"I thought Nezu himself would be here. Or anyone at all. This is kind of a letdown."
Victória muttered to herself as she finally arrived at the practical exam area. A shiny plasticized sheet of paper containing the rules of the practical exam was neatly taped to the wall. The instructions were printed in a total of five different languages, though she chose to read the Japanese so that there was no risk of mistranslation harming her performance. Though she did take a glance at the other languages as well.
"Your score increase by sending robots crash? Geez… Oh, this one robot is named Victory. Nice."
They had specified in the email that it wasn't necessary to wear the school's uniform during the exam, so she took the opportunity to pick something that would lend her an advantage in the test: a black crop top along with black shorts. She had still a few more dark colored accessories she could have picked, but she didn't want to test her luck with the school's uniform policy even though they didn't apply in the current situation. Besides, she was going to an entrance exam, not to a goth convention.
"Hm? There's another paper here."
Indeed there was, a smaller, newer looking paper taped to the left side of the main instructions. It read:
Due to your performance being solo, a few changes have been made to accommodate your experience:
Test area reduced by roughly 75%.
Number of villain robots increased by 10%.
Score system has received confidential changes.
The duration of the test has been increased by two minutes.
New challenges may be added to suit the examination purpose.
The list went on and on, looking almost like the patch notes of a video game. Those percentages meant practically nothing to her as well, as she didn't know the exact original area size and number of robots. The mention of confidential changes was… worrying, to say the least, but she guessed that if they weren't available for her to see then it was nothing she needed to know.
As if waiting for her to finish reading the side paper, the gates to the exam grounds slowly opened with a loud, almost ground shaking noise. Victória wasted no more time pondering, and rushed towards the city replca.
With the summer sun shining through the enormous concrete jungle, the bird noises (which may or may not have been artificial) and the entrance gates not in sight anymore, it felt almost like a real yet abandoned city than a playground for the entrance exams. With extra emphasis on the abandoned part, since there were still no robots in sight after what she assumed to be 20 seconds of light jogging.
"Hmm…They're testing to see if I can track down villains effectively, I see."
Victória walked towards a place where the light was unobstructed and crouched down. She touched the palms of her hands on the ground, her claws extending forward by instinct, and closed her eyes. With the sun hitting her exposed scales and black clothing, and the asphalt lending her its warmth, her body temperature was steadily increasing.
"Nothing behind me… Nothing above or below… Ah, something over there!"
Victória got up in a rush and bolted towards a moderately sized alley to the opposite of where she had been originally going towards. The combination of shadows hid its interior pretty well, but it was possible for her to see a faint glow coming from around the corner.
Jackpot.
There laid her first challenge – one of the villain robots that was worth a single yet valuable point. Its single red eye lit up when she stepped in between the two buildings, the humanoid torso winding up an attack with both arms while the wheel desperately accelerated in hopes of trampling Victória before the same happened to it. The girl accepted the impromptu challenge, using her forward momentum as a boost while she was readying her claws and preparing to slide under the robot's own sharp swipe.
Slash!
"Eh?"
Victória's move was the one that prevailed. Her claws cut through the faux villain's torso as if it was jello, tearing the hull, the inner circuits, and finally reaching the other end and making both parts of the robot fall to the ground, immobile once again.
Victória turned around after she was done, virtually unscathed. She picked up a piece of the robot's chassis and briefly tried examining the material. It wasn't any type of alloy she knew – rather, a type of hardened plastic that was painted to look metallic and more resistant than it actually was.
Piece of cake.
After a while, it looked like she had slashed, smashed and bashed every single robot whose path had crossed with hers. Victória was panting, her limbs starting to ache due to the extended endeavor but still in top condition. She took a while to rest on the ground and count how many she had destroyed – at least fifteen of each kind, excluding the zero-points, which had yet to make its appearance.
Speaking of the devil…
"Five minutes remaining!"
Suddenly, it felt like every single big red button in the control room had been pressed at the same time. Dozens of three-point robots emerged out of nowhere, as well as a terrifyingly loud screech. A metallic hand swooped in and destroyed the top of one of the nearby buildings, making the newest and most dangerous threat visible.
It had to have almost 50ft tall, with six glowing red orbs the size of her head staring down at her and recording her every move. Its torso was, like the weakest kind of robot, humanoid. The bottom part however resembled the structure of a sort of military tank, with gigantic wheels rotating inside the tracks and slowly moving the behemoth around the town. The most interesting part was that, besides the regular dark green painting present all the types robot, there was something else. The writing looked rushed, most likely done a few hours before Victória had arrived at the exam grounds, but it was still as clear as day.
"1.000.000 points."
Before Victória could even try to think of a strategy, the hand once again fell down on the ground like a hammer, shattering the concrete and creating a shockwave that sent her and a dozen of unfortunate one-point robots flying into the air and crashing against a car on the other side of the street, making it explode.
"One minute remaining!"
The Japanese male voice boomed through the air again, and it was what brought the consciousness back to Victória. She found herself laying down in an uncomfortable position atop a few robot carcasses, as well as some car parts and sidewalk rubble. There was fire all around her, and a few of the glass shards dug into the soft skin of her face, drawing the warm crimson blood out towards the collar of her shirt.
"Fire…?"
It took a few seconds for Victória to remember what had happened in the four minutes before, but she was livid. Whether it was because of her bruises and aches – that were painful enough to distract her but small enough to make her able to go on – or the large amount of heat that had suddenly seeped into her. The determination gave her already vivid green eyes an extra spark, rivaling that of the giant figure that was slowly approaching her once more.
She dashed right out of the pile towards the colossus – her feet stomping the ground and shattering small portions of it with every step she took. Two mechanical hands blocked her way halfway through, but she tore right through them even though they were actual metal.
As she approached the target, she retracted the claws from her right hand and formed a fist, jumping onto the tank-like structure that supported all the massive weight of the giant.
Crash!
A single punch was all she needed to send the enormous joint flying off the body – yet the torso and the "foot" froze in the air for a moment while gravity caught up to them, like the biggest game of daruma otoshi ever won. Metal fell onto metal and sent the remainder of the robot tumbling down – luckily away from Victória. The light slowly faded from its red eyes, one by one.
"Time's up!"
"Eh! One million points?!"
Glória exclaimed, helping her daughter into the taxi and tossing her a water bottle. A small groan could be heard as the plastic container hit the girl's damaged hand, followed by a quick apology.
"It's probably not worth that much, mom. They just painted it like that so I would prioritize it over the smaller ones."
"And it worked."
"And it worked." Victória repeated, struggling a little but eventually managing to open the bottle, her heartbeat and overall adrenaline rush gradually stopping as the cold liquid entered her body.
"Are you sure you can teach tomorrow's class like this, sweetie? You don't need to feel pressured just because it's the inauguration…"
"The nurse said my hand going to be as good as new once I wake up from tonight's sleep, so yeah. Plus, I'm only going to be helping Eros with the children's' class, and I don't think I'm going to be punching kids so hard my knuckles shatter again." She paused, taking another sip. "…I don't think I'm going to be punching kids at all, actually."
"Fair point, you have convinced me enough already. Now, let's go for a little tour! Next stop, Musutafu's brand new Little Stars Fighting Academy!"
