Lester had been here at the superpower evaluation center before. It was the same place he'd gone when he'd tried to get his powers tested as a hero. The city's superhero evaluation center, it turned out, became the city's supervillain evaluation center from midnight to 6 am.

  Now, at the place, in a large waiting room, Lester had been sitting on a bench for two hours, starting from midnight. He was number forty-seven. There had been only twenty numbers before him, but it took a while to test each person. Waiting with him here, there were several people. Most looked normal. Some didn't. One man had an axe blade on his head. It stood there like a mohawk haircut. There was also a woman with green-scaled skin, who, Lester thought, might be the same one he'd observed in the central park a while ago.

  But one guy here drew his attention. A person standing in red power armor, which seemed to run on steam, judging from the occasional puff of vapor that came out from an exhaust pipe on the guy's back. That guy could have been him if he had chosen the power Tinkering instead of his Liquid Body. In that case, he could not have, Lester rationalized, used his powers at this moment because of a lack in his Intellect attribute. And he would likely also have had to spend a lot of time building something like the suit. Those were good reasons—not simply excuses—for why he had chosen the less versatile power of Liquid Body. And he would prove his choice to be right, not only to himself but also to the world. He would prove it by taking this evaluation and becoming a true villain.

  It had been the right choice, Lester told himself.

  Trying to focus on the present, Lester checked his own appearance. T-shirt and cargo shorts. Not really supervillainy, but good for physical activity, which there would be a lot of in the evaluation. He also had new expensive—4999$—sneakers, which were rated for people with strength and speed of his level and a bit above.

  As he sat there, his number coming closer and closer, Lester felt his anxiety rise. If he failed now, he would have to wait a year for the next opportunity. He had, for sure, practiced as much as he could with his new powers during the two weeks after gaining them. He could now mostly control the threshold of damage when his body started turning to liquid. It worked simply by wanting really hard not to turn into water. Apart from that, he hadn't been able to do anything else, but what he had should be enough. Enough for him to get to C-rank.

  Finally, Lester heard the announcement, "Number forty-seven."

  It's time. Let's do this.

  Lester approached a counter where an old man took his ticket and pointed him toward a room, where Lester proceeded.

  Inside, he noticed a familiar figure sitting behind a desk. It was the same woman he'd met half a year ago. She had the same kind of business suit, and she stared at him through the same kind of big, round glasses. Back then, she had interrogated him and ended his dreams of becoming a superhero.

  Lester stood there in silence.

  The woman said, "So, you decided to become a villain then?"

  He remembered that she probably had some lie-detection powers. But there was nothing to hide now. There was a kind of simple honesty in villainy.

  "Yes," Lester said.

  "I see." She took out a paper form, which was the one Lester signed half a year ago. By signing that form, Lester had promised to behave for five years, after which he might get another chance to become a hero. The woman added, "I'll just shred this then?"

  "Okay."

  She put it into a shredder, and Lester watched as the machine ate the piece of paper. It had probably been his last chance to become a hero. There was no turning back now.

  After the shredder had finished, there was a moment of silence.

  "Any more questions?" Lester said.

  "No, there are no legal or psychological requirements for becoming a supervillain." She pointed toward a door at the other side of the room. "You may proceed to the testing facility."

  Lester went through and ended up in a small room. The only thing here was a touch screen, which stood on a podium.

  An impersonal male voice said, "Welcome, candidate. Your supervillain evaluation will start here. You will first select the abilities you would like to get evaluated. Then you will proceed to the testing areas. There, your individual abilities will be ranked. These ranks will then turn into points, which will be summed to give you the final result. Approach the touch screen to see the points and rankings."

  Lester did as asked and looked at the screen.

  Points gained from ability rankings:

  F: 0

  E: 1

  D: 3

  C: 9

  B: 27

  Point limits for qualification ranks:

  F: 0

  E: 1

  D: 4

  C: 12

  B: 36

  Twelve points it is, Lester thought, marking his goal. Twelve points was all he needed to become a true villain—twelve points.

