The room pulsed with tension.
Lin Chen stood in the center of the abandoned facility, every muscle in his body coiled tight like a spring. The dark-cloaked figures from Erebus remained at the edges, watching him with calculating silence. No one moved. No one spoke. Then, the lights flickered again—once, twice—and a slow mechanical hum echoed through the building.
From the far end of the hall, a door hissed open. The temperature in the room dropped several degrees. Lin Chen's breath misted in front of him. Footsteps. Calm. Deliberate.
A tall man in a tailored obsidian suit stepped out, not masked like the others, but very much at ease. He moved with the kind of casual precision that sent alarms ringing in Lin Chen's bones. Silver hair brushed back from a chiseled face, and beneath arched brows, a pair of violet eyes gleamed with otherworldly intelligence.
System Notification:"WARNING: Host-level energy spike detected. Anomaly Class: Temporal Manipulator.""Threat Level: S+."
Lin Chen narrowed his eyes.
"You must be the one they call the Timewalker," he muttered.
The man offered a thin smile.
"They call me many things. But yes, I am the third Host. The one gifted with the most precious resource in existence—time."
System Analysis Initiated...Host Class: Temporal AnomalyAbility: Short-Term Chrono-Reversal – Can rewind personal time up to 7 seconds, once every 30 seconds.Status: Memory Core Locked / Combat Intent Confirmed.
The man tilted his head, observing Lin Chen like a biologist might inspect a newly discovered specimen.
"You're impressive," he said. "Your system has evolved faster than expected. I was told to retrieve the girl, but... now that I see you, I'm tempted to collect you too."
Lin Chen didn't flinch.
"You'll have to kill me first."
"Oh, I plan to try."
With a single step, time fractured.
One moment, Lin Chen stood ready. The next, the Timewalker blurred—vanishing, then reappearing at Lin Chen's side, a fist already swinging toward his ribs.
System Auto-Defense Activated: [Quantum Dodge Lv.2]
Time slowed just enough for Lin Chen to twist away, the blow grazing his jacket. But as he countered with a sharp elbow strike, the man vanished—reappearing five feet behind him, untouched.
"You already lost that exchange," the man said calmly. "But you won't remember. That's the curse of facing me."
Lin Chen's fists clenched.
So this was the real power of time manipulation—not just speed, but complete mastery of cause and effect.
Lin Chen's mind worked furiously. Every move he made, every strike, every feint—undone within seconds if his opponent simply rewound his own timeline. There was no way to predict, no way to outmaneuver.
Unless...
"System," Lin Chen whispered mentally, "how do I beat someone who can undo every mistake?"
System Suggestion: Activate Passive Prediction Protocol. Synchronize with Host's combat pattern history.Estimated Success Rate: 18%.Risk: EXTREME.
"Do it anyway."
The fight accelerated into something unseeable by the naked eye.
To onlookers, it was a flurry of flickering figures and afterimages, Lin Chen and the Timewalker vanishing and reappearing in brutal, balletic exchanges across the broken floor. Lin Chen's instincts sharpened with every step, trying to force the opponent into burning his chrono-rewind early—baiting him, faking openings, attacking in unexpected angles.
But every time Lin Chen landed a solid hit, the man would reset the timeline—returning to the moment before the blow, and altering his stance.
System Notification:"Opponent Chrono-Reversal cooldown active. Window of vulnerability: 4.8 seconds."
"Now," Lin Chen growled.
He dove forward, executing a rising knee to the jaw—only for the man to sidestep and backhand Lin Chen into a concrete pillar.
He coughed blood but smiled.
"That was different."
The Timewalker frowned slightly.
"You noticed."
Lin Chen grinned through the pain.
"You changed your counter. Which means... even you can't fully predict what I'll do next, can you?"
System Activation: Logic Penetration Lv.1 – Temporarily enhance pattern breakdown of target behavior.Processing combat logs... Calculating 6 counter routes...Synchronization Achieved: 36%.
"Gotcha."
Lin Chen suddenly shifted his approach, throwing off his own timing, using micro-pauses in movement to confuse his opponent's temporal awareness.
The Timewalker struck—but Lin Chen had already ducked, twisted, and delivered a precisely timed blow to the solar plexus.
For the first time, the man stumbled.
The Timewalker hissed and tried to activate his chrono-reversal—too late. The cooldown hadn't finished.
Lin Chen surged forward, combining his enhanced strength, Precision Forcefield, and Quantum Dodge to unleash a flurry of punishing strikes. The enemy raised a defensive barrier of shimmering time—a distortion in reality—but Lin Chen smashed through it.
"This timeline... belongs to me!"
He landed a decisive strike to the Timewalker's chest. A glowing fragment of code burst from the man's body as he dropped to one knee.
System Notification:"You have defeated a Host-class anomaly.""Acquired: Temporal Module Fragment x1.""New Module Available: [Fate Distortion – Passive Lv.1]"Description: Temporarily increase resistance to timeline manipulation.
System Alert: Critical Memory Fragment Detected.Initiating Sync...
The room pulsed as Lin Chen's system absorbed the defeated Host's data. But before he could inspect it further, the Timewalker raised his head, eyes glowing with raw hatred.
"You think this is over? Erebus never fights alone."
And then, with a sudden shimmer, the man vanished—not teleported, but erased himself from that moment in time.
Lin Chen collapsed to one knee, exhausted, his hands trembling from the exertion.