Infinite Realm

"So, how do you feel?" Saimon scanned from head to toe.

"A bit tired but that's just mentally." Xue Yan said as she massaged her temples.

"That's to be expected. What undergoes the entry trial is your consciousness and not your body. While it's true that your body does get taken into the orb, it's actually stored in a different space from the trial grounds." Saimon explained as he stretched out a hand to the glass orb and beckoned it.

The hovering glass orb, like a child to its parent, floated towards Saimon's open hand and rested on it. 

A black fissure opened right beside Saimon following which he placed the glass orb within it. While the interior couldn't be seen, the black fissure actually led to the treasury of the the Hall. Since the entry trials were over, the glass orbs were of no use and needed to be returned back. 

"While your performance couldn't be said to be amazing, you still succeeded to pass the trials before the deadline. Your partner was already less than an hour ago and has already proceeded to the main trials. Would you like to do the same or receive your rewards?" Saimon queried.

"Sato is already done?" Xue Yan asked with surprise but as she did so, she suddenly felt that there was no reason for her surprise. Sato had never stopped surprising her so completing the entry trials before she did so didn't seem much to her.

'I'm still too weak.' Xue Yan thought to herself.

Meanwhile, Saimon went on to answer her question.

"Yes he did. He skipped his rewards and proceeded straight towards the main trials. I suggest you do the same as he did since that would prevent the difficulty of the trials from increasing." 

Saimon then went on to explain the same thing he said to Sato, leaving Xue Yan to make the final decision.

"I see." Xue Yan responded after Saimon was done with his explanations. "I will proceed with the main trials and receive my rewards after I'm done." 

Following in the footsteps of Sato, Xue Yan decided to receive her rewards subsequently after the main trials. This seemed to be the best decision as the difficulty would be left set at her current ability. If she had accepted her rewards and gotten an increase in strength, Xue Yan wouldn't have enough time to get accustomed to her new-found abilities before the main trials. With the difficulty then being increased, things would be a lot harder for her. With that in mind, it would be better to take the rewards at the end of the trial and face the trials with her familiarized strength.

"Alright then, follow me." Saimon nodded at her choice before leading her to the same place he led Sato.

Meanwhile …

"Damn." Sato cursed as he caught a glimpse of one of the Phantasmal Rock-wolves perform an assault at him from the side. Being preoccupied with the two in front, he couldn't allot his focus elsewhere lest he gets surrounded and injured.

"Watch out!" A familiar effeminate voice yelled at him.

Sato ducked at the call and jumped out of the range of the 3 wolves, not bothering to land smoothly.

*Boom*

A fireball landed right at the spot Sato was, which also happened to be where the 3 wolves jumped at. As a result of such great timing, the 3 Phantasmal Rock-wolves got blasted by a single attack.

"Awoo!"

-35 (761/990 Phantasmal Rock-wolf A's HP)

-34 (739/990 Phantasmal Rock-wolf B's HP)

-33 (821/990 Phantasmal Rock-wolf C's HP)

While it was true that the monsters were made from illusions, it didn't mean that they couldn't receive damage. Magic spells and attacks even had more of an effect on them than physical attacks so having a mage work as the main damage dealer was reasonable.

'We're too slow.' Sato grimaced as he caught of glimpse of the Phantasmal Rock-wolves' remnant HP. 

They were still a distance from the marked spot atop the mountain and yet were being held back by three level 9 monsters. Without a doubt, Sato and Xue Yan would still encounter more monsters along the way and if they had to take too long to finish the monsters off, they would not reach their goal in time. However, each time Sato thought of this, he would end up sighing at their short-coming.

It wasn't that the team was weak but rather, their circumstances made it so. Ignoring the fact that the Phantasmal Rock-wolves were monsters that had high immunity towards attacks, especially physical attacks, there was still the ever-present pressure that blanketed the mountain. Even worse was the fact that the pressure increased as they went higher up the mountain. Currently, the duo were only about 400-500 metres deep so the pressure was still bearable, at least to the point they could still face off against the monsters present. But as they progressed up the mountain, the pressure would eventually become intolerable and it would even take longer stretch for them to finish off a target. Their destination was at the early points of the 2nd section which translated to a bit above 2km in. There was still a long way to go so Sato needed to come up with a good and viable strategy before that time arrived.

