Squad 582's first-place finish in the maze assessment shocked every candidate. Among them, the Magical Girl "Little Brocade," specifically mentioned by the chief examiner, drew even more attention. All the candidates were asking: Who was Little Brocade?
Whether on the widely circulated Carry Ranking or within the candidates' usual social circles, there was practically no one known as "Little Brocade." This unusual first-place winner seemed as though she had sprung from a crack in the rocks, leaving everyone puzzled.
Of course, to the spectators in the viewing stands, this result was not particularly surprising.
Rather, from the latter half of the assessment onward—when Little Brocade suddenly discovered an unconventional use for her Magic Armament and came up with the idea of skipping class by passing through walls—she had already become the focus of many spectators.
It was not as though nobody had questioned it. Doubts such as, "Isn't this cheating?" had reached the chief examiner's ears, and some had even argued that she should be deemed unqualified. However, that proposal was ultimately not carried out.
From the perspective of the Examination Institute's examiners, Little Brocade's actions undoubtedly fell into a gray area. What she had done had not caused any substantive damage to the maze and violated no explicit rules. But if they truly wanted to pursue the matter, they could also stop her under the vague pretext of "disrupting examination order."
The reason such a debatable matter reached a consensus so quickly was not merely because the chief examiner and several colleagues had studied the assessment rules together and concluded that the candidate's actions "exploited a loophole in the rules, for which the Examination Institute bore responsibility." It was also because Little Brocade's actions had caused a slight disturbance.
Some spectators seated high in the viewing stands heard laughter