3rd Phase Begins

With the second stage of the exam ending and Belle attracting a lot of attention to himself, the third phase of the exam began. All the students were teleported to a realistic, apocalypse-ravaged world. "This phase of the exam is the last and it decides everything. If you didn't do well in the first two phases, this is your chance. The goal is to collect as many spatial zone monster rhinoceros horns as you can. How you obtain them doesn't concern the system, you just need to get them," a voice explained, introducing the exam to the examinees and explaining what they needed to do.

"It seems like they are hinting that we can borrow from others," the blonde with a perfect appearance commented.

"Pfft, religious bigots. Why make it sound so holy? Just put it simply: they are encouraging us to rob from each other, the scrawny looking guy John said. 

Clans that brought more participants will benefit more by ganging up on people and sharing the loot," Herbert said.

"Who cares about their numbers?" a student who hadn't been noticed in either test but had ranked in the top twenty for both spoke up.

"How about we squad up?" Belle heard a voice behind him and turned to see Greg standing there with his twin sister, who immediately brushed against him while looking at her.

"I seriously don't understand her," Belle said to himself before responding to Greg, "Sure, why not?" He didn't want to draw too much attention to himself and he already felt that he may have overdone it in the second phase.

"Can I join you guys too?" Belle heard another voice and saw a teenager with blonde hair walking over. "Me too," Belle looked back to see a girl with long purple hair following suit. She seemed to have a charm that was hard to resist.

"That power can work on them, organ-controlled teenagers. Not me," Belle thought to himself as he saw Greg falling under the charm and the blonde struggling to resist. Only he and Liana, who had changed from being meek to glaring angrily at the girl, had not fallen under the charm.

"Sure, if you think that would be great," Belle said with a smile before looking up and asking, "Anyone else want to join us?" He didn't really care about their plans; he just thought that having more people would help decrease the attention on him. Hearing him say that with a smile made some people with bad plans decide not to join, but someone still decided to join anyway.

"A bigger group will make it easier for us to be conspired against fast, and there might be betrayers and spies," Liana stuttered as she spoke to Belle, nervously rubbing her fingers together.

"Don't worry, cute brother Belle is so strong and won't worry about that," the purple-haired girl, Ellaine, who had noticed her charms didn't work on Belle, said as she magically appeared on Belle's back and hugged him. She decided to take it further.

Seeing her like that with Belle, Liana's face turned a bit gloomy, but then she managed to smile. At least she could confirm that Ellaine's powers didn't work on Belle, as she could see almost all the boys in their squad almost drooling.

Tap! Tap! Tap! Liana walked towards her twin brother and, bang, she punched him in the face, causing his face to cave in and his eyes to almost pop out.

"Why did you do that?" Greg, who had been knocked back to his senses by the extreme pain, said as he immediately raised his hands to heal himself. Liana had hit him hard enough for him to blackout.

"I was knocking you back to your senses. I really held back, so say thank you," Liana said, causing Belle and the blonde, who had actually recovered in a way that Belle didn't understand, to burst out laughing.

"We can start now," Belle said as he walked forward. Many other people had formed squads like them, while many others had chosen to go alone. "Fifteen, quite a number," Belle noted as he counted the people with them.

"Rhinoceros should be a mammal, but being a spatial monster, we can't confirm it. Plus, there's the possibility of it having abilities too. We should tread with caution first. They shouldn't introduce anything that will endanger us, but things can always go wrong," Greg, who had snapped back to his senses, analyzed.

"He is the overly cautious type," Belle thought to himself as they continued looking for their first rhino.

"How about we share our powers to increase our success rate of working together?" a burly teenager named Khaid suggested, voicing what many people in Belle's squad were thinking. Most of them had joined the squad to witness Belle's abilities, and hearing their powers early on didn't sound like a bad idea to them.

"Sure, I can read all of your minds, so I guess I can be called a telepath," Belle said with a smile. His words surprised many, as they wondered if he already knew their thoughts. "If you think I'm lying and want to confirm my powers, I can tell you what you're thinking," Belle added, still smiling. Amongst the shocked expressions, Liana seemed to be embarrassed, her face turning orange.

"Even if he doesn't have powers, he would have already noticed with how shameless you act," Greg said, feeling satisfied that he found a way to retaliate against Liana. Suddenly, Liana stomped on Greg's foot so hard that it caused him to scream in pain. "I might as well not fight spatial beasts and just rely on my powers," Greg said, casting a healing spell.

Due to the attention Belle garnered in the second test, he became a topic of discussion among factions and spectators. "I trained him well. The damage was successfully delivered," Elizabeth said, bursting into laughter. She was truly enjoying this version of Belle. With his sister able to see the future and him being able to read minds, it didn't seem fair. Many people wondered how anyone could plot against them while observing the progress of other participants in the exam.