‘Who and where am I? Did she really almost kill me with one kick? What the fuck is this situation?’

Being overpowered for a long time makes one forget standards. Samuel is at the first level of the Superior Mortal stage. The mere thought of a being at the Enlightenment stage would be enough to kill someone else at his level. He was stuck in the delusion of being invincible in the lower dimensions. However, Samuel was not resigned! Coughing out a mouthful of blood, he opened a tear in space behind him on his trajectory, using the momentum to launch another attack.

Appearing on the left of Sylvia, with the speed near the level of her kick, he condensed a spear with his Spirit Gun ability, aiming to slash her leg to incapacitate it. The spear was close to succeeding in its endeavor, yet when it was a few centimeters from hitting Sylvia, it hit a barrier of some sort. The barrier had a repulsion effect, forcing the spear to fly out of his hands, dissipating, and causing his arms to be greatly injured. His arms were twisted beyond belief, appearing similar to ropes, as the repulsion forced him to fly back yet again.

“Is that all you have? I thought you were some super monster since we were set to fight, but I guess not. You can’t even leave a dent in the passive qi barrier surrounding me.”

The distorted voice of Samuel came from the distance: “I am a super monster. How come you assumed I would be able to fight you as an equal? This is infuriating!”

Samuel is a very poor loser, especially when the rules of the game aren’t fair. This, combined with not being able to stand losing such a good posturing chance, caused him to become truly annoyed. ‘Okay, this bitch has got to go. How dare she humiliate me like this? No, I can't stand it. It’s time for demon mode.’

Although Samuel still did not know about the changes in his spatial rune and eyes, he knew he had more to offer than what he had shown up until now. The most important of those was, naturally, the time sphere.

“Gowla.”

The familiar scene of an almost transparent golden sphere, surrounded by an infinite dark-gray expanse, brought warmth to his still-recovering soul. ‘It’s good to be back. I need something to beat her. She uses spiritual qi to cultivate, but I don’t. Maybe there is something there.’ Samuel’s thought was that maybe there would be some annihilation effect of his own personal qi and hers since it was based on spiritual qi. Samuel was not fully aware of the difference between his new and old qi, but he knew there was one.

The biggest problem, however, was the fact that he did not have a long time to think, lest she attack his body again. Time was of the essence. Samuel has a few hours to think of something viable. If he can’t, he is going to face a harsh beating until he proves himself worthy of the traces of Malataincacha.

“She is reliant on spiritual qi, and I don’t sense any here, meaning replenishing her reserves would be difficult. However, she might be carrying spirit stones, so I can’t rely on this. Wait, what the fuck is wrong with my soul? Why is the new spatial rune on my soul so much clearer than it used to be?”

Realizing the rune had changed greatly, far surpassing his current gowla rune in clarity and profundity, Samuel figured there had to be some physical consequence to this change. His eyes were still glowing with that sliver glow, but it didn’t seem to have any effect on Sylvia or space. If there was a physical effect, it was a hidden one.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Didn’t I have a rune before the reset, which was glowing strongly enough on my soul that it could manifest on my body without the need to form a physique? Why can’t I remember what that rune was? No matter, another thought for another day. I need to focus. I assume that the silver glow from the soul rune is enough to slightly manifest on my body, so there has to be something to it. There has to be an effect, or multiple even. Damn, this is difficult. The worst part is that I can’t exit the time sphere to test it out, severely limiting my chances of developing anything. Let me think about what could have caused this change.”

If he could not test it, he had to know what caused it. Only then could he maybe succeed. While Samuel was thinking away in the time sphere, Sylvia was apprehensive, looking around vigilantly. There were two reasons for this: 1. in case Samuel decided to open another tear in space around her, and 2. out of fear for the being who pulled her into this weird place. If that being didn’t like her attacking Samuel like she did and decided to use underhanded means to allow him to win, she needed to be ready.

‘I still do not know what is happening here. Why would I be pulled in here to fight with a person I just met? It just doesn't make any sense. I have to report this situation to Teacher Nicholas and the rest of the sect. My protection artifacts did nothing to stop the teleportation, meaning nothing in the Shattered Realm can. This is a massive, unseen danger.’

Sylvia had a lot of thoughts swirling inside her head, but one was more prevalent than the others: Where is Samuel? Samuel, if we base our logic on the two previous attacks, would have attacked her more than ten more times in this period, yet he did not attack even once. This was highly suspicious behavior! Especially after he confirmed he was a super monster. Sylvia was naturally aware that one madman's ramblings did not necessarily equal truth, but she did not dare take it as a lie. After waiting for about twelve seconds, she decided that enough was enough and lunged in the direction of Samuel. ‘I should go a little harder this time.’ At that thought, a white flame started to surround her legs, covering them fully. She looked like a flaming swan as she flew through the dark stalagmite mountains towards the blood lake, where Samuel lay. A kick of righteous fury was directed towards Samuel’s precious face, at a speed barely perceivable by the human eye. Almost as if sensing the incoming danger, Samuel’s eyes shot open, making a shining silver glow cover an area of two meters around him, including Sylvia. The effects of this glow were shocking, as it seemed to have nothing to do with space at all.

The flames covering Syliva’s leg, the air and energy around them, the blood from the blood lake, the leaves on the hard stalagmites, and the stalagmites themselves vanished. Gone, never to be seen again. Unsure of what just happened and out of fear of the silver glow, Sylvia retreated at great speeds. ‘How can he nullify my attack and cause things to disappear like that?'

More surprised than anyone was Samuel. Wasn’t his eye power a spatial one? Then, what the hell did he just witness? It seemed more similar to an illusion power or something like that, not one of space. Luckily for him, a familiar sound echoed in his head as he was feeling perturbed.

Ding!

[Congratulations! You have unlocked the REDACTED grade innate power, Reality Shift.]

[Reality Shift: What is reality? Few know, and few ever will. What is known is that everyone has their own little realities. You can decide what reality is to you and what is not.]

[Limitations: limited to things in the same power group as you (Mortal->Enlightenment), three shifts a day, and an area limited to where your eyesight can reach.]

[This is not something distributed by the system; rather, it is the culmination of comprehension and your natural talent. This means everything about it is up to you.]

‘Reality Shift, huh? It sure sounds pretty powerful, but I seem to have only two more chances at using it today; I have to make them count. I do not have the energy to shift Sylvia out of existence, but I should be able to do so for the barrier covering her.’

A spatial tear appeared underneath Samuel, swallowing him, before another tear spit him out, flying toward Sylvia yet again. With Spirit Gun running at maximum efficiency, hundreds of bullets fired towards her at all times, with Samuel looking for the perfect opportunity to use his new power on her.

While he was waiting for an opportunity, however, a white, flaming dragon rose from the center of the bullet storm, causing them all to dissipate before the dragon continued on its path towards Samuel.

‘Shit! If I am hit by this, then I lose for sure! I made a goddamn promise; how can I fail here?' Stealing his resolve, his yet again silver and black, scary eyes emitted a silver glow, which covered the dragon in its entirety before disappearing together with it. Knowing this was his one and only shot at succeeding in the trial, Samuel wasted no time standing around; he used a Dimensional Tear ability to create ripples in space, making Sylvia slightly disoriented, before he covered her in the glow of Reality Shift, erasing her barrier with great effort. This was not enough, however. Samuel conjured his good-old Withering Wave to finish her off, knowing that this attack would drain him of everything he had left, making it his final gamble.

“Come on! Please, God, let this be enough!"