Dust swirled up a few miles away from the cave as Leon stood up.
When the wolf-beast dashed through the dust, its twin eyes glowed like a wild dead moon while its obsidian fur wobbled like an angel's feathers.
Leon paused when he moved from the cave's entrance and saw Zoe steadying herself in a solid fighting stance.
'Is she the daughter of the Qing? The Baek's? No, maybe the Fung's? Because only they could recover their energy in a short while like she did after I forced the wolves out of her sight when she was cornered.'
Leon neglected Zoe and moved and stopped at a few distances away from the other exit of the cave.
Zoe stood at the center of the cave with her arms spread apart and eyes locked on the rushing wolf. The air around her hitched and froze when she controlled the pink energy of hers in and out of her wrists.
As soon as Leon shifted his gaze from her and squinted at the wolf, which was just an inch from the cave, sharp air flung across his side like a speeding jet.
He didn't even notice Zoe had moved until he turned toward the exit he had neglected to rush out from, out of respect to watch what Zoe would do.
The fear which had crawled around Leon's heart now turned into an unstoppable laughter as he watched Zoe run like a chick fleeing from an eagle.
"Wait a minute!" he said as sweat beaded his face, noticing he was the only person now standing in the cave while the wild wolf-beast drew nearer.
When the wolf closed five meters away from Leon, another silhouette of a vast beast loomed at the end of the cave, grinning.
For a split second, the bones in Leon's body gave out, causing the blood in him to turn cold, but his mind kept on doing its job.
'Is that?' the thought paused as the memory of the recent news of a vast creature called The Abyssal Lord of Leviathan crept in.
The news played vividly in his head that he didn't even see when the claws of the wolf hurled toward his head. But when the sharp air from the slice flew across his skin, his head snapped back before his eyes could capture the claw shimmering across his face when a sharp scream tore from behind him.
"RUN!"
As Zoe's voice registered in Leon's head and drew him fully into his current body, Leon ducked under the four sharp claws and accidentally loosened his grip on the crystal as he ran.
Stones dripped from the walls and the ceiling of the cave as the wolf leaped in hope of striking the human down, but Leon was on the wind already.
When he exited the cave and reached Zoe's side, dust followed them as they ran at great speed toward another cave without looking back, yet they heard the roars that kept shaking the ground beneath their boots.
Inside the giant petrified cave, the wolf retreated and grabbed the crystal with its mouth. When its jagged teeth pierced through the crystal, its obsidian fur rose on end as the blue glow from the crystal moved through its veins.
The wolf's body began to undergo a transformation when the light in the crystal began to fade out. Its claws sharpened and extended. Its size increased two times while its dead moon eyes glowed like an afternoon sun.
When the newly transformed wolf exited the cave, it loosened its grip on the crystal and hurled it toward a smoky fogged corner.
The blue glow in the crystal blinked repeatedly like a dying sun as the wolf and the Leviathan moved a few miles away from it, and from the smoky fog, Tiger emerged, smiling.
Leon's jaw tensed when he saw Tiger approaching the cave he and Zoe stood at, tossing the crystal like a coin.
Just as he tried to move forward for it, the hologram appeared overhead.
[PARTICIPANT: 10000]
[DEAD: 3500]
[TIME: 5 MINUTES]
[WARNING: REGROUP AT THE MIDPOINT BEFORE THE TIME ELAPSES]
Zoe relaxed her shoulders and sighed heavily. "At long last the time is about to reach."
Her face turned cold when she also saw Tiger holding the crystal they had risked their lives for and turned toward Leon. "Why would you leave that behind?"
Leon tried to speak but kept his mouth closed and shook his head. He remained extremely quiet as they moved from the new cave and walked toward the direction the message had addressed.
More students emerged from strange hideouts and began following the path still shimmering above them.
The moment they halted at the midpoint of the Shattered Land, most of the students had their skin bruised in one way or another. Some walked with bleeding skin, others had a limb torn off, while the very few like Leon and Zoe had only portions of their clothes torn or dirtied.
After stopping behind a number of students, Leon kept his gaze locked on Tiger's blood-sucking knuckle, still tossing the crystal like an unvalued stone.
'Shit!' Leon screamed in his head. 'Now we have nothing to use as bonus.'
