by Jakob Tanner
“Alright, class,” said the instructor. “We’ve been through this before. It’s the exact same thing every time. Stand in the light and think to yourself: ascend to the next floor.”
The students all shuffled and hesitated, no one volunteering to be the first to ascend to a part of the tower they hadn’t been to before.
“What if there’s monsters right in front of the teleporter that I can’t handle!?” said one student.
An examiner snapped. “If you’re scared of such a possibility then you might as well give up now. The tower and its different floors is a very dangerous place. If you’re scared about being chaperoned for an exam in here, there’s no way you’ll be able to survive against higher-ranked monsters or withstand the pressure of a multi-floor conflict.”
The student who spoke nodded his head and whimpered an apology at an almost indecipherably low volume.
Max was more intrigued by a different part of what the examiner had said.
Multi-floor conflict.
He knew that some floors were large enough to contain whole worlds, some bigger than Earth even. Did these different floors actually have diplomatic relationships with one another? So much so that sometimes relationships fell apart and they went to war with each other. What was the scale of a multi-floor conflict?
Max didn’t even want to think about it, it seemed so massive. He sighed. Every time he thought he was beginning to understand the tower and its machinations, he quickly realized how little he still knew about the mysterious spire and all of the worlds and people it housed.
Max shook his head. He could think about all that later. He needed to stay focused on the exam and he knew exactly how to do that.
He raised his hand and walked to the front of the group of students.
“I’ll go up first,” he said, grinning at the examiners. “Gladly.”
The instructor snickered at this boldness, but then gestured with his hands that Max should step forward and put his money where his mouth was.
Max gulped and walked into the center of the light and thought to himself: ascend to the next floor.
58
Before Max even opened his eyes, he smelled sand and salt water.
After the strange feeling of going through the teleporter, Max took in the new floor.
He was in a sandy tropical island.
Palm trees stood around him, the sky was a bright blue, and through the shrubbery he could see an ocean.
“Ahhh!”
Max turned around and it was Casey who emerged next from the teleporter.
She blinked and once seeing it was safe, put her hands on her hips.
“I couldn’t let you show me up like that!” she said, sticking out her tongue. “We’re a team, remember?”
Max smiled. “Of course.”
“Where are we anyway?” said Casey, looking around. “Maybe the exam is actually a beach holiday? I read a book once about the importance of taking breaks and it said that a lot of people don’t know how to relax, so maybe the mid-term exam is actually a test about how good we are at relaxing?”
Max narrowed his eyes. That’s the most outrageous thing he’d ever heard.
“Yeah, maybe,” he said, continuing to look around.
Behind the teleporter was a large wooden building with the tower-zone climber seal on it.
There were a few climbers with copper and silver badges pinned to their chests. This must be a Zestiris climber outpost of some kind.
He didn’t have time to ponder it as the area filled up with the rest of the students and then the examiners as well.
“Welcome to the next floor,” said the instructor. “The Archipelagos!”
The instructor and examiners led them through the jungle towards the beach area.
“This floor is similar to the endless forest in that it is a mono-climate zone with a similar temperature and topography throughout its entire known area. As you can see since there is no tower in sight, this is another wild floor.”
“But what about that outpost,” said Max, pointing back through the jungle to where they came.
“Zestiris has climber outposts on most floors. Just because a floor is wild doesn’t mean that a minority of people won’t live there, but I would put emphasis on minority. Not many people choose to live a life of hardship with twenty-four hour monster spawn cycles.”
Max nodded and didn’t ask the instructor any more questions.
Along the beach was a dock full of moored boats. There were little fishing boats and even larger frigates. They all had the Zestiris climber seal on them.
“Unlike the endless forest,” said the instructor. “The distance between the arrival teleporter and departure teleporter is vast. This world is an oceanic floor full of islands with a variety of different species of monsters. It may be only one floor above the endless forest, but it is ten times more dangerous.”
The group of students looked around in awe. The place was so majestic and beautiful. It was hard to believe it was as dangerous a floor as their instructor was describing.
The instructor and the examiners led them to a big boat. It was already moored and had a plank set up for all the students to use to walk aboard.
The students nervously followed onto the deck of the ship.
It had been over an hour since they’d met up in front of the academy courtyard, and the exam still hadn’t yet begun.
How much further did they have to go until the exam actually started?
Once everyone was aboard the boat, a group of climber seamen unmoored the ship. They began to move further into the vast blue oceanic world until the island they started on became a mere speck in the distance.
The students huddled together in different groups based on friendships and alliances. Max and Casey stood at the back of the deck by themselves.
“Can we eat one of our protein bars yet?” she asked Max.
Max shook his head. “No. It’s not even lunchtime. Let’s hold off until we understand the exam more.”
