Soon, Simon and Luxuria stepped out of an elevator on the third floor and into a large room with a single reception desk.

Sitting behind the desk was a decrepit old man, who was busy snoozing away. But when the two entered the floor, he lazily opened his eyes.

“Eh? Luxuria, you personally bought a new guy in? Who is this?” he asked in a hoarse voice upon seeing the two walk in.

“Keeper Soteris, I have brought Simon here with me to view the collection.” Luxuria replied, in a tone that was neither arrogant nor humble.

“Alright then. Go ahead and let me know when it's done.” the man said with a nod, waving his hands and once again closing his eyes. Within moments, he was already snoring again.

Suddenly, Luxuria and Simon found themselves within a vast room with endless shelves of various artifacts and precious items. None of these items were emanating an aura, but with a single glance, anyone could tell that they were special.

-----

Soon, Simon had made his rounds within the Veracity Hall. Including the Study and the Storage Room, which had thousands of rare materials and artifacts up for trade. There were also numerous floors of sparring arenas and spaces in which courses and demonstrations took place within this building as well.

Allegedly, the Divinity Hall within the Veracity World was also a replica of the real place, which was merely part of the main headquarters. Thus, the items and manuals within the building were all real items stored away within the real world. However, the main headquarters was a well hidden place; Simon had nowhere near the authority to know its location.

Still, it was easily enough to convince him to give it his all to perform within the organization. After all, from what he had seen, the Veracity team possessed the foundations to become one of the hegemonies of the new age of magic. At the very least, allying himself to such an organization would not be unwise.

....

Currently, Simon was standing within a simple and dark room with three figures sitting in front of him. All of these figures exuded a unique aura of strength. And these auras… were actually auras which could only be omitted from mages.

Of the three figures, Luxuria was among them, along with a young man with sunken eyes and an elegant, inquisitive looking lady.

Luxuria suddenly cleared his throat and gestured to the two figures around him, saying, “Allow me to introduce you to your future superiors. The lady to my right is Veturia, and the fellow to my left is Tycho. Both of them have the same authority as myself as members of the Occult Sector of the Research Team. Unfortunately, the other three are not available, but I trust you’ll meet them soon.”

“Right, then.” Simon nodded in acknowledgement. So these were his future bosses.

Sure enough, each had a distinguished aura which suggested that they were at least of the second star core.

“Then, to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?” he asked in a somewhat respectful tone. He was naturally quite confused. After all, Luxuria had led him to this room after the tour without saying a word; a mere meeting with his bosses did not warrant such a dramatic scene.

Veturia glanced at Simon before answering simply, “Here, we will test your capabilities and answer any questions that you have.”

“Oh I see, so that’s why I was brought here.” he nodded expressionlessly, this made sense. “So when do we start?”

Simon had expected a test for a while now, and had therefore prepared extensively for one.

Veturia chuckled, before waving her hand. As Simon’s vision darkened, he could faintly hear, “Seeing as you are so straight forward, it shall start right now!”

...

All of a sudden, Simon’s vision returned and he was now within a gigantic dimly lit arena.

He blinked while looking at his surroundings. ‘Right, this is their Virtual World, after all...’

The Arena that he was within was made entirely of stone bricks, with torches lining the sides, providing a modicum of brightness. As for its dimensions, it was easily five hundred meters in both length and width in a circular shape.

Opposite to him was a large cage. And within this cage, a fierce blue lizard which was easily twenty meters long resided and silently stared at him.

Luxuria’s voice suddenly sounded from one of the seats above the Arena. “Welcome to this first stage of the test. We will be watching you, and you are free to utilize any methods that you know of to deal with the lizard. If you require a weapon or materials of any sort to display your capabilities, just ask.”

Hearing this, Simon paused for a moment, regaining his bearings, before nodding towards the direction of the stands. “I don’t require anything for dealing with this beast. I am ready at any time.”

“Understood.” said Luxuria’s voice from above.

All of a sudden, the cage disappeared around this lizard, and it immediately ran towards Simon with menacing red eyes.

‘Based on its aura, it should be a frost-attributed lizard type beast barely at the first Mana Core. No problem.’ Simon thought with a nod as he calmly stared at the lizard running towards him.

As the lizard rapidly approached, he stood still, seemingly ignoring its presence. Only when it reached Simon did he move.

Swoosh!

With a single fluid movement, Simon abruptly sidestepped the charging lizard and lopped off its head with a flick of his flame imbued hand.

His movements were so fast that it hadn’t even seemed as if he had moved. Rather, it seemed as if he had blurred and appeared to the side of the lizard, who simultaneously had its head lopped off.

A mere beast with a singular star core was not even close to his match.

“Well done. The next stage will begin shortly.” Luxuria’s calm voice reverberated within the stadium.

All of a sudden, the corpse of the lizard dissolved into shards of light and yet another cage appeared where the old one once was. At the same time, Simon felt the mana in the environment replenishing his own stores of mana without his own input; within moments, what little mana that he expended was restored.

