Arrival, The Entrance Exam Grounds
Having been thoroughly blacklisted by the security guards, I never did get the chance to use the casino.
Then again, my sole reason for wanting to make money there was to buy Jona the Reconciliation Set A. After our conversation in the escape pod, my relationship with him had already improved, which rendered the gift entirely unnecessary.
“I did it!”
“Congratulations, Milady. In a few years, you might even consider entering a competitive eating championship.”
Training, eating. Training, and eating yet again.
Thanks to my aggressive dining campaign targeted specifically at buffet hours, I had finally succeeded in registering all one hundred dishes offered by the buffet into my Food Codex.
“A competitive eating championship? Do they serve lots of delicious food?”
“Typically, it is a competition where one consumes a vast quantity of a single dish.”
“Then I'm not going. I don't really have any desire to stuff myself with just one thing.”
Hunting down the next collection spot right away might have seemed a bit materialistic, but a true player must never slack off on their codex! Wherever you go, finding out what dishes are famous and where the local hotspots are is fundamental gamer etiquette.
“Aw, Mom! I need to eat lots of meat! My brother said that's how you build big muscles!”
“Now really, no being a picky eater. If you eat that much meat, you need to eat plenty of vegetables too. Take a page out of that young lady's book over there—her plate was piled high with vegetarian dishes made from puréed broccoli.”
The boy being scolded by his noble mother flinched in surprise.
“Max?”
“Orknodi!”
“Do you two know each other?”
“We met in the Kids Zone yesterday. She was really nice and played with our little brother for a while.”
“My, how thoughtful. Thank you for looking after my children, Lady Orknodi. Might I ask your family's name...?”
“Pardon the intrusion, Madam,” Jona interjected smoothly. “Due to unavoidable circumstances, Lady Orknodi has not yet received permission from the main house to disclose her surname.”
“Oh dear. How tragic. I shall pray that the poor child is granted the right to bear her family name soon.”
The noblewoman turned her back on me and gave Max's ear a sharp tug.
“Come along, Max. Stop daydreaming over girls and finish your bell peppers and paprika at once. If you keep dodging your greens, I'll add cucumbers to your plate—the most dreadful vegetable of all.”
“Aagh, no! Anything but cucumbers, please!”
Even while being dragged away by his ear, Max strained his eyes in my direction, desperately trying to convey some unspoken message.
“It seems you have captivated a young man in the span of a single night, Milady.”
“It's nothing like that. Max is just a friend. We only met yesterday, anyway.”
“I am relieved to hear you understand that.”
Codex collection: complete.
Our journey aboard the airship had also drawn to a close.
[Attention passengers: This airship has safely landed at our destination, the Isle of Trials. We hope you enjoyed your voyage, and we look forward to serving you again in the future.]
Guided by the crew, the passengers began to disembark.
This year's Entrance Exam Grounds was an arid, wind-swept island plagued by dry coastal gusts that were downright atrocious for skin health. Carriages streamed across the grand bridge linking the mainland to the island, passenger ships docked steadily along the coastline, and several distant airships drifted sluggishly across the sky.
It was a scene I had witnessed countless times in the game's intro video—one of the fleeting shots woven into the cutscene showing examinees converging from across the continent.
Incidentally, this game was originally conceived as a pretty-girl dating simulator. But after the studio went bankrupt midway through development, the project was resurrected and retooled into an academy raising sim where players groomed students all the way to graduation.
The reason that random trivia sprang to mind was because of the girl in the straw hat currently stepping off a boat.
“Ah! My hat!”
A sudden gust plucked the hat from her head and swept it high into the branches of a roadside tree. The moment my eyes visually registered that scene, a dull throb pulsed behind my temples.
The Straw Hat in the Wind
The Straw Hat Girl's trademark identity—her beloved straw hat—has caught on a high tree branch!
If you wish to win the favor of this graceful young lady in a white sundress and sandals as she stamps her feet in distress, now is your chance.
