The Deadly Trial

The feeling was quite weird. It was as if I existed in two states simultaneously, kind of what you felt when you were on the edge of your sleep, both sleeping and awake.
The darkness around me slowly turned into light, before my senses finally picked up something apart from the tranquil feeling of nothingness.
As my eyes adjusted to the darkness and my feet adjusted to the cold marble floor underneath me, I looked around in both awe and trepidation. I was in a place that seemed like a huge hall, only that both the ceiling and the walls were covered in darkness. The edges glistened, giving them an obsidian-like feel. However, rather than being blind to it all, I was strangely able to see, to sense every detail.
My body felt strange too, as if it were lighter, more responsive than it was supposed to be. How real it all felt, even made me forget that I was inside my soul.
The Soul Forge, the only way an Ascendant could feel his connection to his Nexus Affinity. It was like a conduit, a bridge that connected every Ascendant to their abilities, granting them the opportunity to both take on trials to walk the path of power and peek into the deepest depths of their soul to know how the Pulse shaped them from the inside.
The Nexus Affinity, a weird phenomenon that changed the world at the same time the first of the void rifts cracked open, pouring out the most grievous and horrendous abominations that did little to hide their lust for human flesh. Along with it also came the black moon, a veil that covered their world, Elysandra, in its cold embrace as it revolved above, a reminder of the horrors of the dark times they had been plunged into.
As the entities from the void wreaked havoc throughout the five kingdoms, the only reprieve against them were the Ascended, the rare few blessed by the Nexus, granting them each a Nexus Affinity, and a Soul Forge to oversee its progress. However, despite the role that the awakened played in society, it was still too soon for them to be able to push back the rifts. Humanity hardly had the time to adjust to the woes of the world as the new responsibility of survival was thrust upon them. And as the Ascended few walked on their path of ascension, the rifts grew as well. The entities became more ferocious, more relentless, creating this odd balance that forced humanity to barely survive against its hostile invaders.
The original Yun too had been born with the mark that signified his connection to the Nexus. The very mark that pulled each one who was capable to walk the path into a trial once they gained the emotional maturity required for it, to test if they could wield the otherworldly powers that were to be granted to them. How these powers came to be dormant in a few but not in others, and the cause behind the rifts or the black moon, was never known, yet humanity stubbornly clung to the last vestiges of its survival.
As the darkness coalesced around me, the surroundings began to shift, the ceiling growing taller, more defined as the hall opened up before me, morphing into a place I knew about, a place that, despite how much I tried, I would never forget. It was as if I had been here just yesterday or maybe I even was; the very street where I had died on Earth.
The darkness poured around me, shifting to take the form of the buildings that dwarfed me from all angles, as the area became clearer and more detailed.
I looked around, the memories of that night still sharp at the back of my mind as they came pouring in. Looking down, I realised I was standing at the same spot where I…
Snapping my head to the right, I heard it, the same muffled screaming and the sound of bodies shuffling, the very sound that had led me to them that night.
My heart hammered against my chest as I took slow steps towards the alley. It was dark, eerily so, and the only sound I could hear was the faint whimpering and the rhythmic clanking of my boots.
As the walls gave way beside me, I finally took in the scene. But rather than seeing three men forcing themselves on a woman, this time it was something weirder, scarier, and even more repulsive. There was the same woman before me, her face exactly as I remembered it, but this time, she was being cornered by darkness itself, as tendrils of liquid shadow had bound her, overpowering her, pushing her against the wall as they slithered across her neck in a chokehold.
What the hell is going on?
I had already seen it in the memories, the Soul Forge trials were infamous for twisting the very memories that impacted you the most, to test your capabilities, but this, this was unlike anything I had expected.
The pool of writhing darkness was both repulsive and eerie, unlike anything I had seen before. The only thing that even came close were the mentions of the beings of the void that I had heard about in the previous Yun’s memories, but even then I had never seen them before.
Before the tendril could wriggle further, I appeared before it in the alley as my breath grew rougher, my hands almost on the verge of trembling as I took deep breaths, balling my fists in defiance.
Do I have to defeat it to clear the trial? It seemed straightforward, but it then struck me that I had no weapon to begin with. The darkness, having noticed my arrival, slithered off the woman as it coalesced before me, taking on a weird shape that reminded me of nothing in particular.
“Run!” I yelled to the woman, who frantically looked at me with the same expression I remembered from that day, fear and gratitude, as she turned to flee. I brought up my fists in front of me, just as I had learned from the countless hours this body had spent in training, drilling the basics of combat in both the sword and fists through the years, preparing for the day it would become an Ascended.
The feeling was almost liberating, knowing how to move, how to defend, how to fight. Originally, I’d had my own fair share of brawls, some that had even led me to kill people. But even then, I had never properly learned how to fight, just how to survive, how to kill. But this body, the memories I had gone through, all of them had provided me with a new horizon.
As the woman disappeared behind the building, the darkness finally made its move. A tendril of shadow shot in my direction at inhuman speed, whipping through the air, gleaming under the pale street light.
It was fast way, too fast for me to react to in time. As its grotesque form pulsed under the light, I was confused about how I was even supposed to deal with something as treacherous and vague as darkness itself.
