An hour remained before the update timer's end. Most players had finished their undone quests, and any untied loose end had been dealt with.
The guilds had recalled all their players to their headquarters, so everyone restarted in one spot. The fighting around the top ten guilds had died down completely.
Very few players could be seen wandering around the cities and villages, which felt weird to the natives. They had gotten used to the abnormals' presence over time, and suddenly losing sight of them was unnerving.
Across the three continents of New Eden, and even on the many islands spread across its seas, players everywhere were getting ready to log out. Some would wait until the last minute, but most logged out preemptively.
Among all the population of players, very few would get logged out forcefully by the system. But amongst all these, one player was still unaware of the update that was about to happen.
Inside a cave, affected in weird manners by time, a single Fey player was still meditating on a rock in the middle of a small pond. This player, Chronos, had no one to remind him that the update was coming, and could not receive world announcements.
His mind was so hooked on learning new magic that he never even thought about looking at his interface clock. The alarms about his pod needing new IV bags didn't reach his interface, as the cave was sealed from any outside interference.
Tyr was looking at his intense focus, and with his ever-seeing eyes, he could see the boy was affecting, if ever so slightly, the time threads around him.
Tyr was the god of time, which meant he was aware of what was coming and what had happened in every timeline that ever existed. His eyes saw the past, present, and future at the same time.
So when he met Chronos, he was already seeing things the man would do later in his life, and what had already happened in a changed timeline. This boy had found him in his last timeline, too.
But things had been different. Looking at the broken threads of time attached to Chronos, he could read exactly what had happened.
'That timeline needs to cease to exist. It can never come to pass.'
The atrocities Tyr could see in the threads of time that connected to that timeline were not something that should ever befall any world. He didn't understand how he, in that timeline, didn't do something about it.
Although gods were strictly forbidden to alter time, Tyr believed that ending a world meant losing any part of that world that came from them. This implied that they would lose power.
And from what he gleaned of that forlorn timeline, nothing much would be left of the world. He couldn't understand how the gods didn't react before that.
From those visions, he could see who had led this to happen, and anger rose inside him. The same god who forbade everyone from intervening in mortal lives and their future was the one to lead to their end.
'Gaius. You loathsome being. How did we let you become so conceited that you think you can break the rules you implemented millennia ago?'
Tyr couldn't break his word to Gaius, so he would still force time forward, as he had sworn to the god, but he loathed the control Gaius had over things. He could feel his intentions were off.
Looking back to Chronos, the god sighed silently.
"Young Fey. I have something to do. I will be back in a little over an hour."
Chronos only nodded once, trying to keep focused on his senses.
Silently hoping the changes in the timeline this time were enough, Tyr disappeared from the cave.
Reappearing on the top of his mountain, Tyr grew in size again. A web of gold and blue lines appeared over the mountain.
Raising his hand to the sky, a single thread lowered itself down to him. From this thread, Tyr started weaving a complex array, connecting multiple points, making the complete piece he was weaving look like an endless spiral.
Once he was done, he gently tapped the bottom, sending it back to the web. As it reconnected with the web of time, the spiral stretched out, grabbing countless amounts of threads, and attaching to them.
The contraption Tyr had weaved out of time itself, served as a highway, of sorts. It connected points in time together, allowing the flow of time to happen at a faster rate.
This would allow the ten-year period that Gaius asked to pass in a much quicker fashion to those outside of it. Of course, Tyr could guess that the only people outside of that were the abnormals and their world.
Already getting visions of events bound to happen in the next ten years, a single tear of blood escaped Tyr's eyes.
'So much bloodshed. All of this, for what purpose?'
Tyr sat on his throne for a while, to watch his work go into effect. It was too late to change things now.
***
Far away from the mountain floating in the sky, in another mountain on the ground, Astaroth was now heavily panting, his breath a staccato. Large beads of sweat were dripping off his entire body.
But amidst his heavy breathing and his clearly exhausted body, the Ash Elf was smiling.
Astaroth let himself drop to his back, looking at the bright white ceiling, and letting out tired laughter.
His mind was wracked with intense pain, and his heart felt like it was about to explode. His soul was still reeling from what he had gone through, but the smile never left his lips.
Lifting his arm tiredly above his head, Astaroth looked at his middle finger. Sitting at its base was a beautiful black ring with a gleaming green gem.
He could already feel his soul connecting to the ring, and all of its inhabitants. The surge in power felt incredible.
Letting another fit of laughter escape his mouth, Astaroth exclaimed victory.
"Hahaha! I did it! I beat every single one of you!"
Coming from his right, the voice of Solomon sounded.
"What now, boy?"
After a moment of thought, and a glimpse at the update timer, Astaroth responded.
"Now, I'm going home."
Fifteen minutes remained before the forced log out.
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