Shortly

Something about it still seemed off. Plus, he was having a hard time wrapping his mind around how time could possibly work like that despite his Time affinity.

How could he become the man that was capable of reversing the flow of time in the first place if he needed the help of his future self to even pass the trial in the first place?

It was like a chicken and the egg situation, but even worse than usual because it was just an outright paradox no matter how you answered…

The only way this would make any sense was if the purpose of his future self wasn't just to help him pass, but rather to speed up the process.

In fact, now that Ryu thought about it…

Before, he had thought about creating a technique that would allow him to reforge his foundation. What if this was similar?

But if that was the case… he was doing a very bad job. There were still many holes in his foundation now, and it felt like too little had been done in that regard.