Author's Reincarnation in a Fantasy Setting

Chapter 49 The Special Exam [5]

In this exam, she was the one I wanted to avoid at all costs. Hence, here she was, right before me.

My older sister, Anya.

There are various reasons behind it, one of them is because I don't want her to accidentally witness that side of mine; it will be a disaster if that happened.

But then I noticed something, she was not alone here. A person, a boy was walking by her side. He was someone I didn't know nor I have seen before; he was a complete stranger.

Anya seems to be having a casual chat with him so it hit me that they might have met in this exam by sheer coincidence, well, not that it mattered much to me.

Though by this I only meant that how they met doesn't matter to me, I would be lying if I said I was fine with him being with her.

Not because of some weird reasons like a sister complex, no. The thing which worried me was that if this boy knows the true essence of this exam then there was only trouble waiting ahead for Anya.

There's no way I'm going to let that happen, even if I ended up straying from my original plan because of that. I just can't, after a long time, I found people that I cared about.

Also, now that I think about it, he might come in handy. And so it was decided, I stood up revealing myself from the bushes. Both Anya and that boy jumped in surprise and went into a defensive stance.

"Hey, calm down it's me," I said as I held my hands up in the air.

"Oh!" Anya murmured when she saw me, later she relaxed herself and told the boy that I was not a danger.

I put my hands down and walked out of the bushes while I patted my clothes to dust the dirt off. Then I was asked a question by Anya.

"How you got here?" and there was only one thing I could say.

"A coincidence, I was just passing by when I heard your voice."

"Anyway, who is this guy with you?" I asked, pointing my gaze toward the boy.

She looked at me, then at the boy, then back at me. After that, she said, "I happened to be near when he was being attacked by an orc. So I went and saved him—killing the orc as a result. It was dangerous out here so we decided to stick together till the end of this exam."

The boy came forward and stood before me, "I am Ster, Ster Grandkeep. And it's just as she said, in situations like this four eyes are better than two," he said before offering his hand for a handshake.

It took his hand and shook it. "I'm Zero Blanks. Her brother," I introduced myself with a firm smile on my face.

"Should I come along with you as well? In situations like this six eyes are better than four I guess," I suggested, coming to the main topic.

"I won't mind."

"Yeah, I won't either. In fact, it would be good if we have more people since we don't know what kind of monsters might be lurking out there."

"Then it's decided I think," I muttered.

After that, we kept scouting the area for hours, and fortunately, we didn't come across any monsters on our way.

I, of course, was observing Ster and from the way he was behaving, it seems like he didn't know about the core of this exam.

But then again, it could be an act to prevent me or Anya from learning his true intentions. And from the looks of it, Anya didn't seem to know the real thing either.

Well, I guess she wouldn't; after all, she was the type to take things at face value without suspecting that there could be a deeper meaning involved.

***

We spent the next couple of hours moving around here and there; sometimes taking a break in the middle.

We could have stopped at a place and waited for the exam to finish but we didn't for one reason; because being in one place for long wasn't safe. Apparently, this was a kind of survival rule in this world.

By dusk, we reached the place where we had decided to spend the night. It was the border of this area.

Mr. Halls has said that right now this forest is covered by a huge, dome-shaped magic circle so that means it had boundaries also.

We planned to stay the night there because the chances of monsters appearing very slim as it was the very end of this forest.

But to our surprise, we weren't the only ones who thought of that possibility. As we came out of the bushes and our line of sight was clear, we saw that a great number of students were already camping out there.

Ten? Twenty? No maybe a bit more than that. The number of people present here was vast, so much that this place gave off the vibe of a picnic spot.

"And there goes our plan of avoiding monsters," Ster sighed at the sight before his eyes.

"Going back right now would be a waste though, and I think being in the company of more people will increase the chances of our survival," said Anya, voicing her opinion.

She did have a look of disappointment on her face but she was adapting quickly according to our current situation.

Still, the more people we have the more the chances of our survival. Maybe the rest of the people here followed the same thinking because none of them seemed like they were about to leave anytime soon.

"Are you okay with it Zero?" Anya asked, asking for my say in the matter.

"Well… it's fine I guess."

Like that it was decided that we'll follow our original plan and spend the night here. The next morning we'll wake up—if we slept that is—the exam would be over.

We walked across the area and sat near a tree. I did say before that other people were already "camping" here but a camp was the last thing anyone will describe this sight as.

Just like us most of the students were lying around or sitting near the trees, some of them were in groups while some were lone wolfs. Though none of them was willing enough to come to talk to us; the same goes for us also.

There wasn't much to do so I rose and went near the wall of the magic circle—or should I call it a magic barrier? Hmmm, I'll stick with circle for now.

As I reached close, I saw a wall that was glowing in a dim golden color. It wasn't visible during the day due to the sunlight but since it was almost night, I was able to see the wall very clearly.

I looked up at the sky and the same color stretched further up, covering the whole sky and then landing on the horizon on the other side of the forest.

I tried touching it with my hand and surprisingly, it felt like I was touching a real wall. It was hard and solid.

Just for an experiment, I tried creating a waterfall on the other side of the wall with my elemental magic but it didn't work.

'So even magic can't get on the other side, huh.'

Though I knew that this was not just a magic circle meant to keep us from escaping, it was a bit more than that.

I returned to where Anya and that Ster were, sat near a tree resting my back on its tree, and closed my eyes.

It was night now and while most of the students were awake, I thought resting a little won't hurt.

Hence, I closed my eyes and after a while, I fell asleep.

***

The next moment I opened my eyes, I was a bizarre scene in front of me. Many loud noises of screaming, crying, and shouting could be heard. The students who were carefree a moment ago were now running here and there like animals.

'This is a bit soon, isn't it? I mean I was only asleep for an hour at most.'

It was reasonable though, we were being attacked by a horde of monsters after all.