Everything slows to a crawl. In the black-and-white world of focus, only mana continues to hold its vibrant color.

The raindrops in a massive area stop in the air as if someone paused time.

The heat disappears from the air.

The giant bear in front of me stops moving.

In just a split second, a massive chunk of my mana disappears.

Then I take a step towards the monster, and the ground under my feet cracks as I transfer all the energy I hold into kinetic, infuse it all into a mana projectile, and shoot it all at the Cinderbear.

The air reverberates in front of me, vibrations I'm able to see with my eyes. The air flickers under the immense concentrated energy that covers the distance in a blink. The chest of the monster explodes into a geyser of blood and flesh, the attack revealing its beating heart and cutting off its front left paw, sending it flying until it falls on the ground, destroying multiple trees.

After the attack, pain surges through my head and body, making me lose control over my mana for a moment. The mana bandages disappear, revealing my still-not-closed wounds, and the armor piece on my left forearm dissipates.

Yet, I still continue to keep my perceiving touch on the monster as it disappears from the spot.

The body of the goblin is set ablaze, and from it, the Cinderbear steps out. It´s smaller now, but its wounds fully healed. The heat again radiates from its body, setting ablaze its surroundings that are still being torn apart by beautiful but deadly rain. The rain that the bear ignores while its intelligent eyes track me.

As the rain starts falling again, I create a thin barrier over my skin that resonates with my mana. When the rain touches me, the barrier destroys the droplets, turning them back to the normal water that now hits my body, soon drenching me fully. The water is flowing down my hair and face, mixing with the blood from my wounds.

Then the bear roars once again and half of the remaining monsters that are still standing, unmoving, explode into pillars of flames that reach far over the top of the trees. They quickly bend, slithering like a snake, and then all at once, dozens of flame pillars coil and bend and reach towards me.

Sending my brain into overdrive, I [Focus] and with [Resonance] reach towards each and every one of the flames as I continue to endure.

I tear all of the flames apart. My mana roars and resonates through the air, accurately hitting the core of each flame and putting it out as if blowing out a candle. Not stopping there, after the flames are gone, my heart sends an audible thump into the surroundings as I collect kinetic energy in my body.

Both the Cinderbear and I take a step towards each other.

His flames and my flames continuously clash in the air between us until we get so close they start swirling around us like a fire tornado, heating the area to the extreme even with the rain that continues to fall.

My heart pumps more and more energy through my body, instantly to be transferred into dark yellow flames that battle the bear's orange ones. Just a tiny mistake, a moment of hesitation would be enough for me to lose control and allow his flames to burn me alive. But there isn't even a speck of hesitation or worry in my head.

I know that I'm smiling, the [Focus] fully working on skills and consolidated to a single task, allowing my emotions to surface.

My mana resonates across the dagger in my hand, and I slash the air in front of me. An attack shoots through the air and a deep cut appears across the bear's face, blinding one of its eyes.

In exchange, the bear takes another step towards me, and from its mouth, heat escapes concentrated into a stream as thin as wire. It slashes me across my face too, blinding one of my eyes and drawing blood that flows down my cheeks, onto my lips, and then dropping from my chin onto my charred and torn clothes.

I smile even more now, just a few steps away from the Cinderbear, and with my heart beating so loudly my bones start to resonate with the output that I need to generate to be able to fight against the monster's flames.

Another stream of concentrated flames slashes against me, and this time I block them with my hand to not get my head cut off, and the dagger falls from my hand along with a few of my fingers.

But it's fine; I don't need them right now. I continue to concentrate and continuously change the frequency my mana resonates on, and soon I hit the spot.

I reach out towards my flames that are all around us and change them, affect them, and soon they start to resonate together with my mana. They resonate at the same frequency as the Cinderbear's flames.

My flames audibly roar, the sound deafening and the ground melting. The air flickers under their force as they devour and take over the monster's flames.

My mana continues to drop to lower and lower levels, yet I continue to push even through my pain until I take control of them all. Then, for a split second, all the flames stop moving.

There is no flicker; they do not burn or move. It looks as if time itself stopped.

