4 - reunion

With the wardrobe door open to his left and right, Thor felt his heart beating dangerously fast.

A cry seemed to be pouring out of the back of his throat.

Staring at the girl's face, Thor inhaled slowly through his nose and held it for a moment.

Then he exhaled through his mouth at the same interval and stopped again.

This is repeated several times.

Thor's breathing and his pulse immediately become calm.

This is a method of self-control that he learned from experience, not from anyone who taught him.

"......Yes. I guess I'll have to raise the bar first."　

Muttering, Thor moved away from the wardrobe and sat down on the bed again.

He closes his eyes and focuses his attention inward.

The image of a tree like a black shadow vaguely appears in his mind.

He pours the full contents of the water bottle that has also appeared into his mind into the tree.

The dripping water is sucked into the roots of the tree without a sound.

At the moment when all the points have been spent, a bud at the end of a branch growing out of the big tree slowly opens.

Power overflows from the depths of the large petals and fills Thor's interior.

When he opened his eyes, the level of had reached 10.

As he thinks about it, the description suddenly appears in his mind.

--Returns a target involved in a battle to a past state.

Level: 10 / Usable number of times: 10 times per hour / Activation: instantaneous / Effect: optional / Scope: contact

Bewildered by this new phenomenon, Thor looked at the contents of the report.

The number of times it can be used has increased dramatically, and there is no longer a time limit on the duration of the effect.

Furthermore, the object was transformed into the target, not the object itself.

Thor clenched his right fist tightly at the result that appeared.

The old man was right after all.

"Okay, let's check them one by one..."

With a subconscious voice, Thor touched the wound on his left wrist.

As soon as he touched it, he felt a strange sensation throughout his arm.

It was as if his hands were folded over and over in the same place.

"Is this a record of the past that I can see? ......"

Like the pages of a book being turned over in pieces, the past of Thor's left arm emerges one after another.

It seems that this history goes back to the age of fifteen, when he first touched the monster.

As he continued to concentrate, the sensations began to spread throughout his body.

The whole body opens up to the outside at once, dividing into several layers.

Like a flower blooming.

Thor slowly removes his right hand from his wrist, feeling the changes that have occurred in his body over the past twenty-five years.

The moment he lost his concentration, the pages fluttered closed.

Thor stood up and picked up a pair of leather gloves that were hanging on the wall.

When he touched his left wrist again with the glove on, the leather glove was the first to change.

The first thing that changed was the leather glove. The record of the first time he had worn the glove and confronted the monster was instantly retrieved.

Next, again, the past of the entire left arm begins to unfold.

As before, it seems that the subject can be selected as long as he is aware that he is touching it, even if he is not in direct contact with it.

Before this condition spreads to the whole body, I try to focus my attention only on the tip of my hand.

Then the past of the whole arm closes at once and I can focus only on the part above the wrist.

"Hmmm, it seems I can still make it smaller."

It seems that if you wanted to, you could even a single hair.

A thought occurred to Thor, and he focused his attention on himself with his arms slouched.

Naturally, pages after pages of his history, including his pants and his entire body, opened up.

It seems that any object on his body or on his person can be the object of his skill even if he does not touch it with his hands.

However, beds and floors do not respond.

This is probably due to the fact that they have not been involved with monsters at all so far.

"Now we have to put it into practice. First..."

He picked up a wooden sword that hung over the edge of the bed.

It is made of oak wood from the forests of the kobolds, and is a very hard and heavy weapon.

But in Thor's case, he had to wield it dozens of times to kill a single horned mole, and it was a consumable item that would last less than a year.

He takes it in his hand and tries right away.

Easily the small scratches on the wooden sword are gone, and it looks as good as new.

I put it back to the time when it had been used for a while, since it was freshly grated and not yet accustomed to my hand, but it seems that I was able to adjust the time as I had hoped.

Now that the object was successfully removed, it was time to move on to the person.

I set the whole left arm back to ten years ago at once.

Slowly I opened my fingers and then closed them gently to make a fist.

--The grip strength had returned.

With unvoiced emotions calmly held in his throat, Thor moved on to a new check.

