Atlas watched as the torches started to shift, first red, then yellow, then orange, green, blue and finally purple. His heart was thumping dangerously fast and he took deep breaths to calm himself down, wanting to be as prepared for the final challenge as he could possibly be.

He went over the other challenges in his head, knowing that this challenge would be an amalgamation of all of the others put together.

First the trial of strength. In it he had first been pitted against the minotaur, having to break off its horns and impale it to end its life. The second part of the challenge had been the dragon, and he had used his horns to damage its wings so that it could just fly circles around him. With his improved stats, he would be able to kill either one far faster than before.

The next trial was the trial of dexterity. He had first been put through what basically amounted to an obstacle course or a jungle gym, or maybe a mix of both. He had gotten through quite easily and had moved on to the next part. The race. The race against the demonkin had been hard, mostly because of all the random illusions that broke his pace and forced him to slow down so as to not get caught up in too many of them. Then they had summoned the other demon, which had almost overtaken him. He would be far more effective against them than last time, but it would still be hard to verse that demon.

The third trial had been the constitution trial, and he had first run through a flaming room. That had been easy. The second half though… that was still terrifying to him. That golem had given him the beatdown of his life, and he had never felt closer to death than in that moment. He would far much better against it, but he still would rather not be pitted against it again.

The fourth trial had been endurance, and he had smashed through that with flying colors. If anything, that trial was more of willpower than endurance. Sure, it required one to run for hours and climb an insurmountable mountain, but willpower was everything. If you stopped, you failed, if you kept going, you succeeded. He would beat whatever that trial could throw at him easily.

The 5th trial was wisdom, and the labyrinth had been annoying, but ultimately, it had just taken time. The poison test was also pretty easy, with him having to play mind games with himself to figure it out. That challenge would have been lost if not for his high constitution fighting the poison. He felt confident about those trials, and he moved to his latest trial.

The trial of intelligence had thrown riddles at him, and he had blasted through them, of all the challenges, it had been the easiest for him.

He arrived at a tall brass door, and- taking a deep breath, he entered it. He found himself standing at the entrance to yet another labyrinth. Where the last one had reminded him of something out of a movie, this one had a more modernized feel to it. The walls were very dark steel, and they looked very sturdy.

A few feet in front of Atlas was a start line, and Atlas felt like he was starting to understand what was happening. He would be racing some creatures while going through a maze. That incorporated 2 of the trials, but he didn’t know how it was going to add the other 4. Were there going to be monsters scattered throughout the labyrinth? That would be half of the trials accounted for, and he could loosely see how endurance and constitution would be added, but he didn’t understand how the trial of intelligence was going to be added.

With a sigh, he stepped up to the start line, and he was suddenly battered with notifications.

You are about to start the final trial! Prepare yourself!

The trial starts in one minute and will incorporate some aspects of all of the other trials.

There are three rules for the trial.

1 - You may never stop moving, as soon as you start, you run until you finish the trial.

2 - You are not allowed to climb over any walls or cheat the labyrinth in any way.

3 - You are not allowed to attack any of the other runners, only the monsters that will be found in the labyrinth. The monsters will not attack the other runners.

Whenever a runner reaches a checkpoint, they will have to solve a riddle to continue on. All contestants will get the same riddle at each checkpoint.

Warning! You do NOT have any extra lives while competing in this labyrinth, any deaths will be PERMANENT. If you lose the race, you will die.

(System tip: There are no traps in the labyrinth this time, so you don’t need to worry about dying to them.)

Warning! The monsters will get progressively stronger the more checkpoint you cross, so be careful when engaging them.

There are a total of 5 checkpoints. The countdown starts now.

00:59

Atlas read over all of the rules, tips and warning, searing them into his brain so he wouldn’t forget.

The countdown continued to meticulously tick downwards, and at the 30 second mark something changed. 5 demonkin marched out of portals that appeared in thin air, and Atlas had to fight as to not yelp. He had not expected them to arrive until the timer reached zero. Over the next 20 seconds, more runners appeared out of thin air, until there were 10 of them in total, including Atlas.

The timer reached 0, and Atlas and all the other runners blasted off. The demonkin clearly wasn't trying to slow him down with illusions this time, and they were using their magic to instead propel themselves at great speeds. It was a contest between Atlas and the demonkin, all trying to pass each other.

