In a large room, several hundred hunter applicants were awaiting the arrival of the exam proctor to begin the first phase of their exam. While the journey to become a hunter would be long and perilous, each of these people were willing to risk their lives for the benefits that being a hunter would entail. However, only a handful of them would earn the right to the profession. Each phase would weed out the weaker members of the crowd, leaving only the strongest to survive.

Currently, there were 510 applicants in the room, each of them with their own pin to signify the order at which they arrived. One such applicant stood out from the rest, not because he was particularly impressive, not because he gripped a pickaxe in his hand, not even because he was no older than twelve years old! No, this young lad stood out simply because of how awful he smelled! None of the people could even tolerate standing next to him, choosing to avoid him at all costs, leading to an abundance of space around him. Even then, the boy appeared oblivious as to why people refused to speak to him, craning his neck in confusion. This boy was none other than Eustace Bell, otherwise known as applicant number 512!

"I wonder why everyone here's actin' all funny? Did I do something wrong?" He wondered aloud. This odd behavior had been happening from the moment he had arrived at the scene. His nose had grown so used to the stench from rummaging through garbage that he was barely even bothered by it. This, of course, lead to some very troubling situations when he was traveling. At one point, Eustace was even ignored by an entire town of people! Only a kind person's recommendation to bathe at a nearby hotspring solved the issue, but the lesson hadn't yet stuck. Clearly, he was much too used to life back home. After all, he had only even left about a month ago.

As if in response to his rhetorical question, something struck him in the back of the head. Not with the kind of force to do him any real harm, but enough to sting for a minute or two. It clanked to the ground with metallic sound and rolled around to and settled about his feet. a small aerosol can that said 'Stank-away' on it. It was shortly followed by a exasperated voice from the same direction it had been flung from. "It's because you stink like a corpse!" said a young, clearly feminine voice. "Maybe if you empty that whole can of deodorant on yourself you'll smell approachable at least."

The can of body spray and the blunt words came from a young girl. Pail red hair, almost pastel in appearance, pulled back into a short, high pony tail, the bangs not long enough to reach into the tail hanging haphazardly around her face. She was dressed practically, a buttoned up short sleeve shirt and well fitted leather shorts. despite looking barely older than Eustace, she stood out in a few more significant ways than the rest of the older crowd about her. most obvious were her tattoos. Along her left arm and leg were depictions of vicious looking vines with scattered rose blossoms here and there, whose petals were nearly the exact color as her hair. On the right side were the images of black birds, of various sizes that appeared to be places as if they were flying in a pattern of some sort, though the reason for the placement was impossible go guess, the placement seemed deliberate. The next thing that stood out was the 8 knives visibly hanging from her belt. For on each side. 6 were smaller, likely for throwing or utility, and a pair were larger clearly meant for close quarters combat. Thirdly, she had a intense scowl-like exception that was the equal to any hard hide thug in the hundreds that surrounded them, it seemed so natural on her face that it was easy to imagine she was born with such a casually angry expression.

She sat near by, with her personal bag half unzipped she was rummaging through it mumbling to her self. "Hang on, if that ain't enough, I think I got some air-freshener in here, maybe the one to punch of cleaner will keep us all from puking up out lunch before the examine starts." she continued to pull things out of her pack, Bar of soap, bottle of water, even a dry shampoo of all things. All the while she was mumbling about how 'she spent all this time getting here and the first real obstetrical is some kids rancid BO.

Eustace was immediately intrigued by the girl, taking no offense to her comments, nor by the fact that she had just thrown a can at him. Mostly because his hat protected him from any projectiles, and all of her comments were actually very accurate. He had a habit of being absent minded when it came to how things worked outside of Meteor City. Since the place was literally covered with trash, he'd never really heard any complaints about his smell, especially because it'd be difficult to tell his stink from the trash's.

