Chapter Text
150 examinees stand on the other side of the obstacle in front of a tall (somewhat familiar) building with the sun setting behind it. Tsezguerra, casually walking through the end of his obstacle course, explains; ‘This is the second phase, it is not being run by me, the Hunter in charge is already inside and watching, but I will be the one giving information. Some of you may recognise the shape of this building, this is the prototype building for the prison known as ‘Trick Tower.’ It was built on this island, far from any living beings since the building itself was so experimental. Your task is to get to the top of the building in 60 hours. Remember this Tower is designed to trick you, it’s in the name. You may think you’re going up when you’re really going down. Left is right, making progress means nothing. So you cannot afford to take a break, you’ll never know how far you are from the exit.’ The examinees all give each other the side eye, ready to run inside at a moment's notice. ‘However!’ Tsezguerra’s voice interrupts their thoughts. ‘There is a catch. You will be put into groups and can only pass the second phase if everyone in your group reaches the top.’ People start murmuring, reminiscent of how they reacted to the first task, about how the groups will be made and Tsezguerra quiets everyone once again, ‘You will all enter individuality through a different door at the base of the tower, you will end up in a room and the people who end up in that room with you will be your group…now begin.’
All different doors begin to appear and open at the base of the tower and the examinees rush to get inside. Miri and Maxus rush too but stop before entering and look up, considering the tower. ‘What do you see?’ Maxus asks, noticing Miri has activated Gyo.
‘A lot of different nen symbols. A huge amount. They were probably experimenting with the best way to keep the prisoners inside. But there’s nothing here that could help us.’ Miri tells them.
Maxus shrugs. ‘Worth checking though.’ Maxus goes to walk into the building but Miri grabs their arm.
‘Wait, before we go in, prototype or not, it looks like a pretty sealed building, if you try to use fire it might waste oxygen…I wouldn’t put it past the examiners to only have a limited amount of breathable air.’
‘Yeah, I know, and don’t you try to find the nearest form of plant life and destroy the building, yeah?’ Maxus says and Miri huffs but nods. ‘Okay, let’s get this over and done with. I’m already hating working with other people and we’re not even inside yet.’
Miri laughs. ‘Maxus, it’ll be fine. Either we get through it or we try for our Hunters licences later. See you on the other side.’ Maxus nods and the two walk into their individual entrances. As soon as Miri is through the doorway, the door slides shut behind her, throwing her into darkness. The dark is disorienting but Miri walks forward feeling the walls for any secrets that could be hidden.
Eventually Miri comes out on the other side, and hears a door sliding open next to them. Maxus steps out from their entrance and looks around the room. There waiting for them are…
The Amori Brothers.
Miri remembers back to what Tonpa had told them when he approached them at the start; The one in the orange beanie is Amori, the tallest one is Umori and the little one is Imori.
The brothers turn in tandem to look at the pair, ‘I guess this is our group then. Hurry up, we don’t want rookies like you slowing us down.’ Amori says. Miri raises an eyebrow and Maxus scowls.
‘From what we heard you were the rookies last year, so maybe you should stop acting like you’re the one in charge.’ Maxus says. Miri quickly puts a hand on their shoulder, feeling the aura around Maxus beginning to vibrate. Maxus breathes out slowly, and Miri smiles softly, then turns to the brothers on the other side of the room.
‘Let’s just get started, shall we?’ Everyone in the room nods and they move towards what looks like a doorway. There’s a table in front of the door with strange cuffs on it. Miri takes the lead and puts a cuff on. It tightens around her wrist and turns on. Everyone else follows suit, putting the cuffs on. As soon as the cuffs are on the door opens and reveals another stone room, extremely similar to the one they were just in except for the writing on the far wall. A riddle.
“What word has one left when two are removed?”
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ One of the Amori brothers asked loudly.
‘It’s a riddle you imbecile.’ Maxus declares, already tired of working with the brothers, even though nothing has happened yet.
The Amori brothers start talking loudly amongst themselves but Miri goes deep in thought, not only trying to figure out the riddle but trying to understand how it relates to their path in Trick Tower.
Maxus turns to Miri, ‘What are you thinking?’
‘I’m thinking the room has to hold some sort of clue…’ She answers.
‘How do you figure?’ Maxus asks, trying to ignore the Amori brothers' chatter.
‘This is only the first room we’ve entered, but I assume this is showing what the rest of our group’s path will be like. I think we’ve entered some sort of ‘Riddle Route’ and we’re the only examinees who have entered a room like this. So, I’m thinking our whole path might be like this, or at least some of it. We have to solve a riddle and that moves us on to the next room. But the examiner wouldn’t just leave it at that, if they did we could probably just shout words until we had the right one. No, I’m sure that solving the riddle gives a clue on how to leave the room but that means we should be able to figure out the answer from the room itself.’ Miri explains, as quickly as they can, considering they are on a time limit.
