All the four coordinators came in Snow’s direction, with a serious look on their face.
"Snow, we would suggest you not participate in this test," the Coordinator of Class A, Miss Lumina, said, looking straight into her eyes.
"We can neither force you to participate nor make you stay back. Decision is up to you," the Coordinator of Class B, Mr. Rick added.
"No, I’ll take the test."
She said it flatly, without a single trace of hesitation, her spine straightening.
Four coordinators standing in a row, hadn’t managed to move her an inch.
Snow had made up her mind, and that was something even Prince couldn’t stop her from participating.
After a while, a mage covered in white robe stepped forward and created a large teleportation circle that covered the entire assembly.
’This damn girl!’ Prince thought.
Once they reached the island, the very first thought that came to his mind.
’I won’t let her go outside the green zone. As long as students are inside the green zones, monsters will not attack them.’
Miss Lumina shook her head at Prince.
The chirping of birds could be heard easily from there. The Island was far bigger than a normal one, and the centre area was covered with the large forest. All four directions had one green zone.
Flags would be found inside the forest. Even so, it wasn’t easy to find a single flag.
Not a long time ago, Prince asked Lumina to do something for him.
’I asked her to give me the location of all three white flags.’
’If Kale can cheat, so why can’t I, in a good way?’
She mentioned all three white flags’ locations in a small paper and passed it to Prince last night through his room’s windows.
He intentionally put his hands inside his pocket, just to check whether that small piece of paper was still inside his pocket or not.
All four classes separated from their coordinators and went to their allotted green zone.
The south area of the island was allotted to Class A, North to Class B, East to Class C, and the West to Class D.
Class A started a discussion. No, it was more of a plan about the test.
Yella Vel, daughter of the academy’s principal, took the lead. "I have a plan! Let’s split Class A into four groups."
"Two of them will be defensive. Defense Group 1 (D1), and Defense Group 2 (D2), and their whole job is keeping our people safe."
"The third group will handle scouting and collecting: they’ll search for red flags specifically with D1 team, and hand off anything they find to whoever’s holding the green zone."
"I put D1 with the scouting team to fight against the monsters, or enemy students, if needed."
"The fourth group stays put inside the green zone itself, guarding whatever flags we’ve already gathered, since only flags physically inside our zone actually count toward our score."
"And listen, enemy teams don’t need a flag in hand to cause trouble. They can dive straight into our green zone empty handed and try to steal our flags, so D2 needs to treat every unfamiliar face that wanders in as a threat."
It was, annoyingly, a genuinely solid plan, the kind of thing Prince might have come up with himself, if he’d spent less time in strategy lessons plotting regicide in the margins of his notebook.
As her long speech ended, Prince let out a sigh, and immediately caught a sharp glare from Snow.
"Oh, and I almost forgot to mention, if you find any enemy flags along the way, take them with you and hide them inside our green zone."
Everyone agreed with her plan.
"Let’s divide ourselves into groups then." Aiden looked excited.
Prince was the one to speak first. "Okay so, I will be in D2 and protect the group inside the green zone. And Snow will be inside the green zone team."
She instantly shook her head, and said without looking at him. "No. I’ll find flags!"
’...!’
"Ok then, I’ll be in D1." Prince didn’t argue, nor did he push his own wishes any further.
He wasn’t doing this out of some deep love or obsession for Snow, at least, that’s what he told himself.
He was just trying his best to change her fate, so that she could live her fullest in this timeline.
He knew what exactly would happen to Snow in this test.
After a short while, class A divided themselves into 4 groups.
Yella Vel was in the group of D1 with other students. And five students were in the group who will stay inside the green zone.
Snow Quen was interested in finding flags with 11 more students. Prince and Aiden were in the defensive group.
They finished deciding, and a red flare lit up the sky. It was the signal to begin.
As soon as the test started, Prince quickly entered the deep forest all alone.
He yanked out the note paper from his pocket and started finding the white flags instead.
Three locations, memorized down to the smallest detail after reading them over a dozen times the night before.
If this worked the way he’d planned, Class A would have a two-flag advantage before most other classes had even found their first red one.