‘Sure enough, what Luxuria claimed was not false.’ Simon thought with a nod. This mana was truly efficacious, and would likely be worth every contribution point paid for them if he wished to buy some. After noting the effects of the mana here, he then turned to the cage that had just appeared.

Within this cage, there were actually a trio of spiders with menacing auras. Seeing this, he was somewhat startled. ‘Three beasts with a Star Core?’

But then Simon quickly shrugged it off. Although three beasts with a Star Cores was indeed much stronger than a singular beast with a single Star Core, he would have eventually encountered a fight as difficult as this anyways. It just so happened that winning this fight was at about the level of strength that Simon wanted to display - enough to barely defeat three beasts with a Star Core.

After all, defeating these three creatures would likely make him appear as if he were monstrously talented. However, if he were to win harder fights than this, it would only arouse suspicion.

“The beasts will be released in five seconds.” Luxuria suddenly stated from above.

“Understood.” Simon nodded solemnly while staring at the beasts within the cage.

When five seconds passed, the cage disappeared and the three spiders immediately crawled out.

Each of these spiders were easily 5 meters wide and 3 meters tall, with sharp jaws and venomous glands. And as bonafide beasts of the first Star Core, their bodies were extremely nimble and hard, and their venoms would definitely be potent.

This time around, Simon could not be careless and he immediately burst into action. He took a deep breath and began carrying out a series of movements, which seemed to bend the world around him.

Not soon after, swiveling wind blades reminiscent of autumn leaves continuously appeared behind his back.

One blade, two, five, ten…

Soon enough, when the spiders were only twenty meters from Simon, twenty four swiveling blades of air had already formed behind him!

With cold eyes which sparkled with green energy, Simon waved his hand.

‘Release!’

Swoosh!

The twenty four blades of air simultaneously shot forwards and to the legs of the spiders at a terrifying speed!

Each of the spiders nimbly avoided the blades of wind. However, none of them managed to do so thoroughly. Of the three, two had half of their legs cut off, reducing their mobility by a large chunk, while the other had received a large cut on its abdomen.

But now, they had managed to reach the vulnerable looking Simon!

Hiss!

With enraged hisses, the three spiders immediately surrounded Simon, shooting near invisible jets of a blue liquid towards him.

Like an acrobat, Simon calmly and swiftly avoided these jets of liquid, maneuvering between the streams of venom. Not a moment later, twenty four shining lights suddenly appeared at the edge of Simon’s vision, and his eyes suddenly gleamed...

Swoosh!

The bodies of the three spiders suddenly burst open simultaneously, causing their insides to explode in a morbid display of flesh and blood.

When Simon once again landed on the ground, he hurriedly leapt away from where he once stood, which was now covered in pools of venom before falling to a knee.

“Whew!” Simon sighed in relief and ‘took a deep breath’. However, beneath his facade of difficulty, he was inwardly smiling.

While the spiders were preoccupied with shooting him down, the wind blades that Simon had shot out earlier had all returned and caught the spiders off guard, shredding their bodies and killing them in an instant. Following this event, he was exhausted and void of energy.

This much was obvious from watching his performance.

However, that was based on his performance... In reality, this spell had not even used a third of his mana reserves, and he was not actually exhausted! Only, if this fact were to be known, it would surely arouse suspicion from his superiors.

…

Meanwhile, on the stands above…

“He’s not bad at all. What do you say, Tycho?” said the elegant lady, who was gazing downwards with interest.

“Not bad, he does have potential. But this is his limit.” Tycho said in a low voice, expressionless as always as he looked downwards.

Luxuria chuckled and shook his head. “Cynical as always, Tycho. But he is indeed quite impressive. Especially his insights regarding nature, the motion of those wind blades contain frighteningly deep insights.”

Veturia nodded. “His insights into nature are truly worthy of praise. Well, I suppose the combat section of the test is concluded for now.”

…

As Simon stood up from the ground, with mana once again streaming into his body, he suddenly found himself back in the original room seated in front of Veturia, Tycho, and Luxuria.

“Now that the combat section has been concluded, you will now begin the main course, which is the research trial. The trial will account for your strengths and weaknesses on its own, and will formulate a profile outlining your abilities. Of course, as your case is rather special, we can make exceptions. You tell us, what do you think would work best?” Luxuria asked Simon with a chuckle, after allowing him to regain his bearings.

Simon pondered over how to reply for a moment. It was indeed true that he had joined through a recommendation, and not through his research abilities. However, as an ex-farming genius, he had practically researched agriculture and magic for most of his life. How could he possibly be an inept researcher?

“Actually, I think taking the research trial will be fine.” Simon replied, inwardly grinning ruefully. What a joke. Even if he were ten times worse at research, he would still be a qualified researcher!

“Very well. Do you wish to start now?” Luxuria asked.

“Yes!” Simon did not hesitate to reply.