Third island.

Crunch.

You have failed a class trial!

Fifth island.

Crunch.

You have failed a class trial!

Interesting run! Managed to get to the sixth island, but got my foot bit off in the process. Apparently Mana Feet only works on the feet that you have. I guessed that it was better to know than to know when it really mattered. As it turned out, though, I was not capable of hopping one-footed to the next island.

Crunch.

You have failed a class trial!

Over. And over. And over again.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

With two attempts of my class trial a day, I was afforded perhaps too many opportunities to get eaten. As the weeks of schooling continued, though, I kept at it. Enough that I’d actually managed to gain another level in the alarmingly fast-leveling Trauma Suppression, even considering that it wasn’t a class-aligned skill.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

Until.

“Oh.”

“Wait.”

“Oh crap. I made it!”

I turned around double flipping off the monstrous tooth fish that lurked within the waters. “Fuck you, demon fish! I made it!”

I collapsed onto the sandy shore, letting both my mana and my sanity recharge.

“You know, I wasn’t really expecting this today. Now I guess I have to look around and stuff.”

And so, I looked around and stuff.

The shore was uniformly bland, and if it had anything to do with the next portion of my class trial, it wasn’t obvious. Then again, that was probably to be expected. If I was on an island, I imagined anything of interest would be further inland.

Sand quickly gave way to grass, grass to trees, and in no time at all, I found myself walking through a dense forest. With all the time I’d spent in wooded areas in the past few months, it was comforting in a way.

That was, it started that way.

Without the benefit of my heightened Perception, I didn’t even realize I had company until it was too late. One moment, I was walking peacefully through the forest, the next, I was surrounded.

A full circle of short, knobbly-faced humanoids stood around me, each of them clutching a spear.

“Feel like I know the answer, but I’m going to ask anyway. No chance you folks are friendly, is there?”

As it turned out, they were not.

You have failed a class trial!

Ran past the boulder. Outjumped the fish. Back into the woods.

This time, I tried to pay a bit more attention to my surroundings. That alone, though, wasn’t going to do much for me, I knew. Not only was my Perception too low to make a difference, but also this was a class trial for Mana Feet. Presumably, some form of the skill would have to come into play.

Unless it was one of the mana types I was missing, the only thing that came to mind was the dark variant of the skill, Dark Soles. I pulled up the description of the skill variant again, double checking that it would help.

Cushions your feet with immaterial soles. Muffles footsteps and leaves fewer tracks. +5 to Stealth. Good arch support.

Well, sounds like if anything’s going to stop a tribe of what I’m assuming are goblins from finding me, this would be the one. I activated the skill and ventured into the forest once again.

To my credit, I lasted longer this time. Apparently just “activating the skill and walking like normal” wouldn’t cut it though. Some time later, with more spears in my body than were normally healthy, my attempt was cut short.

You have failed a class trial!

“Okay. Sneaky Tess. Sneaky Tess. Channel sneaky thoughts.” I activated my skill and set off, doing my best super spy impersonation. I tiptoed. I crept. I peeked my head out from behind trees, trying to spot the enemy before they spotted me.

As a result, I was happy to say that this time around, it wasn’t the goblins who spotted me first — it was the other way around.

I passed a particularly thick tree, slowly inching past it, only to freeze in my tracks as a small figure came into view.

A scout, maybe? In any case, I was in luck. Their back was turned to me.

Probably how they found me the other times.

I snuck. I prowled. I-

Crack.

I winced. For all that my skill helped muffle my footsteps, it wasn’t perfect.

The goblin turned.

We made eye contact.

“So. No chance just you happen to be friendly, is there?”

As it so happened, there was not.

I considered trying to silence him before he could act, but weaponless with baseline stats, I didn’t like my odds. Instead, I ran. Aided by Mana Feet, I hoped to leave the forest before the rest of the hunting party could catch up to me.

Sadly, that evidently wasn’t the point of this part of the trial. Without the Wisdom or Endurance to back me up, I ran out of mana and stamina far before I left the woods. Exhausted and drained dry, the goblins eventually caught up, and then-

You have failed a class trial!

Boulder. Fish. Forest.

Snuck past the first scout!

Did not sneak past the second scout.

You have failed a class trial!

Again and again and again.

Creeping through the forest. Getting stabbed.

Again and again and again, until once again, I passed.

If perhaps not entirely figuratively, I was literally out of the woods. The trees and vegetation dropped off all at once.