Atlas left them all in the dust.

It wasn’t even a challenge. Atlas ran so fast that the others were there one second and then gone the next. This labyrinth was different from the other one he had been through in the trial of wisdom. Where that one had many different branching paths that all lead in different directions and forced him to follow the left wall, This one instead curved and twisted all over the place, but only had one track to follow. It was both good and bad. It meant that he didn’t have to endlessly follow the wall until he got out, but it also meant that monsters would be able to jump out at him if he turned a corner too fast and was unprepared.

As Atlas experienced a few seconds later, running nearly headfirst into a minotaur that had stood just around the corner. Atlas didn’t hesitate, pulling back his fist and driving it like a bullet into the minotaurs chest. Atlas’s fist connected with a loud thud, sending the minotaur hurtling backwards before crashing into the wall. Atlas didn’t let it get up, running over and stomping viciously on its face and breaking its skull before he continued running. He didn’t want to stop because if he did, he might get killed on the spot.

Or maybe not. The system had just told him that it was a rule to always run, so maybe it would just restart him at the start line. Either way, he wasn’t about to test it out.

He could hear the demonkin shouting at each other behind him, but he paid them no mind and quickly sprinted off. He ran into two more minotaurs, both finding their eternal rest just a few seconds later. After almost 5 minutes of running, Atlas came across the first checkpoint.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

It was a golden gate that had a riddle with some text above it.

This is the first checkpoint. You may stop running if you touch the gate, but must immediately restart as soon as you complete the riddle. Conversely, you may also just jog in place while completing the riddle, as you will be able to read it easier.

Here is the riddle-

What goes through cities and roads, but never moves?

Atlas barely paused to even look at the riddle before answering and running through the now open gate. “A road.”

Atlas found himself face to face with another minotaur. There were some differences from the other ones he had fought though. For one, it was a lot taller and bulkier than the other minotaurs, looking much more dangerous. That wasn't what drew Atlas’s eye, the flaming horns, on the other hand, did.

Atlas blasted a punch into the minotaur, making it collapse and a spurt of blood. Atlas trampled over it, continuing to run at maximum speed. He encountered a few more minotaurs, but they all quickly encountered the same fate as the first. After about five more minotaurs and maybe 10 minutes, Atlas came across the second gate, leading him to believe that both the monsters and the distance between gates would double each time. Which meant he would face around 12 minotaurs and it would take 20 minutes if his theory proved correct.

This is the second checkpoint. You may stop running if you touch the gate, but must immediately restart as soon as you complete the riddle. Conversely, you may also just jog in place while completing the riddle, as you will be able to read it easier.

Here is the riddle-

I am always hungry and will die if not fed, but whatever I touch will soon turn red. What am I?

This one was even easier, especially with the type of monster Atlas had been fighting for the last half dozen fights, and he responded with a simple, “Fire” before rushing onwards once more.

He once more found a minotaur standing right behind the gate, but the differences were less pronounced. The minotaur was once again taller and bulkier than its other brethren, and its horns were covered in a denser fire than before, but other than that not much else changed.

This time Atlas didn’t kill it and instead incapacitated it with a quick punch to the head before leaving it and running onwards. The demonkin were steadily closing on him with him taking more time to kill the minotaurs, and he decided to simply hurt them enough to follow him and move on. If he could kill them that was great but if not no big deal.

Atlas assumptions were quickly proved correct as he tore through 11 more minotaurs in roughly 19 minutes. That wasn’t to say that he had been wrong about the time, but more that it had been faster with him avoiding the minotaurs. The demonkin were starting to gain on him even with his improved speed, and Atlas suspected they got faster after every checkpoint too.

He still couldn’t see them, but he could hear them a lot clearer and could even sometimes make out their feet slapping against the steel floor.

This is the third checkpoint. You may stop running if you touch the gate, but must immediately restart as soon as you complete the riddle. Conversely, you may also just jog in place while completing the riddle, as you will be able to read it easier.

Here is the riddle-

What is so fragile that saying its name breaks it?

Atlas was stumped for a few seconds, and had to think about it while jogging in place, he quickly found the answer however and whispered, “Silence!” to avoid the demonkin hearing him, and they arrived quickly after he dashed through the gate.

