I sat in the lightless void for but a moment, yet it felt like an eternity had gone by. Confused, I checked myself only to see I was still naked floating in the void from before. (What the fuck!! What the hell just happened!? Didn't I clear the trial?) Then a voice rang out,
"Challenger has completed and escaped Illusion #1. Now beginning Illusion #2. Notice: the Challenger must complete and escape a million illusions before they qualify to attempt completing the last illusion within this trial space. The next illusion will begin at the end of this message."
Once again, I was thrown into an illusion. The last one was so deep, I thought it was the trial space itself, but it turned out to be something else entirely. Does that mean, the avatar and lifeforce was a part of the illusion too? When examining the Divine Kingdom palace, I found no lifeforce egg or anything outside of what was originally there… (sigh) I thought I had been getting something instead I got duped.
Once again I was assaulted by waves of cursed energy. Only, this time these waves created a mental "burning" sensation instead of a general one of "pain." Additionally, the images I received all had me being tortured instead of my family.
The culprits… my family and friends. In these illusions, I was the recipient of everything I had once saw in the last illusion, and I mean everything. Additionally, I was restricted in this illusion space to a point where I was not able to use any spells. So, I called up my aura and started fighting the people inside the illusions.
Luckily, I was able to break free of the images like in the last illusion. I then created a Bloodlust Avatar which fought all the way to the exit. Once out, I was again place into another illusion, and another, and another… and another.
Each dreadful illusion had its own restrictions on my abilities and overall arsenal. I lost count of how many illusions I was thrown into. However, the effects of the illusions were changing me at a very noticeable rate.
I became colder, numb to the pain and suffering others felt. The pain and suffering I felt smoldered and grew, but seemed far away. Slowly, I was losing what made me a moral individual and felt like I was turning into a cold blood killing machine. With each illusion conquered, more of my personality is taken as the price for survival.
Currently, I am in the final illusion before I face the last trial/illusion within this damn bonus trial. As the waves land on my body, I no longer react to their mental sensations. I am now no longer affected by the images they bring. Only my accursed mana palace reacts to the wave.
Although the lifeforce egg was never something I had received from these illusions, the cursed energy was indeed a real thing, and nourishment for this mana palace. Now the runic tattoo had become extremely lifelike as it slid up and down my arm, an evil gaze glancing at everything it considers food. When the energy wave get close enough to my body, they simply breakdown and are directly absorbed into the mana palace.
All I feel from my left arm tattoo and the accursed mana palace is malice towards others and an insatiable hunger for energy. Since they are a part of me, they have provided psychological relief of sorts as all of the negative emotions building up inside me during this trial were devoured by them similarly as the cursed energy. Sadly, no positive emotions could exist in this hellhole of a trial.
As I approached the portal exist of this illusion, I didn't even give the guardian beast a glance. My Bloodlust Avatar, fully armored like an Egyptian pharaoh with 4 heads covered in masks of a hawk, lion, jackal, and man instead walked over for a "chat". Similar to the previous versions, each face had a different expression, although 3 of them are animal faces.
In each illusion, my bloodlust Avatar would appear differently, but retained similar features, always a somewhat humanoid colossus with 4 heads wearing masks of some sort, and 12 arms all wielding plasmasabers. One time, the avatar appeared to have the lower body of a lamia which is a monster often confused as a Naga or gorgon or other serpent related monsters.
I digress, sorry. In the past illusions, I would have my avatar fight tooth and nail with the guardian beast. Now, my avatar simply consumed the guardian beast headfirst before it wakes. The sight is nerve wrecking for someone whose never seen it before.
My colossus which looks like a speck of dust compared the guardian, expanding its "man" mask's mouth like a snake. It then swiftly wraps the head and bites down on their neck, chomping the head straight off. Afterwards, consuming the rest of the monster's body.
The corpse is then converted into cursed energy which is directly sent to my accursed mana palace. While the runic tattoo monster grew to which it now has the life like appearance of a 4-headed serpentine dragon. The beast was way too detailed for my liking, to be honest.
Each head having a different number of horns and made different facial expressions as they looked around in real-time. Each head has the same apathetic gaze in their eyes though. They looked down on everything (even me) as they scan the area for more food. Even staring at the tattoo can give off a creepy vibe like one of those scary painting with moving eyes only the eyes on this tattoo were actually moving.
Passing through the portal, I was greeted by a final announcement,
"Challenger has completed all prerequisite illusions and no qualifies to proceed to the final combat zone. Challenger, you will now face the carnal beast you have been feeding since the beginning of the trial. You have 1 minute to prepare for the final task which will begin at the end of this announcement".
Well… shiii. No wonder I had a back fucking feeling about this whole thing. I was raising the final boss, this beast of a tattoo on my arm. Holding up my arm, I noticed all four heads turned into 9 heads. Each head was staring back at me with the same horrifyingly elated face. A face like a ghost smiling at their next victim from up close.
When my minute of prep time ended, the tattoo faded from my arm, and the creature appeared directly in front of me, radiating the same cursed energy it had absorbed during all of those illusions. The creature had 9 heads all gazing directly at me. Each head apparently represent a different immoral feeling. And I must now fight my own immorality while in my current state.
Additionally, many of my abilities were completely sealed save my Bloodlust Avatar. Hopefully, I will be able to fight my self-created calamity. This reminds me of a game I played as a kid which had a difficulty called "Ungodly" and customizable setting you could add to make the game even harder (such a masochistic thing to do). Right now, I am facing this last boss on "Ungodly," with every additional setting on, completely crippling my ability to fight back.
I immediately summoned my bloodlust avatar which became the same size as the colossal creature, and they began to fight. As their battle ensued, I began to feel real pain as if claws dug into my arms, legs, and back. Blood would also ooze out of my eyes, nose, ears, and fingernails. Somehow, the damage they caused to one another was being reflected onto myself like a voodoo doll of sorts.
Afraid I might collapse after reaching the finish line, I took a meditative stance and envisioned the battle in my mind since I could see it with all the blood oozing out. The sight I could see was a colossal scale of a warrior fighting a dragon like in the fairytales, only the warrior had four heads. The 9-headed dragon knew all the weaknesses of the warrior and exploited them as they both were trying to eat each other. There's no way this is going to end well for me…
-End of Chapter