Emrah did not move at first.
The world around him was already in motion—too much motion. Steel rang against bone. Screams tore through the air and were cut short just as quickly. The ground was soaked dark beneath his feet, not with water, but with blood that steamed as if the land itself rejected it.
Only then did he realize he was not alone.
All around him, people—mostly men—fought for their lives.
Some wielded blades. Others used crude magic, fire bursting from trembling hands or lightning snapping wildly through the air. None of them looked calm. None of them looked prepared. Their faces carried the same expression Emrah felt settling into his own bones.
This was not training.
This was slaughter with a delay.
A creature lunged from the left—too fast, too sudden. Emrah reacted on instinct, the Infinity Blade forming in his hand in a flash of cold weight. The strike barely saved him. Claws scraped across the blade, sending a shock up his arm so violent his fingers went numb.
One hit.
That was all it would take.
He tried to freeze time.
Nothing happened.
No stillness. No silence. No suspended world.
The realization hit harder than the creature's claws.
It doesn't work here.
The system did not explain. It did not apologize. It simply stayed silent.
Emrah exhaled slowly, forcing panic down into something sharper.
"Alright," he muttered. "Then I'll do this the old way."
Another creature rushed him—this one twisted, hunched, its jaw split too wide, rows of teeth clicking as it moved. Emrah willed the Infinity Blade to change.
The weapon responded.
Metal screamed as it expanded, the blade stretching, thickening, becoming massive—an oversized sword like something torn from myth or a Final Fantasy legend. The weight should have crushed him.
It didn't.
Emrah stepped forward and swung.
The creature didn't even have time to scream.
The blade cleaved through flesh, bone, and whatever passed for a soul, burying itself into the ground behind it. Emrah wrenched it free and turned, already moving, already adapting.
They came in waves.
Some flew. Some crawled. Some moved with disturbing intelligence, feinting, retreating, circling. Emrah learned quickly—too quickly—how each one killed. A tail strike meant poison. A glowing mark meant explosion. A whisper in the air meant mind intrusion.
He countered with precision, not rage.
A smaller blade for speed. A wider one for crowd control. Spikes formed along the flat of the sword when something tried to grab it. A chain snapped out once, dragging a creature from the sky and smashing it into the ground hard enough to crater stone.
His mind raced faster than his body ever could.
Angles. Distance. Timing.
Don't get hit.
Time blurred. Sweat stung his eyes. His breathing burned. Somewhere nearby, a man screamed as light tore him apart. Emrah didn't look. Looking wasted time.
Eventually, the noise changed.
The battlefield thinned.
Bodies—human and otherwise—littered the ground. The air grew heavy, charged, almost reverent.
Emrah straightened slowly, blade resting against the earth.
Only two creatures remained.
One stood to his left.
It looked human.
Too human.
Tall, broad-shouldered, its skin a deep crimson marked with faint, moving symbols. Horns curved back from its head like a crown. Its eyes were calm, calculating, ancient. A demon—but not a beast. A general.
The other stood opposite.
Radiant.
Wings of pale gold folded neatly behind it, feathers untouched by blood. Its face was beautiful in a way that hurt to look at, features sculpted, expression serene. Yet its eyes were cold—utterly indifferent.
Angel.
They did not attack immediately.
They studied him.
The demon smiled faintly.
"So this is him."
The angel tilted its head.
"Unremarkable," it said softly. "And yet… still alive."
Emrah tightened his grip on the sword.
He could feel it now—the pressure. The gaze. Something vast and unseen pressing down on the battlefield like the weight of history itself.
I'm being watched.
Not by the system.
By something older.
The demon stepped forward, power rippling around it like heat.
"Let us see," it said, "which side you truly belong to."
The angel unfolded its wings.
Emrah raised the Infinity Blade.
His danger-sensing passive screamed—not in warning, but in certainty.
Death stood on both sides.
And somewhere beyond time itself, unseen eyes watched with quiet, terrible interest.
Emrah did not hesitate.
The Infinity Gun unfolded in his hand, metal twisting and rearranging itself with a sound like grinding teeth. The barrel elongated, split, curved—until what rested against his forearm was no longer a gun at all.
A crossbow.
Not crude. Not medieval.
Its limbs pulsed with demonic glyphs, veins of dark crimson light running through them like living arteries. A bolt formed on its own, grown rather than loaded—black shaft, serrated tip, runes crawling across its surface before locking into place.
Regenerative. Self-loading. Demon-piercing.
Emrah exhaled once.
You first.
He fired.
