Humanity’s talent ends the day they stop daring to dream.

~Cailleach, the Veiled Hag of Winter

Despite avoiding the stone golem, the construct appeared in the challenge with him. It didn’t say anything unnecessary and pointed toward the course.

“Reach the end in under ten minutes. You can fail an obstacle, but the difficulty increases because you’ll have to climb back up, which will probably take thirty seconds or so depending on which point you fell from—consider that the penalty. If you fall more than three times, you’ll most likely fail. Time starts as soon as you grab the bar before you. I’ll give you a hint as compensation for ending your combat trial. Keep the bar as long as you can.”

Crow had done most of the events before him through the previous Shrines, but never all at once. The first obstacle, called the ladder, required burst strength and momentum. He had to hold on to the bar and then burst upward, taking the bar with him. He’d slot the bar onto the higher pegs as he jumped upward. It wasn’t complicated but required a lot of strength and endurance. The fact this was the first event was diabolical, as it played hell on his stamina.

Crow gripped the bar and steadied his breathing before lifting it. The moment he did so, a horn went off, and an hourglass appeared in the sky with sand already falling.

Clack!

Clack!

Clack!

Crow’s legs were dangling and curled under him as he used his upper body to push higher and higher. The bar slammed onto the pegs, and he swung himself slightly before jumping again and again.

At the top were two parallel bars that sloped downward to a platform below. On the surface, Crow just needed to slide down using the bar, but to keep himself centered required a lot of body control, and then he had to time his landing perfectly, or he’d tumble off into the water below. The only upside was that this challenge didn’t seem to be a life or death one that he knew was designed to weaken his willpower. It lacked the urgency that a life or death trial had.

Without overthinking, he hopped the bar over the lip and landed on the parallel bars before sliding down. The trick was to keep hopping with the bar, or so he thought. Crow didn’t want to speed down so fast that he couldn’t land.

As the platform approached, Crow eyed the bar he was gripping and remembered the hint given to him. His Mind processed all avenues of success in the blink of an eye and suddenly smirked.

Timing it to perfection, Crow hopped the bar and turned it sideways, so he and the bar plummeted toward the platform. While in the air, he bent his body so that the bar preceded him like a spear. Crow slammed the bard into the platform, feeling it give away under his force, but not before he felt a jarring pain that numbed his hands and wrists. Still, he maintained his grip even as his momentum swung him around the bar until his body slammed hard onto the surface. His shoulders wrenched hard, but the bar didn’t budge, and his fingers were still curled tightly around it.

That was probably cheating, but the only verbalized rule was about reaching the end. In Crow’s opinion, everything else was fair game unless they expressly forbade it. In other words, he’d use whatever means necessary.

Looking ahead, he saw a series of rotating discs with a light mist coming down from the void. It not only made jumping from one disc to the next increasingly difficult but just standing on each one would be a task with how slick they were. It was a test of balance, agility, and control.

The more he jumped, the higher he went. Not only that, but the discs were getting smaller and smaller. He chose not to hesitate when jumping across the platforms, knowing that spinning around would only disorient him and make it even more difficult. So he jumped, stutter-stepped to cut the distances down, and jumped again.

Strangely, while he could see the end of the course, each obstacle was wrapped in a fog until he approached it. So he didn’t even know the next event he had to plan for until he was halfway across the discs.

Therefore when he saw a wall filled with holes, he wasn’t sure what to do. He scanned the holes, but since he was below them still, he couldn’t see anything on the other side. Looking up, he thought maybe he’d have to climb, but the wall disappeared into the fog.

Crow decided he’d aim for the largest hole and jump through. Worst case scenario, he’d fall into the water below and go again. He didn’t speed up his pace but did start positioning himself for the final leap. The last disc was big enough to get one foot on, so he’d have to jump twice consecutively and hope it didn’t spin him enough to throw his trajectory off.