‘I’m sure you’re right but that doesn’t help us solve this riddle so…’ Maxus thinks for a moment. ‘They wouldn’t start us off with the hardest riddle they’ve got, but it can’t be too easy either…it’s a word, remove two…two…two letters?’ He guesses.
‘I think you’re onto something.’ Miri agrees.
The Amori brothers turn to the pair. ‘What are you two whispering about?’ The big one asks loudly.
‘The riddle, we think it means remove two letters, so the answer makes a different word.’ Miri explains.
‘What do you mean?’ Imori asks.
‘Well, take the word ‘hundreds’ it is its own word but you remove one letter, the ‘s’ it leaves a word that there is one of, one hundred.’ The brothers stare at Miri blankly. ‘...nevermind.’ Miri looks at Maxus who is deep in thought again. ‘Maxus?’
`The hundreds thing…you got me thinking, it might be a weight of some kind, one kilo, one pound, one ton, one gram, one…’ Maxus trails off and Miri considers the riddle written on the stone wall again.
The stone wall. Stone. ‘Maxus, it’s stone!’
‘What?’
‘Remove two letters and there is still “one” or “ton” left, and we’re in a stone room. That’s the clue! “One” is probably the actual answer, but “ton” is the clue to leave the room.’ Miri explained excitedly.
‘You’re probably right, but how does it help us leave the room?’ Maxus asks. But before Miri can answer, the Amori brothers interrupt their conversation.
‘Wait, what do you mean ‘stone’ how does that make sense?’ Amori asks.
‘“What word has one left when two are removed?” The answer is a word that when you remove two letters, it still leaves a word. “Stone” is a literal answer, if you take away the s and the t, it leaves the word “one.” But that probably doesn’t help us leave the room, so if you take away two different letters from the word that is definitely the answer, the s and the e, it leaves the word “ton.”’ Miri explains and before the brothers can question them further they immediately ask Maxus, ‘Where would a ton be common in the weight of stone bricks?’
‘Well the average brick pallet is one and a half tonnes, so a smaller pallet should weigh a ton…but if it’s a smaller pallet the bricks might be different-’
‘So we’re looking for bricks in the walls that are different.’ Miri turns to the brothers with a raised eyebrow. ‘Got that?’
The brothers look resistant, but figuring thi is their best bet, nod and they begin looking at the walls. Soon enough, Imori points to a section of a wall. ‘Those bricks there are different.’
Maxus rushes to the wall immediately. Imori is right, the section of the wall has smaller bricks than the rest of the room. Maxus feels the bricks, checking for anything strange about them and ends up pressing the centre in. A door on the opposite wall opens and Maxus grins. ‘Let’s go!’ The five run into the next room, finding another riddle written on the wall.
“What is the end of everything?”
The group considers the riddle before Umori, nodding slowly, says, ‘Death…one of us has to die.’
Maxus and Miri stare at each other and Maxus opens their mouth, but before another insult can come out, Miri interrupts. ‘No, it’s literal. The answer is “G” the last letter of the word “everything.”’
‘That seems way too obvious, besides, shouldn’t the answer help us leave the room?’ One of the brothers asks and Miri tries to explain.
Meanwhile, Maxus isn’t paying attention to the conversation, the fact that the “g” on the wall seems different immediately catching his attention. They turn to the tallest of the brothers. ‘Are you tall enough to touch that?’
‘Touch what?’ He asked densely.
Maxus rolled their eyes. ‘The letters you dunce. I think the “g” is different.’
The brother, while obviously put out at being called a dunce, reaches up and is just barely able to touch the “g.”
Maxus’ observation is correct and the “g” gets pressed into the wall, a door opening.
‘Wasn’t that one a little too easy?’
‘Well considering your first answer was “death” I don’t think so.’ Miri tells him. ‘But this probably means there’ll be a good mix of hard and somewhat easy riddles.’
‘Well, nothing’s going to get done by just standing here. Let’s go.’ Maxus says.
The five make their way into the next room.
[ 59 Hours 18 Minutes Remain ]
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Hours later, the small group have been going from room to room, feeling like they’ve been going nowhere and solving riddle after riddle (well…Miri and Maxus have been doing the solving, they just tell the brothers what they need to do). It’s not a short, nor easy process, taking far longer than it should considering Maxus and Miri can’t seem to solve things…together, only one at a time. But since they’ll never know how far they are from the top, they soldier on.
