“YOU! WHY AREN’T YOU DEAD?” Charlie, the giant, yelled loudly. Worse yet were the implications behind his words.

He knows! The thought snapped into place in Chris’s head and he was stunned for a few seconds.

He had been acting on the basis that only he carried his memories through the loop, but the giant’s words scared him. He wanted to find their weaknesses over the loops, but if his enemies also remembered--

Goosebumps appeared on his body as a cold shiver raced down his back. He was fucked.

Chris couldn’t finish the thought as the giant man came into action. He watched as the man picked the sword out of his waist as if it was a small thorn in his side.

The sword looked like a dagger in the man’s hand. Grunting, he pulled his arm back and the sword at Chris, who helplessly watched it collide with his shield.

The shield trembled violently on impact and ripples spread on its surface. The damage was so great the shield instantly turned opaque, becoming visible. A web of cracks covered its surface. One more blow and it would be a goner.

“Grrr, you didn’t have that before.” The giant growled; his every word struck another nail in Chris’s coffin. The sword might not have penetrated his organs, but it had cut his muscles. He was in pain, a lot of it.

Chris wished the giant to stop speaking. The gears of his mind spun rapidly and he figured out a few things.

The giant didn’t remember the previous iterations of the time loop at the start. He would have told someone and they would have found Chris near the fire otherwise. Which meant the man learned the truth after seeing him?

NO!

The man had a nosebleed and he acted strange afterward. Chris could say the man remembered everything after the nosebleed. Something was missing. The nose bled had to depend on something.

The giant sensed no motivation from Chris and quietly shortened the distance between them with swift steps. Then he struck like lightning. The air around them howled in fear of the hammer as it raged at Chris’s head.

Chris raised his left hand just in time to bock the blow. He wasn’t surprised to see the shield break. The hammer easily pierced the shield and crushed Chris’s left arm. Chris fell to the ground and started squirming like a worm, kicking and screaming in agony. His left arm hung limply from the elbow below, broken at multiple places, fingers barely twitching.

Even in the maddening pain, Chris kept an eye on the giant. There were tears in his eyes, a scream at his lips. The pain kept coming back and he kept screaming, cursing.

Soon the giant had heard enough.

He approached Chris with hulking steps and kicked him in the chest. The sword had damaged his core or the kicks would have sent Chris flying. As the kicks stood, they only exaggerated the pain in Chris’s arm. When the giant finally had enough, he stomped on Chris’s chest and pinned him flat on the ground. Chris flailed but couldn’t get away.

“Let’s see if you can make it back a second time.” The giant held his hammer with both hands and pulled it above his head, stretching all the muscle of his torso, looming over Chris like a cobra. The Giant planned to break Chris’s shield and bash his brain into the mud in one full sweep, but Chris had on the final card up his sleeve, literally. He pulled the dagger he had confiscated from the dead boy and stabbed it into the man’s ankle.

The giant screamed. Pain blinded his eyes. The hammer fell from his hands as he bent over to grab his foot and collapsed to the ground cursing Chris. He grabbed the dagger to pull it out, but the mere touch sent him into an electrifying frenzy of pain.

Meanwhile, Chris eyed the sword. It had fallen on the ground between him and the giant. Time was slipping, the loop ending. He could have pulled back and waited for the loop to end, but he had a chance to gain another level and he knew he needed it very much.

Chris gritted his teeth and pushed for it. The giant noticed his actions and the sword and jealously came for it.

A gust passed through. The leaves cheered. They wanted entertainment and that was exactly what the two men provided them.

Both Chris and the giant leaped for the sword, but Chris reached it first, he was faster, more desperate. He grabbed it, but the man didn’t make it easy for him; the giant lunged at Chris with his arms wide open and mouth roaring.

Chris heard the roar and inhaled sharply upon seeing the beastly man lunging at him.

