Hello again lovely readers. I thank all of you that have made it this far in the story.

I can almost guarantee that a lot of you may not enjoy this chapter for various reasons, and I will talk more about that at the end of the chapter, but for now:

Enjoy the chapter!

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Chapter 20: Pain after Pain

I slowly put on my prosthetic after my shower. The smile not leaving my face for a second. I finally reached the second realm after training for so long without a specialization.

I can start the technique that I used in the other world that helped me rule the continent.

Without hesitating I sat down in the center of the room after locking my door. I really hope this doesn’t hurt too much…

I go over the method in my head. In order to start this method, I need to form symbols representing the elements within the void space.

Fire’s symbol is a volcano. Wind’s symbol is a tornado. Water’s symbol is a tsunami. Earth’s symbol is a collapsing mountain. While lightning’s symbol is a lightning storm.

The first challenge is forming them all simultaneously. They all have to start forming at the same time and finish forming at the same time.

The second challenge lays in the fact that even at the second realm the void space does not have the storage space for enough of the power of heaven and earth to form all the symbols.

The third challenge is then to destroy them all at the same time. Not just dispersing them, but completely shattering them. In order to shatter the formed heaven and earth power, I have to flood my veins with as much heaven and earth power as possible.

The fourth challenge is to repair my heaven and earth veins by fusing them. I don’t understand this process very well. The veins will be completely damaged while destroying the symbols within the void space. Fusing the veins sounds weird because the concept of fusing veins is a complete unknown to anyone I have ever talked to. The process is simple, yet complicated. There are probably several conditions that need to be met in order to fuse veins, but I do not know them. But, after this process I have to fuse them together… somehow… I did it in the other world, shouldn’t be too hard to do it again… right?

The fifth and final challenge is to stay conscious throughout the entire process. If I lose consciousness for even a split second the power of heaven and earth will run rampant inside my body and tear me apart from the inside out.

I take several deep breaths in order to calm myself. I need absolute focus in order to do this.

I start to circulate the power of heaven and earth within their respective veins. The power of the second realm has a base strike force of 400 pounds at the C rank, with normal methods anyways. My method is a lot different. With my method, my strike force is fifty percent higher than the base strike force. So my strike force at the C rank in the second realm would be 600 pounds.

The power of heaven and earth moves towards my void space as I carefully control it. I take another deep breath and close my eyes.

I start to form the five symbols within the void space. The five symbols are incredibly close to each other.

With the symbols only a quarter formed my internal energy runs dry. I quickly absorb as much of the power of heaven and earth as I can without overstepping my limits.

The symbols are slowly forming while sweat starts to cover my entire body.

The process is extremely exhausting in the first part. I take yet another deep breath in order to keep my focus.

The symbols are now three quarters formed. An incomparable pain goes through my entire body, I almost scream out, but managed to just barely make it through my gritting my teeth.

There is now a burning pain that is coursing through my entire body from head to toe. The pain has started.

My eyes quickly open as the symbols completely form. The pain in my body has tripled.

Gritting my teeth can only go so far as my breathing gets heavier. I don’t know why this methods hurts this much.

Forming everything went flawlessly. No worries about failing now… unless I lose consciousness and the power of heaven and earth run rampant inside me.

Next step. Destroy it all.

In the process of getting enough of the power of heaven and earth, my veins will be destroyed respectively. Then, I have to fuse them.

I quickly start to move as much of the power of heaven and earth inside my veins as I can. I let out a low grunt as my veins deal with the massive surge of the power of heaven and earth.

The surge of the power of heaven and earth reaches the void space and shatters the symbols instantly.

The power of heaven and earth stored within the symbols floods into my veins not caring for their respective power. Audible tearing sounds are heard from the invisible veins. The veins are being destroyed.

“AAGGGHHH!!!”

I let out a loud scream. Shit. People may start coming. I have to hurry!

I grit my teeth. Holding back the screams of pain. My body is tightly clenching all of its muscles without responding.

My veins are now thoroughly destroyed, I have to do this now, or I will have no chance to even be at the first realm!

I focus my mind and start to manipulate as much of the power of heaven and earth as I can to start forcing the veins to fuse. In order for them to fuse now, all they have to do is touch… but they technically don’t exist… so I have to do my best.

I have to move the earth veins from my limbs in order to meet with the heaven veins surrounding my internal organs.

I manipulate the power of heaven and earth in a way that moves the veins towards each other slowly. The veins slowly move to the same location and are existing within each other, but they haven’t fused yet.

Why haven’t they fused yet? This is when they should start fusing and the pain goes away!

I realize it a split second too late…

“AAARRRRGGGGGHHHH!!!”

