30 Minutes Passed?

"This year's contestants are quite impressive..." A man working one of the screens of a highly advanced control room muttered. His colleague beside him nodded to his observation.

"Tell me about it... to think we'd have a royal prince in our exam..." The colleague stared at the screen, which displayed the scene of the Second Prince eradicating a horde of beetle-like monsters.

In the palm of his hand, a ball of light hovered and radiated a blinding light before soon morphing into the shape of a sword and bisecting the creature in front of him in half.

"I'd say he's almost on par with the First when he was at the same age."

"Eh... I'd say the First is a tad bit better..." The two debated before feeling a hand grasp their shoulders. Their body shook, their eyes soon moving towards the owner of the hands. They saw a young man in his early 20s wearing a robe dotted with splashes of paint.

His hair was as black as night and long enough to be tied into a ponytail that reached down to the end of his back. His eyes were like two bottomless holes that seemed to devour the light passing into them hungrily. An unsettling yet calming smile always held on his face.

"The academy doesn't pay you guys to talk badly about the Royal Family Members. Focus on your screens instead of debating over something irrelevant."

The young man patted their shoulders, seeing that they were ready to get back to work, and walked away, his ponytail dangling behind him. The two workers breathed a sigh of relief.

"Almost thought I lost my job there..."

"I hear you... this place is working us to the bones..."

"I would agree with you... If it wasn't for the fact we just have to stare at a screen for an hour. Which we do on a daily basis." The worker said as he reached towards the bottle beside him, which had a plastic straw coming out of its lid, and took a sip of it.

It was a tall plastic cup with a conspicuous yellow 'W' on it surrounded by a red ring. A typical thing you would see from a fast-food restaurant.

With their attention back to their screens, they couldn't help but point out the girl beside the Second Prince.

"Who's she anyway? I don't remember her from the Noble Database."

"Hm?" The worker put down his drink and met his colleague's eyes before tapping away at his keyboard and scouring through the system to find the girl who matched the appearance on the screen.

"Millis Vellen."

"Vellen? I haven't heard of that Noble name before... did the Royal Family create another recently?"

"... It says she's a commoner..."

"HUH!? A commoner was able to afford these outrageous fees!?"

"It doesn't say... I doubt our system was hacked, so she must've been added in through a recommendation or something..."

"Ah... that does make sense."

The two of them couldn't help but take a curious look at their ranking.

["1. Reph Von Lionbright + Millis Vellen: 78 Monster Kills, 25 Contestant Eliminations"]

"They've already passed."

"So fast as well... it has only been half an hour or so..."

Their ranking then suddenly changed to second place, and in first was...

["1. Marionette Von Roselle: 100 Monster kills, 30 Contestant Eliminations."]

The two of them glanced at each other before shrugging.

"Kinda expected it. If you come from a family known for killing, you better be good at it."

His colleague nodded at his words, "Sounds about right... but that's not to say the Lady of Roses's skills are not impressive."

"Oh, definitely not. Not like we can say much; we're just some commoners with barely any magic power."

They continued to converse with one another for a bit until...

"What did I say about getting back to work?" 

A chilling presence soon arrived behind them. With their heads slowly craning back, they met the intimidating presence of their superior staring down at them.

The young man continued to stare down at them with eyes that looked devoid of compassion. Although his attire was a comical sight to look at, the workers were feeling anything but humorous about their situation.

The two gulped heavily before being scolded once again.

While this was happening, two individuals undertaking the exam wandered through a desolate beach filled with nothing but large stone boulders and spikes.

One of them was a woman with long dark blue hair that reached the end of her back and dark blue eyes with glasses over them. She walked in a funny and robotic manner. Perhaps due to this, her uniform didn't look creased in the slightest.

Beside this woman was an energetic young man with red hair, fiery orange eyes, and a large grin. Over his white shirt was a grey hoodie with yellow accents to fit his yellow tie. He didn't seem to be quite the "Liker" of blazers.

"Ah~! The chilling breeze of the outdoors! Don't you find this great, Testrie?" With his hands on his hips and his eyes turned to the sky, the young man asked the girl as he enjoyed the winds brushing against his skin.

"I'd rather be behind my desk, listening to the bickering of a failing marriage couple, Xander..." Testrie bluntly said - pushing against the bridge of her glasses.

Xander stared at her, his arms loosely dangling by his sides at her answer, "Bruh... you gotta learn to live a little! You can't just be sitting behind the desk wasting away! That shit is hella uncool, in my opinion."

"And I find it "hella" inappropriate for you to be using such uncouth language. Please understand your status as a noble, Xander."

"Ugh! You're such a square!" Xander groaned - rolling his eyes and fiddling with the strings of his hoodie. His eyes then glanced up towards the leaderboard.

["24. Testrie Gla Tyria + Xander Fie Reyla: 60 Monster Kills, 19 Contestant Eliminations."]

"We just need one more, and we'll pass... Ugh... was there a reason for us to avoid the forest? Everyone's heading there, y'know..." Xander whined - pointing towards the Great Forest.

Testrie paused in her tracks. She then glanced back towards Xander and said:

"And that's exactly why we aren't... you and I both know we might encounter the Second Prince or the Lady of Roses... I'd rather be careful and not risk it."

"Tsk... I guess you're right—" Xander then bolted towards Testrie, wrapping his arm around her waist and jumping out of the way of an incoming object that fell out of the sky.

After letting go of her, they scrutinised this object and found it was a...

"I might not know a lot about these things, but that's definitely a Stone Beach Crab, right?"

"Beach Stone Crab... but yes. You're correct." Testrie then raised her hand to her chin, "But the question is why it had suddenly fallen out of the sky."

The crab legs twitched a bit before transforming into pixels and dissipating into the virtual atmosphere.

"That'll be because of me~"

The two of them snapped their head towards a girl with short white hair, beauty that left them stunned, eyes that glimmered and shined like sapphires. It was Lillian.

She was in quite a messy state. Her clothes were covered in scratches, dust, cuts, and tears - revealing her beautiful white skin underneath that leaked a bit of blood due to shallow cuts.

Her breathing was ragged, and sweat dripped from her face.

She gave them a smirk before giving a little wave. (2)

However, something was off about her fingers. Her pinky and ring finger were missing. The muscles and bones were visible at the stumps. (3)

And despite that, she didn't seem too bothered by it. Or, more like she had gotten used to the pain - the enchantment in charge of reducing the pain was definitely playing a huge role in her tolerance. 

"Howdy there~ the name's Lillian, and I'm..." She gave a slight pause, her smirk widening ominously before continuing. (10)

"... Going to need you guys to die for me." She said with a low chuckle. (3)