How did it all start? Yes. That’s right. It all began a few hours ago.
“To achieve your full potential faster, I will make each of you a personal curriculum.” That’s what our professor had said. It sounds like the best, right? Well, it wasn’t.
We were currently standing behind one another, going through all sorts of different tests. But those tests…ah, just thinking about them sends shivers down my spine. The tests he gave us were to assess all our abilities. But…it was torture…torture, I’m telling you.
That smile of his might have seemed nice, but it wasn’t. It was the furthest thing from it.
“Next.” His warm voice spread through the entire room. The worst thing about all this was that…I was the next one.
Each step I took forward was shaky. The previous tests had already traumatized me.
“What’s your name again?”
“Isolde Silverleaf.”
“Ah. Right, I remember. You’re the Elven Princess, is that it?”
I nodded with very small head movements.
“You already saw the others do this test. Do you want me to explain it again?”
I looked ahead of me and saw literal platforms with spikes under them. I had seen others fall on them, and I’m telling you…they weren’t fake; everything was real. This professor was crazy!
“Anything to delay this,” I whispered.
“Huh? I didn’t catch that, what did you say?”
“Yes. Please explain it to me.”
He smiled. “Well, it’s quite simple. As you can see, this is a parkour course, and you need to go through it as fast as you can. Each of the platforms has a distinct characteristic that will focus on one aspect of your movements.”
I gulped. I wasn’t the first one, and I had already seen the others. The first platform had spikes appearing everywhere randomly. The second one had tiles that would fall, and the last one…ah, I don’t even want to talk about it.
The worst thing about it was that no one even knew where he had pulled those platforms from. He told us that it was some sort of military exercise he had done when he was younger. I believed him because I saw his strength back then with the Cyclops, but why did we have to go through the same thing as him?
He patted my back, probably noticing how nervous I was. “Don’t worry, the worst thing that can happen is getting a little bit hurt.”
I frowned in his direction. A little bit?! His definition of little was clearly wrong. I had already seen someone get their leg pierced by one of those spikes. Luckily, there were healers nearby, but…ah, I don’t want to get hurt. Mom, Dad, why did you even send me here? The war is over…why do I need to be tortured?
“I expect a lot from you. Being an archer, you should be one of the best in the class.” He looked at me with that same annoying smile. “You should try to beat the time I made at your age…what was it already?” He rubbed his chin. “Ah. Right, I finished it in, I think, 1:27 seconds. Well, around that. It’s been a long time.”
I looked around me, and everyone’s eyes widened. This guy was a fucking monster. Just finishing this parkour seemed hard enough, but he had done it in one minute and twenty-seven seconds?! The only person who had managed to complete it had done it in five minutes. What kind of past did he have?!
“I-I’ll try to do my best.”
“That’s the spirit!” he said as he pushed me in the back a little, making me walk forward toward the starting line. “Alright, as soon as you walk across that line, the chronometer will start.”
I looked back with literal tears in my eyes and looked once more toward the parkour. I took a deep breath and tried my best to calm my heartbeat as I could literally feel my heart pumping.
“Pfff…you can do it, Isolde.” I put myself in a running position.
“Don’t die!”
“Good luck!”
“You got this!”
I heard some of my friends trying to encourage me, and I was gone. I finally crossed the starting line. The start of the parkour was easy. It was just a straight line with nothing on it. I quickly managed to reach the end of it. However, the worst had yet to come. Arriving at the end of the first platform, I jumped onto the one filled with spikes appearing randomly.
My strategy was simple. Praying. There was no way to tell where the spikes would appear, so I prayed that my reflexes would be fast enough to dodge the spikes.
One of them appeared right beside my right leg, and I barely reacted fast enough by moving my leg away. However, it still grazed my right leg. I could feel a bit of blood coming out of it. But it didn’t hurt; it was probably because of the adrenaline coursing through my body.
Still, I continued to run as I was getting better and better, dodging most of the spikes popping up right under me. I was still grazed by a couple of them, but I could still run. That was all that mattered.
I wasn’t sure if my performance was good, but I managed to reach the end of the first platform, which was something that only half of the students who had done this test managed to achieve. I was at least better than average.
Arriving at the end of the first platform, I jumped toward the second one, which had falling tiles. Once again, I had no strategy, letting my reflexes do the work for me.
However, when the first tile fell under my right foot, I understood that it wouldn’t work this time around. The falling tiles were only one part of the problem on this platform. There was something else that we couldn’t see when we were spectating from far away—a strong wind, making it practically impossible to run forward.
I clenched my teeth. There wasn’t the slightest surprise on my face.
That was just how our professor was.
