The next 42 days flew by quickly, and routinely.

  “Come here. I’ll layer in the second iteration of the blueprint on your soul.” Sage Yeltz said, brushing off the dust from her sooty shirt.

  “I wish we had a little more time…” Seraphine added wistfully. “I’ve almost solved an issue with the kink in the carving.”

  “And I’ve told you that that kind of issue will be solved in the future when we get an actual damn charmsman working on it. It’s useless to think about it for now. Be satisfied with the extent of accuracy that Sylven is able to contribute to our task for now.” Sage Yeltz retorted, snorting a little at her impatience.

  “Task, I thought I could solve it within the time limit! And now I’ll just disappear or something because of this little shit right here without even completing this small thing.” Seraphine complained, stomping her foot in irritation.

  “I would genuinely like to ask what the issue is. This is just incredibly confusing. What did she mean by disappearing?” Pultris asked worriedly in Aurelius’s head.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know. And why do you care if you disappear? Might be an improvement over your current course of miserable afterlife.” Aurelius muttered sarcastically at Pultris.

  He knew it was probably developing some kind of unhealthy habits for the bedroom, but at the same time, the short term pleasure of talking back to an asshole like Pultris was clearly worth the tradeoff for the time being…

  Mr. Tona smiled on the couch at Aurelius’s impoliteness, nodding his head in agreement at Aurelius’s statements.

  “I swear on the Eternal Faiths, that you are the single most infuriating-” Pultris started in offence, just to be cut off by Sage Yeltz.

  “Shut the fuck up and edit the information on your contractor’s soul.” Sage Yeltz said curtly, clearly irritated by the talkative nature of Pultris.

  “Women. Always so irritating.” Pultris muttered in the back of Aurelius’s mind before complying, sending threads of golden string shining around the room and wrapping Aurelius’s body in its binding.

  “Alright. We’re done here.” Sage Yeltz said, signalling to Aurelius to use his charm to shut Pultris off once more.

  “WAIT-” Pultris yelled out in Aurelius’s brain once again, before being completely silenced by the power of a single tap on the charm from Aurelius.

  As Aurelius was about to relish in the quiet that settled over his noggin once more, Mr. Tona took the time to speak up.

  “If what you’re saying about the time loop has been accurate, you believe that you’ve been training for what, like 4 months through the last few loops?” Mr. Tona asked critically, his eyes full of judgement.

  “I mean I appreciate the fact that Yeltz approved my leave of absence for taking care of you for the last 2 months, but I have yet to truly see a single shred of potential in you, boy.” Mr. Tona commented harshly.

  “Pultris seems to be your only option in a fight, and he’s already been restricted to the limit. If you were just a little more competent, we likely would not have to restrict him as hard. Maybe you could even wield a few magic at the level of a high mage through him.” He started, taking out a cigarette out of his case casually.

  “I said don’t smoke in this room, Tona.” Sage Yeltz growled venomously, immediately condensing water around the butt of the cigarette to make it impossible to light.

  “First of all, it’s still Mr. Tona. I’m wayyy older than you, and still your mentor. And secondly, this whole thing is going to reset with the boy over there anyway.” He shrugged, snapping away his soggy cigarette in place of another one.

  Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  This seemed to piss Sage Yeltz quite a bit, with a vein visibly popping on her neck.

  However, after an expectant eyebrow raised from Mr. Tona, she relented, sighing audibly and turning away from looking at the man.

  She was also probably considering the fact that this was the last day that they would be with Aurelius, at least in this loop, and the fact that none of them had any idea of what would happen to themselves after the reset.

  “Anyways, the way you use martial arts is all wrong in so many places that I have no idea where to even start. We’ve spent basically the entirety of the last 2 months fixing when you channel your soul into the spear.” Mr. Tona continued, inhaling a large puff of smoke into his tar-coated lungs.

  “And you’ve made a small progress in basic magic, but it’s all rather useless spells that even I could learn at my age.”

