If You Get Beaten Down, Get Back Up Again
After the background checks were completed, we were given a break, during which a meal was served — and the quality was surprisingly impressive.
Bread can be this soft?
I marveled as I ate. It was so tender it practically melted the moment I chewed it.
I'd finished it all in no time and was licking my lips in regret when a grumble came from beside me.
"Damn it, are we actually supposed to eat this?"
"You could hammer nails with it. This is crossing a line."
If that's a hammer, then the bread on the front lines must be Mjolnir.
I couldn't help but frown at all the bellyaching.
"Pleasure to meet you, mister! Name's Kelin."
Just then, a hulking figure by the name of Kelin strolled over and extended his hand with a friendly grin.
When I clasped it, Kelin squeezed. He had a decent grip — for an ordinary man, anyway.
When I squeezed back, Kelin's face crumpled in an instant.
"Aagh! I yield! I yield!"
Kelin wailed dramatically. When I let go, he shook out his hand and stared at me with a look of utter disbelief.
"What the hell kind of strength—"
He let out a long sigh, then suddenly narrowed his eyes at me.
"My hunch was right after all."
"Hunch?"
"Every single time I've taken the guard exam, I've nailed who'd finish first. Four exams now, and I've never once been wrong. And this time, mister, it's going to be you."
Kelin chattered on noisily.
"You've taken the guard exam four times?"
"Ahem, well, my goal is the elite guard, you see. I passed the general guard exam once, but I turned it down."
"Elite guard?"
"Mister, you don't know a thing about the guard corps, do you?"
Kelin smirked like he'd expected as much.
I nodded honestly.
"I don't."
The heart of this game was the students and the professors. The guard corps barely factored in.
Their role amounted to a signal flare announcing that some event had kicked off — or, at best, stragglers who showed up late to look imposing and sweep up afterward.
Extras, nothing more. It was only natural I'd never bothered to learn anything about the guards.
"Ahem. Elysium Academy's guard corps comes in two flavors: the general guard and the elite guard. They call both of them 'the guard,' but they're a completely different breed."
"How different?"
"Completely! The elite guard's salary is ten times what the general guard gets, and the treatment's on another level entirely. The general guard is basically mercenaries hired to watch the outer walls, but the elite guard is the backbone of the Academy's entire security."
"And the general guard?"
"The general guard? They're just errand runners on permanent rotation. Mostly stationed at the outer walls. They don't even get a glimpse of the Main Building."
Oh no — the ones I saw in the game were the elite guard.
It seemed the guards I'd watched in the game were the elite guard.
I'd chosen the guard corps because its story presence was small, yet it offered easy access to the students and professors. If I ended up stuck in the general guard, my entire plan was going to fall apart.
"How do you get into the elite guard?"
"Heh heh. Place in the top two of the guard exam and you get pulled straight in. It's absolutely brutal, though."
The number of applicants was already pushing a thousand.
Top two out of that.
"Seems pretty loose to me."
"Loose?"
When I nodded, Kelin squinted at me skeptically — and just then, an examiner stepped forward.
"Now, we will move to the fourth examination grounds."
The next venue was a well-maintained training yard floored with packed sand, and it was enormous.
"The fourth test is a one-on-one match against an elite guardsman. Your score is determined by how long you last. It's no stretch to say this is where the elite guard and general guard are decided. But the most important thing is the examiner in charge."
Kelin, who had somehow glued himself to my side again, explained in a hushed voice.
"The examiner in charge?"
"The examiner personally decides how many recruits get pulled into the elite guard. One picked five applicants in a given year. Another picked just one."
"So at least one gets picked, then."
When I gave a light nod, Kelin chuckled and shook his head.
"Your confidence is truly something else."
Just then, figures in guard uniforms filed out in front of us, and at their center stood a man with a goatee. Judging by the general air of things, the goatee was the examiner in charge.
At the sight of him, Kelin's face soured.
"This year's examiner is Bedrick. Damn it."
"What's wrong?"
"Bedrick is famously picky — he almost never picks anyone into the elite guard."
Then the goatee stepped forward.
"Pleasure. I'm Bedrick, Squad Leader of the 4th Elite Guard Squad. The fourth test is simple. When your name is called, step up and face an elite guardsman one-on-one. Your score is based on how long you hold out."
"I have a question, Senior Bedrick, sir!"
Kelin threw his hand up high. The goatee's eyes narrowed at the sight of him.
"Who the hell said I was your senior?"
Bedrick slapped him down without even trying to hide it, but Kelin didn't wilt in the slightest — he just grinned and asked again.
"Haha, and how many elite guardsmen are you taking on this year?"
At the question, one corner of Bedrick's mouth curled upward. It was a very unpleasant smile.
"This year, none."
"……What?"
Kelin stammered, caught completely off guard.
"The elite guard normally recruits only vetted candidates by recommendation. Only when that pool falls short do we supplement from here. But this year, the recommendations overflowed. So tell me — why would I pick anyone from this trash heap?"
Bedrick swept the applicants with eyes full of contempt. Under that icy gaze, the mood of the examination grounds plummeted in an instant.
"Damn it, this year's washed out too. And of all people, it had to be Bedrick. That goddamn Bedrick. Bad luck, mister — under normal circumstances you'd have made it for sure. But after he said that in front of everyone? There's zero chance."
Kelin warned me in all seriousness. I wasn't particularly worried, though.
I would simply make it so he had no choice but to pick me.
