“But… But, I followed all the steps so why do you say that? Is there a major problem with some of the elements I added?” Incredulity infused in his voice, Rune was really confused, and a little panicked.

His plan was getting wrecked.

“I asked for more information about you when I received your form about the composite element you wanted to create, and I think your idea is pure genius. Using your soul specialty to go beyond what the Ether Law would allow is completely possible, and it’s even been proved multiple times in lots of domains. The problem is that your element will have to be stripped down to a tenth or twentieth of their basic properties, not the regular third or fifth…”

“Hum… I hope you could try to understand me... But I really gave my all to try and make your element become a reality. When you become a tier 4 and if you still want this element to be created, then I’ll offer all my support personally! Still, all my expertise, as mediocre as it is, clearly tells me that not only will you need more elements, but also everyone will need to have a slot because the amount of modification you’ll need to do is going to be very, very huge and intricate.”

“Can you give an example of what should be the combination you found after taking everything into account? Just a basic idea to explain how impossible having it at tier 3 is?” Rune asked, he had to try.

“Well, your basic idea is pretty solid, mist, light, darkness, nebula, and mystic are all elements that have a complete composite analysis, the very interesting point about your idea of stripping all the defensive, offensive, and pretty much removing everything except the properties having to do with perception dampening is that you have to strip inner properties to the perception dampening properties themselves… Yeah, it’s very complex…”

‘Why can’t I find a joke to make about that?’

“So, if you understood what I just explained, you should see a problem appear now… You need a lot more elements to fill your composite element. Fortunately, 8 slots should be enough if you take elements with abundant perception dampening properties from the start, this way, even when you strip the defensive, offensive, and owner protecting properties in them…”

“Anyway, in addition to mist, light, darkness, nebula, and mystic, I’d also add illusion, shadow, and nature, but the moment you have so many elements everything becomes more complex… So there is around a 100% chance that some of them will have to be switched with unusual elements.”

His interlocutor, obviously a female, or a male with a very unique voice, delivered the final blow.

‘Sigh… I really need some music right now…’ Unfortunately, he already searched and he didn’t find any, as shocking as it was, and he still didn’t have the time to search about the why.

“I pretty much said everything I had to say, so… If you reach tier 4 and still want to create this element, then you can contact me in the future, my name is Aleda Calico, current research leader of the composite elements research faculty, I’ll have a memo at your name Mr. Tudor if you desire to one day implicate yourself in it, goodbye and sorry for the inconvenience.”

“Goodbye… Thank you for telling me all this,” and as soon as he finished, the call was hung up from the other side.

‘Well…’

His mind seemed to have glitched so hard it arrived in another realm of existence, his whole plan was taken down and dismantled by one move, and this move originated from himself.

‘So the unbending path has inherently no other advantage other than allowing me to have a following for the next ti… No, it’s wrong, as long as I desire it my specialty can go back to the unbending path and the composite element path, it’s just that during my tier 3 adventures I’ll have another specialty than what I had till now.’

When Rune started to think again, he realized that it was now or never that he could experiment with some unique specialty path.

‘Now that I think about it… If at tier 4 I create my element and reach the apex where even a tier 4 unbending perception specialty cannot pierce through it, then keeping an unbending path for tier 5 will have its value reduced a little… But it’s too far into the future! No need to think about it now!’

Ultimately, he now had to make a choice, and while he could postpone it until later, he had every piece of info he needed to make an educated decision.

‘The temporal advancement path option proves to me that the previous path I choose has no effects and can even be completely assimilated to create another power… So it doesn’t matter which one I pick as long as I keep in mind that at tier 4 I want my specialty to go back to the unbending path, or an even more specialized path.’

Slowly, everything added up to something.

‘The spirit ripple path… Will it work in the future when, no… At tier 4 I’ll have to reset all my masteries so it doesn’t matter what masteries I select now, only the experience I gather with it will be worthy.’

