Valdemar made his move at exactly 17:45.
I beat up a few valets on the third floor with an Umbrium and a Cryora.
We were eventually saved by Prime Casten Vorrick.
I collected some loot.
I refused to join Vorrick’s party.
“Vik, what the fuck? We should’ve joined them! I don’t trust they’ll save anyone other than themselves!” Trent muttered beside me as we made our way down the staircase toward the first floor.
“They won’t save anyone.” I replied flatly. “We’ll be safer looking for a way out downstairs.”
Because I already knew – Valdemar’s attack succeeds regardless of what Casten Vorrick and his crew encounter or manage to pull off on their way to the seventh floor.
Besides, Dinah White – one of the marked ones – had gone with Prime Vorrick. And I needed to check if the other two - Colton Banks and the shady staff member – were downstairs…or dead.
More importantly, the second part of my plan hinged on staying alive for as long as I could in this loop.
Knowing myself, in the original timeline I likely joined Vorrick – untrusting of Skyhaven as I am, that just sounds like something I would’ve done.
And something tells me that with my level 3 COG, I probably wasn’t much help to him.
I was probably the first one to die.
Now, I needed to live.
I needed to live and make someone marked by feeding them information that would cause them to make a significant change.
Having Checkpoint would’ve made things easier – but it was already wasted. And I wasn’t going to cry about it.
I’d work with what I have: Déjà vu.
If I had rejected Vorrick in one of my previous loops, then somewhere along the way, repeating a past loop, I’d get the faint recollections to let me know I was retracing familiar steps. That, hopefully, would be enough to steer me.
And if not…then so be it. I’d die here. And hope the next loop’s Viktor – amnesiac and clueless – would follow my footsteps exactly. Then he would reap the benefits of this run. He’d feel the echoes Déjà vu left behind. And most likely – unless the other looper decided to contact him again, which I highly doubt they would – he’d still have Checkpoint available at this point.
“Okay.” Trent nodded. “But…you do have a plan, right?”
“Not exactly. But we’ll figure something out.” I said, stopping as we reached the second floor.
My gaze swept across the floor filled with dismantled valets.
More loot.
“Help me scavenge them for metal.” I told Trent, already approaching the nearest metallic corpse, which was mostly intact.
“You think now is a good time for this?” Trent asked, eyes wide. “Before, it was one thing. But now? After what we were just told about Valdemar?”
I nodded, keeping my voice light – another lie. “Yeah. Don’t worry. We’ll get through this…and this is part of our survival plan.”
“Vik, I don’t know…” Trent muttered, hesitating.
I needed to speed this up.
I reached into my pocket and summoned the Dematerializer from the Inventory.
I showed it to him. “Don’t ask me how I got this. Point is – I can upgrade my COG and improve our chances. So c’mon – help me loot these valets.”
Trent’s eyes widened. “Holy shit, dude! Where did you get a Dematerializer??”
“Didn’t I just tell you not to ask me that?” I grinned.
***
After Trent helped me collect everything we could from the valets, I sent him back to the third floor to “check if we missed something”.
I couldn’t let him see me do magic. Not the mana crystal kind – actual, real magic.
Once he was out of sight, I stored everything we’d scavenged into the Inventory and gave it a quick look.
[Inventory]
- Bronze Key x1
- Tantalum – 1.06kg
- Iron – 26.6kg
- Copper – 7.69kg
- Ironwatch Foldable Sword x1
- Time Plane Memory #6
- Dematerializer
Time to upgrade.
I connected the Dematerializer to the Integration Port and immediately switched over to the Déjà vu System.
[Dematerializer is Active]
[Déjà vu System: Level 6]
[Progress until next Level: 0%]
[Metals needed for Level 7: Iron – 38g, Tantalum – 9.5g]
[You may proceed with the upgrade phase]
Perfect. With the conversion rates in mind, I needed 7.6 kilograms of Iron and 380 grams of Tantalum. I had enough.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
[Required Metals are present in the Inventory]
[Do you wish to level up?]
