I woke up to the soft morning light and the warmth of Sara's breath against my neck.
For a moment, I just existed in that atmosphere—warm, comfortable, and peaceful. Then, reality hit my brain like a physical blow.
3:47 AM.
Thirteen minutes until the start of training.
"Sara," I whispered, gently shaking her shoulder. "Wake up."
She muttered something unintelligible and huddled closer.
"Sara. You need to get back to your room before people wake up."
"Five more minutes..."
"You said that yesterday, and you nearly got caught by the proctor."
"That only happened once."
"It happened three times. This habit of yours is becoming a system."
She finally opened her eyes and blinked sleepily. "Is it morning already?"
"Unfortunately." I carefully stood up. "Come on, get up. You still have to pack your things for the trip anyway."
Reality dawned on her face. "Right. The Summit. I'm leaving today."
"Yes, this afternoon."
She sat up, her hair tousled and her clothes wrinkled. She looked simultaneously beautiful and miserable.
"I don't want to go."
"I know. But international diplomacy waits for no one." I stood up and reached out my hand to her. "Come. I'll walk you to your door."
We stepped out into the corridor—luckily, it was empty at this hour—and I escorted her to her room right next door.
"This is so funny," she said. "Your room is right here..."
"...and yet we're sneaking around like criminals."
"It's your fault for starting training so early. I'm forced to return to my room half-asleep."
"Entirely my fault. I accept full responsibility."
She opened her door, then turned back to me. "One more."
"One more what?"
She kissed me—quick, but passionate. "For luck. And because I'm already nervous about not seeing you for a week."
"Understandable. Go, pack your things. I'll see you before you leave."
"You better."
She vanished into her room, and I made my way to the training grounds.
I arrived at exactly 4:00 AM and saw three people waiting instead of the usual two.
Celeste was tired but ready. Raven sat on a rock, notebook in hand. Luna stood in the center of the field, her form looking "more solid" than usual.
"Good morning," I said. "Luna, are you joining us?"
"Sara asked me to keep an eye on you while she's away. She mentioned 'preventing stupid decisions' and 'making sure he doesn't die' yesterday." Luna's violet eyes sparked with amusement. "I thought training would be more useful than just being a passive observer."
"You want to practice?"
"I want to see if I can still fight. It's been five years since I had a physical body. I'm curious about what I'm capable of as an Anomaly."
"This will be interesting." I looked at Celeste and Raven. "Warm-ups. Standard routine. Luna and I need to figure out her limits."
As they began their drills, I walked to the center of the field with Luna.
"What do you remember about fighting?" I asked.
"Everything. Muscle memory isn't stored in the body; it's stored in the soul. I trained in self-defense before I died—basic things. But now..." She raised her hand and watched it pass through a tree branch like a "transparent" mist. "The laws of physics apply differently to me."
"Show me."
She moved. Fast. Unbelievably fast. One moment she was beside me, the next she was twenty feet away.
"Teleportation?"
"Not quite. I'm moving through the gaps between moments. It looks instantaneous, but I'm actually crossing temporal voids." She appeared behind me. "Distance becomes arbitrary when you're partially outside the chain of causality."
"What about physical contact?"
"It's complicated." She tried to touch a rock. Her hand passed through it like smoke. "Most material things don't perceive me. I can't affect them, and they can't affect me. I'm like a ghost to normal reality."
"But not to me."
"No. Not to you." She poked my shoulder with her finger. It was solid. Real. "You are different. The Regression curse, the accumulated deaths—you exist in several timelines simultaneously. The 'density' of your soul is enough to interact with me."
"So you can touch me, but not the world."
"Mostly. If I focus intensely, I can hold some things—papers, small and light objects. But walls, floors, heavy things? I just pass through them." She walked through a tree trunk to demonstrate. "Great for reconnaissance. Terrible for getting things done."
"What about combat?"
Her face turned serious. "Let's find out."
I summoned my twin swords. "Attack me. Don't hold back."
Luna manifested her weapon, and I stopped in shock.
It was a double-bladed glaive, at least seven feet long, made of the same "non-physical" material as my swords. Silver-white, the temporal energy radiating from it was strong enough to make my eyes ache.
"Where did that come from?"
"I made it myself. I've been practicing for five years since I died. I learned what Anomalies can do." She spun the glaive with mastery. "This is my soul-weapon, just like your swords. When you live outside of time, you learn to forge weapons out of concepts, not matter."
"That's terrifying."
"That's survival." She dropped into a combat stance I didn't recognize. "Ready?"
"No. But let's start anyway."
She attacked.
Fast. Unbelievably fast. The glaive came at me from three directions at once—past, present, and future strikes overlapping.
I parried two. The third grazed my shoulder and...
Pain.
Not physical. A pain that reached into the very depths of my soul. It felt as if frozen time itself had sliced through me.
I rolled back, maintaining distance. "Okay. That hurt."
"Sorry. I should have warned you—my attacks bypass physical defense. I'm striking your soul directly."
"Wonderful. Fighting someone who ignores armor and deals metaphysical damage. Everything is fine."
"You asked for 'full power'."
"I'm starting to regret that decision."
We began to circle each other. Celeste and Raven stopped their drills to watch us.
"Master," Mordain's voice echoed in my head. "She is dangerous. More dangerous than most enemies you have faced."
"I noticed."
"Her temporal nature means she is already attacking you in several timelines. You..."
"I know. Leave it to me."
I released the first seal.
Power flooded my body—the strength gathered over 127 cycles, compressed into this teenage frame. My mana core expanded, and purple-black energy began to flicker around my swords.
Luna's eyes widened. "This... this is more power than should fit in a normal human body."
"People who know me always say that."
