Ayuki used her time to walk around and observe the situation. It felt a bit like a crowded market taking place in a training area. People would stand in rows and groups around each coordinator. Each challenge had a name and a board with a short description of the rules, but it didn't explain everything you needed to know. From the looks of it, participants were even forbidden to use their Fes in every challenge.

She stood still and watched a particularly crowded challenge. A sparring challenge between one contestant and a coordinator. The man with the short hair, who was the contestant, was allowed to pick any weapon of choice. He chose a longsword. The coordinator, the man with the long blond ponytail, confidently picked up a spear. All the weapons were made out of wood, most likely to keep casualties to a minimum. They also had to wear some simple armored gear, mostly to protect the face. They would stand in front of each other in a small circular arena. Well, the arena was just a rope on the ground.

After a three-second countdown, Shorthair started quickly, rushing in with a wide diagonal swing. Ponytails deflected the sword using the spear's shaft with a light spin and instantly thrust the butt of his spear into Shorthair's stomach. The sword dropped on the ground, and the audience cheered and clapped for the coordinator's skill. Collapsed on his knees, Shorthair sighed. He picked up his sword again and eventually mustered enough courage for a second try. It didn't end up well for him though. "Twenty-five points!" The coordinator yelled while writing something down a piece of paper. Do they use a point system to assess us for this round? Twenty-five points sounded like a lot, considering Shorthair's failure of attacks. Did Shorthair display something good, is twenty-five points low or do they assess us on something else than just the results? 

Continuing to a different challenge, Ayuki saw the man in the hoody from the entrance again, participating in the concentration category. Besides him, nine people were standing in a straight line next to each other. They all had bells in their hands. Ayuki looked at the rules. According to the description, a maximum of ten people can participate each time. The goal is to ring the bell at the right moments. The coordinator will give all the signs when to ring it. A simple rule, isn't?

If the coordinator spoke a few specific words or performed certain actions, that's when you had to ring the bell. The coordinator, however, kept speaking in a different tone and speed, used a lot of similar words, and even ring his bell on a couple of occasions, making it extremely difficult for the participants to follow along. It was a funny sight to behold for him to act so unpredictable and childish. Some of the participants would just copy the rest and ring the bell when others did it, some were laughing and unable to focus on the bell ringing at all, and only a few were able to stay concentrated amidst the complete chaos and laughter. Hoody was one of them who seemed completely focused on the task. 

In fact, Hoody scored the highest points compared to the rest. One hundred points...is that a perfect score? It did show that the twenty-five points scored by Shorthair weren't that impressive. 

After watching a few more challenges, Ayuki decided to try one out herself. The memory challenge. She has no memories of her past, so she wanted to see how good her current memory capabilities are. The challenge even looked quite simple. 

"A...A...Ayuki Kazumi..." The coordinator was looking for Ayuki's name on the paper she was holding. "Ah, there you are. Is this your first challenge for today?" She asked Ayuki. 

"Yes, that's correct." The first challenge in my life even. 

"Wonderful. You may have read the rules a bit, but I'll still explain it to you. I'm going to share an E-link of the past with you with a duration of five minutes or so. Then, I'll ask a total of five questions to see how much you've remembered from it."

I've experienced one E-link experience so far. The one from Ellyia. Even now, the memories I've received at that time are still very vivid. It truly feels like those memories are my own, well technically, they are now, but I'm not the one who created those memories. Was it the memories of Ellyia I received? Come to think of it; it did feel like I was flying through the city in those memories, rather than walking. 

"Okay, I'm about to start. Are you ready for it?" The coordinator asked.

Ayuki nodded and put her right hand behind her ear. She assumed this was the right thing to do since Ellyia told her to do this during her E-link thing. 

"Here it comes." A memory flashed by displaying what looked like the coordinator's past. It started immediately with a conversation between her and two other persons wearing the Order uniforms. They asked the coordinator, called Rin, about a certain murder case from months ago. According to their conversation, the two people talking to Rin appeared to be investigators. They gave Rin a case file, containing lots of detailed information about that incident. A person was drowned most likely by the use of Fes and the investigators wanted to know whether there were any insects nearby. The E-link ended when Rin gave them a reply. 

"Alright, now that you've seen the E-link, let's move on to the questions," Rin said. "What is my name? The more details you can provide, the better your score."

"Rin Mayn," Ayuki replied. 

"What was the murder case about?"

"It was called 'The Drown and Dragged' case. The victim was drowned and dragged to multiple locations." It's quite disturbing. Why would someone drag a dead person to different places?

"One of the investigators was wearing a necklace. Can you provide me more information about that?"

"Hmm, the investigator on the left was wearing it. It had an animal design, but I don't know what's it called. It had a long tail, small claws, and a narrow head."

"Okay. What kind of insects did I see there nearby the victim?"