The five walk into the next room, Miri and Maxus immediately on alert for what the next challenge might be. Maxus points to the top of the wall. ‘Up there.’ Miri looks up and Maxus reads the riddle out loud.
“What can run but never walks, has a mouth but never talks, has a head but never weeps, has a bed but never sleeps?”
Miri nods slowly, repeating the important parts quietly. ‘Run…mouth…head…bed. Running…something running, can’t walk, so no legs. Bed…doesn’t sleep, so it’s not an actual bed. Has a mouth…runs, running, r- That’s it.’ Miri turns excitedly to Maxus to give him the answer.
‘A river!’
‘A baby.’ Imori exclaims at the same time.
Miri and Maxus turn their heads to stare incredulously at him. ‘What?’
‘You know, never doesn't actually mean never, it’s one of those dramatising things, a baby has a bed but never sleeps, you know.’ He explains.
Maxus and Miri stare at him blankly before turning to each other. ‘Okay, so if the answer is “river” how does that help us get out of the room?’ Maxus asks.
‘Uh…maybe there’s water in the walls…’ Miri suggests. The two shrug, figuring that’s their best lead and listen to the walls.
The Amori Brothers look at them quizzically. ‘What are you doing?’
‘We’re trying to hear if there's any water in this room…weren’t you listening?’ Miri explains.
The brothers shrug and just let the pair do the work. Maxus is obviously annoyed by the brother’s laziness but Miri just shakes her head, silently saying, ‘It’s not the time…’ They continue listening to the walls, and finally Maxus hears something.
‘Miri, over here!’ They call out and Miri rushes over, listening to the wall, hearing the distinct sound of water rushing past.
‘Good job, Maxus. We’ve found water…now to figure out how to use it.’ Miri begins tapping her chin. ‘So, the logical conclusion would be that we have to make a river…flood the room, I guess. Can you remove the brick?’
Maxus feels around the wall seeing if there’s any way to take out the bricks, and finds nothing. ‘They’re pretty stuck in there.’
‘Well, I guess there’s only one thing left…you know what to do.’ Miri tells Maxus and begins walking to the other side of the room.
Maxus grins and starts pulling objects out of the same place they pulled their bike out of…nowhere, until a small round object with claws sits in his hand. Maxus sticks the unknown object onto the brick and presses a button on it. He quickly runs to join his sister and not a second later the brick explodes and water begins flowing into the room.
‘So now the room is flooding…how does that help us?’ Amori asks, unimpressed at his now wet feet.
‘I don’t know, just…give it a second.’ Miri says watching the room slowly fill up with water. For a moment the only sound in the room was the water rushing in from the wall but eventually, there was a creaking sound. There was no way to tell whether it was a result from the water leaving the wall or filling up the room, but one of those actions triggered a door to open and the group, along with the water, rushed into the new room.
The water flowed into rivets on the floor, making a river in this new room, and unlike all the others so far…there was no riddle in this room, just another door on the other side of the water.
‘So what’s the deal here?’ Umori asked.
‘Maybe they’re finally giving our brains a break and we just have to…swim.’ Miri suggested, shrugging.
‘Okay, who’s getting in the water first?’ Maxus asked brazenly. Three sets of eyes stare back at them incredulously.
‘Why don’t you go first?’ Amori suggested with all the audacity a guy on his second attempt at the Hunters Exam can have.
‘Because we-’ Maxus started, gesturing between himself and Miri, ‘have been doing all the work up ‘til this point. The least one of you numbskulls can do is get in the water first!’
While Miri agrees with the statement, it’s not worth Maxus starting a fire. So, since they can feel the particles of Maxus’ nen starting to smoke, Miri grabs their wrist in warning. Maxus clicks his tongue but does begin to calm down, albeit reluctantly. The brothers watch this strange interaction with confusion and nobody says anything for a while. Maxus shakes off Miri and walks over to the three men and with no hesitation, pushes Imori into the water.
He splashes for a moment, panicked but then calms, looking around him. ‘...it’s just water.’ He says before swimming towards the open door.
Miri sighs. ‘Well, yeah.’ And looks down at herself, bracing for how heavy her clothes are about to get. They nudge Maxus as they walk past and jump into the water, swimming to the otherside as quickly as possible, slowed down exponentially by the layers of clothes she wears.
The remainder of the group follow suit and the five of them, now drenched, continue forward.
[ 17 Hours 46 Minutes Remain ]
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The group looks down at their individual cuffs. An hour remains. There’s no way to tell how close they are to the top or bottom of the tower. All five are exhausted and losing energy quickly. Only Miri, who’s near constant high strung state keeps them consistently reinvigorated, seems to be able to go on. She looks at the new riddle.
