Shadow-raptors circle us while the sun stays stuck behind dirty clouds, and the Grave-Isle feels more like a graveyard every hour. The ground is all black stone and bone fragments, every patch of dirt packed with the stink of old blood. Felisia and I work together, but I take the lead because I have something she doesn't—a way to last.

Another raptor darts in, jaws open and claws out. I watch the pattern in the way it moves. The Grimoire's insight shows me a flaw, a slight hitch when it pushes off its left leg. I sidestep, raise a Hell's Sword, and bring the blade down on its neck. The cut is clean. The raptor drops dead, shadow leaking from the wound.

Felisia guards my flank, sword steady, breath coming hard. She handles the raptors well enough, but she doesn't have my endurance, and she wastes too much energy on every swing. She kills one and then wipes sweat from her brow, lips pressed tight.

The pack shifts, and another wave comes. I keep moving, tracking every beast. The Grimoire gives me an edge I can't explain to anyone, especially not to her. Every time the shadow-raptors lunge, I see openings that nobody else would spot. I save my strength, land my hits, and avoid every pointless move. The Grimoire makes me brutal and efficient. Felisia probably thinks I'm lucky or just fast, but the truth is, I see through every monster.

We fight in bursts. I drive the raptors back, slicing down two more, and Felisia finishes the stragglers. We fall into a rhythm where she covers my back while I strike first. After every kill, I scoop up the dark core left behind. I pocket most, saving them for later, but I crush one and let the shadow energy flow into me. The feeling is sharp, cold, and electric.

Felisia takes a break after every small round, sinking to one knee and breathing heavy. I sit cross-legged, drop into Meditation, and let my mind go blank. The Grimoire helps me there too, slowing my heartbeat and dragging my nerves into a calm that recovers my stamina and focus. I open my eyes five minutes later with a clear head, ready for the next round, while Felisia still looks tired.

She watches me, her gaze uncertain.

"You don't get tired, do you?" she asks, frowning as she tightens her grip on her sword.

"I do," I tell her, "but I've learned how to recover fast. Meditation helps."

She shakes her head.

"I wish mine was higher leveled."

Meditation is a hard Skill to teach and even with me pointing out the flaws of what she was doing, she barely got it to level sixty before he Sky Hunt. It's good, but it's not nearly enough to recover Mana and Stamina fast enough in this environment.

If it wasn't for the Grimoire and Shadow Lattice, I'd be exhausted myself. Not even with a maxed level Meditation this would have been even remotely doable.

We moved on a ruined temple, taking the high ground in hopes of having an easy-to-defend position.

But the next wave comes even faster.

Raptors scale the ruins, claws scraping stone, their bodies moving like black liquid. Felisia stumbles back from one that nearly claws her side, but I step in, split it down the middle, and kick the corpse off my blade. Blood and shadow spray across the ground, and the core drops at my feet. I grab it and crush it immediately with Shadow Lattice, absorbing as much mana as I can before the next monster advances on me.

* * *

The raptors keep pouring in because the Grave-Isle never lets up, and their numbers swell until the ruins echo with snarls and scraping claws. I slash through another one while my blade bites deep into its hide, but the effort drags on my arms since I've been at this for hours without a real break.

The fight turns into a grind where we trade blows and backpedal across the rubble, but I notice Felisia slowing down faster than me because her stamina dips low and her swings lose their edge. She gasps for air after we clear a small group, and she leans against a pillar while her chest heaves.

"I need to meditate," she says, dropping to her knees because she knows she can't keep going without recharging her mana.

I nod and cover her while she closes her eyes, sinking into focus so her body stills and her breathing evens out.

Hordes fall under my blade while Felisia meditates for those last two hours, and I lose count of the kills as cores pile up at my feet. I absorb what I can with Shadow Lattice, pulling the dark energy into my veins so it refills my reserves and sharpens the infernal diagrams in my mind, but even that can't erase the fatigue that builds in my bones. Sweat stings my eyes, and my grip on the Hell's Sword slips once or twice before I tighten it again.

By the twelve-hour mark, I'm panting hard with my back against a cracked wall, but the last raptor in this wave lies dead and smoking at my feet. Felisia stirs from her meditation, opening her eyes as she stands, and she looks refreshed while I wipe blood from my face.

"You held them off alone," she says, stunned, glancing at the carnage where bodies litter the temple floor. "Why didn't you say anything?"

I shrug, but exhaustion hits me like a hammer now that the adrenaline fades.

"Had to," I reply, catching my breath while I scan the horizon for more.

The sky over Grave-Isle has not changed—still gray, still low, pressing in with that same stink of rot and dust.

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I exhale sharply as I scan the ground where cores litter the dirt like dark pebbles. I kneel and pick up a few that remain intact, but I crush them in my palm so Shadow Lattice pulls the energy in. The chill spreads through my veins while the infernal manual stirs in my mind, and I check the diagrams that float before my eyes.

The first one stays clear because Diavolo Draw has unlocked fully, but the second sharpens almost to completion now. I trace the contours with my gaze where edges form like a sword that penetrates a barrier, and the shape promises raw force that shatters defenses. I absorb another core from the pile, yet the diagram holds back because it's not enough to unlock it completely.

