Luke was running in the darkness, making his way through the bare forest.
The only source of light in this pitch black landscape was Luke’s lantern.
Luke had a wind blade ready in his right hand as he was running, ready to kill any Gleems that he runs into. So far he hasn’t ran into any, as he left the house only minutes ago.
‘How come that I can’t find any Gleems when I actually go looking for them?’
Luke would only hunt Gleems for now, and only fight N’Gool if he comes across him, as he knew that there was only a small chance that he could put up proper resistance.
‘Oh, I think I can see one!’
Luke was running towards a Gleem, and then threw out his wind blade.
*Swoosh!*
The Gleem turned its head towards Luke, noticing the out-of-place light that the lantern emitted.
The wind blade made its way through the pitch black surroundings, and just as the Gleem was about to let out a screech, the wind blade accurately cut into the Gleem’s neck, separating its head from the rest of its body.
*Slice, squirt!*
‘Aaaaaaaaaaand… Strike!’
Luke approached the Gleem’s corpse, and kneeled down, absorbing its tiny wind elemental.
‘Hunting Gleems is much easier now, as expected.’
Luke reminisced about the pair of silver robed people.
‘Although, I can only rest easy once I reach the level of those two…’
Not knowing how long such an endeavor would take, Luke stood up and continued running, searching for yet another Gleem to hunt.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
As Luke strengthened his wind elemental throughout the night, his speed and perception barely got any better, but he could more accurately control the wind.
‘That should be the 17th one in total.’
Luke was standing next to a butchered Gleem corpse. He had slaughtered a grand total of 11 Gleems tonight.
While Luke was lost in thought, he heard a male voice behind him.
“Hey there! Did you perhaps happen to see an old man around here?”
Luke’s heart drooped as he slowly turned his head around.
He made eye contact with a pair of dark blue eyes.
It was Mark, with Alissia standing right behind him.
Luke’s eyes widened for a split second and then went back to normal.
‘Son of a… I’ll need to talk my way out of this.’
Luke calmly thought about what to say and then opened his mouth.
“Hello! I haven’t really seen any people around here, let alone an old man.”
Mark tilted his head.
“Oh, is that so? Well that’s a shame…”
Mark then glanced at the Gleem corpse.
“Why are you even killing such puny creatures in this desolate place? Also, in the middle of the night of all times? Are you perhaps here for target practice?”
Luke then glanced at the Gleem corpse and then turned his head back around to look at Mark, answering with a straight face.
“I’m simply killing them as a way to strengthen my wind elemental.”
Mark’s eyes then twinkled.
“No way! Don’t tell me you have both the Capturing and the Transfusion artifacts?!”
Luke got confused.
‘Artifacts?’
“Not really, no?”
Mark’s eyes then narrowed.
“How are you collecting and incorporating the elementals into your soul then? I’m sure that you’re well aware that you can’t do such a thing without either of those artifacts? Except if…”
‘I got a bad feeling about this.’
Mark looked at Alissia, both of them nodding their heads simultaneously.
Mark started gathering wind around his body.
Luke surrounded his legs, up to his knees, with wind.
‘If I remember correctly…’
Mark rushed out and tried performing a right jab on Luke, but instead ended up only punching the empty air.
Luke used the memories of the previous loop to his advantage, dodging to his right, and shot out a wind blade aimed at Mark’s legs at point blank range.
The wind blade scattered as soon as it made contact with the wind that was surrounding Mark.
‘I’d like to say that I didn’t expect that, but I’d only be lying to myself…’
Mark rotated his hips, and thrust his left elbow directly into Luke’s face.
*Bam!*
Luke crashed into the dry ground, knocking the air out of his lungs.
“Cough, cough!”
Mark instantly mounted Luke, holding him down and not giving him even the slightest gap to recover.
Mark looked into Luke’s dazed eyes.
“Talk. What do you know about the old man?”
Alissia approached the now incapacitated Luke, and looked as if she’d pierce right into Luke’s soul with only a single glance from her abyss-like black eyes.
Mark continued talking.
“Look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. This right now is the easy way. Trust me, you really don’t want to see how the hard way looks like.”
Luke smirked at the pair.
“Keke… If you’re gonna kill me, just do it already.”
Luke knew that there’s no way he’d get out of this alive.
Mark turned his head and glanced at Alissia, prompting the woman to heave a sigh.
“I’ll take over. Go and wait over there.”
Alissia pointed to a relatively nearby tree.
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Mark turned his head back and whispered to Luke, smirking.
“Looks like you choose the hard way…”
Mark dismounted Luke, but Luke didn’t even try standing up.
