Chapter 148: People I Know Are Testing Too

Everyone’s eyes were on me.

At that point, Maylene also realised I was there and her mouth opened to call out to me, only for Ava to cover her mouth with her hand, stopping her from shouting out my name.

I’m not sure if Ava called me out to give the participants hope or she just wanted me to show off.

Either way... I guess it would be weird for me to reject her here so I stepped forward to head towards the centre of the room.

"Go... Good luck..." The cloaked woman whispered, almost inaudibly.

I gave her a small nod in response before turning to look at that assault mech that stomped towards me.

I cracked my fists and lowered myself into a combat stance.

There was no warning as the mech immediately lunged towards me, its fist raised and prepared to punch down at me.

Fortunately for me, I had time to react so I simply raised my hand and blocked it.

The robotic fist slammed down on my palm and stopped it in its tracks.

I barely felt the impact and simply shoved the robot back, watching it stumble a few steps with its stubby legs to regain its footing.

The machine whirred even louder as it charged towards me again, aiming to slam both its fists down at me at the same time.

I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to destroy the mech so I was trying not to use my full strength on it. Not that I would have done so anyway since it might give away who I really was.

I figured that I didn’t really need to beat the mech itself but overpowering it would be enough to ’win’ here.

Right as the mech was about to smash me into the ground, I raised my arms and crossed them above me, catching the mech’s fists in between my arms.

I then shifted myself to grab onto the robot’s wrists, holding it in place and not letting go.

The mech tried to pull back its arms but found itself completely stuck.

We could hear the metal straining against my grip but I was not budging in the slightest.

"Stop! Stop! That’s enough!" Maylene shouted, hopping forward.

Yeah, I figured she definitely did not want me to break this machine of hers.

I let go of the machine and allowed it to break free from my grasp, the mech taking a few steps back to steady itself while I remained where I was.

"You pass!" Maylene declared before pointing towards the side where Ava was standing. "Go ahead and stand over there!"

Ok...

I did as Maylene asked and went over to stand beside Ava.

"Ufufufu~ I don’t believe you were told to come here today, my Divine~" Ava whispered.

"Ah... I saw on the news that the tower was completed so I thought I might as well come over to take a look to see if I could help out with anything, you know?"

"Ufufufu~ You are too kind, my Divine~ You’ve worked the hardest during the last expedition so you should be taking a break instead~"

I shrugged, "I wasn’t the only one you know? All of you were also working hard. And I’m more surprised that you guys would even arrange for this without telling me?"

"Mmm... Olivia was intending for us to oversee this stage of the interview and only present them to you after this. You would get the final decision on whether to accept the ones that are shortlisted today."

"Eh? I thought this was the final test?"

"Oh, no, no. One of the final tests to be shortlisted for the position~ Not the final one to confirm the position, my Divine~"

Ah... That makes more sense now... Especially since Olivia did tell me that they would be getting my opinion for the selection too so it wouldn’t make sense if they decided on the people without at least going through me.

"Still..." She continued, a mischievous smile on her face. "That doesn’t explain why you decided to sneak into this group, my Divine?"

"Well... Let’s just say I got involved with some of the participants and was mistaken to be one of them as well so I got dragged along... Then I decided I might as well just follow along to see who are the ones that made it this far."

"Ufufufu~ I see~ And here I thought you only came along to support that friend of yours~" She asked, nodding back towards the group.

My friend? Is she talking about that hooded girl because I definitely never met her before...

I turned my attention back to the front, only to realise there was a very familiar guy wearing full plate armour and holding a shield and mace standing in front of the mech.

Dan?!! I thought you said you weren’t going to join?!!

The mech punched its fist down on Dan’s shield but he simply stood his ground and blocked the attack without moving a step back.

The blow was strong enough to cause the ground to shake slightly so the mech was definitely not holding back.

Dan smirked at the mech and banged on his shield with his mace, "Is that all you’ve got? Come on! I can stay here all day but you definitely can’t, can you?"

The pilot of the mech definitely got taunted by his words as the mech started wailing on the shield, raining down a flurry of blows on Dan which had completely no effect on him.

"That’s enough! Stop! You pass!" Maylene cried out.

Seems like they also take into account people who specialise in defense and did not require them to beat the Mech either.

She did the same thing and told Dan to join me and I watched as that guy strutted over to me with a big smirk on his face.

"Whaddup, bitch?"

"I thought you said you weren’t going to join up because of your family."

"Ahahaha! Well fuck, I wanted to surprise you actually. I was already in the process of signing up to begin with. You think I can let you save the world by yourself meh? You would probably fuck up without me around, please."

I rolled my eyes at him, "Sure... Does Rachel know about this?"

"Of course. You think I came here behind her back ah? As much as I like you, I’m not going to risk her wrath for you, hor. If she wants to murder you, I’m stepping aside."

"Yeah... Same goes for you by the way. If anything happens, I’m using you as a sacrifice to her."

He slapped me on the back, "See? No problems! Hahaha! Too bad though, I really wanted to just show up in front of you and shout ’surprise’! So... Ahem... Surprise!"

"Yay... Clap clap..." I clapped my hands sarcastically.

Ava was also giggling at us from the side but she refrained from interrupting us.

Dan then turned to her and smirked, "So... I guess this time we are coworkers? How should I address you? You’re still my senior right?"

"Fufufu~ There’s no need for that. If you will be working for my Divine, you can just treat me like before."

"’Divine’ huh? You get your people to call you some weird stuff, bro."

I decided not to dignify that with a response.

Ava gave him a wry smile, "How is Rachel and the kids?"

"She’s fine. She’s already back to normal after coming back here. The girls are fine too, all of them are way stronger than I am."

"Fufufu~ They certainly seem like that~"

I turned my attention back to the group as I realised it was the cloaked woman’s turn to step forward.

I wondered what kind of ability she had and why she was hiding her face as well.

Not that it would be an issue considering we have someone like Sergei on our team too.

The mech stomped in front of her and just like before, there was no signal to start and it just dashed towards her to try and punch her.

I idly wondered what they were going to do with any injuries here before watching the cloaked woman jump back to avoid the blow.

She then threw her hands forward and tossed something at the mech but whatever it was seemed to be ineffective as it merely bounced off its surface.

But right as I thought of that, she clapped her hands together and vines suddenly appeared all around the mech, restraining it and preventing it from moving completely.

Ava perked up, "Oh? A Chloromancer? I did not expect to see one here~ That’s interesting?"

Dan turned to her, "What the heck is that?"

"Someone who can control plants," I answered, drafting on my knowledge of games to find that answer.

"Damn, so she can grow and manipulate plants like that? That’s sick."

Yeah... But for some reason... I feel like this was quite familiar... Where did I see this before?

Wait... Oh!! That dark elf we rescued from underneath the rubble back when I was under attack from assassins! She used some kind of tree to cover herself from being crushed!

I never thought I would see her again here!