Chapter 88 87 - Provisional License Test II
While fighting the lizard men at level 4 of the provisional test, Milo felt something he hadn't encountered previously while fighting, besides when he used all his power in one move for his final practical exam. He was feeling tired, using two abilities together as often as he had been during the test was draining him much faster than he anticipated. He'd have to invest more time leveling up and allocating any free stat points he got into his stamina stat.
Milo wiped the sweat from his brow, and took a second to get his breathing back under control before level 5 of the test began. Eventually the monsters he'd be facing for level 5 began to appear, growing from small blocks just like the beasts in the previous difficulty levels. There were two groups of beasts this time, which confused Milo as this was the smallest number of beasts he'd be facing so far. Within each of the groups, there were 4 beasts, and each of them were taller than Milo was, with him being close to 6 foot 3 inches tall, this made the beasts quite large. After the pixel like blocks stopped getting taller, they began to show the beasts more clearly, they were humanoid with green skin, just like the goblins he had faced at the first two levels, this was where the similarities ended however, the beasts he was going to be facing now had bulging muscles, looking like professional wrestlers, and black tattoos running all over their bodies making different shapes and patterns.
These new beasts he would be facing reminded him of a lesson they had in his gatecrashing 101 class at the academy. That lesson they were learning about common beasts they may encounter in the dimensional doors, of the most common humanoid beasts they would encounter, the highest ranked among them would appear in A ranked gates. They had excellent noses and commonly wielded large clubs or swords like the ones in front of Milo now. They were savage beasts and were very cunning in how they fought, showing no mercy to those they killed, often times they appeared to see their prey as a trophy animal treating their killing as a sport. The beasts he would have to defeat at level 5 were orcs.
After the beasts were all done being built by the hologram, there were 8 of them in total. The orcs all looked at Milo at once and charged, Milo threw ice spears to slow them down, eventually a few got close and he was forced to activate his Discharge skill that was attached to his armor. When he did yellow electricity arced up the chest piece before being sent out in all directions, electrocuting and stunning the orcs in proximity of Milo when he activated the skill, this allowed Milo to create some distance. Two of the orcs were unlucky enough to have ice spears shoved through their heads while they were paralyzed and unable to avoid the attack.
After seeing their comrades fall, three of the remaining six orcs rushed at Milo, while the other three moved around to his back in order to surround him. The 3 that rushed him snarled as they rushed, spewing holographic slobber all over. Milo chose to use only his Ice ability to maintain any stamina he had left, and stomped his foot, sending a wall of massive ice spikes jutting towards where the orcs were rushing, one was a step too far and met its end as it was impaled by three of the newly formed ice spikes. The other two were lucky to avoid the attack, and after avoiding it slashed the icicles away with their swords. 5 now remained, Milo had one last trick he could think of and in order to do it, he had to get all the orcs on one side of him. In order to do this, Milo threw up 2 walls of ice on either side of him and rushed to the corner of the room. The spectators watching his test clicked their tongues in disappointment as Milo had essentially trapped himself, or so they thought. Once all the orcs, now in front of him, encircled him in order to pounce all together, Milo jumped in the air and whipped his chain sickle out to full length. When the chain was at full length, he froze the chain in place, and a massive blade of ice was formed all along the chain. He then swung it as hard as he could, just like he had done so while sparring months ago.
The orcs were not expecting Milo to use his weapon at such a range, as previously he had only thrown ice spears at the distance he was at now. One of the orcs was fast enough to avoid the giant blade, but the other 5 weren't as lucky, as they were bisected at their waist, causing them to fall to the ground as a pile of pixels. After this attack, Milo's stamina could no longer hold out and he collapsed to the ground trying to catch his breath.
Seeing its opponent collapsed on the ground, the orc slowly lumbered over while grinning. With no stamina left, Milo had no choice but to let the beast strike him. It lifted its massive sword over its head and brought it down on Milo. At that moment, the hologram froze and Milo heard the GAA member announce that the test would be concluded at that moment over the intercom. The last remaining orc hologram then fell apart into pixels. Milo forced himself to his feet and caught his breath before making his way over to the door where he entered.