"Wow..." Eustace exclaimed, his eyes moving up to examine all of the tattoos that surrounded Ivy's body. One look at his expression could easily tell anyone that he was interested to know more about the grumpy girl. "All of that stuff drawn over ya looks really sweet! How'd ya get it to look so cool?" He asked with genuine curiosity, smiling amiably. Nothing about Ivy immediately sent red flags his way. He was already more than used to hanging around people with perpetual scowls and tattoos, but he had never seen any as unique as Ivy's. Not even the several blades around her waist seemed to intimidate him, it was clear that he had a lot to work on in regards to common sense. Otherwise, these exams would be very short lived for him, even if he was clearly much tougher than most others to even make it to the hunter exams in the first place.

Then, Eustace remembered the very reason Ivy came to him as he paid mind to the various products she had taken out of her bag. He picked up the can of 'Stank Away' that she had previously thrown at him, spraying himself all around. "Thanks a million for this stuff, by the way! I still have trouble remembering to clean up sometimes. I'm not used to doing it daily." He added sheepishly.

As he aproched her, those others around scatered, as any sane person would do when confonted with such a intensly bad smell. Ivy managed to hold her ground but her scowl deepen. Not so much out of anger bout out of a natural reaction to the stench and trying not to lose her lunch. She remained silent, staring intently at the boy as if trying to glare the reminder into his brain that he smelt like the inside of a garbage truck. When he blessedly remembered the reason she had spoken to him in the first place and applied the high-powered deodorizer to his body she took in a deep, loud, gasp of air. "Oh my god that took you long enough to get to. Geez, you weren't kidding when your not used to remembering this kind of stuff." She found that a rather curious fact. The circles she had grown up in had never been exactly the gentlest bunch, so she had seen her fair share of unkempt men and women... but there was always a certain aspect of class required among the upper tiers of them, and she had spent just as much time with the bosses as the brutes.

She gave a dismissive wave of her hand at his question about the tattoos "Careful care, and the occasional touch up keeps them fading out or distorting." This lad was fishy, and she wasn't just talking about the smell. The boy was clearly uninitiated by the dangerous people all around. Sure, neither was she, but she had stared by some of the toughest men in her fathers service. Thugs were like family to her. Plus she was sure more than a few in the crowd recognized the significance of the tattoos on her right side. And he so casually caring such a odd tool. Not a traditional weapon, though if it could go through stone all day she supposed it men and armor was little deterrent to it. "Smelled to me that you aren't used to doing it yearly! Don't worry about it that junk, cleaning is a common curtsy to yourself and to others! If I had to go through the entire exam having to smell you like that I don't I would have wanted to stick it through the whole thing." she said turning her head to look out to the crowd. -Okay, conversation over kid. you don't stink to high heaven and I'm free to focus on the test. Now run along and get lost.- she thought to herself, assuming her body language would indicate she didn't plan one continuing a dialogue.

"'Course, I'll remember it for sure next time!" Eustace replied as she turned her head away. He wondered if she'd want the spray back, it was almost like having an entire bath in a can! But then another thought popped into his mind. Did she have the same odor problems that he did? "Oh, d'you have to deal with the same stuff I do?" Eustace inquired. "Is that why you've got all of this cleaning stuff, miss..." It suddenly dawned upon him that he had actually forgotten to ask the older girl for her name. Instead of asking for it, he simply decided to come up with one on the spot. "Crow?" Eustace stated aloud. The black birds depicted in her tattoos reminded him of crows. Or at the very least, of ravens. Eustace nodded his head as if coming to a conclusion. "Yeah, Miss Crow'll do." He had a bad habit of giving people strange nicknames based on a particular trait of theirs. That is, if they didn't introduce themselves first, which he was guilty of doing quite often.

Eustace observed the crowd, facing the same direction as Ivy, curious to see if anything from that side had managed to catch her attention. Nothing seemed to stick out very much, besides two figures. A very lanky, paranoid looking applicant that kept to himself, and a tall, muscular man that had a very cocky look on his face. For some reason, few dared to look him in the eyes and most of the applicants seemed quite terrified of him. Eustace didn't immediately sense danger from the man, but felt a rare pang of fear as the two of them made eye-contact. Something about the man was definitely...off putting. From just looking at the man, Eustace felt a tad bit frightened, even with his usual carefree nature. By the looks of things, the man was also eyeing Ivy as well, licking his lips as if to intimidate the two of them. Eustace wasn't sure what about them made them stick out so much...Ivy's tattoos? His pickaxe? Their young age?

