12. Rekachev Circus School Trial (9)
12. Rekachev Circus School Trial (9)
A strange tension simmered in the auditorium—a cocktail of confidence, fighting spirit, and anxiety. Contestants buzzed among themselves, sizing up the other troupes' lineups in hushed voices.
The Monster Circus drew the most stares by far.
Maybe it was because three of the controversial "Frank 10" leads were gathered in one place. Maybe it was the troupe members' monstrous appearances, so aggressively conspicuous they were impossible to ignore. Or maybe it was simply that, out of every circus troupe assembled here, theirs had the fewest people.
Whichever it was, the looks they received weren't pleasant. They fell neatly into one of three categories: contempt, disgust, or condescension.
"Before we review the exam, let's begin with the celebratory performance our students have prepared."
The first performers to take the stage were students majoring in Strength Show-off. They bent steel pipes like taffy and twisted them into balloon dogs—a staple gag of party clowns. Every single dog was identical, with no more variance than a factory-stamped product. Achieving that required a perfect grasp of the steel's rigidity and ductility, plus the strength and precision to bend it exactly right.
They lined up five pipe dogs in a row and filed offstage. Applause broke out from people who hadn't been expecting much.
"Impressive, Rekachev."
"It lives up to the name."
The acrobats in the audience who'd assumed this was just a student talent show straightened up in their seats.
Groups of students came up one after another—clubs as small as three, as large as twenty—to show off their skills. The composition and staging of their performances were simplistic. But the technique was so refined it canceled out that simplicity, matching or surpassing that first steel-pipe dog.
Gasps erupted from the crowd at the end of every club's set.
The acrobatics they displayed were so advanced that if you asked most of the assembled professionals to replicate them, they might succeed once or twice in ten attempts. Yet the students reeled the moves off in fluid, uninterrupted motion.
The Rekachev name was no bluff.
They had stripped out every other element that might stir an audience—music, makeup, special effects. Only pure technique remained.
There was a saying: you see as much as you know. The more acrobatic training a person had, the more they could do nothing but marvel. It was a polished, arrogant self-display of the kind only an elite institution could pull off.
The Monster Circus members roared their cheers at the end of each feat too.
All except one.
"Kind of disappointing."
Ella murmured it under her breath, too quietly for anyone else to catch.
She acknowledged their skills were formidable. When a dozen students darted in every direction through a space churning with steel hula hoops, never colliding, she'd been stunned too.
She could pull off that acrobatic feat solo easily enough. Getting over a dozen people to execute it in precise formation was genuinely admirable.
But when she watched a performance, she liked to enjoy it through a spectator's eyes. To her, their show felt mechanical—as if someone had deliberately scrubbed the fun out of it.
She'd have done it differently. Painted the hoops in more vivid colors. Choreographed the moves as a lively group dance instead of rigid drills. Added costumes that introduced unpredictable flair. Layered in dazzling lights and music, broken into song, and threaded call-and-response jokes and ad-libs into every pivotal moment. She'd have aimed for eighty percent—no, higher.
But judging by the rigid expressions on the Rekachev students' faces—so locked in on their own acrobatics they were breaking a cold sweat—that kind of margin didn't exist for them.
Her personal dissatisfaction aside, the celebratory showcase wrapped up successfully.
Cheers and applause showered the students as they gave their closing bows.
Even Professor Elpara, ever strict, allowed a faint smile and a small nod, apparently satisfied. Once all the students had cleared the stage, she stepped up and posed a question to the audience.
"What do you all think is the most important element of a circus?"
Ella felt a sharp sense of déjà vu. She'd seen this exact scene four months ago.
The Rose Windmill Cabaret's manager, Bwallet, had posed the same question.
Back then, his answer had been box-office success.
"I've heard what answers other theaters gave. They aren't wrong. Box office, acting skill, knowledge—all of it matters. But more than anything else, isn't acrobatics itself the most essential?"
She let the words hang and cast her gaze across the audience. The students watched her with flushed, eager faces, waiting for the next question.
"Everyone—what is our school's motto?"
Every student shouted in unison.
"We learn by falling!"
Hundreds of voices rang through the auditorium. Perhaps it was the high level of acrobatics they'd just demonstrated. Several of the visiting acrobats felt overwhelmed by their spirit.
Professor Elpara nodded, her smile pleased.
"Exactly. Technique is carved into the body. Falling is inevitable while learning. And in order to fall... first you have to run."
She stretched an arm toward the air. Behind her, a massive screen unfurled to the floor.
"Some of the troupes here participated in our New Student Selection Test. Do you recall the final task—'Depart! Dream Race'?"
