The Author's POV

Going down the stairs, we soon found ourselves beneath the arena grounds. Inside of a large spacious room that looked to be the size of a football stadium.

Glancing around, I couldn't help but be amazed by what I saw.

The whole room was filled with capsules. Endless amounts of capsules. If I had to estimate, I'd say at least over a couple hundred of them.

...just imagining the costs made me shudder.

Observing the capsules from the distance, I took special notice of how the capsules were arranged..

The capsules were grouped together in groups of six as they each faced outwards and were positioned in a way that they formed a circle. Behind them, large monitors with numbers displayed on the screen could be seen.

Next to the capsules, people clad in white uniforms holding onto some tablets and doing regular check-ups on the capsules were a common sight.

Staring at the scene before me, I couldn't help but be amazed.

'...so this was the VR arena.'

It was a truly spectacular sight. The machines were far bigger and more advanced than the ones in the virtual class I took at the beginning of the year with professor Thibaut. Moreover, with them being more advanced than the ones in the VR class, we didn't need to wear those tight and uncomfortable suits.

"Everyone, please look at me for a moment"

Just as I was busy admiring the underground VR area, instructor Sean, who was announcing moments before, appeared in the middle of the room as he gathered everyone's attention towards himself.

"Great"

After seeing everyone turn their attention towards himself, with a satisfied smile on his face, instructor Sean continued speaking.

"I will make this short. As most of you already know, you will soon be facing each other in the virtual world and the game that you will be playing will be the codebreaker game."

Pausing and staring at all of the first years, instructor Sean continued.

"Since I've already explained the rules of the game beforehand, I will not explain them again. This time, I will tell you a few of the things that you should be careful of"

Raising one of his fingers, instructor Sean said

"First things first, everyone that participates in the game will have their strength suppressed to G rank by default.."

Pausing and noticing that a commotion was about to erupt, raising his hand and speaking louder, instructor Sean continued speaking.

"Before you say anything, this was a decision that the academy has made in the last intra-academy tournament, and there is a specific reason as to why we chose to do it that way."

"In short, it's so that we can see the student's actual skills instead of just watching them dominating the opponents through ranks. This is so that we can provide a fair..."

As I listening to instructor Sean speak, a frown involuntarily appeared on my face.

...this completely changed the playing field.

Right now, the chances of us winning diminished by a lot. Although Jin and Amanda were skilled, if the opponents played their cards well, we could very well lose this game if we were not careful enough.

with the plan that I had previously proposed as it didn't particularly focus on brute-forcing our way towards the opponent. Moreover, as soon as they would spot Jin, they would immediately realize who they were up against. After all, Jin

far, I couldn't help secretly

...Good thing Jin changed.

everything

that you won't know who your opponents are until the very last moment. This was decided by the academy beforehand to

you are fighting against opponents in real life, chances are that you will know nothing about

Sean speaking, I couldn't help but nod my

he said

nothing about them. Thus, this was a great idea by the academy as it made the test

we decided to do it

at some of the students who seemed to have grown more nervous due to the new developments, instructor

for when you graduate from the academy. If you

Sean smiled and pointed

Your group and names should be on

say, instructor Sean glanced at

needed to host the

after instructor Sean left, all of the first years dispersed and made their way towards

started looking around and checked

finding our designated capsules, we had to be careful to not trip on the thick metal wires that extended

"Here"

of minutes into the search, waving his hand,

white uniform came up to us. Wearing thick-framed glasses, the instructor stared at

be the group

responded for the rest of

"Yes that's correct"

and staring at us through the upper gap of his glasses, after a couple of seconds, the instructor turned his attention

enter

-Vuam! -Shuuua!

tablet, steam slowly started rising from the VR capsules next to us as the lid slowly

in the capsules. The capsule I was in was beside Donald and Amanda who

"huuu..."

inside of my capsule, I took a deep breath. Thereafter, staring at my group members next

my vision turned

VR simulation. The tryouts will begin as soon

next to my ears. Shortly after I

initiating, best

...

-Shua!

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opening my eyes the first thing I saw were