The man caught Chris by his throat and squeezed, harder, stronger. He was in such an adrenaline rush that he didn’t notice the sword poking his chest. It had penetrated right through his heart and come out from his back. He squeezed harder and harder, but he could not put any more strength in his hands. He kept glaring at Chris with hateful eyes until his hands slid down Chris’s neck and he fell lifelessly on top of Chris’s torso.

Chris lay on the ground breathing, collecting his spirits, and thoughts, absorbing the warmth that the man’s blood poured into his body. Moon peered at him from the hole in the canopy above; it seemed interested in his choices, actions, and fate. Was it keeping an eye on him?

Suddenly, a bell rang in his head and a projection appeared in front of his eyes.

{You have leveled up.}

Six minutes and some seconds till the end. Should he stay there or do something with the time? Chris could check his status and deal with the skills. He was too tired, out of breath, and out of strength to care.

Time passed slowly. Every second made him weaker and anxious. He pushed the giant off his chest first. Finally, he could breathe again. The man fell on this back, with the sword sticking out of his chest like Excalibur stuck in stone. Chris had no strength left to stand up. He crawled back and sat up using a tree supporting his back.

It was too hard to sit idle so he opened his status next to pass time.

He added the free attributes points to wisdom since the shield's strength depended upon it. His knowledge told him he should be smarter with the extra points. He felt the same though, level head and vulnerable. Maybe adding five or more points at the same time would show him the difference.

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He tried to unlock another skill and learned he needed two skill points this time. Did it mean he would need three points for the third skill? He stopped bothering and closed the status.

The glowing panel disappeared from Chris’s sight leaving him with a man in the distance who had an arrow pointed at him. Fuck! He was so engrossed in the status that he didn’t hear the archer approaching. This… he had no words. Did the glow of projection make him soft and forget his surroundings and condition?

But why was the archer there in the forest? The middle-aged man had never followed Chris in the past iterations of the loops.

Chris swayed to move when the man yelled,

“Stop! Or I’ll shoot.”

Chris looked at the shield floating in front of his head. He couldn’t help thinking it was too small. It could protect his head or chest but not both at the same time, leaving the other wide open. He peered at the clock and stopped caring.

Three minutes until a new beginning,

The archer approached, slowly, wooden bow upright, an arrow lodged on it, ready to take Chris out if he needed.

A question appeared in Chris’s mind.

Isn’t he going to kill me?

He has already killed you once. The thought arrived at the same time as the archer released the arrow… into the woods.

A drop of sweat slid down Chris’s temple. He saw the archer staring at him, eyes trembling. Was that fear?

“What’s happening to me?” The man asked. His voice trembled, uncertain. He was old, white-haired, in his forties. He was sunburnt, like a typical farmer.

“Answer me or I’ll kill you!” The man blurted, angry, maniacal, his breathing getting faster, chest undulating.

“Kill me then,” Chris said through gritted teeth. His heart was barely beating. He was already on the end of the rope. His arm was broken and his stomach wound hadn’t stopped bleeding since the start. He was out of energy, breath, and spirit. Really, he was on his last leg and there were still another three bandits alive. A quick death would mean he could start again, have another chance to do things well, to do things right. He resigned his fate to the archer’s hand, but the man was not the reaper he believed him to be.

“I know you remember. You have to!” The archer screamed. “Everything ends with you.” The archer said more sorrowful than angry. “No one believes me. I can’t keep living like this. Please,” The man fell to his knees, fists clenched. “Spare me! I don’t want to do this again! I don’t want to be in this nightmare anymore. I’m tired of hearing her screams over and over again. It was not supposed to go this way. They were not supposed to have any guards. We were only going to steal the money. No one was supposed to die! But they killed his brother and he’s mad now. I can’t stop him. I can’t kill him.”

Suddenly Chris knew what the man meant. He came up hurriedly. “Wait, wait, you--” He couldn’t believe what he was going to say, but he had to ask. “Are you also…”

“Cursed?”The archer said. His hands shook; the arrow rattled on the bow.

“How much do you remember? No, don’t answer that.” Chris said anxiously. “Did you remember everything from the start?”

“NO.” The old man shook his head, slightly more focused now that he had found an anchor to grab onto, now that he knew he was not going mad, that others were experiencing the same thing.

“I remembered killing you the first time in the previous life when you were running into the forest. I didn’t know what to do. I remembered everything about your previous deaths again a few minutes ago, both times the memories lasted until your death.”

Time was the variable Chris was missing. He glanced at the left corner of his sight and saw it there, hovering in the upper corner, a clock in green with numbers decreasing every second.

He hazily remembered the clock had ten minutes left when he died last time. Now in the green, the clock had only a couple of minutes left. It was all making sense to him. He starts the loop alone, but anyone who kills him also enters the loop. Only, they get their memories when the time in the loop elapses with the time of his death in the previous loop. Since he died last time with only ten minutes left in the clock in the previous loop, both the archer and the giant gained their memories once that time passed in the current loop.

Now it made sense. No wonder the archer didn’t shoot at him in the previous loop while he was running into the forest, but he shot at him this time because he didn’t have his memories yet.

It all made sense, but it also made everything tricky, more dangerous. He was not alone in the loop, only ahead of his murderers.

“What do you want?” Chris asked. He knew their conversation would decide if he would have another enemy on the clock or a rare ally.

“I want to live.” The archer said staring straight into his eyes.

This was exactly what Chris needed. “Then help me kill your boss and save the mother and her daughter.”

“We can’t.” The archer said in a panic. “He’s strong and he has a blaster. Your blaster!”

Chris didn’t know what that was, but he couldn’t give up now. “And I have a shield. And there is no other way. We will repeat the same thing repeatedly until we save them. There is no second way.”

“Then wait for me to recover my injuries. I’ll help you.”

“You can’t,” Chris stared at the clock. The time of his death in the loop determines when those who had killed him would gain their memories of the preceding loops.

“You will not remember anything next time for twenty-nine minutes and the loop is only thirty minutes long. And it’s questionable if I’ll even make it to the end next time.”

The archer growled in frustration.

Chris was too tired to show his emotions. He was just an injured old man with but a breath of life left in him. He really needed the archer's help. They had a slightly better chance of succeeding if they worked together. Alas, it wasn’t possible.

“Wait,” Suddenly, the archer looked at Chris with gleaming eyes; he had an idea! “What if you die?”

He must have not understood the meaning behind Chris’s sarcastic snort because he had more to say.

“I mean what if you died faster? You said you have been dying slower, trying to reach the end every time, but what if, next time, you die faster with enough time left for us to act!”

That was a plan alright, but…

Chris looked at the two dead bodies. “He will also gain his memories.” He said pointing at the giant.

The archer inhaled sharply. “He remembers?”

“He does.” Chris nodded. “He had a nosebleed and he asked me why wasn’t I dead.”

The archer shook his head, determined. “Then we just need to make sure he can’t tell anyone.”

“Will you kill him?” Chris asked with suspicion. The archer and the giant were from the same group. Would he kill one of his men just to escape the loop?

“Don’t misunderstand.” The archer said. “I am only with them because I needed the money. It was supposed to be a one-time thing!” He seemed to understand Chris’s suspicion, sighed, and stopped giving excuses. “I’ll follow him to the forest and then we’ll do it together.”

It wasn’t wrong to think Chris would be taking a huge gamble by believing in the archer. Then again, this was the best shot he was going to get.

“He’ll know you killed him if we fail.”

“Then we have to make sure we do it right.” The archer exhaled deeply. He had made u his mind.

“What do you say?”

Chris spent a few seconds thinking and staring at the clock for one whole minute before he decided that the archer was right. Finally, he shook his head and looked at the archer holding a grin on his face.

“Come then,” Chris patted his chest with renewed hope. “Give me your best shot.”