The white waiting room had about twenty chairs along its walls, with a table and potted plant in the corners. Bell sat beside both Aramine and another student who informed the two of what to expect.
"One hundred?!" Bell and Aramine exclaimed.
The student she was speaking to nodded solemnly.
"There's even more if we're going into a larger den."
Bell had decided to strike up a conversation with a nearby student about what to expect. It was safe to say that she was wholly unprepared for the information, as well as the scenario she was going to find herself in. At some point, Aramine had joined Bell, but she wasn't aware of when that had happened.
The eight students were waiting on both Shota and another student, but from the rate at which students were joining the waiting pool, it didn't seem like they were going to have to wait much longer.
So, Bell decided that she was going to learn as much as she could about the threats that they were going to face in the coming hour.
"Do you know how they build their dens?" Bell asked.
The student thought for a moment before answering, "Not really, I wasn't paying attention during that class."
Bell sighed and looked around for anyone else to potentially talk to. Just as she turned her attention to the room, Shota and the other student entered.
After a moment's pause, a speaker came to life from an unknown location. Despite that, the message it conveyed was as clear as day.
[All students in this team have entered the waiting room, the simulation will be starting now.]
Before they were even able to greet Shota and the other student, the scenery melted into that of wilderness. Every student's clothes were then transformed into fitting armor and garbs.
Bell and Aramine wore armor while Shota seemed to conjure his Marble. However, he had a look of surprise and confusion on his face as it manifested over his clothing.
"Woah..." A student nearby said as they looked upward.
The scenery around them was a thick forest near the base of a mountain. A poorly trodden path led from a small clearing where the students were to a larger clearing. The scenery was beautiful, the trees had orange, yellow, and red leaves fluttering in the light breeze, and the ground was covered in wet leaves and branches.
Bell traced the path forward and found a clearing with a large entrance to a cave in the mountains incline.
She announced to the awestruck class with a whisper, "I see the entrance up ahead. Far. Be quiet."
Their oo's and aah's were quickly silenced by newly cautious behavior. A few of the students turned to face where Bell was looking, and the rest began to crouch. Everyone in the group was careful to not disturb the foliage around them.
Shota asked in a low tone and a similarly low volume, "What's our strategy?"
Another student replied, "We'll have two people go in and subjugate the alpha, a few others protect the entrance, and the rest will stay at the entrance will prevent wolves from escaping."
This student had thicker plate armor and a large claymore on his back. In his hand was an open book, his eyes were scanning whatever notes that he had written.
Bell knew that her Fragment gave her a great edge in single combat, considering her weakening flames and ability to change whatever weapon she used. Those advantages would only be amplified if her target was distracted by another person.
So, she whispered to the group. "I'm down to be one of the hunters, my Fragment can weaken the Alpha and let me get leverage against it."
The others nodded silently, all seemingly wondering if they should extend their hand in assistance. After a moment of silence, Aramine whispered in addition.
"My abilities let me use its blood against it, if anyone has a better Fragment to hunt the creature than either of us, let us know."
Bell nodded to Aramine's words, glad that there was such a person able to fight a Dire Wolf Alpha.
Nobody objected.
The student with the book then whispered, "You don't know how to hunt an Alpha, do you?"
Bell and Aramine shook their heads at the same time, much to the chagrin of the boy. He nodded his head with closed eyes and a smile that told Bell that he was stifling a laugh.
"Well, I'll tell you its abilities and weaknesses." The boy whispered. "Its fur is thick and it can wield the four elements; if you make a single mistake... Well, pray you don't."
He paused for dramatic effect, which made Bell's eye twitch in annoyance.
'Come on, out with it!'
The boy then continued with, "It's one weakness is its softer underbelly, if you manage to get underneath it, try to attack it. Other than that, there isn't much."
After a few moments of silence that allowed Bell and Aramine to digest the information, another student whispered, "Let's head out, then."
So, they all stood up and walked as carefully as they could towards the clearing. All of the others conjured a weapon of sorts that they could use, and Bell simply Created a shortsword.
As they reached the clearing, the rest of the students chose which roles that they would play during the subjugation. The tankier-looking boy was going to stay at the entrance with Shota and two other students. That left six to defend Bell and Aramine while they fought the Alpha.
They took the next few minutes to reach the clearing, with only one bad call where a student brushed against some nearby underbrush. Luckily, there wasn't a patrol of Dire Wolves nearby, nor was the sound loud and abnormal enough for anything nearby to draw attention or concern. Outside of that, the rest of the trek was spent in utter silence and cautious walking.