“What can fill a room but takes up no space?”
‘What are our chances?’ Maxus murmurs, coming up next to their sister.
‘I have no clue…maybe we should’ve taken more time at the start to figure out the height of this damn tower, it probably wouldn’t have helped though.’ Miri says, already searching the room for a clue. Eye twitching when she notices the brothers sitting down to take another break.
‘Well this is the first room we’ve encountered with a window in it, but there’s nothing but sky out there…we can’t be too far from the top.’ Maxus says trying to get a better view outside.
‘I know this is a prison and all but the fact that this is the first window we’ve encountered is really inhumane.’ Maxus stares blankly at Miri. ‘Yeah the prisoners are inhumane too, I know, I’m just saying.’
Maxus huffs out a laugh. ‘Well, it is a strange design choice, I’ll give you that.’
Miri looks at the window and back at the riddle inscribed on the wall. ‘...fills a room but takes up no space…it’s not a design choice!’
‘Huh?’
‘Maxus, it’s our clue!’ Miri exclaims.
‘Is it? I haven’t even looked at the riddle.’ Maxus says, finally sliding their eyes over the inscription. ‘Is it air?’
‘That was my first thought too, but the window is shut, there’s no air getting in or out.’ Miri clarifies.
Maxus just stares at them. ‘Miri, I can’t do another riddle, please just explain.’
‘The answer is light. The window is letting light into the room…filling the room if you will.’ Miri explains.
‘So how do we get out?’ Maxus asks.
‘I haven’t figured that out yet…’ Miri mumbles loud enough for Maxus to hear.
Maxus nods and thinks for a minute. ‘...light…’ And after a moment, they begin to smirk. ‘What do you think should be an essential skill for a hunter to have?’
It’s Miri’s turn to stare blankly at their sibling. ‘What?’
‘Survival skills, right?’ Miri continues to stare, silently asking for more information. ‘Every hunter should know how to start a fire.’ His face splits into a manic grin.
Miri considers this for a second and nods. ‘Yeah, you’ve gotta set the room alight.’ She concedes. ‘Can you at least check if there’s a non-flammable area for me to stand in first?’
‘Of course, that was always the plan.’ They spare a quick glance over at the brothers and mutters, ‘Not for those three though.’
And Miri, so completely done with the utter laziness coming from the three, shrugs, letting Maxus silently direct her to a safe spot.
And in almost no time at all smoke is coming from the floor, spreading out slowly, heating the room like a sauna. The Amori brothers finally take notice that something is happening when their backsides begin to get unreasonably hot. They all jump up frantically.
‘What’s going on here?’ Umori loudly asks and Maxus begins cackling maniacally.
Miri ignores the laughter coming from their sibling. ‘Maxus is setting the room on fire. You’d know that if you had been paying attention.’ She explains calmly, the heat of the room nothing compared to what she feels when Maxus has to burn overgrowth on the island.
‘You could’ve said something.’ Amori gripes snidely.
‘...We did. You three just weren’t listening. That’s your fault.’ Miri says, still calm.
Before the brothers can continue their whining, one of the bricks on the ground goes up in flames and burns to a crisp. Another door slides open and Maxus lets the rest of the small fires in the room burn out.
Miri pats Maxus on the shoulder. ‘Well, at least you finally got to set something on fire.’
Maxus laughs and looks down at their cuff. ‘It took too long to find that brick though, we’ve only got 25 minutes left.’
‘Well let’s just do what we can…no one will be able to accuse us of not trying our best.’ Miri remarks softly. The two follow the Amori brothers into the next room and the three immediately sit back down. Miri sighs and rubs a hand over her face. ‘Could you three at least pretend like you’re trying to get out of here?’
‘What’s the point? There’s no way we’re making it out of here in…20 minutes so we might as well just give up and try again next year.’ Amori says, shrugging.
Miri’s eye twitches. ‘Give. Up?’
‘There’s no point wasting your energy if you know you won’t finish.’ Umori says.
‘No point? There’s no point? You know, trained, licensed hunters don’t die just so you and your braincell-less brothers can give up .’ Miri seeths. ‘If you three truly wanted to be hunters, you’d be giving it all you’ve got. Why are you even here? You don’t bother to solve a few riddles and you’re ready to GIVE UP!? ’
The Amori brothers all start speaking, ready to defend themselves but are cut off when stray weeds suddenly burst through the cracks in the floor. They start slithering towards the brothers while Maxus actively watches, ready to start a fire at any time.
