Standing amidst the chaos, Yuro's mind worked faster than his pounding heart. He analyzed the beast's anatomy with cold precision. 'The thorns are like a grinding mill, but the fiber-spikes on its shoulders... they still share the properties of wood. I can shred those with my Talons.'
But the ground remained his greatest enemy. 'If I stay on this carpet of needles, I'm dead. It's time for a gamble.'
Yuro retracted his Talons, channeling every ounce of his energy into his fists until they glowed with a searing, crimson heat. With a guttural roar, he lunged downward, slamming his Flame Strike directly into the Earth. The resulting shockwave incinerated the grass in a wide radius, denying the beast its primary trap.
The Thorned Beast hissed, immediately launching a volley of spikes. In a blur of motion, Yuro shifted back to his Talons, crossing his arms to deflect the deadly rain. The metal shrieked against his energy shields, but he held his ground.
'If punches are reflected, maybe the Talons will bypass his defense,' Yuro thought, launching himself forward in a desperate offensive. He swung a jagged claw at the beast's hide, but the feedback was instantaneous and brutal. A massive surge of reflected force slammed into his arm, shattering his right Talon into glowing dust.
Seeing the opening, the fibrous vines on the beast's body detached, lashing out at Yuro like lightning strikes. He raised his left arm, severing several vines with his remaining Talon, but the weapon couldn't withstand the pressure and disintegrated.
Yuro retreated, his breath coming in ragged gasps. His energy was hitting the red zone, while the beast seemed as relentless as ever. 'Nothing is working,' he gritted his teeth. 'The only way out is a long-range strike, but I can't stabilize the flow.' He tried to project a beam from his palm, but the energy flickered and died.
'Fine,' Yuro growled, dodging another lethal lunge. 'If I can't blast him, I'll bury him.'
The beast unleashed its shoulder-spikes again, sensing Yuro was defenseless without his claws. Yuro stood motionless as the thorns closed in—then, he vanished.
The spikes slammed into empty air. Before the monster could react, a massive cluster of loosened boulders from the earlier battle crashed down, triggered by Yuro's calculated movement.
Yuro reappeared several meters away, a jagged, wild laugh escaping his lips. "What an idiot... how could I forget my final trump card? Instant Transmission."
But the victory was short-lived. The beast emerged from the rubble, wounded and shivering with a new, terrifying power. Before Yuro's widening eyes, the creature's wooden texture began to ripple and harden. A cold, dark luster spread across its hide, turning it into solid steel. Even the needles floating in the air shimmered with a metallic, indestructible glint.
Yuro's heart hammered against his ribs. The odds hadn't just shifted; they had vanished. Against a body of steel and a rain of metal, his probability of survival had officially hit zero.
Deep within the silence of his mind, Yuro's thoughts stilled. 'I'm still not entirely sure about that man,' he admitted to himself, Shiron's cold face flickering in his memory. 'Despite my doubts, a strange sense of security has started to take root. I was dragged into this world against my will, yet... I've started to love this place.'
He looked at the steel-clad nightmare before him and tightened his bloodied fists. There was something about Shiron—an innate authority, a power that forced others to trust him without a single word or a grand gesture.
'I don't know how he does it,' Yuro thought, his gaze sharpening with a new resolve. 'But one thing is certain: I will not fail him. I will not let his expectations crumble here.'
Yuro slammed his bleeding fists together, igniting them into a roaring blaze. But even as the flames gathered, uncertainty gnawed at him. 'I can't burn through that steel hide,' he realized, his gaze fixed on the metallic nightmare.
The Beast didn't wait. It unleashed a volley of steel needles—faster, heavier, and more destructive than before. Yuro twisted, but he was too slow. A jagged spike tore through his shoulder, another grazed his thigh. He hissed in pain, blood painting the newly formed metallic ground.
But through the agonizing blur, a brilliant, vicious idea sparked. He looked at the towering, seven ancient trees that dominated this clearing. They were massive, dry, and ready to kindle.
With a desperate burst of speed, Yuro sprinted toward the nearest trunk. He didn't attack the beast; he used himself as bait. Every time the monster launched its razor-sharp shoulder-spikes to intercept him, Yuro would vanish at the last second, forcing the projectiles to embed themselves deeply into the wood.
The clearing echoed with the sound of splintering timber. Yuro was a blur of movement, leaping from tree to tree, weaving a web of destruction. He was laughing now, a grim, calculated sound.
With his fiery fists, he ignited the shredded bark and the dry undergrowth surrounding each of the seven giants. The fire caught instantly, roaring toward the sky. Within moments, the Thorned Beast was encircled by a towering vortex of flames, trapped inside a prison of its own making.
Yuro stood just outside the inferno, gasping for air, a smirk cutting through the blood on his face. He watched the flames reflect off the beast's metallic hide, believing he had finally found a way to melt the steel.
The Beast surveyed the inferno, its metallic gaze shifting back to Yuro with a horrifying, silent sneer. It unleashed a network of steel needles, not at the hunter, but at the remaining trees, bringing them down in a final cascade of sparks and flame. The fiery prison disintegrated.
But through the chaos, Yuro saw it. One of the needles was still embedded in his shoulder. He looked closely. 'As it spun through the air, its penetrating force increased... it uses rotation.'
And then, another realization struck him. 'While he attacks with these fibrous vines, his physical defense on his main body is momentarily lowered. The core of the steel is unprotected.'
