Kaios narrowed his eyes, reaching to the ground. He pressed his palm into the mirror surface, as a soft distortion spread in the ground.
Then, with a slow breath, he rose and clenched that palm of his, making it a fist.
As if answering his command, the surface began to quake, before a large chunk of the mirrored ground elevated, floating upward, detaching from the ground.
Its crystalline sharpness was condensing into a heavy sphere. The distorted glass shook faintly, as the properties of the third alloy took control of it.
The third alloy he chose was an alloy called Ferrostal, and its details were:
[Ferrostal
Primary Role: Passive environmental influence.
Property: Gradually magnetizes surrounding objects through slow polarization, allowing indirect metal manipulation and affecting metallic hazards.
Strengths: Works automatically over time, can subtly reshape the environment. ]
This alloy would gradually polarize the objects it came into contact with, though the process was too slow, but here came another reason why he chose it.
As he just hastened the progress of it by using it with the Gravistone alloy. The Gravistone increased its field, while increasing the process of polarization.
Through this synergy, it allowed Kaios to have limited environmental manipulation. That was the reason he chose these two at that time.
Kaios then studied the sphere for a moment, before he waved his wrist. The sphere shuddered instantly, splitting neatly into two much smaller balls.
"Let's check, which one is truth? And which one is false?…"
While muttering this, Kaios flicked his finger, sending the first orb shot into the left corridor.
Baaammm....
It struck the mirrored surface with a violent sound, the impact scattered the shards of mirrors like rain, before it started to mend itself, while leaving the gap where the orb stuck.
Then the second orb went into the right path. For a second, it glided there silently. Then—
fwoosh
The orb phased through the mirrored surface without resistance, vanishing between the endless reflections in it.
Nothing shattered, nothing broke. The right path offered no resistance to the orb.
Kaios gazed at it while thinking in his mind. So, the right one it is.
He stepped carefully toward the right corridor, he still didn't trust any of the trial. Each of his steps was echoing against the mirror, showing endless reflections.
The walls rippled around him, as he approached the place, after which the orb had disappeared.
But when he pressed forward, expecting space to open, showing a path forward… there was nothing.
No path.
No corridor.
Only more mirrors, reflecting himself infinitely between them, only showing his failure, for even expecting it to be this easy.
A look of grim appeared on the face of Kaios, as he thought he chose the wrong path. His fingers brushing the silver bracelet on his left wrist.
As his finger touched the hourglass, a soft glow began to stir in the hourglass. The hourglass began preparing his ability Recheck—to rewind his choice by that of 0.3 seconds.
But then—something caught his eye, that made him cancel it.
In the reflection across the mirror wall, he saw himself move—specifically his reflection.
It was not imitating him nor delaying, instead, it moved like a temporal echo of his from another time.
Suddenly it turned at him, meeting his gaze. His face plastered with a wide grin.
As Kaios saw this, his pupils contracted sharply. He knew there was no grin, only the tensed and grim expression… yet the mirrored reflection had a different one than him.
"…Interesting," Kaios muttered under his breath, lowering his hand from the bracelet, that was still resting upon it.
As his gaze was fixed upon the reflection, he saw it lifting one of its feet and stepping forward.
And as he thought the reflection was about to plummet into the dark abyss below, a ripple of solid ground appeared beneath its foot, glowing faintly like glass.
Then the same happened with the next step. Kaios calmly observed the reflection, as it reached the other side, before it vanished completely.
"Hmm...Does this trial want me to follow the reflection?"
Kaios followed suit, while muttering softly. He raised his foot and tried to step in the air, as the reflection of him did. And just as shown by the reflection, a ground materialized beneath him, made of transparent and shimmering glass.
He walked on this ground, but as he was about to take his 10th step, the path vanished. He stumbled and fell into the abyss.
Then he suddenly activated the Recheck ability of his bracelet, which sent him 0.3 seconds back in time, just before he was about to take his 10th step.
He suddenly halted himself from taking the 10th step, preventing himself from falling into the darkness below.
What happened? Why did the platform vanish suddenly? Everything was going smoothly till now.
As Kaios was wondering about that, the ground above which he stood also disappeared all of a sudden.
Before Kaios could react to it, he found himself plummeting down towards the endless darkness beneath him, waiting to swallow him at once.
F*ck why is this happening to me in every trial!!?
Some time later, Kaios was currently staring at the two-path corridor, scanning for the correct path again between the two, but his mind was filled with another thought.
Hmmm.... So every time I lost a life, the trial reset.
He was thinking that because the massive crater he created, snatching a large chunk of mirror ground, was not there anymore. Also, the gap created between the mirrors was filled.
"Well, anyway...as long as it is like before, the same plan will work surely."
Kaios said while creating two jagged and shimmering spheres from the mirror ground beneath, before hurling them toward both paths.
As previously, the one orb shattered one path of the mirror, the other one phased through its path.
The path was still the same, was it a coincidence that it didn't change, or paths don't reset?
Kaios said to himself before he shook his head, Nothing will change though, the main test was after this.
Saying this mentally, Kaios phased through that path of mirror, appearing on the other side. The other side also remained the same, as no path could still be seen, while being swallowed by the darkness.
He then turned to the mirror next to him, expecting to see the reflection of his before. And this time he was determined to find out the reason behind the disappearance of the platform previously.
As he expected, a reflection of his came, gazing at him while grinning, before taking a step forward. Then, like previously, a platform made up of glass appeared, as he walked above it before reaching the other side.
Though he still couldn't see what's on the other side, but that's not his goal.
Kaios waited for some time, his eyes still focused upon the mirror. Then just as he suspected, the reflection again came.
He repeated the same actions, before taking a step on the platform that appeared and reaching the opposite side.
Kaios still sat there, his gaze not leaving slightly from the mirror, his focus absolute.
Some time had already passed, the reflection repeated its actions for almost fifty times. And Kaios examined each one with an unblinking gaze.
"So, that's how it is!" Kaios muttered under his breath, as he stretched his waist, it was stiff from sitting this long in one position.
"To think I lost a life due to ignoring this simple rule." He said in a self-deprecating manner, as he shook his head.
Kaios had finally got the answer he was looking for, the answer for the disappearance of platforms, as well as what to expect from this trial.
He couldn't help but think what a fool he was. All of this—the waste of time, even the one life he lost—could have been avoided, if only he hadn't ignored that one rule stated on the screen.
That rule is the 3rd rule, written on the screen.