Return Of The SSS-Class Hunter

Derek stood up slowly.

The daggers hovered beside him, circling lazily like loyal guardians awaiting their master's command.

He glanced at his team, calm as ever.

"Let's move deeper," he said. "I need to test this technique properly."

The others nodded instantly, no questions asked.

They began walking toward the next region of the combat zone.

And as they moved…

The ground trembled.

Heavy footsteps echoed across the rocky plain.

Four towering figures emerged from behind the jagged cliffs — massive, muscular creatures at least three times the size of a man. Their bodies were covered in thick armor-like plates. Their eyes glowed red with violence. Their claws dug into the earth with every step.

D-class monsters.

Emma tightened her grip on her wand.

Henry raised his fists.

Eva steadied her breath.

Art braced himself.

And Derek?

Derek's expression didn't change at all.

If anything — he looked excited.

The twin blades hovering at his side glowed faintly.

He stepped forward.

"Perfect. Let's test it here."

The moment his voice fell, the four D-class monsters answered with a roar that shook the rocky plain. Their armor-plated torsos expanded with breath, red eyes locking onto the five students like bloodhounds finding prey.

They charged. Heavy footsteps slammed into the ground, making stones jump and dust burst upward. One monster swung first, an arm the thickness of a tree trunk, aiming to flatten Derek before he could even raise a hand.

Emma's heart lurched.

But...

Derek didn't move.

Not yet.

And in the gallery, hundreds of eyes widened with anticipation. The audience had already seen what D-class monsters could do today.

Other dimensions inside each rifts on the giant crystal screen showed chaos: teams of five, six, even eight students scrambling, magic exploding, shields cracking, bodies flying. D-class beasts weren't meant to be fought by a single student.... Normally it would take two or three students coordinating perfectly just to handle one.

On the far-right screen, a team had already collapsed under the pressure. Half their members were bleeding, limbs twisted unnaturally, faces pale as paper. A bright formation lit up, and in the next second, those injured bodies vanished, transported out of the dimension.

"Team nineteen is disqualified." A booming voice echoed.

A few minutes later, another screen flashed with the same emergency extraction.

Two teams. Gone.

The mood in the arena turned heavy, tense, sharp enough to cut.

And then...

Back on Derek's screen...

The first D-class monster's fist was less than a meter away from Derek's face.

Emma finally snapped. "DEREK!" She raised her wand.

Henry lunged forward.

Eva inhaled.

Art stepped to the side.

But before any of them could even release a spell...

Derek's twin daggers vanished. They simply blinked out of existence as if the air itself swallowed them. A thin silver line streaked across the screen.

It wasn't loud. It wasn't flashy. It was… too clean. Too fast.

Two silver streaks. Four brief flashes.

And then...

The monsters froze mid-charge. Their red eyes flickered. Their bodies stopped as if someone had cut the strings controlling them.

For a heartbeat, they remained standing.

Then the first one toppled forward like a mountain collapsing.

The second fell to its knees... then crashed sideways.

The third staggered two steps, claws scraping the rock, and dropped face-first into the dust.

The fourth beast's head rolled slightly as it fell, as though it couldn't even understand why its body no longer obeyed.

Four D-class monsters. Dead. Within seconds.

Silence devoured the arena. No cheers. No screams. No applause.

Just hundreds of people staring at the crystal screen as their minds struggled to process what their eyes had just witnessed.

In the rift, Emma's wand hung in the air.

Henry stood frozen, fists clenched so tight his knuckles were white.

Eva's lips parted slightly, but no sound came out.

Art's entire body went rigid as if he'd been struck by lightning.

Even the dust settling around the corpses seemed louder than the spectators.

"W-what…" Henry finally whispered hoarsely. "What… just happened?"

Derek stared at the dead monsters. For a brief second, even he looked stunned.

Then something bright ignited in his eyes.

Pure exhilaration. A thrill so sharp it made his heartbeat slam like a war drum.

His daggers reappeared beside him, hovering lazily, rotating like twin stars orbiting a calm sun, as if killing four D-class monsters was nothing more than a warm-up.

Derek exhaled through a grin. "So it's real," he murmured.

His voice carried the satisfaction of someone confirming a theory… and the excitement of someone about to push it further.

He didn't wait for his team to speak. He didn't even pause to let them recover. He took a step forward. Then another.

"Let's move," he said simply.

Emma jolted slightly. "Derek… wait..."

But he was already walking. Because the rift to exit the dimension hadn't appeared.

Which meant...

The trial wasn't over. And that meant...

There were stronger monsters ahead. Derek's smile widened just a fraction. He couldn't wait.

Behind him, his teammates hurried to follow, still half in shock, still trying to breathe like normal humans again.

And above them, in the gallery, murmurs began to rise..... slow at first, cautious, like people speaking in a graveyard.

"What a powerful technique!"

"To think, a student would receive enlightment and be capable of handling such a technique."

"It doesn't matter anymore that if he's only a cultivator now."

"True. Those daggers are no less deadly than any elemental affinity."

Even instructors were no longer pretending calm. Some were standing now. Some were leaning forward. Some looked genuinely unsettled.

Nicholas' face was twisted, as if his mind had been slapped repeatedly.

He stared at the screen like it had betrayed reality itself.

"This… this is ridiculous…" he hissed.

Yami, on the other hand, sat back with a gleam in her eyes that looked almost predatory.

The kind of expression a hunter wore when spotting a beast far more interesting than expected.

Derek's team moved deeper into the rocky region, the terrain gradually becoming harsher. Jagged cliffs rose higher. The air grew heavier. The spiritual pressure in the dimension sharpened.... subtle, but present.

And then....

The ground trembled again.

But this time, it wasn't heavy footsteps. It was something else.

A low, guttural vibration.

Like something enormous breathing beneath the earth.