Three months had passed since Elian first dipped his body into the hellish cauldron concocted by Lunaria.
To the outside world, three months was merely the blink of an eye. But for Elian, it was a thousand years of suffering compressed into ninety days.
Every morning began with blistering skin, every afternoon was filled with bone-breaking physical training, and every night concluded with meditation under the cold moonlight to soothe his fracturing soul.
Inside the hollow of the giant tree, hot steam once again filled the room. But this time, there were no screams.
Elian sat cross-legged inside the boiling cauldron filled with a pitch-black liquid—a mixture of Wyvern blood whose dosage had been tripled.
His eyes were closed, his face as calm as the surface of an undisturbed lake, even though the liquid surrounding him was hot enough to cook raw meat in seconds.
His skin was no longer red. Instead, it radiated a strange milky white glow, as if coated in a layer of transparent jade.
His body remained slender, his waist narrow and shoulders slight, retaining his heavily androgenous aesthetic.
But beneath that smooth skin, his muscle fibers had been compacted to the molecular level. He was no longer fragile glass; he was steel wire wrapped in silk.
"Get out," Lunaria commanded from the corner of the room.
Elian opened his eyes. Pitch black, bottomless. He stood, the black liquid dripping from his naked body, revealing a physique that—while looking like that of an undeveloped teenage girl—held terrifying explosive power.
"How do you feel?" Lunaria asked, tossing him a piece of rough cloth.
"Hungry," Elian answered briefly, catching the cloth in mid-air without looking. His movement was precise, efficient, wasting no energy.
Lunaria smirked faintly. "Good. Because today, you won't be eating my cooking. You will hunt for your own food."
The Elf woman kicked a wooden sword toward Elian.
It was just a practice sword made of Ironwood—heavy and hard, but blunt.
"Eastern forest. Bring me the heart of a Gale Wolf (Storm Wolf). Do not return until you get it. And remember... don't die."
***
The eastern part of the Azure Mist Forest was a deadly labyrinth of vegetation.
Sunlight barely penetrated the canopy, creating shadows that deceived the eye.
Elian moved without sound. He didn't step on dry twigs; he flowed over them.
Lunaria's training wasn't just about strength, but about merging with the environment. For Elian, who was loved by the World, this felt natural.
The wind told him where to step; tree roots shifted slightly to give him footing.
However, his enemy this time was not the environment, but a predator.
Grrr...
A low growl emanated from behind a thorny bush. A pair of green eyes glowed in the darkness. A Gale Wolf.
A low-level monster, but its speed was on par with an experienced knight.
Elian held his wooden sword with both hands. His stance was low. His heart pounded—not from fear, but from an unfamiliar rush of adrenaline.
This was the first time he would kill.
The wolf lunged.
Fast. Incredibly fast.
To the eyes of an ordinary person, the wolf would appear only as a flash of grey shadow.
Its front claws, coated in wind mana, aimed for Elian's neck.
Instinctively, Elian wanted to retreat. But Lunaria's voice echoed in his head: "Retreat means death. You have no shield, you have no armor. You only have momentum."
Elian did not retreat. He stepped forward, tilting his body to the left at an extreme angle.
Rip!
The wolf's claws tore through Elian's tunic, scratching his white shoulder. Fresh blood dripped.
The pain was sharp, but Elian's mind became crystal clear. Time seemed to slow down.
He could see the dust particles flying as the wolf landed and prepared to turn.
"There," Elian whispered.
He didn't use mana to strengthen his muscles because his Core was damaged. Instead, he borrowed momentum from the rotation of his waist.
He swung the wooden sword horizontally, aiming for the wolf's hind leg, its pivot point.
THWACK!
The sound of a hard impact rang out. The wolf's leg bone cracked.
The monster howled in pain, its balance wavering. However, a wounded beast is the most dangerous kind.
The wolf spewed a condensed ball of wind from its mouth—a Wind Bullet.
The distance was too close. Elian couldn't dodge completely.
He raised his wooden sword vertically to block.
BOOM!
The wind explosion threw Elian's light body five meters back. He slammed hard into a tree trunk. His back felt crushed.
The wooden sword flew from his grip.
"Cough..." Elian coughed, the taste of iron filling his mouth. He tried to get up, but his head was spinning.
The wolf, though limping, approached with thick killing intent. Saliva dripped from its jaws, mixed with blood.
Elian groped the ground, searching for his weapon. Too far.
Was this the end? Eaten by a wild dog after surviving the hell cauldron?
No.
