Second Genesis

A ripping line of gold tore the world in two. It spiralled and rippled, almost like a smooth laminar flow with the speed of a mach 10 missile. Everything in its path was torn to pieces and shredded to ash.

There was a chilling grin on Grey’s face.

It was true that when you synced the rhythms of Sacred Bulwark and Hallowed Endurance you could instantly heal back to full health and regain all your stamina at once.

All this time, Calixan thought that Grey was trying to time and sync everything up for that, but he was very wrong.

The valiance of the Last wasn’t in their ability to claw and hope for another gasping breath to fight with. It was to give everything they had right at that given moment no matter what the cost might be.

The syncing of Sacred Bulwark and Hallowed Endurance was a chance to battle again at full strength.

The syncing of Last Bulwark and Last Endurance was a strike of finality that could seemingly never be stopped.

And all it cost Grey was everything he had.

The world swayed around Grey and he collapsed to the ground. Everything went black.

—

VICTOR: Grey Temolt.

—

Operation: Spark Flame

Quest Rank: Uncommon

Mission Type: Two-Part

Objective: Completed

Reward: Access to Prometheus Phase II

—

Chapter One: Lingering Chaotic Attachments

CLEARED

—

**

Grey didn’t know where he expected to wake up. In fact, he wouldn’t have been surprised even if he woke up at the start of the loop again.

He was a bit of a madman, and he had set his loop at the first opportunity he could. So right now, it was set to the moment he stepped out of the gate. He had thought there were good odds he’d wake up there after whoever was left over from the battle decided to run a blade through his heart.

Even if they didn’t have the greatest desire to kill him, just the fact he had so many high level items on him would definitely be attractive to someone.

It was more than a little insane to do this, especially considering he knew that the shorter the loops, and the quicker his deaths, the more backlash he suffered as a result.

It was even wilder when one considered that after every death, Grey usually kept any changes to his Frame, so even if he had set the loop to before the trial, he would have already benefited from everything.

But he hadn’t cared about anything but slaughtering Calixan as quickly as possible. And after the notification he got for defeating the man, could they still get away with not showing him?

Regardless of all of this, the short of it was that Grey wouldn’t have even been surprised if he woke up in a dumpster fire. That was why it was all the more ridiculous that the first thing he saw when he woke up was a pretty face.

A pretty face he actually recognized.

She scrubbed at his body, muttering words of annoyance as she went on and on about how this definitely shouldn’t be her responsibility and how her "big sisters" were bullying her again, and that this man was "so ugly".

Grey scoffed. "Ugly?"

Grey reached up to his face, wondering if he still had his Skrill Mask on or something. But when he felt flesh, he was speechless.

He was quite handsome if he did say so himself, and his body was toned and proportional after he got rid of all that fat. He had always been fit, but now it looked like he had taken some sort of super soldier serum. 𝚏𝕣𝐞𝗲𝐰𝕖𝐛𝐧𝕠𝕧𝚎𝚕.𝐜𝚘𝗺

"Ah!" the young girl jumped back. But because she had been on her knees to begin with, she didn’t get much lift. Her feet got tangled up in her long dress—or was it a robe? Then she toppled over, her ponytail and the soft grass being about the only things that stopped her from hitting her head too hard.

Grey pushed himself up and looked around.

He had been here before. While he was on his way to the trial region, he had accidentally stumbled into a place that he could only describe as the Garden of Eden. If there was a first garden of the world, it felt like it would be this one. Every color, every shade, even the slightly pink-hued sun above them, just felt so much... more.

His problem was that when he strolled in he also went much too far and ended up in private quarters he shouldn’t have been in, where he had stumbled into this young girl.

Well, she was a young girl in demeanor. In age she was probably about 18 or 19 years old. Grey could tell from how her big sisters babied her that there were probably good reasons why she felt so stunted.

Grey had met several girls in his high school who were orders of magnitude more mature than this one. Though, at a certain point, age wasn’t the most important factor in disposition and maturity. Grey bet he would still be immature and crack a fart joke or two even when he was 50.

"You—why did you surprise me like that!?" she immediately propped herself up and pointed at Grey as though to thrust a hole through his forehead with her pointer finger.

"Surprise you?" Grey didn’t even know how to react to that. He shook his head and stood up.

The girl shrieked and covered her eyes with her palms. She smacked her hands to her face so hard that the echo of a slap reverberated through the garden.

Grey looked down to find the towel used to cover his lower half had fallen. He shrugged and started to put on his clothes. Everything was neatly folded to the side already, and certain things had not been taken off him at all, like his Turning Shield, which he appreciated.

As he slipped on his Shadow Forces and completed the look, his lips couldn’t help but purse.

Now where was Frantz’s spear?