Next, turning over the boots on his feet, he opened his full body history.

He chose the moment when he had just finished dinner and lay down on his bed.

The moment I became aware of it, the of my whole body was completed.

When I imagine the skill tree, is still at level 10.

I remembered the reason why I made my boots stand upside down, and unfortunately, the grip strength of my left hand was also restored.

However, the number of usable times was exactly the same as before.

So far we have learned that can be applied to both people and objects.

The time to restore can be chosen as you wish, up to the moment of first contact with the monster.

You have to touch the object to activate it, but you don't have to touch it directly.

And Thor's body and the items he wears are only needed to be aware of them.

However, it is easier to narrow down the target by touching it, so it seems to save time.

It is important to note that there was no change in the skill tree even when the whole body was at once.

It may be that the soul and the body are two different things, but it turns out that can keep the level 10 even if the whole body is returned to the past.

Next, there was no rewinding of memory.

Should we regard this as another case where the body and memories are treated separately?

However, if the existence of the skill is inadvertently revealed, it is a little difficult to cover it up.

And the magic power.

It seems that when the whole body is restored, even the strength and magic power are restored to the state they were at that time.

If the magic power is used up too much, the feeling of loss will lead to severe anxiety, and if all the magic power is used up, the patient will fall into a state of panic.

The recovery will be slow over time, but it seems to be a great advantage to be free from such hassles and worries.

One more very interesting discovery.

As soon as he was about to check the state of the technical tree, a clear view appeared in Thor's mind.

A single branch sticking out of the dark, twisting, spiraling trunk.

As he focused on the branch, the description of the he had just seen flowed through his mind again.

Thor's image of a skill tree was usually more vague.

The skills were only given names and brief descriptions of their effects, and the details had to be verified by actually using them.

Now we can vividly grasp everything from the name of a branch to its length.

Even the mysterious black fruit hanging from its tip.

As soon as I focused my attention on the fruit, a new explanation came to me.

Activation: Automatic / Effect: Strong / Scope: Contact

"Well, I didn't know it came with such a feature."

Abilities" are special abilities granted by growing a tree of skills.

There are two types of abilities: the branch fruit ability, which is produced at the tip of a branch by raising a skill to its maximum level, and the trunk fruit ability, which is given by defeating a special monster.

In addition, some people are born with a root characteristic that grows at the root of the skill tree, and are called "gifted.

It seems to be thanks to this newly acquired trait that Thor can suddenly see the true form of the tree and can confirm the past of the subject in detail.

After completing the check, Thor his grip on his left arm again and approaches the wardrobe.

The most important check still remained to be done.

Reaching behind the open door, Thor ignores the statue of the girl and lifts the small vase at her feet.

He returns to the bed and opens the lid.

Inside was a pure white ashes.

The ashes of an old man.

In this city bordering a miasma, the dead are cremated, not buried.

The reason is that if the body remains, the miasma will cause the soul-less dead to come back to life.

Thor touches the ashes as if he is praying.

He remains motionless for a moment, then exhales and slumps his shoulders silently.

"............ old man, I'm sorry."

I knew it, but it seems that the blessings of the god of creation do not extend to lost souls.

Thor returned the urn to its original position and faced his childhood friend once again.

The girl whose time had stopped was as fragile and beautiful as ever.

Large black eyes with slightly drooped corners.

Her nose was raised, and her lips were a healthy pink and soft.

Her fluffy black hair was still shining with the same glamorous shine.　

Most of the men on the street would take notice of her.

However, with the girl's current appearance, all men are sure to turn away.

Her thin neck was cruelly slit right across, and a large amount of blood was still there, about to flow out.

Thor reached out his arm and gently touched the girl's bloody neck.

Like an open book, one after the other, her personal history emerged.

The girl's appearance on the page had not changed at all.

At once, Thor travels back in time and selects a page just before the girl is seriously injured.

.

Suddenly, the girl's mouth is full of breath.

The grievous wound has completely disappeared from her throat.

The girl blinks silently as her skin returns to its pure white beauty.

Slowly, her eyes focus on the person in front of her.

It was the first time in about twenty-five years that they had met again.