Fearful of drawing any attention to myself, this time I kept my celebration more muted. Wordlessly, I flipped the forest off. It would have to do.

No chance I’m done yet, is there?

Even before I asked it, I already knew the answer. I’d already had to use four different variants of the skill, and if my guess was correct, I was expecting to have to cycle through the others as well.

That, and it was clear that more lay ahead. Just as the vegetation dropped off, so too did the ground.

A barren cliff barred my way forward, the drop a sheer 90 degrees down. This scene repeated itself as far as the eye could see from left to right. The cliff curved as it went, forming a colossal circular pit before me. While I could theoretically skirt around the pit, I had a strong suspicion that wasn’t the point.

Even more notable than the pit, though, was what lay at its center: Piercing up, and up into the sky was a massive pillar. It ascended upwards, turning the pit into a giant ring of sorts. It rose far, far higher than my current position, leaving me with no clue what lay atop it.

All in all, none of that would have been too worrying. It was growing pretty clear that I’d have to descend into the pit to proceed, and while perhaps that would have been an issue when I’d first started the class trial, my new handy dandy featherfoot enhancement took care of that easily.

I would have jumped down, too, if not for them.

“Are we- What did I do to deserve this?”

There, at the bottom of the pit, in numbers I didn’t even care to describe, were droves of gargantuan, writhing, squirming, tubular worms.

Easily large enough to house several of me side-by-side on their backs, I had no desire to get anywhere near the creatures. They jerked unsteadily as they moved, and I was confident that even a few seconds of traveling between them would get me truly and utterly smushed.

It was, however, with a sigh that I realized something. Two somethings, in fact.

First: They’re all covered in a thick layer of dirt. Even from this distance, I could see bushes and grasses covering the worm’s exteriors. Had I had access to any of my other skills down here, I was confident what God’s Eye would tell me.

They’re… earth worms.

Second: Some of them are- They’re climbing the pillar. Somehow treating the sheer ascent as if it were a convenient escalator, various worms circled the pillar moving up and down it with ease.

As I watched them all move about, I groaned, growing more and more certain as to exactly what the trial was trying to make me do. The colossal worms were unfortunately very similar to my most recent boss fight, and from dealing with Slippy, the answer was fairly clear.

Am I… supposed to go down there and ride on giant earth worm backs? And then hitch a ride with one of them to the top? Even with the thrashing and the squirming about, I knew that my vine boots would be able to endure the abuse. Whether I could would be another matter entirely, but…

“You know what? I’m going to choose to be okay with this. I can at least see them. The psychological factor is way less freaky here than it is for the fish, or even the hidden goblins.” It wasn’t like I was just going to stop doing my class trial, after all. If I had to do it, I’d try my best not to freak out. Too much.

And with that cheery thought, I sent some air mana into my feet, walked to the side of the cliff, and jumped.

Ever so slowly, I floated downwards, closer and closer to the only-kind-of-proverbial can of worms I’d gotten myself into. As I neared, the sheer sizes of things hit me at full force, and I started to second guess myself. Sadly, it was too late for that.

At least being covered in dirt means they’re not slimy like regular worms? It was the little things sometimes.

Ten meters soon became one, and I saw that I was on track to touch down on a speedy fella, doing its best to zoom across the dirt. When I was directly above it, I dropped out of featherfoot, already flaring my life mana so it would connect me to the dirt the very moment I touched down.

And then,

WOOSH.

The very instant my feet connected with the worm, I was sent hurtling back, the vines not even having a moment to tie me down.

Had my Intelligence not been capped at 10 down here, I likely would have realized the problem while I was flying backwards. As it was, I would only realize after the fact what had happened: Unfortunately, I’d become a victim of physics.

What I’d done was essentially the equivalent of jumping onto the top of a moving car. Fine if you were already going the same speed as the car, but otherwise a very, very stupid idea.

Having just carried out that stupid idea, I was sent flying to the ground.

It was there that I learned I was wrong.

The worms were definitely worse than the fish.

Smush.

You have failed a class trial!

Two days later (I still wasn’t perfect with the goblin portion of the trial), I stood back on the cliff, gazing down at the murder of worms. True, I was pretty certain only groups of crows were called “murders,” but then again, the worms had murdered me, so it felt fitting nonetheless.

“Okay. So. I need to start with a really slow one?” I spent some time analyzing the worms’ movement patterns until finally spotting the one that I wanted. It was just sort of moving around in a little circle, nice and slow. If I timed it right, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t suffer a repeat performance to last time.

