Arthur groaned, finding it incredibly difficult to even stay on his feet.  He was in terrible pain as if every cell of his body was screaming in agony.  His insides were burning from the inside out. His unconscious desire was to open up his chest and cool them down himself.

"Damn, I wasted too much time on the first test.  I thought I would have more time before the Flame of Love reached a critical stage. "

Even though the second stage changed the setting of the world from a dungeon to an ice-covered ancient temple, Arthur was as hot as the summer months.

"Which weapon do you choose?"

"I choose the sword.  Quickly." - He shouted nervously.

In the center of the temple, the ice suddenly began to shake, as if something was bursting to the surface from below.

Bang.

The ice exploded and shards exploded in all directions.  Arthur covered himself with his hand, protecting his face.

When he lowered his hand, a beautiful steel sword shimmering with jade color appeared in front of him.

"Seeker, as soon as you pick up the weapon, the second challenge begins.  Kill 50 ice golems and prove that you can of finding the path of fear even in the toughest of conditions."

Arthur carefully raised the sword and spoke lowly:

"[Path of Fear]."

The seal on his free hand glowed and coldness seemed to spill over his body.

Suddenly the same situation as with the sword happened again.  Only this time the shivers were felt all over the temple at once.

Chaotic explosions swept through the desolate, gloomy place. Where once there were only bare walls of ice, there were now rows of statues that looked like soldiers of ancient times.

'I am surrounded.  Even with what I've prepared it's going to be insanely difficult,' the guy sighed dejectedly.

"The second trial begins right now."

After saying that a storm of snow came down on the guy.  Visibility became absolutely zero. What's more, the temperature began to drop precipitously.

'Phew, finally the Flame of Love comes in handy.  Without it, fighting in this cold would be completely unthinkable.  Especially since you can't use magic here...'

Arthur had time to memorize the locations of most of the statues, but at the same time, it could not help much.  He now had to rely entirely on the Seal of Fear Path.

He closed his eyes.  Anyway, He couldn't see anything more than two steps away, but the snow was unpleasantly hitting him in the face.

Arthur tried to remove all his senses and concentrate only on the mark on his right palm.  During the first test, he had made considerable progress in his speed in locating the right tunnel.  If it took him 5 minutes to find the first one, it took no more than 10 seconds for the last one.  A monstrous speed of progress!

However, that wasn't enough now.  He had to learn not just to sense a threat somewhere nearby, but to learn to determine in a fraction of a second where it was coming from.

[Skill: Path of Fear (Advanced)

Effect: When used, allows the owner of the skill to sense killing intent coming from beasts and artificial creatures with mana. The advanced version lets you sense the direction of the enemy as well.

Side effect: Fills the person using the skill with a sense of fear with each passing second. ]

'Behind,' Arthur thought, and at the same moment leaned to his side.  In the place where his head had been a second ago, there was a sudden downward chopping blow.

Arthur quickly turned around and instead of counterattacking with his sword, threw his free hand forward.

He was able to catch the ice soldier's wrist and it exploded right before his eyes into tiny shards. The enemy sword fell out and Arthur quickly plunged his blade into the center of his chest.

"The first enemy is dead. Forty-nine enemies remained" - announced a mighty voice.

'Yes, I can do it. I've calculated it right, now my temperature is so high it can make them die at a single touch.'

It was true. His skin was now a red-hot slab.  The only reason he still wasn't dead was that he drank a potion of fire resistance and a potion of strong regeneration beforehand.

During the fight, he kept the mark active the entire time.  Gradually he became more and more accustomed to using it.

'There's one on the right. Another one is in the front.'

A spear strike from the golem in front of him, Arthur dodged to the side and quickly counterattacked with a chopping blow in return.

The Ice Soldier had time to deploy his spear and block the attack, but the force put in by Arthur was too great, forcing him to retreat a few steps back.

This gave Arthur time to rush into an attack on the second golem.  He slid across the icy ground, made a sharp sideways movement, and avoided his enemy's hammer.  The hard blow cracked the ground, but Arthur took advantage of the moment to put his hand on the soldiers' backs and within seconds, it exploded from overheating.

From there it was easy for him to deal with the second enemy as well.

"Forty-seven enemies remained."

The fight continued in the same vein.  The combination of the sword and the scalding touch was even better than Arthur had originally anticipated.

Moreover, his understanding of the skill had reached a high level.  Within ten minutes of starting, he didn't even have to consciously think about their location anymore. It was as if he knew where they were.

"There were four golems left."

Arthur, upon hearing these words, smiled broadly, showing all his teeth.  He was genuinely happy with his success.  The knowledge that he was about to pass the trial motivated him to fight even harder.

But the golems, who had only ever attacked in pairs at most before, perhaps because of the impending finale, suddenly attacked all together at once.

This took Arthur, who had already adjusted to the flow of the battle, by surprise. His only recourse was to let some of the blows directed at him hit some unimportant parts of his body.

So one of the spears pierced his shin, the sword cut his shoulder, and the mace caught his side.  But using that, forgetting the pain, Arthur was able to smash the head of one of the soldiers and blast the other with a scalding touch.

Another blow landed on his chest and Arthur flew backward, hitting his backward painfully on the icy floor. He spat out a mouthful of blood with hatred looking in the direction of the damned soulless creatures.

The two remaining golems approached him. The soldier with the spear struck the lying Arthur, but he was able to flinch backward with a supple movement. The spear pierced the icy floor and while the golem tried to pull it out, Arthur touched his leg.    A second later he lost it and collapsed to the ground, where Arthur with a swift strike of his sword pierced his head through.

The tired lad, knowing there was only one opponent left, rushed at the last golem without any strategy.  He just jumped in his direction like a madman.  The soldier was able to drive his sword into Arthur's stomach, but it was no longer enough.

The guy's hands rested on his chest and with a loud pop, the last enemy was blown to pieces.

"Ah..." - he exhaled and immediately coughed up blood.

"Congratulations on passing the second trial."

A bloody smile shone on Arthur's face.  And he collapsed unconscious on the ground.

*******

"Hold him, you guys..."

A smacking sound came over the ear of Arthur, who hadn't even managed to open his eyes yet.

A spit.

The disgusting liquid splashed on his face.  Arthur grimaced and immediately tried to wipe it off, but noticed that someone was holding his hands.

"Take it as a supreme reward from me, you pathetic dog," - the vile laugh sounded as horrible as scratching the blackboard with an iron object.

"Your miserable mother works for my family. Then you must work for me... Look, how about licking my feet?"

'What? Where am I?' thought Arthur and opened his eyes, but he couldn't see anything, everything was very blurry.

"The third Trial.  The most difficult thing in the path of fear is to find those who seek to conceal their true intentions. Your mission is to find and eliminate four people who are hiding their murderous intentions towards you, seeker."

[Ding! Skill The Path of Fear has been leveled up!]

[Skill: Path of Fear (max)

Effect: Allows the owner of the skill to identify people targeting you and hiding their bloodlust]

'Ah... Right.  The third trial.  A battle in your own memory. I wonder what moment I got into? '

Finally, his vision came into focus and he saw a big fat boy about fifteen years old. Arthur was obviously smaller than him because he was looking up at him from below.

'Zack? Ah ...  I remember that day...  I was beaten so badly then that I lay in bed at home for two whole weeks, unable to get up.'

"Why don't you say something?  Did I tell you to lick my feet, or are you so stupid that you don't even understand simple commands... Well, then you have to properly train a bad dog... Guys!"