Chapter 2: The first test
"You don't fear death. You fear the pain of losing your beloveds and loneliness." The black spirit's chilling voice followed Leon, who was getting close to the right door with steady steps.
He'd asked his dead parents and fiancée to look over him and decided on a path already, so nothing could stop him.
"Leon Blade, you've chosen a proper path. I'll offer you my last guidance. A system is what every resident of Freya World possesses, and it's similar to what you've seen in Earth's games. You will go through a few rooms. The first step on the right path will bless you with the most basic system, allowing you to see your status and interact with other residents. One step is enough to give you that and go to another world. But if you overcome it and enter the second room, you will be given an inventory and minimap feature. The third room is the quest feature, and the fourth room is the shop feature. The fifth room is the end, and you will receive a tailored for you skill if you manage to reach it."
Hearing those words, Leon settled on conquering the whole path and reaching the end, just like many others had done before. He didn't turn around to speak with the black spirit because that man had triggered many unpleasant feelings and soon opened the right door.
The darkness greeted and overwhelmed him, sucking Leon inside.
When the door closed and Leon disappeared inside, the black spirit sighed. "I wish I could've used the best sentence to convince this guy. Alas, I couldn't use his parent's and girlfriend's names. I couldn't even mention them more than once… But that's a part of his luck."
The two doors should have disappeared in a normal case, but they still protruded from the misty walls. It was odd, and the black spirit didn't know the cause.
Then the orders from above fell upon him, and he whispered, "Not only I can't tell him that the peak humanity's body attracts and accepts the opposite gender of the same quality, but you also want me to personally oversee his test and increase the level. Is he the new kind I'll grow to hate?"
The black spirit was a kind of a guy who didn't like more work — not really a rare type.
He flew to the right door and blended with it, going over to Leon's side.
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[You have received a basic system!]
[Leon Blade Lv. 1(0/50) HP: 1000/1000 MP: 1000/1000]
[Click here to see your stats.]
[Click here to see your skills.]
[Guild: -]
[Friends: -]
Those messages swarmed Leon's eyes, not giving him a chance to see what was inside the darkness, and passed him basic information. Believing that he had no skills, Leon took a short glance at his health points and imagined those system windows disappearing — they did exactly the way he wanted, and he moved forward to overcome all tests.
Leon was in the dark world, with nothing ahead of him, feeling rather clueless.
"Is this some kind of labyrinth?" he asked aloud, cautiously looking around.
He had his left hand extended forward in case a wall stood before him or anything else, and his other hand was prepared to smash any enemy ahead of him. Nothing barred Leon's way, though, and he felt like moving forth was the answer to this first test, leaving him confused.
It was quite easy, after all.
But soon, the more he went forward, the worse pressure became, and Leon started feeling it. His steps turned heavier and slower, and it was as though some kind of spirit was pushing his shoulders down. In this environment, with darkness smiling at you from every direction, not everyone with a second chance could continuously go forward.
And once they fell, it'd be the end.
However, Leon kept going forward. His peak humanity's body was on high alert, and he'd be able to react accordingly to all hurdles ahead. Still, the same couldn't be said about his mental, which a certain black spirit was well aware of.
[Ahhhhhh!]
A sudden woman's scream swept through Leon, nearly making him stop. It kept assailing him from the inside and outside, which felt weird as it was like the darkness had started wailing. Another cry rang out, blending with the woman's cries, slamming Leon's body and mind from all directions.
More and more painful screams reverberated within the corridor and Leon's heart: he kept going slower and slower. It was as though thousands of black hands emerged from the darkness, pulling Leon down in a futile attempt to stop him.
Then, out of nowhere, a female cry, similar to his fiancée's voice, hit Leon from the front. For a moment, he felt like he also saw her.
"I saw things… The voice is not the same!" Leon howled convincingly, not giving the darkness a chance to win over him, and took the last step forward.
In an instant, the doors protruded from the black floor, and once they opened, Leon saw a room of white.
[Your system has been upgraded.]
[You've received a minimap and inventory features.]
Leon saw nothing inside but felt secure and eligible for a break. He dropped onto his ass, wiped off his sweat, and locked his eyes on the doors on the other side. Those would lead him to another challenge, which undoubtedly was more demanding than the first one.
The first test was just going forward and enduring the pressure and screams of unfamiliar people. Leon's strong body was the reason he was unstoppable, and the cries of foreign people were, in the end, foreign. They didn't have any weight, and Leon also could distinguish between his dead fiancée's voice and someone who sounded like her.
"Quest and shop features, then a skill tailored for me," Leon uttered while recalling the black spirit's words, "He's said that another world is not the same as Earth. It's a dangerous world, so I need everything to have a new and pleasant life."
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