At 7:00 am, Leon halted at the designated point, panting. Exhaustion clung to him as he absorbed the chaotic sea of students crowding the stark granite plaza.
Hoping for a gap, Leon spotted Jade standing among a group of cool, wealthy-looking guys, laughing heartily.
Drifting his gaze from them to the path ahead, Leon felt anxious footsteps pulsing in his ears like drums.
As he pushed politely through the crowd and reached the front, he paused. Vera was there, brushing a hand against a guy's chest in a sarcastic manner.
The guy's expression softened, as if under a spell. When Jade and his men appeared behind him, Vera dropped the act, ran to Jade, and threw herself on him.
She flung her arms around Jade's neck and kissed him deeply.
The poor students' faces ignited with shock, while the wealthy students stood there with faint smiles.
As Leon moved forward, away from Jade and Vera, he stumbled and nearly hurt himself. Tiger stood there smirking, cracking his knuckles with a slow, deliberate pop.
Seeing the look in Tiger's eyes, Leon knew the sound had been meant for him.
A sharp chime echoed, instantly snapping every gaze upward to the towering screen, which had been displaying pictures of men in wired black uniforms and monsters.
A proctor in a severe uniform appeared on the screen, and the chatter thinned into an uneasy silence.
"Welcome, awakened and normal students," she said in a voice that boomed like a gale across the plaza, prompting the students to cast confused glances at one another.
"Your first trial begins in thirty minutes. Survive in the Shattered Land."
The name hung in the air like a curse.
The Shattered Land. A place Leon knew from history books and nightmares—a scar left behind by the last great war. Every history book calls it a breeding ground for monsters.
A low hum filled the plaza as star-shaped symbols flared to life beneath their feet.
Lines of light crawled across the stone, weaving the entire floor into a massive, glowing teleportation array that snaked around their boots.
Light-blue light swept across the students' faces, etching their fears into relief.
Leon's heart hammered as the restless energy within him stirred in response to the light from the array like a plucked string.
He caught Tiger's eye across the platform, following the array's movement. The boy stared straight into his eyes, almost as if only the two of them were on the moving platform.
When Leon's gaze fell off Tiger, it landed on Jade. Jade stood utterly emotionless, as if surviving in the Shattered Land was a mere excursion.
Vera clung tightly to Jade's right arm, her earlier bravado gone, replaced by a genuine fear visible on her face.
The platform trembled, then launched everyone standing on it upward at the speed of light.
The teleportation hit Leon with nausea like his atoms were yanked through a keyhole and slammed back together in the wrong order.
Everything turned dark. The granite plaza was gone.
Their bodies reassembled on cracked crimson earth that crunched like dry bones beneath their boots.
Air filled with the taste of rust, and something sweetly rotten seared into Leon's lungs as his vision cleared.
Inhaling the air felt like mixing Dusthollow's gritty smog with volcanic fire.
He looked at the sky. It stretched with pulsing purple and sickly green light, throbbing in a slow, sick rhythm.
No sun. No moon, and no stars. Only the faint eldritch glow from jagged rocks that jutted like broken teeth.
Many of the students materialised around him, bumping into one another in a disoriented panic, yet Leon felt profoundly and terrifyingly alone.
Mr Lee's words echoed as a broad-shouldered student shoved Leon aside: 'Only the strong survive.'
With a crackle of static, small drones zipped overhead, flashing a holographic message into the thick air:
[TRIAL 1: SURVIVAL]
[DURATION: 48 HOURS]
[WARNING: THE TERRITORY IS HOSTILE]
The hologram flickered, imprinting a ghostly map with a single pulsing waypoint across the sky before the drones vanished.
'48 hours? Will we be given food or water?' Leon wondered inwardly, but saw the same question reflected in the doomed faces around him.
From a canyon to his left, a skittering sound erupted, causing his blood to turn cold.
"…monsters are coming!"
"…where?!"
"…they are everywhere!"
The air grew thicker, weighted with a sudden dread that initiated a stampede. Screams erupted like a ragged rising hymn of pure terror.
Some of the students fell, becoming a carpet beneath the rushing crowd.
Leon, who managed to pull himself from the ground after being pushed by those with broad shoulders, froze after turning.
Shreds of human flesh still steamed across the crimson earth like grotesque confetti. Seeing that didn't just hit him; it unmade the concept of "death."
And when some fell into his mouth, a sharp, metallic stink coated his tongue—the same coppery warning tang he'd tasted when he first experienced his power awakening.
It made him gag.
"No… no, no, no, no," he said, tilting his gaze away and sucking out a ragged breath that burned.
At that moment, a deafening truth struck him like a butcher's blade, cutting through his skull: the first trial had begun. And there was no way back.
...
The holographic message reappeared as the drones flew back, updating them with cold menace.
[PARTICIPANTS: 10000]
[DEAD: 1500]
Leon's face paled. Yet he moved, navigating a land that seemed twisted.
He skirted ridges that rippled like frozen waves and avoided narrow crevices that exhaled foul, eye-stinging vapours.
He threw himself through a dwarf-like hole, spotting a dog-like monster with four blazing eyes and a long blade-like tail.
Leon found himself in a field of jagged, translucent crystals when he straightened in the cave. The crystals shimmered like thousands of moons.
He spun around just as a feeling of being watched hit him. He saw nothing apart from the raised crystals that continuously threw long, distorted shadows that leaned toward every direction.
A chittering sound blasted from behind him. Leon ducked behind a square-pillar crystal. He felt the fast pulse of his heart pounding wildly as he pressed a palm to his chest.
The sound echoed like knives being dragged across glass. The moment he heard it moving on the left side of the crystal, he hid behind it.
For a second, Leon saw heaven, as a creature with flat, long, and sharp limbs stopped just an inch from his side, growling.
The creature stood there, its long limbs moving on their own in Leon's direction, as if they had a brain of their own.
Leon swallowed hard, held his breath, and closed his eyes tightly after spotting one limb of the creature's right hand stretched toward him.
The atmosphere in the crystal cave remained tense, as if the land itself was waiting for him to falter.
Feeling the limb close in on him, a loud cracking sound echoed from behind the crystal.
The creature turned at great speed toward where the sound erupted. Even after hearing the creature move from the left side of the crystal to the far back, Leon didn't move.
He only moved when he heard no chittering sound in the cave. He rushed outside, only to realise he had been holding his breath.
Leon breathed as he scrambled down a steep slope. And just as he gasped for air, a new sound cut through the oppressive silence, mixing with his panting.
"Not again…" he said, his voice carrying the weight of fatigue that had already overwhelmed him.