“Well, here we go.” I jumped off again, and as I floated down, I hoped I’d finish the trial before I developed too much of a habit of talking to myself.

Unfortunately, with my Intelligence capped, my spatial reasoning wasn’t quite up to snuff. My jump had been ever so slightly underpowered, and I watched in horror as I got closer and closer, realizing that I was going to fall short.

“All right, screw this.” Not wanting to belabor the point, I cut off the flow of mana to my feet. I continued my descent, although at a considerably faster rate. At the last second, I questioned if I was being dumb, and decided to double check.

Quit. Leave. Forfeit. Depart.

To my credit, it worked! A prompt popped up.

Would you like to leave the class trial? Note this will count as a fai-

Sadly, a bit too late this time.

Crunch. And then shortly after. Smush.

You have failed a class trial!

When I snapped back to reality, I had one particularly painful realization.

“Wait, you mean that was an option this entire time? I could have left before I’d gotten crushed by the boulder? Or eaten? Or stabbed? Are we-”

The stream of obscenities that followed felt endless. I stopped them only to conjure up a drink.

“Cool. Third take.” I spotted the worm I wanted, and this time I leaped as hard as I possibly could. Featherfoot slowed my downwards descent while maintaining my horizontal speed, and this time I found myself easily approaching my favored worm.

In fact, I was going to overshoot it. This, however, was a much simpler issue to fix. I cut off the mana to my boots, sending me into free fall for a moment before reactivating the enhancement a moment later. I continued in this fashion a few more times, letting myself lose some altitude so I’d hit the worm’s back perfectly.

And I did! Gently, ever so gently, I hovered above the worm in question, until I repeated the process I’d done the first time around.

Air, off. Life, on.

The moment my feet connected with the earth, vines started shooting up. Instead of being thrown off before they could connect, I stayed stable long enough for them to wrap around me.

“Success! Nailed it! Now…”

Well.

Huh.

The whole reason I’d chosen this specific worm was because it was aimlessly moving in a circle. It wasn’t like I could ride it to the top.

Guess it’s time to go worm hopping? In fact, I decided to stop even thinking of them as worms. The dirt covering them was so pervasive that they were essentially moving blocks of earth. Not really that different from a train or a trolley if I thought about it. Just a slightly wriggly, plant-covered train.

I did a few more loops on my current trolley before spotting one that looked like a good candidate. It was moving faster than mine, but by just enough that I was pretty sure inertia wouldn’t screw me over too badly. Unfortunately, it didn’t pass close enough for me to just step onto it, or even hop.

I’ll need to use air mana again. I pumped myself up, waiting a few more loops before giving it a go. I unsummoned the vines around my boots, and instantly I could feel the thrashing of the trolley threatening to buck me off. Before it could succeed, I jumped.

A short coast through the air later, it was over. I touched down on trolley number two, vines securing me tightly in place. From there, it was just a matter of finding a third.

I continued on in this fashion for a time, jump after jump after jump, until-

“Wait.”

I looked around.

It was a dead end.

None of the nearby trolleys were moving at similar speeds except the one I’d just come from. I tried to retrace my steps, jumping back onto the previous one, but my body chose this moment to betray me. I failed the landing, slipping off and getting tossed to the ground. Before I could even think to try to leave the trial, it was too late.

I did have time for one thought, however.

As the wriggling mass of earth hurtled towards me, I was forced to admit it to myself.

Yup. That’s definitely not a trolley.

Smush.

You have failed a class trial!

“Fourth time’s… the charm? Please?”

This time, I waited before jumping down, taking the opportunity to chart a path through what was essentially a maze. I once again cursed my lack of stats while in the class trial, because what should have been a simple problem became far more painstaking.

Eventually, though, by working backwards from the worms that climbed the central pillar, I had it. Much as I’d originally thought, it started with the slow worm I’d aimed for previously.

Armed with my newfound knowledge, I jumped.

The fourth time was not the charm.

You have failed a class trial!

Huffing from the exertion I’d put on my measly 10 Endurance body, I jumped towards the final worm. My feet touched dirt, I flared life mana like in the countless times before, and I latched on.

Yes. Yes! I’d actually done it! It ended up taking a full 10 attempts, and with me still occasionally failing the previous portions of the trial, that number was actually closer to 14, but that was just one week!

Well, fine, a little bit more. Sometimes I was bad about doing the trial twice every day, but it was close!

I wonder what’s next?

