Anamina silently stared at them before she narrowed her eyes in thought.

"Let's put your flashy swords aside, young men," she said. "You're from LA but you're not acting on their behalf. You're in Multiverse but you're serving the parallel timeline. Just which side are you on?"

Gaus chuckled at the last words. He could now use Gatan to escape or even kill himself if escaping became impossible, but death could still wait since the woman wanted to talk. Maybe she would say something useful, who knew.

He shrugged. "Which side are we on? Let's see... How about this? I'll answer one of your questions and you'll answer mine."

Spear raised an eyebrow before smiling. "Trying to be smart, eh? What do you want to know?"

"The people mentioned in the newspapers several years ago, where are they now?" Gaus recalled what Rachel told him about the people who just appeared out of nowhere and then disappeared later after some time and were never found since then.

"You," Spear said thoughtfully. "If you don't know the answer to that question then you can't be serving the parallel timeline. But if you don't serve them and you don't serve LA, then who the hell do you serve?" She spoke in a low tone and it seemed as if she was talking to herself.

After a while, she looked at Gatan. "What's stopping you from coming over to our side? With your sword, you can help protect a lot of people."

Gatan laughed and shook his head. "Maybe I'll consider it if I know which side are you on and what you're fighting for."

"I'm with the marines and I'm fighting for the people," she said as if that was obvious and he was an idiot for not figuring it out earlier. "You know what the marines are fighting for, right?"

Gatan was shaking his head so she paused and frowned. "You don't know?"

He nodded.

For the first time, Spear burst out laughing. "Then you know nothing about the loop." There was some pause before she shook her head exasperatedly. "That bastard Zilneir takes you and throws you into the loop without telling you anything. That's what he always does. And when he raised pretentious upstarts like you who'll come arrogantly seeking for... whatever you think you're doing here, people always get hurt."

She shook her head, pointing at Gatan. "Yet, a sword like yours is hard to come by. Even if we have many like it, not everyone can control it as you do. Just come over to our side. It is simple: on our side, there are admirals and all of marines and MIA and the police force. Isn't it obvious that we look better than both Zilneir and the parallel timeline? We work together to protect the seven worlds and the equatora. Zilneir is fighting only for himself and LA. And the parallel timeline wants to kill everyone. It's not difficult to grasp, is it?"

"There are always three sides to a story: your side, their side, and then the truth. Maybe if I listen to what The Master has to say, he'll insist he's on the right as well."

Spear shrugged. "Yes, you may be right."

He frowned at the admission but he kept silent.

"In war," she went on. "Being right or wrong doesn't matter. Everyone uses everything they have at their disposal to win. You may be on the right today, and tomorrow you will be wrong. But I will ask you one question: if this is the last loop and tomorrow is going to be Wednesday, how many people will your actions save?"

Gatan didn't know what to say and Gaus opened his mouth to speak but she interrupted him. "Think about it but I don't want to know your answer. From now on, I don't want to see you near my scout ever again."

"You're letting us go?" Gaus asked, confused.

"Why not?" Said the woman. "I can kill you at any time. Just don't forget my question and don't ever come near my scouts again."

Antelina and Raya were the first to flee. After a few seconds of curious stare, Gaus and Gatan disappeared as well.

Spear stood there and watched them escape. About five minutes later, a man appeared behind her.

"Master Spear," he knelt and greeted, "I followed them behind and it's as you expected, they are from LA, or at least they went back there."

The woman smiled. "Good, then."

They both disappeared while the scout and the Armored Sentinel remained behind and set up a detection ward around the area.

Meanwhile, back in LA, Gaus was being interrogated by his fellow hunters. The girls seemed terrified and you couldn't blame them with everything happening. Gatan also had a slight frown on his face that spoke more of curiosity than fear.

"Dammit. I told you we shouldn't do it," Antelina said.

"If we didn't," Gaus said. "Then we wouldn't have known all the things we know now. We just received firsthand information that the loop can end at any time and any loop can be the last. Don't you want to know more about your future? I want to."

"I also want to," Antelina said. "It's the marines I don't want to antagonize. They represent the first world and the government."

Gatan cleared his throat to get their attention. "I think our hunt was successful. Yes, The Master was the one who brought us here but everyone has to start thinking for themselves. We're all afraid our name will appear in the hall of the dread, right? But maybe there is something more dangerous than that. It has always been clear to me that something is going on in the loop even if I don't see it. Whatever that thing is, it's the purpose of the loop and when it's achieved, the loop will cease to exist. What will happen to me if the loop ends today? Do I want to end up being enslaved again? Is LA's goal the same as mine?"

Gatan was silent for a moment as he let his words sink into their minds. Antelina ran to the bathroom and threw up. Gaus shook his head with a deep sigh. The girl was a bad idea. She had already proven to him she didn't want to get involved with the conspiracies of the loop when she refused to take Tyren on his word, back when the other looper told her about Gaus joining the loop before coming to the academy, but Gaus could trust her at the very least and he thought she would make a nice team member just because of that. Anyway, she could be replaced just as easily.

"I don't trust my future to be in someone else's hands," Gaus said with the authority of someone who could erase everything from existence and annulled the conversation they were having at any moment. "The Master brought us into the loop but I will look for ways to remain in it besides just doing everything the academy says. The clones we hunted are just one of the things I am researching to see if I can find out the purpose of the loop. If any of you wants to know more about what's going on, then stay."

The room fell silent. After a while, Antelina left. Then the redhead followed her behind after giving him one of her sympathetic looks.

"It seems there are only two of us," Gatan said after a moment of silence.

Gaus nodded. "It's expected. Although, I must say I didn't expect you to stay. Who would have thought capturing a single clone will lead to that?"

"You hunted down a government property and didn't think that would happen?" Gatan said rhetorically. "How did you know about the clones anyway? I have been researching on the loop for months but I have never come across them, not even once. You have been in the loop for what, a couple of weeks?"

Gaus could tell him how he knew about them and how Tyren had brought one of the clones to Niama thinking it was his bodyguard - which now seemed a bit odd that Tyren was able to evade Spear and take the clone in custody - but that would reveal how long he'd been in the loop before joining the academy, which wasn't something he was ready to do.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

"The loop is a big place, friend," Gaus said. "You won't see what everyone is seeing."

Gatan was silent looking down at the clean floor before nodding. "Yeah, you're right. But what do we do now? What can we understand from the events of today?"

Gaus picked up a pen and paper and wrote #1 Unusual Disappearance.

Gatan nodded. "Although the clone was helpful in that regard, it didn't tell us much. It didn't tell us why the houses would disappear, where the houses would go if they disappear, or about the enemies that would attack after the houses disappeared. And why those specific houses? It seems odd to me. Slave auction hall and the police headquarters may be related by the slave trade and by both being government facilities, but Wislon cinema and 332 Henwi estates have nothing to do with the marines or the government. What's connecting them all?"

"But from what Spear has said," Gaus said thoughtfully. "I think it's obvious the attack is coming from the parallel timeline."

"About that," Gatan said. "You keep saying parallel timeline, I don't know if I'm the only one but I don't know what that means."

Oh? Rachel told him any mention of the parallel timeline had been erased from history. The burly man couldn't have known about it unless he was working with the resistance.

"I'll tell you what I know." Gaus recounted everything he knew about the parallel timeline while the other man listened. "If buildings are disappearing then I think it's safe to assume they are going to the parallel timeline."

Gatan was silent for a few more seconds as he took everything in. He finally took a deep breath and shook his head. "I thought I knew things about the loop and all my colleagues were just... not as knowledgeable as I am. But I know nothing compared to you." He sighed. "Anyway, let's agree that the buildings are jumping from our timeline to the parallel timeline. And that the people in the parallel timeline will only attack if the buildings disappear. So, what's the connection between the two?"

"Maybe they are using the buildings to transport themselves here?" Gaus said thoughtfully. "And the marines have somehow succeeded in preventing them from coming to this timeline by preventing the buildings from disappearing."

"By using the sentinels?" Gatan said.

Gaus nodded. "Yes, I believe so."

Your awareness of the loop has increased.

+179% Loop knowledge

Total: 343.5%

Gaus smiled. Despite not leveling up his classification, it still had its benefits. For one, it showed him the way every time he found something useful on the loop. For another, it gave him one slot to add one person in the loop, which he might have used on Gatan if he didn't add someone else already.

"We have three sides fighting and for what, I don't know," Gaus said.

He put down #2 LA and then #3 marines adjacent to each other.

Everything related to the parallel timeline and the disappearance of the buildings was under #1-unsual disappearance. Everything related to LA and The Master was under #2-LA. And everything related to the marines and the sentinels was under #3- marines.

"Who's Zilneir?" Gaus said. Spear had mentioned the name but he didn't get the chance to ask her about it.

"Huh? You don't know The Master's name?"

Gaus frowned. He'd been wondering about The Master's name for a while now. He repeated the name in his mind. It didn't sound like the name of a wicked or even powerful person at all, at least not in his head.

"In my stay in LA, I have looked into some things too," Gatan said proudly. "The biggest thing that always annoys me is the time I've lost in the loop which I didn't even know existed. How many years have we spent in the loop before we were invited? I don't want to lose any more of my life, time loop or not."

Oh boy. You knew nothing. What if Gaus was to tell him about the second loop? That would probably give him a heart attack.

"There are nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand people in the academy, from XM0001 to XM9999. And there's The Master's daughter called Nostalgia at the top. She is in charge of everything at the academy. It is said that there are permanent loopers but to this day, I haven't seen one. I don't know if it's just a name invented to scare the enemy."

So Nostalgia was the daughter of the so-called Master? She was supposed to take over his lesson on enchantment and alteration according to XM9997. How would it feel to be taught by someone in a position of power like her?

"From what I know, The Master is currently the oldest person in the loop. Before him, there was Javier Minorita Helsinbird Salesal and another man who both joined the loop in the era called M. The Master killed them both. The marines and the Seven only joined the loop after that."

Minorita... There was just no way for someone to talk about the loop without mentioning that woman. Everyone believed she was dead but he knew better. One of these days he was going to find out about her.

"The so-called Seven are part of an organization called Council of Loop Masters. They work together with the marines and many people in the academy are speculating that they were invited into the loop by the marines. I'm still looking into that but I have had no luck so far. Though I somehow got the feeling there are only two people in the loop: The Master and then someone else who is responsible for the marines and the Council of Loop Masters. Everyone else is just tagging along and is inconsequential."

Gaus and Rachel had already come to the same conclusion. But the Council of Loop Masters was new. XM0033 once told him seven other people were fighting The Master, but he didn't mention the Council of Loop Masters. That was to say, both the marines and The Master had their separate armies. Just what were they all fighting for, and which side Gaus was on?

"I'm not with any of them," Gaus said. In his mind, he always envisioned the possibility of the marines hunting him down because of the Rewind, or The Master hunting him down for one reason or another.

"Neither am I," said Gatan. "They're all fighting for themselves. If you join them you'll be a foot soldier, a rock for them to step on. You might say I'm stubborn but I'm on my side. The world will change when the loop ends. I want to be a king when it happens."

Gaus looked into the man's eyes and saw how serious he was. He'd a short list of people he wanted to bring into the loop and all of them would be working for him in some fields. Would Gatan be content with that when he was already looking down on the academy? He would have to consider that in a future restart. Right now, there was something the man could help him with.

"If that's the case then we don't have time to sleep," Gaus said. "We have to be strong enough to defend ourselves."

Gatan folded his arms and looked at him with narrowed eyes. "And you have got a way to do that?"

Gaus smiled. "Yes, I have a way to do just that. Come find me tomorrow after class."

***

An hour after their meeting, Gaus changed into a light dress and went to the arena. The tournament was over an hour ago but that would mean most of the crowd was out of the arena by now. A larger percentage of them had come from outside the city and they would stay there for the entire night, either trading or watching the mages play with their magic. Gaus walked through the crowd, looking for any mage using flashy magic. He was too inconspicuous in the sea of people to be identified by anyone.

Still, whenever he passed by a mage using fireball, the fire would just dim or disappear. Most of the audience wouldn't notice it and the few that did wouldn't think much of it. But the mage themselves, having fully known they didn't dispel the fire when it disappeared, would look stunned. They would look around the crowd, trying to find the culprit blocking their magic, but they wouldn't find anyone. Hell, they didn't even know what it was that was used on them. Most would just continue the show but a few would quit, too afraid to risk their safety.

Gaus was flattered. He didn't know he could scare 'veteran' mages off so easily. For him, it was becoming natural to block any attack. All he'd do was follow the major vessels in the longevity cord and find the vessel supplying mana for the skill being used. He could either use world essence or even mana for the weaker targets to block it. And the skill would disappear. He'd been practicing it ever since the restart began but the system still didn't see it fit to give him the skill and make it official. Maybe there was some level of proficiency that was needed to activate the skill.

Anyway, Gaus had no choice but to keep trying. He would need the skill to kill Tyren and to achieve cord shedding. Rachel had already instructed him on how to do it.

It was 2:59 am and the loop was about to end. What if it was the last one as Spear had said? Gaus shook his head. For some reason, he didn't believe that would be the last.

The next Tuesday came and Gaus and Gatan attended their classes as usual. After that, they went out of the city and hid on a tree, watching a narrow road outside the city walls. When it was thirty minutes past three in the evening, Rachel ran past them and entered the old dungeon. A few minutes later, they came down from the trees and followed her behind.

As usual, all the marines guarding the place were knocked out and laid on the ground unconscious. Gaus explained to his fellow looper that it was always like that and he led them to the same tunnel he'd always used.

"I'll be going first," he told Gatan. "Make sure you follow closely behind." Gaus jumped inside without any hesitation.

Gatan waited for a while as he looked around the dark tunnels before he sighed and jumped in.

***

Meanwhile, somewhere in the third world northern hemisphere, an elderly man lay on a bed with his eyes fixed on the roof of the room. A transparent blue screen only he could see floated above his face.

Congratulations on completing your missions. You have been granted 10 days in the loop.

New quests unlocked: kill Tyren Onis eight days from now.

Reward: 12 months in the loop.

Accept quest? Y/N?

NB: further information on the quest and image of the target will be available after you accept the quest.

12 months? That was fifty times more than all the previous quests combined. He must take it. It meant a complete year of freedom for him and he would have ample time to look into the loop mechanics. Perhaps, he could even find a way to get into the loop by himself. He'd been around for so long to know that nothing was impossible when it came to magic.

The man stood up, buttoned his shirt, and turned around toward the door. He reached for a crown sitting on his desk but he frowned as his hands passed through it. He sighed and left the room.