The veins collapse in on themselves as the pain becomes so large no amount of willpower could stop me from screaming at the top of my lungs from the pain.

I’m missing a portion of my earth veins.

To solve this issue I either have to remove a portion of my heaven veins to balance it out… or find a way to fuse them regardless of the differences.

“AAAAGGGHHH!!”

I let out another scream as my body collapses onto the ground. I have no control over my body.

I decide to try and fuse them regardless of the differences.

I wrap the veins with the power of heaven and earth and compress them further.

“AAAAAARRRRGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!”

This causes an intense pain to move through my entire body. The veins are compressed to an incredibly small size.

I move the power of heaven and earth away from the veins and hope that they fuse.

The veins near my heart start to fuse slowly. The fusing process is supposed to start relieving the pain… but…

“AAAAAAGGGGHHH!!”

I let out another scream. This hurts so much!

My breathing was incredibly heavy. The veins were fusing faster and faster. Let’s try something, anything will be better than this!

I try to absorb the power of heaven and earth into the newly fused vein.

The pain finally starts to dull.

I absorb as much of the power of heaven and earth remnant from the process into the fused vein. The pain is finally within levels where I can control my body again.

I sit up and take deep breaths as the process finishes.

The newly fused vein feels stronger than it should normally. Well, I’m not going to complain about it, but it seems odd. The process still should have been the same regardless of missing a section of the earth vein. To begin with they aren’t the same length. The earth vein was actually the same length of the heaven vein after losing the section in my arm.

Is that it? Equal length makes them stronger when thy fuse? Seems too good to be true…

I sigh as I check what rank I am.

A rank of the second realm…

Huh? That’s not right. I was only at the C rank this morning! This didn’t happen in the other world!

I take a deep breath to calm myself when a knock comes from my door, “Hey man, you okay in there?”

I don’t recognize that voice.

I walk to the door and open it, “Yeah, I’m fine, just a bad dream is all.”

When the door opens all the way I see a guy that looks the same age as me. He holds out his hand, “I’m in the room next to yours. I heard a bunch of screaming so I thought I’d come check on you…” He quickly pulls away his hand and slowly backs away while looking at the door handle.

I look to the door handle also… it is completely crushed.

I smile weakly, “I seemed to have went up a realm overnight. Sorry for the scare.”

He scratches his head, “No problem… well, see ya round.” He then quickly walks back to his room with a grim look on his face.

Why is everyone around me being like that?

Oh well, back to what matters.

I can now use some of the skills that I gathered in the other world. I will limit myself to ones I can use continuously rather than once, because I think it is better to be able to hit a lot continuously than go for a single strike and have it miss.

I carefully go through my memories to try and remember what skills I can start using.

Hmm. I can use the lower ranked version of ‘Velocity’, ‘Speed’.

I should also be able to use the fighting skills, ‘Heavy Strike’, ‘Speed Strike’, and ‘Redirection’.

‘Redirection’ is more of a defense skill that will help move the incoming attack by slightly changing its momentum. The other two skills are pretty simple, heavy strike makes you hit harder at the cost of speed, while speed strike makes your movement fast at the cost of damage.

I take a deep breath as I check the time…

Noon.

I hang my head as I slowly stand up and head to have another shower as my body was covered in sweat from head to toe.

I start to think to myself. What has been going on recently? If I go all the way back to before I died the first time, I can see how odd that demon’s appearance truly was. I was the ruler of what was thought to be the only continent on the entire planet… but that might have just been my defining mistake. How large was that planet truly?

According to what my mother told me, that planet was created by two beings at the very peak. How could a planet that was created with all their might be something so small? How come a lot of the people that I knew in the other world are conveniently placed with me on the same planet?

Another thing that is bothering me. How come I am roughly the same age as these people in the other world, but I am late coming to this body?

I wonder if I will ever find the answer to these questions.

I take a deep breath to calm myself and start to dry myself off from the shower.

I put on my clothes after attaching my prosthetic. My stomach lets out a quiet sound.

I should probably go eat.

-------------The Day of the Test-------------

I let out a long sigh as I head towards the front of the school grounds in order to meet up with the other students. Even though I’m 30 minutes early, almost everyone is here already.

Juliet walks towards me and kicks my shin, “This way idiot.”

I put on a weak smile as I follow her towards the group that I am in. The students avoid me as I walk.

I haven’t seen Kelly in a while. She isn’t here either. Where is she?

I look at the other students, they all have weird smiles on their faces that are a mix between being excited and feeling fear.

I let out a sigh as I stop thinking about it, distractions now may lead to an injury in the forest of a thousand trials. It had been a couple days since I have stated to use my technique. The days passed with me acting exactly like I did before and no one knows that I am in the second realm except for me alone.