The door opened and waiting for him were the three who were watching his test from the viewing window. The Incubus guild member had a smile on their face, along with the school's representative.
"That was quite an impressive showing young man," the representative from the Incubus guild said, "I apologize for not introducing myself earlier, my name is David Black, and as you could probably tell, I am the representative from the Incubus guild who was sent to oversee your tests."
Milo shook the man's hand and introduced himself. What the man didn't know was that Milo had already known who he was after using the inspect skill when they first met in the conference room where they had briefed him about his tests. The association member then told Milo that it wasn't common for a student to do so well in the combat test, previously the furthest he had seen a student get was level 4.
Milo could see this being the case, as the level 4 difficulty was still tough for Milo to complete. After his combat test, Milo was led to another room where he was allowed to rest for a bit before taking his Magic Power measurement. Milo was thankful that they'd be allowing him to take a short rest, as he felt completely drained of both his physical stamina as well as his magic power. Milo also returned his equipment to his dimensional storage, and was now in his regular clothes that were under his armor. After his test, his clothes were now sticking to his body due to sweat which was making him quite uncomfortable. Eventually he felt his magic power restore a bit, and as if on cue, the association member returned to take him to the room where his Magic Power measurement would be recorded.
Now that he had recovered a bit, Milo got to his feet and followed behind the association member as he and the other people there for his test were guided to a new room. When entering, there were a few machines in the room, all of them looking similar to the machine that had originally been used to test his Magic Power at his rank evaluation at the start of school, as well as his retest when he was moved to the X ranked class.
The test giver then gave him the same instructions he had received his two previous times his magic power was measured. Milo did as the man said and stepped up to the machine placing his hand on the orb in the center. Once he had done so he began to activate his magic power which caused the orb to glow. Milo's guess was that the man was looking at a combination of his magic power stat as well as his intelligence stat on the monitor connected to the machine, like the number that appeared when he took his rank evaluation. Due to this, Milo assumed that the number on the screen this time would be 75.
After marking the Magic Power measurement on his clipboard, the man said that the tests would be concluded there and Milo, the Incubus guild member David, and the academy's representative were guided to a waiting room. Milo was told that he'd have to wait there until they finished preparing his provisional license and paperwork.
Eventually the man returned with a manila folder that contained a stack of papers. He handed them to Milo and informed him that inside was a copy of his results, as well as his information which had been sent in by the academy when he agreed to do an internship. The man then handed Milo a silver pyramid shaped object the size of a paperweight. There was a button on the side that the man said would project his rank and information when pressed. This was his provisional license, and would act as a sort of badge that he would have to present when closing dimensional doors. Due to it being silver in color, rather than gold, it allowed the association to know that it was a provisional license, which would limit some of the things he could do, in comparison to what a full gatecrasher's license would allow. Most of these included things such as entering gates on one's own, entering dungeons which the association wouldn't allow provisional license carriers to enter, and other privileges tied to the profession of gatecrashing.
Milo was tempted to open his provisional license badge right there and then but controlled himself as to not appear too immature. The academy rep as well as David then informed him of his day that he'd be starting at the Incubus guild, which just like his message about his test said, would be the following Monday. On that day, he'd be given a tour of the guild's headquarters as well as briefed on the things he'd be doing. Hearing this made Milo a bit worried he'd be stuck behind a desk for his internship but hoped maybe his performance in the combat exam would sway their opinion enough to allow him to close gates with an attack force. After giving him a bit more info, such as where to report to for that day, as well as what time he needed to arrive, he was free to leave.
After leaving the association's New York branch office, he hailed another taxi and made his way back to his apartment. He chose to wait and look at his rank with Corinna and Krista, as the two of them would also want to know which rank he was given. When he arrived the two people in question were already back home waiting for him. When he entered they all gathered around the small kitchen table in Milo's apartment, and he pressed the button on the silver badge he was given.
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