Xavier deactivated the Time Alteration spell and took a breath of air. He blinked, looking around.

The air smelled fresher than it had before. He gazed past the clearing he’d created for the purposes of the fight with the C Grade Fetid Forest Troll and his eyes widened at what he saw.

The rot that had infected every inch of this part of the forest was now gone. The trees were no longer oozing black liquid, the colour of the plants returned to greens and reds and purples. Even the sun seemed to shine brighter down on the area.

“Huh,” Xavier said.

Rhaalir appeared, standing beside the dead Fetid Forest Troll. The elf-spirit looked a little dumbfounded as he stared at the downed beast. You… you did it.

Xavier tilted his head to the side, looking over at the elf. The elf hadn’t been there when he cast the spell to see the Spirit of Time. He hadn’t seen the woman appear. Hadn’t been a part of what they had both seen.

Xavier looked at the spirit. Did you ever doubt I would?

Rhaalir shrugged his shoulders, almost as though the elf didn’t care, but Xavier was beginning to think that the spirit was starting to care about what happened to him.

I figured the chances of you dying were rather high. Maybe 95 percent.

Xavier frowned. He was about to make some quip, when he thought back to the first two versions of him, and what this beast had done to them…

Two versions of me died facing this thing, he thought to himself. One version of me ran. And two, not including me, defeated it… but only because they had learned from each iteration before them.

He stepped over to the Fetid Forest Troll and wondered, not for the first time, if the risks he was taking would one day lead to his death. That version of him who had died the first time… he had seemed as though he thought he was invincible. As though death couldn’t possibly be visited upon him.

And yet, that man was now gone forever.

He wondered, for a moment, what that would mean for Earth, but… he really didn’t want to dwell on that.

It’s a whole other universe. There’s nothing I can do about it, he thought to himself before he looked over at Rhaalir once more. It was a risk I was willing to take, and it paid off.

They won’t always, Rhaalir muttered in Xavier’s mind, and Xavier couldn’t help but feel the truth of those words.

Notifications popped up in his vision, and they held his interest far more than the conversation he’d just been having.

The kill notification came first. Unfortunately, he was unable to receive any Mastery Points until he triggered the advancement to D Grade, so everything he’d gained from killing the beast just… didn’t do anything for him. But that was alright—he would have no shortage of Mastery Points once he advanced.

Advancement… that’s right around the corner now.

He smiled to himself and read the next notification.

Title unlocked!

C Grade Killer

You have slain your first C Grade enemy on your own.

Welcome to the big leagues.

You have received +250 to all stats!

Title Unlocked!

C Grade Demolisher

You have slain a C Grade enemy by yourself that is at least one grade higher than your own. It is rare that a Denizen of the Greater Universe can accomplish this feat.

This is an epic title.

You have received +500 to all stats!

Title Unlocked!

C Grade Destroyer

You have slain a C Grade enemy by yourself that is at least two grades higher than your own.

No other Denizen in the Greater Universe has achieved such a feat.

This is a unique title.

You have received +1,000 to all stats!

The System is offering to grant you a boon and wishes for you to decide what option to take.

1. Higher Value Race Upgrade

2. Higher Value Class Upgrade

3. Permanent Attribute Boost

Receiving such a boon is rare and almost unheard of in the Greater Universe. Make you decision wisely.

One cannot walk backward on the path.

Xavier read through the different notifications. There was a part of him that was a little surprised he hadn’t received more than these, but then again, he knew was just getting greedy.

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The rewards he gained from these titles were immensely powerful, and he could already feel the strength of them, the instant shift in himself as his attributes were raised.

And something told him there would be more value in what he had just achieved than these titles. Doing something as he had… it would gain him recognition around the Greater Universe that he wouldn’t have been able to get without doing it.

And that recognition started with Gimble.

Actually, it started with Rhaalir. The elf might be from the Otherworld and not the Mortal Realm, but something told him that having his respect would help him in the long run.

More interesting than the titles he’d received was the boon from the System. It wasn’t the first time he’d gotten a boon. The last time he’d been given the skill Core Burn, and that had been because of the way he’d defeated the Lord of the Endless Horde.

He wondered about the different options. A Higher Value Race Upgrade… that was very intriguing. He had already started the journey toward altering his race from that of a normal human, something that he wasn’t sure he could stop even if he wanted to.

How much would having a higher value race upgrade help him? And what did that even mean? Perhaps Rhaalir would be able to offer some insights, or maybe he could use Otherworldly Communion to help him make the decision…

Xavier strode over to the corpse of the Fetid Forest Troll. He touched a hand to it and deposited the entire beast into one of his Storage Rings. He wasn’t sure he wanted to incorporate beast parts from something that rotted into himself, but he knew the corpse of a C Grade would be considered incredibly valuable.

I defeated a C Grade beast… The empress, the most powerful Denizen in all of the Silver River sector is only C Grade.

That was a realisation he’d had before, that he was fast approaching her level of power. He supposed the woman had seen as much already. Though she was no doubt a True Progenitor. Her power was probably more akin to that of a B Grade than a C Grade, if one were to compare.

I wonder how far away I am from that…

Xavier just stared around for a moment, taking in all he had done. The fight with the C Grade Fetid Forest Troll… the first two versions of him had been destroyed by it.

