Hell Difficulty Tutorial Chapter 460: What a beautiful day

“I want to change handlers,” I tell her and wait for a pop-up ssage.

“That doesn’t work here,” she sighs and points at the storage cubes I brought with . “White sand was made by a powerful Absolute long ago. It was his way of dealing with annoying mana users and he modified it to trap Champion Caius and others. You surely must know how dangerous it could be if soone were to release it on the Entrance floor.”

“There are people with damaged arcane weapons and surely there are others with full arcane weapons. Plenty of people would be capable of wiping out the entrance floor on their own without any need for a weapon or item.”

“Even arcane items need to be used with intent, while there is not a single attendee capable of controlling the white sand. Do you think you’re the first one to bring white sand here, to Beyond? What do you think would happen if you were to release it here in the highly mana-saturated entrance floor?”

“What happened last ti?”

“Soone brought it here, it got out of the container, beca charged by the abundance of ambient mana and the mana radiating from the people here. It wiped out one of the entrance outposts—and any attendees and locals that were there. A single pile that was probably smaller than two of your boxes combined.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, oh. So let’s do it like this: I will take these boxes, I will also take the weapons you made out of it. There are a few handlers with permission to play around with things like white sand, so I will sell it to them and give you a portion of the shards later. And if you try to bring more, I’ll just take it from you.”

“And you’ll take a cut?”

“Obviously.”

I can’t help but feel disappointed. Part of expected this, but I was hoping for a different outco. At least I’ll get so shards out of it. If I don’t get enough to make it worth it, I’ll be angry.

“Can’t these handlers just ask Rulers to get them white sand or find so themselves?” I ask.

“I know what you’re doing you know, but I’ll play along this ti and give you this for free. It’s impossible to enter the tutorial twice. No one can enter the tutorial other than the attendees from the First Generation.”

“Not even the Rulers?”

The look she gives makes it clear that’s all I’m gonna get.

After a while, she smiles from behind her table. “Weren’t you going to change handlers last ti?”

“I forgot.”

“Did you?”

“Well, a lot of things happened. I might be thinking about it now though, so you better have so good information for .”

“Nope.”

“I’m asking for a new handler the second I get out. What with your attitude last ti, and now this situation with the white sand—I've put in a lot of effort, you know.”

“Sure, do it.”

Her smile widens even more as she watches , resting her chin in the palm of her hand, “But I’m in a good mood, so if you ask the right question, I might answer. You only have a few more seconds before you get transported to the entrance floor, so be quick.”

“Who was the ruler on the first floor?” I ask.

She chuckles and leans back in her chair with a relaxed ease. A playful light flickers in her eyes, and she waits a bit, stretching the seconds until I feel myself getting pulled away.

As if that were the signal she’d been waiting for, she asks, “Do you rember that deer you skinned?”

Then I disappear, without even a chance to respond.

And there I stand, shocked to my core, surrounded by the dozens of Beyonders walking all around , going about their business here on the entrance floor.

There is no fucking way.

An hour later, I’m 99% sure that old hag, asshole of a handler, was just ssing with .

I catch myself wondering why I haven’t already asked for a new handler. It would be so simple—just say the words out loud and go through the options. But to my frustration, I still haven’t done it. All because I believe her when she tells she’s one of the few handlers who can provide the kind of information she gave last ti.

Damn it.

I still have a few hours until I have to go to the eting I advertised on the board, so I take a mont to walk around.

This ti I have my crown over my head, and after a few weeks on the 6th floor, it’s nicely filled. It seems to be a running trend with : filling my crown only for things to go to shit. So I’m expecting sothing to go wrong fairly soon.

And just like that, there goes my act as lee fighter Nona. I’m sure there can’t be many people who could see how much mana I have stored without noticing. The crown is sothing I’m deeply connected to. It would also be rude, so it’s pretty rare for anyone to try to scan the people around us, mostly rookies.

As for my crown, I have to wonder just how many people would recognize it as a [Mana Crown] in the first place.

To ss with them a bit, I move a bit of my thermal energy, creating yellow flas that flicker around the crown, trying to disguise it as a [Fire Crown]. And for the most part, I try to make it as close as possible to the one I saw before.

From what I’ve heard so far, the fire-based crown would get less attention. Lastly, I finish off my camouflage with a simple mask made of mana to cover my face and hide my Flabearer under a wrap made of cloth.

It’s so silly it nearly makes want to forget the whole thing, but still, I continue.

Duncan told a lot of things the last ti I saw him. Sotis people disappear, their bodies are never found, likely taken apart for their traits. In other cases, people with rare skills are kept for testing.

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In the near future, I fully intend to reveal so of these skills to purposefully get myself kidnapped. The kidnappers can then serve as a valuable source of information and loot.

Your body changes and adapts to your powerful skills as they level up. Either because it needs to or as a side effect of a skills influence on the body. Even that little is enough for so people to risk it on the small chance it gives them hints to acquire a powerful skill.

Attribute crowns are so of the most sought after, especially [Dexterity Crown]. as are Strength and Constitution while Mana is mostly considered just a variation of a mana battery. An amazing one at that, the skill likely being equal or better than even the greatest mana batteries, but [Dexterity Crown] seems to be on a different level.

I still don’t fully know how one would even go about filling that crown, but I can clearly imagine its strength. Just imagine a person storing Dexterity over months, over years.

It’s so crazy. How do you fight soone who moves so quickly you can’t see them? Soone who moves faster than you can teleport, to the point that even if you do teleport, they’re already there waiting for you?

Give them a powerful weapon, and they’re one of the most terrifying opponents you could ever face. Just the crown, a thod of enduring the strain of motion, and a blade sharp enough to pierce through armor and barriers—and that’s it for you.

