Chapter 4: The First Trial
Early in the morning, everywhere in the village hidden in the trees...
News spread quickly that an unknown stone statue fell from the sky. The statue was about three meters tall and it resembled a human wearing classic clothing. However, many people claimed that the statue depicted the higher beings living in the higher dimension.
In the hands of the stone statue was a stone tablet. The statue carried the stone tablet on top of its hand, while its other hand rested on top of the stone tablet.
Otherworldly letters were engraved on the stone tablet.
ᜆᜃᜓᜆ᜔
Was what was written on it.
The stone statue that held the stone tablet gave off a sense of great apprehension to all the people who had seen it with their eyes.
After all, what kind of matter would remain unscathed after it fell from such a height? Not only that, rumors also spread that it was originally a block of stone when it fell. It only formed into a stone statue a few minutes after it landed on the ground.
On top of that, there was not only a single stone statue that fell from the sky. News spread on TV and other online social platforms that the same thing also fell in different parts of the world.
Although the cause and origin of those stone statues were still currently being investigated, there was actually a countless number of them to the point that almost every village, town, and city, had stone statues that fell on them.
In the village hidden in the trees, there were actually two stone statues that fell within its boundary. One was in the vicinity of the village, and the other one was in the deepest part of the hacienda owned by Kally's father.
Kally's father ordered his people to block entry of the hacienda. The sight-seeing of the stone statue remained exclusive to his family and his people only. And they were also investigating the origin and purpose of that stone statue.
On the other hand, the other stone statue that fell in the vicinity of the village remained unrestricted. People could go and see it as it became too crowded.
Until finally, one courageous, more precisely, attention-seeker individual came to touch the stone statue, to be exact, the stone tablet.
And then suddenly, an ancient scroll came out of the stone tablet, pushing that man a couple of steps back by surprise. He was stunned for a moment as he saw the scroll rolled open before him.
Then words that were alien for others became legible to him and him alone as he started reading it.
[The conquest of fear will now begin...]
[First Trial: Conquer your greatest fear.]
Shortly after, the ancient scroll dissipated in the midair.
And then all of a sudden, as if some sort of magic had been cast onto that man, he suddenly levitated in the midair.
At first, the man was surprised at the sudden occurrence, but when the height where he was levitating was getting higher and higher, he started screaming in his loudest as if he was not a man, but a lady.
Everything was obvious. He was afraid of heights.
''What the hell, he is flying...'' People remarked in disbelief, each with their own opinions. Some people deemed it a good thing, but many of them thought that it was scary.
That said, many of them decided to put distance away from the stone statue.
Still, quite a lot of them remained curious.
''Who wants to try next?'' Someone suddenly spoke. His name was Jonas, the one standing closest to the stone statue. And from the looks of it, this person held some authority in the village, the terror of the village.
He saw clearly what happened to that man earlier. And that strange scroll that gave off a feeling of both awe and apprehension... He wanted to know what in the world was that.
And for that to happen, he needed more test subjects. He must let others try touching the stone tablet again before him.
But no one stepped up. All of them wanted others to test it out first and see what exactly that stone statue could do.
Jonas' face darkened. He could tell what the people of the village were thinking. And he was displeased that no one dared to step up as a test subject.
''You, over there! Come here!'' Jonas suddenly pointed at a random person. To his joy, that person was a certain nobody. No one would be angry at him even if he used this person the way he pleased.
''What? Why me?'' That certain unlucky young man pointed to himself as he replied and forced out a smile. Even if it was great that someone could suddenly fly away after touching the stone statue, he still didn't know the downside of it.
What if he suddenly fell from a high place and died on the spot?
Or what if he was brought up to the clouds, never again to come down?
No matter what, it would be a good thing if other people tried it first before him.
Kick.
But to his shock, someone suddenly kicked him to his ass to send him forward. He stumbled on the ground, in front of Jonas whose body had as if become a towering mountain.
Then he heard people constantly harassing him and forcing him to do something he didn't want.
''Go, you useless bastard!''
''Try and touch it already!''
''No, don't look at me...'' The unlucky fellow went pale. He wanted to cry or bury himself alive now.
What he wanted was to avoid everyone's attention. But now that everyone was looking at him with different fiery gazes, his body only froze on its own.
His fear of facing people began acting up.
But before he could say anything more, Jonas grabbed the back of his clothes and lifted him like a puppy.
