: Six Months, One Test

Six months had passed since Kusana had entered the forest.

The forest had a lot of effects on him since he entered. First, his appearance looked fully like a caveman since his clothes were in horrible condition. Also, his fists had a lot of scars running along them. Thankfully, he had a substitute toothbrush and toothpaste so his teeth were in pristine condition.

Second, a negative thing happening to him was that he was slowly going insane. Six months of not talking to anyone can do that to a person. Even if he focused his whole time on surviving, he was still lonely. He even missed the small interactions he had with Kamino in the morning.

Third, Kusana got significantly stronger since he had arrived. Before, he could barely punch off the bark of the tree he was punching. Now, he was making dents in the wood although it hurt his hand a lot to do it. The 500 punches he had to throw took up a very small portion of his day.

Finally, Kusana wanted to wrestle one of the beasts at night. He quickly found out that if he completed his daily tasks, the beasts weren't released and he could sleep peacefully, but he also found that he was able to kill one. Almost like some kind of monster from a fantasy novel, it dissolved in the sun.

Right now, Kusana stepped out of the waterfall and used his towel—also known as a pile of leaves—and put his clothes on. He was going to continue the rest of his activities, but when he turned around, Kamino stood there.

"Holy sh-" Kusana leaped back three feet in surprise before realizing it was Kamino. He rested his hand over his heart as it beat too fast from her sudden appearance.

"Your wilderness training is over. You have one more trial before I will give you a full test of your capabilities." Kamino picked up the stone tablet laying on the floor and brushed it off with her gloved hand.

"I want you to kill all of the Rakes." Kamino vanished once more and brought over 10 of the beasts. Now that Kusana was able to get a full look at it, he wished he wasn't able to see it in the light. The thing was even worse looking than he had imagined. Except, these types had brown fur instead of white.

"Kill them with your weapon." Kamino suddenly had the 15 foot long meteor hammer in her hands. Kusana caught the long weapon when she threw it, finally being able to feel the familiar weapon in his hands. Kamino vanished and the Rakes were suddenly animated.

During the time training with Kamino, Kusana was forced to create his own fighting style using the meteor hammer. He called it "Column Cutter" where he uses the spiked ball side to create a large area entangled with chains and crush the opponent, then use the kama side to cut their head off.

The first Rake, seemingly the weakest of the five, leaped forward with its hands outstretched. Kusana easily swung the chain around multiple times at the middle and created some slack for him to hold onto.

Kusana's meteor hammer slammed into it's thick skull, sending it flying into the ground. It was a testing shot to see how strong the weakest one was. It seemed to be a bit stronger than the average human.

Kusana threw the kama side of the meteor hammer to try and pierce its neck, but another Rake leaped at him from the side. They had some kind of order, from weakest to strongest, so Kusana yanked the kama side back towards him.

The blade intercepted the second Rake, but it wasn't as stupid as the first. It blocked the flying blade with it's long claws and the chain went limp. Kusana smirked and pulled once more, taking off the Rake's hand with his yank.

Blood spurted out of the second rake's hands as it unhinged it's jaw to scream loudly. Kusana yanked the ball side of the meteor hammer towards the second and it crushed the head of it, successfully killing it.

Since the first one was released and slightly caught the attention of Kusana, the third one decided to hop in and have it's shot at killing Kusana. Kusana decided to get more serious and swung both sides of the chain backward towards the third.

Both sides of the chain wrapped around the neck of the third Rake, which trapped it easily. It tried to claw its way out of the chains, but was only doing damage to itself. Kusana pulled the chain and both sides of the meteor hammer flew towards the Rake's neck.

After the third rake's neck was cut clean off, the weakest was easily intercepted by Kusana's kama in the forehead. Unknowingly, a fire lit in Kusana's eyes and a small grin spread across his face.

The final two, deciding to work together, growled and circled Kusana. He was busy performing circus tricks with the meteor hammer, swinging it around rapidly and even tossing it up into the air a few times.

The final two Rakes had an odd coordination, being able to leap out at Kusana at the same time. Kusana was mid-spin when he saw them, but he smiled wildly. Suddenly changing the direction of the spin, it went from vertical to horizontal.

The sudden twist in patterns alerted a red flag in the two Rake's mind, which made them shield their faces. A moment later, the ball hit the arm of the first Rake and the kama went into the second's arm.

The second Rake whimpered as it was brutally yanked out of the air and went directly towards Kusana. He immediately side-kicked the beast while the other end of the meteor hammer sent the other Rake flying.

Kusana focused on the second Rake, the beast being stunned. The kick brought the kama out of the Rake and directly under its head. The ball end went overhead and slammed down on the head of the Rake, making it fly down onto the kama and cut it's head off clean.

Kusana turned around and punched the final Rake, but it continued it's sneak attack on Kusana's back. Kusana was slashed on the shoulder by the beast's three claws and began seeing red. He discarded the weapon and jumped on the Rake.

Pinning it's arms down using his legs, Kusana beat the Rake to a pulp. He punched the Rake over and over with powerful fists, each one making a bigger dent inside the Rake's skull.

Kusana didn't know when the thing stopped screaming, but kept pulverizing it until the head was a mound of crushed bones and flesh on the ground. He looked at his bloodied hands and, surprisingly, felt nothing about killing the beast.

"The Rake has a special drug in it's claws that makes the receiver slightly more impulsively angry. You passed the test."

(This chapter marks the end of this arc.)