By the time Eryndor, Lirien and Garruk had reached the arena, the City had already shifted into a different mood.

  The first trial had been restrained and measured, but this one felt louder and far more ceremonial. The air hummed with anticipation, yet the noise never fully erupted. It felt as if the entire audience was holding itself back and waiting.

  They quickly found their place among the spectators which from that vantage point, they could see the entire trial floor.

  At the center of the arena stood a ring of towering totem pillars carved from seemingly horn and stone. Each pillar pulsed faintly with deep amber light that bled into etched runes spiraling across the ground.

  Garruk folded his arms over the railing.

  “The arena is different today,” he said.

  Eryndor leaned forward slightly, resting his elbows on the rail while studying the patterns of light spreading across the arena floor.

  “Looking at the runes, it seems the second trial is not a duel,” he said.

  “It looks more like containment.” Lirien muttered,

  Below them, the remaining candidates stood arranged in a wide circle. They appeared outwardly calm, but their posture carried a tight focus. Ashara stood among them, relaxed in stance but alert in his eyes. He did not appear restless. He simply looked ready.

  Across from him, Rhazek stood broad and immovable, his tusks gleaming beneath the shifting amber light.

  High above the arena, the Beastlord Nakira sat upon an elevated throne platform grown from intertwined horn and root. Her eyes watched the arena floor without blinking. Beside her stood Mahrak, the High Chieftain of the Herd Cities. Farther along the platform, the city’s ruling council and delegates from Prashavat and Matrabhumi Ayoga observed the preparations in silence.

  A single horn sounded.

  It was low and deep, and the vibration rolled through the arena like distant thunder.

  Once again Nakira stepped forward and raised one hand.

  “The Second Trial,” her voice carried clearly across the entire arena without strain, “is the Trial of Persistence.”

  A murmur spread through the crowd.

  She continued.

  “You will not fight each other. You will not be judged on spectacle. You will be judged on survival.”

  The runes around the pillars flared brighter.

  “You will endure what the land chooses to give you.”

  The ground within the ring began to glow.

  Eryndor straightened slightly.

  “What will the city show us today?” he muttered. His voice carried curiosity and excitement.

  Garruk grunted in reluctant awe while Lirien stared sharply at the arena floor.

  The runes expanded outward, forming a circular boundary of amber light that enclosed every candidate within the ring.

  Then the air folded.

  It was not violent and it was not explosive. The space simply compressed inward, like breath being drawn into lungs.

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  In the next instant, the candidates were gone.

  The arena floor lay empty.

  The crowd erupted into layered sound, but the reaction was not confusion. It was expectation.

  Above the arena, the amber light shifted again.

  The surface of the trial floor transformed into something that resembled a living window.

  Inside the trial space, Ashara landed lightly on one knee as the ground formed beneath him.

  The air struck him first.

  It was dry and abrasive, searing across exposed skin. Sand tore across his face and fur.

  Desert.

  A vast expanse stretched outward in every direction beneath a white sun that burned without mercy. The sky remained empty, and the horizon shimmered under the intense heat.

  Around him, other candidates materialized at scattered distances across the dunes.

  Some staggered as they appeared. Some fell immediately. One warrior raised his shield at once to brace against the violent sandstorm.

  Ashara did not move immediately.

  He crouched low and oriented himself.

  There was no shade and no immediate structure to use for cover.

  He stood slowly and scanned the dunes.

  Then he felt it.

  The ground shifted unnaturally beneath his feet.

  Something was moving.

  He stepped sideways without hesitation.

  The sand exploded upward.

  A scaled creature erupted from beneath the surface. Its body stretched as long as a riverboat, and its jaws were filled with grinding rows of teeth.

  Ashara rolled across the sand and barely avoided the snap of its jaws.

  “So that is how this trial will work,” he murmured quietly.

  They were being hunted.

  The serpent-beast twisted violently and dove back beneath the sand.

  Across the desert, other candidates were already engaged. One wolf-kin was dragged screaming beneath the dunes before the sound vanished completely.

  Above the arena, the spectators watched through the shifting projection formed across the trial floor.

  Eryndor exhaled slowly.

  “Well,” he said, “that escalated quickly.”

  Lirien and Garruk did not respond. Their attention remained locked on the projection.

  Inside the pocket dimension, Ashara did not pursue the serpent.

  Instead he changed direction entirely and sprinted diagonally across the dunes rather than running straight ahead.

  The creature erupted again behind him, missing him by only a fraction.

  Ashara glanced sideways and spotted Rhazek.

  The boar-kin did not dodge.

  Rhazek planted his feet and drove both tusks directly into the beast’s rising skull as it surfaced from the sand. His raw strength forced the creature upward while sand cascaded around them.

  He ripped it open with brutal efficiency.

  But the sand beneath his feet suddenly liquefied and swallowed his legs to the knees.

  He roared and tore himself free with violent force.

  Ashara continued moving.

  He ran along the ridge of a dune while the serpent chased him with terrifying speed. He leapt across a gap between two ridges and then turned sharply.

  The creature followed him into the air.

  Ashara stepped beneath it as it fell and drew his sword in a single smooth motion. His strike aimed for the creature’s belly.

  The blade struck hard and sliced through the serpent’s scaled skin.

  The beast twisted violently and attempted to retaliate, but Ashara rolled aside and drove his blade deeper into the wound.

  He exhaled slowly.

  When he glanced around him again, the landscape had changed.

  The desert had become a battlefield.

  Ashara attempted to move forward, but the wind shifted suddenly.

  The ground beneath him trembled again before cracking open.

  Something green erupted upward.

  Vines as thick as ropes burst from the earth and lashed in every direction. The sandstorm stopped abruptly, as if cut away.

  Jungle.

  The air became hot, humid, and suffocating.

  The vines were not passive. They coiled and constricted, dragging candidates from their feet.

  Outside the trial space, Garruk let out a low whistle.

  “That is intense and cruel.”

  “And precise,” Lirien added.

  “They are forcing each candidate to survive in their own way.”

  Inside the dimension, Ashara severed one vine and leapt sideways as another snapped toward his throat.

  Across the clearing, Rhazek hacked through the plant growth with brute momentum. However, the jungle closed behind him faster than he could clear it.

  A shriek echoed through the canopy as thorns erupted from the ground and impaled several candidates.

  Ashara slowed his breathing deliberately.

  “So it is not only about surviving predators,” he muttered.

  The message was clear.

  This trial demanded survival against the land itself.

  When vines lashed toward him, he allowed them to pull him slightly before redirecting their momentum. When the ground swelled beneath his feet, he moved before it ruptured.

  High above the arena, Beastlord Nakira finally spoke for the first time.

  “That Yavvara boy moves well.”

  Beside her, Mahrak inclined his head.

  “They have always adapted quickly.”

  “Those Yavvara people,” he added.

  Inside the trial dimension, the jungle darkened.

  The light shifted toward deep red.

  Then shapes descended from the canopy above.

  Winged predators dropped from the sky.

  Their wings glowed with dull orange light that scorched the air around them. Their massive wingspan cast entire ridgelines into shadow.

  Kaelthrix.

  The trial was accelerating.

  Ashara lifted his blade again and looked upward while preparing to survive.

  Ko-fi! Every little bit means the world!