Seeing the tendril shoot out, trying to impale me through the neck, I barely managed to sidestep, dodging its onslaught. However, rather than continuing on its path, the previous luster and metallicness changed into something more flexible, as the tendril whipped towards my side.
I barely managed to bring my arms up in defence before it struck, knocking the wind out of my lungs as it sent me crashing against the brick wall. My back hit the wall with a crash, and I felt something crack beneath me as unimaginable pain coursed through my body.
Falling onto the cold floor, I wheezed for air. No matter how hard I tried, the air refused to come, making me cough. The impact had left me disoriented, my vision a blur that didn’t even allow me to see how the floor beneath me was turning even darker.
When I finally realised something was wrong, it was already too late. The ground beneath me erupted in darkness. Before I could even manage to stand up, black, obsidian-like spikes jutted out of the ground, impaling me.
The first one went right through my thigh, passing straight through it, splattering blood onto the cold floor. Before I could even process the pain, the second one burst through my torso, grazing past my ribs, puncturing something vital underneath. The third was the most brutal, as it rammed straight through my throat, up through my chin, tearing everything in its way.
And just a second later, the brutality was felt by me in its clearest display as my body finally managed to process the pain. It burned, it burned way too fucking much as I tried to breathe. However, my attempts came out as faint gurgling noises, blood continuing to pool in my mouth, the metallic taste lingering on my tongue.
I tried to thrash against it, to do anything apart from succumbing to reality, but it was brutally clear to me. I died, once again. That was the last thought that hovered in my mind as my vision blurred and the darkness crept over me.
***
I fell to the ground, my knees buckling under the weight as I coughed, my hand automatically reaching for my throat, looking for the wound that wasn’t there. My heart hammered against my ribs, my breathing quickened.
What the fuck, I-I just died.
That was the only thought in my mind, as the phantom pain from the grievous wounds was still clear.
Jesus… Did I fail the trial?
The memories had made it abundantly clear that if someone failed any trial in their path of ascendance—be it the first trial or the ones paving the way for the later tiers, their soul itself would be obliterated, killing them and leaving only a husk of a body behind.
Apart from being born with a Nexus mark, this was another reason why the number of Ascendants that walked the world was so few. And further, these trials were always meant to be deadly, testing the challenger’s resolve, determination, and strength in more ways than one.
Therefore, knowing the fate that awaited me if I failed the trial, confusion clouded my mind as the realisation settled in. Wait, didn’t I just die, yet here I was, back in the same black obsidian-like hall, on my knees panting for air as my arms searched for the wounds that should have been there but weren’t.
Was that a part of the trial? Am I supposed to fight darkness? Is that even possible?
As my thoughts unravelled on what the trial expected of me, I felt it again, the same feeling of my surroundings shifting and morphing as before.
Fuck me! Not again…
As the walls around me coalesced, giving way to an opening rather than the buildings before, the temperature around me started to drop. In seconds, it was freezing as I was forced to bring up my arms to cover myself, a feeble attempt at respite against the strange sudden coldness that seemed to seep deep into my bones, making even the slightest movement harder than it should have been.
The darkness around me dissolved, taking on a whiter hue, as the ceiling above gave way, turning into a dimly lit sky twinkling with thousands of stars, slightly obscured by a white haze.
All around me, the darkness ruptured, giving way to both hills and flats as the scenery finally settled before me.
A frozen tundra.
The temperature made it harder for me to even process what was around me as the coldness prickled my skin like a thousand needles. Cold winds rattled against my figure, and even opening my eyes was a challenge, my eyes burning in the cold.
Breathing became harder, each breath shallow, leaving a puff of vapor in the air.
All that lay around me was a wasteland, with not even a single tree. The cold made it impossible for even the smallest being to survive. The sky remained dark, as if it were always dusk, yet the light from the thousands of stars shone on the plain, bathing everything in its dim glow.
What now? What am I even supposed to do? First I find myself in the alley, get fucking slaughtered, and now a frozen wasteland.
As I looked around frantically, my teeth chattering against the cold, I saw a figure in the distance, obscured by the white haze. However, the haze couldn’t hide its hulking figure that towered almost double my height. The figure then seemed to move, seemed to grow bigger.
Fuck, it’s coming towards me.
As the figure grew larger, the abomination finally stepped out of the haze, its monstrosity in clear display before me.
The closest reminder of a creature that I could associate it with was a polar bear, only this was even bigger and more horrendous. Its fur glistened like it was made of white spikes rather than normal hair. Its paws couldn’t even be called paws, as they ended in sharp, talon-like claws that seemed sharp enough to tear through metal as if it were butter. It stood on its hind feet with a balance rivaling that of any human. Its teeth were a mix of sharp canines that seemed to glow under the pale light, saliva dripping from them. Its eyes were bloodshot red, filled to the brim with hatred and venom as they bore down on me.
Wait, what the hell!
What I heard next made my blood run cold, a deep guttural growl that leaked past the abomination’s face, as it finally shot towards me, its speed something I couldn’t believe from its hulking size.

Chapter end