Saturday, March 26, in front of the Dvor Hotel
The people who had come to take the exam formed a veritable sea of humanity. According to what Furina had said yesterday, this testing site was assigned only to examinees with Visions. Perhaps because of that, many of them appeared to come from quite affluent families. Unlike an orphan like me, they had whole families and relatives. They had gathered to bless the child or niece or nephew going in to take the exam.
"Good grief... Why are there so many people...?"
"It’s an important exam. Their expectations for their children must be just as high."
Though these two were supposedly here to keep watch over me, they had walked me all the way to the testing site. To outsiders, we probably looked like parents and their child.
"Hey, look at him. He looks so young. A kid like that came to take this exam?"
"Isn’t it obvious? Parents who couldn’t make it through the judicial exam themselves are probably training their child from that age so they can pass instead."
"He’s obviously just making up the numbers. No need to pay attention to him."
Malicious remarks came from all around me. It was absurd enough for a thirteen-year-old to take this exam in the first place, and even if examinees only had to be fifteen or older, the sheer amount of material and its level were beyond what children that age could understand. Fontaine’s national character played a part as well. As the nation of laws, making a living through law could only be seen as an elite profession. Even those with Visions took the exam partly for the prestigious title that came with it.
"Ahem! Ahem! The doors will be closed shortly, so all examinees, please enter the hotel."
"Hey, Avrora! Go do well!"
"Don’t get your hopes up... I told you, it’s an exam I’m allowed to fail in the first place."
"Still, you ought to at least get a score. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if some adult got wrong a question that a fifteen-year-old answered correctly?"
...That was true, I supposed.
"Well... The answer rates and exam results will be in the newspaper two weeks from now. We can see then."
Whether one passed or failed the Fontaine judicial examination could be confirmed by finding one’s examinee number printed on the front page of Fontaine newspapers such as The Steambird. The answer rates were also made public, and apparently the killer questions would later be turned into various modified questions.
Sergei clapped a hand onto my shoulder and gave me his blessing as I set off.
"Whatever happens, go and get results worthy of the effort you put in. We’ll be waiting at the lodging."
"Understood. I’ll go take the damn thing."
And with that, I entered the hotel.
The examination room was the grand hall on the hotel’s first floor. There were... around fifty examinees? There were few people, perhaps because so few people possessed Visions. Instead, the desks were spaced absurdly far apart. Was this what the Empire State Building had felt like during the Great Depression? I sat at a desk by the aisle and read through the criminal law book Focalors had marked for me. This was going to show up on the exam? It seemed the newspaper had been telling the truth when it said the questions would be easy.
"Wow... It feels like a dream to be with Lady Furina!"
"Hm-hm~ You should consider it an honor~ It’s not often that anyone gets to spend such a long time with me~"
Damn it... I could hear an ominous voice.
The doors opened, and five proctors entered with Furina. Weren’t there normally just two proctors? Since the room was so large, they must have assigned six. But Furina? Why the hell were you here?
The four who appeared to be assistant proctors went to stand at the very back, while Furina stood at the front holding the exam papers beside the male chief proctor.
Quiet whispers drifted over.
"Isn’t that Lady Furina? I thought Monsieur Neuvillette was coming, but Lady Furina showed up."
"After all the abuse she received, why did she come?"
"She’s cute, though. She feels different from how she looks on stage."
Unlike the outfit she was commonly known for, Furina was dressed today in a black suit and glasses. It gave her a fairly fresh impression. Perhaps realizing I was looking at her, Furina gave me that characteristic smile of hers, as though she were trying to enchant me. That was exactly why she lost every shred of dignity. The other examinees beside me seemed to love it, though.
An announcement instructed the proctors to distribute answer sheets and ballpoint pens. Furina and the other chief proctor handed them out to the examinees. Once I received mine, I wrote my examinee number and name on the answer sheet. And there was a place for a signature? I had a bad feeling about this.
An announcement told everyone to sign, and Furina and the chief proctor began signing. The examinees who received Furina’s signature looked both thrilled and regretful.
"It’s my first time getting Lady Furina’s autograph, but I have to hand it in... I want to keep it as a family heirloom..."
"Wouldn’t Lady Furina’s autograph fetch a decent sum if you sold it outside?"
Was Furina’s signature really that valuable? I sat there indifferently, waiting for Furina to reach me.