‘Nonetheless, living in a different temporality would teach me much more about how to fight in close quarters than anything else, considering every choice I’ll make will be the quintessence of my martial art…’

‘Will I be able to go back once I choose this path?’

It was really a tier-changing decision, from an average human to someone who warped his sense of time to the equivalent of 5 peak tier 2 masteries.

But Rune couldn’t stop the feeling of wanting to experience this life, this feeling.

‘I’m just delaying the inevitable, let’s be done with it, I never hoped to be a perfect being anyway.’

The temporal path was an experience he couldn’t miss.

Temporal Dimensional Perception

Soul Specialty (Tier 3)

Trying to see things your perception shouldn’t be able to, too elusive, too fast, but now your very own perception of time will slow down, permanently, and even more when you so desire, all of your senses will be used as the link between different temporalities. Be wary that from now on you’ll live in a slightly different temporality, different from that of other slower entities. Your perception of previous unbending properties will be almost totally changed to accommodate your new way of perceiving the world

Your sphere resistance to external and internal changes is increased by 50%. Permanently change your perception of time to be extended by 10%. You can at any time choose to depart from your current temporality and enter a different temporality with 100% extended time without suffering from any consequences. You become sensitive to time affecting events happening near you.

Confirm?

‘Yes Ether, bring it on.’

*Ding* Your soul specialty has been upgraded from Shelled Dimensional Perception (Tier 2) to Temporal Dimensional Perception (Tier 3)

Departing from the unbending path he had always trodden made him discover another perspective of reality, of the Ether Law.

His perception sphere wasn’t unbending anymore, the resistance he was used to fighting against was reduced so much he could now shift its shape with a thought.

Fortunately or unfortunately, his specialty kept a small part of its unbending character, something that would eventually disappear if during the next advancement he decided on another path, other than the unbending one.

His sense of time being extended by 10% permanently wasn’t something he really felt as he was immobile, but with his sphere, he could sense a certain discrepancy, not nauseous, just that he received a video of a very slightly slowed down world. He would need some time getting used to it.

Soon enough he decided it was time to have some fun with his new power.

‘Hahaha! Weak beings! Welcome this higher dimensional entity amidst your puny civilization! For I am…’

“Supreme…” He whispered the last word.

And the world obeyed.

Standing up, Rune could only become perplexed at his current situation.

He was far from disoriented or anything of the sort, though the return from his sphere went through the strangest and strongest change ever.

He was receiving the same amount of info as normal, but he was now living in a different temporality. Every second in his life was equal to 0.5 seconds for others, meaning he now received twice as much perception information as others.

‘I don’t feel like I've slowed down at all.’

Obviously, it took some time for his sphere and spirit to finally inform him of what his new reality under this state was.

‘Hello world, did you ever watch a video at 0.5 speed? Well…’

Approaching Nelo who looked to do nothing except reading things in the air, he started to talk, time for the joke of the century.

“Hello Nelo, as a higher dimensional being I’d be pleased if you could spare with me,” laughing innerly, Rune waited for his reaction.

Blinking repeatedly after Rune seemingly “talked” to him, his gaze focused back and his confused glance told everything, “Does, it, have, any,thing, to, do, with, the, call, you, just, re,ceived?”

“Impressive mortal, just follows me to the empty court in the middle, I’ll show you by virtue of my new power how I’m a superior being, Utopia or Astryde? You can also come if you want.”

Rune then jumped and was utterly surprised by how much he could control his fall. Now, even his momentum could be used in addition to the energy platform, his body acted two-time slower, but his mind was… Normal, from his point of view.

His jump and subsequent descent to the empty ground in the middle of all the residential buildings looked like a toddler who just learned how to combine momentum and energy platform, ridiculous.

The unexpected thing was that as Nelo was taking his time to stand up, he could sense Utopia getting up and in a moment, he got out of his room and without any disturbances, he appeared on the balcony, looking at Rune from above with an interesting look on his face.

“If you want to be the first Utopia, I’ll not hold you back, you all look the same to me, inferior being that can’t see past the veil of reality, hum!” Rune completely activated his acting talent.