Yuro retreated several paces, closing his eyes to shut out the searing battlefield. He extended his bleeding, burned right hand forward, his mind flashing back to Shiron's lessons. Shiron taught him to gather the flame into his fist—but that was too contained.
'I need to release it,' Yuro thought, his aura shifting from an internal glow to an external torrent.
With a roar that tore through the air, Yuro released the untamed, violent essence. He didn't punch; he projected. A searing, concentrated beam of crimson energy erupted from his palm, slicing through the smoke and targeting the beast's momentarily vulnerable core.
Yuro's blood-stained face broke into a smile. This wasn't just another strike. This was his last, perfect gamble—his only path to victory.
The beam collided with the Beast, but the impact wasn't what Yuro had hoped for. Unlike Rin's razor-thin, piercing rays, Yuro's energy was wild and unfocused—a blunt force that pushed the monster back but failed to penetrate the steel hide.
Gritting his teeth against the searing exhaustion, Yuro forced his remaining essence to flare. With a agonizing grunt of effort, he remanifested his Talons. They shimmered weakly, reflecting his dwindling reserves.
'My energy is hitting zero,' Yuro analyzed, his vision beginning to blur. 'My opponent is becoming more resilient by the second, and time is my executioner. None of this is in my favor.'
He stood his ground, the cold weight of reality pressing down on him. He had the intellect, he had the basic skills, but he was hitting a wall.
'I have the mind to kill him,' Yuro hissed, his gaze locking onto the metallic giant. 'But my current arsenal isn't enough. To tear through this steel... I need one more piece of the puzzle. I need an additional skill.'
Yuro didn't hesitate. He lunged forward, unleashing another blast of flame, followed immediately by a Flame Strike on the exact same spot. The rebound force slammed back into Yuro, but it was weaker this time. More importantly, the Beast's steel hide finally cracked. The chance was there.
He used Instant Transmission to retreat, but the Beast went berserk, raining a chaotic storm of needles across the clearing. Yuro flickered through the air, dodging death by inches.
With his last shred of essence, Yuro charged his right hand with a concentrated beam while his left glowed with a flame-strike. He teleported directly in front of the monster, but the Beast was ready. A jagged vine lunged forward, impaling Yuro's arm. He was thrown back, blood spraying the scorched earth, as the Beast began to spin in a localized cyclone of steel and thorns.
Yuro stood up, his body broken and trembling. He looked at the spinning death machine and a dark realization hit him. "You've just invented your own execution," he hissed.
Yuro leaped high into the air. He gathered every remaining drop of energy into a Charged Beam in his right hand. Instead of dodging, he allowed the Beast's spinning limb to strike his arm—using the monster's own momentum to spin himself like a lethal drill.
Driven by centrifugal force, Yuro hurled the concentrated beam at point-blank range and fused his hands into twin Talons. He slammed into the Beast's core. The feedback was agonizing, tearing at Yuro's internal organs, but the Beast was shattering.
The monster unleashed a final, desperate volley of needles to push him away. Yuro stopped spinning, his feet carving ruts into the dirt. With a guttural roar of defiance, he delivered two final, massive Charged Strikes.
The Beast's defense crumbled. Its control vanished.
Yuro didn't stop. He rained a barrage of savage punches until he delivered the finishing blow, crushing the Beast's metallic skull into the charred earth.
Silence fell over the Green Lands. Yuro collapsed onto the scorched ground, gasping for air, his consciousness fading as the taste of a hard-earned victory lingered on his lips.
Shiron appeared before Yuro, a faint, almost imperceptible smile tugging at the corners of his lips. "Well done, my boy," he said, his voice calm amidst the wreckage.
"You passed this test, despite my own doubts. It was a tactical masterpiece. I can confidently say you are a monster when it comes to battle strategy." Shiron's gaze shifted to the remains of the steel beast. "But remember—while you used your intellect to defeat him, as you face higher-tier monsters, their own intelligence grows. Outsmarting them will only become more difficult."
Yuro lay on the scorched earth, his breath shallow but steady. "I understand," he muttered, then looked up at Shiron. "But I have a question... If a monster of this tier possessed such lethal skills and adaptability, what do the higher-tier creatures look like? What kind of powers are we truly up against?"
Shiron's expression remained unreadable. "You already know my answer," he replied coolly. "You will learn in due time. If I hand you every secret at once, you'll lose the thread of your own growth."
He paced slowly around the fallen beast. "Even these monster tiers aren't the whole truth. Within each tier, creatures are ranked by their intellect and tactical prowess. And as for the Power System... you haven't even brushed the surface of it yet."
Shiron paused, looking down at Yuro's battered form. "We are facing a system of Three Paths. You cannot switch between them except once every five hours. But for now, leave these matters for the right time."
A weary smile touched Yuro's lips as he closed his eyes. "Fine," he whispered.After Yuro's weary smile, Shiron placed a steady hand on Yuro's head. In a flicker of light, they used Instant Transmission, reappearing at the rock where Rin, Rhino, and Lauren were waiting.
Shiron looked at Lauren and said simply, "Heal him."
Lauren raised her hands, and in a single, breathtaking instant, a surge of restorative energy washed over Yuro, mending his broken bones and sealing his wounds completely.
Shiron then turned his gaze toward Rin and Rhino. His voice regained its authoritative edge. "Now, it is Rhino's turn. Go to your beast. Good luck, Rhino."
Without a word, Rhino nodded and set off into the wild, the next stage of their trial beginning immediately.