Ella and Reina both remembered the events of two months ago.
The obstacle course designed by Charlie, top student of the 26th graduating class.
For the two of them, it hadn't left pleasant memories. One person had been badly injured. The other had wet herself in front of a crowd.
"The preliminary test is its expanded version. A race that uses the entire school as its stage!"
She swept her arm up and read the title displayed on the screen.
"Acrobatic Rush!"
A thunderous roar of cheers erupted from the students. They stamped their feet in wild excitement. For lives crammed with grueling daily training, the week of the preliminaries was like rain in a drought.
The competitors remained comparatively composed.
The Grand Prix had already entered its fifth month. By now, they knew the kinds of tests the Six Great Theaters administered.
As the students' cheers subsided, Elpara began detailing the rules in earnest. From that point on, the competitors listened with full attention.
The Six Great Theaters' exams followed a broad template, but every round the rules got tweaked. The Rose Windmill Cabaret's own exam had sparked controversy in its first iteration over the gift issue. In the third round the Monster Circus Troupe took, the organizers had been driven to frustration by an item whose market value defied measurement.
They listened carefully, on alert for any changes or additions.
"Hidden within the school are three trophies that can be exchanged for 'stars'."
One of the professors carried a sample trophy onto the dais. It was so tall that even set on the floor it reached a person's waist.
"Your objective is to find the treasure chests that contain those trophies."
A second screen unfurled, several times wider than the first. It displayed a map of the school seen from above.
"On the day of the exam, our entire campus will transform into a giant obstacle course. To traverse it, you'll need to apply acrobatic techniques."
The Rekachev alumni and anyone who'd toured the school nodded.
Reina thought of the doors that only opened under sustained static friction. Maya remembered the bamboo grove in the central garden where she'd made her own staircase. Ella recalled the tiger sleeping at the junction with a bell around its neck.
"On the day, I imagine the school will have transformed into something beyond your memories. More traps, more difficult obstacles. On top of that, we've incorporated an iconic element of the city of Yeterinpurk: the floor tiles from Tetromino Plaza."
A dense grid overlaid the school map. Its cells were painted in ten colors.
"Each circus troupe will be assigned one color. Participants in the Treasure Hunt may only step on tiles that match their troupe's color. Please confirm your assigned color."
Ella read the text that popped up on the screen and clicked her tongue.
"We're red."
"Golden Carnival is yellow. Silver Screen is gray."
"Ha ha, oddly intuitive, isn't it?"
While people checked the colors distributed, Professor Elpara continued.
"Ten tile colors will be placed at random across the floors. Naturally, they won't be actual panels. Our school's illusionists have overlaid faint, translucent hues onto the ground. As I said, each team may only step on its own color. Step on the wrong one and that participant is disqualified, frozen in that square. Accumulate three disqualified members, and the entire team is out."
Aggressive search.
Objective: secure trophies.
A three-out rule to block it.
Wonderstein thought of baseball. The people scrambling across the school grounds were batters trying to score.
So, were there pitchers and fielders too?
As if reading his mind, Professor Elpara addressed exactly what he was wondering.
"A maximum of five members may join the treasure-hunt team. Does that mean the rest just sit around and play? Not at all. While the search team navigates the school, the other members will compete here in this auditorium—in 'Mini Games.'"
Elpara pointed at the acrobatic training equipment stacked in the corner. It was the same equipment used in the New Student Selection Test.
"Every five minutes, one representative from each of the ten troupes will step forward to compete for a record on a single piece of apparatus. 'Coins' are accumulated according to the rankings. First place earns ten coins; tenth place earns one. Over the course of one hundred eighty minutes, a total of thirty-six Mini Games will be played."
She laid out what the coins could do.
Opening a discovered chest: 100 coins.
Reviving a disqualified participant: 30 coins.
Buying an item card with a random effect: 10 coins.
So if the school search team was the "spear" driving toward victory, the auditorium team was the "shield" helping them unlock the game's challenges.
The team searching the school for chests could contain "up to" five members; the team competing in the Mini Games in the auditorium required "at least" five.
You couldn't skew the search with sheer numbers, and you couldn't dominate the Mini Games with only one or two elites.
"Please decide which members go to which team and submit your rosters by the day before the competition."
The spear team and the shield team.
Choosing the five best members for each was the strategic optimum for these preliminaries.
Already, you could sense the jostling within troupes over who'd get picked.
For the Monster Circus Troupe, with its small numbers, that kind of competition was a luxury.
They didn't have the leeway to pick and choose.
Everyone had to deploy.