The strange invitation into their realm—or lesson, or trial, whatever this was—didn’t last long in silence.

As soon as the mature masked woman had finished guiding me through her refined instruction, her touch retreating like silk being pulled from my shoulders, another presence stepped forward with the sound of polished shoes against stone.

It was his turn now.

The black-masked man.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” he clicked his tongue with a slow shake of his head, arms crossed behind his back like a disapproving noble. “You certainly lack both elegance and refinement. While your table manners have improved—thanks to Miss Red’s rather patient teachings—you still lack the poise required to truly belong in a place such as this.”

He walked in a slow circle around me, observing every inch of how I sat, breathed, blinked—even how my fingers idled on the edge of the fork.

There was no rest between his corrections.

Every time I thought I had done something right, his voice would chime in with a crisp, “Too stiff,” or, “Relax your wrist,” or sometimes just a low sigh followed by a muttered, “Hopeless.”

It was exhausting.

He treated every micro-movement like it was a performance for an emperor.

I had to breathe just so.

Tilt my head just so.

Smile—not too much, not too little, and certainly not too fast.

According to him, the weight of elegance was in mastering restraint, not performance.

Honestly? I felt more out of breath during his lesson than I did sparring monsters.

For reference—since they never told me their real names—I was left with the bizarre code names they assigned each other to avoid drawing any “unwanted attention.”

Miss Red for the mature woman.

Black Giraffe for the overly serious, overly tall masked man a nickname gifted to him by the child.

And finally, Little Child for the smallest of the trio, who insisted that she wasn’t that little and threatened to explode anyone who treated her like a toddler.

Naturally, Black Giraffe and Little Child nearly had a bloody battle when they first started using those nicknames on each other.

Sparks flew.

Tables were nearly flipped.

The air itself shook with raw power.

But despite all their threats and insults, nothing ever escalated into true harm.

It was all bark, no bite—though with beings like them, even their bark could probably shatter mountains.

As time passed, their strange method of instruction continued, almost like a ritualistic routine.

Miss Red was first—her hands soft but commanding, teaching me the intricate, almost sacred subtleties of proper table etiquette.

It wasn’t just about which fork to use—it was about intention, presence, and subtle influence.

How to be aware of everything at a table without making it seem like I was watching anything at all.

Even the way on how to cut into the meat was important… I had to look at hidden lines within the mana in the space that surrounded the food, a concept that I didn’t even think about…

Then came Black Giraffe’s lesson—pure elegance distilled into exhausting physical and spiritual micro-discipline.

I was scolded for everything from breathing too loud to blinking too slowly.

His definition of poise wasn’t just posture—it was an entire language, one that translated into grace under pressure, into controlling the tempo of every encounter.

And finally—inevitably—came Little Child’s turn.

She didn’t walk forward. She burst into the space like a firecracker with legs.

“Alright, now that the boring adults have had their say—it’s my time to shine!” she cheered, raising both hands in victory. “Time to teach you how to actually carry your presence. You know, aura, pressure, soul-force. That kinda stuff.”

“Isn’t that a bit… dangerous?”

She grinned, her masked eyes glowing bright. “Exactly.”

Her lesson was unlike anything the others had given me.

While the first two instructed through precision and etiquette, Little Child’s method was raw, emotional, instinctive.

She told me to forget form, forget tradition, and instead focus on feeling—on intention.

“Presence is the weight of your soul made visible,” she said, tapping my chest with surprising force. “You want people to freeze the moment you walk in a room? Then you better learn how to roar without opening your mouth.”

Her training—Little Child’s—felt the most foreign to me, even among the already strange and disorienting lessons taught by the other two.

While Miss Red’s etiquette and Black Giraffe’s elegance had their own alien logic, they at least felt grounded in something tangible. But this?

This was something else entirely.

Exuding one’s aura, in theory, was a simple concept.

You gather your mana, assert your presence, and project it outward—it sounded easy enough on paper.

But the moment the lesson dove into the territory of the soul, things began to spiral.

The soul was… different.

Too vast. Too abstract and too unknowable.

“Hey! I told you to take a deep breath!” Little Child shouted, her voice bouncing through the surreal space like a firecracker. “Now consolidate your mana! Feel it—really feel it. And while you’re at it, reach deep into your soul!”

I grimaced, closing my eyes, trying again to focus.

But reaching into your own soul wasn’t like reaching for your sword or even controlling mana—it was like groping through fog for a reflection that kept changing shape.

It wasn’t static.

It wasn’t consistent.

Sometimes it pulsed gently like a heartbeat.

Other times it roared like a storm.

Day after day—or however time passed in this strange, timeless realm—she trained me.

They all did.

Little Child with her soul-forging lessons.

Black Giraffe with his crushing discipline. Miss Red with her calm, methodical instructions.

They rotated between me, each shaping a different part of my being—body, mind, and soul.

What were they preparing me for?

I wasn’t told. In fact, I had the growing suspicion they weren’t planning on telling me anything at all.

Every question I asked was dodged, twisted, or answered with some cryptic metaphor that only made my head hurt.

Apparently, they believed it would be better for me to “experience” everything firsthand.

A frustrating philosophy, to say the least.

Still, as the endless days passed in this eternal space—I began to gather fragments of understanding from the little hints they let slip.

First: they were not a threat to me.

That much had become clear.

Beneath their bizarre antics and sharp tongues, they were genuinely curious about me.

They wanted to see me for themselves, to test me, to guide me.

There was something oddly sincere in the way they pushed me forward, like they had waited a long time for this moment and didn’t want to waste it.

Second: they were deeply connected to Erebil.

That fact wasn’t even hidden.

