Eddie shivered as he felt his skin having chicken skin. It was very dark. The scenery was a gigantic cave a starry sky with golden stars. Occasionally, he could her whispers into the gusty winds. In front, the smell of sulfur and molten rock filled his nostrils. There was a glow of orange in front no more than fifteen paces. As he got closer, Eddie could see that it was the exit to the cave. An immense heat wave slammed into his face.

Eddie wiped the perspiration off his face with his dirty right hand. As he entered the next level of Valhalla, Eddie was ecstatic at the magnificent scenery. He was at the bottom of a spacious chasm. In the center was a gargantuan, flaming sword that reached all the way up to the heavens. Eddie glanced up, trying to see how high the chasm and the sword. It was impossible to see the top as. He couldn't even see the hilt.

“Wow! Such a big sword!”

“Impressive! Isn't it, child?”

“Who . . . who's there!” Eddie screamed in terror.

Eddie felt a demonic pressure crushing him. All the air in his lungs were nearly depleted. He was going to suffocate to death. A crimson, blood silhouetted object emerged from the flames of the gargantuan sword. It was flying at a slow pace, the closer it gotten to Eddie, the pressure increased. Eddie falter to his knees. Eddie was about to blackout.

“Such a weak, pathetic earthling. How was it possible that your are the chosen one? I do not sense your mana cultivation. Perhaps you haven't started your cultivation pilgrimage. You are not a mana cultivator. You can't withstand spiritual of the basic mana Layer Realm. Better I just just devour you in one gulp.”

Eddie coughed and vomit out blood. Tears of blood flow down his cheeks.

“Fortunate for you, I can't immediately take your life on the spot during the trial. Or else my spiritual subconscious will be extinguished. That's unless you give up. What do you say . . . heh heh!”

It laughed as it released the pressure on Eddie. All of his blood began accumulating into a single sphere. The sphere of blood was adsorbed. Eddie coughed and forcefully intake oxygen. Finally, he was able to breath and got a look at the curse object. It was a halberd over six feet long. It had a demonic looking to it. The head of the blade was had an eerie looking dog or wolf head that hat had eyes and moth that could move. It was alive.

“A talking halberd!” He exclaimed with excitement and fear. This had to be a curse object that his mother told him about. A blood contract can be signed.

“Not the expression I was expecting, kid. So what is it going to be? Will you accept my power or will you challenge me to the next level?”

Eddie shrugged and frowned.

“You are really daft. To advance through the trial, either you acknowledge me and be become my host or you'll have to get by me. Option one: wield me and my power; you'll have to satisfy my hunger blood. You'll need to walk the Path of Slaughter and accumulate blood from your kills. If you fail to satisfy my hunger, I will devour your blood essence and your life will be forfeit.

“Option two: get by with your life on the line. Do you best to escape me because I will not stop chasing you through the ends of Valhalla. And the same fate awaits you.”

Eddie grinned and gave the halberd a cheeky thumbs up, “I'm not afraid of you! Just like I'm not afraid of the big, bad dragon inside of me! I'm not afraid of you too,” he laughed. “I will make you my dog! My weapon! Believe it!”

The menacing, hound halberd caroused in laughter, “Boy! I starting to like your tone! Come and embraced the power of the Halberd Demon Chaotic Blood Arts. Your journey begins! Use me as your heart desires!”

Eddie grasp the halberd. It was very long for his height. Surprisingly, the halberd was very light. Eddie gave a several sloppy jabs and a stone boulder crumbled too dust in front of him. He sulked in breath as the halberd in his hands vibrated with a excruciating sting of a hundred honey bees. Overall, he was very ecstatic, wielding an enchanted halberd. He had the feeling that a normal human would explode into meat pudding.

“Careful! You need to start from the basics and stabilize your four mana foundation even if you never cultivated mana before or you will receive a backlash.” The cursed halberd said coldly as it sensed Eddie's mana network. “Especially when your cultivation or mana network has been crippled.”

“Mana cultivation . . . crippled?” Eddie shrugged.

“It means that you will never be able to learn and cultivate mana in your entire life. There are methods to heal a crippled cultivator's mana network. It is very rare to discovered them. Only an Five-Star Radiant Shaman and above can perform the healing process. They could even attach and regrow limbs. Good luck finding one that will help you. They are difficult to encounter in this vast universe.”

Eddie frowned and immediately became dejected. How was he so post live and protect himself if he could never cultivate? Better to commit suicide. However the demonic halberd chuckled, sensing his thoughts.

“That implies to internal cultivation. Not 'external cultivation' with the assists of Celestial Armaments such as myself. You will cultivate my powers with your will power and muscle memory. This require tremendous amount of practice and patients.”

Eddie became even more excited, but it he was still new to the life of mana cultivators.