The bolt screamed through the air and struck the demon square in the shoulder. The impact was violent enough to spin the creature half a step back. Smoke poured from the wound, black ichor sizzling as the bolt burrowed deeper instead of stopping—eating its way in.
The demon roared, more in offense than pain.
At the same time, Emrah willed the Infinity Blade to change.
The blade split down the center. Teeth erupted along its edge, spinning, screaming, alive—yet the sword's core remained solid, sharp, precise.
A chainsaw–sword hybrid, roaring with impossible torque.
The sound alone made the air vibrate.
The angel moved.
It crossed the distance in a blink, spear of light forming in its hand as it struck with surgical perfection—aimed at Emrah's heart.
But Emrah wasn't there.
He twisted, vanished a half-step sideways.
The spear missed him by millimeters and instead pierced straight through the demon's torso.
The demon screamed—this time in real pain.
The angel froze mid-motion.
"…What?"
Emrah didn't answer.
He moved again.
To the watching fighters, it looked like teleportation. To Emrah, it felt like the world slowing—not stopping, but bending around him. His Infinity Watch burned cold against his wrist, its symbol rotating, ticking without sound.
This isn't the system, he realized.
This is me.
Another bolt fired—this one punching through the demon's thigh, pinning it briefly to the ground. Emrah closed the distance instantly, chainsaw blade screaming as it tore into demonic flesh. Sparks, blood, and fragments of corrupted energy exploded outward.
The demon swung wildly, claws the size of swords ripping through the air.
Emrah ducked, rolled, vaulted up its arm, and drove the spinning blade into its neck.
The chainsaw chewed.
The demon howled.
Nearby, one of the human fighters stared, wide-eyed, barely holding his own blade.
"Is… is that man insane?!"
Another shouted over the chaos, disbelief raw in his voice.
"He's using the angel's attacks—he's redirecting them!"
The angel attacked again—faster, sharper, visibly angry now. Wings flared. Blades of light rained down.
Emrah danced between them.
Every dodge was intentional.
Every angle precise.
Light spears missed him by hairs and struck the demon instead—impaling, slicing, burning. The angel realized too late what was happening.
"You manipulate causality," it said, voice tight with something close to shock.
"That power is not granted by the system."
Emrah finally looked at it.
His eyes were calm. Focused. Terrifyingly clear.
"I know."
He twisted his wrist.
The Infinity Watch flared.
For a fraction of a second, the angel's perception lagged—just enough.
Emrah fired three bolts in rapid succession.
One through the demon's chest.
One through its skull.
The last detonated inside, shredding it from within.
The demon collapsed, body unraveling into black ash that the battlefield itself seemed eager to swallow.
Silence—brief, stunned.
All eyes turned to Emrah.
A man bleeding from a dozen wounds whispered, almost reverently,
"…He made a demon and an angel fight each other."
Another laughed shakily.
"No. He hunted one while ignoring the other. Like it didn't matter."
The angel hovered, wings tense now—not radiant, but wary.
"You are an anomaly," it said. "Watched. Measured."
Emrah lifted his chainsaw blade, teeth slowing, then stopping.
"Good," he replied quietly.
"Then watch this too."
Somewhere beyond sight, beyond time, something vast leaned forward.
And the God of Time smiled.
The angel hovered alone now.
Its wings stretched wide, radiant and perfect, every feather humming with divine precision. Light pooled around it, compressing into weapons that shimmered with absolute certainty—certainty that Emrah should not exist here.
Emrah stood opposite it, chest heaving.
Every muscle screamed. His hands trembled—not from fear, but from exhaustion layered atop stress so deep it felt like his bones were vibrating. His danger-sensing passive was no longer warning him.
It was howling.
One mistake and you die.
The angel spoke, voice calm, almost gentle.
"You are reaching the end of what borrowed power can do for you."
Borrowed.
That word dug into Emrah's mind.
He tightened his grip on the Infinity Blade, now resting in its massive buster-sword form. The metal felt heavy—too heavy. Even infinity had limits.
I can't outskill it forever, he realized.
Time won't freeze. Space won't bend.
The angel raised its hand.
Light condensed.
"This ends now."
Something inside Emrah snapped—not loudly, not dramatically.
Quietly.
A thought surfaced, raw and instinctive, born from desperation rather than strategy.
If I could just burn its wings…
The idea wasn't polished. It wasn't a command.
It was a wish.
And his subconscious answered.
Pain exploded in his arms.
Emrah gasped as heat surged through his veins, not external—internal. His blood felt like molten metal, his nerves igniting. He looked down just in time to see flames crawling up his fingers.