  After a minute, the screen changed, and the voice said, "On the machine, mark the tests you would like to do."

  On the screen, Lester saw a list. The list was divided into basic abilities and special powers. First, he took a look at the basic abilities.

  Basic Abilities:

  Intelligence

  Strength

  Speed

  Damage Resistance

  Mental Resistance

  Melee Combat

  Ranged Combat

  Lester knew he could take all of them. But that might not be the right move. For one, it was unlikely that he would get any points in the Intelligence test, and that test was supposed to be really tiring. So, that was out. Mental Resistance was also a maybe-not. But on the other hand, his Will was at five. This might mean that he might do well in that test. Also, it would be nice to find out what his mental resistance actually was in this test environment and not in a real-life mind control situation.

  Lester tapped all the abilities except for Intelligence. The selected powers were transferred to another list where it said Marked Tests.

  Next, Lester looked at the list of special powers. The list was indeed long. It contained everything from fire control to teleportation to plant manipulation to x-ray vision to elastic body to hypnosis to hair control. But it did not take long for him to find what he was looking for. There was a power there with the name Liquid Body. Exactly like the Villain Interface had put it. And there was also a description.

  The powered individual has the ability to turn the whole of their body into water. The individual should be able to demonstrate some control over their water form, e.g. the ability to move quickly in the form and the ability to switch in and out of the form.

  Lester stopped as he realized what the text meant. He really didn't have the mentioned control. Would that mean that his power would not be enough? There were, of course, other abilities related to water on the list, but this was the closest one to his powers. He would have to go with it. He might still get an E-rank from it, and that was one point.

  Lester tapped the power, sending it to the list with the others. Next, he pressed a confirm icon, and the same impersonal voice said, "Proceed to the first testing area."

  A door to the side opened, and Lester walked in and looked around. The room had a single machine, which was a bench press, where one could lean back and push on weights with their arms.

  There was also a board on one wall, which read the following:

  Strength test:

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  Minimum score for each rank:

  E: 300 kg

  D: 1000 kg

  C: 3000 kg

  B: 10000 kg

  A light blinked on, illuminating the bench press, and the voice said, "This is the strength test. Proceed to the arm press. Take the position shown in the picture next to the machine."

  Lester did as he was told, sat on the leaning bench, and took hold of the handles in front of him.

  "Three hundred kilograms. Push the handles forward with your arms and hold for five seconds. If you are not able to do this within a minute, the test will conclude."

  With some effort, Lester did as was commanded.

  "Success. Lower the weights back."

  After he'd pulled his hands back and lowered the weights, there was some mechanical clicking from within the machine. "One thousand kilograms. Push the handles forward with your arms and hold for five seconds. If you are not able to do this within a minute, the test will conclude."

  He pushed again, and, this time, the weights felt much heavier. Lester pushed and screamed, and all he managed was a slight jerk forward, immediately followed by a clank as the handles and weights came back.

  Lester stopped and thought about his situation. The weight was one thousand kilograms. According to the Interface, he was seven times stronger than a normal human would be with his body. That would mean that he would be relatively lifting something over one hundred, which might not be possible for an average human. But on second thought, he'd been working out, and when he'd been in the forest, he had carried a lot of heavy equipment.

  "Thirty seconds left."

  It's not a calculus problem, Lester thought. Then he grabbed both of the handles and took a deep breath. He pushed as hard as he could, straining his body, feeling that his arms would tear off. But he pushed, and slowly the handles moved forward, his arms straightening, and then, at the peak of the movement, he held the thousand kilograms, whole body shaking as a scream erupted from within him.

  Then, Lester's arms transformed into water, and the handles jerked back through the liquid, resulting in a loud clang of metal slamming against metal within the machine.

  As his arms transformed back to normal, Lester said, "Fuck."

  And the voice said, "The strength test has concluded. Your strength is 300 kilograms. Your strength is E-rank. Your overall score is now 1."