It was at about that time that I recalled that my journey wasn’t entirely over. My newest worm steed squirmed over to the pillar at the center of the pit. I realized just what sort of angle I was about to be standing in — completely perpendicular to the pillar, hanging over the empty expanse by nothing but my vines.

The fear of heights wasn’t that bad now that I had featherfoot, but as for my stomach…

The worm approached the pillar. It began to climb. Higher and higher it went with me strung along for the ride, jerking back and forth with only the vines to hold me in place. I thought I might actually puke in the end, but then, blissfully, amazingly, we were there.

It took me a moment to get my bearings and let my head stop spinning, and for a moment I was afraid I’d miss my chance, failing to hop off before the worm started to go back down. Fear, however, served as a good fuel, and I managed to safely dismount.

I didn’t even bother to take in my surroundings at first, flopping to the ground (well outside the range of where the worms made their rounds) and taking a breather. When my stamina and mana were fully topped off (and then a bit longer just for good measure), I got up.

“All right, what are we working with?” I looked around, seeing absolutely nothing but a perfectly circular body of water in the center of the pillar. “A lake? Okay, I guess. Feel like we already did that, but anything goes.” A mass of bubbles shot out from its center, though for what reason, I couldn’t say.

“Well, nowhere else to go.”

After dipping my (boot-covered) toes in a few times and triple checking that nothing was about to eat me, I flared some water mana into my feet and walked out. Figuring that whatever I was here for would be by the bubbles, I moved to the center.

I was extremely happy to say that the bubbles apparently did not signify some giant monster letting out air from the bottom of the lake. After a while of waiting for something to happen, though, I figured I’d have to get closer to the source of things. Dismissing my water-walking enhancement, I took a plunge.

Unfortunately, even aside from the fact that swimming fully clothed in boots sucked, the closer I got to the source of the bubbles, the harder it became to continue. The bubbles seemed to come from some sort of jet, pushing me upwards too forcefully for me to swim past.

Well, what do I have? In terms of mana types I haven’t used yet, I’m working with light and earth.

Maybe earth? It was supposed to weigh me down, wasn’t it? I swam back up to the top, grabbing a giant breath of air before testing the theory out. After channeling some earth mana into my boots, a mass of dense, rocky dirt encased them, thankfully not turning to mud despite the environment.

As expected, I began to sink.

Further and further down I plummeted, past the lowest point I’d managed to swim. Down I went, right into the source of the bubbles until the vastness of the lake dropped away.

Which was a shame. The lake was nice, honestly. Presently, I found myself drifting down some sort of narrow, underground cavern. While I didn’t count claustrophobia amongst my largest fears, I still couldn’t call the experience pleasant.

If nothing else, at least I could see. Whether that was from my Illuminated Sight ability, or some feature of the trial, I wasn’t sure, but I’d take it either way.

Right as I started having trouble breathing, I spotted a hole in the wall of the cavern. Assuming that the trial wasn’t going to just drown me outright, I steered myself towards it. I touched down onto the floor of the passageway, allowing myself to enjoy the sensation of walking underwater. Quickly, though, the passageway shot upwards, hopefully to a pocket of air.

Still burdened by the earth packed onto my feet, I dismissed my mana and started to swim upwards, only for something to grab me.

I looked down, horrified to find that some sort of kelp-looking plant had latched onto my feet. With how firm the grip was, I doubted I’d just happened to get tangled up in it either.

I reached back and tried tearing the kelp from the cavern wall, or failing that, to disentangle myself, only for the attempt to backfire. In a flash, more strands of kelp joined the first, lashing my hands together.

There I hung, suspended in the water in a sort of ignominious hogtie. If nothing else, I was glad there was no one to see me.

All right. Screw this.

I forfeited, glad I’d found the option to do so before I’d been forced to die by drowning.

You have failed a class trial!

I popped back into my bed, taking greedy gulps of air even though my actual body seemed to be fine. Once I settled down (and conjured a drink), I thought the latest trial portion over.

“You know, I don’t think I have anything for that.” The side passageway was tight enough that I doubted there was a way for me to avoid getting wrapped up. At the very least, I couldn’t think of any type of mana I had that would save me.

Still two left, right? Frost or death.

Well, if the trial was unwinnable right now, there was nothing for it but to keep training my magic so I could grab the other cantrips. From there on out, I stopped forcing myself into the trial, instead pushing myself harder and harder to level my spells.

Whatever the reward is for the trial… it better be worth it after all this, right?