“Typhaon? Is that someone I am supposed to know?” Tartarus asked.
Neo observed his reactions.
It didn’t seem like he was lying.
‘So two different people can have similar Intent?’
Although it was weird how Typhaon and Tartarus were both entities with similarity to trees, and both were 81st ranked Grim Reapers, Neo had his reason to think they were different.
Tartarus was far older than Typhaon.
And Typhaon was in the Underworld right now.
‘Maybe Typhaon is Tartarus from the future?’
‘No, that doesn’t make sense either.’
‘If that was true, Tartarus would’ve known about Typhaon.’
Shaking his head, Neo left the unknown Layer.
He appeared above the skies of Layer 2.
“I’ll regress now,” Neo told Kane who was flying nearby and staring at the sky.
“Hmm, okay.”
Neo disappeared from his location and reappeared above the skies of Layer 3.
To teleport like that, he wasn’t using All-Shadow.
He was using mimicked Space Elementals for spatial senses, then he used Pseudo-Gap to reach that location in a single step.
It was a display of overwhelming strength.
Just using two ‘basic’ techniques was enough for him to travel between sub-dimensions.
It was the strength he always dreamed of.
Yet he wasn’t happy.
Tartarus’ smile wouldn’t leave his mind.
That bastard had been too confident that Neo would fail to save Elizabeth again.
Neo used Eyes of Echo.
He burned titanic amount of energy to look far back into the past.
Countless images began to overlap. It was getting difficult to find a particular ‘moment’ of the past among the ocean of images.
Neo remained impassive as he continued.
After using Eyes of Echo with All-Shadow several times during his fight with Tartarus, Neo understood its rules.
Rule number one, the consumption of energy increased exponentially the further you looked back in the past.
Rule number two, the energy consumption was counted from the original starting point.
To explain, Neo could use Eyes of Echo at 2:30, then time travel to 2:20.
Here, he burned ‘x’ amount of energy for looking 10 minutes into the past (from 2:30 to 2:20).
Then, he took a rest, recovered his energy, and he used Eyes of Echo at 2:20 to travel back to 2:15.
In this case, he would burn ‘y’ amount of energy for looking 15 minutes into the past.
15 minutes (from 2:30 to 2:15).
Not 5 minutes (from 2:20 to 2:15).
The amount of energy used was counted from the ‘original starting point’, which was 2:30.
This was why Neo did not use short time travels to work around the exponential energy consumption.
Neo could feel his eyes burning.
The amount of energy he was using was more than what a large star contained.
The moment he saw Elizabeth alive, he used All-Shadow and entered the past.
…
Elizabeth searched through the castle.
She was worried about him. Although he had won the battle against Tyr, he did not look happy.
After searching everywhere, she reached the last room.
She opened the door.
The isolation around the room dissipated, and she immediately sensed his presence.
“Neo—”
Her words were cut off when the world castle suddenly started to shake. Cracks appeared on the walls, the pillars began to shatter.
“The nightmare world is falling since almost all Pillars were eliminated.”
“Neo!”
Elizabeth had an intense look of worry when she turned back to face Neo.
He was… shattering.
“Huh?”
Neo looked down at his body.
“Why are these Time Elementals acting up again… oh.”
A look of realization appeared in Neo’s mind.
“I guess I doubled the people by bringing them back through my Cosmos while this timeline’s people are still here. That must be why Time Elementals increased the erosion’s strength.”
“Why are you so calm!?”
Elizabeth took him to the bed and made him sit on it.
Then, she tried healing him.
But it didn’t work.
“Don’t worry about it,” Neo grabbed her hand and made her sit in front of him. “I’ll go back to my timeline so that this paradox is erased. That should appease the Time Elementals.”
“What happened to you?” Elizabeth asked with worry.
Neo’s presence had changed completely.
His aura had grown sharp and heavy, but it wasn’t just his aura that changed.
The way he spoke while trying to suppress the tremors in his voice, the way he held her hands gently as if it was her who might shatter any moment.
“It’s okay. Everything is going to be alright,” Elizabeth patted his back as she hugged him. “So, take your time and explain what is happening slowly.”
Neo explained everything to her.
As he did that, he kept his senses open.
Ambient Elementals were able to seep into the world through the cracks that appeared in Tartarus’ crumbling world.
Neo could see them.
Hear them.
He had always been able to see ‘Death’ of others. Thanks to it, he could roughly tell when they were about to die.
And, right now, he could see it clearly.
Elizabeth would die.
Death was whispering to him.
It is impossible to save Elizabeth.
“I’m sorry.” His voice cracked. “I… I can’t—”
“You did everything you could. That’s more than enough for me.”
Neo did not say anything.
It was enough?
How?
Despite being able to defeat Tartarus, he couldn’t save Elizabeth.
He didn’t even understand why she was going to die.
Should he put her inside his Cosmos?
No, that will not work. Elizabeth is on a timer.
Turn Beelzebub into a Consciousness?
Then, Beelzebub might grow strong enough that he could stop Elizabeth’s time for a long duration.
It will do nothing. No matter how much time you can buy with that method. You won’t be able to find a way to save Elizabeth in that amount of time.
Should he repeatedly go back into the past to stay with Elizabeth?
This time Death didn’t stop him.
It did not tell him anything. Because Death knew Neo would understand the consequences of his action.
By regressing repeatedly he would achieve nothing. All he would do was force Elizabeth to die repeatedly.
His selfish actions would make her suffer.
So…
He wouldn’t do that.