Unfortunately, there was probably only one or two true hunters in the group, so the process of reaching the entrance to the den was still relatively noisy. Nobody really knew how to truly avoid making noise, and that was due to both the unfortunate season of the year, with plenty of fallen leaves around the forest floor.
But they reached the entrance to the den without problem.
The group paused before letting the two designated Alpha hunters enter. Everyone shared nervous glances at one another before anything meaningful happened.
'Well, here goes nothing.'
Then, Bell ignited her shortsword with the gray flames of Ruination and entered, holding the blade up high so that she could illuminate as much as she could. Aramine was close behind, and Bell heard the quiet sound of sparks forming a Marble.
Bell almost asked Aramine what it was, but didn't, seeing as how that would be a great deal of noise. Bell entered first, raising her broadsword and igniting it with the gray flames of Ruination. Aramine was close behind, and the metal rod turned into a deep crimson dagger.
Bell's shortsword torch barely illuminated anything around the two but was enough for the crouched duo to see their immediate surroundings and remain undetected. The cave system was simple yet dense, there was one main path from the entrance into the deeper parts of the den, but every other meter or so, a door to a chamber appeared.
But they continued down, looking for a large room, all the while careful to stay on the correct path.
After a few minutes of dead silence, they reached the end of the den, and a two-meter-tall entrance led into a dark chamber.
'It should only be the Alpha in the main chamber...' Bell thought to herself.
Bell then looked towards Aramine, who looked back in a similar motion. After a moment of apprehension, the two nodded tersely and entered the chamber.
The makeshift torch that Bell held in her hand didn't emanate enough light to illuminate the ceiling, making the room feel impossibly tall.
Aramine tapped on Bell's shoulder, and Bell stopped walking, closely examining the surroundings that she could see.
There were bones everywhere on the ground. They all seemed to be from various creatures, and Bell even saw the skull of some sort of creature with a large jaw and several tusks.
Then, Bell noticed the air, it seemed to push forward and then pull backward rhythmically. The beast at the innermost part of the chamber seemed to be asleep.
'Something's off.' Bell thought, turning to face Aramine, who turned to face Bell with a similar expression of anxiety.
Another few steps passed by as the feeling of wrongness built up further and further.
The two were about halfway through the chamber when Bell made the fatal mistake of stepping on a brittle bone. It snapped under the combined weight of her, her armor, and her sword.
The sound echoed out into the darkness, and the breathing paused momentarily. At that moment, Bell yelled "Brace!"
Aramine's strange Marble shimmered with an ephemerally scarlet outline before extending from both sides into the shape of a bow.
Then a great howl emanated from the innermost part of the chamber.
A great blast of foul-smelling wind blew against them, nearly pushing Aramine back a step.
Then, the silence was shattered.
Immediately afterward, the room was illuminated by a ring of floating flames that lined against the walls.
Bell then deactivated Ruination, the ground started to rumble, and ice started to spread from the back of the chamber.
'An Elementalist Alpha!?' Bell thought to herself.
The sounds of battle soon echoed into the chamber; the other Dire Wolves had awoken at the calling of their Alpha. From the sounds of the battle, their fellow students had the entrance covered.
When Bell focused on their target, she shuddered with eyes wide and goosebumps sprouting.
The wolf was two meters tall, with rows of shining metallic teeth reflecting the light around it. Decorating its body was shimmering, oily fur that not only reflected the light but partially devoured it into shadows.
The fur had another trait; it changed colors like a radiant rainbow at twilight. Flames danced around its mane in similar colors to the fur that acted as its stage.
'You're kidding me...' Bell thought to herself, the grip on her broadsword slightly weakening.
She had fought one of these before in a nightmare long ago. There hadn't even been several exchanges of claw and blade before Bell was on the ground defeated. That nightmare had ended rather painfully, out of the thousands that she'd ever experienced.
With a look of worried caution on her face, Bell discarded her shortsword and used Creation to conjure a claymore. The sound of her clattering broadsword against the ground echoed across the chamber, breaking the delicate silence.
Previously, she was armed with only a longsword, and this was before she knew how to properly utilize Creation.
Now, though, things were going to be different.
Her claymore was wrapped in an inferno of gray fire before calming down to a simple flame wrapped around it.
Bell heard the sound of an arrow being nocked into a string. In the next moment, an arrow let loose into the air. It was quick and its aim was true, a crimson arrow pierced the eye of the wolf.
The two hunter's exam had just started.