Instead of the expected minotaur on the other side, he was giving an unfortunate surprise. There were now two of them, both looming over him at a ridiculous 12 or so feet. He slammed into the first minotaurs leg, snapping it and causing it to grab the other minotaur for support, causing them both to fall in an amalgamation of limbs.

They served as an excellent roadblock, and it took the demonkin that had already answered the question a few seconds to climb over the hulking form scrambling for purchase on the ground. It only made it harder when considering that both minotaurs were struggling to stand up, thus causing the demonkin to have even more difficulty in scaling them.

Atlas found that there were a total of a dozen of these groups, making the amount of minotaurs in total double to the previous 12, but also kept them all in the same amount of groups.

Atlas used the same technique of shattering one of the minotaurs legs to break through and keep running. This only ever failed once, when the minotaur fell on top of him. This had caused a few seconds where Atlas struggled to life the minotaur off of him while other minotaur tried to pummel both him and the minotaur on top of him. He had finally succeeded in sliping out and continued running until he reached the fourth gate.

This is the fourth checkpoint. You may stop running if you touch the gate, but must immediately restart as soon as you complete the riddle. Conversely, you may also just jog in place while completing the riddle, as you will be able to read it easier.

Here is the riddle-

What is the end of everything?

Atlas jogged in place while he thought. He could hear the minotaurs coming crashing after him, and his mind went into overdrive to try and figure out what the riddle’s answer could be. End of everything, end of everything, end of. Atlas visibly lit up. “G!” he yelled, not caring if any of the demonkin heard him, as he was more threatened by the looming minotaurs crashing after him.

He dashed through the gate and found four minotaurs waiting for him. Oh great. Atlas thought to himself before impacting one of the minotaurs' shins at high speeds. He felt a snap and heard a roar of pain as the minotaur collapsed much like its brethren had just a few minutes ago. The minotaurs crashed into each other, causing a huge clog in the middle of the path, but Atlas had already rounded the next corner, not stopping to see if the minotaurs would chase him.

Atlas almost immediately found himself standing in front of another band of minotaurs and could only grit his teeth and dash between the minotaurs legs, not wanting to be squashed by the collapse of the hulking beasts.

He barely managed to avoid the stomping feet and he quickly outpaced their attempts to run after him. He did the same to the next groups, creating a hoard of bull men chasing after him. He ducked under another minotaur and glanced up- only to immediately regret it when he realized that the loincloths that they wore were only hanging in front and behind their legs, not stitched together in the middle.

He wiped the disgusting memory from his mind, no, maybe scrubbed would be more correct, and sped down the path at an insane pace, leaving the minotaurs in the dust. He quickly arrived at the fifth and final checkpoint.

This is the fifth checkpoint. You may stop running if you touch the gate, but must immediately restart as soon as you complete the riddle. Conversely, you may also just jog in place while completing the riddle, as you will be able to read it easier. When you complete this checkpoint, it will be a mad dash to the finish.

Here is the riddle-

What five letter word becomes shorter when you add two letters to it?

Atlas’s mind was scrambled and he took a deep breath to calm himself down and think through the riddle. The answer came quickly to him after he got his thoughts in order. “Short.” He said confidently before running through the gate-

-only to be smashed backwards as a golem smashed his face with its giant fist. Atlas slammed into the gate before picking himself and dashing past the golem, barely evading another punch. Welp, guess now I don’t have to wonder what the trial of constitution is going to affect. He thought dryly to himself.

He encountered three more golems, each managing to land at least one punch on him, and the last one managing to hit him three times. He was bloody and bruised, and his fists were covered in minotaur blood and looked worse for the wear.

But when he turned the corner, he knew it was all worth it. He could see the finish line only about a thousand feet in front of him. He shot towards his target, invigorated, when a chill suddenly ran down his spine. When he glanced back, he saw something from his nightmares.

-eRr0R-

T?? level ????

Atlas’s face went pale, and he pumped his legs to keep ahead of the demonic entity. It was useless though, as -eRr0R- clearly wasn’t playing with him anymore and went almost supersonic speeds and reached him in the blink of an eye. Struck by inspiration, Atlas reached out and snagged onto one of the devil's horns, using it to throw himself forward. In that brief moment when he had pushed off from the devil though, it had crossed almost the entire distance between the finish line, and Atlas crossed it by rolling over.

The devil screamed incoherently at him as it faded into motes of white light, and Atlas was left alone.

He had won.