The island they’d started on was completely out of sight now. There were a few different islands within view though.
“They must be taking us to a special island,” said Max. “If the test was going to take place in the ocean, we would’ve stopped by now.”
Casey nodded and looked over to the instructor, huddled with the examiners at the front of the boat.
They must have been discussing the exam arrangements.
The other students were trying to listen in, but they seemed to be struggling. Maybe one of the examiners had some kind of trait with a deflecting ability. Either way, the mood on the boat was growing tenser by the minute.
An island in the distance began to get closer and closer.
The instructor turned around and faced the students on the main deck of the boat.
“Listen up,” said the instructor. “We’ll be reaching the island where the exam will be held in a few minutes. Further instructions on the nature of the mid-term will be given upon landing.”
The group of students audibly groaned as the delay to the test continued.
“They’ll give us the instructions at the island,” mused Casey aloud. “What do you think, Toto?”
“Don’t you want my advice?” said Max.
Casey and Toto looked at him unimpressed.
“Toto has some great ideas sometimes,” said Casey.
“He does?”
“You’re just not as in touch with nature as I am,” said Casey, crossing her arms. She then muttered, “But if you did have some ideas, now would be a good time to share them.”
Max considered what they knew so far. It was going to be a survival test and it was going to be held on the approaching island.
“Whatever the rules are,” said Max, “there will probably be a flurry of activity right at the start. We’ll have an advantage if we know what we wanna do before we even land.”
“Great thinking, Max,” said Casey, turning to Toto who nodded. �
��Toto thinks so as well.”
The island was approaching. They’d dock in about five minutes. They didn’t have long to sketch out a quick plan.
Max pointed to some cliffs near the interior of the island. “The island has a summit. If we head there and get there first, we’ll have a height advantage over everyone. As soon as we learn the instructions we should head that way without delay.”
Casey nodded.
With the semblance of a plan formed, all they had to do now is wait to get their instructions.
The boat docked and the examiners told all the students to exit the boat and line up in a horizontal line along the beach. As they walked off the boat another examiner handed each person a candlestick.
“What the heck are we supposed to do with these?” said one student.
“Just line up and hold onto that candle,” said the examiner. “You’ll find out in a second.”
Max and Casey stood side by side. They peered at each other, but didn’t speak. The mood amongst the students had suddenly changed.
It was exam time now. The game was on.
The time for strategizing out in the open was over.
Still, Max wanted to speak with Casey. This candle they were each given was an unexpected development. How did these random candles fit into the survival test?
“Settle down everyone,” said the instructor. He then snapped his fingers and suddenly everyone’s candle lit up with small delicate flames.
“Each and everyone of you is holding a lit candle,” said the instructor. “You must survive the night on this island without letting the candle’s flame go out. These are not normal candles and will not relight from outside sources of fire. That’s for all the clever firebringers amongst you.”
“So we fail the exam if our candle goes out,” said a random student.
Max shuddered. This test was extremely difficult. One puffed out candle flame could mean the end of his climber career.
“Let me repeat,” said the instructor. “You must return here tomorrow with a lit candle.”
Everyone nodded silently. So you could steal another person’s candle if you wanted.
“Alright, any more questions?”
The group was silent.
The instructor walked back onto the boat along with the examiners.
“Alrighty then,” said the instructor. “That’s it. Let the exam begin!”
59
All the climbers stood frozen in a row after the instructor had shouted, “Let the exam begin!”
Max had half-expected chaos to ensue as soon as the exam started, but everyone stayed motionless.
It was the candles. They were a completely unexpected factor.
Everyone was acting extremely cautious, not wanting to accidentally let their flame go out.
Some climbers started walking away, others stood exactly where they were.
Max suddenly had an idea.
“Everyone!” he shouted. “The test isn’t as hard as they made it out to be. They wanted to fray our nerves by making it take so long to get here. They wanted to put us all on edge, so that we weren’t thinking straight. But listen: if we work together, there’s no reason why we can’t all pass this test. If all of our candles stay lit, there’s no reason to steal one from someone else.”
The other student climbers perked up at this idea. Other groups looked to each other, trying to see what their partners and allies thought of this suggestion.
“He lies!” shouted one voice.
It was Cyrus Archer on the other end of the beach.
“Don’t trust him,” declared Cyrus. “He’s not one of us, remember? He’s from the outer-rim! He’ll steal everyone’s candles in the end, you’ll see!”
Max gritted his teeth. That seriously won’t work, will it? There was a clear chance for victory for everyone here. They all just had to stay calm to achieve it. Cyrus’ words were actively working against that goal.
Max bottled his anger. Yelling at Cyrus would only help the boy’s goals to create anger in the group.
“Why don’t you hear me out?” said Max to the rest of the group. “If you don’t like my plan you can head off on your own.”
