The cold began seeping into Ethan's half-naked body almost immediately, but that was the least of his worries. Not only would he have less visibility with the fading light, but the nocturnal beasts would be waking up.
'Those are usually the bad ones.'
Twelve hours in the dark would feel far longer than the first half ever had, and there was nowhere safe, not the trees, the ground, or the river.
He also couldn't keep Beast Assimilation active long enough to rely on enhanced senses.
As such, he crept through the night with a wooden spear he had crafted in one hand and a jagged stone in the other. He was wrapped in rags, covered in dirt and dried blood, but he had given up on attempting to clean himself to mask his scent.
He was even more of a caveman now, almost as if he was losing his civilised humanity by the hour. Not that he cared about any of that, as he looked up to see the moon taking the sun's centre stage.
'Of course it's a full moon,' he groaned internally.
As if on cue, he began to hear echoing howls and all kinds of beast sounds and movement in every direction.
"Great," Ethan muttered. "Just great."
That was when the first beast of the night found him...
He didn't hear it, smell, or sense a thing when something suddenly slammed into him from above.
Pain exploded as iron claws dug into his shoulders, lifting him clean off the ground. The world dropped away beneath his feet as air rushed past his ears.
"What the fu-!?"
The owl beast was enormous.
Its wingspan blotted out the moon as it beat upward, talons clenched around him as if he was nothing more than a small prey, like a rabbit or a mouse.
Owls didn't make noise and were unexpectedly fast and ruthless - silent killers.
Ethan struggled as the beast effortlessly flew him into the air, above the canopy of trees. He looked around him at the giant forest while fighting to break free of its claws, but he quickly stopped struggling as the beast flew higher.
"You wouldn't be so kind as to drop me off gently?" he spoke as he looked up at the giant bird.
A familiar window appeared above the beast's head, but before he could look at it, things took a turn.
The owl looked down at Ethan with its glowing orange eyes, almost as if it could understand what he had said. Then, suddenly, it released its grip on Ethan and dropped him.
"That's not what I meant!" he yelled as he plummeted to the ground.
He was helpless as he fell through leaves, branches, then nothing...
Thud!
The ground rushed up and knocked the breath straight out of him.
Ethan lay there gasping for air, body aching, vision swimming.
If not for the split-second Beast Assimilation he'd triggered before impact and the trees breaking his fall, his spine would've snapped.
'That skill has saved my ass more times than I can count,' he thought shakily.
"I really," he wheezed, forcing himself upright, "really need more MP."
But it seemed as though it wasn't over just yet.
The owl cried as its eyes locked onto Ethan, who caught a glimpse of its orange eyes in the air.
'It's coming back.'
Swoosh!
The creature swooped back in with incredible speed, its talons raking across his arms and slicing through his skin like paper. Ethan hissed in pain as blood sprayed, but he didn't panic.
Instead, he focused - if he had honed one thing in this damned trial, it was his composure. And even though he hadn't even seen the owl's Beast Status, he remained calm and gathered what he could.
'So it dropped me to weaken me and after realising I was too big to carry around. Now it plans on hacking away at me until I can no longer defend myself.'
It was a cruel method of defeating a larger prey, and it would work against most creatures. Ethan might have been among them when he first awoke in the Tower Of Beasts, but he had begun to change without realising.
Focusing on his Ulfen senses, the world sharpened, and stimuli flooded in.
That's when he found it...
No matter how silent it flew, no matter how well it blended into the dark - it smelled.
Everything did, and to an Ulfen, nothing was invisible.
As such, when the Owl Beast dove again, Ethan swung his stone wildly.
But he missed, and pain ripped across his bare back as its talons tore into him.
'That fucker,' he gritted his teeth and adjusted, just like a beast fending for itself in the wild.
Instead of chasing its speed, which he would never be able to match, he waited and predicted. As soon as he caught the scent of the swooping beast, he struck with the stone as hard as he could.
'It connected!'
The impact sent the owl spiralling down, crashing into the forest floor in a mess of feathers and shrieks.
On the ground, without its speed and element of surprise, it was prey.
Ethan didn't hesitate, and though his arm felt numb from the attack, he quickly followed up on the beast with his wooden spear. He drove it straight through it, stabbing down with both hands.
Silence fell, then came the notifications he had come to enjoy.
{Beast Eliminated!}
{Would you like to acquire this beast as your own?}
Ethan stood there, chest heaving, blood dripping down his arms.
"Thanks for the evolutionary shards," he muttered. "And no. I don't want it."
His movements were sharper and cleaner now, especially while using Beast Assimilation. His stats had improved slightly, but that wasn't the cause.
It was his hard-earned experience being carved into muscle memory.
But his body paid the price: more wounds, more bruises, more pain.
Still, he moved on, and as much as he wanted to eat the owl that was the closest thing he would likely find to a chicken, he didn't feel safe. Lugging around its body would be asking for trouble and waste his energy, so as much as it pained him to do so, he left it and continued on his way through the forest.
'Some cracked ribs and cuts, I'll live.'
Deactivating Beast Assimilation to reserve his MP, he remained careful and alert.
But it wasn't long before he realised that the owl beast was nothing compared to what the night had in store for him...
It was sudden.
The forest grew heavy, the air felt oppressive, and even the insects went quiet.
Ethan felt it before he saw it.
The pressure of a presence, one that made his instincts scream.
Then, as the creature responsible came into view and its Beast Status hovered above its head, Ethan's heart sank.
'A D Rank Beast!'
It was the most fearsome beast he had seen by far, yet all he had to say was, "You've got to be fucking kidding me."