The sterile scent of the infirmary was instantly overpowered by the smell of ozone. Golden lightning arced across the room, leaving scorch marks on the pristine white tiles.
Saint Aris, the hero who had driven the Excalibur of the Dawn through Caelum's heart in a previous life, stood in the doorway. He was fourteen years old again, but his eyes were ancient, filled with the manic intensity of a zealot who had seen the end of the world.
"You think you can cheat the timeline, Shadow Duke?" Aris's voice was a harsh, metallic rasp, a stark contrast to the clear, resonant tone he would possess in the future.
Caelum didn't move. He kept his grip on Lilia's hand, his mind racing through calculations faster than conscious thought.
Aris shouldn't be here. He shouldn't have awakened his holy aura until his second year at the Academy. He certainly shouldn't have possession of Excalibur—that relic was supposed to be sealed deep within the Temple of Light for another decade.
But the most terrifying realization was the implication of Aris's words.
Cheat the timeline.
Aris remembered.
The system interface flickered into existence, painting a stark, terrifying picture.
[DEBTOR: Aris (The Anomaly)] Debt: 1 Life (Unlawful Execution) Interest: The Timeline Itself Current Status: [CRITICAL: CHRONO-FRACTURE DETECTED] Value: The Grace of the Heavens [EX Rank] Action: [Collect] / [Foreclose]
"A regression," Caelum murmured, his voice deadly calm despite the pounding in his chest. "I wasn't the only one."
Aris let out a harsh, barking laugh. He stepped over the groaning guards, the golden sword humming in his grip.
"Did you think the heavens would let a parasite like you rewrite history?" Aris spat. "The moment you opened your eyes in this time, the timeline fractured. The Light showed me what you became. The monster you turned into. It sent me back to excise the infection before it could fester."
Caelum's mind snapped into the cold, analytical focus of the Debt Collector.
Aris was unstable. The golden aura surrounding him was erratic, sparking and fizzing instead of maintaining a steady, righteous glow. The burden of a future consciousness in a fourteen-year-old body was tearing him apart.
He's powerful, but he's brittle, Caelum analyzed.
"The monster I became?" Caelum asked, his voice dripping with venom. "I was the only thing holding the continent together while you were busy playing the radiant hero. Who do you think financed your crusades, Aris? Who do you think bought the grain when the northern crops failed?"
"Lies!" Aris roared, lunging forward. He swung Excalibur in a horizontal arc that sheared through the air with the sound of tearing canvas.
Caelum didn't have time to draw his short-sword. He shoved Lilia back onto the bed and threw himself backward, the golden blade missing his throat by a hair's breadth. The heat from the strike singed his tunic.
He hit the floor and rolled, coming up in a crouch near the shattered remains of a bedside table.
"You drained the lifeblood of the people to fund your private armies!" Aris yelled, advancing with terrifying speed. "You corrupted the nobility! You were a blight!"
Caelum snatched up a heavy, brass-bound medical text from the floor. As Aris brought the sword down in a crushing overhead strike, Caelum stepped inside the arc, utilizing the stolen A-Grade Sword Mastery to predict the trajectory perfectly.
He didn't try to block the blade—the holy weapon would have sheared through the book like paper. Instead, he slammed the heavy tome into Aris's forearm just above the wrist.
Aris cried out, his grip faltering. The strike went wide, the blade burying itself deep into the stone floor, sending sparks flying.
Caelum didn't stop. He pivoted, driving his elbow into Aris's ribs. The hero stumbled back, coughing, but his aura flared, pushing Caelum away with a wave of concussive force.
"You're fast," Aris sneered, recovering his balance. "Faster than you should be. Did you steal a talent already, parasite?"
Caelum drew his short-sword, the blackened steel feeling woefully inadequate against the radiant light of Excalibur.
"I merely collected a debt," Caelum said coldly.
He glanced at the System.
[Warning: Opponent possesses EX Rank Aura. Direct engagement is lethal.] [Current Balance: 1,200 Debt Points] [Recommendation: Flee.]
Fleeing wasn't an option. Aris was faster, and he had Lilia cornered.
He needed leverage. He needed an equalizer.
"System," Caelum thought frantically, "can I foreclose on him now? I hold a debt of one life."
[Error: Foreclosure of 'The Grace of the Heavens' requires a target in a state of physical or spiritual submission. Current target is highly aggressive and resistant.]
He couldn't take the talent. He had to break Aris's will first.
Aris ripped the sword from the floor and charged again, the golden lightning coalescing around the blade. This time, his strikes were calculated, relentless. He was using the Radiant Cross, a high-tier holy art that he shouldn't have mastered for years.
Caelum was pushed back, desperately parrying and dodging. The A-Grade Mastery allowed him to read the attacks, but his physical attributes—even upgraded—were struggling against the raw power of the holy aura. His short-sword was already notched and glowing red-hot from the impact.
Clang. Clang. Sizzle.
Caelum was backed into a corner, near the window. He was running out of room.
"It ends here, Shadow Duke," Aris declared, raising the sword for a final, decapitating strike. "For the light!"
"You're a hypocrite, Aris," Caelum snarled.
He didn't raise his sword to block. Instead, he dropped it entirely.
Aris hesitated for a fraction of a second, confused by the surrender.
In that microsecond, Caelum reached into his pouch and pulled out the only other thing he had besides the short-sword.
It was the shattered, blackened fragment of the testing orb from Table 41—the one that held the residual, void-like energy of Lilia's anomaly.
Caelum didn't know what it would do. It was a desperate, chaotic gamble. He slammed the fragment directly into the path of the descending golden blade.
When the holy light of Excalibur met the necrotic void-energy within the crystal, the reaction was instantaneous and cataclysmic.
There was no sound, only a blinding flash of negative light—a pulse of absolute darkness that sucked the air from the room.
The force of the explosion threw Caelum backward, shattering the window. He was thrown out into the evening air, tumbling toward the courtyard below.
As he fell, he saw Aris thrown in the opposite direction, slamming into the far wall of the infirmary, the golden aura flickering and dying.
Caelum hit the cobblestones hard, rolling to absorb the impact, but his shoulder dislocated with a sickening pop. He groaned, struggling to remain conscious.
He looked up at the shattered window of the infirmary. Smoke, both black and gold, was billowing out.
The System chimed, a frantic, warning tone.
[CRITICAL ALERT!] [Temporal Paradox localized.] [The Anomaly (Aris) has been temporarily destabilized.] [Warning: The Inquisition has been alerted to the energy signature.]
Caelum forced himself to his feet, cradling his injured arm. The Academy was no longer safe. Aris was here, and he knew. The timeline was fractured.
He had to leave. He had to rebuild his network, his wealth, and his power, but this time, he was racing against a hero who knew the playbook.
He glanced up one last time, hoping Lilia had survived the blast.
Suddenly, a shadow detached itself from the wall beside the infirmary window. It didn't fall; it flowed down the stone like liquid darkness, coalescing next to Caelum.
It was Lilia.
She was unharmed, but her eyes were glowing with that terrifying violet light again.
"You left your sword," she said, her voice echoing with a thousand whispers. She held out the blackened, notched blade.
Caelum took it with his good hand. He looked at the girl, realizing that in his desperate attempt to survive, he had just formed an alliance with the only thing in the world more dangerous than a regressed hero.
"We need to go," Caelum said, turning toward the shadows of the lower city.
"Where?" she asked.
Caelum smiled, a cold, predatory grin that promised ruin.
"To collect."