CHAPTER 60: EX 60. THE GROUP LEADER

The leaderboard had refused to change.

Despite all his effort, kills and bloody push forward—Eden was still stuck in 4th place. No matter how high he climbed, three names always remained above him, immovable like mountains.

And the worst insult?

The name in 1st place belonged to someone who’d apparently completed their first trial with a record-breaking speed for the slowest... yet somehow now held a massive lead.

"In what twisted system," Eden had growled, staring at the screen, "does that make any sense?!"

It should have discouraged him. Others might have stopped, questioned the system, or blamed fate. But not Eden Feran.

He was only more emboldened.

Fueled by a savage will to climb, he redoubled his efforts. If the system was broken, then he’d break it harder. If someone was cheating, he’d expose them with sheer, overwhelming power.

If fate was mocking him, then he’d mock it back with the corpses of everything that dared stand in his way.

But everything changed on the third day.

The air had shifted. The tension in the forest grew heavier, darker. The very mana around him felt off. Even the most aggressive beasts went into hiding. Eden had been in the middle of tearing through a pack of E-rank wolves when the sky itself had darkened.

That was when he felt it.

A pulse. A rumble. A presence so utterly wrong it made his skin crawl and his instincts scream.

And then... he saw it.

A towering pillar of black energy erupting into the sky, followed by the emergence of a demon—a true one, not a beast or mutant, but a being of pure infernal blood.

At that moment Eden’s instincts screamed at him to run and he followed it without question.

There was no hesitation, no second-guessing. He wasn’t a fool. Whatever that thing was, its aura alone told him enough it was an S-rank... maybe worse. The only people in the Federation who could emit that kind of presence were the Vanguards—and this wasn’t one of them.

So he did the smart thing.

He vanished into the forest, trees blurring around him as he sprinted at full speed. His breath was steady, but his heart hammered against his ribs. After a few seconds, he turned his head back—expecting to still see the demon in the air.

But the sky was empty.

The demon was gone.

And that was worse.

Eden’s skin crawled, the back of his neck prickling with a primal fear. Not knowing where the demon was—that terrified him more than seeing it up close.

But then the sky cracked.

A blinding bolt of lightning struck the center of the Selection area with such force it sent a pulse through the air. Eden’s eyes widened as a battle erupted in the clouds above—the Vanguard herself, Rebecca Sky, clashing with the demon.

Tremors rippled through the forest canopy with every strike exchanged.

Eden let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

"At least someone’s got it handled..."

Just then, the sound of footsteps rustling leaves behind him drew his attention.

He turned and what he saw made him freez.

There were a dozen cadets behind him, breathing hard, watching him closely.

"What the..." he muttered. "When did they—?"

Before he could finish the thought, a girl stepped forward from the group.

She had pale blonde hair, her deep blue eyes striking under the filtered sunlight. Despite her breathless state, she held herself with an air of quiet confidence.

"You’re Eden, right?"

Eden blinked, still processing.

"...Yeah?"

The girl smiled in relief. "Thank the stars. I knew I wouldn’t forget the cadet who finished first in our center."

His eyes narrowed slightly. "She’s from my center?"

He gave her a closer look. Her face wasn’t familiar—but her name clicked a moment later when she introduced herself.

"I’m Eleanor Clark. This is the first time we’ve really spoken."

Eleanor Clark, she was the one ranked 8th in the selection. But she hadn’t stood out in the center rankings. He’d also never heard of any noble family named Clark, either.

Still, her tone was genuine.

Eden nodded in realization, but as he pieced things together, a new thought wormed its way into his mind. That old superstition that the cadets who finished their first trials faster would always do better than the others?

It was starting to fall apart.

’So much for trial completion speed being the gold standard,’ he thought grimly. But then again... maybe it was just this generation that was different.

Shaking off the thought, Eden looked back at Eleanor.

He glanced around at the dozen cadets gathered.

Not just Eleanor—all of them had trailed him here.

"Why did you guys follow me?"

Eleanor scratched her cheek with a sheepish smile.

"Well... we saw you running away, and we figured... it’d probably be safer to follow you."

Eden stared at her in speechless disbelief.

"..."

He wasn’t sure whether to be flattered... or terrified.

****

After coming to terms with the situation, Eden finally stepped forward and agreed to let them follow him. He turned to Eleanor and the rest of the cadets and said, firm and clear:

"We’re moving away from the clash. Stick close and stay alert."

No one argued.

The sky behind them shook with thunderous force, the ongoing battle between the demon and Vanguard Rebecca Sky unleashing shockwaves that rippled through the air like distant sonic booms. Lightning danced, ripping across the clouds like divine spears, and somewhere amidst the chaos, a demonic roar tore the sky open.

At one point, the demon’s aura exploded, raw and unrestrained—a flood of malevolence that surged outward like a black tide. The weight of it slammed into the cadets from afar, forcing a few to stumble and grip their chests, eyes wide with dread.

It was stronger than the Vanguard’s... just for a moment.

But then, just as quickly, the tide ebbed.

The oppressive aura dimmed, shrinking until it was even weaker than before and Rebecca began to push back hard.

Eden could feel it. They all could.

"She’s not done yet," he muttered, eyes narrowing.

He didn’t look back—and neither did Eleanor, nor the dozen cadets who followed them. The group moved in silence, feet crunching against forest underbrush, minds tense, every breath measured.

But just as they thought they were putting distance between themselves and death...

It found them.

A demonic pressure locked onto their location.

And it was moving.

Fast.

Eden’s face hardened as his instincts screamed at him.

They had come too far as a group. But their gathered aura, fear and numbers was like ringing a dinner bell for the demonic presence in the forest.

Moving in a group had backfired.

Terribly.

...

Mass release if we get 100 golden tickets or 300 power stones before Saturday