The Author's POV

Soon after the professor initiated the simulation, my surroundings started to change.

Thick lush trees started appearing from beneath my feet followed by soft and crumbly soil that caused my feet to slowly sink.

My visibility slowly started getting blocked by the towering trees that started sprouting from the ground at an incredible speed.

Extending my hand forward to touch a tree, I was immensely surprised by the realistic sensation that spread through my fingers. Running my hand along the tree trunk it felt like I was touching the lines and wrinkles of an old man's face. It had an uneven surface where I could feel the flaky nature of the dark exterior, that crumbled and peeled, with a crackling sound at the slightest pressure exerted by my fingers.

It almost felt like I was touching the real thing.

It didn't feel like I was touching a bunch of codes, but an actual tree.

"How intriguing..."

[Rank 1750 Ren Dover - Team points: 6]

As I was busy being mesmerized by how realistic the trees were, a notification popped up in front of me.

Seeing the notification, I quickly swiped left to discard it and fell into deep thought.

The game was simple.

Each student had one point, and every time a teammate died the team would lose a team point.

The teams that reached 0 points would then be automatically eliminated and hence lose the game.

The only way to gain points was through completing the hidden tasks available on the map.

At the end of the test, there will be a ranking list that ranks the teams in accordance with their performance.

Taking a good look at my surroundings, my teammates were nowhere in sight.

In fact, although the professor never mentioned this to us when briefing us on the rules, I already knew that everyone was going to be separated from each other.

Well, I was the one who created the scenario in the first place.

The main goal of this test was to survive for 1 hour.

Although it sounded easy, it was in fact not. If it were that easy what sort of test would this be?

The lack of information provided by the professor was intentional because this essentially meant that there was only 1 rule.

And that was to 'survive'

Each person was directly given a weapon, which was automatically given to them depending on the weapon that they had registered on the first day of the academy.

In my case, a sleek black katana rested on the side of my hips.

-Shua! -Shua!

Swinging it a couple of times to adjust myself to the weight of the sword, I nodded in satisfaction.

It feels identical to the katana provided to us by the academy.

Sheathing the katana back into the scabbard, I warily glanced towards my surroundings.

When telling us the rules, the professor never mentioned anything apart from the fact that you must survive, and the more teammates survive with you at the end of the test, the more points your team had.

He purposely left out the details in regards to killing, and because of this, the students automatically assumed that killing was allowed.

Which was his true purpose.

goal was to further divide the line between the 'competent' and 'incompetent' students. This was so that he could exploit the feeble mentality

could easily lure students into making a pact with

test into a hunting party for the

professor Thibaut could fabricate a couple of scenarios where some talented individuals built

such example was building a grudge against

cause them to build

but certain prideful and arrogant individuals would of course not accept their defeat and seek revenge at every

slowly passes and they slowly realize the gap between themselves and Kevin's overwhelming talent, they fall into depravity and despair

reached this point, professor Thibaut would finally make his

offer a make a pact would be made,

was full of

was trying to get

wasn't provided to us, because I was technically a cheat, and thus knew the general features of the surroundings, I could roughly gauge my

should be on the east

and Jin spawned on the north side on top of the mountains, while Emma is on the south side where the desert is located...Melissa and

get a good grasp of the main character's locations, I started to formulate a plan regarding

I was trying to get a grasp of the main characters was not because I was obsessed with them, no, rather it's because all the events

not what will happen to me, as I have never written anything outside of the scope of the

get a good grasp on what the protagonists were up to, I could make a rough estimate on the

goal is to survive for 1 hour, while it does sound easy, excluding the high-ranking students, strong simulations

thing that the

they would've never expected that the creature that was hunting them could perceive their location through their acute sense of smell, resulting in

students wouldn't only focus on hiding, but actually try to develop survival skills for

to get a good grasp of his surroundings before making his way towards the middle of the map, where he eventually reunites

with Jin, but they then decide to work

make my way

head I quickly discard

were definitely going to gather at

were to go there, the only options I had were to either directly get killed by one of them or get used as

left me with

so that even

Just the thought of interacting with Arnold pisses me off. Moreover just because I know what will happen, doesn't mean I know where the

make his way towards the center, and if I follow him there,

As for the rest?

the slightest idea of where

me

Complete the hidden task.

there were five hidden tasks placed on the map. One in the north, south, east, west, and center of the

the sense that the goal of each task was different, moreover, the difficulty of the task should be something that a rank 1750 like me couldn't hope to be able to

I was really

regular rank 1750, I decided to head to where

where I thought it

actually don't have a clue as to

east side, where I currently was, I knew nothing about this place. Apart from the fact that this was a forest-type terrain and that there was a hidden task hidden somewhere around

to where I thought the

of where the hidden tasks could be located, allowing me to have some

has died

was located, I saw a notification once again emerge on the corner of

were ignoring me because of my

I don't really see our team having more than 2-3

be considered a humiliating score, which will result in more troublesome situations where I would have

honest, I really don't want to involve myself

time was because of the annoying things that could come as a consequence of my actions. Moreover, if he really wanted

that were

I knew many ways to get rid of some stray dogs that didn't know their place. Though, at