Chapter 29: The Floor of Tests (9)
"...Haah…"
2F, inside the floating island—in the uppermost office where the exam supervisors stayed—a woman flipped through documents in boredom.
Her desk was buried under paperwork, a bottle of wine, and an emptying glass.
She lifted what little wine remained and downed it in one go. As she returned to the next page, something caught her eye, causing her brows to knit.
"…What's this? An unexplained ecosystem shift in 2F…?"
The report stated that, from a certain day onward, the environment inside 2F's underground caverns had changed.
As a result, shinheuh that originally did not exist in 2F had begun appearing.
The next page was nothing but headache-inducing graphs and dense paragraphs in 7pt font, filling every corner of the page.
"…Seeing is believing, I suppose."
She placed the unreadable report down and stood up from her seat.
....
Skrrrk—skrrrk—skrrrk
What the hell—again?
And three of them this time?
There wasn't just a single individual.
Multiple Bulls were living here.
And if three appeared… there could easily be more.
"Hwarang. Think you can throw three more of those spears from earlier?"
"…Do you really think that's possible?"
Heh, worth a try.
I dropped the idea cleanly and rose to my feet, gripping my sword.
Hwarang was exhausted, and the five-minute rotation was over—so it was my turn.
The Bulls twisted their necks in that disgusting way as I stepped toward them.
Schwip—!
One of them lashed out with its tentacle.
I lowered my body, sidestepped forward, and sliced upward.
The tentacle was severed, falling limp onto the ground.
Kyaaaaa—!
The Bull shrieked in agony.
Even with a clean cut, the cross-section was jagged—as if torn apart by brute force rather than sliced.
The tentacle's durability was impressive, but severed was severed.
Now that I had confirmed that approach worked, I sprinted at them.
The maimed one charged me, while the other two crawled along the walls and ceiling toward Hwarang.
A staff jab flew at me.
Too thin.
Far too weak to oppose my sword.
I cut it in half and simultaneously deployed five shinsu swords, shooting them toward the two climbing Bulls.
They were knocked to the ground, successfully drawing all aggro back to me.
Grrrrr…
Their cold judgment evaporated, replaced with animal rage.
All three turned their focus on me.
Two tentacles snapped toward me like whips.
One was at an awkward angle—I knocked it aside.
The other closed in too fast—
But I was Arie.
I redirected my blade mid-swing and severed the tentacle at point-blank range.
The Bull twisted its neck again, confused—
unable to comprehend how my sword, previously elsewhere, had suddenly cut its limb.
No shinheuh could understand Arie swordsmanship.
Splash!
From the cave entrance behind us, water exploded upward.
A dark silhouette shot forward—another black, reptilian shinheuh.
Another Bull.
That made five.
Was this a Bull respawn zone or something?
"Hoaquin! I'll hold this one?"
Hwarang called out.
I nodded. One he could handle.
I turned back to the three Bulls and charged.
Their most troublesome pattern—staff, tentacle, tail: the triple combo.
Every time they attacked, I cut down their tentacles and staffs.
Piece by piece, their reach shrank.
Their tails remained, but those were easy to evade.
As time passed, their tentacles and staffs were reduced to useless stumps.
All they could do was bite wildly or swing their tails.
The cave filled with violent impacts.
BOOM
BOOM
BOOM
Three Bulls attacked from three angles at once.
First, the bite—
I shoved five shinsu swords straight into its open mouth.
Second, the charge—I diverted its trajectory with a strong slash.
Third, the tail strike—I intercepted it on my backswing.
If it had been just one Bull, I could've played around.
But three at once kept the pressure constant.
Their relentless, animal fury forced me to cut with no pause, no breath.
Blood covered all three of them—their own.
They were barely hanging on.
I tightened my grip and called out:
"Baekya—partial activation."
A faint white glow wrapped around the blade.
The shinsu in the surroundings rippled violently.
It was an idea I stole from the Canine People's "partial transformation"—a way to activate Baekya without the full dangerous cost.
Despite being the lowest output possible, it was more than enough.
Shhhh—!
The Bull lunging toward the light had its body cleanly sliced open.
I leapt over the second Bull as it tried to swallow me whole, gathered shinsu into my legs, and stomped on its skull midair.
Its jaws snapped shut instantly.
