/////

    Vincent looks behind him to see Amelia, who should be asleep staring at him with a mysterious smile.

    ''Oh, Shit!.''

    "I~"

    Before Vincent sai? anything, Amelia''s eyes began to flutter and she went limp thereafter.

    "Huh!?"

    Soon he heard snoring from her and he couldn''t help but chuckle and then sigh in relief.

    "To think that she''ll wake up and pass out again."

    [It seems that your technique is not strong enough yet.].

    "Yeah, But I can work with this."

    All of a sudden, a bright light came down not too far from him causing him to go on alert.

    Seconds after, The light dissipated and what was left was a stone door.

    All of a sudden, a gruff voice echoed across the room.

    "Congratulations my descendants"

    "Not only have you survived the coldest fall of Nif, but you''ve also managed to beat a monster capable of destroying souls with its bare claws."

    "As expected of my descendant." He praised.

    ''Uhm… System…''

    ''Did you know that?''

    [...]

    [It did have a skill that allowed it to do that.]

    [Soul Crush]

    ''... Oh''

    ''Cool.''

    "As you have beaten the first trial, You can proceed onto the next one."

    " I await you." The voice finished.

    "..."

    "Sigh, I guess it''s onto the next one."

    "But first, Sleeping Beauty."

    ///// 20 Minutes Later /////

    "Mmh" Amelia groaned as she struggled to open her eyes and make ahead of where she was.

    "Where am I?"

    "Everywhere and Nowhere." A voice replied.

    "Huh?"

    "Just kidding, you''re in the inheritance trial."

    "...The inheritance trial." She muttered to herself, then slowly her eyes widened.

    "Vincent!" She shouted as she sat up abruptly just to see him nibbling on a loaf of bread

    "Yo," he said, his voice coming out muffled as he had a piece of bread in his mouth.

    Amelia sighed in relief when she saw him, "You''re okay"

    "Yeah." He replied, going back to his bread.

    "What happened?"

    "Well, The roar disoriented us and caused me to lose concentration over my ether pool causing the balls of fire to dissipate."

    "Then the cold hit us hard. The combined power of the roar and the cold made you pass out."

    "But luckily the roar stopped soon after and I was able to escape the beast with our blankets and food."

    "After that, I found a safe place and I started the plan. It worked and that''s how we survived."

    "Fortunately we only had to survive absolute zero for 5 minutes, after that, we were good to go."

    "A bright light came down and a door appeared to the next trial. I was waiting for you to get up."

    He finished the loaf in his dust and dusted the crumbs. Thereafter Vincent stood up and outstretched his hand to Amelia.

    "You ready?"

    Amelia stared at his hand dazedly, ''W~what did I see before?... I must be hallucinating.''

    She took his hand and Vincent pulled her up.

    "Let''s go." He said and walked towards the door that was before them.

    ''I''m glad that worked.'' He thought before he opened the door and walked in.

    Amelia followed after but stopped and glanced around before she entered too.

    /////

    Ama reached into her bag and brought out her special weapon.

    …

    A pair of war axes

    She held onto d the purple cloth wrapped on the black metal pommel of the axes and went into a stance with one axe before the other.

    "Come"

    "RAAAAARRRR!"

    Responding to the call, The beast ran towards her at blinding speeds. It slashed at her with its sharp claws that were layered with an aura of ether rendering it even sharper and faster.

    Still, Ama was already ahead. Before the strike reached her, she parried the hit with an axe and countered by swinging the other towards the lost one''s head.

    However, The strike was blocked by a spear made out of ice.

    "What!" Ama said surprised at the supposed mindless beast, conjuring an Ice spear that it now wielded.

    It flipped the spear skillfully and slashed at her, Ama leaned back and narrowly evaded the spear as well as the surge of ether that went on to cut deeply into the hillside behind her.

    The surge left a huge dent almost halfway into the hill.

    It continued its aggressive play against her, attacking her in ways that a Dark Beast nor Lost One should be able to display.