I stop mid-stride and take a few steps back.

Off to my side, I spot Duncan, hurrying off sowhere with his signature big bag strapped to his back and a smile on his face. He quickly greets a group of feylith and rushes off between the houses.

It almost makes feel ashad for slacking around like this, so even though it’s a bit early, I head over to the spot I arranged for my eting.

The closer I am to it, the more I start focusing again and pushing these constant thoughts away. Now they all get replaced by curiosity.

All 10 rounds of Earth’s tutorial should be synchronized now, aning I have every chance of eting Beyonders from any given round of the tutorial. And as I get closer, I find that that’s exactly what’s happened.

A tall, bald man sits there, raking his fingers through his beard. He’s wearing a tank top, and either one of his arms must be thicker than my leg for sure. Hell, his leg alone probably weighs as much as I do.

It’s the winner of the 1st round’s 1st tournant. The one we saw during the Chronicle of the Past.

Next to him sits a boy, no older than 12, with a slim build and wavy brown hair matching the color of his eyes which constantly flick from place to place, full of curiosity.

Opposite of them is a woman with short black hair, kind-looking eyes, and a golden retriever sitting next to her with his head in her lap while she scratches him behind the ears.

Extrovert class, both of them for sure. The woman is smiling and nodding, while the big, tall, muscular man laughs loudly and happily, ignoring the looks he gets because of that. The boy seems to be used to that, and I can see him rolling his eyes. The way he sits close to the bald man tells they are most likely used to each other, likely from the sa round.

As I approach, the boy finally detects and pokes the bald man. He doesn’t let it show and continues to act normal, yet the feeling of danger increases to an overwhelming degree.

As if I had walked into a den of beasts the sense of hostility continues to ramp up as I continue my approach, and despite the man’s relaxed appearance as he continues laughing in ti with the conversation, the current atmosphere just doesn’t fit that picture.

I let my heartbeat, kinetic energy flowing through my body, perating my muscles, to counter his pressure. I match the tension in the air as I proceed, each of my steps reverberating through the floor around us, my heart beating just outside the range of normal hearing.

My hand closes into a fist and opens.

Winner of the tournant? Let’s see.

“Nona?” Asks a voice, seemingly out of nowhere.

The mont feels frozen in ti, and the bald man, in the process of standing up muscles bulging, stops mid-movent. He glances at , then at the woman with the retriever, the one who interrupted us and sits down.

With that, the feeling of danger is gone.

Disappointingly.

“Hello,” I greet.

“Hello,” the woman smiles, turning to . “Luna noticed your approach,” she says as she pets her dog, who wags her tail in response. “She said you sll like a human from Earth, so I thought you might be the one who left the post.”

“Luna’s pretty smart.”

“She is, right?” The black-haired woman smiles happily. “My na is Leticia, and this is my Luna as I’ve already said,” she states, introducing the golden retriever as if she were the most important mber of their party.

Luna turns to , the sa gentle brown eyes retrievers usually have. But there’s an uncanny intelligence behind those eyes. I don’t feel any indication of a scan, but I’m sure the retriever is checking out and appraising the danger I present.

“It’s fine, Luna, we’re all from Earth here,” Leticia says, smiling and petting her once again, prompting Luna to quietly turn away from .

Leticia then gestures at the young boy. “This is Spacewolf. He’s really sweet, so please don’t mind the na! The mountain pretending to be a human next to him is CarrotCake.”

The bald man, who sits almost two heads taller than and twice as wide, smiles brightly, his teeth gleaming in the light.

“My na in the community is Nona,” I introduce myself.

“Hello, Nona. I hope we’ll learn to drop these nicknas soti in the near future. My handler told that you can even change your Community na, but only once, and only to your real na. So please think about it.”

Spacewolf snorts while CarrotCake stands up and stops in front of . Obscuring most of my view with his beard as I look up at him.

“Round?” he asks.

“Fifth, you?” I return, curious if he will try to lie.

“First round, winner of the 1st tournant. You?”

“I won our first tournant as well.”

The feeling of danger rises again and it’s imdiate this ti. Even stronger than before and the man’s smile becos even brighter.

Then the two presences I felt coming closer reach us, Luna the retriever reacting exactly the way she did when I showed up.

“That makes three of us,” says a man a few years older than , bringing himself to the muscular man’s attention, which he ignores. “I’m Derick, and this is Noelle, 8th round.”

Derick has long red hair tied into a ponytail. He’s slim and dressed in a pair of black pants and a long sleeved shirt. And to top it all off he’s unard.

Noelle is shorter, with brown hair, and wears a long bow strapped to her back, seemingly made out of tal with no string.

They, like the others, seem accustod to each other’s presence.

“Isn’t that great! What a beautiful day this is shaping up to be!” The bald man, who I refuse to call CarrotCake, shouts as he stomps, leaving a crack in the cobblestones lining the street below him. It’s just a simple movent, playful, devoid of mana, yet it perfectly illustrates the power of his body.

I sll another single-attribute enthusiast. It's just a sha he chose Strength.

Leticia rushes to calm the bald man down, and I have a strong suspicion he wouldn’t mind starting a fight right here and now. He certainly seems like the type.

Derick and Noelle stand quietly off to the side, talking to each other. The winner of the 8th round's tournant, it makes curious about what kind of abilities he could be hiding. Unlike the musclehead over there, it's not quite so obvious.

I check the countdown, the ti for the eting nearly up.

Exactly on the second, the last person enters the area, a young man with green eyes and long black hair tied back in a ponytail. He has a beauty mark under the corner of his left eye. That guy...

So we have three winners from the 1st round of tournants.

An archer with a weird ass bow.

A woman who snuck her dog into the tutorial.

Spacewolf.

And lastly, the cowardly Savant.