The three-hour battle was only a battle if the monster could break free from the vessel. It couldn't, as a result, Drew didn't have to spend even a minute dealing with the monster in him.

At the moment, it was struggling, trying to regain its freedom, but it would fail miserably.

Monsters shouldn’t be pitied; they were creatures that only desired to harm everything in their wake.

Drew just stared at his stomach for a while. Then turned to Lau and said, "Thanks. I'll be taking the money now."

"What about the other WhirlWind Hand monster? Or what, you didn't know a pair of two makes a singular Whirlwind Hand?"

"Deduct what you need to let it stay here for two months."

Lau agreed, and said, "The bartender will give you the money."

Drew thanked the man, got a pouch of 40 white marbles and two green marbles, and left.

It took him a little while to get back to the school gates.

"Drew, right?" a guard asked.

"Yeah?"

"Miss Maroon was looking for you. Report to her as soon as you can."

"I see."

They opened the gates, allowing him in.

Drew didn’t head to the classroom right away. First, he went to the basic school shop. The man was half asleep, but when he saw Drew he stood up.

"What can I get for you today?" he said, smiling.

Drew was about to get straight to the point but hesitated. Instead chose to ask, "What's your name?"

The man was surprised. "Gujin Malubu. Why?"

"I thought it would be respectful to do so."

"Oh... That's unnecessary."

"I don't think so." Drew then took out the pouch of white marbles and two green marbles from his pocket. They were the exact size as the other marbles, the only visible difference being their color. "Can you keep these hidden for me? I'll pay for the trouble."

Gujin eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "Where did you find these?!"

"Don't worry about that. Can you hide them or not? I'll pay you ten white marbles. I can offer more if that's not--"

"Is ten white marbles good enough?"

"Yes!"

Drew took ten white marbles from the pouch and handed them over. The shopkeeper took the pouch and green marbles and went to hide them.

"Don't steal anything. I'll know if you do," Drew warned him.

"Of course, sir, of course."

After that, Drew went to see Miss Maroon. When she saw him, she was surprised. "Where were you?" she asked.

"Off-campus."

It was none of her business where a student went once they weren't on campus, so she couldn’t press further.

There was some silence.

"How’s your monster doing?" she asked.

"Good."

She looked him up and down. "You’re sure?"

"Very."

"I see... well. If that’s all, you can go."

Drew left and headed to his usual spot to cultivate. This time, he was going to cultivate his monster. To harness a monster’s power, one had to do more than just hold it in a vessel.

They needed to create a channel from the vessel to their Ferna, but only after the monster was fully subdued. Otherwise, the monster could use the channel to tap into both its own Ferna and yours, potentially breaking free from the vessel.

The only time a monster could use someone’s Ferna without a channel was if the mold was cracked or improperly built.

However, some experts found a way to overcome this limitation by using a "valve method." They would create both a vessel and a channel at the same time, but add a valve to the channel that could block anything from passing through. This way, nothing could go in or out until they wanted it to.

Drew was confident in the strength of his vessel, so he wasn't worried about the monster breaking free by using his Ferna. He began creating a channel to connect his Ferna, which was centered around his core, to the vessel, located in the same area.

The vessel was like a sealed house in the ocean, while the channel acted like the pipes that brought water into the house. The house now had water but the prisoner couldn't escape via the pipelines.

It took a while, but he completed it nonetheless.

When Drew finished, he stood up. "Come out."

The vessel released the monster with great force, projecting it into the world. The two arms, made of spiraling air, floated in front of him.

With both its mind and body subdued, the monster could only follow Drew's commands.

He raised his hands and gave a mental command.

The Whirlwind Hands monster aligned itself with Drew's arms, fitting over them like a pair of bulky gauntlets.

"This is pretty cool..." Drew muttered.

He threw a few punches, but shadowboxing didn't feel useful. He needed to test it on something solid, like the ground.

Drew punched the ground. Instead of hitting like a blunt gauntlet, the spiraling form of the 'hands' drilled into the earth. Satisfied, he stood back up.

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The 'hands' then detached from his arms and started punching forward in various combinations while Drew watched with his arms crossed, clearly pleased with the result.

This is so damn cool.

