In truth, the three old men's agreement to train Shen Zuo's senses for eight years only went according to plan for the first two years. After that, they started training him on other things and stopped sticking strictly to the senses. Bai Ren, for one, would take him on long training trips, sometimes lasting up to three months, during which the rest of the senses went untouched. The old men were flexible enough to reshape the plan's structure more than once over the years.
Today, at the age of fourteen, Shen Zuo was to spend half a year alone in a nearby forest, and he needed to survive while killing at least 150 Level One beasts...
"Yeah, finally, the day you three decided to kill me has arrived," Shen Zuo said mockingly.
Ling Li replied: "Don't worry, you won't die that easily. You've still got ten thousand lashes left before we hit the hundred thousand mark and I break my own record! Hahaha!"
A shiver ran down Shen Zuo's spine, and he didn't respond to Ling Li. Bai Ren spoke up instead:
"I was actually planning on skinning you too, so no, I don't think I want you dead just yet."
Then Zhou Ji chuckled and said:
"And I made a new cake recipe. I want you to try it."
Shen Zuo froze in place, then said:
"No thanks... I don't want to taste a new flavor of crap."
Then Ling Li said: "Go on, and don't come back before the deadline. Don't worry about keeping count of the beasts you kill, just kill them, and if you want to eat them, eat them. We'll be the ones keeping the total count."
With his sword at his side and a mid-sized axe slung over his shoulder, Shen Zuo took off running toward the nearby forest, which lay ten kilometers away.
An hour and a half later, Shen Zuo reached the forest. The trees were sparse and spread apart, some short, others leaning as though the wind had been pushing them for years until they'd simply given up any will to stand straight. The ground beneath his feet was a mix of dry dirt and patchy grass, as if nature itself had abandoned any notion of density here.
Beyond the forest stretched a wide plain, open land reaching all the way to the horizon, swept by wind, scattered with dried, dead leaves. There was nowhere to hide, no shade to take shelter under. Everything lay exposed, and that meant one thing:
Whatever beast showed up, it wasn't going to hide either.
Shen Zuo thought: "Damn it! What am I supposed to do? Never mind killing 150 beasts... I won't even survive a single day out here!"
He tightened his grip and scanned his surroundings again, but nothing had changed. Same exposed ground, same eerie sound of the wind, same heavy feeling pressing down on his chest.
It was still morning, since he'd arrived early.
"Hmmm... calm down, Shen Zuo, this is easy."
He tried to steady himself. He looked around; he had three problems right now: food, water, and shelter.
There were plenty of wild berry bushes around, so the food problem was more or less solved for the time being.
There were also a fair number of trees that stored water in their trunks, so the water problem was solved too.
What remained was shelter, and that one was going to be difficult.
The area was mostly open plain, and the trees weren't nearly large enough to offer real protection or serve as a shelter.
The solution was caves!
Shen Zuo decided to search for animal dens... even a small burrow or a hollow in the ground would do for now.
Decision made.
Shen Zuo started picking berries off the bushes, eating them greedily. He was actually happy about this assignment, not because it was mandatory... but because it meant he'd finally get a break from eating Zhou Ji's cooking!
He smiled to himself as he chewed, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and quietly began pushing deeper into the forest.
After walking for a while, Shen Zuo found more than one hollow... but he didn't pick any of them. The reason was simple: he was looking for a bigger one, and preferably one with a beast already living inside it.
He was eager for a fight, and he got exactly what he wanted.
He found a hollow inhabited by a family of Frelta deer.
This species of deer didn't live in herds; only a male and a female lived together, along with their young, who would eventually separate once they grew older.
And luckily for him... they were only Level One.
It seemed this particular forest had already been cleared of anything above that level.
Shen Zuo watched them from a distance.
"I really hope they don't have some kind of offensive Phantom..." he muttered under his breath, gripping his sword's handle hesitantly, waiting for the right moment to strike.
His eyes never left the deer, tracking their every movement with precision.
The female began drifting a little away from the male, apparently heading toward some nearby grass to graze.
Shen Zuo tried to sneak up on the female, and once he was close enough...
He struck with everything he had.
But before he could reach her, with only a few meters left between them, a violent gust of wind suddenly slammed into him. He fell hard onto his backside, his back hitting the ground.
"Oh no! She's got a wind-type Phantom..." he muttered through gritted teeth, slowly getting back up.
The female fled toward her mate, who immediately positioned himself in front of her, acting as a living shield. It was an instinct bred into this species of deer, protecting one's partner no matter the cost.
Shen Zuo stood his ground, sword in one hand, axe in the other, staring the male down.
That deer had already gone on the offensive, charging with his long horn. His coat, white speckled with black, gave him an imposing look, and the scale-like leather plating on his hide only added to the sense of savagery.
Shen Zuo swung his sword to block the charge.
The first collision knocked him back hard. The sword barely did anything, aside from leaving a small mark on the deer's horn.
Then the female came around from behind her mate to join the attack.