“You are a novice to the realm of cultivators. There are realms that a cultivator establishes his or hers mana network. Breaking through each realm, the mana cultivator becomes stronger and faster. The higher you climb, the more difficult it becomes for one's cultivation to advance to the next realm.

“The first realm is the Tempering Layer Realm. This is the first stage of mana cultivation. There are nine layers in total. Once you exceed all nine layers will you be able to step into the Soul Realm. Once you reach the Soul Realm, you will be able to synchronize mana with your soul to perform Seidr and pure mana energy attacks. You will also be able manifest your mana to create your mana Spirit Armament and equip it at will. Depending on your talents, your soul will transformed in the most suitable armament. Armaments mostly took form of a weapon.

“Above the Soul Realm are three core realms such as Illusive Core Realm, Revolver Core Realm and Absolute Core Realm. Once you able you establish your mana core. Next are the three profound realms. If a cultivator steps into the Earth Profound Realm, the will harness the energy of the world. Upon reaching the Sky Profound Realm, one would be able to hover and fly without a mount or warship. “Lastly, if a cultivator ascends to the Profound Heaven Realm, they will shed away their mortal flesh and stepped into the realm of immortals along side the elves.”

Eddie furrowed his brows. His comprehension skills were very low that he hardly understood what the halberd said. It was the same facial expression that he always made during classroom studies and lectures. This was the reason why Eddie was afraid to give direct answer to pop quiz questions or lectures in front of the his regular education classmates. Most of the time, his responses are inaccurate and incorrect.

“I sense your feelings. Stress not. Your mind is not needed to process all of this. You will feel the difference in mana cultivation when you are able to have break through. All of this is not process through knowledge. It is process through your senses and instincts. You will know how strong and weak a mana cultivator is and your current realm without being taught.

“However, I should mention a few things if your cultivation reaches the Profound Heaven Realm. Profound Heaven Realm experts will lose the ability to reproduce when they surpassed half of their mortal lifespan. They will become infertile for the rest of their life. This also implies if one cultivation cripple after entering the Profound Heaven Realm.”

“I don't get it. What do you mean by reproduce?”

The spirit of the halberd was stupefied and wanted to ram its head against a brick wall. Where did this kid received his education from?

“I swear on my master's name that you are the most dumbest youth I ever stumble upon in my entire existence! Most living beings are born into this universe by their parents. This is what it means to reproduce.”

Eddie was mortified. It felt like he was being lectured at school in front of regular students. Nevertheless, he had a general idea what reproducing meant.

The halberd started glowing with crimson aura. Then it transformed into a wooden staff that has a carved spear pointing head. Eddie was dumbfounded as he witnessed the Celestial Armament transformed into long shaft. The head of the shaft was carved into a triangular pointy head. This would allow Eddie to jab and pierced through objects or his adversaries. Eddie's complexion became sour green.

“No complaining! The current you are not worthy of my complete form. Now lets begin.”

For the next several days, the armament trained him how to use the proper stance and a jabbing technique call the One-Thousand Dragon Roars. It is basically a simple thrust or straight, forward jab of a spear, lance, pike and halberd. The reason why the technique was call the the One-Thousand Dragon Roars is an army of one-thousand pikemen mana cultivators' thrusting in unison are cable of not only repelling back an gargantuan army. They could obliterate a battalion with the capacity of a million soldiers in a blink of an eye.

Days turn into weeks. Weeks turned into months. In that time Eddie learned how to swing, sweep, parry and block another weapon no matter the length. Not only that, he started cultivating. In a short span of time, he went from a commoner to the Fifth Layer of the Tempering Layer Realm. Also, having to obtain a Celestial Armament, he never needed to worry about nourishment and starvation. As long as he kept feeding the halberd blood essence. In return, his body will be provided with nutrients just like splitting a profit.

He has hunted demonic beast has he continued journey through Dragon Sanctuary of Valhalla. When surmounting each peak, there was a portal that took him to a far distant location in Valhalla. Each portal leaded to a different sub-realm. There are a total of six sub-realm that were connected to the Divinity Abyss. Four of Valhalla's plains were trial grounds for junior cultivators bellow the Earth Realm. The last two plains were the Dragon Sanctuary and the Fairy Queendom.

Eddie must journey through the four planes extinguished in order to advance up to the next location. After extinguishing an acolyte. Eddie is then instantly teliported back to the chasm and me must climbed up to next peak and enter the next portal. Climbing can take days or even weeks to surmount a peak. Passing through a location and extinguishing an acolyte and its minion approximately took Eddie a year to accomplish.

Eddie was astonished to learn that his mother's fairy nation was part of this realm. Now he really was looking forward to see what a nation full of fairies looked like and his mother's throne. Now Eddie felt like this trial was now worth it.