In a park, four-year-old children are playing with each other.
A boy was looking at them enviously as he was sitting on a swing bench all alone.
Suddenly, someone tapped his shoulder from behind. The boy turned his head and saw a woman.
She was tall, slender, wearing a long coat on top of some sort of military uniform. He couldn't exactly see her face though. All he could see is her beautiful golden eyes.
Looking at her, the boy's eyes lit up in excitement, "Pretty sister, you are here."
"I promised, didn't I?" She let out a smile and pushed the bench.
He continued to swing high with a huge laugh on his face.
***
"Haaah!" Azzy opened his eyes and sat on the bed abruptly. He looked around.
It was a familiar infirmary of the academy, except that the situation was different.
Last time, he was a visitor. This time he appeared to be a patient. He first checked himself. "Phew, it looked like I was healed."
"But, what was that dream anyway?" Azzy was a little bit confused but then, since it is another unimportant dream, he threw it in the back of his head and carefully, stepped down from the bed.
Just as he walked a couple of steps, he saw four more familiar people on their respective beds like him. They are his opponents.
Upon not finding the fifth opponent, Azzy remembered the moment before the explosion. *Sigh* "In the end, I failed to save her."
"No, it's not your fault." The Reaper's voice echoed in his head. "She paid the price for siding with your enemies who tried to kill you. Not only her but the other four also paid a price similar to death."
"Death?" Azzy's eyes were widened in shock. "What are you talking about? Are they…"
"No, they aren't in a coma." Knowing the thoughts of Azzy, the Reaper explained the situation, clarifying his statement.
It appeared even more of a piece of shocking news to Azzy. Taking a look at them, he closed his eyes and entered his mindscape.
There, he saw the Reaper, as usual, standing straight while the black wolf that was chained seemed to be in slumber. If Azzy would have observed it closely, he would saw a black gem on its forehead.
However, he was filled with anger. As soon as he saw the Reaper, Azzy didn't even consider that the other party is a deity. He roared at him, "Why did you do that?"
"This is how the Justice is done." The Reaper plainly replied to him.
"Not like this." Azzy continued to roar at the Reaper. His anger is causing the rumbling of thunder in the sky within the mindscape. "All of them have five hundred years of life. And they have to spend such a life without any soul energy? Even death is a lighter punishment than this. I'll reverse the time and set things right."
"Calm down, Azrael." The Reaper shouted back at him, making Azzy flinch for a moment.
Walking towards him, the Reaper put his skeletal hand on his shoulder, "now, listen to me carefully. One, their soul orb is only damaged, not destroyed. So, their soul orbs are already healed by a peak-eight-star realm Arcana Master. Still, it will take a few years for them to reach their peak again.
Two, the girl paid for her actions. It's not her fate but if you keep on changing the timeline to save every person, the importance of karma will be lost. As the holder of the Hourglass, you have a responsibility to guard the timeline, not throw it into a mess.
Three, the kid with the Minotaur broke the rules of the tournament by letting his seals modify by someone who wanted you dead. He has the intention to kill you and I think you also know of it from the start.
Moreover, the death of the girl is also on his head. If the one that linked his soul with the Hydra hadn't act fast, there would have been two deaths by now.
Sinners like him if left unpunished, there will be more victims. And you will be responsible for all the deaths Alan will kill in the future because of your mercy. Who knows, those victims will turn out to be your friends like Gideon or Claire.
And lastly, because of my actions of saving you and at the same time, punishing your enemies, several people will want your head. The threat to your life will be increased exponentially from now onwards.
Still, in the end, you have the right to choose your future. So, make your choice. Turn back the time or let this matter go. It's all in your hands."
After giving him a choice, the Reaper waited for his answer in patience. He doesn't know what choice Azzy would pick as he could see different futures. At the very least, he was satisfied with how the rumblings of thunder stopped above.
Even though the Reaper gave him a choice, he also manipulated his decision a bit by specifically mentioning Gideon's name.
As a matter of fact, more than justice, the Reaper wanted Azzy to understand the consequences of showing compassion to the sinners. At the same time, he couldn't forgive someone who tried to kill his host.
It was he who ordered Vajra to corrupt the Minotaur with the Protos energy but its quantity was quite small. So it faced a lot of resistance from the Platinum grade beast.
But then, once Alan's soul orb became empty because of Soul Absorption skill, under the control of Reaper, the Protos energy managed to weaken its defenses and corrupted its mind.
After that, it proceeded to take over the soul orb. However, with no soul energy to merge, it tried to replace the original soul energy and got destroyed together with Alan's soul orb as a result.
Back to the present, Azzy was in deep thoughts, trying to process the things that the Reaper is trying to teach him.
When he thought for a bit, he felt like this deity of his saying is correct but at the same time, he was also a bit guilty for leaving Dove just like that when he has the power to bring her life.
While he's in a dilemma of trying to choose, the school nurse entered the ward and saw Azzy just standing in the middle of the room like a statue.
"Student Azrael, you woke up faster than I thought." She spoke to him with a smile. As a staff member of Aclein Academy, the nurse was also proud of Azzy for bringing glory to the academy.
However, to her surprise, there wasn't any reply from him.
After trying a couple of times, she felt something was wrong.
She quickly left and brought the Vice-principal with her. His four teammates, who are also waiting outside with her, hurriedly entered the ward.
"Azzy." "Azrael" "Azrael" "Rael." Claire was faster than others to hug him. Her face was pale and her eyes were already dry with all the crying for the past couple of hours.
"You don't know how much worried I was... I'm sorry, I'm not strong enough…" Claire was continuing to blabber whatever came to her mind while others just smiled in happiness.
Azzy was taken aback and returned to reality but then, looking at how his friends are worried for him, he felt a sense of blissfulness in his heart. It was at that moment, he had chosen the path.
He closed his eyes and hugged back. "Thank you."
Looking at his actions from the mindscape, the Reaper shook his head with a sigh, "It's a pity that he chose not to reverse the time because he agrees with me but because he doesn't want this moment to disappear.
Although his intentions weren't noble and were quite selfish, at the very least, his path was right. Well, no matter. In the end, the boy will walk in the path that he was destined to. Before that, he must understand that this world isn't called the material world for nothing.
He will have to become free of the illusionary material desires that are born in this world. For that to happen, I guess I have to give a little bit of push…"
As an idea formed in his head, he snapped his skeletal fingers. "I'll give you something that I have taken from you."
Meanwhile, on the outside, as Azzy hugged her in return, feeling happy on the inside, his lips stretched involuntarily and a bright smile appeared on his face.
"Eh?" The others were stunned.
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