Using its head as a foothold, I launched myself toward the third—aiming for the neck.
With Baekya's power raised slightly, my slash carved clean through the thick hide.
The head fell.
"Hyah!"
I followed through, sending a crescent of white shinsu slicing through the last one, dropping it instantly.
At last—my side was finished.
I turned to Hwarang.
He was almost done as well.
Using the experience from the first fight, he had the upper hand.
His flames were closing in.
The Bull staggered.
Hwarang raised his spear for the final strike.
If nothing interfered—
He would've killed it cleanly.
If nothing interfered.
"…?! What the—"
Splash—!!
A tentacle shot out from the pitch-black depth—
wrapped around Hwarang—and dragged him into the deep ocean in an instant.
"This is insane!"
If he gets dragged any deeper, that's it.
I dove straight into the dark water after Hwarang.
Hwarang tried to break free by igniting his flames, but we were underwater.
The Bull ignored the fire entirely and kept dragging him somewhere.
It was even faster than the Bulls we'd fought earlier.
It barely slipped past the whirlpool of shinsu I'd raised to stop it, then suddenly shot upward, piercing through the water.
Before I could even react properly, the Bull escaped the depths—and I immediately kicked off after it.
By the time Hwarang freed himself from the tentacles and returned to me, the Bull had brought us into a dark cavern.
No—at this point, it was more like a massive underground chamber.
Pitch-black darkness everywhere…but we were from the Ten Great Families.
Our night vision was sharp enough to make out what was lurking here.
Small glimmers of light all over the walls.
"…You've got to be kidding me."
If only our night vision were worse—maybe we wouldn't have realized.
Accepting the situation, Hwarang flashed his flames, lighting up the entire area.
The pitch-dark cavern instantly brightened as though someone had flipped on a massive spotlight.
And what we saw—
Masses of egg clusters, like frog spawn but orange in color and dozens of times larger, filling the pools around us.
The eggs could be burned easily enough.
The real problem was the creatures here.
KIKIKIKIKIK—
KIGIGIGIG—
KRKKK—
The Bulls that had blended perfectly into the darkness—each with a small glowing orb at the tip of its tentacle—began revealing themselves as the light spread.
They clung to the ground, the walls, the ceiling.
Black, unpleasant, monstrous shapes everywhere.
At least dozens…No—hundreds of Bulls filled the cavern, all staring at us with hungry, curious eyes, twisting their necks unnaturally.
This place—where the Bull had dragged Hwarang—
was their nest.
"Hwarang."
"Yeah."
"When I give the signal, I'll activate Baekya. The moment everything turns white—run. I'll end the ignition as fast as I can and bolt right after."
"..."
"Hwarang."
"…Fine."
I prepared to activate Baekya.
Even brighter light began pouring from the blade as the surrounding shinsu roared.
One Bull, far larger than the rest, fixed its gaze on us—
and let out a deafening howl.
My ears rang.
And then, as if responding to its roar—
Hundreds of Bulls charged at once.
From the ceiling, the floor, the walls—all swarming toward us.
I raised my sword overhead.
"Hwarang! Now!"
I pushed Baekya's light output to the maximum and signaled Hwarang.
But there was no response.
A bad feeling crawled up my spine.
I spun around—
"What are you doing—?"
Hwarang was staring past me with wide, startled eyes.
I followed his gaze.
And there she was.
A woman I had never seen before stood calmly beside me.
Blue hair.
Blue eyes.
A face that said she was tired of the world itself.
Who…?
"How did you kids get all the way down here?"
She spoke casually as she pressed down the sword I was holding, stepping in front of me.
KAAAAAAAAH—!!
Hundreds of Bulls let out maddened roars, jaws wide as they lunged to swallow her whole—
She flicked her fingers.
Tak—
At that single snap, a wave of freezing cold burst outward from where she stood.
In an instant—everything in the massive underground cavern froze solid.
The entire chamber turned into a colossal ice rink.
Hundreds of Bulls became nothing more than frozen statues, entombed in the ice created by the shinsu she wielded.
A breathtaking display.
So sudden I spoke without thinking.
"Who…?"
"Chief Examiner."
The Chief Examiner— Khun Royal Roma—answered simply as she took out a bottle of wine and drank.
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