Harem System In A fantasy World - Chapter 279: Time

Chapter 279: Time

“Rewind…”

The world snapped.

The bloody water surged backward, no, her body surged upward, gliding out of the abyssal fluid, coming to stop right before the surface.

It rose from the pool, her wounds closing, and her breath returning, her chest no longer pierced as she found herself standing again, not at the beginning, but moments before her collapse, only that her body was still injured, a little bit battered, but alive.

Her eyes widened.

’So this is….’

She didn’t finish the thought; she had already moved again. Faster than before. Her opponent’s eyes widened for the first time.

“Impossible—”

Celeste was already upon her. Her right arm flashed as blood formed out of thin air, forming the shape of a sharp, short blade that she grasped into her palm.

And then she struck out with the blood weapon.

Once, twice. Three times.

The woman staggered as blood sprayed from her chest all the way down to her waist. She tried to counter, but her control faltered.

And in that moment, Celeste did not waste the opening. She condensed all the mana she had left into her blade at a singular point, and she struck.

Boom—!

The blow landed cleanly, but it was not as explosive as you would have expected.

The control was immaculate, targeting the most vital organ any person would need to survive, before a sinister wave of corrupted mana spread out from that point, to stop any potential regenerative abilities she might have from acting.

The woman’s body froze.

Her shocked eyes locked onto Celeste’s.

“How…?” she whispered.

Then she dissolved. Her body broke into wisps of darkness that scattered into the air. Even at the very end, she could not understand what had happened; she had just never seen anything like it.

Celeste stood there.

Barely.

Her body trembling, covered in her opponent’s blood, her own blood, with her breathing ragged, her limbs barely holding her upright.

The rewind had brought her from the brink of death to a somewhat optimal state, not entirely perfect.

But that was all she needed. She had won.

She suddenly staggered as a flood of information flooded her mind. Three spells, to be exact, all of them basic time spells.

She was surprised for a moment as the reality of what she had done finally caught up to her. Once she understood, she rapidly recalled the information about the time spells.

The one she had just used, rewind, was a powerful level 4 spell.

She had also received a level three spell, called time lock.

From what she understood, she could stop time around herself and a target for a short period of time, at the cost of astronomical amounts of mana, and a portion of her lifespan depending on how much she used it.

Celeste frowned. She wasn’t foolish enough to believe that something so clearly heaven-defying could be used without any drawbacks, but wasn’t this a bit much?

’Guess I should use it sparingly,’ she thought to herself, her brows knitting as she considered the implications.

She had never heard of such a drawback, and that was understandable.

Even within the Chronos family, who were known as keepers of time magic, those who could truly touch even the surface of this affinity were incredibly rare, so rare that even her own father, despite being who he was, had never awakened it.

And when she thought about it further, the penalty itself made a strange kind of sense, because for a race like vampires, whose lifespans stretched far beyond that of ordinary beings, losing a few minutes, or even hours, might be considered negligible, especially in exchange for something as absurdly powerful as freezing time itself.

For these basic spells, the cost reflected that, minutes at most for a few seconds of use, which was already more than enough to decide the outcome of a battle between equals. It could be the difference between life and death.

But even then, she could not help but think ahead.

If this were the cost for basic spells…

Then what of the higher tiers?

What of spells that could affect larger areas, longer durations, or multiple targets?

The thought lingered in her mind for a moment before she pushed it aside.

There was one more spell.

A level two ability that distorted a target’s perception of time, not stopping it, not truly altering its flow, but bending how it was experienced, making movements seem slower or faster than they actually were, creating openings where none existed, or masking threats until it was already too late to react, and the distinction was clear to her immediately.

Perception and reality were not the same.

You could have time slowed for you or sped up without realising it, moving normally while the world betrayed you in subtle ways, and in the same instance, you could have time completely stopped around you, feel it, know it, and yet be unable to act at all, trapped within a moment you could not escape.

She smiled faintly as the spells settled in her already large arsenal of spells.

“A good harvest,” she murmured to herself, her voice soft but satisfied.

The trial truly was the best place to grow stronger quickly.

She hadn’t made this much progress in nearly two years at the academy, and yet in such a short span within this trial, she had not only had another chance to evolve her bloodline, but also discovered a completely new affinity, and unlocked its most basic functions, which did not feel basic at all.

That unwillingness to lose, that refusal to accept defeat, had driven her to the brink, and in that final moment, when everything had been slipping away, it had forced the hidden affinity within her to awaken.

Regardless of the gains, the fact still remained that she had almost lost because she had not played to her strengths.

The excitement that had briefly surfaced in her eyes slowly faded as she took a steady breath, forcing her thoughts to settle as she grounded herself once more.

“Don’t let anything cloud your judgement again,” she told herself firmly, her gaze lowering slightly as she focused on her breathing.

Luck could only do so much to help her in this trial, and what had just happened could not be relied on again; she had to be cautious, she had to be smart.

The woman she had just defeated was a powerful peak ancestor-level vampire, though she had been at the same level as Celeste; they should have been evenly matched, since Celeste’s bloodline was also currently at the peak of the ancestor rank.

Yet, it hadn’t felt like that at all, the difference in control, in experience, in how she used her abilities, it had all been painfully clear, and for a moment, Celeste could not help but think that maybe it was because she hadn’t had enough time to truly adapt to the strength that came with that kind of bloodline.

But time waited for no one.

If another person were in her shoes, perhaps they would have given up in the fifth fight, where she had almost lost within the first five seconds, not because she was necessarily weaker than her opponent, but because that bastard ancestor she had been up against was shameless enough to distract her using conversation before ambushing her with an unexpected spell!

Apparently, not everyone was as honourable as Darius, who was kind enough to alert her before he attacked.

It had become obvious to her then that she was too naive and inexperienced compared to every single opponent she faced. But she would not give up unless she lost horribly and died in this trial.

After all, there was nothing for her to lose.

Whining about her inexperience was insignificant; after all, she had chosen to take this trial despite the age gap compared to everyone else.

If she could not afford time, then she would have to make use of what she had in the moment. Her eyes sharpened slightly.

So that begged the question. What level would her next opponent be?

One thing was for sure, if it wasn’t for her newly found time magic, she would have been out already.