There was a flinching twitch in her eye and a flash of well controlled anger at the comment about her dealing with the same sort of smell stuff as she did. But as someone who was raised to be a future member of a ruthless family of organized criminals. One doesn't so easily get angered by a simple ignorant comments by uneducated little shits. That is, of course still she was called crow. Her eyes went wide and she shot up to her feet and glared daggers at the boy, her fists clenched violently into fists. "Don't you Dare call me 'Crow, Miss Crow, or crow ANYTHING!" she pointed a dramatic finger at the boy and growled "I am Ivy Katrina Raven, of the Raven family. Call me a damned dirty crow again and I'll make sure that people will be finding pieces of you scattered across the next four countries!" She seethed angrily for a few more seconds before seemingly to realize her outbursts. She took a slight step back and cleared her throat and striated out her outfit.

"Sorry about that stranger, Just...Call me Raven, Black Bird, Even Birdy if you need a nick name. Just don't call me crow." As she calmed down she noted that the boy hadn't seemed particularly phased by her outburst of anger. Rather he seemed to be distracted by something...or someone. She took a glance in the direction and her eyes focused on the muscular man looking their way with a hungry sort of leer. She had seen that sort of look before, though this one got under her skin in a more significant way than normal. She could feel her heart rate increase a bit, and the odd twist of uncertainty in her belly. She took her seat again, slipping out one of her smaller daggers and casually using it to clean beneath her finger nails. A subtle way to 'bear her talons' so to speak. Remind any who thought of getting in her way that she wasn't a helpless girl if she made it this far. "So, What do I call you stranger? Besides smelly I guess."

"Oh, man, I completely forgot to mention it, didn't I?" Eustace said, smacking the top of his helmet in mild annoyance with his forgetfulness. "My name's Eustace Bell! Pleasure to meetcha Ms.Cr—er, Birdy." Eustace quickly corrected himself, just barely remembering to avoid calling her 'Crow'. He couldn't help but wonder why Birdy seemed so angry when he called her by it! Her reaction seemed to go beyond just plain annoyance, which is something he usually got from people. What could be the reason for her negative connotation with the bird? For now, he decided to stop thinking about it. Eustace was going to inquire about her blades, which he thought looked incredibly cool. However, his attention was drawn to the loud cry of "ATTENTION!" That came from the far side of the room.

Many were surprised to see that a previously closed door located there had now been opened. To the shock of even more people, the old man that had come out of the door was amusingly tiny, likely not much taller than three feet and seven inches! Unsurprisingly, the man's hair, which was styled into a mini-afro, was completely white. "Hello," The man soon began calmly, as if pretending his outburst from before had never happened. "My name is Tora Zoldyck, and I shall be the exam proctor for this year." Several applicants in the crowd started murmuring as he mentioned the surname. Despite the man's goofy appearance, many in the crowd were surprised to see a member from the legendary Zoldyck family in the flesh. "SILENCE!" He exclaimed, to the surprise of the applicants. Tora cleared his throat before continuing. "Your first task is a fairly straightforward one." A wide grin of amusement spread across his face. "To dwindle down the numbers, we have decided to initiate a free-for-all brawl. Now is your chance to easily eliminate competition. Hopefully, the weakest of you will have already been weeded out in ten minutes time. Best of luck." Tora left the room, chuckling to himself.

With that, the silence before the storm began. Only to be quickly broken as one applicant punched the other in the face. Soon, chaos spread throughout the room! Both men and women alike were attacking each other. Some of the more cruel individuals had taken advantage of the fact that there would be no legal repercussions for the actions and started to use their weapons. Eustace felt more confused by the change in mood that had come so quickly! He had almost been completely unaware of a man with a sword dashing his way. Eustace quickly blocked the blade with the top of his pickaxe, just barely avoiding being cut into pieces.