While his jump and dive weren’t perfect, he still made it through. His hip stung when it clipped the left side of the hole, but he landed on a rectangular platform that was as long as he was and a little wider than his shoulders.

Clack!

Crow looked up and saw a latch releasing. It was only then that he realized he was on a type of pendulum.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Crow growled.

Standing up, he prepped himself to run. As his platform approached the next, he took three steps before leaping forward. Crow almost tripped because there was a raised lip at the edge, which seemed out of place. Looking at his new perch, he realized the two sides of the pivot point were uneven. Crow stood at the end of the longer end, and when he heard the familiar clack, he could only sigh.

Unsure of what was happening and knowing he couldn’t reach the other end, he laid down and grabbed the sides. As he dropped, his body slid down until his feet rested on that strange lip. Instead of reassuring him, it only made him more nervous.

Looking upward, he saw the shorter end of the platform tripped a lever which released a massive counterweight. Suddenly, he wasn’t falling but shooting upward at an alarming rate.

“A damned catapult?” Crow grit his teeth and wondered how this had anything to do with Body. Getting flung through the air didn’t seem like it was anything he could train himself to do.

At the apex of the catapult’s swing, he felt his stomach drop as gravity loosened its hold on him. Rather than let the device dictate his trajectory, Crow leaped and hoped he didn’t die from this insane launch. He doubted even the water below would help him much at this height and speed.

Below him was a vast lake, but he didn’t see anything except a dock at the far end of the body of water. There was something he was missing. It wasn’t until he was ten meters from the surface that he found the problem. A transparent mesh of thin strands caught him as his feet pushed against it. The material was something he’d never seen before, but it stretched so much that when it stopped his downward fall, it sent him back in the air just as quickly. Despite stopping his downward momentum, it didn’t stop him from moving forward. So he was flung forward after each bounce, putting him closer and closer to the dock.

The only upside was that his highest height was lower with each bounce. Once the centrifugal force no longer had him in its grip, he could control his landings. With a final flourish, he landed on the dock without stumbling. While his legs felt like jelly, he stuck his landing and couldn’t help but curse at the people that designed this cursed course.

To make it worse, he wasn’t finished and decided to walk to the end of the dock to catch his breath and center himself. He suddenly remembered why this thing was so ridiculous and came to the conclusion it was because he chose this as his fourth event. Still, that last event could have broken his neck if he landed on the netting wrong.

Crow glanced at the hourglass and knew there were less than three minutes left. At the end of the wooden walkway, he found hundreds of ropes hanging from a wooden pergola. The rows of ropes weren’t simple, and he’d done a similar challenge. Some ropes were safe, others were traps, but it was impossible to tell which was which. It tested reflex and reaction speeds.

Crow grabbed the first rope and swung out toward another. He continued to swing to the next but was careful to hold on to both ropes until he was sure. Two false ropes were already pulled off, and he knew this event was also to waste time. Swinging back and forth and getting forward momentum was not easy. It went smoothly enough, but he was fooled when he reached the sixth row. The rope didn’t immediately give until he put all his weight on it.

As he fell, vines shot from his hand, and he used the Thorn Mouth Daffodil to grab onto the wooden beam above. Seeing that it worked, he wanted to slap himself. Why use the ropes when he could use his vines?

Bypassing the ropes, he could skip ahead several rows at a time. Within seconds he was already at the end and had to climb to the top of the wall. At the top were three zip lines that would take him to the end of the Shrine. The problem was the objects were blocking each line that he’d have to avoid.

Well, it wasn’t much of a problem for him. Sending out vines from both hands, he grabbed two of the hooks and locked them on the two outside lines. Using this method, he rode down the center and retracted or released his vines to move back and forth.

It was very smooth. Dropping onto a down ramp, Crow jogged across the finish line. There was still at least a minute left based on the hourglass, but it shattered shortly after completing the event.

After blinking, he found himself staring at an empty gate.