Adam's standards for warriors were on the high side.
Isn't a knight supposed to be able to slice through a tree as thick as an elephant's leg and split boulders as a baseline? He took it for granted, but it was a prejudice that would crush the spirit of every warrior if he said it out loud anywhere.
A warrior was just a warrior.
It was simply that the warriors he'd met so far had been superhumans who held off a Diamond Bear single-handedly and cut down Aicolman's trees.
Normally, a student who could cut down a tree with a single sword stroke would be called a darling of talent and have the heir apparent's seat locked up.
In that sense, most of the participants in this exam were below Adam's baseline.
Except for the man who'd just attacked from inside the cabin.
"Ether, did you see the man in the cabin earlier?"
Ether narrowed her eyes and glared at the cabin.
"He killed instantly with nothing but a thrust, and not a drop of blood splattered. It was clean enough to use as a textbook example."
"...You could see that? It's at least 50 meters away."
"It's blurry, but I can roughly see the marks."
For people in this world who wielded a sword with any skill, that seemed to be the baseline.
Adam recalled the appearance of the man in the cabin.
The average age for the exam was from the late teens to the early 20s.
Adam and Ether were on the younger side even among them.
That man, on the other hand, was in his late 20s.
When he'd put his sword away, Adam had caught a glimpse: the blade was kept razor-sharp, but the scabbard was rusted, showing clear signs of the years.
"He's a veteran adventurer. He's probably the favorite to win, isn't he? That type often fights even with a gap in mana."
"I think so too."
"Then should we give up?"
"No."
Adam refused flatly.
The spoils were doping potions and 5 number tags, no less.
It effectively meant that catching just one warrior would mean passing right away.
How was he supposed to hold back from that?
Of course, the cabin warrior had the advantage of terrain, but the moment they'd pinpointed his location, the initiative was on their side too.
In that sense, letting that slide would make him no man at all.
"Can't you ambush him with magic or something?"
"Actually, the very first thing I thought of was blowing the whole place up."
"Ohh! If that works, it'd be perfect!"
"But my magic's range is way too wide. I could blow him away with a single explosive sphere, but then the number tags might burn up."
It was one of the explosion magic circle's few drawbacks.
Can't be used in tight spaces.
Fine adjustment impossible.
Pure destruction-specialized magic was about as inconvenient as magic could get in actual combat.
Ether looked troubled.
"The explosive spheres... If they have good firepower, can't you narrow the range?"
"It's hard to finely adjust the range so it won't burn the number tags."
"Then......."
'Then what am I supposed to do?' rose up to the back of Ether's throat.
But what could he do?
There was no such thing as perfect magic in the world.
In any case, the opponent was a veteran adventurer who'd been through thick and thin.
On this side, an Arcanist who couldn't even use his magic.
In a do-or-die situation with the retreat cut off, Adam showed a stroke of brilliant wit.
"Miss Ether, a fight doesn't always need strategy and ambushes."
"You're the one who came up with the ambushes and schemes, Adam?"
"A knight always lives with a burning heart in his chest. We touch that nerve."
"No, what do you mean—"
Adam sprang to his feet.
And then walked right up to the cabin with confident strides.
Ether's expression was dyed with shock.
It was a plan that threw away their one and only advantage of the initiative.
***
Adam walked confidently toward the cabin.
He'd left Ether to scout the other bushes around them.
If there happened to be another mage preparing to snipe, his own head might get a hole in it before he could even try to make a deal.
Fortunately, there were no hidden troops nearby, so he set foot in the cabin's front yard at ease.
'New prey walking in on its own two feet.'
After spotting Adam, the cabin warrior smacked his lips.
He seemed completely fooled.
Now all the cabin warrior had to do was catch that one, and he'd pass.
But contrary to the warrior's expectations, Adam, whom he'd taken for some idiot nobody, spoke to him first.
"You there, cabin warrior."
"......."
"I know you're in there. Hurry up and come out and make a deal with me."
The cabin warrior deliberated.
If he knows, why is he walking up so boldly?
