Two more weeks passed, and by now, two-thirds of the giant fungi forest had been set ablaze, reduced to cinders. The sands of the Sharaji Desert swept over the ravaged sections of the forest, and with the shrinking of the arena, so, too, had the combined killing pressure of all living beings in the forest weakened drastically.

  It was ten in the morning. Sunlight cut through the mushroom canopy in bright, hard shafts. Cicadas screamed all around as Otto ran for his life, marksman rifle in hand, Swarmsteel satchel on his back. The loose components rattled inside his satchel as he vaulted over a fallen log and immediately ducked for cover, clamping his hand over his mouth.

  He didn’t make a move, he didn’t make a sound; sweat poured down his brow as he listened to the two pairs of footsteps barrelling down the path he’d been set on.

  If he’d kept running, he would’ve been caught by them already.

  Shit!

  Those two…

  He was part of the culling. His team had everything going for them—strong members, powerful Swarmsteel, a perfect hideout—but none of that mattered in the face of two Mutant-Class beetles with immaculate teamwork. The three of them had spent two whole weeks hunting Giant-Class bugs, raising their attributes, unlocking new mutations, and increasing their killing pressures, but the one thing they never put any effort into was their synergy. The two Symbiote Exorcists could fight alongside each other well enough, but he’d always been cut out of any important conversations, and now?

  The two Symbiote Exorcists were dead—their heads torn off by the twin Mutant-Class beetles—and if he didn’t stay deathly still, he’d be the next to go.

  God… damnit.

  I told you guys we needed to team up with another group.

  As he pressed his back against the log, squeezing his eyes shut, he listened to the rapid thumps of earth just a few strides away—the twin beetles were racing past his log in pursuit of another target. Not him. They’d been chasing him just moments earlier, but in their eyes, the fungi forest probably wasn’t lack of any juicy targets. He gritted his teeth and tried not to shiver. By running the way he did, he might’ve led the beetles straight into another group, and judging by the muted screams and shouts in the far distance, the beetles might’ve forgotten all about him already.

  He had no idea how many groups were still alive.

  He’d realised about a week ago, after his group came upon a spore-decayed site of massacre, that defeating the twin beetles with only three members was probably impossible. They were too coordinated. Their movements were too erratic. They could burrow through earth and mushroom trees to pounce at unsuspecting prey from any angle in this colossal forest, and he still had no clue what their Swarmblood Art could be. Maybe they didn’t even need to use their signature magic to dispatch all of them.

  And the three of us even had them cornered at one point. We surrounded them around a single mushroom tree, blew off an arm from each of them, and drew out all of their stamina. They couldn’t have been faking their exhaustion. That chest heaving and that drooling had to be real.

  So how did they recover so quickly?

  They jumped into the mushroom tree, ate their way up, and within ten seconds they burst back out with completely rejuvenated bodies. They even regenerated their lost arms to boot.

  Was that their Swarmblood Art?

  What could it possibly…

  …

  … No doubt about it now, though, he thought, biting his lips as he peeled one eye open, peeking over the log to see if the beetles had gone. The Sun arranged three people in one team because it’s just the right number to make us think we have the number’s advantage, when in fact, it’s not nearly enough to make up for the sheer power difference.

  Did she want teams to jump at the twin beetles thinking they have an advantage?

  A cruel exam. A violent exam. There were a hundred words he could use to describe the nature of the Sun’s trial, but everyone registered and participated of their own volition. They knew coming into this that there had to be a reason why an average of ninety percent of all participants would ‘drop out’ in the first stage. Otto was no different—he hadn’t come all the way here from the Rampaging Hinterland Front to bemoan the recruiting tactics of the Hasharana.

  He had to move.

  The tension in the air made him grimace as he stood up straight, looking around one last time to see if there were any eyes on his back. Once he determined he was alone, he took a deep breath and pulled down his dragonfly goggles, turning the dial on the side to activate its coloured pheromone vision.

  He squinted; he zoomed in with his left lenses; his eyes caught a poisonous green smoke column rising above the canopy a few hundred metres in the distance. Blinking painfully, he immediately switched off the pheromone vision and pulled his goggles up—he couldn’t use that vision for too long or he’d damage his eyes—but if nothing else, he was a decent tracker. He remembered exactly where that column was, and now that he had a destination to reach, no amount of chasing or being chased would rattle the navigation data in his head.

