Chương 100: A Choice Without Choice

Susanne's consciousness faded for a moment. When she finally returned to her senses, she stood amidst tall trees. She looked around to see if anyone was present, but as far as she could see, there was no one. There were only trees. Currently, she stood inside an old, intricate gazebo. It was built in the middle of nowhere. It was an odd sight. While she thought about what she should do now, she suddenly heard a sound rushing towards her. The sound was strange; it felt as if a landslide was happening.

Unsure of what to do, she simply stepped out of the gazebo and into the field. The forest stretched far and wide. The strange thing was the trees, they were literally tall trees. Compared to the size of the trees, she looked like an ant. Is this a Trial? she muttered. That must be true. Since the timer had completed, they had all been sent to the Trial. While she wondered what she must do, the approaching sound neared. Amidst the big trees, something was coming towards her.

It was big, and at the same time, it looked very familiar. Susanne didn't know what to do. Should she run away from them? Were they coming for her? Were they friends or enemies? She didn't know. However, looking at the size of the enemies, it was better to run than to get caught as soon as she entered the Trial. She ran to the opposite side of the approaching enemies, but it was very difficult to run in the dense forest. Before she could even run for fifty meters, she felt the enemies were upon her neck.

Caught, she simply readied herself for battle. A fierce fireball materialized on her palm. Suddenly, she slid her foot, turned around at the same time, and hurled the fireball at the enemies. Shuuu! Boom! The fireball flew toward the enemy and landed on its face. Without waiting, she hid behind the big tree and gathered another attack. While she was hiding, she heard the sound of something scratching. Screech! She had yet to fully see what kind of enemy she was facing.

As fire swirled on her palm, she peeked past her side to see what kind of monster it was. However, when her eyes landed on the thing, she was taken aback. She saw an enormous rat looking at her with an irritated expression. The rat did not seem to be a regular one. It looked different. It wore armor on its face, body, and legs. Furthermore, the rat was reined in, and a tall person holding the reins was mounted on its back.

The rat continued to scratch toward Susanne because the attack had landed directly on its face. The person, who wore full armor, pulled the reins to control the ride. Once the rat calmed down, the person took off the helmet. Susanne intently watched the tall person who was taking off the helmet, expecting a handsome warrior. But what she saw, how could she describe it? It was another rat. Or, it could be said that he was a rat person. His eyes, nose, and ears all looked like a typical rat, but in a human figure.

What kind of twisted situation was this? A rat person was riding a big rat. While she was trying to make sense of the situation, the rat person stepped off the rat and took a few steps toward Susanne. Susanne readied her fireball to hurl at him at any time. While she waited, she half-expected the rat person to draw his mace and attack her. However, he simply knelt suddenly to the ground.

"This low life welcomes the Hero to the [Evastated Land]," the Rat person said while his head touched the ground. As soon as the Rat person said this, Susanne received a message in front of her. [CONCENTRIC TRIAL] [Trial Name: The Cursed Blood] [Trial Type: Liberation] [Current Region: Evastated Land] [Trial Participant: Susanne Gielgud] [Local Request Detected.] [Request Origin: Ratkin of the Evastated Land.] [Objective: Break the Divine Curse afflicting the Ratkin.] [Trial Completion Condition: Restore the Ratkin to their original form.] [Optional Condition: Discover the identity of the Deity who cast the curse.] [Time Limit: None.] [Trial Reward: Unknown] [Failure Penalty: None.] [Accept Request]: [Deny Request] Susanne read the message that appeared before her. She remembered her grandmother talking about the types of Trials one could receive. There was the [Extermination Trial], where the Trial participant had to defeat a certain enemy.

The second was the [Survival Trial], where the participant had to survive. However, reading the details now, her Trial Type stated [Liberation Trial]. The objective was to break the curse that was imposed upon these people, the Ratkin, and restore them to their original form. But what was their original form? Susanne looked up at the big rat and the Ratkin person who still knelt on the ground. Was their original form the actual rat? She would have to confirm this.

So, the true objective was to lift the curse, not to defeat the person who placed the curse on them, which was some kind of deity. There was no time limit, and the failure penalty was none. That was suspicious. How could a Trial have no time limit and no failure penalty? Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. The rewards were also unknown, which definitely put her in a blind spot. If she had known the reward, she could have easily guessed the difficulty and the danger of the Trial.

Another strange thing was that she could deny the request. But what would happen after she denied the request? Would she get another Trial, or what? Although the situation was not clear, Susanne did not plan to take any chances by trying to deny the request. If she refused and suddenly suffered a backlash, it would be a regrettable choice. The true objective of the Concentric Trial was to complete the trial, so that was exactly what she would do. She directly accepted the request. [Request Accepted.] [The Cursed Blood] Upon receiving the confirmation, Susanne shifted her gaze to the Ratkin. The Concentric Trial did not provide much detail regarding how the curse was to be removed. By her guess, she would have to ask the person in front of her.

"Stand up, explain what happened to your people." Susanne walked forward to the Ratkin. He stood up with great joy. After all, the Hero they had been waiting for had arrived and decided to help them.

"I have very little knowledge about this matter. Please ride with me; I will bring you to our elder," the Ratkin said. Susanne expected that there must be a settlement, so she quickly mounted the big rat, taking a seat behind the Ratkin. Soon after, they rode the big rat away at a blinding speed.

