Brand rolled over a few times when he fell to the ground and barely stopped. After vomiting some blood, he stared deathly at the tree. He felt that several of his ribs were broken. An unbearable pain had taken over his entire body.

"Ugh! Shit!"

Gritting his teeth, he stood up and charged towards the tree again.

Every part of his body, especially his ribs, was torturing him, but it only made him more angry.

The tree was using half of its crimson branches to fight the powemarph; the other half was waiting to deal with him.

As Brand approached the tree, its crimson branches rushed toward him like floating snakes.

He clenched his teeth and started swinging his sword angrily. His sword danced, leaving silver trails in the air that looked like delicate patterns. This was because he was constantly swinging his longsword with all his might and chopping the crimson branches of the tree.

It was simply like burning in hell for him; each sword strike he made caused his broken ribs to sink, and brought him unrelenting pain.

"Take this, son of a bitch!"

After he slashed off its crimson branches, there was no obstacle between him and its trunk. He dashed forward and thrust his sword furiously into its shell. This time, the tip of his sword managed to pierce a part of the crust, causing the tree to shake in anger.

The tree swung all its branches towards him.

He gripped the hilt of his sword tightly with both hands and twisted his body slightly; then he drew an arc in the air with his sword and chopped off all the incoming branches in one blow.

Ignoring his increasingly unbearable pain, he delivered a powerful cross-slash to the crust.

At the same time, the powemarph took advantage of the resulting neglect and began climbing roots again and smashing tumor-like organisms with its tail.

Although the tree's regeneration rate was very high, it was not enough, as it lost almost all of its branches in a very short time.

"Does its regeneration rate decrease as tumor-organisms are destroyed?"

Brand was observing the powemarph as he continued to attack the shell. He had noticed that the branches of the tree were not regenerating as fast as before. He naturally thought that this might be related to the tumor-organisms in the back that the tree particularly wanted to protect.

As both of them continued to attack the tree with all their speed and strength, the ground shook, and many thin roots sprang from the ground and caught its foot.

"What the hell!"

Brand swung his sword furiously, cutting off the thin roots that were trying to hold him in place.

Powemarph continued to rapidly climb roots and destroy tumor-organisms attached to them.

*Kyii!* A high-pitched, ringing sound emanated from the tree.

Brand found that as the tumors were destroyed, the glassy, hard layer that covered the crust gradually faded.

He gritted his teeth and stabbed his sword with all his might once more into the damaged part of the crust, which he had already managed to damage with his previous attacks.

This time, the tip of his sword pierced through it even deeper than before.

The tree swung its few regenerated scarlet branches towards him.

"Oh? Are they less crimson now?" Brand noticed that the branches were fading. He twisted his sword at his wrist and drew a curved line upward, cutting off the branches that were coming toward him.

The tree's fading branches had become less severe and more frail.

As Brand and powemarph continued to attack the tree nonstop, it could not keep up with them with its dwindling regeneration rate and vitality.

When powemarph destroyed the last organism left, all the red aura that covered it disappeared, and the glassy layer on its crust began to dissolve.

He destroyed the completely defenseless crust of the tree with a single slash.

The tree began to shake and tremble incessantly. Its structure began to shrink and warp, as if it were melting plastic. It kept shrinking until it was reduced to a small staff.

At the final stage, nothing remained of the tree, tens of meters high and wide, but a kind of wooden staff, enveloped in a pernicious crimson.

With his departure, the roots covering the wall behind were destroyed, and the wall crumbled into little rubble.

"Oh? Is this…" Brand saw a wide valley as the massive wall collapsed. At the very top of this valley, there was a red ray reaching into the sky.

"Ugh!"

While he was observing the valley, there was a surge in him, and he suddenly vomited a large amount of blood. With the sudden weakness taking over his body, he collapsed to the ground, and his world darkened slightly.

His internal and external injuries were too many, and he had pushed himself too hard.