'Let's get rid of this fellas first.' Sato gazed at the Phantasmal Rock-wolves. 

If he weer to go all-out, defeating them wouldn't be an issue, but Sato didn't want to do so. Who knew what else hid deep within the mountain so it was best to keep some of his cards with him, especially the expendables like his weapon's skill, [Astral Blade]. Luckily, despite facing the Phantasmal Rock-wolves in a unfavorable environment, Sato was able to hold up against them and this was partially thanks to his own personal strength and the passive skill of his sword, [Astral Might]. 

"Xue Yan, speed up on the attacks. We need to clear them quickly, okay?!"

"Alright." Xue Yan nodded.

Resolving himself to his role, Sato jumped at the trio and slashed his sword at them, specifically the one with the lowest HP of the three.

'[Astral Might]!' 

While the skill was indeed a passive one, Sato had discovered during his training at the Hall that the skill had a neat effect similar to an active skill. The description of the skill was to make the user exude an overbearing and boundless aura like the universe. Based on the target's level, [Endurance] and [Willpower], the strength of this aura would vary. However, this aura could actually be strengthened a bit and super-imposed by the user's one emotions and aura. Say for instance, something incorporeal like killing intent, could be combined with the aura from [Astral Might] and strengthen it. Also, one's heated emotions like anger, desperation and so on, could also strengthen the effects of the skill. While the strengthening wasn't absurd, it was still within an acceptable range.

Channeling his emotions and desire for victory, Sato hacked at one of the Phantasmal Rock-wolves and accompanying his attack was the pressure from his aura. This pressure was first faced by the natural pressure from the mountain but only a part of it was negated. The remainder came steam-rolling at the Phantasmal Rock-wolf, holding it in place.

What did it mean to face the aura of the boundless stars? 

A simple solar system like ours has 8 planets of which Earth is on the medium scale in terms of size. In the milky way galaxy, there were around 700-3200 such planetary systems and at least 200-500 billion stars present, much less planets which numbered from 400 billion to 3.2 trillion; and this was but one galaxy. There were hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe and similar to the milky way, they all had more than 100 billion stars. If the numbers of planets in the universe were to be counted, it would surpass the sextillion count. 

Facing just earth alone, one would feel how tiny they were, much less facing the entire universe and its hundreds of billions of galaxies, septillions of stars and sextillions of planets. Even thought the effect wasn't as exaggerated as with Sato's [Astral Might], it was still similar; just on a much, much, much smaller scale. Nonetheless, this was enough to handle a few level 9 Phantasmal Rock-wolves, forcing them to shiver in fear.

While the majority of the pressure was focused on one of the Phantasmal Rock-wolves, the other 2 still felt it and their reactions were hated for a second. While a second sounded small, for a player of Sato's caliber, that was enough to cause a lot of damage.

[Critical]!

-40 [Chop] 

-26

-28

-23 (622/990 Phantasmal Rock-wolf B's HP)

In just a second, Sato had slashed out 4 times, dealing a total of 117 damage points to the Phantasmal Rock-wolf.

Xue Yan didn't waste the opportunity Sato had provided as she took aim and focused her attacks on one of the other 2 Phantasmal Rock-wolves which also happened to be the one with the lesser HP.

[Critical]!

-41 [Fire-Ray]

-29 (691/990 Phantasmal Rock-wolf A's HP)

'We can do this!'

Sato's eyes brightened as he entered total concentration with a calm and collected mind.

*Bruuuuu*

The earth suddenly shook violently as if there was an earthquake or an ongoing battle between two gods of war. Boulders rolled down the mountain and cracks began to form as fissures were left behind. The trees in the distance swayed violently with some of them even falling to the ground. It was like the sign of the armageddon, just a little bit better.

"What now?" Sato's face twisted in frustration.