Chapter 4: The Arbiter's Fatal Calculation
Aiden's lungs burned, not from exertion, but from the spiritual exhaustion of manipulating time. Using even a Minor Deceleration field so early in the ascent was a dangerous gamble, draining a frightening amount of his primordial mana. He leaned against the damp, cold surface of the abandoned bank, watching the blue-light tracker that represented Rin's position move relentlessly forward, consuming the darkness of the ruined city.
Rin was too fast. Too aggressive. Too alive—a fact that was both Aiden's greatest relief and his most agonizing torment.
The residual pain of the Arbiter of Chronos ability often unlocked the most guarded memories. The memory wasn't a soft reverie; it was a physical blow, a harsh flash of the inevitable moment that had led to his rebirth and the cold silence between them.
Twenty Years Ago (The Previous Timeline)
The air was the same, metallic and thick, but the plaza was filled with cheers, not screams. Rin, then just twenty-three, was laughing, his sweat-slicked hair falling into his eyes as he held up the shimmering artifact they had just claimed from Floor 75.
"Aiden! It's the Key of Hephaestus! We actually got it!" Rin's smile was the sun incarnate, bright enough to melt the armor of a Devil and warm enough to soothe the endless strategic tension Aiden carried.
Aiden, standing taller and already burdened by the powers of the Arbiter, merely watched, his eyes tender. "We got it because you didn't deviate from the plan, Blade. Now we can finally forge that armor for the final floors."
They were the undisputed champions of the Tower—a seamless unit of mind and body. The cold strategist and the passionate warrior. They were also inseparable, sharing a cramped, book-stuffed apartment in the secure Hunter district, their world a perfect, dangerous bubble.
Later that night, the bubble burst.
Aiden sat alone in their apartment, the Chronos Class Interface glowing faintly before him. He wasn't reading battle logs; he was running Fate Algorithms. The closer they got to Floor 100, the more variables the Outer Space Gods introduced, twisting the final outcome.
His hand trembled as he read the final simulation log for their planned assault on Floor 98, the domain of the first Outer Space God breach.
[SIMULATION RESULT: FAILED. HUNTER 'RIN''S PHYSICAL COHESION INTEGRITY: 0%. FATAL ACCELERATION VECTOR DETECTED.]
No matter how Aiden ran the numbers—sacrificing himself, using the Hephaestus Key, bringing in allies—the outcome remained the same. Rin died. Not just physically, but his soul was annihilated, preventing rebirth. This fate was fixed by a high-level reality constraint placed by the foreign deities.
Aiden was the Arbiter of Chronos. His power was to control time, but that power came with an absolute paradox: to change a fixed event, a life must be sacrificed, and the ultimate love must be severed.
The solution appeared in tiny, red text:
[CONSTRAINT FULFILLED BY: TOTAL SEVERANCE. HUNTER 'AIDEN' MUST INITIATE THE FATAL CHAIN REACTION AND ACCEPT PERMANENT ANATHEMA.]
It meant Aiden had to become the villain, the traitor. He had to orchestrate a scenario where Rin's survival was guaranteed, but his heart and trust were irreparably broken. Rin had to die in a way that preserved his soul for rebirth, believing the destruction was Aiden's calculated fault.
Aiden looked across the room at Rin, who was sleeping deeply, breathing soft and even. Rin's smile, even in sleep, was devastating.
I love you. And to save you, I must make you hate me more than anything.
He stood up, walking to the desk where Rin's most treasured artifact lay: a specialized Mana Crystal that held a powerful, defensive burst spell. It was Rin's failsafe.
Aiden activated his supreme skill, the one that cost him his humanity: Chronos's Reckoning: Temporal Shift.
His vision stuttered. The world went gray. He wasn't moving forward or backward, but sideways in time, inserting an impossible command into the fabric of reality. He wasn't just changing the past; he was poisoning the memory of their bond.
With icy precision, he didn't destroy the Mana Crystal. He subtly altered its core programming, transforming its defensive burst spell into an explosive decoy that would detonate precisely when Rin needed it most, causing an illusion of betrayal and drawing the fatal attention away from Rin's soul. He made it look like the ultimate strategic sacrifice for a higher cause—the kind of cold, utilitarian choice Rin would despise.
Tears, the last he would shed for two decades, slid down Aiden's face. He knew the hatred would follow him into the next life, but Rin's soul would be intact.
He finished the sequence, and the apartment returned to normal color. He looked at the sleeping Rin one last time, engraving every detail of his face into his soul.
"I am sorry, my love," he whispered, the words dying on his tongue. "I will wait for your hatred in the next life."
Floor 1 (Present Day)
Aiden straightened up, the painful memory of that cold calculation receding like a tide. His breath hitched in his throat—a reaction he immediately masked with a cough.
Rin's blue light tracker was still moving forward, his pace unwavering.
The cost of his rebirth was the knowledge that Rin believed he was a disposable tool, a cold-hearted traitor. The cost of his Chronos power was the constant, low-level thrum of temporal sickness—a price he paid willingly.
He adjusted his tactical vest, his mind already calculating the maximum necessary damage to defeat the next wave of monsters without depleting his mana reserves.
I am the wall behind your shield, Rin. And a wall doesn't need to be loved.
He started walking again, his steps matching the precise rhythm of a protective escort, always twenty meters behind, always observing, always ready to pay the price of precision to keep the one thing he treasured most alive.
Suddenly, Rin's blue light tracker stopped moving.
A new, massive energy signature flared ahead—not demonic, but powerful and clean, infused with the overwhelming authority of a higher realm.
[HUNTERS. YOU HAVE ENTERED THE SANCTUARY OF ARTEMIS. PREPARE FOR THE TRIAL OF PURITY.]
Aiden frowned, his eyes narrowing. A Greek God's trial on Floor 1? That was a severe deviation from the past timeline. Something was accelerating the Tower's difficulty, and it wasn't the Devils.
Rin, however, was facing the source of the light, his sword now fully drawn, the Rending Gale energy swirling dangerously around him. He didn't look brave; he looked furious.
Aiden rushed forward, crossing the forbidden twenty-meter threshold. He knew why Rin was angry. Rin's mother had been a Hunter devoted to a different deity—a devotion that had played a tragic role in the previous life's calamity.
"Rin, wait," Aiden commanded, dropping the formal title in his urgency. "Artemis is a Neutral Patron. Her trial will not be a physical fight, but a spiritual one."
Rin didn't turn around. "Spiritual purity? Something you know absolutely nothing about, Arbiter."
The cold challenge was a dagger thrust directly into Aiden's deepest wound. He stopped, unable to move closer, unable to cross the line of hatred Rin had so clearly drawn.
A blinding sphere of silver light descended, enveloping both Rin and the angry swordsman in a sudden, impossible silence.
The introduction of Artemis and the "Trial of Purity" introduces the Pantheon element and immediately heightens the personal drama, as it touches on a sensitive point in Rin's past.