Darkness bled into vision. Not the suffocating black of a nightmare, but a shifting, fluid darkness that shimmered with light just beyond reach.
Zhen Ruhan stood in the dreamscape.
He was barefoot, surrounded by an ocean of stars. The Memory Bead had dissolved into his skin moments before sleep took him, and now, this was not a dream.
This was a memory.
Not his.
And yet, somehow, his soul reacted.
Before him stood a man in glimmering black armor, each piece inlaid with silver veins like rivers of time. His long white hair flowed behind him, and in his hand he held a staff that ticked faintly like a clock. Around his eyes spun gears of light.
The Time Monarch.
The man raised a hand to the sky, where two moons overlapped, and whispered:
"One second...
...can change the fate of worlds."
The moons collided and time exploded outward.
Ruhan gasped and fell backward, overwhelmed by a flood of motion. He saw visions blurring:
Cities rising and falling within a heartbeat.
Children aging into dust in seconds.
Armies freezing mid-charge as a lone figure walked between them, untouched.
A throne made of shattered timelines, where the Time Monarch sat alone.
And then one fragment stopped. Clearer than the rest.
A battlefield, covered in blood.
The Monarch stood surrounded by corpses, holding the same ticking staff.
Before him knelt a boy broken, coughing, dying.
"You're not ready yet," the Monarch whispered. "But one day... you will be."
His eyes met Ruhan's.
"Chrono Seed... awaken."
The dream shattered.
Ruhan awoke with a jolt, breathing hard.
Dawn was rising in Tianxu Realm, the sun not a single sphere, but two interlocked orbs spiraling each other like dancers. Golden light spilled across the warped landscape.
A prompt blinked in front of him:
Time Fragment Absorbed: Memory of the Chrono Monarch (Partial)
— Skill Unlocked: Chrono Vision
— Bonus Trait: Seed of Insight (1/7)
— +3 Temporal Points
He sat up, heart racing.
The memory lingered clearer than any dream he'd ever had.
Chrono Vision… it pulsed behind his eyes.
He blinked.
And time slowed.
The wind paused mid-rustle. A drop of dew froze mid-fall. His heartbeat echoed louder, more distinct.
He exhaled and time resumed.
Power.
Real, terrifying power.
"I need to control this…"
Later that morning, Mei Lin returned, this time with a floating orb trailing behind her.
"You saw the Chrono Monarch," she said without asking. "Your fate's speeding up."
"Who is he?"
"One of the first who touched the roots of the Dao of Time. Some say he is time. Others say he broke it and rules the pieces. All we know he watches those with potential."
"And I'm one of them?"
"That's not for him to decide. It's for the world to prove."
She waved her hand.
The orb glowed.
New Task Unlocked:
Challenge the Timekeeper's Trial
Objective: Reach the top of Mount Baijin before sunset.
Rewards: Skill Upgrade Option (x1), System Upgrade Token (Rare), First Hidden Title Opportunity.
Ruhan stared at the mountain appearing in the distance. Tall, jagged, shimmering with time distortions like heatwaves. Floating boulders orbited its peak.
"No breaks, huh?"
Mei Lin smiled faintly. "Time waits for no one."
Ruhan set off.
The terrain was brutal steep inclines, time warps that reversed gravity, patches of land that looped endlessly. At one point, he found himself walking in a circle for twenty minutes before realizing a floating flower was moving backward in time resetting the terrain around him.
He activated Chrono Vision again.
This time, he saw the anomaly a tear in time, barely visible to normal eyes. He leapt through it and emerged ahead, further up the path.
System Notice: Environmental anomaly bypassed. +1 Temporal Point
As the sun rose higher, he encountered his first Time Wraith a creature made of fractured seconds. It pulsed like a stuttering video, attacking with unpredictable lags and bursts.
He used Temporal Echo to distract it, then activated Moment Step to teleport behind it.
A solid punch to its core.
It dissolved into sand and static.
Task Progress: 38%
Loot Gained: Time Dust (Common), Energy Thread x1
"Not bad," he muttered. "But I need something stronger…"
The higher he climbed, the stronger the distortion became.
Clouds above spun backward. He aged slightly and then reversed. His hair lengthened, then snapped back.
It was a test not of strength, but of time control.
At the halfway mark, his body nearly collapsed from strain.
But a voice whispered from the mountainside ancient and low:
"Let go of time. Let it carry you."
He closed his eyes, let go of resistance and suddenly, the air carried him. He floated, rising upward slowly.
He reached the summit just as the twin suns aligned a rare event Mei Lin called the "Temporal Harmony." Light fell across him, and the sky rang like a bell.
Before him stood a gate made of hours and minutes, spinning like a gear. An inscription appeared:
"Name your path. Carve your Dao."
He thought long and hard.
Finally, he spoke aloud:
"I walk the path of the Chrono Dao mastery not of strength, but of every moment."
The gate accepted the answer and vanished.
System messages erupted.
Trial Complete.
Skill Upgrade: Temporal Echo → Temporal Clone (Lv.1)
System Upgrade Token Received
Hidden Title Unlocked: "Whisper of Seconds"
Ruhan fell to his knees, panting, laughing.
He had survived.
And he was no longer the same.
Far away, in a palace made of sand and starlight, a figure opened their eyes.
A golden mask hid their face.
"Chrono Seed… has bloomed."
End of Chapter 4