  Without hesitation, he began sprinting across the forest towards the source of the smoke column.

  What do I even say to them, though?

  ‘Sorry, my teammates just died because they weren’t strong enough despite being warriors infamous for fighting in pairs, and I ran away by myself because I realised it was a doomed fight’?

  It’s fine if they think I’m a weakling. It’s worse if they think I’m an untrustworthy coward, and that…

  …

  Maybe he was a coward. There was a reason why Hasharana don’t tend to be long-ranged fighters. They were the wandering bug-slayers of the continent, and getting their hands dirty down in the nitty-gritty was part of the job. A boy like him who preferred staying far and away from any bugs so he could snipe them down from a distance simply wasn’t the ‘ideal’ Hasharana, and it certainly wasn’t what people would imagine if they were told a Hasharana was coming to rid their town or borough of their bug infestation.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  What would he say if his skillset were questioned by the other team?

  They’d ask him what he could offer by joining up with their team, and he was supposed to say… long-range support? Against those beetles?

  Nope.

  Not a chance in hell my bullets will even come close to hitting those Mutants.

  In that case–

  He screeched to a halt when a loud thud resounded across the forest, and he threw himself behind a colossal mushroom trunk as something sharp and heavy slammed into a distant tree. An obsidian-edged sawtooth blade. Rifle shaking slightly in his hands, he peeked out the side of the tree and narrowed his eyes at the pair in the small clearing—he recognised the two of them in an instant. One was a Noble-Blood from the Attini Empire in regal, feathery attire, and the other was a raven-cloaked Plagueplain Doctor in a mosquito mask. They were there two weeks ago when his team first encountered the twin beetles, and just like back then, the two were arguing about… something.

  It was difficult to make out what they were saying from a distance, so he pulled up his wax moth earmuffs and turned the dial on the right, magnifying every sound in the forest.

  It was immediately apparent to him that there were just the two of them; their third teammate was nowhere to be found.

  “... You left her for dead,” the noble mumbled, clutching her bloody stomach as she leaned against her sawtooth blade wedged into a giant tree. “You had a choice… to save her or take a risky, killing shot at the Mutant-Class… but you chose to–”

  “She was already dead either way,” the doctor growled back, and she was just as bruised, battered, and bloodied—her syringe claws were stabbed into the same tree as she hung onto it for support, glaring straight at the noble. “You know, if you want to be a hero so much, why not just leave me the fuck alone and go buddy up with another team? I’m sure they’ll be very receptive to a Noble-Blood like you–”

  “We were teammates, Blaire,” the noble growled, ripping her sawtooth blade down through the tree as she stumbled, trying to regain her footing. “We may not… have known her for long… but she was our teammate. Between killing a bug and saving a human… you would choose the bug? When we already had the beetles cornered and weakened?”

  Blaire sneered back at the noble. “Fool. They weren’t weakened whatsoever.” Then she ripped her claws out of the tree as well, rasping for breath through her mosquito mask as she stumbled deeper into the clearing. “They were toying with us. They could’ve recovered all of their strength at any point. I know a cornered and weakened bug when I see one, and I’m telling you, that wasn’t it. If I hadn’t pressed the attack and went back to help our drag of a teammate, they would’ve recovered and killed us both immediately.”

  Otto blinked. That was exactly what had happened to his teammates as well. They thought they had exhausted the beetles and let their guard down, but then–

  “They recovered in an instant anyways!” the noble hissed. “Their Swarmblood Arts have something to do with the rapid regeneration, correct? They kept it hidden when they activated it, but the turning point came after they burrowed into a tree and emerged completely unscathed—at that point, we should have just immediately retreated with her! You did not even manage to stop them from burrowing to regenerate, so why did we continue taking a fight against Mutant-Classes with unknown Swarmblood Arts?”

  “It was a shitty situation without a perfect out, and you know it!” Blaire snarled, her syringe claws bubbling and hissing with glowing green toxin as she cracked her neck, eyes glowing fierce emerald. “You know, if your decision-making is sooo perfect, then just fuck off and join another team! I’ve been telling you to get off my back for two weeks already, but oh, the Bitch of Justice just has to stick with the teammate those flower bastards assigned her with–”

  “–because we are a team, and as much as I despise your heart-collecting hobbies, we can’t beat the Mutant-Classes alone–”

  “I can! Just a bit more time! If I can observe them for just ten… no, five more minutes, I’ll figure out what their Swarmblood Arts are and develop a counter venom!”

