Mr Julian, the director of the academy, had his chest puffed up. His face pulled back, and he inhaled what seemed like all the molecules of air in the entire room.
Afterwards, he exclaimed: "Next test is going to be a competition between all of you, half of you will be eliminated."
'Why's this old guy so excited? Half of us are going to be eliminated.'
Quickly after the director shouted, his face changed, and it appeared more serious and natural, as he hadn't shouted earlier.
"Before we begin, I want you to know that everybody here is being judged based on your ability to keep your composure and also to refrain from any sort of uncivilised..." The director babbled continuously.
This continued for some minutes, and finally, Mr Julian closed his 'speech' with the final remarks.
"The next test will be a two-two challenge. Please pick a partner"
Either it was the entire long speech that the director had provided or the fear of being eliminated, there were no longer any shouts and constant noises erupting from the crowd.
Everyone seemed to ask each other rationally, analysing their attributes and finding weaknesses and the strengths of the attributes and getting a suitable partner.
But Dorian did not have any chances for such an opportunity because there was already a blue-eyed fellow standing right next to him.
Wallace.
With his 'vision attribute' that Dorian had theorised, Dorian assumed that Wallace had made his way to Dorian through the strong crowd of 5000.
Even though they did not converse, both Dorian and Wallace had already decided that they wanted to be partners for the next round.
Even though all of the entrance takers were rational, they were not hopeless. A circumference started to form around Dorian and Wallace, begging Wallace to let him be their partner.
Wallace, who may have been trained from a young age, addressed everyone like a true prince:
"I want you all the know, this guy I have chosen to be my partner complements my attributes. In the whole continent, you can't find such a guy who perfectly complements an attribute. Please try to find someone who complements your attribute too. As the director, Mr Julian, said, let's all be rational"
With his words, several burned their hope, but a spark of jealousy grew.
Countless eyes looked at the perfect face of Dorian, wondering why he had gotten the best partner.
Dorian felt the gazes of the entrance takers.
He did not care.
Who cares about some gazes?
After the efforts of Wallace and his convincing demeanour, he had managed to separate himself from the attention.
After about half an hour, 5000 of the entrance takers had finally gotten a partner.
Then, a paper just like from before magically appeared before Dorian.
The paper was transparent, ethereal, and it had a pen attached to it.
[Team Name: ]
[Team Members: ]
That was all, that was written.
Dorian asked Wallace.
"What should be the team name?"
Wallace put his hands to his chin, as if he were a philosopher.
His blue eyes were deep and had a spark of certainty. It seemed like the blue eyes had an ocean brewing up.
"The name..
--
--
--
of.. our..team.."
Dorian put his ear fourth and paid deep attention to the next words Wallace was going to articulate.
'What is the royal prince cooking up with his creativity?'
"Name it yourself", Wallace replied hastily.
"..."
"What?"
'This guy can't be serious. Maybe I'll name it something from Earth, my old world.'
Dorian thought of all the interesting concepts from his old world. Firstly, he thought of science, then art and finally, seemingly out of nowhere, he thought of memes.
"I'll just write NPC"
"What does that mean?"
"I don't know. It sounds cool"
Dorian gritted his teeth and, with his cringe face, wrote NPC.
'How uncreative I am'
It seems everyone has written their names along with their partners and learned their attributes.
Dorian and Wallace looked at each other. Their eyes met.
They had not said their attribute to each other, even though Wallace had hinted at it and Dorian had also hinted at his attributes.
Both of them looked away and towards the front stage.
It was as though both animously agreed that it was not important.
"We'll learn later" was what both Dorian and Wallace thought.
"Since almost half of you failed the last round, half of you will fail in the upcoming round of the test. In the next test, each team will face off against the other in a challenge."
"It will be a two-team competition in various sets of challenges. For this next test, we will travel to the tower of loom"
'That tower?'
Dorian has read it in a book. The tower of loom is a tall tower which reaches the sky. The tensile strength of the material it was built from defies the height of the tower. The tower of loom can be seen from one city to another. It is extremely tall.
Previously, it was a jail which housed dangerous criminals. The higher the floors, the more dangerous the criminal and the punishment. Because of the debates about the inhuman punishment and torture, it transformed from a jail to a property of the Canon Academy.
The tower of loom was seen as a dangerous place throughout the entire continent, but now, Dorian was going to have a test in the same tower.
Even though the Canon Academy is just an institute for Ascenders. It is the institute where all strong, capable, and important figures from the human race continent rise from. It was the symbol of the Human continent. It was well-known all over the world on all continents.
Several other races had tried to imitate the Canon Academy but had failed to replicate such a monopoly of dominance.
The Canon Academy were not loose with their selection process; they were neither soft nor biased.
Selecting the best of the Ascenders should be tricky, but the model of these entrances was 'Survival of the strongest'
As the director announced the tower of loom, the translucent paper appeared infront of Dorian and Wallace.
[Your first opponents are:
'Two make a better one']
'What sort of a stupid name are these?'
As Dorian looked under the page, he saw two names.
[Troy Andres and Trey Andres]
"We'll beat these guys, right, Wallace?"
Dorian turned to look at Wallace.
Wallace's blue eyes were wide open. His blue eyes contained a horrifying, frightened look. It was as though he had seen a ghost. Wallace's hands were the same paper that Dorian had received.
He stuttered and spoke in a low voice,
"Troy..and.. Trey"
Dorian facepalmed.
'Fuck'