The world turned gray. Jack no longer felt any pain, and he also felt exceptionally light at the same time: as if his body had no weight or physicality to it. He calmly gazed ahead, not surprised when he found himself looking at a person that looked identical to him from the back, with the hand of an undead creature impaled through his abdomen- both of them completely frozen in place, motionless.

Because that was him. His physical body, or more accurately, vessel as he’d come to understand it. Jack looked down at his hand, realizing that it was just a translucent outline- much like the rest of his body. In the background, Jack could hear the sound of gushing water coming simultaneously from all directions, but upon scanning his surroundings he saw no river or stream of any sort.

The landscape was identical to the real world, except Jack saw everything in muted gray colors, with misty fog obscuring his view when he tried to make out the edge of the landscape he was within. A thought came across his mind, and he turned to focus his gaze on the golden entity, wondering if he could figure out something about its origin.

“Curious,” Jack muttered, though no voice came out from his mouth. Everything else in his line of sight, whether it be the arena, the undead creature, or the surrounding platforms was painted in a dull gray, but the entities had retained their original color, without any change. Jack was slightly disappointed because he couldn’t find anything new about their origin in this form either, and had to veer his gaze away before he met with any retaliation like he had earlier. It was only natural that the being who granted him this power wouldn’t be affected by it, but Jack was desperate for any and every clue so he had to try.

‘Focus,’ Jack mentally adjusted himself, remembering that the time he had in this form was very limited. The Tome that had transferred this legacy technique to him had defined this as the ‘state of semi-permanence’, but for Jack it was just confirmation that the ‘soul’ actually existed. In this state, Jack was no longer limited by the constraints of his physical body. Time had not stopped, his senses had expanded to the point where the motion of the undead creature piercing his body, which should have taken barely a few seconds, had slowed down to months or even years from his point of view.

Though Jack could not maintain this form for more than a few minutes, in that time almost no time would pass in the real world- it would basically be an instantaneous transition. He walked towards the undead creature, covering the distance in a matter of a few seconds. Jack had his fair share of supernatural experiences by now, but seeing yourself getting impaled by an undead monster that had driven its claws through your abdomen in slow motion was another level entirely.

When Jack had scouted the area earlier, he had discovered that he could no longer see the hallucination-clones in this soul form of his, only the sole undead who’s attention was focused on his physical body’s back.

He examined the ghoul from behind, able to spot the residual miasma left over from its switch from miasma form to physical form.

“Manifest,” Jack proclaimed, and the next instant the misty, gray fog Jack had noticed earlier rushed towards him from all directions, forming a small, cylindrical object that was wide enough to fit in the palm of his hand, and just barely as wide. Thousands of small runes had been carved upon its surface, so small that Jack could barely make them out due to his heightened awareness. From the knowledge imparted to him, Jack knew that it was a rotary device, he just had to apply pressure in the right direction.

The next instant Jack was taken aback, as he could suddenly see. See the thin gray strings extending from the small rotary mechanism floating in the air to his physical body, the droplets of blood he had spilled across the floor and bits of organs that were hanging out of his body- there were easily hundreds of such strings. He also noticed that one singular thread was connected to the undead creature’s right arm, the one it had used to impale Jack.

He extended his right arm forward with some trepidation, grasping a hold of the mystical rotary object with care. The moment he made contact, Jack felt a power flow through him that was simply incomparable to the inferior Qi he was so grateful to channel before. His aura in that moment changed, and the raging anger Jack was feeling earlier transformed into a placid calmness that felt unshakable. This was a power that those who existed, could not defy.

This was time.

‘Snap out of it!’ A part of Jack’s consciousness roared inside his mind, and he realized that he had been subconsciously influenced by the potency of this power. His right hand now looked significantly fainter, and he knew that he’d lost a lot of time.

“Fucking damn!” Jack exclaimed but no voice came out, completely aghast. This terrifying power was not one someone at his level should have come across easily, and if he continued to tarry he would've died without even getting a chance to activate his power.

‘Come on, move,” He felt desperation leaking into his voice as he put the entirety of his effort into making the mechanism move, finally hearing a small click. It was barely a centimeter, but it had definitely shifted.

Jack watched in awe as the hundreds of gray threads exploded into motion, one string pulling the undead creatures arm from his physical body and forcing it two steps back, while every single drop of blood he spilled returned to its liquid form and was returned to his body via dozens of threads that moved at lightning fast speeds,, his organs reinstated to its original position and knitted together, and the gaping hole in his abdomen replaced by a perfectly smooth, scar-free patch of skin, all happening almost instantaneously.

Initially, Jack thought that he was reversing time. But now he understood that he was denying time instead, denying the minute or so in which he was inflicted with a fatal wound. If he had reversed time, the undead creature would react in the exact same manner as it had before, and it would have no knowledge that he had already tried and failed in his attempt to kill Jack once before.

No, what Jack had done was far less powerful and much more nuanced. His technique only affected time for his own physical body, invalidating all damage done to it in the last minute by reinstating it to the condition it was in a minute earlier. So if he had been greviously injured for longer than the time he could deny, he would still die.

Jack knew that this technique would be far more potent if he could unlock its full potential, but even currently it was a terrifying power far beyond the realm of his expectations.

“So that’s why it's called a legacy skill,” Jack muttered in realization, his hands barely visible by this point. Before dissipating though, he made sure to memorize the exact position of the undead creature.

He was long overdue for some payback, and this time it was the undead who wouldn't see it coming.