CHAPTER 50: CHAPTER 50: DEATH IN THE TRIAL

In a room at the top of the Spire in Safe Zone 9527, Tina sat at a desk. Behind her was a huge floor-to-ceiling window.

If you stood up a little and looked outside, you could take in the whole Safe Zone 9527 at a glance.

A biting cold wind, carrying small snowflakes, kept hitting the glass and made a faint sound.

Elise sat on the sofa in the room. She looked at Tina, hesitated for a moment, then chose to ask.

She said: "Tina, do you think this [Windchaser] can successfully class change to [Berserk Blood Warrior]?"

Tina kept her head down, looking at the papers on the desk, and answered, "The chance is very, very small."

Elise asked, puzzled, "Is it that hard? I don’t know much about the [Berserk Blood Warrior] class, but [Windchaser] should be much stronger than normal players, right?"

Tina lifted her head a little, put down the file, leaned back in her chair, and answered, a bit tired:

"The [Berserk Blood Warrior] class is special. It asks for a heart that does not change even after a hundred deaths. You must be crazy with bloodthirst yet still stay clear-headed. Even if I entered the trial, there would still be a high chance I would fail."

"So you’d better not get your hopes too high. But even if he can’t class change, he should still be able to help you finish your transformation."

After hearing Tina’s words, Elise nodded slightly.

Tina is the administrator of Safe Zone 9527, and the strongest person in the whole Safe Zone. Since she said this, [Windchaser]’s class change would likely end in failure.

She had already helped [Windchaser] as agreed, as much as she could. The rest was up to [Windchaser] himself.

Even so, Elise still hoped [Windchaser] could complete the [Berserk Blood Warrior] class change. That way her own transformation would be safer.

So Elise asked, curious, "What if he does manage to complete the class change?"

Tina slowly stood up and faced the big window. Looking at the endless wind and snow outside, she said softly, "You know this too. By region, the world is split into safe zones, settlements, main cities..."

"If he can complete the [Berserk Blood Warrior] class change, he can become the strongest player in Safe Zone 9527."

"When he goes to the Ice City settlement and keeps growing stronger, he can also build some fame and become a well-known expert."

Elise pressed further: "What if he enters a main city, which is bigger and busier than a settlement?"

Tina was silent for a while. Her eyes looked far away, as if she fell into some memory.

After a moment, she answered, "If he doesn’t meet other chances, most likely he’ll just blend into the crowd and end up as a fighter who can only look up to the truly strong."

...

The smell of blood—so heavy it stank of iron and rot!

After Ethan pushed open the iron door, a blinding white light appeared in front of him and swallowed him in an instant.

When he opened his eyes again, he found himself standing in a sea of corpses and blood.

He froze for just a moment, then quickly adjusted and carefully checked his surroundings.

A small hill made from countless bodies of humans and monsters stood less than ten meters away from him.

Thick, stinking blood was slowly seeping out from the base of the corpse hill, pooling together, then flowing gently toward the lower ground.

Between the grass and the soil, there were bits of torn flesh and organs everywhere.

Ethan lowered his head and glanced at his watch, wanting to see if it showed any useful info.

But to his surprise, the watch he always wore on his wrist was completely gone.

This must be what Tina meant: inside the trial, he can’t use weapons, gear, or items, and the stats from leveling up also vanish.

Sure enough, when Ethan carefully felt his body, a weak, powerless feeling spread through him. It was like he was no longer a level 10 player in Dawnfall Online.

But had become the person he was right after brain surgery, recovering in a hospital room.

Without the watch, nothing could show up. Ethan felt like he wasn’t in Dawnfall Online anymore, but back in the real world.

Before he could react, the ground under his feet started to tremble, very faint at first.

Ethan quickly climbed up a small hill made of corpses, more than ten meters high. He stood on the high ground and looked into the distance.

Before he could see what was causing the shaking, a monster’s corpse under his feet—one that had no lower body—suddenly moved.

In an instant, a monster’s arm, sharp like a long blade, stabbed through Ethan’s heart from behind.

Ethan looked down at the claw that pierced through his chest from behind, and he grabbed it with his right hand by instinct.

Then he tried to draw his longsword, hoping to kill the monster behind him while he could still move.

But he felt his body slipping out of his control. His vision blurred. A strong fear of death wrapped around him completely.

What do you face when you die?

Is it pain and despair?

No. Pain and despair are what you feel before you die.

When death comes, the fear of losing everything bit by bit drowns you.

Death takes all your senses and all you have. You can’t fight it. You can only feel yourself falling into nothing.

Is the class-change trial really going to fail like this?

Ethan wouldn’t accept it. He had been careful enough. That monster only had its upper body, yet it still ambushed him!

In this situation, anyone would die!

When all of Ethan’s senses were gone, it was like he entered a void. Nothing existed, and even his thoughts began to fade.

Then, in that void, a white light appeared and lit everything.

Ethan opened his eyes again and found he hadn’t truly died. He was still standing on the corpse hill.

At his feet, a new body had appeared, its heart pierced by a monster’s arm.

The corpse looked exactly like him.

Ethan touched his chest on reflex and found no wound.

Only then did he realize the [Berserk Blood Warrior] class change trial might mean dying many times.

After he "revived," the first thing he did was dig through the bodies at his feet to find a blood-stained longsword, then he chopped the monster that ambushed him into pieces.

Having already died once, he became even more careful. He kept checking the monster corpses around him to avoid another sneak attack.

These monsters looked strange. They were about the size of a normal human, but the bones in their hands were very sharp, and their skin was tough, like a weapon.

It was like they didn’t need hands for delicate work—only for fighting and killing.

Before Ethan could figure out their weak spots, the ground started shaking harder.

He looked into the distance and saw a tide of monsters slowly moving toward him.

And not just from far away. Two monsters appeared near the corpse hill and were running straight at him.

Ethan gripped the longsword he had picked up and judged their speed.

He found they were about as fast as top pro athletes in the real world—basically the human limit.

And he still didn’t know how to pass the [Berserk Blood Warrior] class change trial.

He had no clue, except for Tina’s reminder: stay alive, and pay close attention to everything the trial makes you feel.

Thinking of that, Ethan took a deep breath, slowly raised his longsword, and stood on the hill of corpses.

He didn’t plan to strike first. From this high ground, the monsters would have to show openings as they climbed.

When that happened, he would take his chance and kill them.

Soon, two monsters rushed toward Ethan. He kept steadying his breath.

When they were less than three meters away, Ethan moved.

As one monster climbed over a companion’s corpse, he drove his longsword hard at its chest.

He didn’t know their weak point yet, so he had to test it.

But things didn’t go as he hoped. Just as his blade was about to hit, the monster suddenly raised an arm and blocked the strike.

Ethan’s body stalled for a split second. The other monster grabbed the chance and swung its blade-like arm, cutting off his head.

The same void. The same white light.

Ethan opened his eyes again. He saw his own headless body, and the two monsters standing by it.

Before he could move, they noticed he was back and charged without hesitation.

He no longer had a sword, and his body was no better than a normal human’s. The best move was to turn and run.

Luckily, there were corpses everywhere—human and monster—so there were plenty of weapons.

Right before they caught up, Ethan quickly bent down, grabbed a greatsword, and stopped in his tracks.

The monsters were much faster than him. Running would only delay death, so Ethan chose to attack head-on.

Three seconds later, Ethan opened his eyes again, and another severed body lay nearby.

No doubt about it—he died again.