The thing about not needing to eat or drink is that you suddenly have a lot of extra time. It's honestly rather shocking how much time is added once you think about it. It might not be a crazy amount of time but an extra hour or two makes the day feel much longer.

Usually, that would be a good thing since days sometimes feel as if they just flash by. The downside of that is, of course, filling up that time with something else.

Which was a slight issue for me. All the things I could currently do were either limited or stressful. Going out and reentering society or even just going for a stroll was also risky.

I was a headless man.

I couldn't wander through town without care, nor was I willing to walk these forests on the off chance I got caught.

It was very much possible to use my Pretender abilities to look like a regular person. That, however, couldn't be done for extended periods. Here on Earth, my titles were a lot weaker and a lot more draining. Walking out was a gamble.

I wasn't worried about people finding me given my new form of sight, but my trust for the government's spying policies was not high.

My headless nature was yet another wedge in my life that I would have to overcome.

My life seems to be filling up with those so-called little wedges. I was not a fan of it in the slightest.

After having escaped from my grave, I'd made my way back home through the cold. That's when I discovered that I wasn't all that affected by it.

More benefits of being a Dullahan, I guess.

If I really think about it, my adaptation fragment had turned me into a pseudo undead entity.

A rather strange turn of events, I would say. An uncomfortable and restricting one as well. So that meant that I couldn't go outside, and given how little I used the internet, it left me feeling a bit restless.

That should have meant that I had more time to mess around with my qi and powers, but that wasn't exactly true.

While my powers had become more versatile on Earth, the cost was that they were also a lot more draining, and the recharge rate was horrendous.

I still felt tired from the little ghost trick I had pulled of, and my qi still hadn't recovered from my first failed attempt at escape.

In fact, only about 5 percent of my qi had recovered since then. This is why I found myself currently in my kitchen mediating and trying to figure out a way to restabilize the fulcrum.

It was currently the most urgent task that needed to be accomplished right now. It was my chance at being God and living in a story. There was no way I was going to let it slip out of my hands like that.

My meditation led me back to the essence of Deventus and back to her mind. My attempts at communication were met with the same effect as last time. My message was sent, but all the responses were much too fast for me to understand. The time difference was messing with all attempts at communication.

So, all I could was use my pretender ability to imitate the process that she was using to hold the connection alive. Most of the time mediating was spent reinforcing that connection.

Right now, I was meditating again.

My mind had started to fall back into the meditative trance that had been cultivated for over a century. Just as I was about to dive in, I was halted by the presence I felt.

Iz?

I was caught off guard. One of my very first creations was attempting to reinforce the connection as well.

I honestly hadn't expected it.

Iz had never seemed to be smart enough to take the initiative. Yet here he was clearly doing so.

Through my connection, I called for him, and in the next instant, I felt the puppy-like excitement that was indicative of Iz.

At that moment, I felt a deep sense of pride.

Huh, things were looking up.

..........

Just because things are looking up does not mean that a task loses its difficulty.

The past few days were filled only by my attempts at stabilizing the connection and boredom as I waited for my qi to recover.

A small amount of progress was being made on both ends, but there was no way the connection would be the same.

My death had seriously disturbed whatever had tethered me to the fulcrum. And apparently, that entity wasn't going to be fixing it.

Izs arrival has sped up the process, and as we got used to the task, our speed of reinforcement increased. But even then, it was slow-moving.

We couldn't reinforce it too much since it needed time to stabilize after every significant attempt. So I was forced to take hour-long breaks filled with silence and an overthinking mind.

An expected result, but I'd started to feel frustrated at the rate of our progress. I'd learned patience after my century of life in Malum, but that didn't diminish how aggravating the whole situation was.

I didn't know whether or not my powers would disappear once the connection was lost. It wasn't a risk I was willing to take in the slightest.

If that was true, the loss of the connection would result in my immediate death. Even if that wasn't true, I could only imagine my disappointment at having fumbled what was essentially godhood. I would constantly be looking back and kicking myself in the ass for letting it slip past.

No, I couldn't let this connection close.

Luckily enough for me, the universe seemed to have mercy on me, and there was no active force stopping me from doing so.

Knock on wood.

I sighed as I finally stopped pacing across the office. Overthinking would do me no good. Even if it no longer brought headaches with it, there was still very much no sense in doing it.

What I needed right now was to focus and just keep moving forward. The longer this whole process kept on, the more I felt like killing Arnaud.

As I took a seat at the desk, I instinctively reached for the teapot on the snack table before coming to an abrupt halt.

There was no point in that.

"Goddammit."

There was nothing to do. My attempts at Browsing the internet only left me feeling even more frustrated than ever.

I took a deep breath before I started to talk to myself.

"Just relax, William. You're worrying too much. You're at your worst when you stress out."

"Deep breaths. Focus inward."

"In and out."

Knock! Knock!

"Who the fuck?"

In my frustration, I'd turned my attention away from my vision. I still hadn't gotten used to it yet. Being able to see everything around me hadn't increased my ability to focus on multiple things.

Quickly I took stock of who was at the door.

There were two individuals who seemed to be government officials. They both wore the same uniform, and I could clearly see the firearms at their side. What were they doing here?

I'm pretty sure no one was aware of my murder unless the government had gone against their privacy agreement. Which actually made sense.

Regardless of that, this was not the time.

Couldn't they have waited a couple of months before arriving? Their arrival would only throw another wedge into my life.

Quickly I reverted back to my original look with the use of my title. The process was immediate, and a quick glass in the mirror confirmed its authenticity.

The drain wasn't immense since there was no use of "fake" powers, but I could feel it. I was already feeling the tiredness.

As I walked out of the office, I quickly surveyed the entirety of my supernatural vision.

What had been a slight surprise turned into shock as I located multiple officials perched up in different areas with guns in hand.

What on Earth?

Something was definitely not right, and I didn't know what.

My qi started to roll and picked up pace in my body. There was no way I was going to die twice. Another death would definitely destroy my connection to the fulcrum.

Knock! Knock!

"Yes, yes, I'm coming. " I shouted.

They clearly knew I was here. There was no point in trying to hide.

I just had to hope that I was powerful enough to handle them.

I pulled the door open as I arrived. My qi was ready to explode out at any second.

"Mister Benjamin Francis?". The one that spoke was a man of Chinese descent with a rather gruff voice and thick accent.

"That's me. How can I help you?"

This time it was the other person, a woman with red hair and almond-shaped face, and green eyes that spoke."You are under arrest for violation of the undead code 112."

"What?"