But just as Kael was about to summon his status screen, Aiona suddenly floated closer toward him.
Her tiny face was filled with obvious anticipation.
"So?" she asked enthusiastically. "What do you think about the design?"
Kael blinked once.
Aiona gestured proudly toward the room around them.
"I did some research regarding human living spaces, and apparently pink appears very frequently in descriptions of comfort and happiness, so I decided to go with that theme."
She turned back toward him with sparkling eyes.
"What do you think?"
Kael slowly looked around the room again.
Pink walls. Pink lighting. Pink bed. Pink everything.
The entire place radiated overwhelming feminine energy so aggressively that he almost felt mentally attacked just standing there.
Then his gaze returned toward Aiona.
The tiny guide spirit was staring at him with bright hopeful eyes, looking almost exactly like a child waiting to be praised after proudly showing off something they worked hard on.
Kael stared at her for a few seconds.
Then he silently decided to keep his true thoughts to himself.
He gave a small shrug.
"It’s alright."
Immediately, Aiona beamed brightly.
"I knew you’d like it!"
Kael sighed internally but kept a calm expression outwardly.
Instead, he shifted the conversation elsewhere.
"I want to attempt the next trial in one go," he said. "But before that, I need some time to train and get used to my new strength."
Aiona quickly nodded.
"Okay then!"
After saying that, she floated back toward the miniature pink house sitting at the corner of the room before disappearing inside it.
The tiny door shut behind her.
Kael finally turned his attention back toward himself.
"Alright," he muttered quietly.
"Time to see how strong I’ve gotten."
He could already feel it.
The changes inside his body were massive.
Eighteen levels at once was absurd.
The pain had been hellish, but the amount of strength he gained from it was equally ridiculous.
Without hesitation, Kael summoned his status screen.
The familiar translucent blue interface appeared before him instantly.
---
[Name: Kael Voss]
[Title: -]
[Class: Void Sovereign]
[Class Perks: Void Absorption, Null Field, Sovereign Claim, Echo Strike]
[Skills: -]
[Level: 26] [66%]
[Health: 2,306]
[Mana: 1,740]
•—Stats—•
[Strength: 71]
[Agility: 70]
[Endurance: 91]
[Intelligence: 116]
[Vitality: 87]
[Constitution: 65]
•—Stat Points: 75—•
•—TC Balance: 12,457,400—•
•—Talent: Infinite Reward Multiplier—•
---
Kael stared at the screen silently.
Then he slowly nodded to himself.
"Yeah..."
This was insane.
His level had jumped from eight all the way to twenty-six.
And his stats had practically doubled.
The increase in power was absurd.
But surprisingly, the thing that caught his attention the most was not the stats themselves.
It was another section entirely.
The skill tab that had appeared on his status screen.
Kael’s breathing paused slightly.
"...A skill tree?"
His eyes narrowed.
That should not have happened yet.
Normally, awakened individuals did not unlock their skill tree until far later. Around Level Fifty at the earliest from what he remembered.
But his had already awakened now.
Kael quickly focused on the information, and the moment he saw it his eyes widened slightly.
The skill tree had awakened at Level Twenty.
That was unbelievably early, and more importantly, incredibly beneficial.
Currently, he only had one available skill slot, but the next would unlock at Level Forty, then another at Level Sixty.
The pattern continued like that.
The earlier someone awakened their skill tree, the earlier future slots would become available as well.
Which meant his advantage here was enormous.
Most awakened individuals spent a huge portion of their growth relying almost entirely on class perks because they lacked actual skill slots. Even after eventually unlocking skills, the low number of available slots heavily limited their versatility.
But Kael would not suffer that problem nearly as badly.
A slow grin spread across his face.
Then another.
Until eventually, he could not hold it back anymore.
"Hahaha..."
A low laugh escaped him.
Then it became louder.
Every single day since awakening, his growth had become more and more ridiculous.
At this point, even he was beginning to feel shocked by himself.
After calming down slightly, Kael dismissed the status screen.
Now came the important part.
Actually testing his strength.
Stats alone were ultimately just numbers on a screen. Reading them of the screen was one thing.
Experiencing what the numbers actually translates to personally was another entirely.
Kael slowly clenched his fist.
Then he immediately began training.
The first thing he tested was speed.
He lowered his stance slightly before dashing forward.
The result shocked him instantly.
The sudden burst of speed exploded far beyond what he expected, and before Kael could properly react—
BANG!
His body slammed directly into the opposite side of the start room.
Pain shot through him immediately.
"...Ugh."
Kael groaned softly while rubbing his shoulder.
"This is gonna take a while to get used to."
Without wasting time, he immediately stood back up.
Again.
Time passed rapidly afterward.
Kael continued experimenting with his new physical abilities relentlessly.
Speed.
Strength.
Reaction time.
Movement control.
He tested everything.
Several times he nearly lost balance from moving too quickly.
Other times he accidentally applied too much force and almost launched himself across the room.
But gradually, he began adapting.
Forty minutes passed before he even realized it.
Kael now lay sprawled flat on the floor, staring silently at the pink ceiling above him.
Over the last forty minutes, he had pushed himself hard while testing the limits of his current capabilities.
He had not held back either.
There was no point.
The start room itself was absurdly durable. Even with his current strength, he could not leave so much as a visible dent on the walls.
So he had gone all out during training.
And thanks to that, he now had a much clearer understanding of what he was capable of.
Still, Kael did not immediately rush toward the next trial afterward.
Instead, he simply continued lying there quietly.
Not because he was tired.
Far from it.
With his current stats, a mere forty minutes of training was nowhere near enough to physically exhaust him.
No.
He was resting his mind instead.
Resetting himself mentally.
Right now, adrenaline was still surging through him from the excitement of discovering just how powerful he had become.
And that was dangerous.
Very dangerous.
The previous trial had already felt relatively easy to him.
Now he was even stronger than before.
If he entered the next trial while overflowing with confidence, there was a high chance he would begin to underestimate the Tower trials.
And Kael knew better than anyone how dangerous overconfidence could become.
The Hell Difficulty trials were bizarre.
Unpredictable.
Completely unreasonable.
Entering carelessly while drunk on confidence was practically equivalent to speeding toward his own doom.
So he waited.
Time passed quietly inside the pink start room.
Kael simply stared at the ceiling in silence while slowly calming his thoughts.
Eventually though, he finally sat up.
Then slowly rose to his feet.
His expression gradually became calm once more.
It was time to challenge the next Tower floor.