William stood frozen in place as he remained within the observation zone, separated from the chaos by a single pane of reinforced glass, staring forward in nothing but pure, unbridled shock. He wasn't sure he had ever been this stunned in his entire life. His gaze remained fixed on the boy standing outside, covered in soot, clothes singed at the edges, purple hair whipping in the turbulent wind left behind by the destruction.

To William, this wasn't simply a movement and balance training session. It wasn't some ordinary physical assessment or controlled exercise meant to test agility. No, this was a fucking death trap disguised as training. And yet the boy… no, the monster before him had endured it without a scratch. Without a grimace. Without even a single complaint slipping past his lips.

What made it even more horrifying was that inside the observation zone, William had felt everything Asher felt. He hadn't just watched the survival challenge unfold on a distant screen or through a detached display; he had lived it, felt it, experienced every single impossible sensation.

At the very beginning, when Asher sensed the sharp shift in the air, William felt it too, a sudden, biting change in atmosphere that prickled against his own skin. When Asher tore forward, launching himself from one colossal beam pole to another with reflexive grace, William felt the phantom sensation of wind whipping violently around his own frame.

The force of jagged earth spikes ripping through the air past Asher's body, the blazing heat bursting from erupting fire arrows, the tremor of shockwaves slamming into Asher's body, every maddening sensation had been transmitted directly into William.

His back still glistened with sweat from heat he had never truly been exposed to, as though the observation room had stolen those sensations directly from the training field and forced him to experience them.

In a way, William understood, at least partially, what Asher had gone through. But even with that secondhand understanding, he knew without a shred of doubt that in no scenario would he have survived even the very first attack. The moment the survival challenge began, he would have died. Instantly. The attacks were too fast, too calculated, too merciless.

He had also noticed how Asher avoided several of the beam poles, ones close enough that they could have helped him, but Asher treated those poles like plagues, refusing to touch them. William didn't need to be told why; those poles were traps. Yet inside the observation zone, even when witnessing everything more clearly, he hadn't detected a single one of those traps himself.

He remembered vividly the moment he had tried to warn Asher earlier, telling him to be careful and not to attempt showing off here because this wasn't the place for it. But now, after watching Asher walk through a storm of destruction like it was nothing more than a warm-up, William felt those earlier words slap him across the face.

His mind raced through the entire sequence Asher had endured, trying desperately to calculate if he could have survived even one of those attacks. His thoughts circled again and again, but he eventually dismissed the idea entirely. It was pointless. He would die, barely lasting a single second inside that hellish challenge.

His thoughts drifted to the meteor, an absurd, outrageous attack in its own right. The destruction it left behind was immense, carving through the training field with overwhelming force. Then his mind shifted to Asher falling from the sky afterward, recalling the terrifying yet impossibly fluid movement with which the boy maneuvered through the blazing fire arrows.

Asher had used gravity itself as a stepping stone, turning deadly shockwaves into propulsion, bending every disadvantage into an advantage. William had even watched Asher counter gravity, if only for a brief moment, and then instantly adapt to dodge the final trap laid out as a deadly surprise.

'Truly in a world of his own,' William thought as he shook his head slowly. Deep down, he knew that no matter how far his own copy ability evolved, it would never be able to replicate something like this. 'Unless I become able to copy pure talent itself,' he mused darkly. But would his copy ability ever reach that stage? He had no idea. The possibility felt distant, almost impossible.

'Best not to compare myself to him, for my own safety and mental health,' William muttered inwardly. It was one of his greatest personal principles: he compared his current self only to his past self, never to another person. He knew he was talented, and he knew he trained consistently, not to surpass anyone, not to chase after another person's shadow, but simply to pursue his own growth. He trained with himself in mind, always making himself the goal.

'At least I will be here for a few days. I'll be able to learn a few things from Instructor Elowen,' William thought, taking a slow breath. With renewed resolve, he decided to devote his entire stay here at the Wargrave Ducal Estate to mastering movement and balance training. It was free training under the supervision of an expert; there was no logical reason to waste such a priceless opportunity.

Beside him, Finch stood in a similar state of disbelief. For some inexplicable reason, since stepping foot into the Wargrave Ducal Estate, Finch seemed to be slowly losing some of his usual fat, though neither of them commented on it. Regardless, Finch was just as shaken as William. He shook his head after watching the survival challenge conclude, not even bothering to ask if he could survive something like that. He knew the answer. He absolutely wouldn't.

While there was always the chance that his Good Luck ability might activate and save him in such a scenario, Finch had long since realized something: his Good Luck ability never interfered with his training. Whenever he trained, the ability vanished entirely, as though deliberately refusing to assist.

He had suspected this from the moment he began his own, much gentler movement and balance training. During it, he had been struck repeatedly by harmless arrows despite expecting his Good Luck ability to shield him. It never did. It simply refused, as though acknowledging that he wasn't in real danger.

"William," Finch suddenly spoke, his voice shattering the silence. William's eyes snapped away from the soot-covered boy standing outside and shifted to the shorter boy beside him.

Finch, noticing he had William's attention, continued, "I think I've just found the reason to train, and stop being lazy." His tone was calm, but something deeper flickered behind his eyes. Determination. Resolve. Awakened.

William studied him thoughtfully. He knew Finch well. The boy hardly trained or cultivated seriously, yet managed to rank 234th out of thousands. If Finch trained with the seriousness William and Asher possessed, William had no doubt he would climb the ranks with terrifying speed. Factoring in his Good Luck ability, especially if it activated during real combat or dangerous situations, Finch didn't even know how far he could advance.

For some reason, this single scene before them had awakened something dormant in Finch's mind. He understood, with a clarity he had never reached before, that even though he and Asher were friends now, this was Crymora, a world defined by blood, hardship, and power.

Adult friendships were not the same as the friendships children or toddlers shared. If he wanted to stay beside someone like Asher, he needed strength of his own. People like Asher were destined to climb higher, inevitably pulling away from the weak.

Finch silently vowed he wouldn't be left behind, not by Asher and not by William either.

William smiled at Finch's resolve but said nothing. Although he would have loved to throw out a joke or two, he refrained. This was an awakening moment for Finch. It deserved silence, not laughter.

Outside the observation room, Instructor Elowen stood with an uncontainable smile tugging at her lips. Her body trembled subtly from the excitement coursing through her veins. For the briefest moment, she completely forgot about the trainees she was supposed to teach next.

'He really cleared it without a single injury,' she thought, leaning back against the wall. Unlike William and Finch, who had remained inside the observation room, she had stayed directly within the training field, though at a distance. Even when soot and smoke from the meteor washed over her, her appearance remained pristine, untouched, perfect.

'What has the Duke given birth to?' she whispered internally, still unable to wrap her mind around what she had witnessed. Truthfully, she hadn't expected Asher to clear the challenge without a single injury. She only wanted to evaluate his improvement. And now, having seen it, she was more shocked than before.

Her mind wandered to the First Sun, Malrik, and his own outrageous natural gifts.

'I wonder why they haven't taken over the Empire at this point,' she mused. With how effortlessly the Wargrave Bloodline produced extraordinary individuals, it would have been easy. Throughout recorded history, the weakest Wargrave was someone who had reached only the Wavestar Life Rank and couldn't advance further, and that was still beyond the capabilities of most people.

And now, another monster had appeared.

A boy named Asher.

A boy who made deadly training mechanisms look like mere toys.

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