  Lester tried to process what had happened. His powers had failed him. His arms had automatically turned. While training, he'd never put his body to this kind of stress.

  "Shit," Lester said.

  "Proceed to the next testing area." A door opened on one side of the room.

  As he got up from the machine, Lester tried to shift his mind to the trial ahead. This was not the end. This had only been the first test. Plenty of opportunities to gain more points. And he'd still gained one point.

  Lester went onward, entering another room, and this one was large. There was an oval-shaped track here.

  On one wall, it read:

  One kilometer run

  Maximum time for each rank:

  E: 2 minutes

  D: 1 minute

  C: 30 seconds

  B: 15 seconds

  "This is the speed test. Move to the starting position and face toward the direction of the arrow."

  A glowing square illuminated onto the track, and at one side of the square, there was an arrow. Lester went inside the square. He took a starting position for running, crouching down, ready to spring forward.

  "When the countdown ends, there is a bang, and the green light flashes. This means you can start running. Run around the track four times to finish the test. If you move before the countdown ends, you will have to start again, and you only get one extra chance."

  As he stood there, Lester's mind went to his new shoes. 4999$. Time for his investment to pay off.

  The countdown started, "5 … 4 … 3 … 2 … 1 …" A bang sounded, a light flashed green, and Lester sprang forward, his feet flashed into motion, pumping for speed as he whirled around the track once then three more times, dashing past the finish line.

  "The speed test has concluded. You ran a kilometer in 1 minute and 1 second. Your speed is E-rank. Your overall score is now 2."

  Lester sat down, breathing hard, trying to process what had happened. One second. Only one second, and he would have gained D-rank and three points, and he had even invested in these new shoes. 4999$.

  "Proceed to the next area."

  Lester sighed and said, "Fuck, I really need to up my game here."

  The next room had one illuminated square at the center of it.

  On one wall, it read:

  Mental Resistance test

  Minimum time for each rank:

  E: 1 min

  D: 2 min

  C: 3 min

  "This is the mental resistance test. Go stand inside the square and stay there for as long as you can."

  "Okay," Lester said and moved to stand at the center of the square.

  He didn't hear any more instructions and didn't see any signs of what else to do there. Apparently testing one's mental resistance was strange as there seemed to be no doors to the room he was in despite him entering through one and the walls were quite pale like vanilla ice cream running down but he was still going to stand here because the voice had said so but the tentacle rising from the floor winding around his leg was maybe too much for a simple test like this despite it having something to do with mental which was not as stable as the room seemed to be running down a waterfall.

  Lester fell on his back, head spinning.

  "The mental resistance test has concluded."

  After a short while, Lester got up and looked around. The room was normal again.

  "You lasted 1 minute 32 seconds. Your mental resistance is E-rank. Your overall score is now 3."

  Lester realized what had happened. He had been subjected to some kind of mind control. But he'd resisted it a bit. Normal people would only have gotten an F-rank. At least he'd gotten one point. That was something.

  "Proceed to the next area."

  There wasn't any announcement here, but there was a man standing in the middle of a padded area on the floor. The man was old-looking, around one and a half meters tall, and he had long white hair and big white eyebrows, which hung to the sides along with his hair. The guy said, "I will be testing your mastery in the art of combat."

  Lester sized up the small man. The guy definitely had a martial master kinda vibe to him. One might easily presume that the guy was weak. But that wasn't most likely the case. There were so many videos out there where some professional fighter got humiliated by some strange-looking old guy. And he, Lester Rigby, knew better than to underestimate the fellow.

  "Okay," Lester said.

  "Thrice you can attempt to attack," the guy said, "and thrice I will defeat you."

  "Right," Lester said, noting the strange way of speaking. Was it an act to sound more mysterious, or was the way of speaking just something that naturally came along with the guy's martial powers?

  "Now, you shall make your first attempt." The man beckoned Lester with a gesture of an outstretched hand and a slight movement of fingers.