His willpower was nearly exhausted.

Although he wanted to see the end of the Test, a feeling that he couldn't fulfill his wish was starting to take over his heart.

When powemarph came in front of the staff, its body began to deform, turning into a cloud of blue smoke and enveloping the staff.

Sharp crackling sounds came from the staff, and the cursed crimson aura that surrounded it disappeared in a cloud of blue smoke.

Brand spat out the blood in his throat and crawled to the staff. As soon as he picked it up, he realized that this staff was actually quite familiar to him. After thinking for a moment, he realized that it would fit perfectly into the carving above the stone door of the pyramid.

He struggled to his feet and staggered towards the outside of the wall.

His expression darkened as he looked down the valley he had to cross to reach where the red ray was.

"I don't know how long I can last…" Brand gritted his teeth, "But I'll go as far as I can go."

When he looked back, he understood more clearly how huge the maze was. The wall that collapsed was actually just a small part of the wall that covered that part.

The outer walls of the maze were at least several hundred meters high and tens of miles wide.

He sighed and began to descend deeper into the valley.

Due to his severe injuries, it was not possible for him to move quickly. So he couldn't even guess when he might reach the end of the valley, if he could.

During his journey into the depths of the valley, he leaned against a rock many times and tried to rest as much as he could while standing. He made the mistake of just slumping down once and resting, almost unable to get up from the ground again.

In this way, for a time, he didn't know how much, but he continued to move on with the aim of reaching the end of the valley. In some places he had to climb, in others he had to bend, and these were the things that made him the most difficult.

An unknown time passed.

By the time Brand reached the peak at the end of the valley, he was very close to the red ray. Only a few hundred yards ahead was a bridge that looked like it was made of silver light, and then nothing would stand between it and the red ray.

"W-What...is...this...?"

As he approached the bridge, he felt some kind of pressure settle on him. Either someone was putting invisible weights on his shoulders, or the earth had decided to pull him from his feet and bury him in the ground.

Brand grinned awkwardly as his expression darkened.

"How stupid I am... Of course I won't be able to reach it that easily!"

With each step he took, more and more pressure came on him, and all his bones began to ache and radiate a wave of pain as if his internal organs were shifting. The blood that came into his mouth and started to foam, started to seep from the side of his lips.

His eyes were starting to turn red, especially as he tried to resist the excruciating pain of his broken ribs.

With every step he took, using the last scraps of his willpower, he felt that his soul and body were drying up like a dehydrated flower.

He looked up and saw that he had only just reached the halfway point of the bridge.

"I did my best. I've already endured very well up to this stage. I'm sure the Test will give me a good grade."

As Brand slowly surrendered, the weight on him pinned him to the ground and began to crush him.

He blinked a few times as he stared at the dazzling brilliance of the bridge, and his gaze returned to the bridge's end. He slammed his hand on the bridge angrily and began to crawl along the bridge with all his remaining strength.

"Just one more time!"

After roaring with all his might, he closed his eyes and completely exhausted his willpower.

He didn't even have the strength to pull himself up after he threw his arm forward once more, but at that moment he felt the pressure on him disappeared as well.

When he opened his eyes, he realized that he had reached the end of the bridge.

He tried to take deep breaths for a while, but the blood pooling in his throat blocked him, causing him to have a coughing fit. After lying on the ground doing nothing for a while, he started crawling towards the red ray.

Just as the ray that brought him from the desert to this realm, he once again saw the crystal set on an altar and the enchanting sight of its ray emanating from the crystal.

After he had crawled up to the altar, he saw a stand in front of him full of engravings.

Above it stood a large azure diamond.

"This must be the third piece of that stone door!" Brand crawled over to it and picked up the diamond from the stand.

The ground suddenly shook violently, and the altar emitted a dazzling wave of light.

The time and space around him began to change, and the surrounding image began to resemble the dance of silver lines trapped in a whirlpool.