Time Passes With The Blink of An Eye

Drew opened his eyes to the familiar Eternal Meadow that he was now intimately familiar with.

'I see why the System chose the void for my original subspace...'

'Though this place has a better effect on my mental state, it still has some things that can distract my mind from the task at hand,'

'But the Meadow has its own merits. I can train combat skills here unlike in the void,'

"50 years... Passed by just like that," Drew whispered as his mind remained calm and steady.

"I wouldn't have thought it was possible... But thanks to the System, anything is possible,"

Drew stood up and gently stretched his body for just the satisfaction of the action.

The time Drew had spent in this space was 50 years, but for his mind, it wasn't so. Instead of 50 years of isolation, he instead spent a single year here. And in this year he learned many things and gained many insights. The time would have gone by faster if he didn't try out some of the ideas that he came up with while meditating.

"It is really painful that I don't have access to outside knowledge while I'm in here... and that I can't increase my physical body's strength or my body's magic," He said with a regretful sigh.

"I wasn't able to increase any of my skills besides one..."

"And even then, I'm not too sure that it will be helpful," He said while eying the skill in question.

"I increased my time affinity to lightning strike level which is in the middle of the scale,"

"And I got my Time Mastery Skill to level 4... Any further would require me to learn a specialty for it and I can't do that in here," He said while looking at the endless plain scape in front of him.

"But at least I did something of worth," He said before raising his hands into the air, throwing his scythe as he did so.

The Scythe flew into the air a decent distance before hanging in place for a few seconds before falling back down.

However just as it was about to land in Drew's outstretched hands, time seemed to slow down as it twirled at half the speed it normally would have.

"It's not a spell, but I can still affect the time a little bit with my understanding of it," He said before grabbing the slow Scythe from the air and stopping the effect.

[System Reconstruction Complete]

[User is returning to his body!]

---

With a slight wave of dizziness, Drew found himself back into the familiar tunnels of Black Street with Kull.

The Half-Giant stared at him from behind his mask with confusion and worry.

'Are you alright?' The scroll wrote in front of Drew.

"Uhg... Yeah... I should be fine," Drew said between dry heaving.

'What happened to you?'

"I got a..." Drew trailed off.

Now was the final test of trust between himself and Kull. Reveal all that is to be revealed or hide what you can. Drew frowned for a moment before finally coming to a conclusion.

"Class... I got a class," Drew said in almost a whisper.

'What?!' The quill wrote in shock.

"I got a class. After I sacrificed those items my power granted me a class,"

Drew stared down at his hands after he finally fought off nausea. Worm-like threads were twitching and writhing underneath his skin. They were both black and blue and they seemed to be assimilating with his body.

'How?! What Class?!' Kull shook as he wrote. He seemed to be almost paralyzed with worry.

"I'll be fine, I think,"

"The class is something called 'Mana Demon',"

"Apparently I now have an affinity for Mana and Demon skills and the sort,"

His eyesight began to flicker as more and more things lit up in his surroundings.

First came the waves of energy and multicolored particles that weaved and moved throughout his surroundings. Then came the small colorless nodes of energy that these particles moved to and from, almost like living strings.

After his eyes adjusted to the waves of magic in the air they went under yet another transformation.

He stared at Kull and found that he could clearly see things flowing within him. They were similar to the particles that moved throughout Flux but were fainter and more difficult to track.

He turned his gaze to the walls around him and found that where ever he focused these particles appeared.

"Mana... and Time?" Drew whispered to himself as he began to see new worlds beyond his own.

His eyes began to finally settle down, but just as he finished adjusting to the sight a blast of time particles flooded from where Black Street was from. He felt the particles throb as they were swept past his body.

'They feel... controlled and afraid,' Drew thought.

After the sudden influx of time magic, it finally seemed to calm down for a moment.

"We need to go, now!" Drew stuttered as he felt the amount of energy coming from the Guild Hall in the far distance.

It was overwhelming, It was more magic than he had ever felt before. It was the definition of Colossal.

Kull immediately started dashing down the tunnels towards the closest exit with Drew tagging along behind.

'It's closing in with us!' Drew panicked.

'I don't know what it will do... but with this amount of magical energy it can't be good!'

'I'll try what I can to stop it from targeting Kull and me,' He thought resolutely as he turned his head around and waited until the energy came into view.

It took less than a minute for the energy to catch up to them, but as soon as it came into view Drew instantly cast his only spell.

"Dispel!" He shouted, channeling his energy towards the opposing wave of sickly green mana.

His white/blue energy jetted from his body like a blazing trail as he ran, and it tackled the wave with determination, trying desperately to end this surge of magic.

"It's not working," Drew mumbled as he felt his mana being depleted quickly.

"Fine! I have no choice,"

"Kull, Stay still, I'm gonna try and protect us but it could be dangerous," Drew shouted out towards Kull as he began to use abilities he had never truly utilized before.

"Activate Mana Reaper!"

"Activate Leyline Rampage!" He shouted as loud as he could.

Normally Drew couldn't use Mana Reaper unless he was in contact with his opponent's energy, but he could also turn it on to absorb the surrounding area. But as he used it to try and dampen the incoming magic, something strange happened.

He felt the immediate surroundings become void of energy, but he also felt the spell his magic was tackling become a power source for his skill.

'It seems like even if my magic is touching theirs it works!'

But before he could rejoice at his new founding a sudden rage began to fill him from the pit of his stomach. It felt like a tsunami of heat and wrath had been unleashed from the very core of his beings and before he knew it, the energy began to be released outside of his body.

Red strands of mana began surging out of his body like leeches and began viciously devouring all the surrounding mana leylines.

It looked like lightning as it surged and crackled through the air in a flash of pure rage. After a few seconds, the strange red energy seemed to have devoured all the leylines and receded back to Drew's body... but it didn't leave.

The red light covered his body in chaotic lines of light that spread constantly and moved to his eyes which became as intense as fiery rubies.

As this red rage covered and moved up his body Drew began being consumed by it and felt his mind go blank.

'I'm so tired...' He whispered as the rage took over the majority of his mind.

'I think I'll take a little nap now,' He whispered in his mind before blacking out.

---

He awoke to the feeling of his body being utterly broken. Any movements sent red hot pain throughout his body. Even his ragged breaths seemed to draw in indescribable pain.

He opened his blurry eyes and found that he was no longer in the tunnels, but instead in an open field of grain.

"It looks like... home," He groggily whispered as the picture of his farm shack filled his mind.

As soon as Drew spoke a black dagger was placed on his throat with a clear intent to kill.

"What?!" He yelped at the sudden pressure.

"Drew!" Kull's familiar voice echoed out painfully.

"Are you... You?"

"What? I've always been me," Drew sputtered.

The blade quickly left his throat and a loud thump could be heard from behind him.

Drew forced himself up despite the pain that it caused and turned his head to look toward Kull.

"Kull... What happened?!"

The sight that greeted him was a badly injured Half-Giant who lay upon the ground helplessly. His left leg was bent at an unusual angle and blood poured out of his black and scorched armor.

"You..." Kull grunted before his body went still.

"Kull!" Drew yelled as he forced his body closer.

Silence was the only thing that answered him at that moment.

'What did I do?!'