17 Near Death
After hours of practising on this light, he was slowly able to reduce the distance he was getting pushed by. Yes, this difference was minuscule but it was way better than nothing, it meant he was actually improving.
The light was able to travel fast enough to seem like a blur to the human eye, this was a ridiculous speed to the current Neil yet he was able to somehow catch up to it. He had no clue how it was happening but he also knew that he may not get this chance to improve at a ridiculous rate ever again so he simply continued.
The rock he was originally using had been used up hours ago and he had already switched many times. In fact, the boulders which he had previously destroyed had regenerated, the whole room was white except scattered around the room were boulders the size of a human. These boulders are what he had been using for the past few hours for his training.
Not only was he slowly able to catch up to the speed of the light he was also becoming more efficient with the use of his scythe, he no longer wasted as much energy while swinging it and his accuracy gradually increased alongside it.
He continued on and on for what seemed like many more hours to him until he was finally able to withstand the light so he was only pushed back by 1 metre.
"Finally... I'm finally able to withstand this ridiculously powerful light!"
Gasping out for air he began shouting in joy as his efforts seemed to not have gone to waste. A spring of joy exploded out of his heart as he finally felt an accomplishment, he had finally done something to get closer to his goal.
"Hahaha!"
Joy was simply taking him over as he began to laugh hysterically like a maniac, before long he had calmed himself down as he slowly began thinking about what had just happened.
First of all training through the use of his scythe was extremely useful, it had increased his core being but only by a very small amount, from 15 to 17, but he felt even more powerful than before. Perhaps if he were to face that man that he had killed before he could now do it at double his original speed with one slice only.
Perhaps my Core Being is an overall evaluation of my physical strength plus skill? Because even if I haven't become stronger physically I can now bring out much more power than before, it may not even bring in skill to the evaluation and merely focus on physical attributes only. For example, a giant with natural-born strength would have a higher Core Being than a middleweight boxer but he would not be able to fight using all of his strength as he has no skill, only brute strength.
If I am right about the Core Being then that's fine but I still have no clue what 'Celestial' means, I shouldn't worry about it for now I guess. It won't help to worry about something I won't be able to figure out on my own.
Now that he was done with trying to handle that light he didn't know what to do. There was no exit that he was able to see which he could go through so he was stuck once again.
"This difficulty really loves messing with you doesn't it..."
Neil sat himself down with a sigh to gain his breath back and recover from the fatigue that had built up during his practice.
He looked around the room and looked to see if there were any patterns on the floor or the walls or maybe even the ceilings, any clue that he could get he would gladly take.
But no matter how much he looked all he could see were boulders spread out all over the room and white walls which caged him in. The further he tried to see if there were any signs hidden the further he stepped into the abyss that was gradually sucking him in.
"No, calm down again. I'm getting too agitated, there is no such thing as impossible merely it is assumed to be impossible and so it was called the impossible difficulty.", at least that's what I would like to think but it's called impossible for a good fucking reason.
He once again took in his surroundings and pushed all of his mental power into figuring a way out, there was a way, after all, it's just that he didn't know about it yet. The boulders had to be the clue to finding the way out! While thinking like this he began imagining all of the boulders within the room and arranged them into a formation in his brain.
A pattern... I need to find a pattern...
"I can't find one, I need to get a better view of the boulders, my current perspective isn't helping in the slightest."
An idea suddenly popped into his brain.
"That should work."
Bang!
He swung his scythe at one of the boulders and shattered it, he picked up exactly 5 rocks.
"Let's test this.", he then threw two rocks simultaneously, "Let's see which one it goes after first."
The light appeared again, It went through both rocks simultaneously and disappeared as fast as it appeared.
"Again."
This time he threw one rock, waited a moment and threw another. the light destroyed them one by one, it took about two seconds to destroy both.
He smirked as he held the last one in his left hand, "Time to risk it all."
The rock flew into the sky, but right behind it was him, his eyes grew in concentration.
"I can't die here."
The first light appeared, it went directly towards the rock, but that wasn't what he was concentrated on, he had to check if whether a second light would appear depending on whether or not he was in the air.
And to his surprise, no other light appeared.
Crack!
The rock shattered, a second light appeared behind him and flew towards his neck.
Twisting his body he shifted to allow his scythe to reach it.
"Shit! I won't be able to get it!", but his attack wouldn't be able to reach it at this rate.
The only thing in his mind at this moment was the image of his little sister crying, and the voice of that bastard mocking him.
"Fuck you!"
"AHH!", he forcibly twisted his body, he felt his bones creaking and the pain pierce through his veins but he didn't stop.
Snap!
The sound of a bone-breaking echoed but the pain couldn't stop him, his scythe finally reached the location of the light.
A vast amount of energy blew him backwards crashing into the ground.
-----
State -> Severely Injured
Fatigue 2 -> 5
-----
Not only was he extremely tired but his body was on the verge of breaking down, he had just risked everything for that one gamble of his.
"I'm so stupid.", he mocked himself as he winced.
"But this pain is nothing like before.", he felt himself grow dizzy so he let himself drift to sleep, he just hoped that just like before he would heal up, otherwise he would die.
'From now on I won't make such a stupid mistake, I should have just thrown more rocks than 1.'
His eyes then closed and he fell asleep.
An unknown amount of hours later his eyes were back open.
-----
State - Severely Injured -> Heavily Injured
Fatigue 5 -> 3
-----
A long sigh of relief came out of his mouth, he still felt the pain his spine and ribs but it was much less than before, after a few more times of sleeping he should be fully rejuvenated.
"This body is too weak but it makes up for it with the insane regeneration, I don't know if this was a gift or not you bastard but I'll be taking full advantage of this.", he sat up and began just waiting there, as long as he waited long enough he would become tired again.
Just like that, he was back asleep after a long wait.
-----
State - Heavily Injured -> Injured
Fatigue 5 -> 3
-----
He repeated this until he was finally no longer injured, although he was still slightly fatigued.
Making his way to the middle of the room he broke a boulder apart and grabbed 10 rocks, that was the maximum amount of rocks his left hand could hold, it was too small to hold any more.
Holding his scythe in his right hand and the rocks with his left he started once again, one by one the rocks made it into the air, just behind the last rock was Neil.
Looking down he paid attention to all of the boulders, he memorised all of their locations from a birds-eye view and quickly dropped back down before the last rock was shattered.
"My memory has also clearly improved, in the past that would have taken many tries before I could full memorise the pattern.", but that wasn't his biggest problem right now.
His teeth clenched and his eyes grew in anger, these boulders, they spelt out one phrase.
"Are you mocking me you bastard!", his nails ripped through his flesh and his blood stained the pure ground.
'Oh poor Neela'
That was what the boulder's spelt out.
"This Trial truly deserves to be called a 'Karmic' Trial.", his eyes were unnaturally calm as of this moment.
