Chapter 9: Trials(2)
Already being drenched, the cold air didn't do anything to help Kai's situation. His body shivered, not from fear, but from the biting discomfort of wet cloth clinging to skin and the wind cutting through the fabric like knives. He was knee-deep in cold mud, and his soaked school uniform clung to him like a second, miserable skin. The fabric had turned heavier, dragging against his body with every step.
It was awkward, to say the least being this wet, this cold, and still technically weaker than most people out here.
His level was only 6.
One useful spell to his name—Lightless Slash—which, while powerful and full of potential, was still hard to use repeatedly with his current mana control and reserves. His Talent Grade had increased, sure, and he had the backing of an ancient inheritance, but right now, he was a low-level fighter in the middle of a live-fire exercise where most people were out for blood.
He remembered the map of this artificial forest well it was huge, broken into four major quadrants.
He'd landed in the north, which was, for lack of a better word, tame. Calm. Serene even. Wide rivers. Slow breezes. Rolling terrain that seemed almost designed for beginners.
But Kai remembered what was happening in the other zones.
The south was chaos.
An absolute war zone, packed with the most students. They were already fighting in packs, betraying each other, stabbing friends in the back for a chance at survival. It was madness down there. A frenzy. The instructors had placed the most volatile students in the same quadrant just to see what would happen. It was a pressure cooker waiting to burst.
Then there was the west, where things were quieter but darker.
Rose and Marlon had landed there, and Kai knew exactly what they were doing: building an army. But not just any army—an army of controlled people. They were using the Slave Tokens hidden around the map, subtle items no one talked about at the start but which changed everything once you knew how they worked. Most people wouldn't trust each other in a game like this. A "last man standing" survival game didn't invite cooperation. But if you made someone into your slave real magical enslavement they didn't have a choice.