Just A Simple Footstep - Fixed

Swoosh---!

Surtr raised his arm, flames burst out and coiled around, forming his sword once again.

Gripping the 'hilt' with his other hand as well, he raised it at the sky.

The flames around his sword began absorbing a small portion of the malevolent energy from Nidhogg, causing them to turn a dark purple.

BOOM!

The flames ripped through the air, bursting upwards.

At the same moment, Nidhogg opened its mouth, recollecting all the malevolent energy it had released seconds ago. The rate at which the energy was drawn back increased rapidly, visibly bending space.

Creaking sounds blasted outward as the energy ball continued to condense.

As the two separate forms of energy clashed and merged, they began to rumble and shake the entire world they stood upon.

Deep within Muspelheim, the many fire giants that roamed the lands began to roar and shake in both fear and anger as they sensed their protector's power breakthrough the skies.

On the other hand, the demonic souls that roamed Niflheim bowed down in fear and trepidation, Nidhogg held great fear over them.

-----

With his life slipping out at a steady rate, Ariel looked up at the two giants.

'Enough with the despair Ariel, you decided to regress, this is your second chance at life, don't give up so easily you idiot.'

Zing---!

The light emanating from the culminated energy was completely subdued.

A heavenly white light slowly came down, an illusion of archangels and seraphims danced alongside the heavenly light, playing divine music as they came down to their level.

'Aren't they coming straight at me?'

A comfortable feeling began spreading through his body, the divine music soothed his soul whilst the light closed all of his wounds, fixing his nose, his eyes and any more bleeding.

His body rose into the air slightly as a cacoon of white light began submerging him

'I don't think I've ever felt this comfortable before...'

The cacoon slowly disappeared from the battlefield.

FLASH-----!!!!!!!

Where Ariel previously stood, a blinding light split the void apart.

Step.

Every other sound instantly disappeared, even the sound of space cracking and splitting from Surtr and Nidhogg's combined attack disappeared.

Nothing appeared from the bright portal, just the sound of a simple footstep.

"Nid, attack on my mark."

Surtr began pouring every bit of his strength into his sword, the flames on his sword died down, revealing a black blade beneath.

Hiss...

The black blade began sizzling and crackling, black energy pouring out from within.

Crack.

A long crack spread along his blade, but he didn't stop pouring in his energy.

Nidhogg on the other hand was rapidly decreasing in size, reddish-black steam spewing into the air as he burned his blood essence and poured it into the ball building up within his mouth.

A minute later.

Nidhogg was only a few meters long at this point, the condensed ball had also become smaller and more condensed.

"Hiss... Swallow this ball.", spitting it upwards it landed within Surtr's mouth.

Gulp.

Surtr didn't question it and swallowed it immediately.

BOOM!

Violent purple energy exploded out of his body, veins popped and burst along his skin, his dark blue blood began running down his body.

Crack.

Another crack spread along the black blade.

"Die.", Surtr sensed his energy going out of control.

Dark violet energy spewed out the blade as he swung it downwards.

ZIPPP----!

Space began rippling outwards, squeezing and bending into many shapes and forms.

In response...

Step.

Just a simple footstep.

-----

In an unknown white room.

Ariel took off his clothes and check out his body and made sure everything was back to normal, rubbing his nose it felt completely fine and he could breathe as normal. As he expected, the Tutorial did its job and gave him back everything he lost.

His nose was readjusted, his skin returned and the charred flesh had disappeared as if it was never there.

"I'm back already, my clothes are fine as well and my phone is functioning as normal."

There was only one problem.

"My arm is still missing."

Blink.

Its immense pupils stared at his face.

"Kekekeke...Are you still in there?"

Vibrant red energy twirled around, skipping and hopping in the air with joy.

Ariel grasped the stub of his missing left arm over his clothing, "What do you think?", he clenched it slightly after he remembered the situation he was just in a moment ago.

'But why couldn't I select the lower levels in the first place.'

The eyes didn't give him much time to think, "You gave me quite the entertaining show."

The eyes began smiling again.

'It said 'Me', there's no way it would be acting casually if it saw what I just went through, meaning the ones who actually watched it was 'Them'.'

He bit his lips lightly, 'That also means they must be paying attention to me now.'