  It was the noble’s turn to scoff this time. “If you were so strong and capable, you would never have left the Plagueplain Front to begin with.”

  Blaire’s eyes darkened. “What’d you say?”

  “You heard me.” The noble dragged her giant sawtooth blade behind her, drawing a half-circle in the dirt as her legs parted in a battle stance. “There is no conceivable reason for a Plagueplain Doctor to take this exam. A real Plagueplain Doctor would be too busy drugging themselves and butchering bugs in the crystal trenches to even remember the date of the exam. You came here because you failed to join the Plagueplain Doctors, and the only other way to get out of being persecuted as a feral, filthy war criminal is to be pardoned as a Hasharana.”

  Even in his exhausted, trembling state, Otto was able to reach into his pocket for a single anti-chitin bullet.

  He loaded it into the rifle’s chamber, knowing he’d probably have to fire it really soon.

  “... Says the disgraced noble,” Blaire said quietly, going down on all fours like a wild animal as she reared one claw behind her, Swarmsteel armour plates across her arms rippling as she tensed every muscle in her body. “There’s no good reason for a noble to take part in these shitty exams, either, unless you’re a disgraced noble—or, worse yet, an exiled noble. What? Were you chased out of your manor with only bristled leaves to wipe your ass with? You trying to reclaim your honour or some shit like that by becoming a Hasharana?”

  Okayyyyy.

  Yep.

  They’re gonna start killing each other again.

  Before the two girls could swing at each other, he stepped out of cover and fired once into the air, the rifle recoil nearly tearing his arm off his shoulder. He winced quietly; he was much more tired than he realised. Still, the crack of an anti-chitin round smashing through the canopy above him got the girls’ attention, and they whirled at once to see him walking towards them with his hands raised.

  He sincerely hoped he had a warm and friendly smile on his face, but, frankly speaking, he had no idea how his face was holding up being glared at by a furious noble and a bloodthirsty doctor.

  “H-Hello,” he said, and he immediately cursed in his head. How could he have stumbled over his first word? He coughed and kept his rifle pointed towards the sky; he could still salvage this. “I’m… Otto. Otto Glasbrenner from Team Gentiana. May I know the names of the… uh, the lovely ladies I’m speaking with?"

  The noble scowled, two hands on her giant sawtooth blade, and the doctor’s reaction was much the same.

  “I am Wisnu Balam Hunahpu, eldest daughter of Earthen Hunahpu and the leader of Team Qantuta,” the noble said, fingers stretching and curling around the hilt of her blade.

  “And I’m Blaire. A real fucking Plagueplain Doctor, and this bitch isn’t my leader,” Blaire said, killing pressure practically oozing off her sickly pallid skin. “Now, what the hell’s a Pioneer doing sticking his nose in my business?”

  He grabbed the barrel of his rifle with his other hand and held it horizontally above his head, freezing ten steps before them. “Collaboration,” he breathed. “My teammates were killed by the Mutant-Class beetles, too. Since you also lost your third teammate, why not join up with me? I’m sure my skills as a Swarmsteel Maker will come in handy–”

  “Fuck off.”

  Blaire didn’t hesitate. She changed targets from Wisnu to him and pounced at him in the blink of an eye, poisonous mist shooting out the back of her cloak as she did—were it not for Wisnu jerking herself in front of him to parry her claws, he would’ve had his face torn off already.

  The fungi forest rumbled. Wisnu snarled at Blaire as they locked weapons. The noble asked if the doctor was willing to kill innocent humans in front of her now, while the doctor snapped back with something just as sharp, just as offensive.

  For his part, Otto didn’t hear what the two girls were actually saying. While he took a nervous step back and lowered his rifle, he turned his head to the side. His ears craned to the canopy above. There were waves of Giant-Class bugs charging towards them from the far, far distance—in hindsight, he probably shouldn’t have fired an anti-chitin bullet just to stop the girls from fighting.

  Whether they liked it or not, they had to work together now… though the two girls were still glaring at each other, and neither one of them looked ready to back down from their little quarrel.

  … Welp.

  Here we go again.

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