Chương 8: Chapter 7: Thea’s Trial to Become a Rook

Arriving at the training grounds, I saw that many people were already there training. I then found an empty spot, and we decided to have her take the assessment there. The assessment was quite simple: she had to survive a barrage of attacks without taking a direct hit. Fighting back is allowed, but she should not suffer any direct damage, or she will fail. This test lasts for ten minutes. This test is to ensure situational awareness and critical thinking when facing a stronger opponent.

This ensures that as a Rook, they can make the correct decision when danger comes to succeed or escape with their lives. In previous attempts, Thea usually rushed in to try to brute-force her way through and try to defeat me or just attacked everything blindly. Though I lowered my damage output so that she could repel it, the amount of attacks I sent out was simply not something that could all be blocked. So, she constantly failed.

In her last attempt, she finally grew smarter, dodging into a blind spot I had made on purpose, and she escaped my attacks for the near full duration. Near the end, she got overconfident and wanted to brute-force her way through the ending when I ramped up the attacks. Of course, due to her overconfidence, she got hit in the back and failed. Demons have stronger bodies, so they tend to try to brute-force their way through things. It's fine if you're stronger than the enemy, but what if you aren't?

So, I made this assessment to test if they can think instead of just acting. I might be overly cautious, but what if there is somebody like me who is hiding themselves and has absurd strength? This kind of possibility is not zero. I then started the assessment. As Thea has been through this several times, I started without explanation. Like usual, I limited my power to the edge of what she should be able to handle if she played it smart. I then told her to get ready as we would be starting soon.

Since this has happened so many times, it has become an event in Equilibrium to watch Thea try to become a Rook. Even though we didn't tell anyone the assessment was happening, people still found out when they saw the two of us together in the training center. They then spread the word and have all gathered around us, keeping a decent distance so as not to get caught in the crossfire.

As this happened so many times already, I stopped caring if they watched the assessment, as it wasn't exactly something I did in secret. If they could learn something from this display and become more careful in the future, why not let them watch? I then started the countdown to start the assessment: "We will begin in three, two, one." I then began my first round of attacks. Dozens of fireballs formed in the air, shooting towards Thea. She, seeing this and being prepared, dodged to the side with fewer fireballs.

She then ran as fast as she could, deflecting the ones that got close. I then continued by freezing the ground towards her. She then jumped back, away from the frozen ground. She then fired off a ranged attack of her own to try to distract my attention. I saw it and let her do it, and several ice shards were shot at me. I then created a wall of fire, directly evaporating the ice shards. Thea used this time to run behind me, shooting more ranged attacks of wind blades, ice shards, and fireballs.

She was smart not to use a larger attack, as it would drain her stamina and leave her vulnerable later on in the fight. She has grown quite a bit since her first attempt. I then created a magic barrier in the direction of the attack, blocking them completely. While defending, I sent out more powerful ranged attacks; this time, a giant wind blade was slashed out towards Thea.

Rather than defending with her body like she would have in the past, she created several walls of rock in varying directions to deflect the direction it was coming in. By the time the wind blade came close to her, it was completely deflected upwards, causing her no harm with minimal energy to defend. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Since time was continuing to tick down, I put my effort into my attacks to teach her not to let her guard down no matter what, since enemies can be hiding their strength. I then shot large attack after large attack of different spells. I shot boulders, wind blades, giant fireballs, and giant balls of water. Thea used counter-elements of the magic each time and efficiently deflected my attacks in smart ways that let her preserve energy.

I then became even more persistent in my attacks, but I did create blind spots in my attacks so she could detect weakness from enemies. Thea instantly saw these blind spots and entered them, as significantly fewer attacks were in these areas, and it was much easier to defend. Each time I created a weak spot, she saw it and took advantage of it. By this point, half the time had gone down and I was very impressed with what she has shown so far, much better than her last attempt.

I decided to try harder, as I can't make promotions so easy. Rook promotions are intentionally made difficult as they will be pillars of the organization. Knights and Bishops are a lot calmer, as the only assessment is ability and level. If you reached a certain level—which the minimum was level 150—and one of your skills has reached level 20, which is the intermediate skill level, you then only just need someone of a higher rank's approval once they see you meet the requirements, and then you'll be promoted.

So, for this Rook promotion, I can't make it easy just because half the time has passed and I'm currently satisfied. I need to complete the assessment completely to see if she is missing anything. This time, I stopped using magic altogether, completely changing my attack pattern midway to surprise her. You can never be sure what might happen next, and she needs flexibility to change if the situation gets worse. I then pulled out my sword and closed in the distance towards her.

Seeing my approach, she created a mist to try to block my vision and used sonic attacks to try to prevent me from tracking her exact location, spreading out her mana to cause me to lose her in my mana tracking search. I could, of course, force my way to find her using my superior skills and level, but this was an assessment to become a Rook; that would be too excessive. So, I pretended to not be able to find her and let her run around, waiting for her next move.

After some time, I realized she was stalling for time and could no longer wait and started using my magic to clear out the mist. Once the mist was cleared up, she suddenly disappeared. I wasn't looking too closely before, so I actually didn't know where she was and didn't want to use too high-level magic, so I could only use a bit more effort to look around. I then used low-level search magic to see where she went. Several minutes passed and I was starting to get annoyed, but finally, I found her.

She had covered her tracks and hidden in the ground, deep enough to do it in that short amount of time, but not so deep I couldn't detect her. I then used body-strengthening magic and stepped hard on the ground, creating a crack, and the ground opened. Thea then appeared, not surprised to be found, and waved at me. My eyes twitched as she was so casual about the situation. I fired more fireballs at her, and she used earth magic to tunnel the long way back to the surface while blocking my fireballs.

Once on the surface, she did the same thing again but used stronger mist magic and shot out several balls of light, trying to blind me. I was running out of time and decided not to play around too much anymore. This time, I instantly got rid of the fog with wind magic and shot the balls of light down with dark magic, engulfing the light and canceling it out. This time, she didn't have time to escape, so I rushed at her. She then dodged what she could and deflected what she couldn't dodge.

With every strike I made, my moves were faster and faster. I could see the strain on Thea's face as she was starting to struggle, as she was getting tired from all these attacks. After what seemed like an eternity for her, I suddenly stopped all my attacks. Thea then looked at me, surprised and confused as to why I stopped. I then said the words she had wanted to hear for so long: "You have passed. I welcome you into the ranks of the Rook level."