Reaper's Resurgence - Book 6 - Chapter 22 (Patreon)

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Table of Contents

Click the following link for Chapter 22:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NsF96FbleBUrLOPipdALTh4YQF31M4u3iHZAlhxFEyM/edit?usp=sharing

Or you can read the unformatted version below:

Outside the Trial Tower

“Why are you interfering?” the Quantum Enforcer asks after appearing next to Zal swinging his blade to strike his neck with a seal instead of an execution strike. Only to vanish again a moment later and reappear over a dozen meters away after his attack misses. “You can’t genuinely think of her as your daughter, can you? She has no connection to you or the position of Quantum Architect anymore. It would be far easier for us both if you would stand down and let me handle the threat.”

Zal narrows his eyes a little as he begins restructuring the universe around them to avoid any attacks against him. All while attacking the Quantum Enforcer with fragments of reality around them.

“Staying quiet?” the Quantum Enforcer says, sounding irritated. “You are still necessary for the universe, and it would be a crime to break that balance. So I will seal you away until the matter of the threat to the universe is dealt with.”

“You mean the threat to yourself,” Zal eventually speaks, growing irritated at how the Quantum Enforcer keeps trying to accuse Lexi of threatening the universe itself. Just like the threat of the Corrupted One himself. “Do not put her on the same pedestal as the Corrupted One.”

“But she is on the same pedestal as him,” the Quantum Enforcer declares without pausing in his seal preparations. “A threat to Quantum Beings is a threat to the universe itself.”

Zal rolls his eyes as he begins fragmenting reality around them and launching the attacks to cancel out the Quantum Enforcer’s attempts to create his seal. Stalling for time bit by bit.

If Zal is honest with himself, not even he knows why he is helping Lexi so much. She did technically become his daughter in an energy manner after becoming the Quantum Reaper, but beyond that, they have no connection. She was simply a tool he used for his own benefit.

To start everything over from scratch.

And yet, now he can’t help but want to help her. Despite the number of times in the past that he just sat back and watched despite technically being able to assist her.

Over time, it seems he has genuinely begun thinking of her as his daughter. Even if she already has a father and doesn’t think of Zal in any such way.

Zal knows Lexi doesn’t view him as her father in return. To her, he’s just a mentor or helper of sorts.

But he doesn’t care. He isn’t absolutely certain how or why he’s begun to feel this way, but he does know one thing at the very least.

He won’t let some stubborn old mule of a Quantum Being attack Lexi.

Alexia

I grit my teeth after reappearing in the first part of the trial for the fifth time. Having been executed once more by an attack from the Quantum Enforcer’s past self.

This time I managed to get pretty far in the battle. I even critically injured the Quantum Enforcer.

Of course, the Quantum Enforcer merely reverted the damage before it could become fatal. But it is better than I’ve done in any of my previous attempts.

The main issue is that the Quantum Enforcer keeps changing up his execution strikes after a period of time passes.

He always starts by going for the neck. But after several hours pass, he changes it up and goes for the heart. Then he goes for limbs once that stops working. Changing the execution strikes to crippling strikes instead that merely attempt to cripple me.

And, if that was all, then it wouldn’t be as much of an issue.

That’s not all, though. Because all of his execution and crippling strike attacks seem to have an effect that delays and weakens any time reversal powers. So whenever he uses that once-every-ten-minutes power, I find it harder to recover from the wounds he causes.

His regular attacks don’t have this effect, but after he started using the execution attack to cripple me by attacking my limbs instead of trying to execute me, it became a problem. A big one.

It’s harder to predict him when I don’t know the exact locations he is attacking, and he seems to attack a lot faster when he isn’t going for execution strikes. Although I’m not sure why.

Maybe he’s not putting in as much energy into his crippling strikes as he was putting into the execution strikes?

Regardless, what I’m surprised most about is how that status effect of interfering with time reversal powers actually affects me this much. Since I have a skill that makes me resistant to status effects.

I glance at the skill to make sure I’m not misremembering or anything.

{Quantum Equilibrium: Due to the balanced quantum state of a Quantum Reaper, you grow naturally resistant towards any and all status effects.}

No, I’m not misremembering it. The racial skill should still be in effect.

Which means his time power interference is just that strong. Enough to make it impossible to fully reverse the damage even with this racial skill in effect.

The reason I lost this latest time was because, unlike the previous time before it when the Quantum Enforcer only managed to cause numerous deep cuts that I couldn’t fully reverse, the Quantum Enforcer managed to completely cut off one of my arms. And I couldn’t reverse it at all to regain my arm, leaving me missing an arm.

Of course, my natural regeneration using my soul would eventually regenerate my arm. Simply because I’m an Ascendant Tier. But that would take too long. Far longer than the battle itself could possibly take.

I clench my fist as I watch through the first and second parts of the trial again.

The best way to get through this trial is to make absolutely certain to avoid any and all hits. No matter how fast the Quantum Enforcer is.

I can’t let even a single crippling attack hit me.

With a plan in mind, I take a deep breath before fully focusing on studying the Quantum Enforcer in the first couple trials.