Two
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“Use a few arrows and give your best.” The youth brought out a black bow and arrows from a column and handed them out to Dudian while encouraging him.
Dudian reached over and grabbed the bow. It was slightly lighter than the original hunter bow. But it would still be very heavy for most scavengers. He took out the arrow from the quiver and pulled the string. He aimed at the distant target.
The target was 30 meters away. The sharp arrow sped away and hit the target. It didn’t hit the heart but deviated almost half the way.
“Very good. Have you practiced before?” The youth looked at him as he was surprised.
Dudian nodded: “A few days.”
“A few days……” The youth whispered and nodded slightly. He handed out a black strap: “You should cover your eyes. Let’s see how you shoot blindly.”
Dudian nodded. He grabbed the bow after being blindfolded. He mentally searched for the location of the previous target’s position. Although he could use the sense of smell to help him easily find the target, he avoided doing so. He wanted to know what he was capable of. Was his talent as an archer good enough?
Whoosh!
An arrow rapidly shot past and nailed the target.
Dudian took off the strap and saw that the arrow had nailed to a similar location as his previous shot. The deviation was not significant.
“It seems that you have quite the talent as an archer.” There was a trace of a smile on the youth’s face as he spoke: “Although your constitution is over the top but it is extremely rare to get such results after a few days of practice. You should give best efforts maybe you will be the second hunter to reach the silver level as an archer.”
“Did a hunter reach the silver level in archery in the consortium?” asked Dudian.
“Well, there is a total of eight hunters who are silver level in the consortium. Two knights, three warriors, two scouts and one archer.” The youth continued: “There are few who choose to be an archer. Mainly because of poor combat capability. If there is no help to contain the prey, it is very difficult of archers to hunt. Most of them are too dependent on the team. Therefore, it’s rare for an archer to move up. You got to have excellent skills.”
“Archers have poor individual combat capability?” Dudian could not help but glance at him. His choice was based and fancied because in his perspective the archers had the most individual preferences while hunting. So their combat capabilities had to be the best?!
However, he’d agree that archery skills were hard to amass.
After all, the warriors and knights often fought with monsters in the front so their abilities improved very fast. But the archer’s were supported from the back. Practice makes perfect’ didn’t apply to them much like the other professions.
“Let’s try your talent in other professions.” The youth came up with Dudian to the second area. There were few wooden puppets in here. All kinds of different weapons were placed next to a shelf. There were swords, iron whips, hammers and other weapons of different length. Except for the spears. The spears were the exclusive symbol of the Knights.
“Attack the wooden puppets with different weapons until you break them. And find one which is suitable for you.” The youth laughed.
Dudian nodded. He picked up the sword, came towards the wooden puppet, and began to hack it.
He felt awkward and uncomfortable as he continued to hack it many times.
Dudian immediately knew that the sword was not suitable for him so he replaced it with the dagger.
Relative to the sword, daggers are smooth. But he put it down to change it as there was no force behind a dagger. It would tire him down.
He tried other weapons. Iron whip, hammer, swords… One by one Dudian tried all of them. Ultimately, he felt that daggers and swords were more comfortable to be used by him rather than the other weapons. The youth also graded his performance and came to the same conclusion after the evaluation.
“Your warrior talent is also good, but your archer talent is even better. Let’s look at your knight talent.” Youth said.
Knights were totally different from the knights of the military. Although the fighting was similar but the knights of the hunter headquarters were more important as they fought outside the giant wall. They would undergo a rigorous examination and will be awarded the Order of the Knight. They are purely focused on combat outside the giant wall.
Dudian sat on a dummy horse and held a spear. It was constantly waving and he felt very awkward.
The youth looked and shook his head. He took Dudian for the last test.
A Scouts main ability was to hide and escape in time. There was a cage which had swords and spears in it. It was shaking and making all the weapons inside to move. There were no particular rules and everything depended on person’s reaction speed to determine if he was up to the job.
“Put this on.” The youth handed a heavy armor suit to Dudian.
Dudian immediately put on the armor.
He went into the cage. He was encircled by swords and spears. The cage began to shake.
Dudian quickly dodged as his eyes swept around to check the motion of the weapons. There was a silver light caught his eye, so he quickly bent to dodge the stab. Everything was based on his instinctive reactions to the surrounding situation.
Nevertheless, there were two or three times that he was stabbed. There was the protection of the black armor which resulted in no injuries.
Soon, the test ended.
The youth opened the cage: “Geez! I did not think you have such a sensitive skills. Although your constitution has been modified because of the magic marks, but to have such a good reaction is awesome. You should switch to being a scout. Because of your latent, you can be a silver hunter very early on. After so many years of my experience, you are totally in top three of the scout talents that the consortium was able to grab. No, the top two!”
Dudian did not expect to get this evaluation. He was in joy, but it was not enough to change his mind.: “I still like to be an archer. I would want to kill the enemy from 1000 meters away.”
“This…… Okay.” Youth sighed in regret. He didn’t insist, as it was only a simple test. People could show some talents, but it was not entirely correct. Many people that were not good at first would improve later on. He had seen many examples such as that. Moreover, the key to everything was the interest shown by the hunter towards the occupation. That’s why consortium didn’t mandatory choose the occupation and let the hunters make the choice optionally.
“Although your archery and scouting talents are high, but do not be complacent. Next, you will be trained by the consortium and will be given a year to become a true hunter. ” Youth earnestly said: “Your training time will be only one-third of the other trainee hunters, but you have magic marks and all aspects of your physical condition have been enhanced. After a year, the consortium will send you over the giant wall to hone you in real combat, if you aren’t good enough by then.”
“However, you are more aware of the dangers of the world outside the giant wall than other trainees. So give good efforts. If you are lazy today, tomorrow you will be your dead.”
Dudian faced the youth and nodded: “I know.”
“Well, let’s go to the hunter training field. ” Said the youth.
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