"Oh, I believe you called them Revenects. Flies that are drawn to even the tiniest bit of water. You realized that they were mostly flying around the victim instead of drinking the water because it was most likely mixed with blood, which they hate. It indicated that the victim had possible wounds of some kind."

"Good. Now the last question. What was the ID number of the victim?"

"Uhm..." That was in the case file I guess. Let's see. "Three, six, nine, five...seven...one?"

Coordinator Rin smiled now and clapped her hands. "Okay, good job. Hundred points!" She wrote it down in her paper and then reached out her hand. "I'm impressed Yona Ayuki. You have a great memory." She shook Ayuki's hand with great enthusiasm. 

"Thanks, I'm surprised myself," Ayuki said while letting out a laugh. Well, what do you know, I have something I'm good at after all. 

The audience was clapping too now. "Wow, it's the first hundred points for the memory challenge!" One of them said. "I only scored ten points haha," another person mentioned.

"Ayuki! Ayuki!" A familiar voice came from the crowd. It was Aisha, waving happily. "Way to go! You were awesome out there!"

So she watched my participation? "Thanks, Aisha. I guess I'm good at memorizing thing, hehe. How're you doing so far?"

"Oh, great. I'm actually already done. There's quite some time left before the next round starts. Now I'm just doing some extra challenges for the fun of it. Most of my scores were around the sixty points. Not bad, eh?"

"She also did the memory test, but totally failed it though," said the young man next to Aisha. He was a head taller than Aisha, wearing a red headband.

"Shut up, Eran! You didn't have to mention that part." Aisha elbowed the brown-haired Eran in his stomach.

"Oeff...Why not?" Eran said. "There's no shame scoring only ten points in a challenge. It's perfectly fine."

"Stop it, will ya! It's embarrassing, okay?" Aisha's face started to get red. 

"Oh, come on. You did a lot better this time, compared to two month—"

Aisha blocked Eran's mouth with both hands. "Okay, big guy. Enough talking for you." She looked at Ayuki now. "Oh, Ayuki, if you haven't seen it yet, you should try the observation challenge. It's pretty fun!"

"Oh, okay. I will take a look at it then. I still have two more challenges to do." Ayuki looked at the board displaying the remaining time. Still two hours and thirty minutes left 

Aisha was pushing Eran away while he kept protesting her. "You better hurry then. The waiting line can be pretty long with some of them. I'm sure you'll be great with that one too. Well, we have to go now. There are some things we've to discuss..." She waved at Ayuki while punching Eran too with her other hand. "Cya!"

"See you later!" Ayuki waved them goodbye. They sure looked quite close. 

----------------------------------------

I never thought I would participate in this admission...but let's not complain any longer. You have decided to change Ryuzo! See the truth with your own eyes and don't let anything stray you away from your goal this time.

The first round didn't start that great as Ryuzo hoped it would. The coordinator told him that he lacked the motivation to join the Order Elites. That wasn't completely true, Ryuzo thought, he never mentioned his true goal, only that he wanted to protect the person most dear to him. Until so far, he still hates the Order, and the coordinator noticed that too, warning him to change his attitude. Why is it wrong to hate them? I decided to join them despite my hate for them, doesn't that actually show how strong my determination is? If they can't even realize that, then screw it, it's not my problem. I'm going to join the Order Elites, whether they want me or not.

The second round was at least better than the first. Something that doesn't rely on reasoning or Fes abilities, just your real talents. That concentration challenge was luckily a breeze. A hundred points must be a perfect score, right? See? I can do this just fine, no problem. What shall I do next?

He walked by a couple of challenges until he saw the sparring challenge. The long blond haired coordinator sure looked strong, but the idea to have a chance to beat up a person from the Order was very tempting. Hmm, now that I think about it, whatever happens, I can hurt him without anyone being against it. Okay, I'm sold.

While Ryuzo waited for his turn, he made sure to study this coordinator's way of fighting. Ponytail was a vigilant fighter. He would always await his opponent's move and strike whenever a big opening presented itself. So far, the fight was usually over by a finishing move of his. His pattern was more or less a combination of a few light attacks to the body to bring it out of balance before his finishing move appeared. Depending on the weapon he used, this was usually a wide swing from above to strike his opponents to the ground. 

Ryuzo's turn eventually arrived and it was time for him to choose a weapon. Aside from the axe, he didn't have any other experience with weapons. He went for the sword and a round shield just since the combination looked useful. The coordinator just smiled and picked up a longsword, one that could be held with two hands. They put on their protective gear and were now standing in front of each other.

"Alright, this is how it goes," Ponytail said. "Stay within the circle, use your weapon as you like and score many points as you want. That's it. Are you ready?"

Ryuzo took on a stance with his shield facing forward and the sword pointing the other direction. "Yeah, let's do this." The plan now is to focus on his fighting pattern, especially that finishing move. Either I have to strike him just before he uses it or try to withstand it and go on full attack mode afterward. Well, here goes nothing.