The silence on that trail was deafening.

"So no one came here because they thought it was prohibited? A few participants saw us, right?" Mathias asked.

He was sure that the hunters conducting the exam had seen them and said nothing, but what about the other participants?

Damian, having better senses, knew that a few participants had seen them too.

"They did. I saw two of them on the second-floor windows staring at us. Soon, this information will spread, and others might come here to check. If this is the right place to go, we must find it quickly," Damian said, looking around for anything useful.

The trail was basically a muddy road with packed vegetation around them. It went somewhat into the forest, but then it turned, keeping itself close to the hotel, kind of circling around it.

Both Damian and Mathias kept looking at everything, trying to spot something. Damian even used his Demon Eye—he still had the eyepatch on—to make things even sharper for them.

However, there was nothing. At least, they didn't see anything.

"Let's walk through it again," Damian said.

After circling around the hotel one time, they did it again. Nothing.

Two times circling the hotel to find nothing. It was frustrating, for sure. Damian was certain that there would be something on that trail.

"Was I wrong?" he thought.

The trail had been a guess, but Damian was confident it would give them results.

"Again," he said.

This time, the third time they were exploring the trail, things were different. They were not alone anymore.

Two participants were also exploring the trail with them.

It looked like they were searching for things, just like Damian and Mathias.

The word had spread quickly, for sure. Though Damian expected more people to show up there. Maybe it was the fact that he and Mathias had been searching the trail multiple times with no result? That might have made the others think there was nothing there in the end.

Damian walked toward them."Hey," he said, "can we talk?"

Both participants were girls, who appeared to be friendly, but Damian knew better than to trust just the looks.

One of them, a short girl with glasses and pink hair, smiled and said, "Of course we can."

It was a good start. At least they were willing to talk.

Damian explained how he had tried to explore the trail and realized that no hunter had stopped him, so that made him think there might be something there. Yet, after exploring it two times, he hadn't found anything.

The short girl said, "And did you only look on the trail? What about the forest around us?"

Damian thought about that, but going deeper into the forest would make them move further away from the hotel, and that might not be ideal. But the girl had asked that because she clearly had something in mind.

"From the window on the upper floors, I spotted a hunter in the forest. The hunter was standing still, like he was there to block anyone from going further into the woods. But there was still a portion of forest to explore before arriving at where the hunter was," the girl said.

Well, that was for sure good information to have. With it, Damian felt confident they could explore more parts of the trail.

"So, what do you say we work together to find out more?" Damian suggested. "Nothing said we can't work together, right?"

It was the same principle Damian and Mathias had been following. Working together might be the best thing to do.

Neither of the girls opposed the idea."We could. Let's start exploring the area where I saw the hunter."

They didn't spread out too much to cover more ground. The reason for that was simple—they wanted to stay close to one another. Neither duo trusted the other completely, and that was okay. After all, they had just met.

So, instead of staying on the road, they jumped over the wooden fence and entered the forest.

The forest wasn't that dense, so it was easy to walk through it and also see further ahead.

Mathias looked a little worried. "Are you sure that girl saw a hunter in the forest? What if she's lying to us?"

Damian could understand why he felt that way. If she was lying, they might get into trouble with the hunters—but the chance of that was really low.

"I don't think that, even if we're not allowed to be here, they'll disqualify us from the exam. Remember the hunters we saw going underground? They'll just give us a warning."

The examiners certainly wanted to cut down the number of participants, since they could only issue so many hunter IDs. But that didn't mean they could just disqualify people without a good reason.

A process like this had rules, and Damian strongly believed they would be safe.

Anyway, they walked in pairs as they explored the forest. The two girls weren't right beside them—like, really close—but they stayed near enough to keep each other in sight, just to be safe.

Damian and Mathias liked the way they were handling the search. It gave them confidence that no one would try anything funny.

It didn't take long for Damian to realize they were heading in the right direction. With his Demon Eye activated, he noticed faint traces of mana left behind by the hunters who had organized the test.

That meant the hunters had been here doing something. Even back in the hotel, Damian couldn't see their mana like this. It was almost as if they had deliberately left those traces for participants with the skill to track them.

Damian leaned toward Mathias and whispered, "I think this is the right area. Pay attention."

Not long after he said that, the girls came over, both smiling."We saw you whispering to each other. Did you find something?"

"Maybe," Damian replied. "I think I found some traces of mana around here. It's worth taking a closer look."

Both girls looked surprised. "Traces of mana? How can you even see that?"

After asking that, the girls quickly realized how absurd their question had been.

"I'm sorry for even asking. Well, let's take a look around this area then."

Damian was glad they didn't push it any further. He had no intention of explaining.

They walked for a couple more minutes before finding something—or rather, Damian found it.One of the trees carried a heavy concentration of mana traces, both around its trunk and on the ground in front of it.

"I think there's something here," Damian said.

He walked over to the tree and started digging with his bare hands.

"A box!" the girls exclaimed.

Buried right in front of the tree was, indeed, a box. Damian pulled it out, brushed off the dirt, and looked at everyone.

"Should we open it now?"

They all agreed. Damian lifted the lid. Inside was a key and a folded piece of paper.

The note was small, with only a few words written on it:

"Search the obvious place."

That was it.

"What now?" Mathias asked. "What are we even supposed to do with this key?"

The key was obviously meant to open something, but they had no idea what or where.

"Let's search for another box," Damian said. "If this is the only place where we can get the answers for the test, then there must be more boxes—one for each duo."

They scoured the forest, checking every corner they were allowed to reach, but found no more traces of mana, no more buried boxes.

"Maybe there are boxes in other parts of the hotel?" one of the girls suggested. "It would make sense, right? We can't be the only ones passing the test."

Damian thought the same. Especially with more participants arriving the next day, it was clear this test wasn't going to be as straightforward as they had first believed.

"Let's head back," he said. "We can spread out and look for a place to use this key."

That was the only option they had for now. Damian slipped the key and note into his pocket and started back toward the hotel.

On the trail, they crossed paths with two more duos searching along the road. When those participants saw Damian and the others coming out of the forest, their expressions tightened.They were clearly thinking: How the hell did they get into the forest?

Damian ignored them and kept walking. Back at the hotel, he and Mathias split up, just as the two girls did.

But the words on the note wouldn't leave his mind.

"What should be an obvious place in this hotel?"

Those words gave him a direction to follow, for sure, but they were so vague that he had no idea where to actually start.

The first "obvious place" that came to mind was his own room in the hotel, so that was where he headed first.

As he walked down the hallway, passing the rows of doors, two participants suddenly stepped in front of him. Their intent was clear from their faces—it wasn't a friendly encounter.

"What did you find in the forest?" one of them asked.

The other pulled out a dagger.

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