Is he just fishing?
Just as his brain was spinning fast, Adam made the first move.
"Hey, come out already. If you don't come out, I'll just kill you right away."
"......."
"You'd better come out, you know? Honestly, I could burn you to death on the spot right now. But then the number tags would burn up. So I'm saying let's make a deal."
The warrior snorted at the laughable provocation.
You can kill me? Then you should've killed me already.
Go ahead and kill me. Go ahead.
"This bastard doesn't believe me."
The warrior snickered and readjusted his grip on his sword hilt, as if to say he'd never come out.
KA-BOOM—!
The eyes of the warrior, who'd been watching with a smirk, went wide.
A pillar of blue fire shot up on the other side of the window, and with a thunderous roar the whole forest shook as if screaming.
The shock made even the cabin lurch, and the warrior nearly went rolling across the floor.
In the middle of that chaos, Adam calmly went on, hands clasped behind his back.
"Hey, I said come out! I'm not joking, you know? The next zone to blow is the cabin! The cabin, folks! Accept the deal, and there won't be any bloodshed!"
A cold sweat formed at the cabin warrior's temples.
Unlike the playful, cheesy spiel, the explosion just now had been real.
In 10 years of living as an adventurer, he'd never even heard of magic with such brute power existing.
Magic usually resembled its caster's temperament.
A guy who poured out that insane firepower couldn't possibly be sane.
He might actually wipe me out regardless of passing points.
Realizing he had no choice, the warrior reluctantly opened the door.
"What's the proposal?"
"Let's make a deal. What I want is number tags. So let's duel fairly with the number tags on the line. The winner takes the number tags."
"A mage and a warrior fighting?"
"Yeah, I'm saying let's go one-on-one with our fists."
For a moment, the warrior doubted his ears.
A mage proposing to throw away weapons and fight with fists: this was a genuinely crazy bastard.
No risking his life, and if he beat a mage, he'd pass immediately?
The other side must have something in mind, but even if there were hidden troops, there wouldn't be many applicants with as much combat power as him.
It was a proposal he had no reason to refuse.
"Fine. Let's go somewhere without people."
***
The two left the cabin and went into the forest.
Two men side by side in the middle of a forest with no people.
It was a setup that truly called to mind a school-days fistfight.
The warrior, having lightly warmed up, smiled nastily.
He's still just a mage.
A goody-two-shoes mage who reads books all day is going to beat a 10-year adventurer? Not a chance.
Adam also warmed up in silence.
A 10-year former slave.
On top of that, thanks to his recent mountain-hermit life, his body was as conditioned as any adventurer's.
His bones were thick, so he had no talent for flashy swordsmanship, but when it came to beating people up, he had a philosophy of his own.
When Adam stripped off his shirt as a taunt, the other side took off his shirt too, and the match began.
In that instant, the warrior flinched at the sight of Adam's body.
It was a body far too scarred for a mage.
Adam, too, marveled at his opponent's body.
His belly sagged like a middle-aged man's, but his chest muscles and taut lats were a work of art.
'Looks like defense is the way to go for now.'
When Adam raised his guard, a fierce barrage came pouring in immediately.
Shin kicks, grabbing him by the collar and throwing him, even pulling his arm to bite it.
Practical techniques learned against magic beasts assailed Adam.
A one-sided beating.
But Adam's stance didn't crumble.
'Would you look at that?'
Even as he struck, the warrior felt puzzled.
He was letting the impact flow off through his solid traps, but this was pure willpower holding out.
Even getting pounded like a sandbag, the light in his eyes didn't die.
If not for his mana protection, the warrior's fists would have started stinging first.
The warrior had the overwhelming advantage in the fight.
But Adam's true strength was his ferocious endurance.
The two didn't exchange a single word. But they shared the same thought.
Time to end this.
The warrior swung his leg wide to seal the win.
A crescent kick with enough power that blocking alone couldn't stop it.
As big as the motion was, it left an opening where his stance broke.
That was when it happened.
Adam, who'd only been hunkered down, made his first move.