Yet here he stood, alive, without a single scratch. It wasn’t just about power—it was how one used that power, and how well prepared someone was. If he knew every move an enemy could make…

Xavier shook his head. It would rarely be possible for him to know every move an enemy could make. The only reason he’d been able to do it in this instance was because he’d summoned the Spirit of Time, and that was only something that he would be able to do every six months.

Rhaalir looked over at him. You have achieved something remarkable here, Xavier Collins. I look forward to seeing what you come up with next.

Xavier inclined his head to the elf. Rhaalir had been a good instructor. Their contract didn’t have a specific end time, and Xavier wondered if he would be gaining any new Otherworld spells when he chose his next class. If so, he would be glad to have the elf still around.

Thank you, for helping me get this far. I don’t know if I would have been able to rank up my Otherworld spells as fast without your guidance.

The elf scoffed. Of course you wouldn’t have been able to. Rhaalir shook his head. You were lost without me.

Ah, there’s that tone I’ve grown to love so much, Xavier replied.

He glanced around the area once more. He could hear things in the forest he hadn’t before, and the wind—which had been still the first time he’d walked through here—was beginning to stir the leaves on the branches. A bird flew overhead, and somewhere in the distance a roar sounded.

This area of the forest was coming alive again, now that the Fetid Forest Troll had been defeated. Xavier couldn’t help but wonder if this would be like what would happen on the Dark Mountains, when The Nightmare was finally slain.

He looked forward to seeing that.

Now that he had defeated a C Grade beast, and by himself no less, he knew that the chances of defeating The Nightmare had risen. Even though he was a subcommander in the raid group, that was still something he didn’t feel safe doing with Gimble and the others, not when Liana’s husband’s life might be at risk.

Fortunately, fighting The Nightmare wasn’t something on Gimble’s agenda. Like the C Grade dragon Xavier wished to go after, apparently The Nightmare was on another level completely to the C Grade beasts they’d been coming up against.

Gimble didn’t want to risk a fight like that.

Xavier contemplated heading back to Hunter’s Home. He was still E Grade, at the absolute peak of E Grade, and he was 99.99 percent sure that he was the most powerful E Grade that had ever lived.

Were there other things that he could accomplish in this state? Were there things he needed to do, before pushing onward to the next rank, that he had been neglecting? The last thing he wanted to do was move too fast and miss something…

But then, he didn’t want to second guess himself, either. He vividly remembered the second version of himself that had gone up against the Fetid Forest Troll. That version of him had been far too cautious and timid. He had been second guessing himself the entire time during the fight, after seeing himself get killed.

And not just seeing it. He’d felt the pain of that death as though it were happening to him.

Xavier shuddered just thinking about it.

Being in that frame of mind, having that lack of confidence, it was what had gotten that second version of him killed, as much as it had been the Fetid Forest Troll.

I’ve pushed myself hard enough, done more than anyone could be expected to at this grade. Now, it’s time for me to keep pushing forward. I can’t keep putting this off forever.

Xavier didn’t return to Hunter’s Home. He didn’t want his advancement to happen there, with all the other people watching. He wanted to go somewhere where it would just be him. He knew that Gimble and his party would be waiting at the tavern to hear about what had happened with the Fetid Forest Troll, but the dwarf could wait—in fact, he would probably appreciate the excuse to spend a little extra time in the tavern.

Xavier supposed he could have returned to the Staging Room for this. That would have been the safest place for him to go through something like this, as he would be all alone, the System preventing anyone from being able to enter the same instance as himself.

But he wasn’t feeling worried about his safety. He had other ways of guaranteeing that.

He walked a little ways deeper in the forest, journeying through the territory that once belonged to the Fetid Forest Troll. Though sounds were now beginning to return to the forest, the place was absolutely deserted. After a little while of walking, following the trail the Fetid Forest Troll had left as it had made its way to face Xavier, he came upon a cave. The entrance and the ceiling within were large enough that the troll would have had no trouble walking through it, and indeed muddy footprints led inside the cave, ones large enough to have been made by the troll.

Xavier walked inside what had once been the domain of a C Grade beast, wondering what he would find. All he was really looking for was a bit of seclusion, somewhere to activate his advancement to the next rank.

The cave smelled wretched, and part of him regretted his decision to come through here. But it was easy enough for him to filter out the stimuli and ignore it.

There was nothing special about the cave. There were no decorations on the walls. As he walked through a tunnel, he saw nothing of note—until he came upon a large chamber.

To one side of the chamber was a massive bed, with soiled linen. Xavier had imagined the troll would have slept on the ground, but apparently he was wrong.

There wasn’t much else in this place. In one corner was a stack of bones that had been picked clean, bite marks evident in them. There was a single, large wooden chair and a table. No books to be seen—but Xavier couldn’t imagine the troll reading.

None of that was interesting, but what was interesting was the chest at the back of the room. It looked a hell of a lot like the loot boxes that Champions received any time they finished a tower floor. Xavier had never seen a loot box be a reward for defeating a C Grade beast, and he’d been a part of the raid group for a few weeks now. Gimble certainly hadn’t mentioned loot boxes.

But perhaps that was simply because this wasn’t a loot box in the strictest sense—it was simply a chest. Somewhere for the C Grade beast to keep its valuables.

What does a troll think of as valuable?

Xavier walked over to the chest a knelt in front of it. He undid the latch and levered it open on creaking hinges.