Adrian awoke in a sea of cold. At first he was groggy but he soon regained his mind's sharpness when he began to drown in the cold. He began crawling across the snow as he knew that the moment he stopped was the moment of his death.

"Adam? Who has bound you? Come over here and I shall free you from your bindings." A mans voice called out from the distance.

There were many possibilities as to who the voice belonged to, with the majority being dangerous and likely fatal but he still went towards the voice as it was his only hope of survival.

Adrian slowly crawled over to the location of the voice, noticing that although the snow was the same colour, it felt darker the closer to the voice he got. Darker and darker the snow felt and as it got darker it got colder. When it got to the point were it was darker than sin, It was cold enough to freeze fire solid. Then it suddenly cleared again, and the white was bright once more.

Before Adrian was a lone sword with a pocket watch hanging from the handle. The sword's blade was like a diamond, carrying a faint blue tint. The handle was slick and there was no handguard, meaning the sword would look like a random piece of metal, if not for it's beauty and craftmanship. The watch was golden, with an almost regal tint. It had roman numerals at numbers 12, 3, 6 and 9, but most importantly of all, it didn't tick. 

Adrians first move was to use the swords edge to remove his bindings. The next thing he did was stretch as he was getting a cramp from all the crawling.

"So you aren't Adam after all. I suppose that makes sense though. He has been dead for a dozen millenia or so." sighed the voice. Adrian stared at the watch before starting

"My name is Adrian, not Adam. Is the Adam you are refering to-" before Adrian finished the voice inturrupted him.

"I am refering to the first human, Adam, you resemble him in all areas but the eyes. His were blue."

Adrian stared at the pocket watch.

"I greet you Chronos, the original God."

"Hehe. What a smart child you are, what gave it away?"

"The first part is knowing the original Adam. The stories say that at first their was you, Chronos, God of time. Then you created Gaia, Goddess of the earth, and between the two of you was birthed the first thousand gods. For a while you were satisfied, however, you noticed the gods were too unchanging, too eternal, so you created Mankind with the ability to change and grow. You created Adam and Eve, who resembled You and Gaia respectively, and thus humanity was born. Although you could just be making up the fact you know Adam, further evidence proves your identity."

"Good child, please continue."

"The next is the story of how the thousand overthrew you as the emperors of the universe. The thousand had grown envious of you and started a rebellion led by Nix, God of fate. In the end they were incapable of killing you and instead they split you into a thousand pieces, one for each of them, and proclaimed themselves 'The Great Gods'. Gaia fell into greif and became irrational, birthing countless new gods, and a new era of warring gods arrived. Although Nix currently holds the throne, wars are still waged between the God Realms. But the last bit isn't important right now, what's important is that this is one of the Great Gods realms and that pocket watch is a piece of you, Chronos."

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

Adrian had finally finished explaining his deductions, exhausted after speaking for so long.

"Hahaha. Very good indeed, young Adrian. This realm is infact owned by Winsvarya, God of winter, and one of the so called Great Gods. What I am curious about is how you got in here. It is guarded by a field that repels anyone who approches, using the darkness of peoples minds to freeze them into lifeless statues. That was the other reason I thought you were Adam, he was the only man I knew with a mind without inner demons. I suppose you are the second. Now I can guide you out of here, but you are going to need to take me along if you want to survive. I also recommend you bring the sword too. I was using Winvarya's Divinity to create it in order to break free."

Adrian picked up both the pocket watch and sword.           The pocket watch was put into his pants pockets but when it came to the sword...

"Is there a sheath?" inquired Adrian.

"It was just going to be used to break me free so I didn't bother making a sheath. You are just going to have to carry it."

Afterwards Adrian headed right as Chronos had said it was the way to the exit. Immediately after exiting Adrian felt the blackness yet again, but it was far easier to exit due to having access to functional legs.

They continued on, trekking through knee-deep snow, until they finally reached the exit. The exit was a door identical to the one within the Great Hall, barring that it was open and looked like it lead to the eternal void. Guarding the door was a legion of what appeared to be 5000 Godbeasts. They were mainly wolf, standing on their hindlegs and with the hooves and antlers of a stag. They surrounded the exit, leaving no gaps. Adrian could not fight his way through either. Any one of them was capable of killing him ten times over, let alone 5000 of them.

"Now this is were I come in. As you can see the pocket watch is split into minutes and hours, with a big and little hand, just like any normal watch. Instead of telling you the time, it allows you to wield time instead, with each minute and hour being a charge. It holds a maximum of 12 hours and 60 minutes at any one period. If you use a minute, it will take a lot of time to recharge, you don't need to know the exact time as it is multiple times longer than the average human life span. What you need to do is use a minute to freeze time, and make a sprint for the exit. You will only have a single minute of frozen time, Got it?"

"Got it." 

"Good. Begin when you are ready."

Instead of starting immediately, Adrian began calculating the fastest route. He would have preferred to rest himself, but time was a luxury he didn't have.

(A/N: Okay so he might have the luxury thanks to the watch, but still, that would just be a waste. Also plot)

There was a small period when there was only a single Godbeast before the gate, leaving it open for Adrian to squeeze through.

He pressed the button on the stop watch.

Adrian hurried to the exit as fast as he could, counting every second. He was ducking and weaving his way through the legion, fearing that contact with any of the statues might unfreeze them and cause major issues. by the time he reached 30 seconds he was only a third of the way, causing Adrian to speed up. He side stepped and rolled his way past the Godbeasts, bringing out all his skills as an apprentice thief. When time resumed he was at the gate with only one Godbeast between him and the exit. Instead of hesitating, Adrian lifted the sword and continued charging, taking the Godbeast by surprise and piercing it through the chest. Adrian didn't stop his momentum and barged through the gate and back to the Great Hall.