Whether you scale the trunk or fetch a ladder, use any means at your disposal to retrieve the hat first and deliver it to her!
What a thoroughly ridiculous affinity event.
What was the point of grinding a heroine's favorability at an entrance exam, anyway?
“Do you intend to retrieve it for her, Milady?”
“Not particularly. If she can't even get that back through her own power, she shouldn't have applied to the academy in the first place.”
“How cold-hearted of you, Milady.”
“And whose fault do you think that is?”
“Pray do not misunderstand. It was meant as praise.”
“Mine was praise too.”
Meanwhile, the NPCs were having a field day. Several of them eagerly tried to scale the trunk only to slip and crash down; another climbed too high and burst into tears because he was terrified of climbing down; and when someone finally rescued the crier, the rescued boy blushed and fell head over heels for the burly lad who saved him. Complete and utter bedlam.
Standing amidst the onlookers politely clapping along, I noticed the girl in the straw hat wearing a truly extraordinary expression. Enlightened, you might call it. She looked entirely resigned, as if telling herself she would simply buy a new one.
She is a little pitiful, though.
If a named supporting NPC had been around, at least one of them would have stepped up to retrieve it. Just as that thought crossed my mind, a familiar, bearded mountain of fur stepped beneath the tree.
“Out of the way, runts! Unless you're looking for broken bones!”
“Whoa, it's a monkey beastman!”
“Aren't monkeys supposed to be masters at climbing trees?”
“With a frame like that?”
“If he tries to climb, that branch is snapping for sure.”
A short distance away, I spotted Giselle wearing an intensely pained smile. It seemed his newly hired bodyguard was charging around entirely on a whim, much to his employer's distress.
“Let's watch this before we go,” I said.
“Ah, the insolent beastman who challenged the examiner,” Jona murmured.
As the three of us stood shoulder-to-shoulder watching the scene unfold, the monkey beastman unslung the heavy staff from his back and cocked his shoulder back to the limit. It was a stance that had absolutely nothing to do with tree-climbing. Realizing what was about to happen, the surrounding spectators belatedly scrambled in every direction.
BOOOOM—!
A thunderous impact battered our eardrums, followed by a violent shudder that rustled the foliage like a dying scream before an avalanche of debris poured from above.
Rustle—
Patter, patter, thump!
“Eeeek!”
“B-Bugs! It's raining bugs!”
“Aargh! A rhinoceros beetle clamped onto my finger!”
Swatting at insects and ducking falling leaves, the spectators dissolved into total chaos. The breeze carried a cluster of leaves and creepy-crawlies toward us as well, but Leaf, who had been holding a snack basket and a parasol, snapped her arm forward.
Twirl.
Tap-tap-tap!
With a deft flick of her wrist, the parasol spun into a blur, deflecting every leaf and beetle to the left and right. Several nearby onlookers struck by the ricocheting debris glared our way in outrage, but the instant they caught sight of Jona's sinister glare, they shrank back and hastily scurried away.
Swish.
Clack.
Amidst the madness, the monkey beastman had spun his staff with dizzying speed, knocking aside every insect and stray leaf so that he remained entirely untouched. Catching the falling straw hat neatly on the tip of his staff, he extended it toward the young lady with a flourish.
“Why so crestfallen, my little fawn?”
Ugh, gross.
“Will receiving this restore your spirits? My sweet brown-tailed doe.”
The girl in the straw hat stared back with a face utterly devoid of gratitude.
“Waaaaah! It's all your fault a shower of bugs fell on me, you brute! There are aphids and grubs in my hair and all over my dress! Waaaah!”
Straw Hat Girl's Affinity Event has concluded.
No participant gained favorability.
Well, that happens.
Sequence-breaking and cheese strats weren't for amateurs. Unless you're a seasoned veteran who knows the exact mechanics, trying to brute-force an event is bound to blow up in your face like that.
“That was quite a worthwhile performance,” Leaf observed dryly.
