"Yes. I am you... from a distant future—more than two millennia ahead."
The words still echoed in his mind—the future version of himself appearing in that desperate mont, wielding mastery over ti and space. A figure so overwhelming that Ery couldn’t help but compare him to old headmaster Altus Dreyden himself—perhaps even stronger.
It all felt surreal.
Yet now, a week after the incident, that awe had soured into frustration. Each passing day, Ery grew more annoyed with his future self.
"Why can’t he just get out of this monster completely?"
He had escaped the collapsing realm only to find himself trapped within what seed to be the beast’s true belly, a chamber stretching like an island, nearly a thousand kiloters across. The place was a grotesque imitation of a world: walls of pulsing flesh, veins glowing faintly with otherworldly energy, and the constant sound of a living heartbeat reverberating through the air.
In the days since, he had scoured every corner of the grotesque landscape. Not a single living creature stirred within. The real threat lay in the hundreds of spatial rifts scattered across the space. So were no larger than a clenched fist; others yawned as wide as hills. When Ery probed them, he discovered no hidden pockets or safe passages—only unstable tears, seething with dangerous energy. From their resonance, he concluded they were raw fractures, unstable remnants of the destroyed realm he had narrowly escaped. Each one humd with chaotic energy, promising death to anything foolish enough to step through.
Then there was the air: thick with toxins, laced with acidic fus that could strip the flesh from even a seasoned magus. The only reason Ery could move through it unscathed was the resilience of his halfblood body and the protective aid of Chututlu. Even Morgana, for all her strength, could endure it for only a few hours before retreating into the safety of Ery’s domain.
Inside his domain, dozens of Chizpurz and orcs were nearly finished cleaning up the aftermath. His 80% primal transformation had once again left a trail of destruction across the lands; hos had to be rebuilt, landscapes reshaped, and order restored.
Ery’s main relief ca from the gradual recovery of his companions. Durak the orc had regained his full strength, and Livi’s condition had steadily improved. As for Twik, his precious plant companion, progress was slower—tiny roots had only just begun to sprout. Ery planted its core near the Elysian trees, hoping their nurturing energy would speed its growth.
"I hope you recover soon, buddy."
Ery’s dark self approached him then "Create a clone body... even better, let take over the main body. With leading, we have a much better chance of breaking out of this place."
Morgana also insisted, "I want to help," Determined to find a way forward despite the suffocating acid that still surrounded them outside.
But Ery shook his head. He had already glimpsed the truth. His future self had left him a jade dal, etched with runes and infused with fragnts of mory. He had studied it, and though he hated to admit it, he understood.
He pulled the dal from his robes, letting the others see.
At first glance, it seed unremarkable—just a disc of jade. But as his energy flowed into it, the surface glowed faintly, its inscriptions shifting like ripples in water.
It was not just words. The dal poured out flashes of mory—broken fragnts, shards of another story that was both his and not his.
They saw an alternate story unfold.
The vision began with their first encounter with the world beast during their perilous journey ho. Only this ti, in this alternate reality, there had been no voice of warning from his future self.
They tried to run away multiple tis and failed.
What followed was chaos. A brutal, desperate battle. Rosin Karat and Vayarel fell in that struggle, alongside the fey warriors. Still, their deaths were in vain—Ery, Kaelyn, Galael, and Soltz were eventually dragged into the realm within the beast.
From there, fate seed to play out as if it were set on a fixed path. Galael still t his sudden end for his greed in search of rare materials. They still encountered the dark elf Talaro. But this ti, without the might of a Supre Magus to stand against him, they could not overpower the enemy. Forced into uneasy alliance, they hid in sanctuaries, learning to survive.
Then ca the most jarring revelation.
Without Vayarel, without the supre magus, without his future self, without Morgana or Kronos, Ery was stranded in the realm for over a thousand cycles.
He learned the temporal law with much difficulty, fought endless conflicts with Talaro, each encounter more costly than the last. One by one, his companions fell. Kaelyn and Soltz perished. Durak, Livi, Kingrig, Haron—all gone.
Only his daughter Shinta endured, along with Twik, whose state mirrored the one Ery now nurtured beside the Elysian trees.
Thirty years passed instead of two.
When at last he escaped, it was only to find himself again within the belly of the beast. Another thirty years of tornt before he broke free.
With the temporal difference, nearly two hundred years were lost.
Too many changes. Too much regret.
The jade dal’s vision ended abruptly, its last echoing whisper showing him the path to escape the beast’s belly. When the light faded, Ery noticed one of the four runes engraved on the dal shifted and dimd, leaving only three untouched—three more sealed ssages waiting to be revealed.
The final words of this first ssage still lingered in his mind:
To reach the second cosmos before the next seal would unlock.
Ery let out a long, weary breath
"Why... can’t he just tell everything at once? This future ... he’s too damn cruel." It felt like he was being toyed with by his own shadow.
Still, what he had learned was undeniable. The situation within the belly of the great beast matched the details described in the jade mory almost perfectly. Reluctantly, Ery resolved to follow the steps outlined for him—whether he liked it or not.
But before moving forward, there was sothing else gnawing at his curiosity.
The spoils of his last battle.
Two prizes.
The first was the Death Gate, the newly acquired Khaos guardian.
The second was Kronos’s aperture, still sealed, containing his domain and whatever treasures and secrets the fallen enemy had left behind.
"Let’s hope there’s sothing worthwhile in there..."
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