[ ??? ]
A man covered in ash and dirt drags his ragged body across a mud filled landscape. The sinking sun was hidden by layers of dark clouds. Thunder and lightning roared like ferocious beasts as the gales of the wind slashes at the man's exhausted body. It seemed like it was going to rain, yet for some reason not a single raindrop had fallen.
He crawled on the coarse harsh terrain, one limb at a time, slowly but surely moving forward. The man was not deterred by the constant bombardment of the harsh weather. Although his body was on the brink of collapse, his eyes told a different story.
There was a resolute and unyielding determination hidden within. He forced himself to keep on moving, until he finally reached his goal, a shining purple colored fruit in the shape of a honeycomb hanging on a boney gray branch.
He stretched his arm forward to pluck it from its branch. Upon touching it a transparent thin blue box appeared in front of the man.
[ Fruit of Regression ]
┎
Upon consumption of this fruit you will regress back in time. Your memories will be transported into your past self.
The amount of time regressed is dependent on how many branch timelines have a regressor, 1 week from the beginning of the Trials for each timeline.
There are 99 fruits. Each fruit can be used to reset the branch timeline or regress a person.
A total of 47 fruits have been consumed.
┛
The man's eyes lit up when he saw the information.
Without a second thought the man hurriedly placed the fruit into his mouth and bit in. A faint multicolored light enveloped the man.
…
[ February 2nd, Seoul, South Korea, 4:00 AM KST ]
Snap!
A 20 something year old looking young man shot up from his bed, clutching his forehead with right hand. Sweat dripped from his face. He was breathing heavily, heaving in large gulps of air. His eyes were adjusting to the dark environment as his blurry vision started to become clear.
It looked like he just had a terrifying nightmare. However, there was a smile spreading on his sickly face. This was an unusual sight to behold.
He stayed like this for a few minutes as his expression turned into one of disbelief. Slowly he stretched out his right hand in front of him.
The young man unclenched and clenched his hand multiple times, he moved each of his fingers one by one, then he turned his hand to see his palm.
Tears started to roll down his face.
"I'm back…"
He let out a soft whisper and fell back down into his pillows. Once again he fell into the embrace of sleep, a small smile still lingering on his face as his tears dried up.
…
[ ??? ]
Two people wearing business clothes sat at a table in a luxurious adorned restaurant overlooking the city, the bright lights shone through the glass walls. It illuminated the dimly lit room with shades of different colors.
"I can't believe we made it back?"
"Same, that old hag was actually right. The fruit really brought us back to the past"
"Speaking of that, it seems like there are 12 other branch timelines. We need more information on them."
"True…"
The person took a sip of his wine before continuing with a meaningful look.
"We need to get in contact with the others. We can't let those from different branches get ahead of us."
"Well isn't that obvious?"
…
[ March 14th, New York City, 5:00 PM EST ]
A black haired middle aged man sat across a large wooden table facing a blonde middle aged woman. In his eyes there was a mixture of reluctance and relief as he looked over. The woman across from him was his wife, or more accurately his ex-wife.
He and her had decided to file for divorce after almost 20 years of marriage. While there were still lingering feelings of love, their spark had died out. Both felt that their love had run its course and they could no longer live a happy life with each other.
"Alright, I've signed the papers. Now all we have to do is divy up the assets."
The man said with a sigh. He had not wanted to divorce his wife, but it felt like his marital life was stuck in quicksand, slowly devouring him. She and him had gradually started to argue more and more over the years. In recent years, it had become a daily occurrence.
With the advocacy of their eldest daughter, they eventually went to therapy. However, all that resulted from the therapy was an atmosphere of passive aggressiveness and unwillingness to change.
It seemed like both of them were set in their ways and couldn't come to a compromise. In fact, they would have continued to live this bitter life until their death. If it were not for the fact that their eldest daughter encouraged the two of them to separate, they wouldn't even have filed for divorce.
Their daughter had told them to live their lives and not be consumed by the bindings of marriage. She didn't want them to continue being together and constantly be hurting each other. Eventually they might have started to cheat on each other, the daughter knew that both would not have been able to handle the emotional trauma.
It had become a toxic relationship that both of them needed to leave. Otherwise they would have become people that even they themselves would not recognize.
…
[ April 9th, New Haven, CT, 2:30 PM EST ]
"Em, should I go semi-formal or casual for my date?"
"She actually said yes. Nice. Where you taking her?"
"That sushi place by the greens on Nicoll street."
"That's the sushi bar right."
"Yeah."
"Then casual should be fine."
"Gotchu. Thanks for the advice."
"No prob. By the way, he wants you to bring your telescopic lens for the shoot on Sunday."
"Oh okay. Do I need to bring my lights?"
"Nah, he's bringing his, so you should be good to go. Anyways good luck on your date."
"Aight see you sunday."
A young man hung up the phone as he looked at himself in the mirror. He put down the tie he was holding, shook his head and walked over to his closet to pick up a new set of clothes.
'Yeah I didn't think so either.'
…