Shen Zuo barely dodged it... but what came next was worse.
A sudden strike from the male. The deer never even got close to him, and yet, it slammed into the side of his shoulder anyway. A focused, powerful blast of wind. Even though it wasn't a direct physical hit, it nearly tore straight through his shoulder!
Shen Zuo winced in pain as he stumbled back a step.
"An offensive Phantom... on the male too?!" The female's Phantom had already been bad enough, and now this too?
Shen Zuo let out a breath, then launched his attack.
The female was closer to him, so he lunged toward her, his sword cutting through the air.
He tried to strike her flank, but she used her Phantom again. A gust of wind burst in front of him, halting his momentum and knocking him to the ground once more.
He barely had time to regain his balance before the male charged, horns first.
But Shen Zuo, with a sharp, sudden movement, sprang back up from the fall.
His shoulder was still dripping blood, but he paid it no attention.
Then, suddenly, the female's horn pierced his left side from behind.
He felt the pain, but a strange smile spread across his face.
Ignoring the horn still lodged in his side, he tore himself free and spun around, striking with the axe and putting everything he had into it. He hit her leg and broke it, then dragged the axe upward, tearing a deep gash into her chest.
The blow appeared to have wounded her severely...
The male went berserk.
He charged wildly at Shen Zuo, who was still tangled up in the female's horns as she tried desperately to pull herself free, wracked with pain, only complicating Shen Zuo's situation further.
But he seized the opportunity anyway.
In a sharp instant of focus, he barely dodged the charge, rolling to the side.
And as the raging male rushed past him, Shen Zuo held his sword out in the path of the charge. The result? A small gash torn into the deer's flank, not enough to bring him down, but enough to make him even angrier.
Now, only the male remained. One on one.
Shen Zuo charged in with a fury that outmatched even the deer's own rage.
In a reckless instant, he hurled his sword toward the fleeing female. The sword struck her side, not a lethal wound, but enough to take her out of the fight entirely.
He raised the axe with both hands and struck the deer's horn from the side with everything he had. The blow was powerful enough to shove the deer sideways and shatter the horn completely.
The horn hung loose now, broken and dangling limply beside his head...
Shen Zuo grabbed the nearest rock he could find and hurled it straight at the deer's eye.
But the surprise? The rock shattered in midair and rebounded violently, striking Shen Zuo's own body and leaving him with several shallow cuts.
That was the male's protective Phantom at work, an invisible barrier, but a harmful one.
Shen Zuo, as if unaffected, charged forward again with the axe, determined to finish the fight.
The deer charged in turn, his head snapping to the side, and it was the broken horn that struck Shen Zuo this time, so the wound wasn't serious.
In a flashing instant, Shen Zuo raised his axe high, then brought it down hard onto the deer's back. The strike nearly tore off a chunk of the deer's hide, and a scream of pain filled the air.
Shen Zuo smiled the smile of a victor, even though he'd just been thrown to the ground with force. He landed on a rock, which tore a deep gash into his back, and his clothes ripped, but none of it seemed to bother him.
He kept his grip on the axe, his eyes never leaving the deer.
Then, with a quick leap, he stood back up.
The deer was exhausted. Shen Zuo... was not.
Hesitation flashed across the deer's face, but the moment he glanced back and saw his injured mate, his resolve seemed to return, and he charged again, using his one remaining horn.
Shen Zuo was ready this time.
He executed the same plan he'd used against the female, but instead of dodging, he grabbed the horn with his hand and stopped it from piercing through.
Then, with his other hand, he swung the axe down onto the deer's back with everything he had.
The sound of bone cracking echoed through the air, and a deep wound opened up along the deer's back.
The deer screamed and attacked violently, using the very same wind Phantom, which this time tore into Shen Zuo's foot. But Shen Zuo didn't care about the wounds anymore.
He struck with the axe once more, a massive blow landing directly on the deer's spine, stopping him from moving entirely.
The deer collapsed to the ground instantly. His hind legs went completely limp; he could no longer stand.
He tried to crawl, but his movements were slow and agonized.
His chest still rose and fell with rapid breathing, but he'd lost all control of the lower half of his body.
His final cry was faint, a blend of instinct and pain.
The Phantom's visible form suddenly dissipated from his body, as though the body itself could no longer sustain it.
On the very first day alone...
Shen Zuo took serious injuries, deep wounds in his shoulder and foot, his clothes completely torn to shreds, his skin covered in bruises, mud, and blood.
He'd killed only two beasts out of the 150 required.
But in exchange, he'd come closer to death than he'd ever expected. His breathing was heavy, his body trembling from exhaustion. He didn't even have the strength left to stand; he sat down beside the deer's corpse, staring silently up at the sky.
'Just the first day... just one single day...'
He said it to himself, pressing a torn piece of his shirt against his wound.
Night hadn't even fallen yet,
and his very first fight... had almost been his last.
His fighting style was, quite simply, suicidal.