The principal appears in front of everyone a couple minutes later, “I’m glad to see that everyone is here early! Since everyone is here early I shall start the explanation! First of all! The groups shall be formed before getting on the transportation vehicle! There are only six people per group! The transportation vehicles only transport six people at a time! Every group will get their own transportation vehicle! These vehicles are controlled externally via a computer system! The first group will be decided by me!”

Damion, the principal looks into the crowd and sees me and smiles evilly, “Ryu’s group will be the first group to go! When you arrive at the forest of a thousand trials the guards at the door will recognize you and will let you in immediately! Do not wait for everyone to show up and enter as soon as you arrive!”

I hang my head and sigh. Juliet smiles widely, “Hey idiot, looks like we get to go first!”

The first vehicle arrives. It looks like a large hummer. It is painted pure black. The windows are so tinted I can see the reflection of the sky in them. The wheels are off-road tires. How long is the drive?

Damion stops me as I was about to step in the vehicle, “Hey Ryu, are you sure you want to be in that group? This whole thing is seeming too sketchy, also… just between you and me, your mother, the vice principal has gone missing.”

My jaw drops, “How long has she been missing for?”

He looks down slightly, “Since the day after you got here.”

I make a complicated expression, “I talked to her a bit less than a week ago. She came directly to my door, but since she got a call and had to leave I didn’t follow her when she left.”

Damion frowns more than I’ve ever seen, “Ryu. This isn’t me as a principal asking you not to go with that group for fear of bullying. This is me as a friend, please don’t go. This is a very, very bad situation.”

I sigh lightly, “I’ve been in more complicated situations. I need experience in this world. I have questions that need answering, and I won’t get them by sitting within the protection of this school.”

Damion shakes his head, “Ryu, I’m begging you. Don’t go.”

I give him a weak smile, “I may not be strong right now, but this experience will help me get stronger.” I walk into the vehicle and turn around before closing the door, “I’ll talk to you when I get back. It won’t take long.”

Damion makes a pained expression as I get into the vehicle, but walks off anyways. I wonder why he says it was so dangerous.

I realize it too late. The attack on the school…

My mother showing up.

The unwavering hate that Juliet has towards me.

My eyes widen as I realize I really have dug my own grave.

The girls in the vehicle gossip while completely ignoring me smashing my head off of various surfaces.

We arrive at the entrance to the forest of a thousand trials. I was expecting a tower, but it seems this is all underground. The only way to tell that there is something here is the tents that are set up around the area, and a small opening in the ground revealing a large spiral staircase. My head lowered, I walk out of the vehicle and look at the guard with a pale face.

He makes a complicated expression as he begins to talk, “Group one. You may enter now.”

I give a weak smile as the girls enter before me. I should focus on the trials or I might end up having different issues.

“Hurry up idiot!” Juliet yells at me as I jog to catch up. I have a really bad feeling. I know exactly how this is going to end… but I did this to myself. How long until it happens I wonder?

We get into the room of the first trial after walking down for several minutes we all arrive in a high ceilinged room that was light by a bright ball on the roof. The room had several switches on the near side and an abyss in the center, and stairs leading down on the other side.

There was writing on the wall. It says;

‘This is a puzzle, solve it.’

… Really?

So much for the super mysterious atmosphere…

Juliet and the girls walk over to the switches and start pulling them randomly. There’s no way that’s going to work at-

I get cut off as a bridge starts extending across the abyss. There’s no way they were pulling them randomly!

“Idiot, how come you didn’t help us?” Juliet frowns as she walks over to the bridge.

I walk onto the bridge first, “Well I was going to say that we should check for clues to solve the puzzle. To be honest I didn’t expect it to be so easy. There wasn’t even any repercussion from pulling the wrong switch.”

She makes a complicated expression, “They do that normally? Why didn’t you stop us then?!”

I sigh, “It was because you went over too quickly.” I step onto the bridge in order to cross. I was kicked in the back of the head and lose my balance, “Wha-“

Juliet is there with her leg in the air. A huge smile on her face. As I start to fall into the abyss she mouths, ‘Idiot’

While falling I hear laughing from all of the girls echoing down the abyss with me.

Well, who knew it would actually happen like this? The day I die… again.

I lose. I’ve lost again! Why can I not do things properly! I should have laid low like my parents said!

I close my eyes as I prepare to hit the bottom of the abyss.

I could now feel that I was extremely close to the bottom…

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Hello again, I hope all of you enjoyed this chapter.

I really just wanted to clarify a couple things, in this chapter there will be many questions as to what actually happened. Also, it seems as if there are many plot holes appearing. This is (mostly) intentional, and shall be fixed soon enough.

Feel free to tell me your opinion, as I am interested in what all of you, the readers, think.

Have a nice day!