"Can I ask you why my arm wasn't healed alongside the rest of my body?"

"Your arm? No clue."

He furrowed his brows, 'It doesn't know why? I don't think I can mention the thing with Tutorial ending with an error either or else 'They' might decide to kill me on the spot.'

'I'll have to find out later why they couldn't regrow it.'

"Now then, considering the others won't be finishing for a while, why don't we do something fun whilst we're waiting!"

"Fun?"

Its vibrant red energy formed a pair of hands and began clapping wildly.

"Yes! Fun!"

The hands stopped clapping.

"Something very, very-"

Its eyes turned dark red.

"Fun."

-----

Dust blew up into the air.

A man with blond hair and a ripped chest crushed the other mans face into the dirt, blood splattering outwards as he demolished his nose.

Bang!

He picked his head up and smashed it back into the ground.

-Winner!-

"...", Ariel had a blank look on his face.

"I've never gotten the chance to do this before!", the excitement within its eyes was obvious.

The two of them sat on a sofa with a screen in front of them and controllers in their hands.

"So by fun... You meant video games..."

Freeze.

The room turned cold and the vibrant red energy stopped moving.

"Are you telling me video games aren't fun?", the vibrant red energy slowly turned towards him.

"Hahaha... Never mind...", a long, blank sigh left his mouth.

The disappointment on his face was a sight to behold.

"You suck."

The pair of eyes was quite frank with its judgement.

'Well of course I suck, I'm playing with one hand.'

Of course, Ariel would not dare to actually say that out loud.

Clatter.

The vibrant red energy holding onto the controller flung it to the side, destroying it, it quickly wiped away the rest of the evidence, including the couch they were sitting on.

"Are we done already?", Ariel dusted his clothes off as he stood back up after the couch was destroyed.

"The Tutorial is over now.", the eyes were back in their normal mode, any sense of familiarity Ariel had built up with it whilst they were playing was destroyed by it.

It flew up into the sky and waited patiently.

A second later blue lights began flashing all around the room as the Testers returned.

Faces full of depression, despair and insanity surrounded him.

Some biting at their nails, chewing through their skin.

Others kneeled down, calling for their loved ones and family.

'Just as I expected.'

The room went from one full of expectation, excitement, and some who were terrified.

To one that seemed like it was filled with veterans who just returned from a bloody battlefield.

His eyes swept through the contestants and he was easily able to separate those who had selected the harder difficulties from those who selected the lower ones.

'I wonder how Ray and Luc-'

"!!!"

He found Ray lying down in the corner, shivering and muttering to himself the words 'sorry' over and over again.

'But how did that happen? Did I already change the future?'

'If so-', he scratched his chin slightly, 'Then that's two really good assets lost.'

"Ahem."

The eyes began speaking.

"Before I start, I would just like to say that I hope all of you are doing well!"

Silence.

Everyone continued shivering in fear and worry as they listened to him speak, no one dared to speak up anymore.

"Hahaha! Seems like your doing well I guess!"

The eyes squinted, its energy calming down from its usual 'joyful' tone.

"Now then, shall I reveal the final results?"

-----

[Total Survivors - 6860]

[Level 1 - 2347]

[Level 2 - 632]

[Level 3 - 738]

...

[Level 11 - 126]

[Level 12 - 1]

[Level ??? - 1]

-----

All types of facial expression spread across the room.

Ones of fear and trepidation.

Ones of absolute despair.

But most of all, shock.

Even though they knew that people died, they were only actually in shock after they had the figures placed before their eyes.

"Surprisingly, only three thousand people died, I actually thought more would die!"

The eyes were excited once again.

"We even have 2 special cases this time!"

-----

'A Level 12 survived this time?'

Ariel didn't care too much about whether or not the people from the higher levels survived as they would all leave with PTSD and be practically useless after they left this room.

'But Level 12 is different, I paid a lot to gain some information about Elegance Online.'

In Level 12 you didn't have to survive anything, in Level 12 you had to kill a full-fledged Demon.

A level 400 Demon.

'So it should be impossible for anyone to survive that unless you killed the Demon.'

Ariel looked through the contestant one by one whilst the eyes were still going on and on about how special the two cases were.

'Just who is it...'

Until his eyes landed on the one person with a missing limb.