Pinned against the wall, Damian held his breath in the face of his attacker. Her intense amber eyes leered into his own eyes of terror. She had demanded that Damian explain himself but he was at a loss for words. In the previous timeline, the lady made sure he was ok and even praised him for his heroic efforts, even if they did interfere with her work. However this time, she directed her fury at him after dealing with the thugs.

“Talk!” She growled as she punched the wall, barely missing Damian’s head.

A fist-sized crater was produced inches away from the hair on his skin. It was a simple yet terrifyingly effective interrogation technique.

“I was trying to help you!” Damian yelped.

“I’m not referring to what you were doing. I want you to explain how you knew I was faking being unconscious.”

“W-what do you mean?”

“Right before you were about to get stabbed, you glanced at me. Like you were waiting on me to act. You knew that I would save you. So why would you rush in like that when you can tell that I’m faking?”

[She’s way too sharp! She figured out that I knew about her from one glance! I guess I should just come clean, kind of.]

“The truth is I need your help! I sensed how powerful you were as I saw you being dragged off and thought that you could help me. I have no malicious intentions so would you kindly put me down?”

After a moment of hesitation, the lady complied, releasing Damian from her death grip. Her menacing aura faded, finally giving Damian a chance to catch his breath. As he massaged the back of his neck, which was aching from how he was being hoisted up. The lady, arms crossed, spoke up.

“Look kid, I’m really busy right now so I can’t help you with whatever you need help with.” She sighed as she dragged the unconscious thugs away. “Sorry but you’re gonna have to ask someone else.”

“Wait!” Damian called out.

To his surprise, the lady actually stopped in her tracks.

“My village, Hudson village, is going to be attacked this night by a beast. No one in the village is strong enough to stand up against it. But you are! You can save us!”

“...”

Silence. Damian knew that if he let this go on she would really leave.

“M-money! Is that what you want? If you help us for just this night I’ll pay you three-hundred dollars. No, three-hundred and fifty dollars!”

“...I’m sorry but I really can’t. Use that money and issue a quest at the adventurer’s guild. With that much you could hire at least an A-rank adventurer.”

With that the lady turned to leave again. Time slowed as she took steps towards the light. The click of her boots connecting with the ground echoed throughout the confined alleyway. Droplets of sweat formed from his creased forehead.

[I can’t let her leave. She’s my best bet at winning. I have to do something, I have to do something, I have to do something, I have to!]

With no other choice, Damian got on all fours, trembling as he groveled on the floor.

“PLEASE!”

The lady flinched, surprised at his determination to get her to help.

“I told you, I can’t. I respect your resolve but I’m on a mission to free slaves from the black market. I can’t stop here.”

“I only need your help for tonight. Then you can go back to your mission.”

“I-”

“Besides,” Damian interrupted, not giving the sympathetic lady a chance to refute. “Those slaves…they can wait, can’t they?”

“How dare you say that!”

An aura of rage oozed from the lady once again. She spun around, ready to give Damian a hard smack to the face but stopped short once she witnessed his woeful expression. His eyes filled with desperation and despair, caught her off guard. Her aura dissipated immediately and a conflicted expression covered her face. In a moment, she reached her decision:

“I..I’m sorry.”

This time she left for real, leaving Damian to despair in the lonely alleyway.

“Damn it...”

Damian hung his head low. He had failed to convince the lady to help him out. Now that her help was inaccessible, the difficulty level had increased by tenfold. As he stared dejectedly at the floor, a flash of light caught his attention from the corner of his eye. One of the thug’s knives lay on the ground, not too far from him. Damian reached out, grabbing the knife. The handle fit his hand perfectly. His other hand soothed the blade with his fingers, wiping the dirt that had accumulated on it.

[I could kill myself right here and go back. I could try again.]

Gripping the knife with both hands, Damian lightly pressed the tip of the blade against his throat. A tingling sensation arose from the area, a warning from his body. If he pushed it all the way in he would activate his blessing and go back to this morning. Or maybe he could direct it to before their confrontation and try to convince her again? Damian theorized that he could change the time he goes back to but was never in the right mind during his deaths to test it out. Maybe now that he lost his best chance at winning, he could take his life, restarting the loop and testing his theory at the same time.

[I need her help. I’ll just end up dying this time again so I might as well end it early. Come on, Damian. It’ll only last a second.]

For what felt like eternity, a trembling Damian held the knife against his throat. The blaring noise of his rapidly beating heart consumed his hearing.

[I can’t.]

Damian released the knife, letting it clatter on the stone floor.

[To kill myself over an unclear future, I can’t do it. If I’m going to die in this loop, I’m gonna die fighting.]

Damian steadily rose from the floor, patting off the dirt from his clothes.

[Killing the beast this time won’t be that difficult. I’ve learned where it’s achilles heel is after all. We don’t need a super strong person like Charles or that lady.]

With a newfound determination, he exited the dark alleyway and basked in the sun’s light, smacking his cheeks with both hands.

“Alright. Let’s do this.”

******

Back at the village, Damian invited Rose, Timithus, and Richard to join him in a battle conference in the same cabin he had greeted Charles in the last timeline. Rose sat with proper etiquette, with her back straight, head up, and legs closed. Richard and Timithus, however, sat with a more casual style, legs a bit spread and back a bit slouched. Damian exaggeratedly cleared his throat, signaling that the meeting was starting.

“I’ve gathered us here to explain the plan to defeat the beast that Rose has warned us about shows up.”

“Shouldn’t we wait until adventurers accept the quest? That way you won’t have to explain it twice.” Rose suggested.

“Well, about that…” Daman rubbed his pointer finger on his lower cheek. “I ended up not issuing a quest.”

