As we waited, the sounds of chatting started to fade away, as we all stared at the metal door locking us in. The timer above the door had just 10 seconds left. The students at the front gulped and inched closer to the door as if it would give them an advantage.
I stood at the very back of the crowd, not participating in the mob slowly pushing forward to the door. I stood alone due to the little incident with the black haired girl, as others gave me weird looks.
'Long day...'
The time ticked on
7... 6... 5...
The tension in the air definitely surged.
3... 2... 1...
*BEEP BEEP BEPP*
A horn blared signalling the start of the exam. The metal door slowly opened vertically, revealing the ruined city of office spaces and roads. The students in the front immediately took off, running in different directions in order to secure the most points.
I was the last one out the gate but I wasn't too worried of being late to getting points. In my head, I had already figured out my game plan to pass this test.
My ability is to create illusions or allow others to hallucinate. This means my ability is strictly mental, and that I don't have any physical combat power. Also means that I can't take down any of the robots populating the city.
The main difference between my illusions and the hallucinations I conjure, is that illusions can be viewed by anyone within my domain, whilst I have to cast hallucinations individually on each person I make eye contact with. My illusions can be very versatile, able to fake all 5 human senses: Sight, Hearing, Touch, Smell and even Taste. My hallucinations are more restricted, only able to cause visual and auditory hallucinations.
In this exam, I would have to avoid all the robots and just focus on saving as many civilians as I can. The robots I can easily run past as long as they are within range of my domain, which currently I can only stretch to a 8 metre radius. I can't give the robots hallucinations, because well... they don't have eyes. I'm pretty sure they use infrared sensing, so I can just fool them by removing my heat signature when they are in my domain, making me invisible to the robots.
I have to avoid the tier 3 robots, because they are bipedal sentries with ranged weapons mounted on their shoulders. They can't shoot actual bullets, but they do shoot rubber pellets, nets, gas and more to slow or incapacitate students. Since they have ranged weapons, they can shoot me before I can even get close enough to cast my illusions. Anyone outside my domain will not experience the illusions I cast on people inside my domain. I should've trained harder to increase the range.
Tier 1 robots look like mecha spiders that crawl on walls. Tier 2 robots are 3 metre tall human looking robots wielding electric batons. Tier 4 is tier 2 but gigantic, that just stomps around, destroying everything in its path. I'm not even going to near that thing.
With my plan, I just to pace myself and scout out as many civilians as I can. If I see any tier 3 or 4 robots, I'll just take a detour as the city layout is pretty simple so I won't get lost
'If I have time, I could also do a little bit of trolling, as the staff never said I can't do psychological harm', I grinned in my head.
(POV CHANGE - Third Person)
Somewhere in a closed off building next to the examination area, a team of teachers at the Hero University of Lagnad are watching the students' performance. The staff controls the hundreds of cameras in the site, projecting each student's actions on the dozens of screens in the rooms.
"This year's potential students sure are strong..." ,the Plague Doctor muttered.
"I'm especially impressed by that student who could wield ice powers to that level of destruction..." said a tall man with a white mask.
On one of the screens, showed a light blue haired boy walking down the street leisurely. Each step he took seemed to freeze the ground, causing the road to be covered in a thin layer of ice. Any robots which got close and tried to attack simply got encased in a prism of ice. Tier 3 robots which tried to shoot from range got sniped by long sharp icicles that were formed in the air. Other students stayed away from him, knowing they can't compete with that level of power. This display of power was not the only stand out performance.
"Look at this student, he's just toying with robots at this point.", pointed out by the woman in a witch costume with a sizable bust.
"He floats all the robots up and let's them fall from 100 metres..."
The short boy floated everywhere he went, yawning into his hand every now and then.
"I would love to teach him..." purred the witch with an alluring gaze.
The Reaper watched on in silence, focusing on all of the students participating, trying to evaluate their performances and taking notes. Some scenes caught his eye. A couple of students in an area were... behaving weirdly. They seemed to be dodging and rolling away from attacks, but there was nothing there. Another student was seen punching the air. He rolled back, as to dodge a life threatening attack but he was seen having a boxing match against the air.
'What the f*ck, have they lost their minds?'
He watched closely, trying to figure out was happening. Then he saw another student. The student was tall with black hair, jogging along the street. The robots seemed to sense him from afar and tried to attack. But when they got close to him, they froze up and started turning, as if looking for their target which was right in front of them.
"Is that tier 2 robot in sector 3 malfunctioning?"
"Uhh... the data of 2-066 shows that he is functioning perfectly, and shows no signs of damage to its sensors or circuitry.", replied one of the staff tapping away at the computer.
"Bring up the student's profile on screen 5."
Soon, a detailed profile of Timeo was shown on a larger central screen.
"His name is Timeo Craft. Age 18. Ability is known to be illusions. Not much is written about his ability as the hospital which registered his ability said to they couldn't properly test it the due to lacking necessary equipment and Timeo's reluctance to fully showcase his ability."
"Hmm... very interesting." the Reaper smiled.