Two and a half bells had passed from the start of the Test. During that time, Kai had acquired a total of 10 blue crystals, 5 green crystals, and 4 red crystals, putting him at 125 points. He could’ve had much more, but he’d spent most of his time making his way up the mountain he was on.

Because even though he’d wanted to pass this Test, he’d also wanted to challenge himself, and he just knew that the peak of this mountain had a Spirit Realm beast. And so, even though it was extremely likely that he wasn’t within the top percentage of the competitors within the Shard at the moment, he didn’t care because a black crystal would make all of the walking worth it.

He had seen a few people on his way up the mountain, but had avoided them so that a confrontation over crystals wouldn’t be forced. And the fact that he’d only seen a few meant that the Shard was much larger than he had originally expected.

And so, with 30 minutes still left in the hunt, Kai stood at the entrance to a massive cave. From within he could feel the power of a Spirit Stage Beast calling to his singing blood.

He stepped into the cave, knowing that whether he was victorious or not, this would be his last battle of the test.

The cave led him downwards for almost another 10 minutes, and just as he feared that he wouldn’t even get to the beast in time, the hallway he was in finally opened up into a humongous cavern. And right in the middle of it, a large reptile was standing, facing the entrance to the cavern.

At first glance, the only name that filled Kai’s head was Flood Dragon, but then common sense took over and he realized that one, a creature like that would be mountains larger than the creature in front of him, and two, it would be much much more powerful than anything in the Spirit Realm of Cultivation.

A closer inspection revealed a creature known as a Flood Wyrm, with sky blue scales covering every inch of its extremely long body. It was limbless, which set it apart from other draconic creatures.

However, its strength could not be underestimated, as even a weaker draconic creature like this Flood Wyrm was still in the Second Stage of the Spirit Realm, making it a powerful opponent.

The description of a Lesser Wyrm ran through Kai’s head. He had never thought that he would meet one of these majestic creatures, and yet, he was fortunate that his old teacher had taught him much about them.

Wyrms were the weakest draconic creatures, but shared many characteristics with their more powerful cousins, just in a lesser form. Their scales were very tough and difficult to crack, but if you were to break one, the skin underneath is extremely soft and easy to stab into. A Flood Wyrm like this was most likely ice based, which made sense, due to the environment the Shard had placed it in, which meant that fire was also a weakness.

If Kai had had more time, he probably would’ve left some type of poisoned food out for the creature, which wouldn’t have killed it, but at least sickened it, slowing it down. And then, he would’ve exploited its weakness to fire to further slow it down and then used his own speed to dodge its attacks and bleed it out. Unfortunately for him, he did not have enough time to do any of these things.

However, there’s always one way to beat an opponent. Immense, overwhelming power.

Yeah, sure, normally it would be a nigh impossible feat for someone in the Forging Realm to even think of defeating a beast in the Spirit Realm, but that was exactly who Kai was. He thrived on that thin line between acceptable danger and certain death and had survived that line dance so far. Plus, this was all an illusion anyways so he could go all out without fear of death. He could take liberties with his body that he normally wouldn’t and attack with abandon and so, he actually felt confident of taking out this creature.

Readying his sword, he fully entered the cavern, where the Wyrm finally raised its head and growled at him.

Kai stepped closer and readied his stance, and then made a “come at me” motion, that finally set the creature off.

It roared in anger at the puny thing before it that sought to challenge its power and as it did so, Kai could feel the waves of power bursting from the creature.

Without hesitation, Kai began to circulate his Chi, his first time using it since he’d entered the Shard.

If the others had known this, they would’ve blanched in horror at the monster who’d been killing beasts like it was nothing for the last two and a half hours. The issue though, was that while most of the competitors there had all learned at least one or two Techniques on top of their Energy Gathering Technique, Kai was more stunted in that department.

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The forbidden Energy that he Cultivated hadn’t been used in a very long time, and so, there were no Techniques written for him to learn, which is why he would have to create his own Techniques and though he’d spent the last year doing so, he’d only been able to finally create a Gathering Technique, one that let him Gather Chi through the chaos of battle.

And so, the Chi in his Core that he used was only to strengthen his body and make it more agile. And that, along with his Sword Earth Energy was more than enough for most threats.

Another advantage he had, however, was that he’d spent years both learning and battling beasts in the wild, and so unlike the other competitors, he also knew the weaknesses of the beasts he’d fought so far and so really didn’t need anything other than the Sword Earth to defeat them.