I went on the offensive, merging Earth's martial arts with "Atermoor" swordsmanship. The four elements—water, fire, earth, air—swirled around my blades as I moved.
Luna parried with her glaive, and reality began to crack where our weapons met. Space and time fractured around the point of impact.
We exchanged blows—she struck from unbelievable angles, and I adapted by instinct. She was faster, more versatile, capable of attacking from the past and future at once.
But I had experience. The combat knowledge of 127 lifetimes.
"You're holding back," she said, parrying a strike.
"So are you."
"I'm using seventy percent of my power."
"And I'm using forty."
We broke apart, both breathing heavily—her figuratively, me literally.
"Do you want to go higher?" she asked.
"Let's go."
I summoned my knights.
First, Mordain appeared—seven feet of black armor and tactical precision. A massive six-foot sword appeared in his hand.
Selene stepped out from the shadows—liquid grace and twin daggers, already moving to the flank.
Azrael rose from the ground itself—destructive energy crackling around his hands, ready to annihilate whatever he touched.
"Now it's a real fight," I said.
Luna smiled—a sharp, knowing look. "Now it's getting interesting."
She moved, and suddenly there were three of her. The past, present, and future versions attacked simultaneously. Her glaive split into three paths, each targeting a different knight.
Mordain blocked with calculated precision. "Temporal duplication. Estimated power: equivalent to SS-rank."
Selene melted into the shadows, evading. "She isn't copying herself. She exists in three moments at once. We need to..."
Azrael simply unleashed a wave of destructive light at all three versions. They dodged and merged back into a single Luna.
"Creative," she said. "But predictable."
The glaive came at me from behind—except "behind" was five seconds ago, and she was striking from the past into my present.
I felt it—that sensation that comes when you've died 127 times and your soul remembers every timeline. I moved before the blow landed, blocking something that had technically already happened.
"Causality precognition," Luna noted. "You can sense temporal attacks before they occur in your timeline."
"It's become a survival instinct."
We were truly fighting now. Me and three soul shards against an anomaly existing across timelines. My swords and their weapons against a glaive that struck from past, present, and future.
The training ground began to fracture. Literally. Under the collision of accumulated death power and temporal anomaly energy, reality itself was tearing.
"Stop!" Raven screamed from the sidelines. "You're going to tear the dimensional barrier!"
We both froze.
Luna's glaive was at my throat. My sword was at hers. Azrael's destructive energy was aimed at her heart.
A perfect stalemate.
We both stepped back at the same time, and the weapons vanished.
"That was..." Luna began.
"...insane," I finished. "You are terrifying. If we had fought seriously, there would be a crater where this part of the campus is right now."
"If we had fought seriously, one of us would be dead. Maybe both."
"A comforting thought."
She smiled—sincerely this time. "I haven't fought like that in five years. It's nice to remember I'm not just a passive observer."
"You were never passive. You were just limited." I looked at Celeste and Raven, who were staring at us like we were madmen. "What?"
"You two just shattered reality," Raven said tonelessly. "You left temporal scars on this field that won't heal for weeks."
"Is that bad?"
"It's catastrophic! Do you have any idea how much dimensional damage you caused?"
"Not my department."
"Clearly!" She was scribbling notes frantically. "I have to document this. A cross-temporal battle between a Regressor and an Anomaly. The theoretical applications alone..."
"Maybe document later and panic less now?" Celeste suggested.
"I'm not panicking. I'm calling for scientific awareness. There's a difference."
Luna sat on the grass, looking more tired than I'd ever seen her. "That took more energy than expected. I need to rest."
"You need to rest? You're literally made of temporal concepts."
"And you're made of accumulated death traumas. We both exist at the expense of things that shouldn't be." She lay back, staring at the sky. "Markus?"
"Yeah?"
"If Azkaros returns in seven years... if he has full power like Raven said... even with all your experience, all your knights, and all your gathered strength..." she looked at me seriously. "You're going to need help. Real help. Not just me or Sara or these two."
"I know."
"Do you? Because in cycle 96, you fought him alone and barely won. And he wasn't even at full strength then. This time..."
"This time he'll be stronger. I know. That's why I'm training these idiots." I pointed at Celeste and Raven. "That's why I'm gathering people. That's why I'm trying to break my curse before the seven years are up."
"What if you can't break it?"
"Then I'll die. One more time. And cycle 129 will begin." I shrugged. "What's new about that?"
She was silent for a long time. "You aren't afraid."
"I've died 127 times. Fear is just data to me now."
"That's not healthy."
"Nothing about my existence is healthy, Luna. I'm a walking temporal paradox with three soul shards and enough trauma to fill a library. 'Health' left me somewhere around cycle 40."
"Fair point."
We sat in silence for a while as Celeste and Raven continued their training, casting nervous glances our way.
"You know," Luna said finally, "in all the timelines I can see, in all the possible futures branching out from this moment... there is one constant."
"What?"
"You. Still fighting, still trying. Even when logic says 'stop,' even when the odds are zero, even when death is certain—you just keep going."
"Stubbornness is my only consistent character trait."
"It's not just stubbornness. It's..." she struggled for the word. "It's hope. Despite everything, despite 127 failures, you still hope it will be different this time."
"Hope is just delayed disappointment."
"Maybe. But it's the thing that's keeping you human. It's what keeps you as Markus, rather than just a sentient weapon."
I had no answer for that.
The sun rose, painting the sky in shades of orange and gold. Training was technically over, but none of us moved.
Four "impossible beings" sat on a cracked training field, waiting for the day to begin.
Waiting for Sara to leave.
Waiting for seven years to pass.
Waiting for Azkaros to return and destroy everything again.
But for now, I had this moment.
I suppose that's enough.
After the classes at the academy, Sara came to my room wearing beautiful clothes.