"Tonpa-san, where are we?" A timid voice spoke up from behind him. Startled, Tonpa turned to stare at the girl that just seemed to have fallen right beside him in the less than spacious room. He was in a room he remembered all too well from the 287th Hunter Exam, a room that abides strictly by the saying "majority rules".
The girl was rather small for her age, messy blond hair held down by a small baby blue beanie. Despite her young age, she wore a tight blue tank top and some tight black jeans to boot, not the image most parents would want for their daughters. Tonpa couldn't help but wonder if her border-line skimpy outfit held some sort of purpose. Considering she was fifteen; however, he had some serious doubts.
She was Sora Hōseki, one of the seventy-five rookies out of the five hundred or so candidates in this year's Hunter Exam. If Tonpa was being completely honest with himself, he was having a ball this time around.
The 290th Hunter Exam was rookie-crushing heaven. It first started when Tonpa ended up passing around so much of his spiked drinks to the strangely large number of rookies that he had eventually run out. Coincidentally, the large number of rookies plummeted down to merely forty-four applicants by the end of the first phase. Unfortunately, the handful that had wisely decided not to drink the drink that had been given to them, wolfed it down during the second phase when no break was given after the end of the first phase.
Between the spiked drinks and how hard the exams already are in general, only ten rookies remained by the start of the third phase.
Before Tonpa could answer the girl in front of him, two more doors opened above them. A young man fell with a screech, brown hair seemingly resistance to the wind pushing against him as his chocolate brown eyes showed just how frightened he was. Tonpa snorted.
Hito Tsuika, another rookie in this years exam, though he is a rather bland one. Tonpa had almost died when he saw the twenty-four-year-old. The man had shown up in a simple white T-shirt, jeans, and slippers of all things. It was as if he was taking a casual stroll instead of the hardest exam known to man. If the man had breezed through the exam so far; however, that would have been another story.
No, halfway through the first phase his slippers had broken and Tonpa could have sworn he was unconscious on the back of that truck in the second phase. What remained now was a dirtied white t-shirt and shredded jeans. His slippers replaced with shoes the man had probably gotten from someone else.
There was silence for a fraction of a second as Hito mumbled under his breath about something before Tonpa's attention was brought to the roof of the room.
Tonpa couldn't help the sweat drop forming at the side of his head at the sight of thick meaty legs dangling from the ceiling. There was only one contestant that was so ripped he couldn't even fit through the door of the roof.
Cracks started forming as the legs dangled helplessly before suddenly falling down to the ground. Tonpa flinched back as the man merely sighed and stood up, towering over everyone present with an impressive height of 6'11. His hands were wrapped across his chest cradling a lithe woman as her bright amber eyes poked out.
They were Rikishi and Sho, a new rookie duo Tonpa knew he would no doubt see next year if they manage to fail this year's exam. Rumor had it the two were either married or engaged. Either way, they were inseparable.
"How interesting," Sho muttered immediately, wriggling her way out of Rikishi's grip as she stared up ahead at the watches on the table. Tonpa blinked at her black and gold cheerleading outfit, which was in sync with Rikishi's all black wrestling outfit. The waist of said wrestling outfit had a golden belt with a symbol Tonpa had never seen before.
There was more silence as Hito picked himself off the floor, attention also drawn to the watches on the table. Sora's stormy grey eyes quickly became guarded at the sight of so many people starting to crowd around her. If it was shyness, Tonpa couldn't say, but the girl fit quite a few cliches already. It would only be natural she was either shy, had a terrible past, or some other shit like that. A sob story was the best motivation for the exams too, how fitting that it also brought an excessive amount of glee to Tonpa as he caught their faces after failing.
"Trick Tower, a rather famous phase in the exams for how utterly unpredictable the tower itself can be," Tonpa sighed when he noticed their attention was on him for an explanation. He could tell Sho was confused, but he could already guess what she might have been bothered about.
"While it is still true that the Hunter Exams changes yearly for people like me who keep retaking the exams, the third phase is rarely touched because of just how much diversity the tower can provide. Our challenge, majority rules, is only one of the many the tower has to offer. Next year you might have to do it alone, another year you might be with three people. The people you're with can also greatly influence or hinder your success rate. The obstacles also change periodically, a great way to throw off retakers," Tonpa continued, walking forward to grab a watch.
