The Understated Dragon Lord novel Chapter 614

Beauty was at a loss for words.

Cane Gold, pointing at a stick of incense that had burned down halfway, urged Daniel with a reminder. “If that incense stick burns out before you bring down and wear the little red hat, you lose!”

"Damn, there's a time limit? Cane Gold, you should have said something earlier!"

Without further delay, Daniel leaped gracefully onto the Blades Mountain. Despite the thick fog and the razor-sharp knives that could slice through iron as if it were mud, Daniel was too quick and tough for them to have any effect. In no time at all, he scurried up to the summit like a monkey, snagged the small red hat, and swiftly placed it on his head, then jumped down from the mountain in one smooth move.

His agile performance left Cane Gold astonished, though the steward regained his composure quickly. Not much surprised him these days; after all, Daniel was Beauty's pick. It stood to reason that he’d possess a certain level of ability to be chosen as her hunting dog.

“Country boy, you have good reflexes and speed to have completed the challenge so quickly," Cane Gold acknowledged. "However, Inferno will be far more merciless! Speed alone won’t save you in the second challenge, which is to enter Inferno.”

Cane Gold led them to the next challenge, the Inferno. This so-called Inferno was a valley, a fiery chasm about five hundred meters long, blazing with intense flames.

"Inferno has a simple rule," Cane Gold explained to Daniel. "Walk from the entrance to the exit alive. The valley isn't very long, only about five hundred meters."

After a brief pause, he warned, "The fire in this Inferno is a hundred times hotter than the flames used to cremate bodies. Not just flesh and blood, even a chunk of steel would melt into molten metal in there. So, you can now choose to give up."

"The words ‘give up’ do not exist in my dictionary. If I’ve climbed the Mountain of Blades, why would I be afraid of entering Inferno?"