He grinned, trying hard to stay cool and nonchalant, but with no one around to judge him, he couldn’t help geeking out over how awesome the 'hands' were.

Then an idea popped into his head. The 'hands' halted their shadow boxing and hovered just above the ground, parallel to it. Drew decided to try something new—he leapt toward the hands, hoping to land on top of them.

But only his right foot made contact with one of the 'hands.' As soon as it touched the spiraling air, the wind’s spinning force threw him off balance. In an instant, Drew felt himself slipping, his arms flailing uselessly as he crashed down hard onto his back.

The impact knocked the wind out of him, a sharp pain shooting through his body as he stared up at the sky, dazed and groaning in frustration.

"That was dumb..." he muttered.

The 'hands' returned to his vessel.

Drew's Ferna capacity at the moment was 121 FN, and merely having the monster in his vessel consumed about 20 FN per hour. His Ferna recovery rate was only 22 FN per hour.

Drew could maintain the monster, but keeping it outside his vessel and active consumed about 62 FN per minute—not too bad. In fact, it was pretty efficient. Since the monster didn’t have any special abilities, there was no additional Ferna consumption to worry about.

He figured it was time to attempt one of the hidden trials.

These trials were scattered throughout the school, designed as secret challenges for students to find using clues. In exchange for rewards, students had to risk something—whether it was their safety, resources, or reputation.

In his alternate future, Drew had never participated in a hidden trial at this school, though he’d heard plenty about them. His friends—back when he still had any—would often discuss the locations.

Unfortunately, Drew couldn’t recall much. The only location he did remember was for the hardest hidden trial. This particular trial only allowed two participants, and they couldn't leave until one either died or surrendered.

The rewards, however, were great—monsters, weapons, armor, cultivation items, money, even treasure maps.

In the coastal region where they lived, such treasure maps were especially valuable.

Time to go hunting!

Drew wandered near the dormitory and approached a tree. He made a sweeping motion with his hand as if parting a curtain—but nothing happened.

It seemed he’d misremembered the location.

For the next two hours, Drew moved from tree to tree, repeating the same motion, earning odd glances from students passing by. By the end, he felt like a lunatic.

It was humiliating, and the more he tried to convince himself it wasn’t, the worse it felt. No matter what, the embarrassment wouldn’t fade. But none of that would matter once he found the hidden trial—he'd be thrilled then!

“What’re you doing, Drew?” someone called out.

Oh, what now!

Drew turned to see Shun.

“Nothing,” Drew replied, straightening up. “Just looking for a marble I dropped.”

Shun raised an eyebrow. “Oh. Well, uh... Bein’s in a lot of pain. You should apologize.”

“Tell Jiman I’m not interested,” Drew said flatly, walking toward the item shop.

“Jiman didn’t send me,” Shun said.

“Did he tell you to say that too?” Drew asked, without stopping.

Shun hesitated. “Y-yeah. But he also said you’re in danger.”

Drew shrugged. “Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not really worried. What you did to Bein was... gross.” Shun’s voice was quiet but firm.

Drew stopped and faced him. “So?”

“But sometimes people go too far. I don’t think it’s worth getting killed over.”

“I appreciate the concern, but I’m not going to bow and apologize. And I’m certainly not giving his parents 200 white marbles. I don’t even have a tenth of that.”

“Is your pride really that important?”

“Pride is one of the most important things in this world,” Drew said. “Without it, people will walk all over you.”

Drew turned and entered the basic school shop. He withdrew a single green marble from Gujin and used it to buy three trial clues from the item shop.

“Good luck,” the item shop vendor told him.

"Thanks."

As Drew left the item shop, he examined the clues:

‘Hidden in plain sight, I only reveal myself when mother hides to have affairs.’

‘I follow the trail left by the fallen brother’s son.’

‘Die today, live tomorrow, sing a song that shall never end.’

The clues were vague, but Drew could decipher parts of them. The first one implied the trial was hidden in plain sight but wouldn't appear when the moon was in the sky. It referred to an old legend about the first woman who became the moon to support the Earth. The 'hides to have affairs' part was still tricky, though.

The second clue pointed to the direction of the first comet, but Drew wasn’t sure of that either. As for the third clue... he had no idea what it meant.