They spoke of her casually, familiarly, as if they had known her to a very close extent…

The child joked—half-seriously—that I should treat them like her children.

But it didn’t feel metaphorical.

No… I could sense it in the way they moved, spoke, and even existed.

They were pieces of her.

Living fragments of whatever made Erebil… Erebil?

And lastly—

They were connected to me.

Not just in a “we’re helping you” kind of way.

No, it went deeper than that.

I could feel it.

They weren’t just aware of me—they were aware of something else.

A version of me I didn’t remember.

A self I had no knowledge of.

Sometimes, when they looked at me, I could swear it wasn’t me they were seeing—but someone else I had yet to become.

Or someone I had once been.

And here I thought I had met all the versions of myself in the trial, it seems that wasn’t exactly the case…

It wasn’t exactly clear just how much these three knew about me—but judging from the little things they let slip during our so-called “casual” conversations, and the way they conducted my training, I could tell they knew far more about me than they should have.

More than most beings in the world, perhaps even more than I knew about myself.

It was subtle—the way Miss Red would correct a habit I wasn’t aware I had, or how Black Giraffe would comment on flaws in my mana control I had never voiced aloud. Even Little Child, in all her chaotic energy, occasionally muttered things under her breath—familiarities about my past, present, and possibly future—that she had no reason to know.

And as frustrating as it was, I couldn’t do anything about it.

In this realm—whatever it was—they held the upper hand.

All three of them were far stronger than me, not just in physical prowess or mana capacity, but in presence.

In weight.

Their very existence felt like it carried gravity, while I felt like I was still tethered to the ground, unsure of how to even stand properly in their space.

Even the system—seemed to flicker in disarray.

When I tried to check my status, the screen distorted, crackling and blinking like a broken hologram.

Words scrambled, numbers twisted, icons faded in and out like ghosts.

And my mana, which I had once been able to call upon with a mere breath, now felt… heavy.

Restrained.

Like it was being watched.

Even my skills were somewhat downgraded… and I doubt I could do much even with ascension as my soul was still being healed…

This place disrupted the very foundation of my power.

There were countless things I was curious about.

Questions that swirled in my mind like a storm:

What was this place truly?

What were they really?

What was their true connection to Erebil—and, by extension, to me?

And even more than curiosity, there was worry.

Worry about Alice.

They told me she was safe—that time in this place didn’t flow the same way it did in the White World.

They insisted that even though I felt days, perhaps weeks passing here, only moments may have ticked by outside.

But that reassurance did little to ease the knot in my chest.

Alice was still recovering… still vulnerable.

And I wasn’t there to protect her.

No matter how much I told myself she would be fine, that nagging fear wouldn’t leave me.

“Hey focus you dimwit!”

I wanted to complain.. but I knew my limits for now…

Eventually…

But before I knew it—the final day of training arrived.

There were no grand announcements.

No ominous warnings or epic conclusions.

It simply… ended.

I stood in front of a mirror—if it could even be called that—its reflection warping ever so slightly as if it too was unsure of what it was reflecting.

But one thing was clear: I had changed.

Gone were the worn clothes I had arrived in.

In their place was a sleek black suit, perfectly tailored to my form.

A matching long coat rested on my shoulders, its fabric heavy with strange energy.

Black gloves covered my hands, and a high collar wrapped around my neck like a mantle.

At first glance, the outfit resembled the Black Giraffe’s own attire, almost like a passing of the torch—but the intricate blue patterns woven along the edges of the coat set it apart.

They pulsed faintly, glowing with the same hue as my eyes.

It felt… right.

The outfit made me look… clean and extravagant at the same time.

Sharp lines, tailored form, and a subtle sense of power threaded through every fiber.

I almost didn’t recognize myself.

Miss Red took a moment to admire me before she spoke with a teasing smile in her voice.

“Well then, you’re ready now~ Just make sure not to mention us, okay?”

“Hmph. This kid’s still meek,” Black Giraffe scoffed. “But I doubt he can hold his tongue for long…”

“I think she’s already aware anyway,” Little Child chimed in, spinning once on her heel. “But oh well~ His soul is fixed! It’s up to him how he handles it now~”

I opened my mouth to ask—anything, really.

“Don’t you guys think it’s about-“

But I didn’t get the chance.

All three of them raised their hands simultaneously.

A sudden force swept over me like a gale.

My body lurched.

The world began to spin. Lights blurred together in a rush of colors, my vision fragmented into flashes.

My breath caught in my throat as the space around me cracked and folded in on itself.

“Wait—! At least explain everything before you throw me out!”

“Bye-bye, Han~!” the child’s voice rang in a sing-song tone, almost mockingly cheerful.

“…Han?”

My heart skipped a beat.

My eyes widened in disbelief, but I barely had time to process it.

The last thing I saw was a glimpse of the girl’s mask lifting ever so slightly—just enough for me to catch the small smile curling beneath it.

Then the world snapped again.

And I found myself standing in the middle of a vast, windy meadow.

The skies stretched endlessly above, a rich canvas of blue scattered with soft white clouds.

Sunlight poured gently through the heavens, casting golden rays across the swaying grass.

A cool breeze swept past me, carrying the fresh scent of wildflowers and earth. It felt… peaceful. Serene.

Too peaceful, considering what had just happened.

It felt almost like I’d been plucked out of reality and placed into a dream—a simulation of a perfect spring afternoon.

The only thing that disrupted the otherwise natural beauty of the field… was the pristine white table sitting neatly in the center.

A bit far off, but unmistakably placed there with purpose.

It stood out like a misplaced brushstroke in an otherwise perfect painting.

Great….

“What now?”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep