The 1000th Reincarnation

When Zephyr came to his senses, the first light of dawn seeped through the trees, and he lay on his side in a forest. He moved his jaw around, which had been resting in a strange position while he was sound asleep on the ground. He stood up, examining his surroundings. Veldris was next to him, watching the entire time. 

"Veldris, I know, for a fact, you could've killed them and woke me up," Zephyr said irritably. 

"Yeah, but they weren't going to kill you anyway so there was no point."

Zephyr scoffed at how useless this spirit was. 

Well, if this useless spirit didn't sense them as dangerous. I guess that means this is the start of the examination. 

Looking around, he saw four mountains. One in each of the cardinal directions. The biggest one lay in the south where he sensed someone strong, very strong standing on top of it. Soon after, he heard static piercing inside his ears. Zephyr covered his ears in agony until it went away. 

This is... telepathy, isn't it? 

Telepathy wasn't a hard skill to use but if whoever was using this skill were trying to communicate to the ten thousand other participants in this over one hundred thousand kilometer area, their mana would have to be almost limitless. And there was only one person who could achieve such an inhuman amount of power. The Patriarch - Jin Wol. 

"Welcome, everyone, to the first trial of the entrance examination for the Moonshadow Academy! The first trial starts the moment I finish speaking. In this trial, you and ten thousand people are scattered around the largest basin in Kyomora. Your goal for this trial is, simply, to survive. If you survive for a week here, you "pass". For now, two things have been restricted on your end. Needles have been put on your spin to suppress your qi, for now, and your weapon has been confiscated. I'm warning you right now before you try it, you will immediately die if you try to take the needles out. Next, I'll tell you about the special areas scattered across the basin. Five different temples are randomly placed with two things. One of them is weapons. The second is qi pills that grant you about thirty to forty years worth of training in one go if you manage to fully absorb it of course. There are other special areas scattered across this place, but it'll be interesting to see you find them yourselves without telling you what they are." Jin pauses abruptly waiting a few seconds. "There are no rules, begin."

Immediately, Zephyr runs in a random direction. If Zephyr wanted to gain the upper hand, he had to find the temple containing the weapons. While running, Zephyr sensed many people going to one location. 

That must be where the temple is!

Concealing his presence as well as he could, he climbed onto a branch and started slowly heading toward the structure in the distance. As he approached the temple, he heard the sounds of people already fighting. Atop a tree, Zephyr scans his surroundings. 

Looks like there are approximately twenty people outside fighting each other, and about... four or so people sneaking around inside. 

The temple was massive. Actually, it was way too big to be called a temple. This structure looked like an entire cylindrical mansion from the outside. There were three openings he could go through. Two of them were on either side of the temple. However, there was an opening on the top of the building between the walls of the temple and the cone-shaped roof. 

Zephyr was way too far from the opening, though, to leap from the branch to the gap. 

Wait, my qi is blocked, but that doesn't mean I can't use the Abyssal.

Repeating the ritual in his mind, he aimed it at his feet. He leaped from the branch, unable to reach the gap. Right as he was about to fall his legs pushed him upwards again allowing him to get to the ledge and make his way up. 

Huh, so it really does produce the same effect regardless of logic. 

Zephyr, without making a noise, gets himself over the ledge and spots stairs leading down to the right and a drawer on his left. Without wasting a single second he opens the drawer.

I guess this was the pill Jin was talking about.

Zephyr puts the pill in his pocket and then eyes the second item.

A dagger, perfect.

No matter how strong a person's legs were, it was physically impossible to leap to the ledge from a tree or climb the flat, slippery walls of the temple.

Zephyr heard footsteps coming up the staircase.

Looks like he's confident he got here first if he's stomping all over the place.

Zephyr leaned over the edge waiting to catch him off guard. The boy ran up the stairs, Zephyr jumping him from above, slicing his neck in one go. Blood splattered all over Zephyr.

He searched the body.

Hm, he had nothing but chainmail armor. I guess he wasn't strong, just the fastest and sneakiest one to get here.

Zephyr took the chainmail armor off the body and put it on. He headed down the stairs and approached a door. Opening it, the inside was nothing like he imagined. Bridges connected countless rooms, rooms that were basically entire houses. Each one could house entire families, and each room just led to another doorway. It would be extremely difficult to find the right door to the top. 

Zephyr thought about exploring this maze of a temple but realized it wasn't worth it getting into unnecessary trouble and headed back to the top. When he opened the door to the steps, he sensed two other people. 

They must've gone past me while I was scouting the area. Shit, either I risk it and go back to the top or I turn back trying to find another way out risking getting encountered with other people exploring this place.

After pondering for a second, Zephyr decided the best course of action was to face these two people head-on. Trying to catch them by surprise, he leaped up nine stairs and pulled out his dagger, coming face to face with them. It was the two people who bullied him earlier when he was training. 

"Well, well, looks like the qiless kid showed up," the biggest-looking kid sneered. 

Zephyr leaped over them, stabbing the other kid in the back, pulled out the dagger, and sliced his head clean. 

"How..." The kid backed away from Zephyr. "HOW DID YOU GET SO STRONG!?"

He ran backwards leaning against the edge. It seemed like he'd rather kill himself than get killed gruesomely by Zephyr. Zephyr ran at him, the dagger ready to stab in straight in the chest, but the kid then threw himself off the temple. He'd rather gamble his life away than be guaranteed to be killed by Zephyr. 

Zephyr had no time to waste, he sensed an entire group of participants getting closer and closer to him. There were two options, would he stay, or would he fight to survive?