Miri begins speaking again as the weeds wrap themselves around the legs of the brothers. ‘You three are here to take the hunters exam. That should mean that you’re ready to be hunters and a hunter doesn’t get to give up, this world does not allow hunters the right. If you’re here to become a hunter, you’re a hunter for the rest of your life. Nothing changes that. You give up when you die. Doing this exam means being prepared to go and go until you die . If you three become hunters you don’t have the right to give up. So if you three lazy idiots come back next year and the year after that to do this exam then you better be prepared to actually become hunters, because hunters don’t give up .’ By the end of Miri’s rant the weeds have wrapped themselves around the brothers necks, not tightly, just as a warning. She finally turns to Maxus and sighs. ‘Maxus.’
‘On it.’ Maxus walks over to the brothers now tangled in a bunch of stray weeks. ‘This might hurt.’ They say with no remorse to be found and begin burning the weeds off of the brothers. ‘This works out for the both of us because I’m freeing you of the weeds but also…I get to burn you a little bit.’ Maxus explains with a manic expression. The three brothers squirm and hiss but stay quiet until…
‘The Second Phase of the exam is over. Ten applicants have passed.’
A smaller door slides open, a silent signal telling the failed applicants to leave. Miri sends one last glare towards the brothers before walking past them, Maxus following close behind. The door leads to a long flight of stairs and the pair begin their long journey down.
‘Well…that could’ve been worse.’ Maxus states with a smirk.
Miri slowly breathes out. ‘You’re not wrong.’ They walk in silence for a while before Miri breaks it again. ‘We’ve been walking for a while, I guess we were actually near the top.’
‘Exactly what I was thinking. It’s annoying we didn’t finish…probably would have if we weren’t with those three.’ Maxus grumbles.
‘I don’t know about that…’
‘What do you mean?’ Maxus asks.
‘Did you notice…how do I put it? We seemed to take turns…thinking.’ Miri tries to explain.
‘Huh?’
‘Like, we weren’t solving the puzzles at the same time, I’d think of something, take a break and that’s when you’d think of something. It’s not something that matters at home because we do different things but when it comes to doing the same thing at the same time, it’s almost like we have to take turns.’ Miri says as they finally reach the bottom of the tower, walking outside for the first time in 60 hours.
Maxus considers his sister's words for a minute. ‘You might be right about that, I guess it only matters when we’re under a time limit though…so what do we do?’
‘About?’ Miri asks.
‘Future Hunter Exams. If we get put under a time limit again, what if we don’t make it out, and we just keep failing?’
‘I guess we’ll have to take them separately. Trade off every year until we both get our licences.’ Miri suggests with a shrug.
‘Okay…how do we decide who goes first?’
Miri rubs their chin thoughtfully. ‘Got a coin?’
‘Yeah, I think so.’ Maxus says, reaching into all of their pockets until they pull out a coin. ‘You call it, it was your idea.’
‘Tails.’ Miri says as Maxus tosses it into the air.
They both watch as it comes back down and Maxus catches it in his hand. ‘...It’s tails.’ He says after a moment.
‘Guess it’s my turn next year then.’ Miri says with a grin.
‘Yeah, okay, don’t come crying to me when the whole exam is based around setting fire to things.’ Maxus mumbles.
‘Now that’d be ironic. Come on, let's go home.’ Miri turns to begin walking to the shore, where they had arrived but Maxus stops them.
‘Wait a second.’ Miri looks at him quizzically. ‘You’ve got leaves in your hair.’
‘Oh that’s weird. Will you take them out for me?’ Miri requests.
‘I guess it’s the least I could do as your favourite brother.’ Maxus says, reaching for Miri’s hair.
‘You’re my only broth- Ow!’ Miri hisses.
Maxus immediately holds up their hands at Miri’s yelp. ‘Did that hurt?’
‘Only a little, but yeah.’ Miri says, rubbing her head. ‘Was that all of them?’ Miri asks and Maxus nods. ‘Show them to me.’ Maxus hands them the leaves and Miri’s eyebrows raise. ‘That’s so strange.’
‘What is it?’
‘These are the leaves from my tree.’ Miri explains and Maxus raises an eyebrow.
‘That is strange…’ The pair stand in thoughtful silence for a moment before looking at each other again. ‘Well we’re not gonna get answers just standing here, are we?’
‘You’re right, let’s go. I need to have a word with Uncle Netero about this second phase anyway.’
‘He’s gonna get an earful from the both of us.’ Maxus agrees, throwing an arm around Miri’s shoulders.
And Maxus and Miri, having both failed their first attempt at the Hunters Exam, go home.