[You have awakened a Divine Halo.]
[Anti-Lucky Halo]
[Why chase trouble when it can come to you? Survive the disasters. If you make it through, great rewards await!]
Upon seeing the panel appear out of nowhere, Jue Yun widened his eyes, bewildered by the sudden emergence.
"Damn! I awakened a high-level Halo! But why is it so weird?" He couldn't understand a thing.
Based on the basic knowledge he had learned, in this world, people could awaken Halos.
These Halos were gifts from the heavens to each individual and could take many forms. Some served as aids, like accelerating Cultivation, while others were combat-oriented, increasing offensive power.
"And mine? Disasters? What kind?" Jue Yun brought his hand to his chin, pondering. As he remained in that state, a dark blur appeared above in the sky, soon coming to a halt. The creature looked down.
Feeling that strange gaze on him, Jue Yun looked up. Above him, he saw a hawk with jet-black feathers, darker than coal, with a massive beak and wings spanning over two meters. At the sight, he swallowed hard.
'Black Iron Hawk...' He recalled basic information about this creature. A beast that loved metal and was extremely powerful. Its main attribute was iron.
It was a difficult animal to defeat. Even True Realm cultivators found it troublesome to melt through the creature's carapace. Jue Yun, being only at the Half-Step Physical Realm, didn't stand a chance.
'Damned Halo!' he cursed in thought. Then, slowly, he began to move among the trees. The place he was in was called the Irregular Cliff, filled with trees of bizarre geometric shapes and large scattered rocks, creating a strange and hard-to-describe environment.
The reason he was there was to collect a Thunder Fruit, which grew on the peculiar trees. But before reaching that goal, the Halo awakened.
'Stay quiet… Don't panic, stay calm.' He moved farther and farther from the trail, but before he could fully escape, he saw the hawk dive from the sky at full speed.
"Shit!" Jue Yun stopped thinking altogether. On reflex, he threw himself under an inverted tree, whose leaves grew from the sides instead of the top. Rolling into the bushes ahead, he camouflaged himself among the foliage. He held his breath, making no sound at all.
The hawk landed on the ground and then turned its face toward the tree where the young man had hidden. It then flew over. When it stabbed with its beak, it found nothing. Everything was covered in green. Furious, it raked its talons through the leaves, ripping them apart like slicing grass.
"Shit's fucked!" Jue Yun felt his heart stop as he saw his hiding spot being destroyed by a sharp claw. His chest pounded like a runaway drum.
'Halo! Where are the benefits? I survived already!' He tried to reason, but nothing happened. His face then twisted in fury. 'I can only depend on myself to survive.'
Coming to that conclusion, he grabbed the dagger from his pocket and slashed downward, opening a small space. He laid down against the earth and stayed there. Clutching the dagger's hilt tightly, he waited.
When the hawk tore through the top, ready to strike, a dagger flew from below straight toward its eyes. It was too late to dodge. The blade pierced its pupils.
"Roaaarrrr!" A pained roar echoed from the creature, which opened its beak in pure rage. But before it could react, a figure leapt from beneath the leaves, right by its blind spot.
It was Jue Yun. Taking advantage of the opening, he punched the left eye—the only one still intact.
'You might have a solid defense, but your eyes are a weakness. It's impossible to cover them in metal. And your speed is slow because of your body's own weight.'
That was the solution he found to escape. Even if he couldn't kill the eagle, he could blind it and flee.
When his fist hit the eye membrane, it burst. His hand sank into the creature's eye, blinding it completely. But before he could celebrate, a talon grabbed his neck, choking him.
'Gotta break free…' He was being suffocated. Air was fading, and his bones began to creak. If his neck broke, he'd be crippled.
Desperate, Jue Yun began to kick at the eagle, landing flying strikes with his legs, but it was useless. Hitting that creature was like hitting a mountain of iron.
The hawk, even blind, smiled eerily, savoring the humiliation.
On the other side, Jue Yun was in panic. 'Is this how my life ends? Am I going to die a second time?'
He refused to accept it. 'No, I won't! Once was enough… In this life, I will be immortal!'
Madness filled his eyes. In the next instant, before his neck was crushed completely, he took advantage of the eagle's height and giant limbs to bite into its flesh, trying to rip a chunk out with sheer force.
His teeth clashed with metal, breaking instantly. But it wasn't in vain. He managed to injure the damned creature, even if just a bit. He felt its weight lessen, and without hesitation, he spat the broken teeth toward its eyes.
The hawk, acting on instinct and already traumatized, jerked away abruptly. That caused it to release Jue Yun.
He didn't waste a second. Grabbing his dagger off the ground, he ran without looking back. A roar exploded behind him, and the wind carried by the creature's fury made his hair stand on end.
'Don't look back.' That was his only thought as he dashed across nearly a hundred meters before diving behind another tree, panting, hoping the beast would go away.
The hawk flew forward, soaring for several meters, but it saw nothing. Everything was dark. Enraged, it destroyed several trees with the force of its hatred before finally vanishing into the forest.
Silence took over.
Jue Yun cautiously peeked out. Once he confirmed there was no sign of the eagle, he let out a deep sigh.
"I survived." Emotion flooded him. Being alive felt good. But thinking about the reason for all that danger made him grit his teeth.
"Damned Halo! I want my fortune now!"
Furious, he waited for the benefit to finally appear, but nothing happened. That only increased his anger. Standing up in rage, he was about to continue on his way when he noticed something strange: the tree he was near had changed color. Once green, it was now blue.
'Don't tell me…' His expression turned to disbelief. If it was what he thought, going through that near-death experience might not have been so bad after all.
Without wasting time, he began to climb the tree. It vaguely resembled a Christmas tree from his old world, with flowers extending from the trunk to the top.
Cutting through everything with his dagger, he climbed onto a flat branch, heading straight to the top. When he arrived, his eyes sparkled with irresistible joy.