Chapter 222: Second trial

Chapter 222: Second trial

Two days later the time comes and I start getting ready for the second trial. The farewells are short. Everyone in group 4 already knows about Beyond, some a bit more, others less, so there is no need for an explanation.

Biscuit gives me a nice piece of glass that he still thinks is the same as the mana stones they use here as currency. He also gives me a few pieces of dried deer meat.

Isabella somehow isn't petty and just hugs me and wishes me luck.

The boys are the boys, so they just tell me to level up a lot.

Haddy just nods his head and tells me to be careful.The initial posting of this chapter occurred via N0v3l.B11n.

Tess smiles at me and says not to worry about them while I'm gone.

Lily uses the opportunity to hug me and only stops after I knock on the top of her head a few times. I even have to boost my body a bit so she lets me go. That reminds me that if I ever lose mana, I will be weak like a baby against most of the members of group 4, even with my stats from Active tempering.

Sophie waves her hand awkwardly, and Maya puts a small bag into my hand, full of some rations and other useful stuff.

By the time I separate from them, I feel tired already and quickly get to the basement of our house.

“Use Beyond entrance token,” I say, and after the portal appears in front of me, I step through.

Welcome to the Beyond's second trial!

After passing through all three trials, you will be able to enter the Beyond.

The place I'm in isn't the second floor, nor any of the floors I visited before. The sky is dark, lit by stars that shine brighter than they should.

I slide into [Focus] and the world loses even more of its colors, yet the lights become brighter, shining on the ground I am standing on. As far as I can see, I see deep craters and mountains spewing out fire and smoke.

It's hard to breathe, and the gravity that affects my body is much stronger than it should be, forcing me to use Mana Regulator to put more mana towards Reinforcement and strengthening my body.

The cold that threatens to freeze my body is terrible, the worst I've ever felt, and I reach in and start releasing some heat I stored in the thermal orb I started filling with thermal energy days before Beyond.

Releasing more of the heat, it flows through my body and pushes away that terrifying cold, that is not visible at all. There is no ice, no freeze.

A hole forms next to me, and from it, a fire spews out, melting the ground around, threatening to do the same to me, only to be absorbed and turned into heat, stopping me from freezing.

Sensing a stronger eruption coming, I boost my body and move high in the air, hovering at the place and watching as the hole expands and tons of melted material spew out, a heat so strong I have to move further to not overwhelm my skill.

At the same time, the gravity that pulls on me is much stronger, so it's difficult to even float and the amount of mana I spend is so high I decide to land.

I check the quest and reward.

Beyond’s second trial quest: Survive for one week.

Quest Rewards:

Active skill combination token (low-grade)

1000 shards

I take in the text in front of me and there's a single reward that I can't stop looking at. The active skill combination token. The token with the potential of being a really good reward.

After reducing the amount of thermal energy as much as I can, I move again, away from the place where I feel another crater forming. Then, after examining my body more, I realize that I'm not wrong and it's as I thought the moment I entered here. That weird feeling I immediately got and started examining my body, almost unable to believe it.

My heart is not beating and generating any mana, affected by something that I can't even detect right now.

I seem to be otherwise fine. The blood is still somehow flowing through my body and my current mana pool is filled and not leaking, it's just not getting replaced.

Multiple hours have passed and the strain of gravity put on my body is getting stronger, the monsters are getting harder to detect, and my heart doesn't move at all.

But, that's it?

I send another blast of kinetic energy underground, reducing the surface of the attack and moving it as efficiently as I can.

[You have defeated Crater Worm - lvl 191]

Is this really a Beyond trial?

I dodge two leeches and this time I do not even use the sword, just create a thin thread of mana that I cover in [Resonance] and cut both monsters apart.

[You have defeated Mana Leech - lvl 179]

[You have defeated Mana Leech - lvl 183]

Before another worm has time to shriek, I send a small thermal orb at it, and it explodes inside the monster's weird mouth filled with dozens of sharp teeth. The monster screeches even louder while thrashing around and burning, unable to stop the flames even in this terrifying cold.

[You have defeated Crater Worm - lvl 168]

More thin threads of mana appear around me, each covered in widely resonating mana, and this time it's me who tracks the monsters and attacks.

One day has passed.

The gravity is strong, but it feels weirdly comfortable as it keeps pulling on my body. With the little amount of mana I'm using, every step hurts and every wrong move threatens to send me tumbling, but the efficiency continues to improve.

The air closer to the mountains is getting colder and I'm forced to use more thermal energy from the orb. I don't like it, but the extreme temperatures are hindering my ability to fight, so I do it.

As time passes, I come to like the planet I'm on.

Other than blasts of iron-melting fire from the ground and monster attacks once in a while, it's quiet, so almost scarily quiet. There is no day and night, and no sun comes to the sky. It's permanently dark, the planet lit by beautiful shining stars that are lighting the way through the extremely clear sky.

Even though I'm moving for a day already, the mountains are still far in the distance, clearly showing how giant they have to be to still be so far on the horizon.

Six days remain, and I know I won't be getting any sleep, having to constantly manage my mana, and thermal energy, and keep fighting the monsters that will jump at me the moment I show weakness.

And I am fine with that.

As always in these situations, my mind feels sharp. It all makes me feel more alive than ever. It forces me to stop thinking of useless stuff and focus on survival at the place where a single mistake could end me.

Yet, the more threatened I feel, the stronger the danger is, the more I realize how much I want to live. Amazed, I observe myself utilizing everything I have learned. My skills, my body, my mana, and my talents. All of them constantly used to keep me alive.

The second day comes, and the sky is still the same, and the mountains look as far as before. While fighting against cold and gravity, the monsters continue to attack me, but that much is fine. The problem is that just now I realize that there is something or someone messing with my perception of reality.

I used a decent chunk of my mana to check my mind and it doesn't seem to be affected, only my senses are being fed fake information.

My skills are unable to fight against it, it being too ever-present and shown by me being constantly fed the wrong positions of monsters and the world around me looking different than it is in reality.

The result of that is more wounds on my body, and I'm being forced to create armor to protect myself and feed my passive with thermal energy to heal the wounds.

Unable to rely on my eyes anymore, I close them, but the effect still lasts as if the effect is delivered to me even through closed eyelids. [Perception] is being fed the wrong visuals too.

So I reach inside my body and cut nerves leading to my eyeballs, blinding myself. Then I actively stop the passive from healing this small wound that will be easy to restore later.

My usage of [Perception] changes, and instead, I continue to feel waves of kinetic energy and heat from the monsters' bodies.

A day passes, and I start being fed wrong information even from kinetic and thermal energy.