  “Essentially, you have to try harder in the next loop, and the one that comes after.” He finished, making Aurelius start indignantly about how he was genuinely trying hard on his magical studies.

  However, he was stopped by the mixed expression on Mr. Tona’s face.

  “I’m not saying you’re not trying. I’m saying that you need to try harder. If not for your sake, then for our sake.” He explained, taking another deep drag off of his cigarette.

  Aurelius felt a twinge of guilt and fear at this statement, and Seraphine flinched slightly at the corner of the room.

  Aurelius wondered to himself what was the nature of each reset, and if it really did, clear the slate completely… And if it was a case of different timelines, did that mean that the Fae Queen did genuinely level the entirety of Tlacualtzin in one of them?

  There were questions that remained unanswered, and one that would take far too long to realise.

  Aurelius shifted around his space, feeling unnerved by the uncomfortable answers that Quetzalcoatl’s miraculous magic could have for everyone else in the room…

  “It’s a little quite unnerving to know the day that you may cease to exist, and be unable to affect change in any way…” He continued, snapping away the remains of his cigarette.

  In its place, he summoned 4 cigars, each looking rather expensive.

  “So, before I go back home to make sweet love to my wife,” Mr. Tona declared, drawing the ire of discomfort from both Aurelius and Seraphine, on top of a visible gag reflex from Sage Yeltz.

  “Let us all share the most perfect cigar known to men.” He said with satisfaction, tossing the sticks over through the air to the rest of them in the room.

  Aurelius quietly stared at the cigar, wondering if he should… take up Mr. Tona on the offer.

  “What do you think you’re doing? You don’t get the cigar.” Sage Yeltz claimed, condensing another bubble of water onto the cigar.

  “NO! THAT WAS EXPENSIVE!” Mr. Tona screeched in despair, dramatically falling to the floor, while skillfully lighting his cigar on the way down.

  “The boy’s underage. ” Sage Yeltz scoffed, lighting her own cigar.

  “And does that stop anyone?” Mr. Tona replied with a comical eye roll, mocking the tone of Sage Yeltz as he took another drag of his cigar.

  “If we don’t just cease to be after this, I’ll be turning you in for illegal possession of these mana cigars.” Sage Yeltz growled back, puffing on her own cigar.

  After a slight consideration, Seraphine followed the will of her youth and lit her own cigar.

  “Don’t smoke that Serphine. That thing has enough mana extract screw with your casting for a whole month or so…” Sylven quipped up in concern.

  “Eh- KOFF, koff, KOfF, kOOF” Seraphine just shrugged, breaking immediately out in a coughing fit, with disgust lining every wrinkle in her face…

  ???

  “Enjoy your trip, Mr. Vennor.” The portal attendant nodded, handing over Aurelius’s ticket at the booth.

  Aurelius nodded back in thanks, taking the ticket in his hand gingerly.

  There was around 3 hours left before Aurlius was to become reset once more.

  And now that he had discovered the fact that his loops were time limited, he decided to use it to his advantage, booking a portal over to the nice beach town of the Eastern Shores of the central continent…

  The ticket had set him back nearly a quarter of his savings, amounting to 40 gold coins for the trip.

  However, he had used his shrewdness to get Sage Yeltz to sign away a portal travel voucher, given to those going on Commission sponsored business trips, and brought the price down to a more reasonable 20 gold coins.

  He had, of course, not used up the rest of his savings in this loop as well, with his financial habits still refusing to give in to temptation…

  “Haa… 20 gold coins…” Aurelius sighed, and glanced over at the girl standing next to him.

  “That’s why I prefer airships.” Seraphine shrugged, brandishing her own ticket happily in her hands.

  “And why the hell are you following me?” Aurelius asked, feeling uncomfortable at being so blatantly stalked.

  “I need to discuss something important with you.” She replied, shrugging her shoulders at his question.

  “I want to talk about how to exit the loop.”