The fourth test began. The elite guardsmen lined up one by one, and from sheer bearing alone they were a different class from the motley crowd gathered here.
There was a reason Bedrick had called the applicants a trash heap.
Not that it mattered much — to me, they all looked about the same.
The applicants, freshly stewing over Bedrick's blunt assessment, marched up with fire in their bellies, but they never stood a chance.
Not one of them managed to land a single hit on the examiners before being beaten down one-sidedly. This wasn't a test; it was assault.
"S-stop! I yield! I give up!"
"There's no such thing as giving up."
One applicant who couldn't take any more screamed halfway through, but the elite guardsmen didn't stop kicking until the man had passed out.
"Next."
After that, applicants surrendering en masse became the norm.
"Damn it, Bedrick. He's doing this on purpose to break our spirits. Beating them down that savagely."
Kelin gnashed his teeth at the goatee. I felt a flicker of confusion.
"Savagely? That seemed downright gentlemanly to me."
"Gentlemanly? Mister, are your eyes broken? Normally they weed you out with a little restraint. They don't beat you half to death like that."
Kelin protested, horrified.
I suppose my standards have drifted a little too far toward the battlefield.
Having come straight off the front lines, there seemed to be a gap between society's common sense and my own. Still, I considered my standards the correct ones — because one day, the whole continent would become a battlefield.
Soon, Kelin's name was called. His examiner was a short one.
The examiner recognized Kelin and curled one corner of his mouth.
"Well, if it isn't Trash Kelin. Still haven't given up? The general guard is perfect for a loser like you."
At the sight of him, Kelin's face twisted in fury.
"That's the guy who took the exam with me last year. Total piece of work. Damn it, why did it have to be him? Whew."
With a low sigh, Kelin let out a thunderous battle cry and climbed up.
His spirit was good. Or rather — his spirit was all he had.
Dismal.
Kelin's skill was abysmal. He had decent strength, but his movements were sluggish and utterly predictable.
His opponent, by contrast, was fairly competent. The man could have ended it in one stroke, yet instead of finishing it he just rapped Kelin all over. It was cruel, deliberate mockery.
Kelin hauled himself up again and again, bellowing "Guard Spirit!"
His battle cry was passable. The results never changed.
Wham! The guard baton drove into Kelin's solar plexus, and he crumpled to the ground with a heavy thud.
"Kelin. Passed into the general guard."
The examiner spat on the back of Kelin's fallen head. Kelin trembled, fists clenched.
"Grave."
Then my name was called. Of course — right after Kelin's turn.
Kelin looked up at me with his bruised face, the light in his eyes dimmed.
Tsk. I clicked my tongue quietly and picked up the wooden practice sword.
"Mister—"
"Right, the score's based on how long I hold out, you said."
At my question, Kelin nodded absently. Watching him, I added:
"And how many points for beating the examiner senseless?"
Kelin's eyes went wide, then curved into a warm smile.
"Heh. Even as a joke, that's refreshing."
It wasn't a joke, but I saw no need to explain.
"Mister!! Give him what he deserves!!"
Kelin shouted at my back. He'd already recovered his energy, apparently, because his voice was deafening. So deafening, in fact, that every eye in the training yard swung toward me.
Which suited me fine.
That way, no one could pretend it never happened and wriggle out of it later.
"Hurry up. I have lunch to get to."
The examiner waggled his hand, as if trying to weigh me up — but he was wearing that pathetic excuse for a guard uniform, so the gesture wasn't intimidating in the least. It had no effect.
Just as he wanted, I closed the distance instantly.
The gap vanished in a heartbeat, and my wooden sword shot toward his solar plexus.
Startled, the man hurriedly dropped his sword to block.
Slow.
Crack! Our swords collided with a sharp ring, and his blade was shoved rudely aside.
"What the hell kind of strength—"
He tried to reset his grip, but his stance had already collapsed. My wooden sword rapped the thigh he'd left wide open.
Smack! His leg buckled, his center of gravity lurching hard. I pressed strength into my sword, and he couldn't hold — one knee dropped to the sand.
By any reasonable measure, this was the point to concede. Instead, he clenched his teeth.
He didn't seem inclined to surrender.
Neither did I — I had no intention of accepting it anyway.
When I raised my sword, he instinctively guarded high.
Sloppy. Yawn-inducingly so.
Thud. My heel drove cleanly into his chin.
His eyes rolled back, and he started to crumple — but I hadn't given him permission to fall yet.
A few truths had been beaten into me while rolling across the front lines.
When you put something down, make certain it stays down.
Half-measures only make things worse.
The wooden sword yanked the collapsing man back upright. I pinned him in place and swung my fist. Crisp impacts rang out one after another.
The man opened his mouth — clearly about to call it quits.
I clamped a hand over his trap and swung the sword again, dealing out extra blows for every one of the applicants he'd stomped flat.
At last—
Thud! He went down in a graceless heap.
"Dismal."
I clicked my tongue and looked around. Everyone was staring at me, faces frozen in shock.
A training yard packed with hundreds of people, utterly silent. A silence that sounded rather pleasant.
Then my eyes met the goatee's.
Bedrick's face was beet red, and he was trembling. Furiously, it seemed.
Looking right at him, I asked:
"Do I pass?"
Bedrick chewed on his lip, working his jaw. Just as I opened my mouth to ask again, the answer came from somewhere else entirely.
"Mister! Of course you passed, that's a given!!!!"
Kelin's thunderous voice shook the entire examination grounds.