Deep underground from Dick Sakura, there was one of the vast testing facilities owned by the Hunter Association. This was the venue for the 288th Hunter Exam. An elevator carried the sacrifices down to the bottom of this abyss, which reached as deep as 100 floors underground. Near the entrance, one of the examinees was sitting.
An obese, middle-aged man with thick eyebrows and a square nose. His name was Tonpa.
Last year, the total number of examinees who reached the first phase was 405. The examinees who had broken through the terrifying competitive ratio were all masters with outstanding abilities in some field. The Hunter Exam venue was a place that ordinary people could never reach.
How is it this year? As far as Tonpa has confirmed, more than 1,200 people who reached the first phase have already gathered here. It was clearly many more than in average years. It could also be said that it was a year with many excellent rookies. It was truly a delightful thing for him.
Commonly known as the "Rookie Crusher" Tonpa. He was a man who had continued to take the Hunter Exam, which is held only once a year, for 33 times. Among those, the number of times he had appeared in the main exam amounted to 31. He could be called a regular of the Hunter Exam in name and reality, but it also meant he had accumulated that many failures.
Insufficient strength was one reason, but if he had seriously aimed to be a Hunter, there was a chance he could have won a passing grade through effort. In other words, there was a reason why it didn't turn out that way.
One reason was that the Hunter Exam involved great danger to one's life. All risks arising from this exam are brushed aside as the examinee's own responsibility. Even if you lose your life, it's your own responsibility. And that danger increases as the stages progress from the first phase to the second phase. In order to grasp a passing grade, one must have a corresponding resolution. Tonpa didn't have that much ambition.
And another thing: in that extremely dangerous Hunter Exam, he had a pleasure he prioritized over passing. He polished his skills in firmly guarding his own safety, and fawning over the strong to yield the win. Even so, the reason why he insisted on this exam was solely to "crush the rookies."
Ding—
Another sound rang out, announcing a visitor. Tonpa looked toward the elevator while licking his lips. He had all the information on those who had reached the main exam over the past 30-plus years etched into his head. Distinguishing whether that examinee was a rookie or not was a simple task.
However, Tonpa, who was waiting with growing expectations about what kind of person the next prey would be, lost his words when he saw the figure of the girl who stepped out of the elevator.
Gathered here are battle-hardened warriors aiming to become bloodthirsty hunters. The single girl who suddenly appeared among them was far too out of place. Her presence was reminiscent of a single flower illuminated by silver moonlight. He saw a vision of a blue rose there.
A blue rose, which is said not to exist in nature. It has been used as a synonym for "impossible." Now, they can be created artificially through selective breeding and genetic manipulation, but they are only a pale purple. The "true blue" that people have continued to crave strikes the heart as a solitary fantasy precisely because it can never appear in nature.
He felt dizzy at the contradiction that the impossible existed. The girl was receiving a number plate with her examinee number written on it from Beans, an Association member. In other words, she was also one of the examinees.
It's not that there are no child examinees. In fact, in last year's exam, a 12-year-old boy passed as a rookie and became a Professional Hunter. But that, too, was a result achieved precisely because he had talent. In particular, the talent required for the Hunter Exam is of the physical ability and martial arts variety.
It wasn't a place where a girl who looked like she hadn't even killed a bug should come. Other examinees probably held much the same view. In the middle of the venue, which was beginning to buzz, the first one to move was Tonpa. He approached the girl with an unsteady gait, his center of gravity shifting.
It was a state of mind more like an insect attracted to a flower than an action by his own will. And that insect was by no means a beautiful butterfly. He was aware of how filthy a human being he was. To hide that foulness, he pasted on a personable smile.
"Hi! I'm Tonpa. Are you a rookie, by any chance?"
The girl, who had been looking around anxiously, nodded at Tonpa's call. No further conversation followed. Whether she was shy or just not good at talking, she seemed to struggle with it. Occasionally, her gesture of fidgeting and rubbing her feet together while grabbing her skirt stirred up his protective instinct even more.
For the time being, Tonpa tried to get into a flow of introducing each other to somehow find out at least the girl's name.
"Cho... Chocorobov."
The girl's name was Chocorobov. It was a sound that didn't suit her appearance. It was thought to be a pseudonym. You don't necessarily have to register under your real name for the Hunter Exam. However, in that case, the pseudonym is recorded as the official Hunter name, and it can never be changed after that. Even if she used a pseudonym, he wondered if she was really okay with that name, but he kept it to himself for now.
"Nice to meet you! Even though I look like this, I'm a veteran of the Hunter Exam. If there's anything you don't understand, feel free to ask me anything."
So saying, Tonpa held out one hand. Although he tried to ask for a handshake, he didn't expect such a beautiful girl to respond easily to a middle-aged man she was meeting for the first time. But contrary to that expectation, she obediently grasped Tonpa's hand.
It was a soft, small hand, as if to say she had never held anything heavier than a pen. Tonpa calmly savored that sensation, which lacked reality, as if he were shaking hands with a phantom. While keeping the same smile pasted on, he proceeded with analyzing the girl's character in his heart.
As for breaking through the path to the main exam, it wasn't impossible as long as one could secure a connection with a guide. It was certain that it wouldn't be straightforward, but there were several loopholes.
As for her personality, while she had some wariness, a sense of being somewhat out of touch with the world could be seen. Probably, the society she knew was only the clean, public world, an innocent state before knowing the back world where rotten people are mixed in. She could be called the perfect prey.
She didn't show much emotion on her face, but was it due to a psychological factor from her childhood? At least if she had led a normal life, she wouldn't have come to a place like this. Had discord with her family or isolation from society left deep wounds in the young girl's heart?
Her clothes were as good as new, but the only thing was that the large penguin plushie she was holding in her arms was dirty. The penguin had a somewhat distorted expression and wasn't very cute. But on the contrary, that made him feel the girl's strong attachment.
It wasn't a matter of appearance or cuteness. She wouldn't have brought it this far unless she had a strong feeling that she didn't want to let go of it no matter what. A memento given as a gift from someone—that plushie was the only friend she could open her heart to and interact with. Only this penguin knows her smile, which she has never shown to anyone. It must be so.
Tonpa the "Rookie Crusher" pondered. How should he cook such a masterpiece? What kind of weakness should he strike to make her show him the most beautiful despair?
It is said that a rookie who achieves a passing grade on their first attempt appears only about once every three years. There aren't many people who can think optimistically that they can just take it again next year even if they fail. Among the rookies who came to take the exam with a light heart and "unluckily" advanced to the main exam, there were not a few who were driven into an unrecoverable mental state.
Tonpa had seen many such people who dropped out. And he realized: this exam, where he can watch up close as promising young people have their dreams cut off and die, is the best show, irreplaceable by anything else. For that purpose, he had begun to take matters into his own hands and lure rookies into traps. The girl in front of him was no exception.
Unless a person who has stepped even one foot into this venue withdraws from the exam, they must handle whatever happens using only their own power. Crushing each other between examinees occurs as a matter of course, and examiners don't intervene there either. Everything included is the Hunter Exam. It's written properly in the exam guidelines. There was no one to stop Tonpa's misdeeds.
"Well, don't be so stiff; just relax. For now, as a token of our friendship..."
It wasn't an action based on deep thought. He tried to take out a juice can he had prepared in advance. It was one of the "crushing" methods he habitually used as an initiation for rookies.
Approaching a rookie examinee who knows nothing with a smile, and offering a juice containing an ultra-powerful laxative. It was a product where, if you take one sip, a mudslide that makes it impossible to even take the exam while wearing pants continues for three days and three nights.
But Tonpa reconsidered. Surely not that. For this girl, such a demonic deed couldn't possibly be permitted...
'To whom do you intend to beg for forgiveness?'
"Beautiful girl" and "mudslide"—it was a combination that must not be. However, he had imagined that sacrilegious scene that would fear even God.
A sudden, intense abdominal pain attacking her; while the girl would be shaken by the pain she was experiencing for the first time in her life, she would surely sense that the cause was brought about by the man in front of her.
While distorting her expression with anger and shame at being caught in a base trap, the girl would surely glare at Tonpa. However, her body would not listen. No matter how much patience there was, the physiological reaction occurring inside the body could not be suppressed. Once the effect of the medicine appeared, she would be deprived of even the room to move even a single step from that spot.
It might be a disgrace heavier than death for the girl. Reason, which says she absolutely cannot yield, and the physical instinct she cannot resist—in the gap between them, Tonpa intended to present a certain medicine before the writhing girl.
It was an antidote. He was prepared in case he was poisoned instead. If she had this medicine, the girl would be released from the pain. The fact that the hope of being saved was in the enemy's hands would surely give the girl further conflict.
"H-Here, as a token of our friendship, drink up! Haah... haah...! Let's toast to each other's good luck...! Heheh!"
With hands that were trembling unconsciously, the juice was handed over. After staring at the juice can for a moment, the girl pulled the tab open without doubt. While drinking the juice without the laxative that he had prepared for himself, Tonpa was observing the girl's condition.
If he dangled the antidote, he could make the girl listen to anything he said. For example, it would be possible to take away her precious plushie friend. It would also be possible to drop it on the floor right before the girl's eyes and trample it with mud-smeared shoes.
And in the end, Tonpa had no intention of handing over the antidote to the girl. What he really wanted to see was beyond that. The end of the girl whose last hope had been cut off and whose body had reached its limit. In other words, the collapse.
At that time, what kind of expression would she show him? With what kind of voice would she scream?
'Crush her!'
Tonpa couldn't resist his own inner voice. The flower-like fragrance drifting from the girl accelerated his desire.
His gaze was focused on one point. The girl's lips touched the opening of the can. Into those fresh, cherry-blossom-colored lips, the polluted liquid in which Tonpa's malice was condensed was about to enter. Tonpa, who had fallen into an abnormal state of excitement, was staring intently at that scene. Conversely, he could see nothing else.
"Oh, it's old man Tonpa. I knew you'd be here again this year."
At the point where Tonpa's gaze turned as if it had been flicked, there was a silver-haired boy approaching this way while raising a hand with a "Yo."