[CONCENTRIC TRIAL] [Trial Name: The Lost Younglings] [Trial Type: Rescue] [Current Region: Brennus Stone desert] [Trial Participant: Nickolas Raymond] [Local Request Detected.] [Request Origin: Serato Clan.] [Objective: Rescue the captured younglings from the opposing clan.] [Trial Completion Condition: Safely return all surviving younglings to their clan.] [Optional Condition: Discover the reason behind the conflict between the two clans.] [Time Limit: 48 hours.] [Trial Reward: Unknown] [Failure Penalty: None.] [Accept Request]: [Deny Request] Nickolas stood in front of a group of people. They watched him eagerly, holding their breath as if their entire lives depended on his decision. After arriving in this vast stone desert, Nickolas had encountered a clan facing a great problem. Their clan's children had been abducted by another clan, who demanded a ransom in exchange for returning the kids.

However, these people were neither willing to hand over the ransom nor willing to let their children be killed. Thus, they had approached him to safely rescue their kids. That was when he received the system message for a Rescue-type Trial. Seeing that there was no failure penalty, he was not going to deny their request without trying. Even if he failed to rescue the children, he would not receive any punishment. However, he did not plan on failing the Trial. [Request Accepted.] [The Lost Younglings] Stacy sat at the edge of the lush village, right beside the village's defensive wall made of small sticks and stones. Following the devastating battle and the cruel incident, the Trial had sent her to this place. It was a peaceful village with a total population of 98 people, whereas just last week, it had been 102. Two days prior, four people had disappeared while hunting near the Grander Cave.

Thus, upon her arrival, the Village Chief assumed she was a Rogue warrior and requested that she exterminate a Dark Devil residing in that cave. [CONCENTRIC TRIAL] [Trial Name: Cleansing the Dark] [Trial Type: Extermination] [Current Region: Grander Cave] [Trial Participant: Stacy Kendall] [Local Request Detected.] [Request Origin: Village of Hundred Petals.] [Objective: Eliminate the Dark Souls lurking within the nearby village.] [Trial Completion Condition: Exterminate all Dark Souls inhabiting the village.] [Optional Condition: Discover the origin of the Dark Souls.] [Time Limit: 1 Week.] [Trial Reward: Unknown] [Failure Penalty: None.] Looking out at the vast, lush land brought relief to her heart. When she initially decided to participate in this Trial, her plan was to deny the first Request and directly enter a [Trial Tree]. However, she changed her decision after going through so many things. Moreover, the scenery felt good, and taking some rest would not be a bad choice.

"It feels good, being in this place," a voice suddenly sounded.

"Yes, it is," Stacy replied without turning her head. Daniel, who was holding some food, looked up at the sky and breathed in the fresh air. He felt a sense of peace; he wanted to stay here forever. After arriving at this place, he had discovered that Stacy, whom he knew as Ashley, had also come to the same location. He was the guard hired by Casey Merriman as an escort for the research team via Quest board. At first, he genuinely thought these people were just researchers who had gotten stuck in the Trial.

He had even worried about how they were going to survive. That was until he saw their battle against the Pleasence. When he saw her here, he wanted to ask a lot of questions. He wanted to know who they were and the purpose of their disguise. Most importantly, he wondered why they had not helped Arthur in the first place when they possessed the strength to do so. However, he restrained himself and did not ask. Since no one knew what another person was going through, who was he to judge or question them?

His entire view of them had completely changed. If anyone needed to be worried about, it was him. After all, he was the one who was stuck here, not them. Thus, he felt relieved when he saw Stacy arrive at this place. Since he had also accepted the same Trial, it was now a combined Trial for them. With a week's time limit, they could relax for a while before carrying out the Trial's objective. Daniel sat down on the berm, lay down, and closed his eyes.

Inside an endless white canvas, a young man lay on his back on the floor. He had walked for a long time, exhausting himself completely. He was not even sure what he was trying to find. Perhaps he simply wanted to find something other than this unending white. Among all his frustrations, the text floating in front of him was the most annoying. It refused to go away. Even when he closed his eyes to try and sleep, the text remained clearly visible. How was that even possible? He was not sure.

At this moment, all he wanted was some peace and a good sleep. Nothing more.

"Why are you torturing me? Leave me alone! I don't want anything to do with you for God's sake!" Arthur suddenly yelled. However, there was no one near him. There was only a Notebook simply hovering a few feet away. No matter how long he walked across that white canvas, the notebook would not leave him alone. It constantly followed him, asking for something he was not interested in. The frustrating thing was the lack of a reply to his yelling. It was deadly quiet in this place.

If they let him sleep here, he would sleep for a whole year. But the text in front of his face never went away.

"Dude, I want you to do nothing but remove this text from my face. It gives me a sick feeling," he said quietly. Still, there was no answer. Frustrated, he sat upright and looked at the notebook near him. He stared at it for a while as if it were a standoff. Sigh! Arthur let out a big sigh. After getting poisoned, or whatever had happened to cause his death, he directly appeared on the white canvas.

He had highly doubted he would appear here again after his first resurrection, but God knew how or why he was here now. However, he decided that since he had died a second time, he would stay dead here. Furthermore, the penalty for the second death and the contract the notebook asked for were too much and too cruel. He would not live a happy life even if he were to come back to life again. [Candidate Arthur Purchase died.] [Resurrection Protocol Activated.] [Resurrection Cost: 50% of Remaining Lifespan.] [Candidate Verbal Confirmation Required.] [Please provide verbal confirmation.] [No alternative option is available.]"I don't want to be resurrected, just let me be. I hope I will get used to these words," Arthur muttered as he lay back down, his face pressed against the ground.