Who is he?
The Eight-Trigram Highway.
Jake stood at its threshold, the Vorpal Edge's hum vibrating his molars. Ahead, the shattered overpasses coiled like the ribs of a fossilized god.
If the Wheelwright's here, he's either a saint or a masochist.
He activated the Edge.
[Lifespan: 29 Years, 23 Days]
[Drain: -1 Year/Minute]
The world fractured. To his left, a rusted freight drone lay caught in a loop, its hull disintegrating and reassembling endlessly. To his right, a puddle reflected a starless sky from a century ago.
Jake stepped onto the highway.
The Phase Stalkers struck in silence.
Three translucent shapes materialized, their jaws gnashing across overlapping timelines. Jake pivoted, the Edge carving a crescent through the nearest beast's forelimb. The blade bit deep, severing tendons in both past and present. The Stalker collapsed, its death cry echoing yesterday and tomorrow.
[Lifespan: 28 Years, 19 Days]
Gritting his teeth, Jake vaulted over a crumbling divider. The second Stalker lunged—and phased through him. Ice seared his veins as its claws grazed his soul in another timeline. A warning flicker in his peripheral vision: Right!
He spun, Edge raised, and caught the third Stalker mid-leap. The blade cleaved its skull, spilling ichor that evaporated before hitting asphalt.
[Lifespan: 27 Years, 6 Days]
No loot. No reprieve.
Ahead, the highway split. The left path shimmered—safe for now. The right dripped with temporal acid, dissolving a scavenger's skeletal remains. Jake's Edge twitched, its hunger urging him deeper into danger.
You're on a clock. Literally.
The derelict convoy sprawled across four lanes. Jake recognized the insignia on a half-melted transport: Elysium Logistics. The cargo doors hung open, revealing rows of cracked Chrono-Wheels.
Most were white-tier, their holograms dead. But one—cracked and flickering—still pulsed green.
Jake approached, Edge raised. The wheel's display glitched:
[ INSTANT DEATH ]
[ INSTANT DEATH ]
[ INSTANT DEATH ]
[ INSTANT DEATH ]
[ TEMPORAL SHARD ]
A glitched spin. Seemed like a modding session that had gone terribly wrong.
Wonder who left this here.
But his palm pressed the console anyway.
The wheel spun, edges disintegrating. Jake's power flared, blood dripping from his nose as he wrenched the needle toward the glitched slot.
Click.
A shard of iridescent glass materialized—jagged, humming, lodged in his palm.
[Acquired: Temporal Shard (Consumable)]
[Effect: Freezes local time for 10 seconds (One use)]
[Lifespan: 25 Years, 14 Days]
Jake pocketed the shard.
There were parasites who had whispered about the Wheelwright like a messiah - the engineer who sabotaged Syndicate wheels to help starving spinners.
But others told darker tales: a narcissistic tinkerer who lured victims into his web with promises of salvation, only to harvest their relics.
Which is true?
He felt he way the asphalt crumbled beneath his boots—not collapsing, dissolving, grains of concrete unraveling into temporal static.
Above him, the sky flickered between noon and midnight, as Jake tried to make another critical decision.
Left path: A decaying stretch swarmed by larval Phase Stalker.
Right path: A shimmering mirage of pristine roads devolving into a gravity sinkhole.
The Edge's corruption snaked past Jake's shoulder, blackened veins throbbing in time with his pulse. He had minutes before the Rot reached his heart.
Choose.
"Left," he muttered. Larval Stalkers were sluggish. Seemed like Wheelwright would prefer easier to kill enemies to build his safehouse.
He charged, the Vorpal Edge humming as it tore through the first Stalker. Ichor splattered, freezing mid-air as the blade's distortion field slowed local time. Jake ducked beneath a leaping larva, his blade severing its tail.
11 Years, 8 Days.
Drain accelerating.
He killed seven before noticing a bunch of dead bodies squirming over a stalled Syndicate hauler.
This means he'd made the right decision. This MUST belong to the wheelwright.
But… he wonders what kind of accident took place that wretched that hauler this much.
A shriek ruptured the air.
Behind him, the larval corpses twitched.
No.
An adult Phase Stalker, triple-jawed and dripping temporal venom, phased through the hauler. Not translucent—solid.
Prime Stalker.
Jake's mind raced. Prime Stalkers were apex predators, immune to phase-shifting tricks. Kill one, and its pack would hunt you no matter where you ran to.
