Spirit Soul

Upon waking up, Kyle felt that his entire body was fully energized.

He wasn't sure for how long he had been uncoscious.

But, the moment he opened his eyes, he knew why had his exhaustion disappeared.

A faint membrane seemed to envelop his body.

This membrane was providing him with an enormous amount of nutrition.

Only when he moved did it slowly disperse. Post that, Kyle was finally able to get out of the unique sleeping place he had been. After stepping outside, he stretched his body and stifled a yawn.

Looking at the ground, he realized that it was a coffin. But contrary to his expectations, it had been warm and comfortable.

Nevertheless, it was weird to realize that he had slept in a coffin. While rubbing his drowsy eyes, Kyle heard a familiar voice.

"You are finally awake? That's good. I'm Lahan, the Dullahan of the Undead Castle, pleased to meet you! And now, spar with me!"

Kyle had not even completely shrugged off his sleep and his eyes still felt heavy.

Drowsiness and exhaustion was clearly visible in his eyes.

Yet, the moment he heard the Dullahan's voice, he flinched before turning around in an instant.

Alarmed by Lahan's words, all of his earlier drowsiness was washed away.

Kyle simply stared at the Dullahan with an appalled face.

Lahan merely flickered with its soul flames before brandishing the black-purplish longsword he held in one arm.

After seeing his confidence and demeanor, Kyle couldn't help but feel a little bit intimidated.

The Undead being neither restricted its death aura nor the mana fluctuations it released. This further pressured Kyle.

Meanwhile, Kyle had no idea what was going on, where he was and why the Dullahan seemed to be so eager, yet unwilling to fight him.

It was weird, and subconsciously he just blurted out whatever was on his mind.

"I...didn't pass the second trial? I don't have to defeat you to pass it...right?"

His hopes came crashing down when Lahan smoothly brandished the longsword he was holding and pointed towards a specific direction.

"You have to defeat me, and Knirg, the Death Knight to pass the second trial!!"

It was as if Kyle's senses suddenly went numb.

After hearing Lahan, all he did was blink his eyes, taking a moment to process what he had heard.

An avalanche of curses and complaints erupted in his mind, and he had the mad urge to hurl them at Lahan, and the Death Knight, who could be seen in the corner of the large room.

"You guys don't want to torture and kill me, or am I missing something?"

Right now, even if it was suicidal, Kyle required information to know how to save his life.

Before, the Dullahan had acted differently than it was now the case.

As such, something must have happened during the time he had been unconscious.

He didn't think that they wanted to kill him or otherwise they wouldn't have helped him recuperate, to begin with.

Yet, one could never know what was on the mind of others.

"Kill you? Not really, we are supposed to test you! Nobody asked you to throw more than 1000 Undead Cores into the dried-up well. So, live with the consequences.

In order to pass the second trial you only have to hit both me and Knirg once!"

Though Lahan made it sound as if the task was a child's play, Kyle wasn't fooled.

He also sensed how the Dallahan threw all the blame on Kyle as if it was his fault for creating the given situation.

This was not the case because the young man in front of him had theoretically passed the second trial the moment the Undead Army retreated.

However, the situation had changed because the young Lady and the Lich seemed to be interested in him. Hence, they had tweaked the challenge a little to test Kyle's mettle.

To be precise, everyone had grown interested in Kyle because no human or humanlike being was supposed to be in the proximity of the Undead Castle.

One had to fulfill specific requirements to enter the region the Castle had been built on, but none of them had been met.

As such, Kyle was not even supposed to be around there.

This only meant that he had been brought by someone or something, which was the reason for the Undead being's interest in Kyle.

Earlier, they had thought of him just as a lucky youth who had found his way to the castle.

He was either their salvation, doom, or simply insignificant for them.

Yet, after witnessing that Kyle could actively invigorate himself, the Undeads had become increasingly wary of him.

There were many abilities that were dangerous for Undeads, but everything that had to do with the living was a threat to the dead.

Because of that, the others first wanted to figure out what Kyle's ability truly was, before intervening, if necessary.

Yet, what the Undeads had figured out was shocking, to put it simply.

By killing Undeads, Kyle's ability was empowered, through which he had prevented exhaustion wear him down.

The Lich, who was the second strongest amongst all others in the Castle of the Undead, had figured out Kyle's trick.

He had sensed that Kyle could deprive the released souls of their excessive energy and devour it to energize himself.

It was uncertain how this act affected the souls.

But, it was quite interesting that they wouldn't be fully devoured by Kyle.

This was essentially what attracted the Lich's interest.

Meanwhile, the young Lady had a different reason to be interested in Kyle.

But that was not something she shared with anyone else.

Instead, she had ordered the Lich to punish Lahan and Knirg and make them act as both instructors and examiners for Kyle's combat proficiency.

Kyle knew nothing about the plans the Undeads had for him.

And even if he knew, there was nothing he could do about it.

Right now, he was still too weak, and the Undeads were well aware of this.

As they had an upperhand, they could make Kyle dance to their tunes and subject him to countless trials and tests.

While Kyle had sensed this, he wasn't sure what would they achieve from this or why they had chosen him for the same.

They wanted to make use of Kyle, and to do this, he had to become much stronger than he currently was!

However, what he didn't know was that all of the Undeads had their own selfish plans.