‘It would be useless to even attempt an escape, I might as well try getting some more information, as I’m basically dead at this point.’
“Look, let’s make a deal. I’ll tell you everything that I know about the old man, but you’ll also give me some information in return. It’s a win-win situation.”
Alissia raised her eyebrow.
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“What makes you think that you’re in any position to propose such a deal?”
Alissia stretched her right arm out, and moved it in a downwards motion.
Strong wind suddenly pushed down on Luke, who was just about to sit up.
‘This goddamn bitch!’
“What do you know about the old man?”
Luke glared at Alissia.
“Screw you.”
Alissia narrowed her eyes.
“Is that so?”
Alissia moved her outstretched arm further downwards, causing the wind that was pressuring Luke to become three times as strong.
“This is your last chance.”
Luke was struggling to even breathe, his whole body suffering under the immense pressure.
He grinned and managed to open his mouth.
“Screw. You.”
Alissia clenched her outstretched hand into a fist.
*Splat!*
Luke instantly turned into a bloody splatter, coloring the dry ground scarlet in the dead of the night.
A silver light floated up from the pool of blood, shining out in a bright blue hue.
Alissia’s face contorted, as she reached her arm out once more.
“Such a thing cannot b-”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Luke gasped.
“Cough! Cough!”
He brushed his face over, and looked around him.
*Screeeeeeeeeeeee!!*
Surely enough, a Gleem was already charging at him from his behind.
Luke was holding a thick, sharpened stick.
He snorted, and instead formed a wind blade and simply threw it at the Gleem, as if it was bothersome to him.
The Gleem was diagonally split in half, its guts flowing out on the reddish-brown dirt.
Luke threw the stick away and made sure to absorb the tiny wind elemental.
‘That’s 18.’
Luke once again examined his surroundings.
It was around late afternoon, and judging by the stick that he threw away, and his battered knuckles, this was the point in time right after he went mad because N’Gool crushed him to death.
‘That feels like such a long time ago…’
Back when he went mad, he killed two Gleems, and then proceeded to kill three more. The one laying on the ground right now should be one of the latter.
‘I still have plenty of time left to hunt for even more Gleems.’
Another bonus of going back in time over and over again was that he had a seemingly unlimited supply of dry meat and water.
‘Although, I’ll stop dying at some point, so I should find an alternate source of food and water as well.’
He glanced at the Gleem’s corpse.
‘Food shouldn’t be an issue. As for the water though…’
Luke came up empty handed with a solution for that particular problem.
Thinking of problems, there was also one of those waiting for him back in the house.
‘I should go and get rid of the old man’s corpse right away, as I’m relatively close to the house.’
Luke remembered how Mark enveloped his whole body in wind, and tried replicating it.
‘Huh, not yet I guess. But this is also pretty good.’
The most Luke could do was surround his legs in wind, up to his knees, and also his arms, up to his elbows.
Luke started running towards where the house was, and arrived there in under a minute.
‘I’m so much faster now than when I first appeared in this forest. It’s incredible.’
Luke opened the door. He pinched his nose as he walked in.
‘Come to think of it… I never searched the old man’s corpse. He could have something useful on him.’
Luke kneeled down and started patting down the old man’s corpse.
Sure enough, the old man indeed had some very useful things on him.
‘A pocket watch… I will finally be able to tell exactly how far I can go back in time with this.’
Next up, Luke picked up a folded up piece of paper.
Unfolding it, Luke’s eyes greatly widened.
“Hahaha… Someone’s gotta be kidding me.”
What Luke was looking at was a map of this forest, along with a few areas surrounding it.
The thing he needed the most was right in front of him this whole time.
Luke folded the map back up, and continued patting the old man’s corpse.
Luke found one more item, also vital to navigating his way out of this forest.
‘A compass… I can’t believe that I kept getting rid of the old man’s corpse over and over again without searching it even once…’
Luke attached the pocket watch to his belt, and put both the compass and the map in his pants’ pocket.
“Let’s go old man.”
Luke picked the old man’s corpse up once again, gathered wind around his legs, and ran out of the house.
He soon found an open plain and laid the old man’s corpse down on the ground.
Luke gathered the wind into a half-ball shape, and started digging.
‘After this long, I can at least do this much.’
Luke finished digging a hole pretty fast, and picked up the old man.
He placed the old man into the newly dug hole, and pushed the dirt back into the hole using a wide, flat chunk of wind.
He found a big branch nearby, and planted it vertically into the dry ground, right next to the now closed-up hole, marking the old man’s grave.
“Rest in peace, geezer.”
Luke gathered wind around his legs, and started running straight into the forest.
‘It’s hunting time.’