It was just another rainy day in District One of the Delwias Island region. People woke to the deep sound of the palace horn echoing across all five districts, announcing the beginning of the annual Evaluation for Ascension.
This year's applicants lined up at the palace gates with their invitations in hand, entirely unaware that this was meant to be the final evaluation ever held on Delwias Island.
Most of the applicants were teenagers experiencing the evaluation for the first time. They carried immense hope in their hearts and an extra layer of confidence in their powers, which only made them look foolishly naive to those watching.
The older participants simply went with the flow. They looked exhausted before the process had even begun. Having participated in previous years, they knew exactly what the evaluation entailed, and they held no excitement for it.
The evaluation was split into three stages: a theoretical exam, a practical test, and a final combat stage where candidates fought one another. Only a select few winners would be granted permission to leave Delwias Island, and age was not taken into consideration during the final stage.
The veteran applicants remained silent and kept to themselves. They knew a secret that the first-timers did not: the evaluation did not begin when you stepped inside the palace, but the very moment the first horn sounded. Every action since that horn blast was being observed and scored as part of the test. Naturally, those who knew kept that information to themselves. In a test like this, every person fought for their own survival, and no one could blame them for it.
Five reception desks had been set up to process the applicants. This year, over a thousand candidates had gathered from across all districts, an extraordinarily high number compared to previous years.
The mages at the reception desks were already aggressively weeding out the crowd, turning away the disabled, noisy teenagers, pregnant women, and anyone deemed unfit. Even before the actual testing began, a massive portion of the crowd had already been eliminated.
When one rejected applicant began causing a scene over his pregnant wife's dismissal, one of the palace mages struck him with a bolt of lightning. The blast threw the man far backward onto the cobblestones. He was not dead, but his body was badly burned and broken, eliminating him on the spot alongside his wife.
The guards offered no healing magic. The man's wife knelt beside his trembling body, weeping aloud as the crowd looked on in silence.
A few sympathetic applicants made a move toward her to offer help, but a senior mage's cold voice cut through the air: "Anyone who attempts to show them mercy will be eliminated alongside them."
Coming from higher authority, those words felt like absolute law. The onlookers immediately turned their heads away, leaving the couple behind. Eventually, the weeping woman and her injured husband faded from sight as the line slowly moved forward.
The rain poured relentlessly, as if trying to drown the island. The dreary gray sky cast a melancholic shadow over the grounds. The rejected applicants walked back toward their homes with their heads hung low, while several repeat candidates openly wept over wasting their final chance. The air felt suffocatingly heavy, and the people lined up at the desks looked less like hopeful mages and more like souls waiting for entry into heaven.
The intake process took nearly three hours. By the end, out of the original thousand, barely six hundred applicants were permitted to move forward.
Ethyl stood in the crowd, looking around at the candidates with a quiet sense of superiority. Many of them stared back at her, surprised by how young and delicate she appeared.
When the mage at her desk read her invitation, a flicker of doubt crossed his face. He asked for her graduation date, and when she answered, he nodded in approval, gesturing for her to pass and even wishing her luck.
Whispers immediately broke out among the applicants near her.
"Yes... that's her. She's one of those prodigies."
"I heard this girl possesses terrifying power."
"I just hope I don't have to fight her in the final stage."
"Why is she even taking this test? They should have just handed her an ascension permit."
The surrounding candidates talked about her as if she were deaf, some admiring her, others brimming with envy. Ethyl ignored them all, keeping her eyes fixed on the palace spire rising above them.
'This is only one step away from opening the gates of hell in your homes, you bastards', she thought to herself.
Deep inside her eyes burned a fierce, buried rage that she forced herself to keep hidden behind a calm exterior.
Scanning the crowd, her gaze landed on Richard, who was standing beside his friends with a smug grin. A wave of disgust washed over her.
"Hmph... I really should have broken a bone or two that day," she muttered with a sharp smirk.
"Who is that girl? Do you know her?" Garen asked, looking down at Ethyl. He raised his hand above his head in a mocking gesture to emphasize how short she was.
"Shh! Just mind your own business!" Richard snapped, stepping away from his group and walking directly toward her.
"I see you learned your lesson, buddy," Ethyl smirked as he approached.
Richard held up his hands, his tone surprisingly subdued. "I don't want to draw any attention to myself during this evaluation, so please stay away from me. I can't afford to lose, and..."
"And?" Ethyl raised an eyebrow.
"And I'm sorry about what happened the other day," Richard said, bowing his head slightly. "I acted like a complete ass, and I shouldn't have done that."
Before Ethyl could respond, Richard turned around and walked back to his friends, leaving her standing there in utter shock at his sudden change of heart.
Shortly after, all six hundred remaining participants were led into a massive testing hall filled with hundreds of small individual desks and chairs. Each candidate took a seat according to the code number pinned to their chest, waiting in tense silence for further instructions.
A senior mage stepped up to the front stage with a measured, confident stride.
Looking out over the sea of nervous faces, he spoke in a clear, echoing voice: "The paper that is about to appear on your desks contains exactly one hundred questions. You have precisely one hour to complete it. Your answers will be magic-bound and corrected automatically upon your first choice, meaning there is no way to alter an answer once selected."
He paused, a faint, cold smile touching his lips.
"Ah... I almost forgot to mention. The timer has already begun. Good luck."