmatched. Some can accelerate decay to instant death, others freeze time itself. Legends even whisper of time travel, though that seems doubtful—if it were true, Hyumans would still be slaves. The Sylari despise change. To them, advancement is an abomination, which makes them hate Hyumans and Cybranians most of all.
The Goliath Tribes are simpler. They follow the Law of Strength. Mountains crumble in their fists. Seas part. Their bodies alone are weapons strong enough to shatter a Sylari's stasis. Brutality, distilled to perfection.
The Cybranian Nexus is the most secretive. They're the cyborgs of the Accord, augmenting their bodies with technologies powered by laws they barely admit to following: Knowledge and Progress. Unlike us, they don't just train abilities—they build them. Their intelligence is their true weapon.
And lastly, the Unspoken. Almost nothing is known. They are whispered to embody Creation, Destruction, and Control. To encounter one is to face a god in mortal skin. Records suggest it takes a hundred Hyumans of equal standing to fell a single Unspoken. Best advice if you see one? Run. Pray it ignores you.
Elijah's hand cramped slightly, but he pushed through the ache, finishing with a thought he'd picked up from countless dusty tomes.
Hyumans remain unique. Unlike the other races, we lack conscious understanding of the Laws. We wield fragments unknowingly, scattered and random. But in theory, every time we train our abilities, we are brushing against the edge of those great Laws, inching closer to their truth. The others may scorn us, but what we lack in certainty, we make up for in possibility.
He stopped, flexing his fingers. Thirty minutes gone, only two questions answered. His heart skipped a beat, but at least they were good answers.
Elijah buzzed through the remainder of the history section, thankful that most of the questions shifted toward true/false and multiple-choice formats. His pencil moved quickly, his earlier detailed notes carrying him through the nuance. A few questions were tricky, trying to bait careless students with phrasing, but nothing he hadn't drilled before.
Then the page turned to math.
Elijah froze. His brain went utterly blank as his eyes scanned the first problem.
What the heck is this?
The problem statement sprawled across the page like some arcane scripture:
A prototype electromagnetic field generator creates a spatially varying charge density inside a cubic test chamber with side length a. The charge density is modeled as:
p(x, y, z) = p₀(1 + x/a + y/a + z/a), 0 ≤ x, y, z ≤ a
Part A – Compute the total charge Q inside the chamber using a triple integral.
Part B – The quadrupole moment tensor is defined as:
Qᵢⱼ = ∫ p(x, y, z) (3xᵢxⱼ – r²δᵢⱼ) dV,
where r² = x² + y² + z², δᵢⱼ is the Kronecker delta, and i, j ∈ {x, y, z}.
1. Write the quadrupole moment as a 3×3 symmetric matrix.
2. Evaluate its entries symbolically in terms of a and p₀.
Part C – Find the eigenvalues of the quadrupole moment matrix. Briefly explain what physical directions (x, y, or z) correspond to stable vs. unstable field growth inside the generator.
Elijah stared at it. The numbers didn't even feel like numbers anymore. They swam on the page like a cruel illusion.
Emitters definitely have an advantage on the written portion. Their brains just… hum at this level. If I try to brute-force this, I'll burn all three hours on this one problem.
He sighed and rubbed his forehead. If my dad wasn't an engineer, I wouldn't even have a prayer. Maybe I can fake something plausible… lean on the descriptive part, say something about "charge symmetry" and "field stabilization." Close enough. Skip steps, write a few courtesy notes, and pray they don't dock me too hard.
He scratched out a vague outline of Part A, scribbled something about "net positive charge density gradient favoring edges of the cube," and for Part B wrote:
"Symmetry suggests diagonal dominance. Off-diagonal terms negligible. Eigenvalues indicate instability in one axis (likely z) with relative stability in orthogonal plane."
It was academic bluffing, pure and simple, based more on half-remembered comments from his father's late-night experiments than actual computation. The sheer absurdity of it made him shake his head. What kind of sadist puts graduate-level tensor algebra on a high school trial exam?
He flipped the page to the next math problem.
2. What is 2 + 2?
Elijah blinked. Then blinked again.
"…You've got to be kidding me." He whispered it under his breath, then chuckled despite himself. Wow. They really weren't exaggerating when they said some exams are harder than others.
His pencil tapped once, twice, then he circled the answer with deliberate force, like carving victory into stone.
Four.
One problem had looked like it belonged in his father's research notes, and the next could've been solved by a toddler. Elijah shook his head, both amused and unnerved. Luck really is a skill here. If Tim got a test full of questions like this, he might actually pass for once.
He exhaled, rolled his shoulders, and pressed on. The math section wrapped up with a few more manageable problems—basic calculus, simple geometry proofs, nothing close to the tensor nightmare he'd skipped. His nerves steadied as he flipped to the next section.
Moral and Ethical Philosophy.
Elijah grimaced. Here we go. This section is could never be straightforward.
What even would a correct answer look like for this section. I feel like anything I put down will inherently be subjective. Well guess I'll just get to it. How bad can it possibly be…right?