The other students nodded their heads to suggest that this option seemed reasonable enough.
Cyrus winced bitterly on the other end of the beach. He was up to something. Max just wasn’t sure what.
“There’s more than one airbringer among us,” said Max. “They should be able to manipulate the wind to protect us from the breeze taking out the candles. Next, we can search for a cave at the bottom of the jungle’s cliffs for shelter for the evening. So long as we manipulate the air flow and have some sort of covering the candles will be protected—”
Before Max could finish he felt a subtle strengthening in the ocean breeze around him.
Cyrus smirked from across the beach along with his ally Sybil Westley.
“I won’t be tricked!” shouted Sybil, not believing any of the words she was saying. “Stay away from me and my candles!”
Chaos soon ensued as a gust of wind swept across the beach.
Cyrus Archer and Sybil Westley snickered even more. They were clearly allied together for this exam. It made sense: the two children of the most privileged and powerful families in Zestiris teaming up to crush the other students. It was the exact kind of thing they would do. Max shouldn’t have been surprised.
They did not care about working together with everyone else though. They wanted to pass the exam and see everyone else fail.
Sybil twisted her hands—obviously manipulating the wind.
“Ahh!”
A bunch of students cried as their candle flames fluttered and then sizzled out from the gust of wind.
The candle flames went out like falling dominoes, getting closer and closer to Max and Casey.
Casey quickly stretched her arm backwards and shouted, “Max—take my candle and get back!”
Max grabbed her candle and moved backwards as quickly as he thought was possible without disturbing the sensitive candle flames.
This was bad.
Sybil Westley was a talented airbringer and she’d just knocked out forty percent of the class with that gust of wind she just shot out.
Casey raised her hands and pushed the wind back, stopping the air in its tracks.
Sybil and Cyrus scowled at her from the other end of the beach.
Sybil readied another gust.
“Max!” shouted Casey. “It’s time to run! Stick to the original plan!”
They rushed across the beach as the skirmish amongst the students continued as a waterbringer attempted to retaliate against Sybil by creating a huge rising tide of ocean onto the beach.
“Go go go!” said Casey as Max hurried through the island jungle. “Stick to the plan! Head to the summit!”
Max rushed and kept an eye on the candles.
He kept thinking the same thing over and over. That was an unbelievably stupid move on Sybil and Cyrus’ part. Sure, they’d knocked out a whole group of the competition, making future exams easier. The only problem was they’d just made this current exam ten times harder. They’d created more antagonists on the island than there were before. Just under half the class would now be hunting students with lit candles. They hadn’t solved anything by what they did, but their actions had now actively made the test more difficult.
The screams of fighting students diminished the further they ran off, but there was always a hint of something coming from behind them that made them not want to stop running.
It was good they had a destination in mind. Their forethought and planning might be the only thing that saves them from failing this exam.
Hopefully.
60
Max and Casey ran for fifteen minutes without stopping.
Max still held both candles in his hands, diligently holding them steady in his arms and protecting them as to not disturb the candle flames.
“I’m very nervous about these
flames going out,” said Max as he continued running.
“Don’t worry,” said Casey. “I’m using my trait to create an air pocket around us, so the wind swirls around the candles and us, but never close enough to the flame to disturb it.”
Max’s heart pounded. He was so happy he was allied with Casey at that moment. He had originally been thinking that he’d done her the favor, but right now for this current situation, having an airbringer on his side was the perfect ally.
Cliffs eventually emerged and there was a natural passage upward towards the island’s summit.
The two companions kept moving forward, keeping an ever watchful eye over their shoulders for any other students following behind.
“Are we safe?” asked Casey.
So far it seemed like no one had caught up to them. They could still be fighting on the beach or scrambling frantically through the jungle with no actual destination in mind.
BOOM!
A loud explosion of mana and energy reverberated across the island from down at the beach.
“Geez,” said Max. “Some of them are still fighting over there. I don’t think we’ll be safe until tomorrow after the exam finishes. Just under half the class will be hunting down candles now thanks to Cyrus and Sybil’s selfishness. For now, let’s keep moving to the summit.”
They hurried up the island, keeping an eye out for other students and predators.
They eventually reached the top of the summit. They could see over the jungle foliage of the island and the ocean beyond, including the boat that the examiners and the instructor were spending the evening on.
“Alright, we’re at the summit,” said Casey. “What’s our next move?”
Max looked around, the summit was another smaller jungle raised by the cliffs to rest above the jungle down below.
“We need to find a good shelter spot where we can keep our candles,” said Max. “Then we need to figure out if there’s any other way onto this summit beyond this point. Then we need to set up traps and alarms all along those points. What do you think?”
“Sounds good,” said Casey. “As I can mediate the wind around us, it’s probably better if I take the candles from you.”