Ellis watched the chaos that ensued 15 minutes after everyone had left the hall. He had kind of guessed the situation before him as soon as Archer left the exam hall without giving any further instructions.
At first, everyone just met with their friends and discussed their answers as soon as they left the hall while walking off.
Soon one by one they realised except for the surrounding few acres and the buildings everything around them was sealed off to all students in a barrier. It was next to impossible for anyone to bypass the barrier. Even if they did it was probably futile, seeing as how the guards outside of the barrier looked at them.
There was no place for food or refreshments. It didn't take them long to find out they were trapped inside the barrier, together with the students who were disqualified.
Few students went in front of the barrier to demand explanations from the guards, but they were only met with the empty stare of the guards outside of the barrier.
Ellis decided not to waste his energy and sat down. Due to being in the game realm he had often went days without food and was used to it, and knew how to best conserve his energy, unlike the clueless fools around him.
However, water was another thing, but being a rank 2 magi solved that problem for him.
He suddenly spotted a figure amidst the crowd talking with a few other nobles descendants, Phil. Ellis had noticed him walking out of the hall with the other nobles when they were disqualified for being caught for cheating. Ellis knew by tomorrow if Phil didn't manage to get a golden ticket he would be disqualified.
"There is bound to be a combat round. There is bound to be a combat..." Ellis chanted to reign in his desire to rip Phil apart. Doing something now was akin to putting not only him in danger but his Lord's reputation in jeopardy.
He lowered his head to take his sight away from Phil for a moment, praying Phil somehow finds a golden ticket.
He decided to wait and see what this round entailed. Something in his gut told him that there would be a chance for him to enact his plan for Phil.
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It had been 1 hour now since the end of the exam.
Most of the students were either lying down or sitting down in order to conserve their energy after wandering around the whole area looking for a way out or to find some food.
"Have you found anything?" A boy with the badge number 2234 asked the girl who just walked in.
The girl shook her head as she looked at the guards standing in front of the barrier warily.
"Relax, I presume they put the barrier up for the 2nd part of the test, not to capture us." Badge number 2234 consoled the slightly panicked girl as he sat down.
The girl nodded as she sat by the boy while looking at their 3rd member of the group and their team leader sitting on her own, with eyes closed.
The girl was slightly envious even though she already had her turn yesterday.
"I hope this rotten exam don't interfere with my counselling session with father." Badge number 2234 voiced in annoyance while looking at their team leader.
The girl nodded while looking at a group of people using magi in detest and abhor. She closed her eyes and started to calm her mind before proceeding to pray to the almighty hoping there might be some kind of revelations on their journey to find the chosen one.
The quicker they find him, the quicker they can get out of this forsaken land.
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'Interesting a barrier of rank 4 aptitude. Should take about maximum 20 hits and minimum 10 hits of my arms before it shatters.' The girl winked at a student who she found was feasting on her body with his eyes.
'These disgusting and slimy teenagers are annoying. Maybe I should just kill that annoying crown prince along with the other prince that bastard supports? It would be funny to see those guys run around like headless chickens. Why am I here again?
Who cares, I will ask the old man when he talks to me again. Till then I can play around with my new toy.' She looked at the small group of students walking around energetically while everyone else around them was trying to conserve their energy, led by a particular boy who can resist her award.
She felt the paper towel in her pocket which was stained with the blood of her new toy.
"Today is the best day ever." She cheerfully chimed while following them from a distance while occasionally getting the greetings from her puppets scattered around the area.
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"Hahaha, look at you fools starting to get tired already." Rondell shouted out loud while pointing at Ian and Ruby who just suggested to take a rest.
"You idiot, not everyone is like you. Besides we are not physically tired just mentally drained from the long day." Ian argued back.
"We have been here since 8am and now it's about 5:50 pm. It's been roughly 10 hours since we have been here. I need to take a short nap, who knows how long this is going to go on for." Ruby defended herself.
They carried on arguing with themselves while the rest of us just walked along until they come to a decision.
"Someone's following us." Lewies suddenly interrupted.
Natasha eyed me for a moment before looking at Lewies for an explanation. Damn, it is really freaky how she is so observant, if all of the royalty are like this then I hope I never meet any of them.
"How long?" Natasha asked while getting ready for casting.
"I just noticed now." Lewies replied while we kept on walking.
"You didn't notice?" Ian asked while looking at me. Crap now he caught onto it as well.
"No, I was just thinking about other things. Sorry." I gave them the half-truth, while closing the surplus amount of notifications from the system.
[Host has resisted the mind control effect]x21
The number of notification just kept increasing every minute. It's like she wants to get my attention and see what I will do about it. It's almost creepy but I also think she is doing this to confirm her power indeed doesn't work on me.
They sighed while Ruby asked "What now? Confront that person or just let them follow us."
Uh oh. I have to make something up before they piss her off.
"No." I said calmly while everyone listened to what I had to say.
"We can't be wasting energy fighting people. Who knows what the next test might be? Let's just find a place and relax for a while, like Ian and Ruby suggested and see if our stalker comes to us or not." Thank you stable mind for helping me bullshit the way out of this without revealing anything.
"Reasonable plan." Natasha said while nodding along with everyone.
We found a spot and sat down; I was hoping she would just go away now but every minute the system let me know that wasn't the case.
[Host has resisted the mind control effect]x3
Lewies suddenly tensed up while alerting everyone "She is coming this way."
"The stalker is a she?" Rondell asked back in surprise.
Lewies nodded, while everyone else slowly prepared for the unknown.
Suddenly I felt someone behind me. While everyone just looked at the beauty behind me in a daze before soon something covered my eyes as a sweet voice enriched my ears.
"Guess who?"
I gulped. I have got to calm down and pretend as I know her. If not after she leaves the ensuing questions from them will blow my lie. And telling them the truth is the last thing I want from what I have seen she could do.
"And I stand corrected that the imperial princess is the most beautiful people ever." I could hear Rondell mumbling some bullshit.
"Let go of him." The slight change in even Maisy's voice suggested even she fell for her.
"Can't do that until he answers." The sweet voice hammered my ear again while her smooth hands covered my eyes.
[Host has resisted the mind control effect]
"I don't know. I am sorry." I said slowly while hoping she doesn't go on a rampage and control my friends.
There was an awkward silence for a minute before she removed her hands from my eyes. I turned around to see the jade-like eyes slowly getting red.
Before she could say anything else a sudden announcement shook everyone up. "Sorry for the wait everyone, we were just getting ready for phase 2 of the test. Food and refreshments are being served right now, just find the large sign that says, 'Food is here'."
"I can't believe you forgot me so quickly Law. We will meet again, and you better hope you remember my name before that." She quickly chimed in before leaving us all in a daze.
'Is she toying with me?' I thought while looking at the questioning glance from my best friends.
'Yeah she definitely is doing this on purpose but why?'
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'That eye, why do I find it so familiar?' Natasha thought as she looked the back of the girl getting further away.