“We’ll attack you with progressively stronger attacks, and you have to resist for as long as possible. You can use any method at your disposal, whether it’s running or attacking us.” A teacher raised an arm and said, “Understood?”

Himo nodded.

“Start!” the mechanical voice announced as all the teachers conjured a ball of fire in front of them. With a wave of their hands, the fireballs sped to Himo.

He didn’t move. While the teachers wondered what he was up to, he waited until the last second and, with a single wave of his hand, changed everything. A thin layer of frost parted his fingers like a curtain and extinguished the fireballs, but it didn’t stop—it swept through everything and turned the white plane into a land of ice.

“This…” The teachers looked at the ice. 

"Not bad!" A bearded teacher pointed a finger to Himo. He shot an icicle. It sped faster than the scissors and soon reached Himo.

It stopped. Himo threw it back with a flick of his fingers—it charged to the teacher like a raging bull.

The bearded teacher tilted his head. The icicle sped beside his cheek and crashed behind him, drawing a deep crater into the ice. He widened his eyes. “To think he has such control over the illusion. Is it thanks to his practice with that violin?”

Himo raised an eyebrow. Aren’t they too weak?

[No. It’s just the user that’s abnormal.]

As though they could hear his thoughts, the teachers went into action. All fifty touched the ground and swapped ice for lava. Aside from the small island they stood on, the whole realm burned in red.

That’s more like it! Himo smiled. He stood in mid-air, using [Hopper]’s platform as a foothold. He decided to make a few experiments. Staring at the lava, he focused on the countless small, imperceptible elements: atoms. He imagined that they stopped, and so they did. The lava cooled and solidified, turning into a slab of extrusive molten rock.

As heat is generated from the movement of atoms, stopping them equals to halting heat production.

He chuckled and leaped down to the rocks. 

Another ruckus erupted among the teachers, and they choose the next course of action. Finally, they decided to take it seriously.

Several spikes darted out of the rocks to impale Himo, but he dodged them with a backward somersault. He glanced at them. To avoid future ambushes, he erased the floor. The realm turned into a dark, bottomless pit.

Lost their footings, the teachers fell, but they soon arose again. The angels flew with their wings, while the others stood on a small floating rock each.

Himo went for the next experiment. He held a deep breath and erased oxygen.

The teachers created several spheres of fire around the child.

After killing the fires through a wave of water, Himo frowned. The lack of oxygen isn't affecting them? Then… He summoned a new substance: sarin, one of the most dangerous chemical compounds known to man. Colorless and odorless, it could kill a human in ten minutes.

Once again, despite inhaling it, the teachers didn’t react.

That settles it. Changes that can’t be perceived won’t work in illusion realms. Himo rolled his eyes. Why didn’t that old man tell me?

But there was no time to complain. His surrounding changed—he lost sight of the teachers. He returned to the sphere-like room he’d first found before the tests started. “Th—” Spikes darted out of the walls. He widened his eyes and shifted his balance to avoid them. Surrounded by spikes, he waved a hand to destroy the room.

And he found three lava waterfalls just outside. He shifted their course with a blast of wind. Tens of flying swords escaped the lava.

Himo glanced at the teachers in the distance. They're being serious now. He leaped away from the swords with a stacked [Hopper_x3] and sent some boulders flying their way. But tens of lighting bolts assaulted him from all sides. He blocked them with a slab of earth. The swords, having avoided the boulders, reached him.

He dashed away. The swords kept chasing after him, and he kept blocking them. But they never stopped. While countless obstacles kept appearing around him, Himo frowned. How should I drag the fight more? These swords are persistent… I could keep blocking them, but it’s getting boring!

[Why is the user trying to drag out the fight?]

What do you mean? The objective was to survive the longest possible… oh. Right! I can just defeat them!

[Did the user really realize that only now?]

Himo chuckled. My bad, I got tunnel-visioned on the experiments. Thank you, system! You were useful for once!

He whirled back and snapped his fingers—a bomb of air exploded below and thrust him above. The swords were disrupted. With but a snap of his fingers, he changed outfit. He wore a full-body anti-radiation suit.

While the teachers puzzled over his suit, he raised a hand and, with a smirk, called out two words no listener would ever forget.

“Hydrogen bomb!”

The teachers looked left and right, but nothing seemed to have changed. They only saw that Himo dashed as far as possible and turtled up within a black sphere.

“What is he doing?”

While many teachers were confused by his actions—a few were about to resume attacking—one screamed, “Above!”

Under the blue sky was a dark shadow. Its shape reminded of darts, though its size was incomparably bigger. A teacher cast some light over it, revealing its metallic exterior and black tip. It was just some metal weight, the teachers thought. Either way, it was just a harmless illusion, they thought.

Their instincts disagreed.

Their skin spiked goosebumps as each heart crazed with erratic beatings. That innocuous falling dart screamed one sole thing: death. Their bodies moved by themselves, flying as far as possible. It was too late.

The metal dart reached their height, and its dreadful scream spiked up. Filled with panic, the teachers raised hundreds of barriers, walls, and even took out their real shields without realizing it.

A white plasma exploded the dart, and everything turned white. No sound was heard, no pain was felt, and no watcher had seen. But everything turned into nothing. The teachers passed out. Only a black sphere—Himo’s hiding place—stood intact, flying at a safe distance.

“Activating safeguarding procedure,” announced the mechanical voice.

The illusion realm shattered like glass, and Himo found himself back to the starting room. The teachers lay on the floor, shaking. Their mind flashed the former scene countless times, but it only served to get them more and more scared of it. Even for them, it was a traumatic experience that would require several weeks of meditation to heal.

On the other side of the room, Himo showed an excited smile and grabbed his shirt with a hand. His heart was racing. Despite being protected by a multi-layered sphere of graphene and having moved far from the blast, even he felt the vibrations—the terror—of the bomb. He wondered, when would he be able to withstand an attack of such caliber? At the nascent soul realm? Longevity realm? Or something above? Would the headmaster be able to resist it?

“Oh.” He blinked and turned to the teachers on the floor. Feeling a hint of guilt, he scratched his cheek. I fear I exaggerated a bit…

[The user’s definition of “a bit” is perplexing.]