In the end, Damian decided not to issue a quest due to the possible danger that other adventurers knew about the U.S. as well. [When the entire world is my enemy, then the less people I interact with, the better] is what he thought. It was a ballsy move, but Damian decided that he should work with what he already had before he reached for more, the lady he asked to help him being an exception.

“Yar whole proposal was based on the fact that adventurers would take care of the beast away from the village. Why did ya change yar mind?” Richard asked.

“My gut told me that I shouldn’t. Something about the guild felt ominous, so I turned the other way and came back.” Damian answered with confidence. He had planned out his excuse beforehand so was ready for any questions that would be raised.

“Your gut?” Rose broke in irritatedly. “This isn’t a game, Damian. We need all the help we can get if we are going to take the beast down.”

“Yeah, I get that but please trust me on this. There was something seriously off that I felt when I went there. If we work together and organize a well thought out plan, I’m sure we can beat the beast without help from the adventurers anyway.”

“I disagree. Even if we could it would be very close, too close. We need to hire adventurers to assist us to avoid any risks.”

“I trust Damian.” Richard chimed in. “If he went back on his word it must have been for a good reason. Don’t ya think so, Timithus?”

Timithus slightly nodded in agreement to Richard.

“Well then that’s three to one.” Damian smiled apologetically. “Sorry but you gotta trust me on this one.”

“Fine.” Rose accepted defeat, slightly slumping in her chair before quickly repositioning herself back to her proper posture.

“So let’s get to planning. But first, Rose, you said you saw the beast with your own eyes right? Can you tell us what you know?

[I actually know all there is to know about it but that's knowledge from a different timeline so I’ll let Rose do the talking.]

“I stumbled upon it on my way here. It’s an ape beast with snow white fur, about 8 or 9 ft tall. Very muscular. I never directly fought it but I could tell from a glance that it was powerful. I avoided it at first and went ahead but when I realized that it was heading straight to this village I had to speak up.”

“Hmm, so based on that description I would assume that it’s strong suit is its strength. Do you think it had any blessing?”

“Sorry, I’m not sure about that.”

[She doesn’t know about the beast’s insane regenerative Blessing? Well, she did say that she didn’t fight it so that makes sense. They don’t need to know about its Blessing anyways. I just need to direct them to attack its weak point, the neck.]

“That’s ok. Don’t sweat it. Let's go over some stuff. There's two things that absolutely need to happen. First, the beast needs to be lured away to avoid any destruction or casualties in the village. Second, we need to either incapacitate it or straight up kill it. For how we lure it away, I’ll be the bait and lead it to a clearing in the forest. It’ll be easier for you guys to fight there and it’ll be away from the village too.”

“Hold on a second.” Richard cut in. “Ya shouldn’t be in the front lines with us, it's too dangerous. I’ll be the bait instead.”

“No, it’s better if I act as the bait. I’ll also have Rose covering for me while I make it to the clearing so I won’t be completely on my own. You and Timithus will wait at the clearing for us to arrive where you two will surprise attack the beast.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad, but are ya sure ya want to do this? Ya will be putting yourself in the most danger.”

“I’m sure. It’s better if you both can launch the attack than if it was only one of you for what I’m thinking. Being an ape, most of its power probably comes from its arms so I want you two to cut them off.”

“That's quite a tall order.” Rose noted.

“Yeah, even I realized that. But in the end the cut doesn’t have to be perfect. If you guys can cut off at least up to the elbows, that would be good enough.”

“Me and Timithus can do that.” Richard accepted the role. “Though if ya could come up with a way to stop the beast from moving for a little while that would be very helpful.”

“A way to stop it from moving, huh? That's a hard request to pull off. Maybe I could try holding its waist?”

“That’ll accomplish nothing…” Rose clarified as flatly as silicon wafers.

“You got a better idea?”

“I do actually. While I was watching over Emilia, she showed me how she caught the animals in the forest.”

“Oh! So you're saying…”

“Yes. We utilize a trap to immobilize the beast, just like how Emilia uses the traps to catch the animals. If we enlarge the scale of the trap design she uses on the small animals, we should be able to restrict the beast’s movements for a short while.”

“That’s brilliant! Nice going Rose!” Damian grinned from ear to ear.

“It’s nothing special. I just remembered what Emilia showed me earlier today.”

“That settles the surprise attack. If we’re successful that’ll leave us with a beast with no arms. So that leaves the last part of my plan: While the beast is panicking from losing its arms, one of you will lop off the beast’s head from the neck.” Damian pointed to the corresponding area on his body. “Who’s the most confident with a sword here?”

“I vote myself out.” Rose raised her hand. “I’m only efficient at using a bow.”

Damian turned to Richard and Timithus, the only two left.

“I’ll do it.” Timithus volunteered, speaking up for the first time in the meeting.

“No objections from me.” Richard announced. “In terms of swordsmanship, Timithus here is levels above me.”

“So it’s settled, Timithus will land the finishing blow. Remember, you have to cut its head off from its neck.”

Timithus grimly nodded in response.

“Any questions?”

A moment of silence implied that no one was confused. Damian opened his mouth to dismiss the group but Rose interrupted him before he could speak.

“What do we do if the plan fails? Do you have a backup plan?”

Damian did. His backup plan was to use his Blessing to travel back in time. He couldn’t outright say that though, so he stayed vague, while not forcing too much pressure on them.

“I do, but it’s a secret.” Damian turned to exit the cabin. “Don’t worry. We won’t lose. I’ll make sure of it, one way or another. Anyways, I gotta go get Emilia to make me that trap for the fight. Let’s meet up again at the gates of the village at nightfall.”

With that last word, Damian left the small cabin, leaving behind a confused, but slightly less tense trio.