King entered the Sanctuary, the water shimmering with an ethereal light that seemed to penetrate his very soul. As he swam deeper, the light began to pulse more intensely, leading him to an empty, utterly white place. "Remember a distant past!" a voice said, echoing throughout the area.
He began to see things; they were fragments, flashes of memory, but they quickly transformed into vivid, painfully real scenes.
He saw himself as a small child, his eyes wide with fear, cowering under the gigantic gaze of his father. The hoarse, contemptuous voice echoed in the Sanctuary, each word a stab to his heart. "You are a disgrace, King! An abomination! You are a stain on the entire history of the Goliaths!" The words, once whispered, now roared in his ears, resounding with the force of thunder. He felt his father's punch on his face, the crushing impact that made him feel small and insignificant.
The scene changed. King was now in his village courtyard, surrounded by young Goliaths. They pointed at him, cackling, their laughter cruel like sharp blades. "Look at the freak!" they shouted. "The weakling! What kind of skin color is that?!" The stones they threw, once harmless, now struck him with brutal force, leaving marks on his skin and soul. He felt the humiliation burning in his chest, the pain of rejection suffocating him.
The images continued to unfold relentlessly. King relived every moment of loneliness, every look of contempt, every cruel word, all his 30 years of pain and suffering. The feeling of being an outcast, a stranger in his own community, oppressed him with overwhelming force. The death of his father, whom he himself had killed, his blood staining his hands, soaking his clothes.
The Sanctuary was not a refuge, but a mirror, mercilessly reflecting all his wounds, all his emotional scars. King struggled in a sea of old grievances, drowning in a whirlwind of painful memories. This was not just a test, it was torture, a relentless dissection of his past. "Do you regret your past, King?" the voice asked him.
King was wracked with the pain of his memories. Hearing the question, he remembered when he was hunting the bear, how he was after the battle, when he was attacked by the Dire Wolf and a lightning bolt struck from the sky and killed the Wolf. Remembering the figure who helped him, and who he was, his eyes began to burn with fury.
"I know what I did. I have nothing to regret. Regretting my past means forgetting who I am, and that means losing the reason for my fury. As long as I have reasons to hate, my fury will burn! That is my blessing!"
King found himself in the white void again. He realized that the tests would somehow be related to himself. "So that's it? I passed?" King wondered, looking at the void around him, which was now beginning to create a new space.