I curse under my breath since the edge teases me, and I know more power waits if I push harder.

Felisia watches me from the side while she catches her breath, and she asks if I'm okay. I nod and tell her we need to prepare for the mini-boss because the glow is building already.

* * *

Nobles are at the peak of the cliff, all in silence now. They have gone through refreshments, some even through a nap, but in the last hour, no one looked at Adrienne or Calantha. To be fair, no one even looked at Felisia.

Every single eye was locked on Jacob Cloud.

Somehow, he absorbed the cores without a flinch, so whispers ripple through the crowd since what he did demands respect.

"That's talent," a lord acknowledges. There's not even a grudge in his voice.

It's not grudges that bring these men to be stunned and speechless.

These are all men that, at one point or the other in their life dreamed of becoming great warriors, legendary Knights. However, at some point, reality started creeping in for them, just like it does for everybody.

But, looking at Jacob Cloud, a feeling reignited in their chest.

They hate the commoners and the peasants, for the most part. It's not even born just out of stupid spite, but the kind of fear they have in their hearts that, if they weren't born in their noble households, they might have suffered the same miserable destiny of those who have nothing.

The poor remind these nobles what they could have been if a silver spoon had not been placed between their lips at birth.

But now, Jacob Cloud reminds them of something else.

He reminds them of legends.

Even though not many have voiced it, there's been an undercurrent of nobles starting to cheer for him.

Why?

Because when you see greatness, it reflects on you like the sun on the moon.

Through Jacob's feat of endurance, they have started feeling their own blood pump. The old nobles have relived moments in their life when they themselves have been heroic. The young ones have started feeling the itch to practice more, to reach the same height they just saw one dirty commoner reach.

When they look at Veyl, there's nothing of that.

Veyl doesn't inspire them.

Veyl seems to come from a whole different world, as if he was always meant to be strong, to be powerful. Yet, even though they probably come from a world closer to Veyl than Jacob's, they look at the man called Jacob Cloud with a fire in their heart.

Before they could even realize it, they started cheering for the commoner.

Skeptics shift in their seats, and they mutter that the power itself means little because anyone can swing a sword hard. Endurance hits them like a gut punch, yet he fought for hours and replenished mana mid-battle as if the island fed him.

That kind of talent would rise above the bottom even in Ytrial where prodigies swarm like flies, so one uncle nods slowly since he can't deny it anymore.

He leans to his wife and admits what's in his heart.

"The boy fights with vicious precision that no one expected, but before in the Crucible no one had seen his moves because the Dungeon hid everything. Doubts lingered like fog, and they wondered if luck carried him or if cheats slipped him through. Now the mirrors show the truth clear as day, so he adapts on the fly and turns attrition into fuel."

That was the real difference between the trial in the Crucible and the Sky Hunt.

Now, it's in front of everyone's eyes.

Jacob Cloud is not the commoner coming here to usurp them.

In their hearts, Jacob Cloud is the story of a human just like them who could humiliate none else than an Elf certified by the High Court.

"Did you see that endurance?" a distant cousin of Felisia blurts, his voice stunned but direct. "I'm not impressed by the power, but the way he endures and refills his mana while fighting stands out like nothing else."

Another cousin nods fast and chimes in right away.

"Absolutely, such talent wouldn't be unappreciated even in Ytrial. It's undeniable now."

A third relative leans forward with wide eyes and adds his voice to the mix.

"He turned that swarm into his own fuel source, and we've never witnessed adaptation like this before our eyes."

Lord Clearwater folds his arms as he watches the feed, and he turns to Sir Greyson who stands rigid at his side.

"I notice, Sir Greyson, that the kid seems to be improving during the fight at a scary speed," Lord Clearwater says while his voice stays low but steady.

Sir Greyson inclines his head since the observation rings true, and he replies without hesitation.

"Yes, my Lord, I believe that I have never seen someone improve and learn like young Jacob Cloud does."

Guildmaster Dorne clears his throat from the edge of the group, and he steps closer while his eyes narrow on the mirror.

"Well, we'll see if he survives the second trial," Guildmaster Dorne says as his tone stays flat but laced with doubt.

He turns then to the branch of the family where uncles and aunts cluster like vultures, and they want Felisia to fail because her win would upend their plans.

* * *

Guildmaster Dorne walks close to the aunts and uncles as they huddle near the back wall, and he leans in while keeping his voice to a whisper.

"Everything is ready," he says.

One aunt nods sharply since the signal hits home, and she glances at the mirror without a word.

Usually, the mini-boss in the second trial is exactly at the very beginning of Gold rank, Guildmaster Dorne thinks, and it's perhaps still primarily a Silver threat that is something hard to kill but not impossible.

But what they give Jacob will crush that balance since it's going to be a late-stage Gold rank threat, and he smirks inwardly because the rigged beast will finally killed the rat who bankrupted him.

He's tired, too. We imagined he would be able to survive the Shadow Raptors. But he has no chance of facing a monster so strong without a full tank.

He's injured.

He's weak now.

He's ready to die.

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