“Why, are, you, tal,king, so, fast?” As Utopia asked this, he jumped from the balcony and landed next to Rune’s position.

“Puny peasant, you don’t even understand the language of time and you dare question me?” Rune used his whole spirit to make the air around him be filled with different colors that didn’t mix together.

He used all the extraordinary colors he learned to create for this effect to be the most majestic and cool ever.

“If you want the answer… Face me and my power to the best of your ability! Prepare your defensive posture if you want to be the first to taste the power from the higher dimension,” he kept making the cloud of color increase in size, changing its composition from rainbow to fractured burning purple and red.

Utopia didn’t deign to answer, he just put his whole body on guard, ready to react to what he thought to be anything.

“Doesn’t this situation… Remind you of something my dear little Utopia?” Rune didn’t hold back at all and used all his energy to make the colored energy cloud around him become completely red, a flamboyant burning red, the red of blood and destruction.

Taking the first step, he started to approach Utopia at a leisure pace, “You’re not going to escape right? We’re both tier 3 after all, and why would you even escape from your friend?”

Creepy smile on, Rune was the one who did the opening move with the most simple punch he could.

“Let’s see how long you can last against a supreme being, young hero, because before long… Your heart will exit your chest and end up in my hand…”

Rune used this punch to provoke a reaction, he would never underestimate Utopia’s capabilities, but unless he became peak tier 3 already, this match, the young rululu was doomed to lose.

‘His reaction, so fast…’

The difference compared to the last time they had a similar fight was that now Utopia would never joke when sparring with Rune anymore. And his current goal was to prove Rune wrong, by not only defending himself but also riposting.

From a simple punch, Utopia immediately boosted his leg. Before being hit, he intended to hit Rune directly.

‘Brave…’

Rune was only starting to understand his own power, but the basics were still here.

For Utopia, his countermove was instant, but for Rune, the time he took to prepare and launch it was two times slower.

Rune did a mirror move, his goal wasn’t to attack, it was to disrupt. Just as Utopia launched his counterattack, Rune's foot appeared on his shin, blocking his move before it took too much speed.

“Of course I’m not going to use the juggernaut style, who do you take me for! I’ll methodically rip your heart out of your chest, be happy as the longer you struggle the stronger I become hahaha!”

Rune wasn’t joking anymore, before being in an acting session, it was a way to ascertain his new power against an adapted and friendly opponent.

To maximize his advantage, he had to close in on him, so he stopped his cool gait and used all the knowledge from his body control fundamental to control all his 5 000 strength, which then transformed to more than 10 000 thanks to the Ether Law shenanigans.

Slowly. His body acted slowly. The moment he used all his strength to accelerate, he could feel that compared to before, he was slow, twice as slow, and then his fighting instinct fundamental started to work.

His movement and trajectory were perfect, textbook even, it was the minimum expected to reach tier 3, but when time slowed down… Things started to appear in his mind.

‘Unbelievable…’

Mid-course towards colliding with Utopia, the fraction of a second he needed to reach this consequence, Rune had the time to see something.

‘A different temporality…’

How could mere data transmit what perceiving time felt like, what it really meant for the recipient? A soul specialty was different from a specialized mastery, you could imitate the result but not the nature.

And now, Rune understood that the important part in his new specialty wasn’t a time perceived twice as slow compared to before.

It was the fact that he was now a resident in a different temporality, he wasn’t using his spirit to manipulate his perception of time, it was just a switch. One moment he lived where time had its own tempo, and the other…

Rune adjusted his own posture, he used his feet to slow down his speed, and when he made contact with Utopia who retreated some steps, like a bully, he abused Utopia’s reaction time to make him react to three different feints, before successfully grabbing his neck through an opening he couldn’t not create.

“From the start… I let you have hope… But I didn’t realize that I was lying to you till now…” Rune acted a little melodramatic, but for some reason, he felt that he owed an explanation, so he freed Utopia.

So he deactivated his boosted sense of time.

