Chapter 117 - The Rank Evaluation

The Rank Evaluation began with a dead civilian.

Etzel looked down at the body.

Then at Renn behind the observation glass.

Then back at the body.

“This feels personal.”

A speaker crackled overhead.

“Candidate Deymar, the evaluation has started.”

“So no explanation?”

“Correct.”

“Hospitality continues to decline.”

The room around him was a manufactured street: three concrete storefronts, two wrecked vehicles, smoke vents hidden somewhere above, and enough broken glass to make the Authority’s cleaning budget offensive.

Saeva hovered near his shoulder.

Orsik stood five meters behind him, shield lowered but ready.

The civilian was a training construct.

Convincing enough to make Etzel uncomfortable. No pulse. Artificial blood. A deep wound through the abdomen.

System information did not appear.

This was not a dungeon.

No helpful labels.

Good.

Etzel crouched.

“Cause?” Orsik asked.

“Something narrow. Fast. Maybe claw. Maybe blade.”

Saeva pointed at the alley.

“Blood.”

A trail crossed the pavement.

Etzel followed it.

Thirty seconds later, something screamed behind the second storefront.

A transformed creature burst through a door.

Lean body. Long forelimbs. Bone hooks along both wrists.

Etzel moved immediately.

“Orsik, right!”

Orsik closed the street.

Saeva went high.

The creature saw Etzel and charged.

The dead civilian had a narrow wound.

The creature had narrow hooks.

Simple.

Too simple, a quieter part of him said.

Etzel attacked anyway.

His spear struck the creature’s shoulder.

It twisted away and fled toward the alley.

Saeva cut it off.

Orsik advanced.

The creature panicked.

Not fought.

Panicked.

Etzel saw that one second too late.

A second training construct stumbled from the storefront behind him.

“Help!”

Etzel turned.

The floor beneath the civilian collapsed.

A hidden pit opened.

Etzel lunged.

Too far.

Orsik was farther.

Saeva was chasing the presumed killer.

The civilian dropped.

A safety field caught the construct before impact.

Red light flooded the street.

Etzel stopped.

The transformed creature froze.

Renn’s voice came through the speaker.

“Why did you engage?”

Etzel looked at the hooked wrists.

“Wound matched the target.”

“Did you confirm?”

“No.”

“Did the target attack the civilian?”

“No.”

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“Did it attack you before you struck it?”

Etzel exhaled.

“No.”

The dead civilian disappeared as the projection shut down.

Underneath the fake wound was a piece of broken metal from the wrecked vehicle.

Not a claw.

Not a blade.

Debris.

Etzel stared at it.

Sivenne’s voice came faintly from somewhere behind the glass.

“Ouch.”

Etzel looked toward the observation room.

“I can hear you.”

“Good.”

Renn cut in.

“Candidate Deymar. Assessment?”

Etzel forced himself to answer cleanly.

“I accepted the first coherent story because it fit the visible evidence.”

“And?”

“I deployed both summons toward an unconfirmed threat and left the actual rescue area uncovered.”

“Correct.”

Etzel looked at Orsik.

The knight said nothing.

That was worse.

“Point loss?” Etzel asked.

“Yes.”

“How much?”

“Continue.”

“Cruel.”

When Etzel reviewed the room during the reset, he found three clues he had ignored: the transformed creature's feet carried dust from inside the storefront rather than blood from the street; the supposed victim's blood trail stopped before the alley; and the creature had been trying to escape through a door, not approach the body.

None of those clues proved innocence alone. Together, they should have slowed him down. Etzel filed them away. He did not promise himself he would never jump to a conclusion again. That was the kind of promise people made immediately before doing exactly that.

He promised something narrower: when a story fit too cleanly, he would spend one breath trying to break it.

The street reset.

Etzel did not make the same mistake twice.

The second phase removed Orsik.

Not literally.

The evaluator simply marked him unavailable.

Saeva looked at Orsik.

Then at Etzel.

“Me.”

Etzel smiled.

“You sound very confident.”

“Me.”

Orsik stepped outside the marked zone.

“Do not compensate for my absence by becoming reckless.”

Etzel frowned.

“That advice feels targeted.”

“It is.”

The scenario began.

Smoke.

Limited visibility.

Four civilians scattered through an underground parking structure.

One moving threat.

Etzel chose Saeva because information mattered more than force.

For the first three minutes, it worked beautifully.

Saeva found two civilians before Etzel saw either.

She marked the threat’s route through the bond.

Etzel avoided direct contact and moved the civilians toward extraction.

Then the threat changed direction.

It was a C-Rank training construct built like a six-legged cat.

Fast enough that Etzel could not simply outrun it while protecting two slower civilians.

“Saeva, distract.”

She struck from above.

The construct turned.

Etzel moved.

