The Unrecorded Extra



"Listen," I began, clapping my hands to gather my team's attention. "We have two options, either we go offensive or defensive."

Noticing no one seemed to want to say something, I continued.

"If we go offensive, we have to leave our base with at least two people, the rest will search for the enemy's flag and take it away."

"What if we stay defensive?" Niah asked.

"If we stay defensive, then we will stay here. Waiting for the other team to come by themselves to our base. Probably three to four will roam around, and if that was to happen we will get the number advantage."

Ember raised her hand, but kept it at a moderate height, with her fingertips reaching the same level as the top of her head.

I slightly raised my eyebrow at her gesture.

"Yes, Ember? Do you wanna say something?"

She nodded calmly. "I want to go offensive."

"Me too!!" Niah and Hulio followed along.

I shifted my attention toward Enzo who was already sitting on the ground as soon as we arrived here. 

Noticing my gaze, he shook his head and then yawned as he leaned on the nearby tree.

As I glanced back at the three individuals who voted for the offensive approach, I inquired, "Why do you want to go for offensive tactics?"

Niah and Hulio quickly averted their gaze, displaying restlessness and occasionally seeking support from Ember through stolen glances.

Observing their reaction, I let out a sigh.

Eventually, I shifted my attention toward Ember, who appeared ready to share her thought.

"For evaluation. The earlier we act, the more time we have for demonstrating our skills to get a higher grading."

As soon as she uttered those words, both Niah and Hulio abruptly made approving noises. "Yes, yes. That's it! We want to get a high rating for this exam!"

"You do know that we have two hours for the exam time limit, right?" I asked.

"Yes, and?" The two low-rankings cocked their head to the side. Ember stared at me silently.

Just as I said before, there were two options that a team could choose on how to play this exam game for the first 60 minutes.

Offensive or defensive.

If a team chose to be offensive, they basically played a search-and-destroy game mode. They would search for another team's flag, then steal and keep it for 5 minutes to make the opponent team out of the game.

The other case was if a team chose to be defensive. They would play a tower defense game mode except that they couldn't build a tower or defensive utility to stop the enemy's advance.

Well, though I could say that in general, this exam game was more like Capture The Flag mode but the participating teams wouldn't be limited only to two opposing teams but a hundred. A combination of Battle Royale and Capture A Flag I would say.

In my opinion, an offensive approach would be harder than a defensive tactic. Why? Because of the 5 minutes countdown to keep the stolen flag. 

Five minutes are not a short time you know? Especially when you also need to fight the team flag owner.

Not to mention that the offensive team would be outnumbered because they had to split their number.

That was what I wanted to tell these three who voted for the offensive tactic but, I thought that it might be interesting if they figured out the difficulty by themselves. Might as well serve as their lesson for getting too ambitious.

"You know what. Just do what you like. Enzo and I will try to defend our team's flag here while you guys seek the enemy team's flag," I said dismissively.

"Really?!" Niah surprised. "Will you two be okay?"

"If you are worried then why don't you just stay here with us?"

"Eek– I, I am just asking…"

I sighed. "We will be okay. There may be only three to four people who will try to steal our flag. I think we can handle it, right, Enzo?"

Enzo just nodded, seemingly not caring about what I just said.

Well, anyway, I was confident I could protect the flag!

With that, our team was split into two divisions. 

The attacker division: Ember Crimson, Niah Hayes, Hulio Lio.

The defender division: Zio Varrez, Enzo Ruiz.

My gaze followed the attacker division until they disappeared from my sight.

Once they were gone to the thick of the forest, I approached the flag positioned near the tree where Enzo was enjoying his nap.

My hand reached for the flagpole, trying to pull it up but failed.

I observed the flag, my eyes searching for something, and eventually found what I looked for on the flagpole stand.

An indicator.

The indicator lit a red light, indicating that the lock was active.

The flag had a sensor, it could identify who tried to pull it. And this flag was designed so the members of the team that owned the flag couldn't pull it out from the flagpole stand. Only the enemy team could do it.

But…

Remember what I said that defensive tactic was the best choice for the first 60 minutes? It was because of this locked flag.

In the first 60 minutes, the flag's owner couldn't pull their flag. But, after 60 minutes had passed, the indicator would light green color, indicating the flagpole stand was unlocked and we could finally bring the flag around.

Yes. That's what I'm going to do.

Holding my ground for 60 minutes. Once the lock was unlocked, I would bring the flag around and regroup with the other members. It was then that the offensive tactic would be viable because we didn't need to worry about leaving our flag in its original position as the flag would be with us all the time.

Smirking, I leaned on the tree next to Enzo's.

"Looks like you noticed the indicator on the flagpole stand," Enzo said as soon as I settled in my relaxing position.

"Sure, I do. How about you? Since when did you notice it?"

"I already noticed it as soon as we arrived. In one glance."

Hoho.

This was unexpected.