Chapter 349: Back in Time-2

Uriel felt his consciousness completely embrace the void of death, endless nothingness and an absence of self, a painless yet horrid state of nonexistence.

It was all gone, an effect he assumed couldn’t be reversed; yet one moment he was gone, the next he was back.

"Uriel, watch your back!" Dorian warned, sending out a metal spark towards the sneaking monkey creeping up on the absent-minded Uriel.

Uriel’s eyes widened, still remaining frozen in place, in fact his muscles went even more stiff...

"I-it worked!" Uriel chanted, staring down at his hands in pure shock and exhilaration, his eyes reddened as he took in slow, refreshing breaths.

Tears streaked down his cheeks as he continuously stared at his hands, bearing no care for the commotion of raging four-eyed monkeys around.

All that didn’t matter to Uriel — he was just dead! No one could understand what experiencing death felt like.

It felt like he had transitioned in and out of the void, his consciousness dissolved into nothing; he felt every piece of what he was, parts of himself he was still discovering, slowly dissolve one after another.

And now it was all there again — the exhilaration, the fear, the mixed feelings — flooding his brain, paralyzing him both mentally and physically for the next few minutes.

His fingers trembled as he sobbed, the soldiers around him glancing around in confusion, as none of them carried memories of the lost future.

Uriel summoned his spear, tightening his grip around the weapon, as the astral glow sparkled down the lance, an armour slowly congealing around his frame.

Uriel slowly got ahold of himself, and the realization hit: if he didn’t prepare, death would come again.

His mount appeared beside him, and he flung himself upon the steed, the astral glow coming off him growing bright.

As a temporal field surrounded both him and the group of soldiers behind, his connection with the bound constellation was still strong.

Fortunately, the time reversal cost wasn’t something he had to pay for — someone else had already shouldered the cost, and that was Seth.

He had fueled the time activity, meaning Uriel still had enough essence to affect the temporal flow within a range of a hundred meters.

His steed moved, fueled by the raging flow of time, Uriel’s frame barreling forth with rage and intensity, his lance punching right through all foes like a hot needle through wax.

The intense desire to remain living lit up in his heart as he recalled the cause of his death.

It was never the defiled... it was something more dangerous, something that brought terror to him at the slightest recall.

Uriel quickly cleared out the area at a dazzling speed, startling even his allies.

In their eyes he was suddenly acting strange for no reason.

Everyone slowly calmed in their actions, as Uriel slew all the enemies before they even got to lift a finger.

And doing it all so fast, within a few seconds, aside from the fading corpses of the four-eyed monkeys around.

Reining his steed to a roaring halt, he turned to the humans, "We need to run now!"

Yes, the only way Uriel felt he could remain alive was by fleeing.

The atmosphere slowly dropped cold, as a sickly presence settled in the air.

The thick, stifling aura caused Uriel to feel sudden, intense nausea, the image of being ripped into two flashing erratically in his head and causing a blinding pain.

It was here!

Seth was wrong from the beginning — the feline defiled were dangerous, but they weren’t dangerous enough to kill Uriel so quickly; no, it was something much worse!

A shadow flickered in his head, his eyes went red, terror flooding his veins, as he screamed at the top of his lungs.

"Run now!!!"

He tightened his rein over his steed, starry essence congealing into clones of the mount.

The ability stemmed from the Mass Cavalry Summon.

The humans felt the change. They didn’t know what was wrong, but they could feel it, and their souls, still bearing trauma from the reversed effect of death, reacted more sensitively than anticipated.

Everyone threw themselves upon their mounts and burst into streaks as a shadow flickered behind, an unsettling, hoarse roar quaking the forest.

...

On the opposite end of the island...

Surrounded by a thick and dense wave of death and cold essence was Elaine and Brandon’s crew.

Elaine felt confused for a split second; everything just felt wrong all of a sudden, from nowhere.

She blinked, feeling a tinge across her unblemished, pale skin, her winter-blue hair flowing beautifully with the wind.

Frowning, she dismissed the feeling and continued to engage her opponent.

Meanwhile behind her, snapping awake, was Brandon; it was a weird feeling, especially since he had already been conscious.

But sudden flashes of his death hit him — the void of nothingness folding in, the feeling of his mind slowly dissolving into the dark.

His brain going cold — it was, without a doubt, the scariest event he had ever gone through in his life.

And for a moment he almost believed it was all a dream; it was hard to sort between the memory of the future and the past.

As the memory stood as both, the dilemma stressed on his soul a bit, leaving him confused for a while.

Just as if one used teleportation without any affinity to space, one would be plagued by a deep physical dysphoria.

Like nausea, dizziness, and sometimes vessel ruptures.

It was the same with traveling through time without an appropriate affinity; this time it left a deep stress on the soul instead of the body.

Causing a brief moment of mental instability...

A chill crawled up his back, recalling how he was brutally slaughtered.

He was faring quite well against the cat-like corrupt who had attacked from nowhere, when suddenly, it struck.

The moment the image of his murderer flashed in his head, Brandon’s heart ran cold.

As the same haunting feeling faintly settled into the atmosphere — and that smell.

Faint, but Brandon couldn’t forget the smell of his killer, not ever.

His heart thrummed with fear as he turned towards Elaine in the distance, his opponent lashing out with a claw.

The four-armed monkey made a loud screech as it struck, but Brandon barely cared.

Compared to his killer, this beast was nothing — his gaze sharpened and his frame blazed, the monkey consumed by the flare without Brandon having to make a single move.

A jet burst of flames catapulted his body through the air, landing before Elaine and throwing a flame ball, instantly reducing her enemy to ashes.

His frame fueled by death, now burned with sinister rage, the deep blue embers flickering and leaving faint images of skulls.

Grabbing her by the shoulders, he yelled, "Elaine, we need to leave now!"

Elaine was startled; to her, this was all too sudden. Leave now? Why? she thought.

Her lips were about to move to ask a question when, from behind, an ear-piercing screech rang out, grating through the eardrums and causing those who didn’t have enough defense to bleed out from their ears.

"What is that?" Elaine gasped, while Brandon wore an ugly scowl, whispering, "It’s here..."

Brandon hadn’t even fully established why he was alive again, yet here he was about to die once more.