The wind was silent. Not still — silent.
Even the whispers of the system were hushed here.
Lin Xian stepped into the next realm… and the world around him cracked like glass under pressure.
> [Entering Zone: Temporal Ruin – Trial of the Fifth Seal]
Known As: Temple of the Time-Eater
Status: Reality Fragmented.
Hostile Presence Detected: Chrono-Class Entity
⚠ Memory Instability: Past may overwrite present. Tread carefully.
Before him stood a spiral temple of obsidian and bone. Time itself unraveled around it — trees growing and dying within seconds, ruins rebuilding and collapsing in eternal cycles.
The moment he stepped forward, the system flared:
> [Warning: Linear existence compromised.]
Trial Activated – Seal 5: Confront the Devourer of Time.
---
🕯 Inside the Temple
Candles lit themselves.
The walls shimmered, showing fractured reflections — not of his face, but of versions of himself:
Lin Xian as a tyrant clad in dragonbone.
Lin Xian as a wanderer in rags, holding Aurelia's frozen corpse.
Lin Xian kneeling… before Velkaris.
He gritted his teeth.
"I choose none of these fates," he said.
And that's when it arrived.
---
🕱 Entity: The Time-Eater
The room darkened.
A massive figure emerged from the shadows of the shifting timeline — tall, robed in black and gold, its face a swirling clock of reversed runes, eyes like vanishing stars.
> [Entity Class: Temporal Apex – The Time-Eater]
"You walk into the mouth of endings, and dare defy the written loop?"
"I will not kill you, Lin Xian. I will make you regret being born in time at all."
It raised one hand.
The air froze. The stone floor became ancient, then new, then forgotten.
---
⚔ Time Battle Begins
> [System Trait Activated: Ember of Regret]
Resistance: Temporal Delusion: 32%
Skill Unlocked: Soulburn – Rewind Denial Slash
Lin Xian's blade ignited with flame that shouldn't exist. Not fire… but something older.
Whisperfang vibrated — aware. Awake.
He struck once — and time bled.
The world twisted.
He wasn't attacking flesh.
He was slashing through moments.
Each strike erased a second from the entity's existence.
But the Time-Eater retaliated — reaching into Lin's past.
Suddenly—
> He was nine again.
Alone. Hungry. Locked beneath the schoolhouse after his mother's death.
The memory was too strong. Real.
He dropped to one knee.
The Time-Eater's voice echoed:
> "Every strong man was once a scared child. I will bury you in that child."
---
🔥 Inner Fire Ignites
But Lin Xian laughed.
A laugh made of grief and madness.
He stood, eyes glowing.
"You think you own my past? I carry it as armor."
> [Fifth Seal Broken – Power Unleashed: Godflame Core]
Trait Gained: Temporal Resistance Tier I
Skill: Ash-Step – Move through fractured time
His body flickered — then blurred — as he stepped between the seconds.
One strike. Then another.
The Time-Eater screamed — not in pain, but in erasure.
> [Entity Eliminated. Time-Rift Stabilized.]
[Seal 5 of 9 Unlocked]
Reward: Time-Forged Ember Core – Enhances speed, reflexes, temporal awareness
---
Lin Xian sheathed Whisperfang.
The world around him faded into calm.
But not silence.
Because now, he could hear the ticking.
Not from the temple. Not from the world.
From within himself.
---
> [System Whisper: "Only four seals remain, Flamebearer."]
"But the gods now see you not as a player…
They see you as a threat."