These clues likely referred to different trials. And Drew didn’t have access to the school library, where he might find more information. He needed 54 points just to unlock the first section.

“Troublesome,” Drew muttered to himself.

Out of the corner of his eye, Drew saw Jiman running toward him. When Jiman reached him, panting heavily, Drew greeted him calmly.

“Hello.”

“Don’t ‘hello’ me!” Jiman snapped. “Just apologize! Apologize now!”

“No,” Drew replied.

Jiman lunged for Drew’s neck, but his hand stopped mid-air as something grabbed his throat. His feet left the ground as he was lifted several meters.

Jiman’s eyes widened in shock, his hands clawing at the spinning wind, trying to grasp what was holding him. Drew, however, kept his hands at his sides, indicating he was using his monster's abilities.

Although Drew still had the physical strength of a boy his age and couldn’t fully draw on the monster’s power, he could rely on it to hold off someone like Jiman.

Jiman could easily kill Drew, but Drew knew he wouldn’t—not in public. It would damage Jiman’s reputation too much. After all, Drew was now his ‘son,’ even if everyone knew Jiman only adopted the boys for glory killing one of them outright would be a scandal. And if Shun found out, he’d despise Jiman even more—something Jiman definitely didn’t want.

Shun wasn’t particularly close to Drew, but he had a strong aversion to violence.

Drew dropped Jiman onto the ground, leaving him in disbelief. There wasn’t a crowd around—if there had been, Drew wouldn’t have acted like that.

Jiman wouldn't have taken kindly to being humiliated like that.

Drew walked away. "Leave me alone."

Jiman’s eyes were bloodshot as he watched Drew walk off.

----------------------------------------

Drew spent another hour looking for the hidden trial, using the bits of the clues he understood, but it ended in failures.

This was starting to annoy him. The hidden trial would help a lot, especially with what was coming.

He wasn’t acting rashly, refusing to apologize for no reason. He had a plan and was confident in it. That plan required him to antagonize the opposition as much as possible.

Besides, 200 marbles were ridiculous. He would never agree to something so insane.

But since the trial wasn’t going to reveal itself any time soon, he had to focus on what he could control.

He planned to spend a large chunk of his money buying food for his Whirlwind Hands monster. Monsters grew stronger by consuming meat.

The rarer the monster, the more meat it needed. To max out the strength potential of the 'hands' from 0% to 100%, it needed about 100,549 pounds of flesh.

Buying meat was an option, but there was another: hunting beasts. Unfortunately, he was only allowed to leave the school grounds for two hours a week, and he used up about an hour and 50 minutes already, so that wasn’t really an option at the moment.

The trials would have plenty of beasts...

So it looked like he’d have to settle for buying raw meat. Except the butcher’s spot was locked off until he earned 75 school points.

And even then, at 75 points, he could only buy 100 pounds of meat a week.

Truly, his only option was cultivating and doing his absolute best to come out on top in the next assignments.

Drew took a deep breath, acknowledging the high-risk situation he had placed himself in, but he knew the potential rewards were worth it. His opponents were oblivious to the true game unfolding beneath the surface

He went to the classroom and used the space to cultivate, focusing on cleansing his Ferna.

----------------------------------------

Meanwhile, Jiman knelt on all fours, his forehead pressed to the cold floor as he groveled before Bein’s parents. The dim candlelight flickered across his bowed form, casting long, trembling shadows that made him appear smaller and more pitiful. In contrast, the shadows of Bein’s parents loomed large and imposing on the walls, like giants towering over him—merciless and unyielding.

"Forgive me," Jiman pleaded, his voice wavering. "Drew has become... difficult to control. Unruly. I’ve tried everything."

The room was silent, save for the soft crackling of the candles, the air thick with tension. Jiman dared not lift his head, feeling the weight of their judgment pressing down on him like an unbearable burden.

At last, Marla spoke, her voice cold and sharp. "You think we should deal with him, then?"

Jiman’s heart raced as he nodded, not daring to look up. "Yes. Do with him as you see fit. He’s beyond my reach now."

Marla exchanged a glance with her husband, a dark understanding passing between them.

"I think we will," she said, her voice low and menacing.