****Damon's POV***
Two hours after the commencement of the entrance exam, I finally made it out of the mountainous region.
If I give myself the benefit of doubt, I'd say I was maybe in the top 80 at this point. After this part, there remained only one more part before reaching the institute.
To yours truly who had read the novel, I knew that the actual entrance exam of the Astral Mystic Institute, was the fog of doubt. What the institute was actually looking for was mental fortitude.
It didn't matter if you had an alpha ranked physique, so long as you couldn't get past the fog of doubt fast enough to qualify as part of the one hundred and twenty.
The rest of the race, be it the towering automatons, the mountainous region, and the last part, they were merely a buffer at best.
Just hard enough to not make the test look lukewarm, and simple enough that anyone who reached the Eta- rank could easily pass them with ease.
What was before me now though, was the last stage of the entrance exam, the mushroom grotto.
The mushroom grotto wasn't filled with beasts, traps, or anything. It's only key feature was it's uncountable passages. If one was not cautious, they'd keep ending up in the same place over and over again.
Right now I stood before over twenty different crevices on the hill side. But here lied the problem. I did not know which one to choose.
'Maybe I should just decide with einy, meiny, meiny, moo.' I chuckled at my own thoughts.
'Hold on a minute captain.' Bubbles' mocking voice rang in my head. 'we both know you're so bad at, no scratch that, so terrible at navigation that if I say go up, you'd go left, so I'll be taking on that responsibility.'
I scowled. Bubbles was right, I was quite terrible at navigation, but did he have to put it so bluntly?
In the end, "fine." I sighed. "But we better don't end up going around in circles."
"What do you take me for." Bubbles said materializing before me. "Cats are known for their sense of direction."
"And how do you know that?" I raised an eyebrow.
He rolled his eyes.
"Where else would I know it from? you're my only source of information."
"From my memories?" I muttered skeptically. If it was, then I certainly didn't remember it. 'Strange, maybe it was something I overlooked.' I thought.
"That, I choose that one." Bubbles' enthusiastic voice broke me out of my thoughts.
I frowned.
"Are you sure? it doesn't look very optimistic to me." I muttered. The passage Bubbles had chosen was at one etched three meters high on the base of the hill.
"It looks mysterious, that alone makes it seem like a beacon to the geographically inclined."
I agreed, so we entered Bubbles' chosen path. The passage was filled with all sorts of bizarre mushrooms, with myriad spectrums of colors.
~Many many minutes later~
"Can you see the light, I told you, with a cat's sense of direction, finding the exit, would be child's play." Bubbles proud voice echoed in the tunnel.
It had been fifteen minutes since we entered the passage. Not long after we entered, we soon came upon another set of passages, and this time, more widely strewn than the ones outside.
In fact there were quite a few youths pouring their frustrations at this intersection.
But that didn't dampen Bubbles' energy, if anything, his spirits were lifted at the sights of so many youths stuck.
We followed passage after passage, tunnel after tunnel, until we finally saw light at the end of the tunnel.
Bubbles got even more excited as we got closer to the source of light. But I had to admit, I wasn't optimistic about our chances, and I wasn't going to get my hopes high.
We soon reached outside the tunnel, and then glanced at each other for a few seconds.
Unsurprisingly, we were right back at the place we started. Only this time, we came out through a different passage than the one we took.
"Nooooooo!" Bubbles cried. This was the perfect moment to say; I told you so, but I restrained myself.
After Bubbles' short tantrum, we went back, flowing different passages this time, but we still ended back outside all the same.
The third time we tried, there was aome improvement. This time we didn't end up outside, but at the first intersection where numerous youths were gathered.
"Oi, if it isn't the trashy prince." suddenly, a thug looking youth hollered at me, making me the centre of attention.
"Heh." Another youth with him snorted. "He's no more a prince remember?"
The third youth let out a dark chuckle and began walking towards me.
"Hehehe, so we can rough him up quite a bit huh?"
'Wait wait wait, what's going on?' I locked eyes with my familiar. 'I thought these types of situation doesn't occur in real life.'
'You tell me, but then again, we're in a novel aren't we?' Bubbles awes reply came to my head.
'You're technically right, but doesn't seem a bit over exaggerated?' I frowned.
"Marcus." the first thug called to the third youth who had started walking towards me. "Don't rough him up too much."
"Hehe, that's all I need to hear boss." the third youth chuckled crookedly.
Sometimes, I truly marvel at some people's idiocy. What type of stupidity would even make you recklessly want to go attack someone whose ability you didn't even know?
Abilities could be quite bizarre. They could range from barely having an effect on the world, to ones that could destroy cities.
So people get a little cautious when fighting someone who's ability they knew nothing about.
However these idiots decided to attack me, just because they heard others murmuring about me.
After getting confirmation from his supposed boss, the first idiot trugged towards me.
'Smoke his ass captain.' bubbles yelled in my head. "I was planning on doing just that." I muttered.
The idiot reached me, and made a laughable excuse of a punch. I deflected his arm to the side, then followed up with a flurry of hands, elbows, kicks, and finally an upper cut that lifted his body off the ground.
Silence.
The few spectators around were silent for a few moments, before someone finally broke the silence.
"W....what did I just witness?" a youth sucked in a cold breath of air.
"Didn't they say he was a trash?"
"How was he able to fight like that then?"
"Hmph, Marcus underestimated you, but now it'll be a different case." The second thug stood up, his arm muscles flexing, until a metallic sheen encased his arms.
"Rah!" he let out a shout and short towards me, but perhaps his ability that turned his arms metal, also added to his weight, I effortlessly ducked under his fist, before delivering a brutal kick to his guts.
"Ughk!" Spittle flew out of his mouth as his body left the ground and got launched backwards from the force of the kick.
Seeing his pitiful state, I turned away from him, and towards the ringleader of this circus. But... he was nowhere to be found.
"Really?" Bubbles muttered in indignation. "I was really hoping to get in a hit or two on that guy."
"You can do that later. For now though, we'll go through every passage possible,I don't believe we won't get out of here in the next half an hour." I set myself a deadline.
But first I went into a tunnel, then six replicas of me came into existence before my eyes. After that, no words were needed, each of me went different ways, passed through different tunnels, and mapped out the entire places I'd been.
If there was anyone more suitable to get out of this puzzle, then it was me.
It took about twenty minutes, but one of me finally managed to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
"Finally." I muttered.
Far in the distance were a lot of towering buildings. The Astral mystic Institute.
I had made it. Well not quite yet. The finish line was still about three kilometers away. Even though, I'd say I'm almost done.
With a mental tug, my main body appeared at the end of the mushroom grotto.
Time blurred as I sprinted towards the buildings. I hoped I was in the top forty, but I knew that was kinda hard to achieve, after all I didn't really engage the test with that goal in mind.
But whatever rank I got didn't matter, I muttered as I got closer to the buildings. 'All that matters is that the protagonist still got first place.' I thought as I began hearing noises from youths the closer I got.
I crossed the final stretch of a bridge nestled over a small stream, and finally reached the institute.
A crowd of youths were already gathered there, so I received quite a lot of states due to my reputation. But I ignored all that and decided to look at my rank.
78....
79. Damon Darkfell.
"Great, I'm not part of the last stretch then." I muttered, half contemplating, half thrilled.
Then I looked up the board to see the top ten, but then froze.
1. Anastasia Necron
2. Alistair Von Drake
"...."
"The hell?!"