The Cinderbear doesn't like it, and with a loud roar, all the remaining monsters around us are set ablaze, turning into flames that start rushing towards us. But it's too late. Flames I took over move and coil like a snake, and this time they are not dark yellow; they are of a beautiful golden color as they rush towards the bear, pressing on the field around him and devouring his body.

In the end, only the skeleton of the bear steps out of the flames, and his flames flicker and dissipate. The skeleton of the monster takes one more step towards me before crashing down and finally stopping to move.

[You have defeated the CinderBear - lvl 196]

[Lvl 120 > Lvl 121]

[Lvl 121 > Lvl 122]

[Lvl 122 > Lvl 123]

[Resonance - lvl 15 > Resonance - lvl 16]

[Resonance - lvl 16 > Resonance - lvl 17]

[Redistribution - lvl 33 > Redistribution - lvl 34]

[Redistribution - lvl 34 > Redistribution - lvl 35]

The moment Cinderbear dies, the rain stops and disappears. Even the droplets that come crashing down, now that the heat doesn't destroy them, just straight up disappear. The sky is once again a beautiful blue, with two suns in the sky.

One minute remaining.

The ground starts shaking and the sky turns pure black, yet there is still somehow enough light to see.

The two suns in the sky expand and quickly grow bigger and bigger until they fill up most of the horizon. Two giant suns so close to the surface that they should be logically tearing it apart, burning it to ash. One yellow and the other one orange.

Then in the middle of each sun, a pupil expands, and two giant eyes stare down at me.

(Another unfortunate one.)

The voice is like thunder, sounding only in my head, yet the ground shakes and the area around me continues to get destroyed.

Error. Unallowed Interference detected. Activating failsa…

(Enough.) the voice says, and the message from the system stops, and the window disappears.

Then the giant eyes continue to stare at me. Two giant burning spheres of fire with pupils in the middle.

(I have only one piece of advice for you, an unfortunate one. Never get any of your skills to level 99.)

Then it all disappears. Two eyes are gone, the ground stops shaking, and the system messages fill up my vision as if nothing happened.

Congratulations on fulfilling Beyond’s quest! You have acquired:

Attribute upgrade token

Rare graded equipment

shards

You will now be transported back to your floor within the Hell Difficulty Tutorial. You can enter Beyond again in 4 months.

Before I get transported out, I grab the dagger from the ground, immediately appearing back on the third floor of the house I entered the Beyond from.

One quick scan tells me I'm alone, and I lean against the wall and slide down to my bottom. My heart is beating wildly, my head is hurting. I still have a few stab wounds. I'm poisoned. One of my eyes is blinded, and I'm missing a few fingers. Am I getting careless because I have a healer at hand?

And what the heck was that even? Damn, that was scary; that thing even messed with the system. Was it because it was Beyond? Is Beyond under weaker control of the system or was that thing just that powerful?

And what was that warning? Not to get a skill to level 99?

Well, I'll deal with it later, future problems for future Nathaniel, screw that jerk. Now then, I need to check my rewards, don't I? I can lose a bit more blood; my body can handle it, but I don't think I can wait any longer.

"Use attribute upgrade token," I say, and a window appears.

WARNING! You can only upgrade one out of 4 attributes. After you pick an attribute, you can't change it later. You can upgrade your selected attribute up to three times.

Attributes for upgrade:

StrengthDexterityConstitutionMana

Choose wisely.

What a dumb warning.

"Upgrade mana."

Congratulations! You can now upgrade your mana attribute. Please pick one of the three options.

Warning: after you pick the option, you can only continue to upgrade that option and won't be able to pick the other upgrades.

Choose wisely.

Mana Amplification: Enhances the sheer volume of mana you possess.

Stage 1: Vast ManaStage 2: Omnipresent ManaStage 3: Limitless Mana

Mana Restoration: Accelerates the rate at which your mana replenishes itself.

Stage 1: Sprouting ManaStage 2: Thriving ManaStage 3: Unending Mana

Mana Potency: Boosts the potency and intensity of your mana.

Stage 1: Potent ManaStage 2: Dynamic ManaStage 3: Supreme Mana