When Furina came before me, she signed with a smile that seemed to say, ‘I did it~.’ But why were you taking so long to sign it?
Looking closer, I saw that she was putting an absurd amount of effort into making the signature high-quality. Hey. This was being submitted anyway. You didn’t need to do that.
Then came the announcement to distribute the exam papers. The papers were... fucking thick. I had to solve all of that? There were four periods—did that mean this much material was going to keep coming every period?
The first period was constitutional law, the second civil law, the third criminal law, and the fourth was an elective. I had chosen legal history. Focalors had drilled it into me that I needed to know this to understand the other laws, so I had followed her advice.
Anyway, I received the thick stack of exam papers and stared at it in shock. It seemed far too overwhelming for an ordinary fifteen-year-old—or thirteen-year-old, for that matter.
The bell signaling the start of the exam rang, and I turned the page. But why were there only two questions per page? Was this math? Then why was the text packed so densely? Was it a reading comprehension test?
I knew roughly what to expect thanks to the past exam questions I had gotten from Crucabena, but receiving the actual test was still overwhelming because of the sheer volume. Still, thanks to Focalors’s crash-course training, the questions themselves were easy to read. The problem was that reading them took fucking forever. Sighs rose from all around me. It seemed difficult questions had been mixed in. In the middle of solving a question, I looked at Furina—and that girl seemed to be staring at no one but me. Was that really proctoring? Wasn’t she completely driven by personal feelings?
"Five minutes remaining."
Fuck, I’m screwed. I had to fill in the bubbles. Wasn’t it insane to make us solve fifty questions like this in one hundred minutes? I began marking my answers without hesitation. The instant I finished the last one, the bell rang, and the assistant proctors in the back collected the answer sheets. The assistant proctor gathering mine seemed to flinch when he saw Furina’s signature. Was that just my imagination?
Perhaps because judicial examinations required so much thinking, the break time was forty minutes. I intended to take out my civil law book and study for the next exam, but... once Furina finished organizing the answer sheets, she gestured for me to follow her. It seemed that brat wanted to be with me even here.
Dvor Hotel, First-Floor Storage Room
"How did you manage to snag a proctor position again?"
"Hm-hm~ There is no such thing as impossible in Lady Furina’s dictionary~ I told Neuvillette I wanted to be a proctor at the Dvor Hotel, and he wondered what had gotten into me before making a chief proctor position just for me~"
He really was Neuvillette-mon.
"Ahh~ It feels so nice to be with you like this~"
"Quit clinging to me. What if the other examinees see?"
"So what~? I need to cling to you while I have the chance~ The break is forty minutes, after all~"
She really did seem genuinely happy.
"I’ll play with you as much as you want after the exam is over, so don’t cling to me in the examination room. We could get accused of cheating."
"Hng... Okay..."
Furina released me from the storage room and headed toward where the proctors were gathered. This had to be her first time proctoring, right? Otherwise, there was no way she could act like that.
Then the second, third, and fourth periods passed, and I was completely drained in my seat. Fuck, I didn’t think even the college entrance exam had been this brutal.
When the announcement said they could leave now that the exam was over, the examinees slowly rose and filed out of the examination room. I was still melted into a limp heap in my chair. This was too exhausting. Just let me use my body instead...
Ten minutes later, I had finally recovered enough to prepare to go home. At that point, Furina entered the examination room, apparently done with her proctoring duties. Seeing me alone as I gathered my things, Furina must have thought this was her chance and approached me.
"A~vro~ra!"
"Aah! You startled me!"
"Why are you so startled? Now all we have to do is play together."
"I’m too tired... Let’s play another time..."
It looked as though thunder had crashed behind Furina’s back. She apparently had not expected that reaction at all.
"What, what, what?! You said you’d play with me!!!"
Furina began shrieking. How was I supposed to calm her down...?
"I didn’t know the exam would be this exhausting either... I’m so tired..."
"Then you should compensate me for breaking your promise, shouldn’t you? Hmm~ What would be good~?"
"Anything... I’m fine with whatever..."
My brain must have been seriously fried, because in my extreme laziness, I just babbled whatever came to mind.
"Then I’ll take your first kiss?"
"Go ahead... No, wait, what—"
Smooch
A moment later, Furina blushed and said,
"I mean it... Just so you know..."
Then she ran out of the examination room.
"Uh... What the hell was that...?"
Beneath the sunset sky, spring only deepened.
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