A few hours had passed, and by now, everyone from the blue team was wearing a yellow bandana on their wrists.
There was no intervention by the exam overseers, so naturally, Raelis figured he was still within the confines of the rules.
But there was still one more issue at hand.
He turned to the unconscious Zeri and sighed.
"How do we disqualify her?" Raelis asked.
"Huh? How should I know?" Mira replied. "Just tie her up and toss her into a corner."
He nodded. "And when she wakes up?"
"Um... when she wakes up...?"
"We can't." Clea sighed. "The only way to eliminate her is to capture the King and Queen of the red team. In turn, we'd eliminate their entire team as well."
"But how does capturing even work exactly?" Raelis asked. "We've captured these guys, right? But nothing..."
He trailed off, spotting the familiar rings on their fingers.
"I see... so to get rid of them, we need to take their rings off," Raelis deduced. "That seems simple... yet a bit difficult."
"This academy wouldn't be called the Furnace if it was easy," Clea remarked with a chuckle. "Anyhow, what do you have in mind now?"
"I'll go and have a chat with the green team," Raelis stated. "Since it's Auren, I believe he has the brains necessary to see where I'm going with this strategy."
He met Clea's gaze.
"What do you say to trying to convince the red team instead?"
"...Me?" Clea pointed to herself. "Are you sure?"
"Why are you so surprised?" Raelis raised a brow. "You're acting as if you don't know what you're doing."
In reality, she was a great commander, as she knew how to deal with incidents as they happened.
So after a few back and forths, they went their separate ways.
She wasn't reluctant so much as confused.
But the reason why he told her to go was fairly simple. He just didn't want her being around Zeri when she finally woke up.
If she woke up. That skill should normally put others in a coma from the mana exhaustion alone.
Because of that, he decided to do this swiftly.
After a good 15 minutes of running, he finally arrived in front of the green team's castle, and to his surprise, it was made entirely out of wood.
It was like one giant treehouse, and because of that, the flaw was apparent.
How did I not see it earlier? It's so easy to get rid of them... but I won't. Not yet.
He slipped into the shadows and made his way through the gate, climbed up the giant tree branch, and finally ended up at the very top of the castle.
It had no windows, so he entered through one of the holes.
He saw a few of the green team's soldiers scattered throughout, yet all of them seemed disinterested, almost like they were slacking off on purpose.
The castle's structure was slightly different from his own, so it took him a while to finally arrive at the throne room.
He took a deep breath and slipped under the door, arriving on the other side.
There weren't any soldiers present, only Auren and the Queen, Sophia.
They seemed to be chatting lively, but their conversation was cut short when Raelis stepped out of the shadows, startling the two of them.
Immediately, Auren's body lit up in flames as he sent several fireballs his way.
However, Raelis was fully prepared for them as he used Basic Flame Step to appear right in front of Auren.
But before Raelis could strike or try to defuse the situation, he felt a powerful kick impact his abdomen, causing him to go flying off toward the back of the throne room.
Only then did silence settle over the room.
Ugh... Raelis spat out a mouthful of blood. She really didn't hold back, did she? I guess I was right when I thought she was dangerous.
"Why have you come?" Auren asked coldly. "You call this an invasion? You came here alone. That is incredibly foolish, Raelis."
He turned to Sophia. "Shall we play a game on who gets to take his ring off?"
She let out a sigh. "No need. I'm bored of your games, so I'll just do it. Go kick your feet up and relax."
With those words, she rolled up her sleeves and slowly began approaching Raelis.
Yet not even a few steps in, she suddenly tumbled, falling to the ground first as her entire body began to twitch, then stop.
At the same time, Raelis took a glance at his daggers, whose tips were covered in green liquid, yet one tip in particular had a bit of blood on it.
That was because, when she kicked him, he managed to nick her with his daggers coated in poison, just enough to paralyze her.
Raelis let out a groan and stood up.
He met Auren's furious gaze and spoke.
"I'm not here to fight. I'm here to give you a proposal you'll have trouble refusing. It's beneficial for everyone, and if you refuse, then I might have to take your intelligence into question."
Auren didn't reply. Instead, he crouched down and checked up on Sophia.
After figuring out that she was fine, he took a few steps toward Raelis, wariness clear in his gaze.
"What is the proposal?"
"For someone so strong, you sure love to act like a weakling," Raelis remarked.
Auren was stronger than the hotheaded Elandra, whom Raelis beat in the preliminary exams, but he was much weaker than Zeri.
If Raelis had to guess, then he'd have a fairly challenging fight against Auren... if he didn't hold back.
Still, Raelis decided to share his plan.
"I want you to merge with the red team," Raelis stated. "It's possible since I've already done it with the blue team."
He explained how the bandanas worked, and after a few minutes, Auren let out a sigh.
"Two teams must remain in order to pass. I see... that makes sense," Auren mumbled.
He paced around the throne room, muttering all sorts of nonsense until eventually, he met Raelis's gaze once more.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but the headmaster never said teams could be changed, only alliances could be formed, and only queens could form them. Right?"
Raelis's brows furrowed. "Yes... but I've seen candidates switch sides already."
Auren shook his head. "No, you've seen candidates from other teams wear different bandanas. That doesn't mean they've switched teams. It just means they're pretending to."
He took a few steps forward, arriving in front of Raelis.
"My theory is that the rules are absolute. You can't change teams. You can't merge them. So even if every member of the blue team put on yellow's bandana, and you remove the rings from their leaders... it won't matter. Their team will still be considered eliminated."
Auren let out a sigh. "So in the end... the teams that exist are the ones we were assigned to when we were teleported to the throne room."
"But... we can still use this. All we need is to reach the green team, and I'll do the talking," Auren said with a faint smile.
Raelis stared at him for a long moment, his brows furrowed.
Auren had set the groundwork by questioning Raelis's logic, then layered on facts that were difficult to refute.
He didn't challenge Raelis directly, he simply filled in the gaps of a theory Raelis had already begun to suspect.
Raelis knew what would happen if he turned his back to a person like Auren.
He has a point... but he's clearly trying to manipulate my decision-making. However... since I've already come this far, I have no reason not to see it through. Especially because I can backstab him whenever I want.
With that, Raelis nodded with a faint smile.
"Sure, you can lead the way."