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Seth could still faintly recall what had happened to him before. The invasion came from those mysterious, gray-colored portals and the countless cavemen and dinosaurs that invaded New York's outskirts.
His battle against their strongest and also their leader, the Primal King.
And how utterly overwhelmed he was.
He used every trick he could use, every technique, every skill, and every item, yet at the end of the day, this was a foe he couldn't overcome no matter what.
Or perhaps he could, if he had known about him coming here beforehand, but he was yet another of those strange variables that had not come here before.
Something disturbed the original timeline, and beings such as Bing Xue and the Primal King appeared, powerful enough to defy everything Seth had ever known.
But at the same time, It was thanks to Bing Xue kicking him that he regained the memories of his past life, which triggered him to obtain his Regressor Class.
However, above all else, he was also confused.
He found himself resting on a comfortable white bed, covered by golden blankets. He was in the interior of a place made completely out of glistening gold.
There were windows without glass, which led to the windy outside.
He stood up, looking outside, to find there was a sea of vegetation, enormous forests of all colors, golden and silver-colored mountains, swamps, oceans, and...
The heavens above twisted constantly in colors, varying from red to orange and even yellow.
The air was also heavy, and it seemed packed with an energy similar to the Ki that the inhabitants of the Martial Arts Worlds wielded.
However, the Ki they used wasn't as rich and potent as this one, which was even thicker than mana and spirit energy combined.
The more he concentrated his senses on trying to comprehend what this energy was, the more tired he felt. His own body was barely able to resist inhaling this energy without beginning to grow weaker.
It seemed that the inferior Ki he had cultivated beforehand had become detrimental to him, an impurity that the Ki surrounding him now was trying to overwrite with itself.
"Ugh… This place… Where am I?!" Seth felt an intense throbbing pain over his chest and then his head, and also in the eye that had been replaced by the Eye of Time. "Cough, ugh…! Agh!"
He fell to his knees after trying to resist the pain. The thick Ki in the environment wrapped around him as if it had a consciousness of its own, beginning to forcefully burn through his impure Ki, the Ki he thought was the only energy out there that martial artists used, and replacing it as he inhaled and exhaled.
Slowly, the pain faded as he looked around in disbelief, his hands glowing with golden light. It was incredible; he couldn't believe it!
"Is this another world?" he wondered. "Maybe when I died, I reincarnated somewhere else? No, but my body is completely intact! Am I in the Divine Realm of a God then?"
Seth hastily stood up, walking towards the door leading outside, only to find someone standing right outside of it, looking down on him.
"A-A caveman?!"
It wasn't the same type of caveman as the Brutes, though, but it was one without a doubt: tall, powerful, muscular, with a primitive appearance, messy and long red hair, yet a very beautiful face. Her skin was as black as charcoal.
"Bing Bing said... can't let you out," she said. "Go back!"
"Eh?! Hey, wait a second!" Seth tried to resist, but the girl's powerful hands grabbed his little arms like twigs and almost broke them as she threw him back inside the room.
BAAM!
The door closed after that.
"W-What with that tremendous strength?!" Seth muttered, feeling a terrible pain in his arms. "Hahh… She is definitely much above Level 999, isn't she? Just what is this place?"
Seth felt very tired even after everything, sitting down on the bed and beginning to contemplate his life choices while trying to recall what happened.
"Where is this place? What… happened? Ugh, my head," he groaned.
However, the only thing he could recall was his last moments—the agonizing pain of death as the Primal King blew his head into countless pieces.
"I was only able to regress in time once," he thought. "So naturally, this isn't another regression; at that time, I should have simply died. Someone revived me and put me here. But who has such a tremendous healing power capable of reviving someone on Earth? That shouldn't be possible- Ah."
And then he felt something, an overwhelmingly powerful presence, right behind him.
His eyes flashed with Time Essence, as he tried to evade an incoming attack, jumping out of bed!
"You still look to be in pain. It was a bit hard to regenerate your brain after it was completely destroyed, but I am fairly sure I did a good job."
Seth panicked; the thing behind him moved faster than he could even predict!
"Uaaagh!"
In an act of pure human reflex, he ended up falling head-first into the ground from the bed, almost looking stupid while doing so.
And then he heard her laughter.
"Hahah, well, aren't you quite stupid for someone as strong as you?" she laughed. "Come on, stand up. Did you think I was going to attack you? Maybe I would... I tried to test you a bit, but I saw how you were going to evade, so I stopped. Did you predict the future? I had yet to even make a move."
Seth looked up as a beautiful woman made entirely out of golden, silver, and rainbow lights converging together stood in front of him, wearing a dress made of the same composition as her body.
Her bright rainbow eyes resembled jewels, shining with bright light, and her presence alone irradiated the same pressure a goddess of the highest floors would exude!
It was such strong pressure that he could barely even move or breathe."
"Hahhh… Y-You're…!"
"I am?"
"You're… Bing Xue!"
"That's right… Wait, I think I recognize your face from somewhere."