He charged straight ahead and dove into the warrior's guard.
With the distance closed, the warrior's kick cut through empty air, and Adam's fist struck the warrior square on the jaw.
"Kuh!"
Because he'd hit with pure muscle alone, it didn't quite cause a concussion, but it was enough.
One moment of carelessness invited defeat.
The moment both of them sensed which way the fight had gone, the warrior's eyes rolled over with injustice and shame as he thought.
'What is this, a kids' game... Losing to fistfighting!'
He pulled out a dagger he'd hidden behind his trousers.
"Isn't that cowardly?"
"Hahaha! What's so strange about a warrior using a blade?"
"Fair enough."
Adam nodded in agreement.
If anything, his opinion of the warrior went up.
Because he'd been thinking the exact same thing, which meant the man probably had the same moral compass as Adam.
Plop.
An explosive sphere he'd prepared in his pocket struck the warrior square on the head.
And then.
KA-BOOM—!
A small explosion concentrated on a single point burned up the warrior.
The reason the flames were smaller than usual was that Adam had carved a magic circle on the sphere right before the fight.
-Concentrate the explosion and flames on a single point.
By concentrating the damage on a single point, he'd naturally succeeded in reducing the range.
The reason he'd suggested a fistfight, too, was to make the man take off his shirt so the number tag wouldn't burn when he used the explosive sphere.
The result was a huge success.
"Kuh!"
The man, engulfed in flames, collapsed with smoke pouring from his mouth.
"Y-you bastard......."
"I win, right?"
"Damn bastard... Fair and square, my ass."
Looking down at him, Adam spoke.
"What's so strange about an Arcanist using magic?"
The warrior squeezed his eyes shut and weakly let his head drop to the ground.
"You barely won, huh?"
Ether appeared, her black hood pulled low.
"You startled me. I nearly thought you'd lose. Well, if it looked like you were going to lose, I'd have come out."
"There weren't any applicants hiding?"
"There were, but I chased them off."
Adam's gaze was stolen by Ether's shoulder.
Wet fresh blood that seemed to have splattered just now was still vividly there.
'She didn't chase them off. She cut them down and came back.'
As the two of them chatted leisurely, the warrior came to and shouted, gasping for breath.
"I! I'm going to pass!"
"......."
"I'm sick of adventuring, risking my life! I wanted to live well, eating well and dressing well at the Palace!"
"You're after success?"
"Isn't that obvious? Can you say you're not?"
"For me it's money. I need a lot of mana stones."
"Then you're the same!"
The warrior slowly got to his feet.
There was a hole in his chest, and blood was dripping from it.
"I lived as a slave my whole life, then became an adventurer, and now I can finally get into the Palace! An Imperial knight, even if the Empire falls, just being from the Palace means that when you sell out the country, they pay you enough to live idle for the rest of your life......! Whether the country goes under or I go under, I could live stably for the rest of my life now......."
The warrior, a dagger in one hand, leapt lightly.
Thanks to his supple body, he closed the distance in an instant.
That speed was beyond what Adam, an Arcanist, could follow with the naked eye, so he ended up leaving an opening.
Slash.
But his dagger didn't reach Adam.
"......."
The warrior's neck, half cut through, dangled.
It was where Ether's sword had swept past.
In Adam's eyes, Ether's sword looked like three swords for a moment; it was a wondrous swordsmanship.
"Y-you, you, you bitch... How. Your stage is......."
"Even the Empire has no need for a man like you."
"How......."
The man couldn't finish his words and fell backward.
"Don't think you'll get to die comfortably after declaring you'd sell out the country."
Ether cut the warrior's not-yet-severed neck once more, severing it completely.
She rolled the head that had dropped with a dull thud and kicked it into the bushes with a thwack.
"That means I pulled my weight, right?"
"Yes......."
Her hat was pulled low so he couldn't see, but her lips, just barely visible, were smiling at the fact that he'd acknowledged her.
"Let's get along from now on."
"I want to get along too!"
It was the moment the average warrior in Adam's mind went up.