“Sure was.”
Straw Hat Girl had it rough. Slogging through absurd hardships all because of some half-baked affinity event. Whether it was the heroines or the male protagonists sweating blood to 'save' them, both sides suffered endlessly from these forced narrative events.
“Hey, little miss! The testing grounds are up this hill!”
“Where are those people heading?”
“Don't mind us! We're just here to do a little sightseeing!”
When I offered that breezy excuse and waved, the examinees cheerfully waved back. Countless applicants trudging up the hill cast longing glances in our direction, while a handful of others trailed behind me down a side path with curious grins.
“The monkey beastman is following as well,” Jona noted.
“I guess Gold Tickets head this way too.”
The hierarchy of tickets was finally starting to show. While the holders of Iron, Bronze, and Silver Tickets were funneled toward the hill, the testing route for Gold and Platinum Ticket holders led much deeper into the island's interior.
About thirty minutes elapsed.
Just when I figured we had pushed quite far inland, a familiar sight—something I used to see on school field trips—caught my eye.
“Stone cairns?”
Small and large stones had been balanced into towers all across the path. Unlike the other applicants who strolled past without a second glance, I knew the gimmicks behind this entrance exam. Any peculiar scenery encountered on the path to the testing site was invariably a hint for the trial ahead. It seemed the first stage of the exam was going to be building stone pagodas.
“You may not,” Jona stated flatly.
“...I haven't even done anything! Why are you saying no?”
“I merely spoke preemptively.”
“Liar. You think I'm going to swallow the stones, don't you?”
“Since you are aware, pray exercise restraint. Once the examination begins, we will no longer be permitted to watch over you.”
Right.
Once the trials began, Jona and Leaf wouldn't be able to come with me.
“Entry for non-participants concludes here. Those attending the entrance examination, please present your tickets.”
Standing before an arched gateway was a gatekeeper dressed in monastic robes, a broom resting in his hand.
Jona and Leaf spoke from behind me.
“We have absolute faith that you will pass with flying colors, Milady.”
“Here is a pouch of candies,” Leaf added, holding out a small drawstring bag. “Take one out to enjoy whenever you feel peckish.”
“Thank you, Jona, Leaf! I'll definitely pass!”
Orknodi glanced back several times, checking on the two of them as they saw her off. Watching that hesitant, childlike figure, Leaf spoke with only her lips moving, keeping her hand raised in a steady wave.
“I am concerned. Milady often appears to draw sharp, uncompromising boundaries, yet she possesses an unfortunate tendency to grow far too soft toward those she has grown fond of.”
“Worry not,” Jona replied evenly. “Even without us, there is someone inside the exam grounds who will move to protect her.”
Giselle sauntered past them alongside the hulking monkey beastman. As the underground merchant shot them an obnoxious, knowing smirk, Jona found himself thinking that—for today at least—the man's presence was a blessing.
“Did you spare his life with this moment in mind?”
“Never forget. While she is our revered lady, to the organization, she is merely another 'scholarship student.' The other prospective scholarship students may attempt to undermine her.”
The entrance exam itself did not worry Jona in the slightest. What he feared was an ambush from rivals. The dark merchant Giselle was, in essence, a watchdog meant to shield their young lady from internal competitors within the syndicate.
“Milady is out of sight now.”
“Let us prepare a celebration gift for her passing.”
“Food will suffice, I presume?”
“Our thoughts are in alignment.”
Neither the head butler nor the combat maid harbored a single shred of doubt regarding their lady's triumph and safe return.
After turning my head back several times, I finally confirmed it.
Neither of them was anywhere in sight. At this distance, there was no chance of getting caught.
“Ahn—”
Opening my mouth wide, I popped in the Stat Stone I had discreetly snatched from one of the stone cairns.
You have consumed a Stat Stone.
A random attribute has increased by 1!
Phew! I was walking on eggshells the entire way, terrified my precious Stat Stone would get confiscated if they caught me!