  Immediately, Lester rushed forward, swinging his fist at his opponent, but he hit nothing, felt a sting on the side of his stretched arm, and ended up face down on the padded floor.

  As Lester got up, the short man said, "That was your first attempt, and I was not impressed."

  Lester thought about what had just happened. The fellow had been too fast. Too fast for even his enhanced reflexes. He hadn't even seen what the guy did.

  "Now, execute your next attempt," the guy said.

  Lester decided to try something different. He lunged forward, this time not trying to punch but instead tackle, arms stretched out to grab his quick opponent. But again, Lester's attack ended with him on the floor face down, and he felt someone standing on top of him and heard the words, "That was your second attempt, and I am not impressed."

  After Lester had gotten up again, the guy continued, "If you do not impress me, in your last attempt, your evaluation will be F-rank. Now, execute your last attempt."

  Lester eyed the small man. This was not going well. He would have to think outside the box, or he would fail completely.

  Lester rushed forward, swinging his leg at his opponent's head. Lester couldn't see what happened, but he let his leg liquify as something struck it. And he continued with a backhand strike, which he also let turn liquid on contact. He then finished with a quick forward jab, which touched something lightly.

  Lester saw the man standing a couple of meters in front of him. And the guy was holding his palm forward in a stop motion. The man said, "The evaluation has ended. In the smallest way, I am impressed. Your melee combat shall be E-rank."

  Hearing the words, Lester felt satisfied. Even if E-rank meant only one point, impressing the small master did somehow feel really good.

  Lester bowed slightly to the evaluator and said, "Thank you."

  The guy nodded and pressed a button, and a door opened with the impersonal voice sounding again, "Your melee combat is E-rank. Your overall score is now 4. Proceed to the next area."

  The next room had a long wooden bar table, and some ten meters behind it was a large screen. On the long table, there was a pistol-looking device.

  "This is the ranged combat test. Grab the pistol from the table. Do not break it. If you do, you will fail this test, and you will have to pay for the damages."

  Lester knew he had only three tests left, including this one. His score was four, and he needed twelve. That meant he would have to score all three at least D-rank for three points each if he was to make it.

  Taking a deep breath, Lester approached the table and took the gun carefully, feeling its weight. It looked like some kind of a laser pistol. There were normal iron sights on it. Simple enough, and he'd even shot a real pistol several times. And this here was probably more of a toy.

  "Shoot targets that appear on the screen. You gain one point from hitting a target and lose one point for each missed shot. Stay behind the table, or you will fail the test."

  Lester saw a countdown appear on the screen, starting from ten. It was time to do some gunwork. He would have to trust his old hunting experience now. He'd learned to shoot different guns at the Juniper Grove range, with the help of Armie. She'd been a good teacher. She'd definitely cared about him, and he'd liked being part of the hunting group.

  Damn that clone who replaced me.

  Lester shook off the old thoughts, steadied his breathing, and lifted the pistol, aiming through the metal sights. The number hit zero, and two round red targets appeared on the screen. These Lester took out immediately. And the test continued, targets appearing faster and faster, and getting smaller and smaller. At some point, they started moving in straight lines then changing direction, at which point Lester started missing shots. In the end, the targets were only a blur, and Lester was not confident he could hit anything, so he just put the gun down.

  After a moment, the targets disappeared, and the screen showed his score and other information.

  Targets hit: 81

  Shots missed: 14

  Total score: 67

  Minimum score for each rank:

  E: 40

  D: 60

  C: 80

  B: 100

  "The ranged combat test has concluded. Your ranged combat is D-rank. Your overall score is now 7."

  Lester let out a sigh, feeling relief and some disappointment too. His gunmanship was definitely one of his best traits. He could have maybe scored even higher if he'd just been a bit more focused and gotten a bit more lucky. But in the end, what mattered was that he was still on track to become a true villain.

  "Proceed to the next area."

  Lester knew there were only two tests left. And the last test was for damage resistance. This meant that the next test would be the one where he would need to demonstrate his superpower.