The fire should've been distant.
A storm battering the sky, slamming into ice walls and reinforced barriers, far from him.
But to Adam, it was already inside him.
Each explosion above Bai Village echoed in his bones.
Each scream of a child tore through his chest like a blade.
Each tremor underfoot reminded him: he had done nothing.
He crouched behind a shattered pillar at the village's edge, vision narrowed to the girl in silver—her arms wide, her body a bruised canvas, her breath white from overusing her Qi to keep the ice barrier alive.
She protected them all.
Even now. Even as blood trickled from her nose, even as her knees buckled, even as the enemy's flame crashed again and again against her shield.
And he—he was watching.
Again.
"Last time… it started like this too."
Adam's eyes darted to the crumbling rooftops where villagers scrambled for cover.
Old Bai, his face burnt and beard frayed, was shielding two toddlers with his bare arms.
Madam Yue was dragging someone's corpse out of a collapsed house, her eyes blank.
Lin Kuan was fighting off two enemies at once, limping, bleeding from the scalp.
Old Zhou, exhausted, yelled for reinforcements that never came.
And he—he had strength now. More than before. More than that first life where he died nameless. He was a martial artist, but merely the lowest of the bunch.
It wasn't enough. It was never enough.
"What's the point of coming back," Adam whispered, "if I still can't save them?"
The fire intensified.
The ice dome overhead pulsed and cracked with each blow, spiderwebs of orange and gold racing across its surface.
The girl was screaming now—not out loud, but inside. Her eyes clenched. Her shoulders trembling. Her back arched against the pressure of holding up the barrier while everyone leaned on her.
And still she didn't break.
"She's just a girl, she looks even younger than me…" Adam choked out.
"Why is she stronger than me?"
He dug his fingers into the dirt. Blood from his palms mixed with soil.
He wanted to move. To run. To scream.
But he was paralyzed—not by fear, but by failure and helplessness.
"I remembered it all," he thought, heart pounding. "Every face. Every fire. Every death."
"I came back so I could stop it."
"So why? Why does it feel like I'm still a spectator? A burden?"
A boy he recognized ran past, screaming for his mother.
Adam didn't know when he started crying.
He didn't know when his lips started mouthing the names of the dead.
He didn't even know whose name he was muttering when his voice cracked into a sob.
He only knew that he had failed.
Again.
Again.
Again.
"I can't let it happen again."
He looked at his hand.
The veins under his skin were faintly darker. Ever since his first death, something had festered there.
Over four different lives, the darkness has been accumulating in his chest. Dormant and unresponsive.
He had ignored it. No, he feared it and the distruction it could potentially cause.
But now…
"If it can help me move…"
"If it can help me fight…"
He placed his hand against his chest, directly above the flickering black star that had never stopped pulsing.
"Then take it, even it means O can't come back to life anymor. As long as I save them, nothing else matters."
The darkness surged.
His back arched violently as pain ripped through his body, slicing every meridian, choking every breath. His vision blurred. His ears rang. A scream tore from his throat as his bones cracked in sequence.
He felt the darkness awaken. Not slowly. Not gently.
Like a beast ripping free of a leash.
Darkness flooded his limbs, boiling, pulsing, venomous. Even his martial cultivation that has been stagnant for too long, burst forward—one, two, three realms climbed in the blink of a breath. Mid tier three, later tier three, peak tier three, initial tier two martial artist...
It kept climbing only stoping after reaching the peak of tier two martial artist.
And then he moved.
Faster than he could think, he stood grabing a broken sword next to him.
With a single swing, a wave of black mist shot upward and slammed into the dome just as a fireball was about to pierce it. The explosion was swallowed whole. Silence followed.
Everyone—villagers, attackers, even the girl—turned.
Adam stood there, a storm of shadows swirling around him, his eyes pitch black and glowing faint violet. His body was trembling. Not from pain—but from the overwhelming pressure building inside.
Old Bai's voice cracked: "What… is that?"
Old Zhou dropped his weapon. "That's not dark matter or even star energy… that's something else."
Even the enemy faltered midair.
Adam looked at his own hands—blackened and twitching.
The power was real. It obeyed him—for now at least.
He screamed. This time, with fury.
A second swing erupted. Stronger this time. The fire clouds above parted. The barrier trapping the villagers shattered like glass.
The sky opened.
The villagers gasped for air as wind finally poured in. The ice girl collapsed onto her hands and knees, her eyes still as cold as ever but with a hint of shock this time as she glanced at him.
He had done it.
He had changed the ending.
But…
Adam's knees gave out.
The power didn't leave him—it fed on him.
"It's not done…not yet..."
The situation of Bai village was still grim, they were injured and tired while their enemies were still overlooking them from the skies.
His chest cracked. Blood filled his mouth. His eyes dimmed.
He watched as the enemy regrouped midair—four masked cultivators forming a formation.
A new barrier shimmered into existence—a dome of golden light, descending quickly like a trap sealing shut. It was much weaker than the first one, but more than enough to do the job.
The last thing Adam saw was the girl rising once more to stand beside Old Bai.
The three grandmaster holding their broken weapons as they faced their death with courage and bravery.
"I couldn't stop it."
"I bought them a few seconds… That's all."
He smiled, faintly. Sadly.
"It's not enough, but it's still more than last time."
And then the darkness devoured him whole.