With the death of everyone in that group, the people at the beach became restless, they expected the trial to join this organization to be a hard one, but this already went to another level, this was not hard anymore, it was a pointless suicide.

Mack’s voice echoed in the beach, and what followed was the sound of the waves crashing against the shore, no one spoke, and for the first time, the man monitoring the trial from the sky changed his gaze and looked to where Mack was, he looked at Mack with surprise, and his face could not hide his own emotions. It was his third time overseeing a trial of new recruits, and never he saw someone this strong joining.

Most of the trials were decided in the last hours, when people finally realized that they would had to kill a lot to be able to reach the selection criteria, bribery or exchanges could only make someone gain few tokens, after all, most of people really wanted to join this organization, they were all vagrants with no one to have their backs. Only a few of them had they own groups, and those usually were the ones who would sell their tokens if they decided to leave the trial.

High in the sky, the overseer of the trial refocused his gaze on the people at the beach, his thoughts again a mystery, and no one noticed the subtle change, because the rest of the people were focused in this freak in front of them, Mack.

Mack truly didn’t wish for a pointless battle to happen, in his view, killing a dozen to avoid hundreds of deaths was the best outcome. He didn’t care for a single of their souls, but he still had a conscious.

Mack was about to talk again and ‘warn’ people to stay at the beach when something hit him in the shoulder, the impact was so strong that he fell to the ground and rolled for a few meters.

Not a second later, light came to everyone’s eyes and a clapping akin to a god calling his servants, echoed in the silent beach.

It was only then, that everyone realized what happened, someone hit that guy in black with a ‘thunder’ spell.

Smoke rose from Mack’s body, and the smell of charred meat filled the area.

A few meters from where Mack was, amidst the group of ten people, someone suddenly laughed and said “I guess he thought he was some kind of god, well, gods don’t became barbecue so easily”. 

The entire beach looked at the man who spoke, and they could clearly see he was a ability user, because the man had two small white horns usually hard to see amidst his white hair, but now, they looked like two electrified nails struck at his head. The overseer changed his gaze to Mack body again and gave it a pondering look, ‘Was I wrong?’.

But before he could retract his gaze, he heard the ‘charred body’ talking again “Fuck! that hurt you know?” and another thunder struck the already charred body as soon as the words came out.

The smell of roosted pig increased sevenfold and the man with white horns raised his voice and ordered to his own group, “Everyone, attack together!”

His order fell in the ears of his comrades but what he was aiming was to mobilize the beach to ‘group up’ against the man in black clothes, and just as he said that, a few of the people at the beach got the ‘hint’ and moved out to attack the man in black.

The overseer of the trial heard the shout and figured what was happing in a blink of an eye, but his gaze never left Mack’s charred body, still laying on the ground, unmoving, now even more charred than before.

Another thunder struck Mack’s body again, and not even a second later several fireballs and another flashy ability’s hit the place at the same time, raising a column of smoke, dust and fire for meters.

Seeing the devastated area everyone stopped attacking with ranged spells or ability’s and waited for the smoke to disperse, they could not aim anymore, the place had become a crater already.

A few seconds passed, and as everyone already thought that not even a speckle would remain of the man in black, more and more moved out of the beach and as if feeling that they ‘had worked together’ some started to talk with each other, this was how human mind worked, even knowing deep in their skull that they would had to kill each other in a few hours, they still behaved as expected of a social being.

One of the few girls approached the guy with white horns and in a attempt to socialize asked “So, you can manipulate lightning or your ability only allows you to unleash thunders?”

The guy with white horns disabled his ability and sensing the atmosphere relaxed and said, “For now, only thunders, but once I fulfill a few criteria’s my ability will evolve, you are the girl that used fireballs, just now?”

The girl understanding that the man didn’t wish to reveal more of his ability gave a small nodding and spoke, “Yes, I’m Loris, a vagrant mage, I was raised in Kaleput”.

‘Kaleput’ Once the man with white horns heard that word he looked sideways to his companions but didn’t said anything, he put a smile in his face, and refocused his gaze in the girl, but now, with a little more respect for her, “Nice to meet you, Im…”

But before he could said his name, Loris saw a dagger lunged at the man neck, and the man stumbling to the side and falling to the ground. All happened in a blink of an eye, but it fell as an eternity to Loris, because that happened right in front of her eyes, less than a meter of her.

In one second the man was smiling, and in the other he was craving for his life as blood gushed from his neck and mouth, too soon, too fast, her mind went blank as she just kept there seeing the man struggling to breath while holding his own neck.

Seeing what happened to the guy with white horns, a few of his companions rushed to him to help him, a others kept looking around as if to search for the one who did it.

In their minds, Mack was as dead as someone could be, that, until they heard his voice coming from the crater made by the spells.

“You now….. cough… cough… The first thunder really hurt, the second…. made me pissed off… but the third…..”

Everyone’s gaze turned to the still bellowing ashes and flames as they heard the words, and by now, almost everyone had left the beach, less than a dozen still were there, apprehensive and doubtful about the entire situation.

Loris gaze too turned to the area as she heard the words, and her gaze was one of a shock, she would never imagine that THAT guy was still alive, ‘How…. how…’ she thought as she saw a blury figure stepping out of the smoke and saying….

“… the third turned me on!”

Said Mack, in tattered clothes and with red wisps of blood flowing around him as if they were vengeful souls of former enemies.