The beast struck.
He barely dodged, the Edge screeching as it parried venom-tipped claws. Each clash cost him seconds, days, years:
9 Years, 21 Hours.
8 Years, 17 Hours.
The Prime's claws grazed Jake's ribs. No hidden traps sprang. No rescue drones descended. A true saint would've fortified this stretch. A narcissist would let the highway prune petitioners, ensuring only the strongest - or most desperate - reached his safehouse.
Jake's arm buckled. The Rot had reached his collarbone, necrotic tissue spreading like ink through water. He triggered the Temporal Shard.
The world froze.
Amber light suspended the Prime mid-lunge, drool crystallized in the air.
Ten seconds.
Jake's blade plunged into the Prime Stalker's flank, ichor pooling in midair like a grotesque sculpture. The Wheelwright isn't a saint. He's a curator.
Seven seconds.
The Prime's six eyes were frozen wide, jaws parted mid-snarl. Jake wrenched the Edge free, phase-shifting the blade to strike the beast's underbelly—a wound that would bleed across timelines.
Narcissists don't build sanctuaries. They build galleries.
Six. Five.
Jake's boot cracked the Stalker's forelimb, bone splintering silently. His lifespan counter flickered—7 Years, 11 Hours—as the Rot chewed deeper.
This thing isn't a guard. It's a showpiece.
Four. Three.
He slammed the Edge hilt-deep into the Stalker's primary heart, black veins in his arm throbbing in sync with the blade's hunger. The Prime shuddered, trapped in time's grip, yet somehow aware.
Kill it, and the swarm comes, and I'd be dead.
But maim it…
Two. One.
Jake yanked the blade free as the Temporal Shard shattered.
—Time snapped forward—
The Prime Stalker's roar split the highway, its body erupting with wounds that leaked across realities. Jake staggered back, the Edge's drain accelerating—4 Years, 8 Days—as the beast thrashed, ichor raining in slow-motion droplets that aged concrete to dust on contact.
"Come on," Jake spat through bloodied teeth. "Call them."
The Prime's remaining eyes burned with primal rage. It reared, mangled limbs scrabbling for purchase, and let loose a subsonic shriek that warped the air.
Somewhere in the highway's twisted guts, a thousand shrieks answered.
They're coming.
The ground trembled as Phase Stalker swarms converged—larval packs skittering over collapsed overpasses, adults phasing through derelict transports. Jake stood his ground, the Vorpal Edge humming a death dirge.
3 Years, 22 Hours.
The Prime lunged, venom-dripping jaws wide enough to swallow him whole. Jake pivoted, the Edge severing a fang—but the Stalker's claw caught his thigh, slicing to the bone.
2 Years, 17 Hours.
Agony seared his leg. Jake collapsed against a rusted fuel tanker, the Edge's glow guttering as the Rot reached his jugular. Black veins pulsed like parasitic worms beneath his skin.
Where are you, you bastard—
The swarm closed in.
Then—
A discordant chime rang out, sharp as a bell forged from broken glass.
Every Stalker froze.
A gigantic truck erupted from the earth—mammoth, rusted things grinding to life.
"Down here, idiot. Can't have you lobotomizing my favorite exhibit."
He snapped his fingers.
Something invisible yanked the Prime Stalker backward, pinning it to a glowing sigil etched into the asphalt. The swarm hissed but didn't advance—held at bay by pulsing ward stones embedded in the highway.
The Wheelwright hopped down, boots crunching frozen Stalker ichor. Up close, he looked like a mad surgeon.
"Oh, I do love a good audition," he said, crouching to inspect Jake's rotting arm. "But really? Using my Stalker as bait?"
Jake's vision blurred. 1 Year, 9 Days. "You… collect rarities. Not corpses."
The Wheelwright's grin widened. He pressed a device to Jake's neck—a syringe filled with liquid starlight. "Astute! But incorrect. I collect potential."
The injection hit like a supernova. Jake's back arched as the Rot's advance halted, black veins freezing mid-pulse.
Lifespan Locked: 1 Year, 9 Days.
"Temporal stasis," the Wheelwright murmured, examining Jake's arm like a prized insect. "Crude, but effective. Now—" He kicked the Vorpal Edge toward Jake. "Pick up your toy. Let's see if you're worth the antidote."