Chapter 22 Delayed Genocide

One thing about Nobe that Mono or the other first years know about him is that he isn't afraid of death. The concept of death is something that interests him more than it does scare him, what does scare him though is the process to death.

'Shit, that looks painful as hell. I'm not going through that.' I'm not one to care if I die or not, it really doesn't bother me, I see timelines end in my dreams, but what does cause me problems is the pain during death.

Nobe calls himself a pacifist, though he himself knows that's bullshit he does it either way. The reason Nobe calls himself a pacifist is because he would never cause his enemy or opponent needless excessive pain, if he can kill you in one strike, he won't hesitate. But he also tends to play with his enemy if they are weaker than him.

So naturally Nobe hates torture and the like. The only reason why he was scared at what he saw was because it looked painful. What he saw was quite simple, Daniel, Mono's opponent, created a pillar of flames directly under Mono's feet. He possessed stronger flames than the commoners since Nobe could feel the heat, though little, from where he was.

During foresight, the user experiences everything the future holds for them. For example, if a user was to feel sorrow then and not now, they shall experience that sorrow and the reason as to why.

Anyway, at that point, Daniel just bombarded Mono with a lot of attacks, the reason behind it was because he acknowledged the guy's strength and mobility with his element. Now here is where things went wrong, when Daniel decided to halt his assault to see if Mono was even there, everything broke.

Like glass shattering. Nobe had no Idea what the hell this meant but one thing he knew, more like saw, was that the shattering originated from Mono's position. Like when you strike a mirror, the center of the impact and all those cracks spreading from it, that's the very image Nobe witnessed but in 3D and in front of his face.

Since it was immediate death, during his foresight, Backflow was passively activated. This confused Nobe at first since having Backflow activated during foresight is impossible, but he soon came to the realization that backflow was activated by his future self, passively. But even so, his future self-had difficultly avoiding, not because he was stuck or because he was slow, no, what made it difficult was because he knew nothing of it.

Truthfully, it was a beautiful sight. Seeing space shatter right in front of your eyes, with the sun high up in the sky and the broken pieces reflecting that light in a slow mesmerizing manner, since backflow was activated, they witnessed it in slow motion. It caught both of them sunned for the entire moment until it reached Nobe's body.

A crack that still flowing came quite close to Nobe while it left shards and differently sized pieces in its wake. Curiously, or stupidly, Nobe reached for it and touched it with his index finger, the idiot seemed to forget that backflow was activated passively, which meant danger, but confusion and the amazing sight made him lose focus. On a side note, during Backflow the user's speed is not affected and if strong enough can enable others to not be affected during its activation.

When Nobe's index finger touched the crack, for a moment the crack stopped moving forward then, Nobe's finger cracked like glass then shattered, once again, like glass. First off, the pain that came from the crack spreading, which was an instant but due Backflow being active it was a slower process, was brutal. His finger didn't become like glass in any way, it remained the same however that amounted to the pain. During the cracking, Nobe felt as if his skin, flesh, and bone were being torn apart individually but at the same time, then came the shattering where it just felt like amputation. "AHHHHHHHHH!" Nobe screamed in pain, but sadly it wasn't the end.

From his finger to his hand then his arm, the process went on as it consumed his body bit by bit, his screaming never ceased. As for the 'him' watching, though he felt the pain he was also looking around to see if this was affecting other students, and it was, even the ground. He stared at the shards and pieces that contained his flesh, blood, and bones in pure astonishment. When the cracking reached his chest, the vision ended.

When he returned to the present, it took him a moment to collect himself as the trauma of pain and his death weighed on his mind and body heavily, this was a naturally reaction as Nobe couldn't comprehend what came after death, and as an added extra since Foresight was activated passively he wasn't mentally ready for him to witness the future, this causes huge amounts of doubt and a mental backlash that gives the user a headache.

"What fucking kind of genocidal attack is that? and why are you using it now of all dam time!!?"

Nobe squirmed in pain and agony as he waited for the mental backlash of foresight, though he knew he didn't have much time until Mono committed genocide he needed the backlash to prevent that.

Space and time users are similar in one way, the headaches and body damage they get as a repercussion for using their elements in a certain way, for space users it's when they overuse it while for time users is when they use it with out being prepared to witness or affect time, and the reason is simple, the headaches are a sign that they are becoming more in tune with their element and the body damage is a sign they can't handle it yet.

For a better understanding, take Mono for example, the 'annoyance' he had was him becoming more in tune with his element, then the sounds he heard that eventually begun to hurt his ears and the failure of his eyes as well as the growing headache are a sign that his body isn't ready for the for the advancement and as such the 'Genocidal attack' that Mono used is a result of his existence failing to accept the advancement, this is a defense mechanism to protect the body and mind since he was attacked during process.