Bing Xue squinted her doppelganger eyes, analyzing Seth and trying to recall where she had seen that face before. It didn't take her too long to remember. It was a very random moment in her life. On the first day she came back to Earth, she went to register with the hunter association and ended up making a terrible fuss over the simplest of things.
And it was all provoked because someone was really angsty over her skipping the line. He insulted her and even kicked her, so she responded with a kick herself, breaking his ribs and almost killing him. But she healed him and left him alone, forgetting about his existence.
She didn't know his name or anything—just another mortal in a sea of billions. Although she cared about humanity as a whole, she was never going to care about a single person in particular.
"So you do recognize me... at the end," sighed Seth. "Bing Xue, I've been hearing about it for a while. Did you... revive me?"
"So it was really you! That guy I kicked the other day..." laughed Bing Xue; she didn't even look like she regretted that. "Yes, I did revive you. Your entire brain was destroyed; I had to carefully stitch it all together with my abilities. It was a bit harder. There's no pain, right?"
"In fact, it still hurts... my entire head and body." Seth looked at his own hands. "But it's amazing you could revive me after I was torn to shreds like that... I… I owe you an apology for what I did back then, and I also want to thank you deeply for having saved me."
"Ah, it's fine; there's no need for apologies or thanks," Bing Xue shrugged. "We're quite even now, right? So, what was your name, young man?"
"I am Seth, a player... I recently hit Level 999; I think it's one of the highest out there. Not many players should have reached such a high level yet," Seth said.
"Hmm, certainly, certainly, but you're more different than I imagined." Bing Xue squinted her eyes, analyzing Seth.
Seth was nervous. Bing Xue was a being of unparalleled strength, the first ever returnee, a woman who had gone missing eleven years ago and came back just recently. He could already guess that this woman had at least spent a few hundred years in another world, one very similar to the Martial Worlds but, at the same time, very different too.
Her powerful eyes struck his soul; she was analyzing his very existence. Seth wanted to keep his existence as a Regressor a secret, especially from her, a being that wasn't even present in the original timeline!
She was too big of a variable for his plans to save Earth, and although she had also said she wanted to protect Earth as its new guardian, he couldn't trust her.
She had spent too many years in another world; her very existence had been twisted, and she had assimilated the customs, language, and powers of another world, a ruthless one.
Seth, if he had to be honest, didn't consider her a human anymore.
She was an alien being, a threat to this world.
If he had the power... He would certainly just eliminate her.
However, things were much different; her overwhelming power meant he could simply never do such a thing.
He had to work around it and find another way to see if she was truly trustworthy.
But how?
He couldn't even tell or read what was inside of her head; she was a complete enigma.
"You're very suspicious, aren't you, Seth? You're strange. How was it possible for you to battle the Primal King so evenly for a few minutes?" she wondered. "You're not a returnee like me, right? Your powers, abilities, and even your soul can't ever be compared to mine. So how?"
Seth felt the powerful pressure of her aura weighing him down. The man tried to keep himself standing, but her presence was overwhelming.
Also, she was very tall!
Seth had thought he was tall at 1.84cm, but this woman was clearly over two meters!
She looked down on him with a domineering gaze, which was strangely charming.
"Well, I have been blessed by the grace of many gods," Seth explained. "I've been given information and many tips; thanks to their help, I was able to get this far."
Seth activated several skills to make his lies more convincing. His voice, his confident demeanor, and his sharp eyes—anyone would have easily fallen for such a lie.
Yet…
"You're lying," she said. "You're a terrible liar at that... Do you think I would ever believe such bullshit, Seth?"
Bing Xue stepped forward, her powerful presence only making the young Regressor tremble.
How did things become like this?
This wasn't supposed to happen!
He was the Regressor, a man who would change the future and save Earth!
With all his knowledge and all his powers, he was supposed to become the main character of this story.
Yet, a variable that he could have never predicted appeared.
Someone who could even make the regressor tremble in fear.
"I… I am lying, yes," he said, deciding not to fight anymore. "I'm sorry…"
"…" Bing Xue looked at him with a menacing glare, but her face quickly changed into a cheerful and motherly smile. "Is that so? Well! It's fine; mortals are like children; they lie all the time. I must teach them how to be proper adults. Now, now, Seth, please tell me... What exactly are you?"
Her gentle demeanor changed instantly as her sharp eyes suddenly glowed with red light. Seth felt her overwhelming gaze; it felt like he wasn't just facing a beautiful, tall woman.
No.
It felt like he was in front of an absolute being, something beyond his own understanding!
It was like a pillar of pure light, piercing the skies and everything with a single eye, gazing through his very existence.
Had he ever fought against such a being before?
No, never, even when he reached as high as Floor 96 in the tower.
"I…"
The Regressor, someone with a power that would only confuse people and make him sound suspicious, was now considering explaining what he truly was.
He had no other option; Seth had to gamble and see if Bing Xue was truly someone righteous who wanted to protect Earth.
"I am a regressor," he confessed. "I come from the future, exactly ten years from now."
"Oh?" Bing Xue had never expected such a revelation.
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