[YES / NO]
YES.
[You have gained 1 Skill Point]
But I wasn’t done.
[Dematerializer is Active]
[Déjà vu System: Level 7]
[Progress until next Level: 0%]
[Metals needed for Level 8: Iron – 54.5g, Copper – 55.94g, Tantalum – 12g]
[You may proceed with the upgrade phase]
Okay, Copper’s conversion rate was…0.8%, right? So I’d need around 7 kilograms. Then, in addition, 10.9 kilograms worth of Iron and 480 grams of Tantalum.
I had enough. Another upgrade it is, then.
I hit YES again.
[You have 2 Skill Points available]
The next level needed even more copper, and I was fresh out. So this was it for now.
Now, let’s spend those points before Trent gets back.
I considered leveling up Temporal Trace to get another – a fourth – mark, but a different thought crossed my mind: Shouldn’t I upgrade all the System’s skills to at least level 1 first?
If I want to utilize the Déjà vu System the way Chronos intended, I need all of it’s skills available.
That just felt…right.
Okay, let’s start with DjV mode.
First up: Afterimage.
[Skill acquired: Afterimage lvl.1]
[Next Level: lvl.2: Duration of the afterimage is prolonged to 10 seconds]
As expected, short-lived at first – probably five seconds tops. That’s fine.
Next: Echo Sense.
[Skill acquired: Echo Sense lvl.1]
[Next Level: lvl.2: The echoes will become clearer and more frequent]
So right now they’d be messy and rare? Great. Well, at least it was a passive skill.
Just as I thought I was done, another Déjà vu System message popped up on my COG’s screen.
[A New Skill Available (DjV): Mirror Leveling]
What?
I navigated to the skill list under DjV mode and found it – one of the previously censored skills had become visible.
6. Mirror Leveling – Lvl.0 / 1
Passive skill. For each level in the Déjà vu System, you receive an additional level to allocate into your COG System.
I blinked.
Double level gains? Was this for real?
Something that would let me level up both my COG and my memory retention abilities at the same time? Yes, please!
I needed more metal. Fast.
And just as I spotted Trent coming up down the staircase, I already knew – the first floor's valets were going to be my next target.
***
Once we reached the first floor, I was relieved to find more valet corpses than on the third and second floors combined.
The problem? Not all of them were salvageable. Some had gone through heavy Umbrium decay, or Ignis’ melting fire – too far gone to extract anything useful.
Among the bodies, I spotted Colton Banks, sprawled on the ground with a jagged piece of metal protruding from his head.
So…unless he’d been fed new information by the other looper during this run too, it was safe to assume he’d gotten marked for something he did before the start of Valdemar’s attack.
Maybe he triggered an evacuation? Would make sense, considering his almost-oligarch status.
The shady, marked staff member was nowhere to be seen.
We were also met by the survivors – mostly injured folks, women, and children, along with a handful of terrified men – all throwing us skeptical glances.
One of them, a woman who looked like an oligarch based on her attire and the air around her, approached us carefully. She had a handgun gripped in her right hand.
“And who might you be?” She asked, gaze sharp and fully judgmental.
“It’s the damn rats from Orlinth!” Someone snapped behind her.
The voice belonged to the woman I'd marked earlier - the one with the clock invention.
“Probably here on Valdemar’s orders to finish us all!”
I half expected Trent to snap back at her – he usually did – but it seemed even he wasn’t feeling brave enough under the threat of a loaded gun.
Luckily, before her wild theory could spread, others stepped in – people I recognized from the third floor.
“Oh, shut up, you hag!” A woman snapped. “That young man saved us upstairs!”
Murmurs of agreement from the third-floor survivors followed.
Being from Orlinth - a rat - I was surprised to gain the support of Skyhaven's residents. Twice today.
The oligarch woman seemed to relax – just a little.
“I’m still waiting for an answer.” She said coolly.