Sho's look of confusion turned a little suspicious. How she could be suspicious, Tonpa couldn't really say. Silently, she too grabbed a watch for both herself and Rikishi. Her long golden hair swirling around her as she marched back to her partner. Less than ten seconds later she was back in his arm where she would probably camp for the rest of the challenge.
Tonpa could only stare at the duo as the rest of his team wore on their watches. If it weren't for the fact that Sho had a sort of aura around her that warned of power, Tonpa would have easily grouped her next to Hito in terms of usefulness. The fact that Tonpa could have sworn he saw her sleeping during the second phase said a lot about how utterly nonchalant the rookies seem to be becoming each year.
There was a rumble in front of the group as the stone wall keeping them confined into their small room started sliding apart. Immediately, they were met with a choice. Right or Left.
Personally, Tonpa just choose at random, a little shocked that the walls had moved on their own instead of being provided with the option of whether or not to open a door and start the challenge.
In the end, the right path won. Sora led the way, walking briskly as she attempted to stray away from the group. Tonpa and Hito walked close together right behind her, though there wasn't any small talk exchanged between the two. At the back of the group was the duo, talking to each other in hushed whispers.
Tonpa couldn't have told you how long they had walked. He also lost track of how many choices he had picked at random between the simple choice of right and left. If it wasn't for Sora's sudden halt, he was certain he would have walked right off the edge, lost in thought.
Tonpa stopped just at the nick of time though, saving himself from crashing right into her. Hito wasn't as lucky. Tonpa stifled his giggles as the duo came up to look at the scene. Sora looked extremely angry from her spot on the floor, eyes glaring up at Hito from where he was perched dazed on her back.
"Kono Yarou! Get off me!" Sora screeched, drawing out laughter from everyone around her. Hito, despite just being called a "little shit", just stared at her in general amusement.
"Watch your mouth, yariman," Hito teased, but that probably wasn't the smartest thing he could have said. Tonpa knew her outfit was borderline-skimpy, but calling a fifteen-year-old girl a slut was pretty rude, even if she had initiated the insults. If Sora's furious eyes were anything to go by, she was not amused.
She stood up abruptly, watching coldly as Hito stumbled onto the floor. In a flash, she had a hand around the base of his foot and threw him into the void that stretched around the room. There was only one platform in the middle of the room, which Hito couldn't have reached from where he was thrown.
The man would have died right then and there if she had let go of his foot, but she hadn't. Instead, Sora starred in satisfaction as he swung and hit the edge of the void, before idly dangling in the dark abyss.
"Who are you calling a slut you…" Sora started screeching, words getting more vulgar as she continued screaming her head off. With every insult, she shook the poor boy like a ragdoll until Tonpa was certain the kid had some serious whiplash. With each shake, Hito's head hit the edge of the void. Each time producing a sickening crack.
Tonpa stared in shock, contemplating whether he should try and break up the terribly one-sided fight. It wasn't like he wanted the man to die, but his own life was also something to think about before jumping in.
"Stop her," Sho muttered, jumping out of Rikishi's arm. She turned, flattening her skirt as if she had just told her partner to get the morning newspaper instead of jumping into a bloody brawl. Rikishi, for his part, looked completely at ease as he straightened up. Unfortunately, there was no need for his assistance.
Laughter broke up the fight fast enough.
Tonpa perked up as he heard the feminine laugh. Turning his attention to the blond high school girl on the other side of the room, he noticed she was surrounded by a group of 5 other people, each with their own distinct clothes. Despite their glaringly obvious differences, they each had one thing in common. The same look of tiredness in their eyes.
Tonpa also couldn't help but notice that none of them were in chains, and each seemed to be dressed in clothes of their choosing, not standard prisoner attire. Did the Hunter Association really put them up against hunters this year? That would put them at a serious disadvantage.
A discrete smirk made its way onto Tonpa's face as one of the hunters, the teenage mutant ninja turtle wanna-be, stepped up to introduce the whole point of this challenge to the group. This would seriously put them at a disadvantage, one Tonpa had no intention of turning.