Not normal fire.
The flames were dark at their core, edged with crimson and gold, licking reality itself. The air warped around them, screaming softly as if in protest.
"What—" the angel began.
Emrah's hands were on fire.
The Infinity Blade caught first, its surface blackening before glowing red-hot, hellfire wrapping around its edges like it had been waiting for this. The Infinity Gun followed, vents glowing as demonic flames poured from its seams.
The system said nothing.
It couldn't.
This wasn't its domain.
Emrah stared at the flames, breath shallow.
"…So this is mine."
The angel recoiled—just a fraction.
"That fire," it said, voice sharpened by alarm.
"That is not divine. Not infernal. It is—"
Emrah moved.
He fired.
Bolts screamed through the air, but now they carried hellfire, detonating on impact and erupting into spiraling infernos. The angel deflected one—its shield cracked. The second scorched its wing, feathers igniting instantly.
The angel screamed.
Not in pain.
In disbelief.
"You imagined this—!"
Emrah charged.
Each step left burning footprints in the ground. He swung the massive blade once, twice—the third strike the angel barely blocked, divine light clashing against hellfire in a blinding explosion.
The shockwave tore the battlefield apart.
Emrah planted his feet.
With a roar torn from somewhere deeper than his lungs, he raised the buster sword high and slammed it into the ground.
The world ignited.
Flames erupted outward in concentric shockwaves, hellfire racing across the terrain like living things, spiraling, leaping, hungry. The angel tried to rise—its wings caught fire mid-motion, burning black, divine light shrieking as it was consumed.
It fell.
Hard.
The angel struggled, wings half-gone, body cracking under the heat.
"This fire… burns concepts," it rasped.
"It is shaped by hatred—"
"No," Emrah said, walking toward it through the flames, eyes reflecting hellfire.
"It's shaped by survival."
He lifted the blade.
The angel looked up at him—not with arrogance now, but understanding.
"You were inspired by the demon," it whispered.
"And so you created hell."
Emrah swung.
The blade cleaved cleanly through the angel's body.
There was no blood.
Only fire.
Hellfire devoured it from the inside out, burning wings, flesh, light—until nothing remained but drifting ash and fading heat.
Emrah stood alone, flames slowly dying around his hands.
His knees nearly buckled.
Somewhere beyond time and space, entities stirred.
And for the first time—
The God of Time did not merely watch.
He nodded.
The battlefield didn't end in silence.
It ended in eyes.
They gathered around Emrah—men bloodied, armor cracked, weapons still humming with residual power. Some looked at him like he was salvation. Others like he was a problem that hadn't decided what it would become yet.
One of them broke the stunned quiet with a shaky laugh.
"What the hell was that?" he demanded. "Did your benefactor give you fire powers too?"
Another stared at the scorched ground, at the angelic ash still drifting in the air.
"That wasn't system-grade. That wasn't anything I've ever seen."
Emrah opened his mouth.
He didn't know what he was going to say—I imagined it didn't sound sane—but he felt the weight of their attention pressing down on him.
And then—
The world peeled away.
No flash. No pull.
Just absence.
He stood somewhere else.
Everywhere was white.
Not light—white. A color so complete it erased depth, distance, even shadow. There was no floor, yet he stood. No sky, yet space stretched infinitely.
Time did not exist here.
Then the voice came—not from ahead, not from above, but from everywhere at once.
"Congratulations."
Emrah stiffened.
"You have passed the test."
The God of Time.
"You are a worthy choice," the voice continued, calm and vast. "And it appears you possess powers beyond those I have granted you."
Emrah swallowed. His exhaustion followed him even here, clinging to his bones.
"You will now return," the voice said, "to the exact moment from which you were taken."
"Wait," Emrah said quickly.
The word echoed, not outward—but inward.
"I have a question."
There was a pause.
Time itself seemed to lean in.
"…Ask."
Emrah steadied himself.
"Who were the others? The people fighting beside me."
The answer came without hesitation.
"Other gods' chosen ones."
The words landed heavier than any blade.
Before Emrah could process them—before he could ask which gods, or why, or how many—
The white shattered.
Reality snapped back into place like a slammed door.
Emrah reappeared in his room, momentum unbroken, and collapsed onto his bed. The mattress barely had time to protest before his body gave in.
His cane clattered softly to the floor.
His mind went dark.
Outside of time, the gods continued to watch.
But Emrah Aybeyli slept—
unaware that he had just been measured against champions of the divine
and found worthy.