Episode-975
Chapter : 1949
Lloyd gripped the handle of the short, heavy sword in his left hand. The Hour Blade.
It was black and ugly. It looked like a chunk of metal that had been at the bottom of the ocean for a thousand years. It radiated a feeling of extreme heaviness. Just looking at it made your shoulders ache.
Lloyd took a step toward the portal. The wolves were already rushing toward Airin. The Collector was grinning, thinking he had created enough chaos to escape.
"Seventh Form," Lloyd said. His voice was heavy, like a stone dropping into a well.
He lifted the heavy black sword. It moved slowly, dragging trails of dark energy through the air.
"Stasis."
Lloyd swung the sword.
He didn't aim at the Collector. He didn't aim at the wolves. He aimed at the empty space right in front of the portal.
He slashed the air horizontally, from left to right.
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When Lloyd swung the heavy Hour Blade, there was no whistling sound of wind. There was no flash of light. Instead, there was a deep, resonating THUD, like a heavy book slamming shut in a quiet room.
The blade left a black line in the air. It was a scar on the world itself.
The effect was instant and terrifying.
The three wolves that had just jumped out of the portal froze.
They didn't just stop moving like they were pausing. They became statues. One wolf was in mid-air, its claws reaching out, its jaws open in a snarl. Gravity stopped working on it. It just hung there, suspended in space, motionless. The spit flying from its mouth froze into little diamonds of liquid. The smoke that made up its body stopped swirling and became as solid as black rock.
The portal itself, the swirling vortex of purple energy, stopped spinning. It looked like a painting of a portal. The ripples of magic hardened. The claws of the other monsters trying to get out were stuck, unable to push forward, unable to pull back.
Everything within ten feet of that black line Lloyd had drawn was locked.
"Stasis," Lloyd repeated, lowering the heavy sword.
The Collector stared at his monsters. He waved his hand, trying to command them.
"Move!" he screamed. "Bite her! Move!"
Nothing happened. The wolves were trapped in a single second of time. They weren't dead, but they weren't alive either. They were paused.
Lloyd walked past the frozen wolves. He tapped one of them on the nose with his finger. It felt as hard and cold as iron.
"You can scream at them all you want," Lloyd said casually. "But they can't hear you. In their world, no time is passing. For them, this moment will last forever... or at least, until I decide to let it go."
Lloyd turned to face the Collector. The man was backing away, hitting the wall of the greenhouse. He had nowhere left to run. His time machine was useless against Lloyd’s speed. His monsters were useless against Lloyd’s lock.
"What... what are you?" the Collector whispered. He looked at Lloyd with pure horror. "You aren't a mage. Mages use mana. Mages use elements. You are... you are breaking the world."
Lloyd looked at the heavy black sword in his hand. He felt the connection to Zafira, the ghost woman floating silently behind him. He felt the cold logic of the universe in his grip.
"I am an engineer," Lloyd said. "And I just fixed your glitch."
He looked over at Airin.
She was still frozen against the table by the Collector’s original machine, but she could see everything. Her eyes were wide, filled with awe. She watched Lloyd standing there amidst the frozen monsters, holding swords made of time itself.
She wasn't looking at a nobleman anymore. She was looking at the man from her dreams. The man who solved problems that no one else could solve.
Lloyd turned back to the Collector.
"You have a choice," Lloyd said. He raised the silver Minute Blade again, pointing it at the man’s face. "You can drop that black box and surrender. Or I can cut the time out of your lungs, and you can spend the rest of eternity trying to take your next breath."
The Collector looked at the frozen wolves. He looked at the portal that was now just a wall of solid energy. He looked at the golden clock in Lloyd’s eye.
He knew he had lost.
Chapter : 1950
But the Collector was a fanatic. He served the Fire Fly Corporation. He served the Seventh Circle. He knew what happened to people who surrendered. Failure was punished far worse than death.
"You think you've won," the Collector spat. "But you don't know who we are. You don't know what is coming."
The Collector’s hand tightened on the black box. But he didn't turn it off. Instead, he jammed his thumb down on a different button—a small, recessed switch on the side.
"If I can't take the girl," the Collector snarled, "then no one gets her."
The box began to glow with a violent, unstable red light. It started to shake and whine.
"Overload," the Collector whispered. "This device contains a miniature singularity. In three seconds, it will collapse this entire building into a point the size of a marble."
Lloyd’s eyes narrowed. A bomb. A time-bomb, literally.
"Three," the Collector counted, a mad grin on his face.
Lloyd didn't panic. He didn't try to rush forward to grab the box. He knew he couldn't stop the reaction by hitting it. It was already counting down.
"Two," the Collector said.
Airin watched Lloyd. She saw him take a deep breath. She saw him switch his grip on the swords.
He wasn't looking at the Collector. He was looking at her.
"One," the Collector screamed.
The red light on the box flashed blindingly bright. The air began to scream as gravity started to collapse inward.
"Goodbye, Lord Ferrum!"
But Lloyd just shook his head.
"Not today," he said.
He lifted the silver Minute Blade. But he didn't slash at the enemy.
He turned the blade around and pointed it at himself.
"Fourth Form," Lloyd whispered.
He slashed the sword across his own chest.
It didn't cut his skin. It didn't draw blood. Instead, the blade passed through his body like a ghost.
"Rewind."
The world blurred.
For Lloyd, the universe suddenly jerked backward. It was like a film strip being pulled in the wrong direction.
The red light on the box sucked back inside. The sound of the scream vanished. The Collector’s mouth closed. The count went from "One" back to "Two." Then back to "Three."
Lloyd watched the last five seconds of reality undo themselves. He saw the Collector’s thumb lift off the button. He saw the mad grin fade back into fear.
The world settled. They were back in the moment just before the Collector pressed the self-destruct switch.
To the Collector, nothing had happened yet. He was just about to press the button. He opened his mouth to say "Three."
But Lloyd was already moving.
Because Lloyd remembered the future that hadn't happened yet.
He stepped forward, using the Accel form again. He vanished.
Before the Collector’s brain could even send the signal to his thumb, Lloyd was there.
Lloyd didn't use a sword this time. He used his hand. He grabbed the Collector’s wrist in a grip of iron.
CRACK.
He broke the wrist instantly. The black box fell from the limp fingers.
Lloyd caught the box with his other hand before it hit the ground.
The Collector screamed, clutching his broken arm. He stared at Lloyd with pure, unadulterated confusion.
"I... I was about to..." the Collector stammered. "How did you know? I hadn't even moved yet!"
Lloyd looked down at the shivering man. The golden clock in his eye ticked one last time before fading back to blue.
"I told you," Lloyd said, his voice flat and tired. "I cut the hands off the clock."
He squeezed the black box in his hand. Using his sheer physical strength, boosted by his Steel Blood, he crushed the device. Metal gears and glass crunched and shattered.
The grey heavy feeling in the room vanished instantly. The sunlight returned. The colors became bright again. The sound of the birds outside rushed back in.
Time was normal again.
The frozen wolves shattered into black dust as the Stasis spell ended, their connection to the portal severed.
Airin gasped, falling forward as the invisible wall holding her up disappeared. She caught herself on the table, breathing in huge gulps of air.
She looked up.
Lloyd was standing over the cowering Collector. The ghostly woman, Zafira, faded away into the shadows, her job done. The swords dissolved into mist.
Lloyd turned to look at Airin. He looked exhausted. Using that much power, manipulating time itself, had drained him. But he was safe. And she was safe.
"Are you alright?" he asked again, just like he had when he first crashed through the roof.
Airin nodded, tears finally spilling down her cheeks.