More confident now, I stepped forward. “I’m Viktor. This is Trent. We were hiding on the third floor before Prime Vorrick told us to join you all down here.”
She sighed, then nodded. “I see. Well – find a spot to rest. Not many of those left as you can see from all the bodies scattered around.” She said coldly, gesturing toward the body of none other than Dalton Rose, Head of Solvane.
Then, she added. “There are medkits over there if you’re injured. Hopefully, this will all be over soon.”
She turned away, and both Trent and I exhaled in relief.
But before I could even turn my attention toward the fallen valets, something happened that I couldn’t have anticipated.
A man slumped against the wall – his left arm soaked in blood – spoke, voice hoarse and trembling but clear enough to drive fear within us all.
“It won’t be.” He said. “Valdemar’s finally here to judge you.”
The woman oligarch froze mid-step and turned toward him, her eyes narrowing. “What?”
“You heard me.” The man said, his tone growing firmer. “Skyhaven’s been rotten for too long. It was foolish to think judgement wouldn’t come. Valdemar is the Divine Judge.”
Divine Judge?
Was he quoting something religious?
“Valdemar’s a terrorist, fool!” another survivor snapped, standing up and glaring.
The woman oligarch nodded. “You’re injured. And scared. But that’s no excuse to glorify the enemy. He’s no Divine Judge. He’d gathered enough influence to bring real change – peaceful change – but instead he chose chaos. Do you have any idea how many times Dalton tried to reach out to him? How many times he had wanted to listen to him and his demands? Do you?”
Her voice rose. “Every time, Valdemar snubbed him! Ghosted him. Ignored every attempt at diplomacy. Why? Because he doesn’t want reform. He’s just an egomaniac dead set on burning the entire world for the fun of it! That’s madness – “
A gunshot split the air.
Her head suddenly exploded.
Blood splattered across the nearby survivors. Her body dropped like a ragdoll.
Screams erupted. Panic surged through the room.
People – those who could move – scrambled to their feet.
But the injured man stood, gun still smoking in hand, aiming it at everyone.
“Sit down, scum! All of you!” He shouted.
I stayed in front of Trent, shielding him as the man’s gun swerved toward us as well.
“Robert, what is wrong with you?” A woman from the group – who seemingly knew him – cried out, her voice trembling, her eyes wide with horror.
“Shut up!” He barked, face contorted in rage. “I wasn’t going to let her badmouth the leader!”
“The leader?” I echoed, my heart thundering.
The man nodded. “What – you think following Valdemar is a privilege reserved for the Foundry and Orlinth?”
He turned to the rest of the group. “Wrong! There are plenty of Skyhaveners who see his cause as just. Plenty who’ve already joined Libra!” He waved the gun wildly at the frightened crowd. “Not these pigs, obviously!” Then he gestured toward the corpse of the woman oligarch he had just shot. “And definitely not that pig Caldra Huntington who dared spread lies about him!”
He sneered. “Skyhaveners like me! Proper people. Not corrupt, bloated trash like the rest of you!”
He continued with the same fervor. “When had you ever considered what your fellow citizens from the lower platforms are going through? Had you ever worried about anyone other than you? I’ll answer that – no, you hadn't!”
Then, with his free hand, he reached into his coat and pulled out an Ignis, slamming it into the Channel Core of his COG.
He tapped furiously on the interface, then raised his voice.
“Oh Divine Judge, who watched the rot of men,
Who saw their towers reach the skies while their brothers and sisters had bled their lives –
Come now, and burn away their impurity.
Watch me as the flames cleanse their lies.
May your fury give way to love and justice reborn.”
He finished with a shout. “Long live Libra! Long live Valdemar!”
Then he dropped to his knees.
Was he…praying?
Oh, no...
Shit.
Shit!
I realized what was going on too late.
I moved fast, grabbed Trent, and shoved him back toward the staircase…but it was already over.
His COG detonated, exploding the entire first floor and killing us all.