    ''Is it possible that it remembers how to fight from when it was still a person?'' She reasoned to herself.

    ''But that''s impossible. People lose all forms of reasoning and memories when they become beasts.''

    Her inner monologue was caught short when she had to block an overhead strike from an ice spear that now seemed to carry a red tint.

    Although she misjudged the force behind the hit as it struck her down with a force that made the ground begin to give way.

    "Arg, This damn beast must have been a Maeth."

    "[Ether Burst]"

    A well-planned blast of raw ether shoved back the dark beast plus gave Ama the space to counter.

    The ineffectual banter went on between them, with neither letting up.

    Ama was able to land some hits after getting used to the style but it only caused dents in the beast''s ice-like skin which soon regenerated.

    Whilst the Lost one attacks were either evaded, countered, or blocked by Ama.

    The longer they fought, the more annoyed Ama became.

    Soon she heard a familiar voice in her thoughts,

    ''If it was him, he would have killed this beast a long time ago even without using his abilities. Yet you are unable to do the same.'' The voice mocked her.

    ''Pitiful, Incompetent… Weak ''

    ''That''s why your mother died.''

    ''You were too weak to save her.''

    ''And she was too weak to stay alive.''

    ''Weakness killed her''.

    ''Weakness killed me.''

    "Enough!" Ama burst in anger, a wild explosion of ether outburst from her.

    Her eyes gleamed with a bright orange glow and flecks of orange specks appeared around her.

    The blade of her battle axe also glowed in the same hue.

    Then with a burst of sudden speed that her opponent was not able to react to, Ama blurred from her position and came before it.

    She then stabbed both axes deep into the shoulders of the Dark Beast causing it to roar in pain.

    She followed up with an ether-powered stomp on its knee effectively shattering it, and ended the assault with an ether-powered punch to its chest.

    The fist flung the beast through the air and lodged into the walls of the cave.

    All of a sudden, A sharp blade that was linked to a long chain flew through the air and dug into its forehead with such force that it was thrust further into the wall.

    Ama held the end of the chain and grunted as she pulled back on the blade.

    Resulting in the dark beast following because its quick regeneration resulted in the wound healing with the blade still in.

    It sailed through the air until it reached Ama who went on to land an uppercut kick to the chin sending it upwards.

    All of a sudden the chained blade lodged into its head glowed in an orange hue, and the chain started to emit steam.

    This is because the cold air and moisture around it was immediately heated to boiling point and beyond.

    Ama pulled down on the steaming chain blade, but instead of it dragging the beast with it. The blade instead sliced cleanly through the beast from its forehead down.

    When the beast fell back to the ground, its legs gave way, and the beast''s body split until it stopped at the head.

    Ama sauntered towards it and pulled out her battle axes lodged into the shoulders. She stored them back into her rucksack and went into the cave again.

    ''Tch, I wasn''t able to kill it without using my skills.''

    ''But.''

    ''When did Dark Beasts start to act like that?'' She thought while glancing towards the fallen beast.

    Out of the blue, a cold, strangely sweet metallic strange scent hit her nose from within the cave.

    "Blood?"

    She traced the scent deep into the cave and came upon a disturbing scene.

    A white-furred wolf-like Dark Beast, that laid upon a smaller Dark Beast that looked just like it.

    Both had scratches, bite marks, missing flesh, and fresh blood all over, indicating that they were just attacked.

    However, that was not what disturbed Ama.

    What disturbed Ama Ivory was that the two dark beasts looked just like the dark beast she had killed after she came out of the Avalanche.

    ''They must have been related…'', She reasoned, a sudden pang of pain hitting her chest.

    She stared at the dead bodies and couldn''t help but think, ''When did Dark Beasts start to act like this.''

    Ama invoked a flame on them and then left the cave, not looking back at the pair of corpses that burned radiantly in the snow.

    She continued her journey to the peak of the mountain.

    /////

    First Trial Down, Now onto the next one

    Please support this story with gifts, PS, GT, Basically whatever you wish to give

    Onto next time

    Byeee.

    ////