Nick walked into the Containment Unit-
BANG!
And immediately jumped to the side as several rusty nails shot past him.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
More and more rusty nails flew past Nick as he swayed back and forth to avoid them.
Near the wall of the Containment Unit was the tall and gaunt figure of an old man. It was almost 2.5 meters high and was chained to the walls by black chains.
The entire figure was covered by rusty nails, which detached from the body to fly right at Nick.
"AAAHHH!"
The gaunt figure aggressively shouted in pain as it tried to tear itself from the wall with all of its strength.
Naturally, the chains were so stable that the Specter couldn't tear itself off that easily.
The nails were shooting at Nick with a lot of speed, but he managed to avoid them pretty well.
'I guess this is a defense or evasion test,' Nick thought as he avoided another barrage of rusty nails.
Moments after the rusty nails hit the walls behind Nick, they fell to the ground and turned into black smoke.
At the same time, new nails grew out of the Specter's body.
'I can avoid the nails from a distance, but it's not easy to avoid them if I close in,' Nick thought.
'But that isn't an issue.'
BOOOM!
A spear entered the Specter's chest and pushed it back.
Naturally, this was one of Nick's throwing spears.
Nowadays, Nick rarely got any opportunities to use his throwing spears, but he still carried them with him.
Usually, since Nick was an Assassin and Runner, he fought with his blades since they could attack faster.
A proper throw was extremely powerful, but Nick couldn't throw a second spear before his enemy reacted.
That was much easier to accomplish with blades.
"AAHH!"
The Specter kept shouting and threw more nails at Nick.
BANG!
Nick's spear punched through the Specter's head, disturbing its aim.
BANG!
Since the Specter's aim and attack speed had suffered massively with that hit, Nick charged forward and decapitated the Specter.
The body kept writhing and shooting more nails as the head slowly turned to black dust.
Ding!
Then, a green light appeared, and the Specter's body started to cramp up as some small bolts of black lightning came out of the chains, binding it to the wall.
These black bolts of lightning could suppress the use of a Specter's Zephyx, turning them immobile.
Nick walked forward and grabbed one of the two spears stuck in the Specter.
DZZZ!
Some black lightning hit Nick's hand, but he barely felt anything.
Nick's Zephyx was isolated from the outside world, and the black bolts of lightning were designed in such a way that humans could still touch them without getting injured.
Nick pulled his two spears out and quickly left the Containment Unit.
Technically, the Specter could still fight, but that was only because Nick didn't go for a kill shot.
If an Extractor had the opportunity to decapitate a Specter, most likely, they could have also killed it.
'20 points already,' Nick thought as he walked to the fourth level.
Getting past the first two levels wasn't difficult.
The first level was almost unlosable, and the second level only required someone to have some guts.
The third level was a bit more difficult. In a way, this was the first actual fight, but it was still quite easy.
After all, the Specter couldn't even move.
Hitting it wasn't an issue as long as someone could deal with the ranged attacks.
Nick walked into the locker room for the fourth level and once again saw two different entrances.
There were no special rules for this one either.
Nick entered the door leading to the Physical Specter and readied himself.
Surprisingly, Nick could enter without getting attacked immediately.
On the other side of the Containment Unit, Nick saw a little girl with long green hair. She looked not older than eight, but there were two things that identified her as a Specter.
First of all, she didn't have eyes. There were only black holes in her eye sockets.
Second, six black tentacles covered in teeth came out of her back.
"Are you here to play with me?" the girl asked innocently with a distorted voice.
"I am," Nick answered.
"Yay!" the distorted voice answered while the girl's body didn't move in any way. "Mister, how strong are you?"
Nick looked deeply at that Specter.
"Early Expert," Nick answered.
"Early Expert?" the girl repeated with delight. "I get to use 25% of my power! Thank you!"
Usually, Nick immediately attacked his opponent, but not this time.
When he had seen the little girl, he had felt a strong feeling of danger.
Either this Specter was extremely powerful for its level, or it was on a higher level.
Nick assumed that it was of a higher level and that it was simply supposed to adapt its power to its opponent.
And sure enough, based on what it just said, Nick was right.
"Let's play! Let's play!" the voice repeated with excitement while the head slowly lifted to look at Nick with a dead expression.
Nick readied his blades.
'Survival is not guaranteed here. This is a good opportunity for a test,' Nick thought.
"You can have the first turn," Nick said. "But be careful. Our playtime might end before you can hit me."
The girl's mouth slowly widened into a grin.
"I like cocky meat the most!" she said.
WHOOOM!
Then, she suddenly charged forward, and her tentacles expanded to cut off all of Nick's escape routes.
WHOOOM!
Suddenly, an explosion of light occurred, and the girl was blinded.
Nevertheless, her tentacles clamped together like the maw of a monster.
CRKSH!
But then, her upper and lower bodies separated and flew in different directions.
Nick appeared an instant later behind the girl's upper body.
'Nobody's watching,' Nick thought.
Naturally, Nick's ability hadn't activated in the hallways or any of the other rooms, but it was possible that it could activate in this room.
After all, levels four and up of the battle portion were supposed to simulate real fights and include real danger.
So, there was a chance that nobody would be looking into this place.
However, it was also possible that they were looking into this place to see if the Specter was playing according to the rules.
Nick couldn't be sure either way.
Because of that, he used his explosion of light to test that.
If nobody was watching, his ability would activate, and he could easily win.
If somebody was watching, Nick would just cut through one of the tentacles and jump to the side.
But it was also possible that somebody was watching and that Nick's light could also fool them.
Maybe there was some kind of device that could transmit videos?
Well, whether the device was here or not didn't make a difference.
Nick's ability worked.
It was important to note that the Specter had only felt truly dangerous to Nick as long as his ability didn't work.
However, since Nick's ability actually worked, it was no longer a big deal.
With his ability and his powerful body, Nick's effective physical power was on the level of an Initial Specialist.
That was at least two times stronger than this Specter.
The Specter collapsed into two shocked heaps.
"I lost?" the little girl asked in surprise.
Ding!
At that point, the light turned green, and Nick walked towards the exit.
"You lied to me!" the girl shouted.
Then, the tentacles of her upper body suddenly moved with a lot of power and threw her towards Nick.
Naturally, this was not part of the test.
Nick hadn't expected the Specter to suddenly become crazy and attack him with its full power, but this also wasn't the first time he worked with Specters.
And an experienced Extractor knew to never let down their guard in front of a Specter.
WHOOOM!
An explosion of light.
BANG!
The torso of the girl shot out of the explosion of light and hit the wall at the back of the Containment Unit.
Nick just opened the employee entrance and left.
The girl looked at the closed door for a while before slowly combining her halves again and waiting in the middle of the room.
'Seems unsafe,' Nick thought as he walked towards the fifth level. 'It was obviously a Late or Peak Elder, but they trusted it enough to test Initial Experts.'
'This could very quickly end with unnecessary deaths. This is a combat trial, not a danger trial.'
'I should talk about that when I get to meet one of the supervisors.'
Nick entered the locker room for the fifth level.
Surprisingly, there was only a single door.
'No difference between Physical and Force Specters?' Nick thought with a raised brow.
Then, Nick saw an illustration.
'A special rule, huh?' Nick thought as he looked at it.
'I just have to use up all of the Specter's Zephyx?'
'Sure,' he thought as he opened the door.