Suddenly, a cold sensation spread through Elian's mind. Not fear, but something more primal. He stared into the wolf's eyes.
He realized something. The wolf breathed too. The wolf was also part of the world's flow.
And Elian could hear its heartbeat.
Thump-thump... Thump-thump...
The rhythm was clear in Elian's ears. He saw a gap in the mana flow around the wolf.
A weak point beneath its neck, unprotected by thick fur.
As the wolf leaped for the final bite, Elian didn't try to run.
He grabbed a sharp tree branch from the ground—not a weapon, just forest debris.
Elian threw himself onto his back, letting the wolf loom directly over him.
With precision guided by "fate," he thrust the branch upward.
STAB!
The branch pierced the soft spot under the jaw, going straight into the brain.
The wolf convulsed for a moment, its heavy body collapsing fully onto Elian. Hot blood soaked Elian's beautiful face, turning it into a gruesome yet mesmerizing mask of death.
Silence.
Elian pushed the heavy carcass aside. He stood up, his breath ragged.
His hands were trembling, not from exhaustion, but from the realization that he had just taken a life.
He stared at his blood-stained hands.
"I... won," he whispered.
He didn't feel nauseous. He didn't feel guilty. Instead, a strange feeling grew in his chest. Satisfaction.
The taste of power over his own fate.
Elian knelt, took out the small skinning knife Lunaria had given him, and with hands that were now steady, he carved open the wolf's chest to retrieve its heart.
***
When Elian returned to the tree they called home, it was already dark.
Lunaria was sitting on a tree branch, her long legs swinging idly.
She looked at Elian, who walked with a limp, covered in wounds and dried blood.
In his left hand, Elian gripped the wolf's heart, which was still dripping blood.
Lunaria leaped down. She didn't praise him immediately. She walked around Elian, inspecting the wound on his shoulder and the bruises on his back.
"You were careless," Lunaria said coldly. "You let it hit you with a Wind Bullet. If that had been a Tier 2 monster, your head would have exploded."
"Forgive me, Master," Elian lowered his head.
"But," Lunaria's tone softened slightly. She took the wolf's heart.
"You killed it without a sword. You used your environment. That is the essence of our fighting style. You are not a bull crashing into a wall, Elian. You are water that drowns the stone."
Lunaria touched the scratch on Elian's shoulder. Green light radiated from her hand, slowly closing the wound.
"Bathe. Clean yourself. The smell of your blood invites other predators."
Elian nodded and walked toward the small stream near the tree.
As Elian walked away, Lunaria's expression turned serious. She looked toward the southern part of the forest. Her pointed ears twitched.
The wind carried a sound that shouldn't exist in this forest.
The sound of iron footsteps. The sound of horses. And the hum of tracking spells.
"Imperial dogs," Lunaria hissed.
These three months had been quiet, but it seemed Elian's trail hadn't completely gone cold.
Or perhaps, they were tracking the abnormal mana radiated by Elian while he was in the cauldron.
Lunaria knew she could slaughter them all easily. But this was an opportunity.
"True torture isn't inside the cauldron, my student," Lunaria murmured, gazing at Elian washing himself in the river.
"True torture is when the world forces you to run endlessly."
Elian returned with wet hair dripping water, wearing a clean tunic.
He looked fresh, though his eyes seemed older than they had been that morning.
"Master?" Elian saw Lunaria packing items into a leather bag. "Are we leaving?"
Lunaria tossed a real sword—a light and sharp Elven short sword—toward Elian.
Elian caught it with reflexes that were vastly improved.
"Our 'honeymoon' period is over, Elian," Lunaria said, strapping her crystal bow to her back. Her face was serious, a faint killing aura radiating from her.
"There is a group of Imperial Trackers entering the outer perimeter. About twenty men. Led by a Tier 4 Mage."
Elian's heart raced. The fear from his past resurfaced, but this time, he gripped the hilt of the sword in his hand tightly.
"Are we going to run?" Elian asked.
Lunaria looked at her student. A cruel smile etched onto her red lips.
"No. This is the final exam of your first stage."
Lunaria pointed into the darkness of the forest.
"You will be the bait. Lure them into the Mist Swamp in the western sector. Separate them. And kill them one by one. I will only watch and prevent the Mage from using wide-area magic. The rest... is yours."
Elian's eyes went wide. "Me? Against twenty soldiers?"
"They think they are hunting a wounded rabbit," Lunaria leaned her face close to Elian's ear, whispering in a tone that was seductive yet deadly.
"Show them, Elian. Show them that the rabbit now has fangs."