Finally, the long-awaited time of the hunt had arrived. Strangely, earlier that very morning, a message had been delivered to every first-year cadet with a peculiar and unsettling instruction: they were not to bring any equipment or special clothing with them.
This was an incredibly senile thing for each student to read, and it left a sour taste in their mouths. The implications were far from subtle. They had always suspected the military was eager to make them stronger—by any means necessary—but sending them off to a foreign planet without so much as a blade or armor? That wasn't just negligence; that was outright lunacy. It was like being handed a suicide note, signed and sealed by command.