While working for the young lady they were working on achieving their own, separate goals.

At the same time, there were those that simply obeyed the orders and did as asked.

They were a majority who didn't plan to make use of Kyle because they simply didn't know what kind of ability he truly had!

Not even Kyle could say this for sure.

And, if he were to hear what the Lich had comprehended about his ability, he would be even more confused than anyone else.

Thus, without being able to understand what was going on, Kyle could only assume that the second trial had yet to end.

And, it was his fault for throwing all Undead cores into the dried-up well.

This left Kyle with no choice but to meekly accept his fate and face the challenges thrown at him because it was self-inflicted...or so he thought.

"If I have to hit both of you once...can you two restrict your strength a little?"

This was the most important double Kyle had on his mind.

If both were to restrict their strength to the Peak of the Fortification stage, or maybe even at the Initial rank of the Vitae stage, Kyle felt that he would be able to fulfill the task he had been given.

It was only later that Kyle realized how stupid this thought of his was.

The two Undead beings in front of him were not normal combatants, but veterans holding combat experience worth thousands of years!

That was something Kyle had missed out on earlier and also why a bright smile had appeared on his face when they readily agreed to him.

Both the Dullahan and the Death Knight restricted their strength to the Late Fortification stage, which was on par with his current cultivation!

"Is that low enough, or shall we further restrict our strength?" The Dullahan asked in a teasing tone.

Kyle realized his mistake and a frown appeared on his face to hear the question.

However, only a moment later a sly grin manifested on Kyle's face as he got a sudden idea.

"It's perfectly fine!"

But before he could act upon his idea, he heard the rattling noise of an armor moving around.

"By the way. If you summon this fox of yours, we're gonna kill it." Knirg suddenly announced.

He appeared next to Lahan, just as Arashi was about to jump out of Kyle, ready to initiate a surprise attack.

Knirg's seemingly simple words caused Kyle to freeze in his tracks.

He was shell-shocked to hear that they wouldn't hesitate to kill Arashi and simply nodded his head in response.

Kyle asked his Spirit Soul to provide him with enough soul force, which he could annex and use against his opponents.

Suddenly, Kyle's silver serpent spear appeared in Knirg's gloves before he threw it towards him.

Catching the spear, Kyle looked at it for a moment before swinging it around, trying to get into his combat stance once again.

It felt as if several days had passed since the battle against the Army of the Undead had ended. In fact, this was exactly what had happened.

Having slept and rested for several days, Kyle's body had fully recuperated. But at the same time, his senses were still a little bit muddled and not on their peak.

As such, Kyle had attempted to get his act together by wielding it a little bit.

His eyes spotted the bright glow behind the slit in Knirg's helmet.

Meanwhile, Lahan's soul flame was flaring up and flickering wildly.

Seeing them both, Kyle couldn't help but think that a little warm-up wouldn't be enough.

'They said that they don't plan on killing me, right?' He asked himself in doubt.

The thought of fighting two powerful beings made his mind go blank the moment Lahan announced.

"Let's start!"

Saying so, both Lahan and Knirg rushed towards Kyle, as if they were ready to slaughter him.

Their presence was overwhelming and Kyle felt as if two monstrous powerhouses had released their pressure to subdue him.

Yet, what happened was that the two Undead being's battle intent was released.

But, it was something both of them did naturally when a battle started.

Never having felt something like this, he froze in place.

And, it was only a moment later that the longswords of both Knirg and Lahan pierced through Kyle.

Or at least that was what his mind had visualized.

However, it was only a fraction of a second later that Kyle realized with relief that he was still alive.

However, the silver serpent spear had been flung out of his hand.

He wanted to move and look where the two Undeads had disappeared to.

But that was not possible because an ice-cold blade lay on his neck.

The tip of the blade cut into his skin, making little droplets of blood trickle down before they splattered on the ground.

The blade was ready to behead him at any given moment.

And Kyle's mind was already imagining every single possible way of dying by Lahan and Knirg's swords.

This made goosebumps appear on his body as his legs began to shiver.

"The death aura has already affected him, but he is definitely still alive, and afraid to die...that's good!" Knirg suddenly said out of nowhere, and the Dullahan agreed, its soul flame moving as if it nodded.

"It is good...yes, but being unable to move under the pressure of our battle intent, is not exactly what I would consider as good…"

Kyle just listened while struggling to breathe.

His throat constricted and he began gasping for air which made Lahan remove the ice-cold blade from his neck.

After doing so, he turned his attention back to the discussion with Knirg, who retorted,

"Do you expect a youngling without real combat experience to endure the battle intent of War veterans, who fought for thousands of years...when they were alive?!

Our cultivation might have deteriorated over time, but that doesn't include our combat experience...it grew when we sparred with each other, without holding back, didn't it??"

Kyle listened intently to what the two were saying, and he couldn't help but feel flabbergasted.

"Thousands of years...cultivation..deteriorated?!" Kyle mumbled in shock.

He couldn't help but ask himself just how old the two monstrous Undeads truly were.

Kyle also wondered if they had been alive when the Castle of the Undead had just been constructed.

What Kyle didn't know was that Karnias, the owner of the Castle of the Undead, had never been the strongest being inside the Castle, to begin with.

Instead, he was just sheltering beings that should have never stepped into the outside world!