"Noen, take off the headphones and get out of the chair! NOW!" the woman screamed.
Noen didn't hesitate. He ripped the heavy headphones off, tossing them back onto the headrest, and scrambled out of the blue chair just as another shower of sparks erupted from the ceiling. He hit the floor and scrambled away as the machine gave one final, dying groan. Within seconds, the frantic humming stopped, leaving nothing but the smell of ozone and the sight of thick, grey smoke curling up from the seat.
The heavy door slammed open. Joris Gantz and Ms. Halden sprinted into the room, their faces pale.
"Mr. Gantz!" the woman cried, her voice trembling with visible fear.
"What happened?" Gantz demanded, his eyes darting around the wrecked equipment.
"I—I just had him open his system like usual, and then..." she gestured toward the smoking, charred chair, "...that happened."
Gantz turned a sharp, piercing look toward Noen, as if it were somehow the boy's fault that the machinery had self-destructed. Without a word, he moved toward the desk and began tapping at the laptop.
"Yeah... completely fried," he muttered to himself. He looked up from the screen, his expression unreadable. "It looks like we won't be able to register your system just yet, Noen."
He turned to the woman, who was now standing nervously beside him. "It's likely because of how different his system is. Call Mr. Kessler. Tell him he needs to take a look at this immediately."
"Yes, sir!" she replied, reaching for a desk phone.
Joris turned back to Noen, his eyes narrowing slightly.
"In that case," Joris said, his voice regaining its cold, professional edge, "let's move straight to the ability test."
"Follow me," Joris said. Ms. Halden, Joris, and Noen left the room and walked through the long, sterile hallways.
On their way, they were met by Mr. Kessler, whose eyes immediately lit up when he saw Ms. Halden. "Ohhhhh, Ms. Halden!" he said cheerfully, rushing toward them as if to wrap her in a hug.
But she pushed him away before he could get close. "A pleasure that you—ahem, I mean, that you all have com—"
"Excuse me, please, I need to get past," she interrupted coldly. Mr. Kessler flinched, his cheerful expression crumbling as he stared at the floor. He stepped aside, looking genuinely hurt. The three of them walked past him without another word, and Mr. Kessler turned the corner into the room that was now reeking of burnt electronics.
The trio took an elevator several floors down. When the doors finally slid open, Joris Gantz was the first to step out, spreading his arms wide with pride. "Welcome to the Training Hall, Noen!"
Noen looked around in awe. The hall was massive, filled with people—mostly his own age—training intensely. But they weren't just training against dummies.
"Wait... are those real magical beasts?" Noen asked, pointing toward a creature in the distance.
"Correct. Most of the people here just recently awakened their systems, just like you," Joris explained. They walked past several students who were locked in combat with small magical beasts. "Everyone who awakens a system must come to the Town Hall for the System Registry. They go to the testing room we were just in to officially register, and then we come here to evaluate their basic abilities. We go over their roles, their stat caps, and so on."
As they walked, Noen's gaze locked onto a familiar figure. It was...
Mika.
"MIK—" Noen started to shout her name, but he caught himself, the memory of what happened that morning hitting him like a physical blow.
Mika heard him anyway. She turned around just as she slammed a Flumph—a small, flying, jellyfish-like beast—into the ground. She hissed at him, her face twisted in a silent snarl, but Noen was already too far away to hear.
The three of them walked a few more meters until Joris stopped in the center of the hall. "LISTEN UP, EVERYONE!" he shouted.
The hall went silent. Even those still fighting their beasts did their best to keep the noise down.
"Everyone, please leave this hall! If you look to your left, you'll see the large gate leading to Hall 2. Try to drag your opponents with you."
The massive gate groaned open. One by one, the students began to filter through, some struggling to pull their beasts along. Mika, coming from the back of the crowd, intentionally shoved Noen aside as she passed, the struggling Flumph clutched in her hand.
Noen shook his head, watching her go. He didn't say a word, just followed her with his eyes until she disappeared behind the gate and it slammed shut with a heavy thud.
They now had the entire hall to themselves. The silence felt heavy, amplifying the sound of Noen's own rapid breathing.
"See that small hole in the wall?" Joris asked Noen, pointing toward an opening about the size of a juggling ball at the far end of the hall.
"Y-Yes?" Noen stammered, clearly confused.
"Small capsules will roll out of that hole," Joris explained calmly. "And from those capsules, magical beasts will spawn."
Noen blinked. "From such a small capsule?"
"Exactly," Joris replied quickly. "To start, we'll roll out the strongest magical creature that can be stored in a capsule of that size."
Noen flinched, his hands beginning to shake. "Wh-Why the strongest at the start? Isn't it supposed to go from easy to hard?"
Joris patted him on the shoulder. "Don't worry, Noen. The beasts we can fit into these capsules are at most ten meters tall—roughly D to C-system rank level, depending on how much LP you have."
"Ten meters?" Noen shuddered, his voice rising in panic. "That makes no sense! You know my system is below FFF! My stats are all in the negatives!"
Joris merely shrugged. "It could just be a display bug or something similar, although that's never happened before aswell, but who knows?"
Before Noen could protest again, he saw it. A capsule came rolling out. Noen's eyes locked onto it, tracking the small metallic sphere as it skidded across the floor and came to a halt in the center of the arena.
"Well then, good luck!" Joris called out, already making his way up to the safety of the observation stands.
"You can do this!" Ms. Halden shouted from the stands, her voice filled with a mix of encouragement and visible anxiety.
The capsule hissed. A second later, it burst open with a violent expansion of magical energy.
"ROOAAAAHHHHH!!!"
A deafening, guttural scream ripped through the air. Noen's eyes widened, his heart hammering against his ribs.
"W-Wait a minute... isnt that... a... a Orc?"
Another roar shook the room. The beast was at least five meters tall, a mountain of red muscle and tusks, wielding a rusted iron club that looked heavy enough to crush a car. Without a moment's hesitation, the Orc locked eyes with Noen and charged at full speed.
"Oh no..."