A pale dawn light filtered through the high windows of the East Sea Spirit Pagoda as Duke Qiang Shen led his son down the marble halls. Crystal chandeliers chimed softly overhead, casting prisms of color across polished floors inlaid with spirals of jade. Portraits of past Spirit Masters—faces carved in relief—watched them silently as they approached the vault-like doors of the Thousand Beast Platform.
An attendant in emerald robes bowed deeply, producing a terracotta tablet impressed with the pagoda's seal. The Duke pressed a handful of jade tokens into the attendant's hand, and the attendant's eyes widened in silent awe before waving them forward. No one spoke; respect and anticipation filled the vaulted hall.
Qiang Ming's heart drummed as he stepped onto the circular platform. The marble beneath his boots vanished, replaced by the scent of damp earth and a cool breeze stirring unseen leaves. He stood in an ancient virtual forest, moonlight shimmering through the towering redwoods. Their trunks were thick as castle walls, gnarled roots weaving a web across the glade floor. Ethereal fireflies blinked in the shadows, and distant howls hinted at unseen predators.
He inhaled deeply, filling his lungs with the forest's fragrant promise of trial. Then, without hesitation, he sprinted down a winding path, every muscle honed by months in Slaughter Barony driving him forward. With a thought, the Blackstone Abyss Hammer materialized in his hand, veins of violet energy pulsing in time with his heartbeat.
Within a dozen strides, Qiang Ming encountered the first wave of spirits: Iron-Back Beetles, each no larger than a hound, shells gleaming like burnished steel. They skittered into his path, mandibles chittering with challenge. Qiang Ming launched himself into their midst, hammer spinning in a wide arc. Carapaces shattered under the concentrated gravitational shock of his blows; beetle limbs flew like shards of obsidian. Within seconds, the glade was littered with broken exoskeletons that dissolved into motes of bronze light.
Pressing onward, he came upon a clearing of Storm Foxes, three lithe creatures with crackling blue fur. They lunged in unison, fangs bared. Qiang Ming responded with a stomp that cracked the earth beneath him, then delivered a SoulQuake Blow aimed at the lead fox's flank. The impact compressed the air into a blast wave that folded space and snapped the fox's spirit in an instant. The others scattered, disoriented by the psychic tremor, and Qiang Ming finished them with bone-crushing strikes. Their forms flickered and vanished, leaving cinders of spirit energy glowing in the mist.
A faint rumble heralded Ember Lizards—serpentine beasts whose scales glowed like molten metal. Fire coalesced on their breath as they advanced through the underbrush. Qiang Ming met them head-on, hammer meets scale in a barrage of sparks. Each strike ruptured spirit cores, sending geysers of flame into the canopy. Ash drifted like embers on the wind as the lizards collapsed in convulsions of pixelated light.
He barely paused, legs burning, as he charged downhill into a pack of Fangtooth Direwolves, their howls a chorus of primal hunger. He pivoted on one foot, catching a leaping wolf with the hammer's shaft, then swung its butt into another's jaw, shattering bone and spirit in tandem. Dozens fell before he reached the riverbank, bloodied but unbowed.
By now, his breathing was a roar in his ears. Yet the forest did not relent. Iron Bears, spirit remnants of ancient brutes, lumbered out of the shadows, their claws like spirit-forged steel. Qiang Ming's hammer struck their shoulders with SoulQuake power, reverberations cracking ribs and reverberating through the grove. The bears fell in heavy thuds, moss and leaves rattling to the ground.
At last, a titanic roar split the night air: the Fire Lion twins, siblings bound by an unbreakable bond and fed on spirit-fire. Their manes flared like molten suns, and they advanced side by side, eyes locked on Qiang Ming with feral intelligence. This was the apex trial: centuries-old apex beasts whose combined Spirit Power dwarfed anything he had faced.
He steadied his breathing and circled wide, hammer poised. The first lion charged, teeth glinting. Qiang Ming unleashed a SoulQuake Blow, compressing the wind into a shockwave that collapsed the lion's spirit defenses—its roar cut short as it stumbled. The second lion's cry of grief fueled its fury; it lunged at the fallen sibling's side. Qiang Ming darted to the side, spinning into a rising overhead strike that cleaved the lion's throat in a single, devastating arc. The beast's fall created a blast of spirit light that illuminated the entire forest.
Sandaled stones beneath Qiang Ming's feet trembled as the two great beasts lay intertwined in death. He closed his eyes and sank to one knee between them. He pressed both hands against the soil, drawing the residual spirit energy from the lions' shattered cores. Motes of golden-red and violet light swirled upward into his chest, each wisp a measure of raw power. His exhaustion drained away, replaced by a calm clarity and profound hunger—the Spirits' gift for his mastery.
In the pagoda's control room, Manager Lian and his technicians monitored the platform's feed on a vast holo-screen. The forest carnage replayed in accelerated loops. Lian's jaw dropped as he watched Qiang Ming's final assault.
"What the hell did you do to this boy, you lunatic?" cried Manager Lian, pointing at the Duke's nonchalant grin. "He's absorbing energy like a spirit well!"
Duke Qiang Shen chuckled, leaning against the console. "He's hunting his own potential," he said. "A bit of… unconventional schooling."
Their banter abruptly cut off as an alarm chimed: "GUARDIAN ENGAGED!" The holo-screen shifted to a panoramic view of the platform's vaulted ceiling being rent by skeletal draconic claws. A colossal, bone-white hand—each finger longer than an adult—smacked the forest floor where Qiang Ming knelt. The impact sent shockwaves of earth and light scattering in every direction.
Lian and the Duke exchanged worried glances as Qiang Ming, hammer in hand, rose from the fallen lions. His eyes blazed with excitement—this was the true trial. He ducked beneath the skeletal hand's next strike, the draconic bones crashing into shattered trunks behind him. The guardian's second massive blow obliterated a grove of virtual redwoods in an explosion of spirit-howl echoes.
Qiang Ming charged forward, hammer drawn back. A hymn of spirit energy sang through the battered clearing as he prepared to face the Skeletal Dragon King, an ancient floor guardian rumored extinct since before Tang San's ascent. The dragon's foul black smoke seeped from its hollow ribcage; its skull—crowned in jagged bone—a cathedral of dread.
The Duke and Manager Lian, breath caught in their throats, watched as Hammer Kid squared off against this primeval construct. The fight for Qiang Ming's true metamorphosis had just begun—and the Thousand Beast Platform would bear witness to a battle for the ages.