“Hello Utopia, I’m back from the other side,” a simple smile for a simple talk.

“This grab was insane, how'd you do it?” Still in shock from the grab, Utopia searched for the explanation.

“It seems I just became the best trainer of fighting instinct ever after I advanced my specialty so don’t be shocked! It’s not a secret but I just received a call that informed me that my composite element was pure genius but it’s so genius that I need to wait till tier 4 to create and have it…”

“So I decided to experiment a little for my tier 3, and…” Making the suspense increase voluntarily, Rune took pleasure in Utopia’s increasing curiosity.

“I just so happened to get a path that boosted my sense of time, extending it by 100% at maximum, but only now did I realize that I misunderstood some parts of what is implied by that, so how to explain this grab? Well, it seems that the word ‘different temporality’ used to describe how my time is extended by 100% also includes my whole spirit in it, and maybe it’s possible I misunderstood what extended implied till now…”

“But now that I think about it, maybe it’s why a peak tier 3 mastery would only give an extended time of 20%, yeah now that I think about it...”

Losing himself in his new revelation, Rune kept babbling incoherently about what a different temporality involved.

“Stop! Tell me the effect directly!” Utopia finally snapped and kicked the ground in frustration.

“In sum, a different temporality involves the addition of new… Insights? Like different ways to fight against you and answer your moves. My fighting instinct, or maybe the Ether Law attached to it just naturally taught me the most fundamental way to bully people living in slower temporality, and that was the grab I just did, it’s…”

Finishing on this, Rune was simply smiling.

“Completely broken! Hahahahaha!” And started laughing maniacally after concluding this.

“It’s completely stupid! Why would our own fundamental masteries make us ignore something so deadly? And why would something like that not be written on the board?”

“I hope you’re ready for a beating! I also don’t know what it is exactly, but I just did it so I can do it again!” Rune provoked him.

Once again preparing himself, his spirit phased through time and entered a different temporality.

But this time he didn’t just activate it, he entered it. A different mindset led to a different result, and once again he could feel something change deep inside him.

The Ether Law existed in all temporality, and Rune didn’t know it, but he felt that there was something that happened to them when the time changed.

A new insight instantly popped in his mind, like the Ether Law just now realized he missed an obvious part of his education and was making up for it now.

Once in this state, without losing any time, he approached Utopia who adopted a defensive posture.

As a result of the new knowledge he was acquiring, Rune didn’t think at all, he did everything by following his fighting instinct fundamental and started with the same simple punch.

This time Utopia was more careful and started to side-step the punch, but the moment he started, Rune switched from a punch to a front kick, forcing Utopia to go in the opposite direction.

If Utopia used strength as his primary way of moving, he would be forced into a confrontation with Rune, but with momentum, everything changed, and he seamlessly switched from left to right.

In the normal temporality, Rune would have reacted by going all-in and catching him before he escaped, but now he had a new way to do it.

He activated the momentum he never really used except for passive training and transformed his kick into a sweep.

But while for Rune he reacted as fast as he could possibly do because he was prepared for it, for Utopia, it was literally like a tier 3 peak speedster just decided to play with him by making 2 easy feints before truly striking.

And faster than his momentum could take him away, he could only block and hope for the best.

Once again, the same happened. Rune was like an omniscient opponent that saw what he was doing and simply responded in a belligerent way.

He executed a complete rotation and when Utopia was ready to block the kick from his right, he received a kick from his unprotected side.

And was sent flying.

“See, it’s as easy as breathing now that I know what to do, it’s not just 1 second that becomes 2 seconds, it’s everything that involves my spirit that is extended, so my reaction speed and when I decide to use momentum is included in it,” Rune said clearly what he just did.

“Again!” But group leader Utopia seemed to want to go at it again.

“That’s why I said I’m the greatest close-quarter trainer now, but I don’t know how you plan to answer to what I do, good luck finding the answer.”

Rune was ready to spar for a long time, understanding himself as he continued to fight, the only true way of progressing.