Grey shot up, a hand moving to his chest.

The cot under him snapped beneath the sudden, jerky movement, catching the attention of Brad, Stella, and Mauve who all looked over like they were ready to fight at any given moment.

But instead of seeing a sudden attack, they instead found a PTSD-laden Grey looking around like he was hearing war shells explode all around him.

Grey’s chest heaved and then he slowly calmed down.

It had been a while since he experienced a death—well, it had been a couple days. But that wasn’t the reason he reacted like this.

He didn’t remember setting a checkpoint here.

This was the place he had taken a nap, sure. But his last checkpoint was definitely in the city. He had passed out after his battle with Calixan, so he didn’t set a checkpoint after that because he was immediately occupied by the nuns, then rewards, then rage about said rewards being stolen. After that, he honestly just forgot.

The last checkpoint he remembered setting was just after he stepped out of the Last Paladin Trial. So technically, he should have revived right before his battle with Calixan.

Though, he didn’t really fear battling Calixan all that much right now. He was a lot more powerful than before the start of their initial battle, he would win a lot more swiftly now—especially with the Helm of Grace on his side.

In fact, the extra time would have been invaluable. Now that he knew that ugly fuck was coming, he would have had more time to react and get ready.

But what the hell was this? Why did his timeframe get shortened so much?

’Is it because of Phase II?’ Grey thought with a frown.

One would think that an increase in phase should help him, not harm him. Why would it make his life harder?

Grey knew for a fact that it was possible to have longer time frame resets.

The first rebirth he ever experienced sent him back more than a day—several times, in fact. In the Vampire Lord Instance, he also went back a decent chunk of time every time as well, though not nearly as much.

So why the hell was he paying more for less in return this time?

Grey pulled up his status screen.

—

[Name: Grey Temolt]

[Named Affiliation: Disciple of Sir Trolley]

—

[Frame: Prometheus]

[Frame: Vampire Lord (Established Class)]

[Frame: Helion (Proving Class)]

[Frame: Last Paladin (Established Class)]

[Pending Quests: 3]

—

Stamina: 351/351

Sync Rate: 0.32%

Energy Reserve: 2,100.1/12,100.1

—

Grey’s eye twitched. 10,000 Energy Units? What the hell happened? When had he lost that much?

Did it cost that much more for him to be reborn now? Or was it 5,000 for a checkpoint, and then 5,000 to revive?

No, that didn’t make sense at all either. How could it go from 10 to thousands in the blink of an eye?

Sure, he had improved to the Established Class, but he had also improved Prometheus to its second phase as well.

Something was wrong. He assumed that it cost more to go back now because he was a lot stronger. But the gap shouldn’t be this great.

He checked his notification screen but didn’t see anything.

’Maybe?’

Grey frowned and then closed his eyes, entering his Cyber Space.

The first thing he saw was something that certainly wasn’t there before.

’I definitely should have tried this earlier...’

In the middle of his Cyber Space was a floating red-gold flame. It just bobbed there, and though it didn’t have any anthropomorphic features, Grey still somehow felt like it was looking right at him.

"You’re supposed to help me, not make things worse, you know?" Grey said, more than a little bit annoyed.

Something about dying had a way of throwing ice cold water on all your rage.

A fluctuation came from the flame in response to Grey’s words. It wasn’t words, but instead a somber sort of energy.

Grey frowned. ’It’s apologizing?’

He could feel the subtlety. The flame was saying sorry, but also that it was necessary.

"You’re sorry? What was necessary about it?"

Another pulse came from the flame. This time, it didn’t feel like a feeling, but instead like it was pouring some energy into his Neural Frame and almost making it fire in a particular pattern—a pattern that was making Grey look toward his status screen again.

It wasn’t a very strong compulsion, and Grey felt like he could snap it whenever he wanted. It was almost like someone who cared for him was leading him by the hand.

Grey frowned, but he did as the flame wanted anyway.

His lip twitched.

"Really? This is the benefit?"

The flame released another pulse, this time sheepish.

The change was minuscule. Grey’s Energy Reserve had gone from 2,100.1 to 2,100.3. Granted, it was just a single pulse, but Grey could feel the parameters almost like it was second nature to him.

The Prometheus Spirit could only replenish his Energy Reserve by just 0.2 every minute. At that rate, it would take him almost a month and a half to fill up his Helm Frame a single time. And that was assuming he never had to use any of the energy.

The flame pulsed again, clearly agitated that Grey wasn’t thankful enough.

"How about you tell me why you shortened my rebirth time? That idiot is going to show up in half an hour at most. What am I supposed to do with that? I can’t even get back to the outpost in that time."

Grey didn’t seem to even acknowledge the potential of running.

He had had a bad feeling ever since he heard them announce their zone number during the broadcast. If that ugly thing was here, it was only a matter of time before more ugly bastards showed up. In fact, more ugly bastards might very well already be here.

Meaning... if he couldn’t defeat this one, Earth was screwed and they would all die like every other Cracked World before them.

The flame began to pulse wildly.