If one was able to see the origin of the cracking he/she would see the fire that Daniel attacked him with was trapped in broken glass-like pieces and nothing was protruding from his body, but Nobe didn't know that.

Now what happens when a time user experiences headaches caused by their element?

The moment Nobe felt the slightest pain in his head, he immediately cast a spell called 'static progression.' There is a difference amongst spells, actives, passives, and skills, a spell is a mechanism activated by one's elemental mana, in this case static progression can only be cast by using mana of a time elemental.

What static progression does is place Nobe and any desired target(s) in a static sub-timeline, an off branch of the main one, while the main timeline progresses as normal in this sub-timeline time has stopped, well more accurately, the concept of time progression isn't accepted there. In this timeline damage done to Nobe becomes unable to be registered to his body or mind, why? Because Nobe makes it as such the attack takes an infinite amount of time to reach or actually damage his body and as such there is no time of contact, so no damage, he can also apply the same effect on anyone else in the timeline.

Nobe and his targets are still able to be seen by those in the main timeline, but they can't interact with them and vice versa, reason? Since time in the sub-timeline doesn't move while that of the main timeline does, neither can make contact. Think of a speeding car and a still human, even though the human can touch the car, for how long? It's not like they can't make contact it's just that the time frame for the contact it basically null.

Now in this case, the main timeline moves so fast that contact is impossible and how is this possible, the speed of the main timeline isn't counted in seconds, its counted in Femtoseconds (a quadrillionth of a second) while the sub-timeline is still.

Once Nobe activated static progression, he designated his targets as Mono and Rina, the only other space user he knew, luckily enough she was seated just below him. Once the targets were chosen, Rina tilted her head in confusion and muttered in an audible voice, "Eh? What's happening?"

With that out of the way, Nobe placed the benefit of 'no contact' on her and ever so casually turned right, walked though the seats and people on them and then turned left and walked down to Rina's Isle, once again through people and seats. When Rina saw him walk through people and seats, she thought that he was another space user, but then threw the thought away since she never noticed any disturbance or distortion in space as he walked through people and objects. Wary, Rina got up and prepared herself for a fight.

'Honestly I don't have time for this trash.' Nobe thought in annoyance as Rina looked ready to kill him, 'I experienced death a few moments ago can't you all chill me?' the poor dude thought in agony as he was still receiving the trauma from his death.

"Rina, right? Look we don't have much time, literally. I'm Nobe, the only time user in school, and I'm your classmate but most importantly I need your help." Nobe said in desperation, he looked sick and deprived of sleep, his eyes were red, and his left eye was slowly starting to bleed.

Rina, finally realizing that Nobe was in no condition to fight took a deep breath and looked around and thought, 'He should be the one responsible for the sudden slowed time, this must take a lot out of him considering his state but what does he mean-' Rina's thoughts were cut short by Nobe's explanation.

Once she didn't look like she wanted to kill Nobe he continued, "I'm sure you have questions but for later, right now I have placed the three of us in a spell, one of my actives 'Backflow' is still in effect, that's why time is slowed but once I finish explaining I shall stop it, understood?"

Rina didn't like how he interrupted her thoughts but let him consider his state, she nodded in understanding and waited for him to continue.

Rina's face to people who she didn't know well looked like she would rather kill you than have you close to her, a complete contrast of her happy and child-like face around Mono and Emily as well as her friends, and Nobe took offense to this. 'I'm saving her ass, but she looks like she wants me dead should I just leave?' Nobe considered running but decided against it then continued.

"Your childhood boyfriend over there has gone full Emo in a moment you shall witness what I mean, out of all the people hear I deemed you the most competent since you're a space user as well, so in short your job is to contain him and stop him from fucking us all up."

Rina hated Nobe when he called Mono her 'childhood boyfriend' she glared at him in anger but as a guy who just went through death he couldn't care less and he just walked down to the stage, through everything of course, as he explained the effect Static progression to Rina.

Once down there with Rina he said with a bit of fear, "Get ready, I'm cancelling backflow. Also, I don't know if it will affect you but make sure no crack touches you, since I'm reaching my limit, the benefit on 'no contact' is weaker on you compared to me."

Rina Nodded meekly as the memory of her encounter with Mono Resurfaced in her head, the determination he had when he was trying to kill her was scary. Once Nobe received the signal, all that was meant to happen happened.

Since he was slow in activating static progression, the shattering had already started but luckily enough Daniel and the ref weren't caught in it yet. With a weak smile Nobe declared "BEGIN OPERSTION DELAYED GENOCIDE!!!!"