Ten meters.

Fifteen.

One civilian stumbled.

Etzel caught him.

The construct abandoned Saeva and came back.

Predator’s Interval opened.

Etzel saw the route.

He could reach the ramp.

The civilians could not.

He closed the ability before temptation became stupidity.

“Behind the pillar!”

They moved.

Etzel met the construct alone.

First strike blocked.

Second redirected.

Third hit his ribs.

The training suit absorbed most of it.

Most.

Pain still folded him sideways.

He recovered.

Spear low.

The construct was stronger.

Not absurdly.

Enough.

This was the part cleverness did not erase.

Etzel could read movement.

He could choose terrain.

He could use Saeva well.

His body was still Level Twenty, and his Rank development was still catching up to the fights he kept entering.

The construct attacked.

Etzel gave ground toward a parked vehicle.

One step.

Two.

Saeva returned.

“Now.”

She flashed across its eyes.

Etzel struck the front knee.

Not to break it.

To turn it.

The construct hit the vehicle instead of him.

Etzel climbed the hood, vaulted the roof, and dropped on the opposite side.

“Run!”

The civilians ran.

The construct recovered.

Etzel did not try to defeat it.

He made it choose him.

Every time it looked toward the civilians, he attacked.

Every time it committed to him, he retreated.

Ugly.

Tiring.

Effective.

Saeva found the third civilian.

Then the fourth.

Etzel’s breathing turned rough.

His healing leg began sending increasingly rude opinions.

He ignored the first.

Respected the second.

Adjusted on the third.

The final civilian crossed the extraction line.

Green light filled the garage.

Etzel sat on the floor.

Saeva landed on his head.

“Strong.”

“I am horizontal.”

“Strong horizontal.”

“Thank you.”

During the garage scenario, Saeva learned too. Her first instinct after Etzel took the hit was to abandon reconnaissance and attack the construct until it stopped moving.

Etzel felt the decision forming through the bond before she acted.

“No. Find the others.”

She hesitated in the air. The hesitation lasted less than a second, but it mattered.

“Etzel hurt.”

“I know.”

“Kill.”

“Later. Civilians now.”

Saeva's anger pressed through the link, hot and uncomplicated. Then she obeyed—not because the bond forced her, but because she trusted the decision.

Etzel felt the difference. A command could move a summon. Trust could keep a team functioning when the command hurt.

Two minutes later she returned with the last civilian, still angry, and Etzel considered that a better result than perfect obedience.

The evaluators also tested communication.

Halfway through the second scenario, the smoke became thick enough that spoken commands failed. Etzel switched to short Soul Link impressions with Saeva: direction, danger, return.

They were not sentences and they did not magically teach language. They were meaning compressed through a bond both of them had practiced. Saeva responded faster than she would have weeks ago.

Orsik, watching from outside, later pointed out that Etzel had stopped micromanaging her route.

“She saw more than you did,” he said.

“So I let her.”

“Good.”

Etzel smiled. “You sound surprised.”

“I remember your first week.”

“Unnecessary historical attack.”

Orsik entered after the safety lock released.

He offered a hand.

Etzel took it.

“How bad?” Orsik asked.

“Pride?”

“Body.”

“Less damaged than pride.”

“Good.”

Renn met them outside the scenario chamber.

No score sheet.

Etzel immediately distrusted him.

“How did I do?”

“You completed the second scenario.”

“That is a fact, not an answer.”

“You protected all civilians.”

“Better.”

“You took three avoidable hits.”

“Worse.”

“You used your summon appropriately.”

Saeva lifted both arms.

“Me.”

Renn ignored her with professional discipline.

“And you correctly chose not to pursue the threat once extraction became possible.”

Etzel nodded.

That part mattered.

A younger version of him might have wanted the clean victory.

The evaluation did not care whether the monster remained standing after the civilians were safe.

Neither should he.

Renn handed him water.

“Ten minutes.”

“Then?”

“Final scenario.”

Sivenne, Maerin, and Tessa emerged from the observation room.

Sivenne looked delighted.

“You attacked the innocent monster.”

“It had suspicious wrists.”

Maerin said, “You committed before establishing motive.”

“I have already been professionally insulted about this.”

Tessa checked his ribs.

“You’re bruised.”

“Also professionally.”

She gave him the look.

Etzel stopped talking.

Ten minutes later, the final chamber opened.

It looked nothing like an arena.

A small neighborhood square.

Six civilians.

One transformed creature crouched beside a fountain.

Blood covered its mouth.

A woman screamed from behind a barricade.

The creature turned toward Etzel.

Authority text appeared on the wall.

Etzel read it twice.

Not eliminate.

Identify.

The creature growled.

One civilian shouted:

“Kill it!”

Etzel lowered his spear by one centimeter.

“Not yet.”