Then Jonas placed him before the stone statue enough for that unlucky man to touch the stone tablet with his face.
Then another scroll suddenly showed up again, revealing the same short message.
[The conquest of fear will now begin...]
[First Trial: Conquer your greatest fear.]
Jonas didn't understand it, but the unlucky young man did. Then, as if some kind of magic had been cast onto him, the unlucky young man's entire body suddenly began emitting a strange yellowish glow.
''Ugh, my eyes...'' Jonas couldn't help but cover his eyes with his other hand. He covered it not because it was dazzling, but because his senses didn't want to take his eyes off of him.
Why would this bastard glow like this all of a sudden?
Not only Jonas, but all the people there who saw the glowing young man couldn't help but have their attentions being attracted. As if that young man had just become the star of the show.
''You can go now,'' In the end, Jonas put him down. He faced his back against him, trying to avoid seeing that strange glow again. He didn't know why, but that glow was attracting his very attention. And his gut feeling was telling him to avoid it.
''Fuck, don't look at me, everyone!'' The unlucky young man finally began shedding tears. He was always afraid of being seen. He was afraid of everyone looking at him at the same time.
But now that he was glowing, and that glow could naturally attract everyone's attention, how else could he possibly avoid this calamity?
In the end, the unlucky young man ran away. As if he was a lady whose virginity had been robbed away by a pervert.
Meanwhile, Jonas was starting to get the gist of it. He was starting to understand the nature and capability of the stone statue.
But he needed more test subjects to confirm his conjecture. As such, he made other people touch the stone statue again.
Different results came up. One of the people who tried to touch the stone statue became invisible. He was someone he knew the best. His friend who always sought attention. And he knew that this guy was afraid to be alone.
But now that he became invisible, he became completely alone. His greatest fear.
On the other hand, one of the people began emitting strong winds, another was fire. There was also someone who could summon rats out of her body.
After seeing all of these, a lot of people were scared away and left that place. Until only a few of them were left to watch the unfolding situation.
Then someone touched the stone statue again. Someone afraid of her father summoned the doppelganger of her deceased father and began trembling.
She ran away as her father chased after her with a slipper ready to wallop her butt.
Others then tried it out too.
But on the tenth attempt, Jonas finally decided to try it out himself. He now completely understood what the stone statue could do.
It was able to manifest one's greatest fear and enable people to use it as their magical power.
As ridiculous as it was, it appeared like it was the case.
As for him... Jonas wasn't oblivious to his greatest fear. He took a long deep breath before he finally decided to touch the stone tablet.
The ancient scroll he expected to appear came out of the stone tablet and then rolled open for him. But this time, he was able to understand the words written on it. In addition, he was now also able to read the word written on the stone tablet, as they were written on the same language.
F.E.A.R.
It said.
In any case, Jonas started to read the words revealed by the scroll. He couldn't help but furrow his eyebrows.
[The conquest of fear will now begin...]
[First Trial: Conquer your greatest fear.]
As he expected, it was something like that. But to think that there was actually a mission behind it. And it was to conquer his greatest fear. To think that it was more complicated than what he expected.
Would he be able to accomplish this trial? Thinking about his greatest fear, Jonas nodded his head and readied himself for the next moment to come.
Since he was afraid of lightning, he would be able to manifest it and use its power, right? That would be a good ability if he really managed to conquer his fear.
''Oh? To think that there's a human who can summon someone like me using F.E.A.R.''
However, in the next moment, Jonas suddenly heard a cold and sinister voice from behind him. There was a moment of pause before he continued with a threatening tone,
''How unpleasant. I feel like wanting to kill you right here, right now.''
Streaks of unfortunate memories flashed within his mind. His body trembled, his face went exceedingly pale.
Only then did he recall something he'd long forgotten. Something he tried to bury deep in the river of a painful past.
''A demon...?'' Jonas muttered. He thought that he was not afraid of such a myth anymore. He even beat up people who tried to scare him with such a story when he was still a boy, to the point that no one dared to mess with him any longer.
But what in the world was this now? A demon was right there behind him. He hadn't seen one in the past but he was certain of it.
A demon must be there to give him torment.
_____________________
Name: Jonas De Guzman
Status: Challenger
Title: None
Ability To Conquer: Demon
Rarity: Legend grade
Type: Summoning type
_____________________
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Jimar_Jemar
Jimar_Jemar What is your greatest fear? Let's try to manifest it into an ability.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone