"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
Anon jumped. Anon had long since met the conditions of what he called the 'protagonist halo'. If destroying the very artifact that maintained his consciousness didn't wipe him out. What else could? He was curious. Just how far could he 'push' this seemingly broken 'plot armor' he felt he had acquired.
Anon thought about it clearly. Ever since he returned from his domain. He had stepped into a different world. A world that noone else could see. But he felt he had forgotten something crucial. He thought about Ayil and how she awakened his hidden potential.
They say that if you smell shit everywhere you go. You should check your shoes. Anon felt that his life experience itself was abnormal.
It was as if he was the main character! While he knew where his seals came from. He couldn't explain how he even survived the destruction of Sovereign's Timekeeper.
He had chalked it up to his body absorbing the potential of a alternate universe. But was that really what happened? How did he even connect to an alternate self in the first place? What faciliated this?
He thought all about this as he fell.
"I can feel it! My ax-"
SPLAT!!!!
Anon was turned into a bloody paste. He didn't break the barrier of the control rate of his body. Instead, like an idiot, he jumped to his death.
He fell for less then 12 seconds.
He lost consciousness completely.
He died...
----------------------------------------
"Axiom state!?" Anon shouted randomly and found himself on a bus. Others gave him a weird look, but he ignored them. He was heading towards his destination. One of the tallest buildings in the world. He planned to risk it all! He planned to breakthrough...
"Wait a second..."
Anon noticed something wrong right away. His animaxiom! His 'anima reservoir' was completely empty! He had but a fraction of anima circulating through his body that wasn't stored in it.
He slowly felt the energy regenerating.
"I died?"
"But how am I still alive?"
Anon got off the bus and looked at the building he planned to 'risk it all'.
"I feel as though I've done this before..."
Anon remembered the feeling of falling and then an abrupt ending. A nothingness. Oblivion.
But it was as if he traveled through time back to before he even snuck into the building. Anon wasn't a complete idiot. He recognized the only anomaly was his 'anima reservoir'.
Anon had discovered three soul relics.
Anima Reservoir
Anima Generator
Anima Manipulator
The animaxiom was stored in his 'reservoir'. It didn't have a physical location. It was stored in the soul! But he had learned from Ayil's meddling. He had learned how to inject this energy into his body by using the 'control' of a soul relic.
His 'anima manipulator'.
He noticed rigtht away that the small amount he had injected outside of his soul hadn't been affected. But the real storage of it. His soul...
It was completely drained!
Anon looked up at the sky.
"I can control time!"
He laughed in madness as people avoided him.
Anon then abruptly stopped and thought clearly.
"It burns through my animaxiom..."
"It seems to be triggered on death..."
"Well... There is only one thing to do!"
Now that Anon knew about his ability. He wanted to master it. He stood idle on the streets like a homeless person as he waited for his animaxiom to refill.
Once it was full.
He snuck past security and reached the top of the building.
"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
He even said the same statement as a form of ceremony! This made him feel a little nostalgic. He remembered when he tricked his hourglass into mentally attacking him by pretending to not be aware of the time loop he was in.
Anon then jumped.
As he fell towards the ground. He smiled and shouted.
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"I WILL NEVER DI-"
He splattered into a bloody paste.
Anon died.
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"DIE!!!!!" Anon found himself standing on a sidewalk. Everyone was looking at him weirdly. He coughed and ignored the weird stares. Anon wasn't wearing a blindfold at the moment. He had stored that in his storage space. He instead had some sunglasses on to avoid scaring people.
"It seems I was right! I can go back in time upon death. But it isn't unlimited. It seems to require my animaxiom!"
Anon couldn't help but praise Ayil! Without her help. He probably wouldn't know about his soul relics for years...
"But the question is..."
"How far can I go back?"
"If I increase the capacity of my reservoir... can I go even further back?"
Anon decided to do various test.
"I was at 100% capacity. I am now at 0%."
Anon checked his phone.
"I went back exactly 24 hours..."
"But it takes me about 96 hours to go from 0% to 100%..."
It was slightly more then 10 units of animaxiom an hour. His current capacity was 1,000.
"Is there a way to increase the rate I regenerate animaxiom?"
Anon realized that the animaxiom circulating his body seemed to be unaffected.
"It seems only my soul goes back in time. It isn't a physical time travel. This means that if I store the energy in my body beforehand. I can retain it. But there are limits to this."
Anon simply lacked strong control of his 'manipulator' to abuse this properly.
"Is there any way to control the mechanism?"
"Looks like I will need to die again..."
Two days later...
Anon was standing on the top of the building. He smiled and said:
"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
Anon jumped!
SPLAT!
Anon died.
----------------------------------------
"Phew. That was risky!" Anon hadn't waited until 100% capacity. He had tried it at 50%!
He checked his phone.
"12 hours..."
Anon was at 0% again.
He waited two hours and was at 2%.
"If the math is consistent. Then when I die this time. I should go back roughly 28 minutes..."
"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
Anon jumped.
SPLAT!
----------------------------------------
Anon regained consciousness. He was standing on top of the building.
"Alright. I'm starting to get used to this."
Anon had an intrusive thought. What would happen if he jumped with 0%? A true death? He fought back the urge to test this. But he really wanted to!
He checked his phone.
"Hmm... this is wrong. I only went back 20 minutes..."
Anon walked to the edge.
He looked down at the busy street.
He waited an hour.
1%
"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
He jumped!
As he fell. He focused on the 'feeling' of his manipulator. He tried to trace back where this weird power came from. Right before he crashed into the ground.
"Found it!"
SPLAT!!!
Anon died.
----------------------------------------
Anon regained consciousness on top of the building.
"I went back 5 minutes this time. It should've been 14 minutes... It seems to become less consistent the less energy I have. But I should do more test."
At the border of life and death. Although it took some attempts. Anon discovered another soul relic!
Anima Leap
Anon was like a child on their birthday. He felt as if he had been gifted a truly interesting gift. He tried to 'rewind' without dying. But his overall control simply wasn't there.
Anon decided to 'thoroughly' test himself.
He spent a year living homeless in this city. While this was a year to everyone else. It was actually not so for Anon. He had died over a hundred times. Sometimes he waited until he reached full capacity. Sometimes he tried it when low on energy.
Eventually. He made a breakthrough!
"I either die a mediocre waste. Or I ascend to the pinnacle..."
Anon jumped!
Right as he hit the ground and was splattered into a bloody paste.
Time froze!
Anon felt the pain extend into infinity. He had abused the control of 'anima leap' and discovered yet another soul relic!
Anima Ward
If Axiom was watching Anon's growth. 'It' might've even been shocked! Anima Ward was designed to prevent certain scenarios. Basically, it had a single main function.
A defense mechanism over the soul!
This prevented other existences from hijacking or taking over Anon's indestructible soul. Because Axiom had designed his soul to be completely broken and overpowered. He didn't want to make a wedding dress for others.
Being his avatar. To be worthy. You had to meet certain requirements and only Anon was crazy enough to truly use his soul relics in an unexpected way.
Anon through a use of his 'anima manipulator', 'anima leap' and 'anima ward'. Managed to attach his consciousness to a strand of animaxiom that was in his physical body.
He essentially then pushed his 'leap' into a stasis. This allowed him to freeze time on death! This wasn't even a part of the power Axiom had planned for him.
Anon wasn't playing by the rules.
So... what was the point of freezing time on death? It was incredible! He could 'think' in frozen time. If before, when he died. He was automatically using his anima leap to go back in time.
Now he could 'savor' the feeling of death.
Anon spent decades in frozen time. The entire time. He felt all the pain of his body in its frozen state. He couldn't move his body and the universe had come to a grinding halt.
But this 'power' made Anon drunk.
The feeling of infinite time. He felt he would soon become the most powerful being in reality. But something unfortunate happened!
The frozen time shattered!
"Ahhhhhh!" Anon yelled in pain as his body started to reconstruct itself. It wasn't that the pain was too much. He was sad that his infinity plan wasn't going to work. There were people who saw him falling from the building. They saw him die and become a bloody paste.
But they then saw something impossible!
Just like how he reversed time and went back in time on death. Time seemed to reverse for his physical body. His injuries healed and he stood there in tattered clothes.
A crowd of people had stopped to watch the 'show'. But nobody had been recording at the time. Except for the government that had been secretly keeping an eye on Anon's every move!
Anon whispered to himself:
"I see... I wasn't paying attention to my reservoir. To maintain my consciousness in frozen time. It isn't free or infinite either!"
"But what the hell was that? Not only can I go back in time on death. I can ressurect!? This is bullshit!" Anon yelled to the heavens at the unfairness of life.
He didn't think anything would actually happen from abusing his powers. But now he showed a MAJOR supernatural feat on one of the busiest streets in the world.
His secret identity! His debut! It was in shambles... Unless...
"I need to go back!"
Anon then realized. His energy was completely empty. Not just the stuff in his soul.
"It used up the energy I had stored in my body!?"
"I see... going back in time requires the soul. When I froze time. I spent years observing my state. My energy slowly bottomed out. Then I couldn't sustain the frozen time. So time resumed. But I then died."
"I died at 0%! What I just did was quite careless..."
"But another soul relic was activated and sucked in the accumulated energy I had stored in my body. Reviving me..."
The most embarassing thing was that despite spending years experiencing the moment of his death. He still hadn't unlocked his axiom state!
Anon used his tattered shirt to cover his face. He didn't need to see anyway. He then ran away from the crowd of people gathered around him.
"What the hell is animaxiom? Where did my soul relics come from?"
"Why is it so hard for me to die?"
"What the hell am I?!"