Just as he thought of them losing the previous stone, Zoe pulled out two different sets of purple crystals from her pocket. "Take this Life Core Energy stone."
'Where did she get those from?' Leon thought while reaching out for the stone.
She handed one to Leon and kept the other for herself. "This will at least help you get more energy to replace the one you used to save me back there. Better still, you can trade it for money if you're after money like the rest."
When Leon focused more on the stone, he felt a strange energy moving within him, merging with the one which had already taken form and was waiting to be unleashed fully.
A few minutes after Leon placed the stone in his pocket and moved to the front, he saw Jade and Vera moving together, holding the same life core stone that Zoe had handed to her.
Tiger also stepped forward with bruises on his hands, but when he increased his grip on the fading blue crystal, all the bruises vanished in an instant, followed by a moving blue glow in his skin.
The students standing beside him threw confused glances at each other, and when Tiger hurled the empty stone to the ground, three injured students fought for it like it had just torn out of their ribs.
"Get away from my Starfire Opal."
"Give it to me, it's mine."
Zoe watched the fighting students and exhaled sharply. She looked at Leon, at the empty stone which had now broken in two, and shook her head.
Dust got blasted on everyone's face as the huge Black Falcon military cargo arrived, hovering above them. Some of the students moved aside and paved way for the craft.
Five of the special training proctors wearing black combat outfits stepped out of the craft when its ramp lowered.
The proctor with a scar on the side of his eye and a chewing stick in his mouth pulled out a datapad from his side pocket and began checking the students one after another.
The rest of the proctors arranged the students in queues of two, the guys moving to the one chewing the stick, while the ladies moved to the others.
When one-third of the guys boarded and began making noise, the proctor shut them up with just a silent look. But when he turned his gaze back and saw Leon, he frowned. "Board silently."
Leon nodded and climbed into the craft and joined those who sat on the right, opposite to Tiger and his friends.
As soon as the last male student entered the craft, two other Black Falcons landed, and from within, men dressed in white robes and masks that seemed to pulse with a life of their own jumped to the ground before the base of the craft even touched the ground.
The masked men dashed into the places no student had even ventured, holding black sacks that sagged as if already burdened. After a few minutes, some returned, and in their hands, the black sacks were now smearing blood on them.
Tiger stood from his seat and walked to Leon. "You protected what's mine, Dusthollow rat." He growled in a low voice. "Never think she can be yours."
Leon locked eyes with Tiger and smiled. Zoe and a few other ladies climbed into the craft and caught the act.
The smile on Leon's face increased when his eyes shifted from Tiger and focused on Zoe.
Tiger turned for a quick look, then placed a hand on Leon's shoulder. "She's a prize for the strong. Not for filth like you. Remember what I said about your family." He roared in a voice that sounded like a cold knife in Leon's gut.
Leon smirked, flipped off Tiger's arm and moved a step back, shaking his head.
Though he didn't counter back like Tiger had wanted, the silence he left between them was far more unnerving than the bones crackling sound echoing around him.
When the Black Falcon lifted into the air, Leon sat down on his seat and looked at the land below through the window at his side.
From thousands of miles from the craft and the land, he still saw the Leviathan snarling at him.
Though he had survived at the cave, he knew with certainty that the actual phase of the trial wasn't the one he had endured, but the one which would take place within the walls of Alchemania.
With the solo studies he had had on the awakening programs, he knew the phase they were entering into was the one that humiliated the weak and crowned the strong, which also generated both warriors and monsters.
The real game, the real fight, and the real killing were the ones ahead of him.
The Black Falcon moved silently through the sky. Clouds passed by its metal body. The moment Leon peeked through the small ten-inch window, he saw two huge birds moving at the same speed as the craft.
When the craft entered into a dome of lightning, the birds retreated with loud cries which were heard even from the inside like a warning cry.
Whispers washed over Leon as he closed his eyes, pretending to be asleep.
"...Did you also face that huge monster?"
"...Nah, but I faced giant baby Godzillas. Here's what I took from them after I managed to kill one."
"...Wow, that's shiny. Is that one of their teeth?"
"...Yeah. That's not the only thing. But I'll show you when we land."
"...How come that boy survived?"
"...Who?"
"...The Dusthollow rat."
"...I don't know, but maybe he's so poor and dirty that the monsters even opted not to eat his meat."