This beast, however, was a whole different story. A Spirit Realm Beast was a powerful being, and anyone in the Forging Realm would be at a severe disadvantage normally. Kai, though, with his Sword Earth, and his extensive knowledge of beasts, had more than a good chance to defeat this Flood Wyrm.

The Wyrm growled at him for a few moments and then shot forward with a speed greater than anything Kai had ever seen. If it wasn’t for the Chi infusing his body with greater speed and reflexes, along with his already agile form, he would’ve died from that first charge.

Instead however, he was able to barely leap out of the way and jaws snapped shut right where he’d been standing, just a second before.

A similar scene played itself out a couple more times, and Kai made no move to attack, instead just feeling out his opponent, figuring its speed out. Patience was the number one trait most important to dealing with beasts. Figuring out attack patterns and then using them to his advantage was something Kai did extremely well. Unfortunately for him, he was on a time constraint.

And so, after the fourth charge, Kai finally attacked. Jaws snapped shut as Kai leapt out of the way, but then instead of staying back, he landed and launched himself forward just as the Wyrm was about to slither back.

The beast saw him just in time and Kai was able to barely slash through a scale near its mouth as it snapped its head back. No blood was drawn and the creature was now a little more wary of its opponent.

The creature then, contrary to what Kai had expected, opened its mouth and let loose a jet of ice right at him.

Kai launched himself sideways, but unfortunately, he was just barely clipped with the edge of the ice blast.

A sharp pain, and then numbness permeated his left leg. After he landed hard on the ground, he quickly looked down at his leg and saw that it was covered in a thin layer of frost, which would definitely slow him down. This was a major issue since he wasn’t too much faster than the Wyrm anyways. But now there was no chance that he could dodge a single one of its attacks.

He quickly got to his feet, keeping his weight on his right leg. As the Wyrm reared its head back once again, Kai’s eyes widened in surprise and he decided to use the same move he’d used on the Rhino a couple hours before.

He pumped Chi from his Core down to his right leg and then waited until the Wyrm committed to its attack. He then launched up, the Chi in his leg even cracking the illusory floor of the cavern slightly at his launch point.

Due to the usage of Energy, even off one leg, Kai was able to jump much higher than he had against the Rhino and easily cleared the head of the large Wyrm.

As the Wyrm passed under him and Kai flew down, he forced the Chi both from his leg and his Core to his sword arm. His arm shook from the strain of forcing both Chi and Sword Earth onto his weapon.

Though the sword he was holding was of a stronger metal than the crude iron he’d used at the village, it most definitely wasn’t strong enough to contain both energies.

He’d counted on this, however, and so when he came down in a perfect trajectory right onto the right eye of the Wyrm, he released the Energy he’d been holding onto.

His sword stabbed right into its eye and then exploded inside, destroying the right side of its face internally and even pulverizing a few of its scales on the outside.

He held on then, with all his strength as the beast reared its head back roared in pain and anger. It then started shaking its head, first slowly and then ramping up to where it violently threw its head about.

Kai held onto the hilt of his sword and however much of the blade was left inside with all of his strength as he was almost thrown off the Wyrm’s head.

As the Wyrm flipped its head around, Kai forced the broken blade in deeper and deeper, hoping to reach its brain.

The beast screamed in rage as Kai hurt it further. It then finally used some more of its meager intelligence.

The higher Stage and Rank a beast was, the smarter it would also be. There were some exceptions, of course, like beasts that were solely based on intelligence, but those were rare, almost as rare as other Draconic beasts.

Generally, another significant reason why higher Realm and Stage beasts were so dangerous was because of their higher intelligence. Match that with the power of a Spirit Realm creature, and a genuine threat was created.

It started to rush forward and rip its head back as violently as it could, instead of moving its head from side to side.

The second time it did that maneuver, Kai was thrown up into the air and at the end of it, was dangling in front of the creatures mouth, right hand still grasping the hilt of his broken sword.

The Wyrm opened its mouth and Kai, in a desperate move, pumped every last bit of Chi from his Core, into his blade to try and kill the monster. Silver lightning started to arc across his arms and into his weapon, dealing even more damage to the draconic beast.

The Wyrm chomped down on Kai’s legs and he screamed in agony, still pumping Energy into the creatures brain. The monster chewed and Kai still forced Energy out through his hand, as he died.

And then suddenly, as blackness threatened to overwhelm his vision, he started to fall through the air. In his almost dead state, he barely felt the impact of the ground, but he forced himself awake to look for one thing.

A few seconds later he saw it. Right there, at the edge of his vision, he saw the object he’d been looking for. The black crystal.