Chapter 2013 A thousand more. "I really do not exist here..." Nux muttered out loud as he went to his apartment. Yes, since the entire city had been transported here, his previous home was here as well. Nux thought that maybe, in this timeline, 'he' was working somewhere else, so Jason and his boss didn't know him. But even when he returned to his apartment, he realized it didn't belong to him—it never belonged to him. He even checked the city records and searched for his name, but... Nothing. He didn't find anything. He didn't exist in this world. Nux's expression turned heavy. He expanded his senses even further, trying to find more versions of himself, but again, no matter how much he tried, he couldn't find anything. He found people he had interacted with—more than once, actually. All different from each other—but he didn't find 'him'. And not just him. He didn't find his wives either. He and his wives did not exist in any of these realities. 'Wait...' Suddenly, Nux's expression changed as he realized something. He closed his eyes and expanded his senses. This time, he searched for Yrniel—a Yrniel where Progenitors roamed free. And he found one such version. A Yrniel that had just come into existence, where the Progenitors were still growing and facing the Magic Beasts. He teleported to the world, and very quickly, his eyes fell on Azriel Origin, the Vampire Progenitor. However, as he glanced at the Dragon Progenitor standing next to him, he frowned. Wanting to confirm what he was thinking, he grabbed the being and started reading his memories. Azriel tried to protect his friend, but Nux grabbed him and started reading his memories as well. And very quickly, he realized it... The Dragon Progenitor... His name was Valtharion Origin. Yes, Dagahra or Saphira Origin didn't exist in this world—neither did Faustina or Caesar. None of Yrniel's Progenitors except for Azriel existed. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦 Not just in this reality, but in any of the realities Nux was seeing. "All the beings connected to me... no longer live in any other realities." Nux finally realized it. When he devours a being from a universe, he isn't just devouring them from one universe—he is erasing their existence from every single universe. The reason he couldn't find any other Nux was because... No other Nux existed. The universe inside his body—since it wasn't formed like how the rest of the universes were formed—was not connected to any of them. In this vast, endless multiverse... Nux was a sole existence that is... an outsider. An anomaly. A multiverse anomaly. "Holy..." Nux gulped audibly. The revelation opened up a whole new perception of things. It was as if he was exploring an entirely different world, getting answers to the questions he was never able to find answers to. Questions like... Why was he never able to form a Law related to Time? Aeliana had the Law of Absolute Control—a Law that did allow him to control Time. It could very much be used to derive a Law related to time—yes, a weaker Law, but a Law nonetheless. Not just her—Rune's Law was related to Time as well. Amaya's Law could devour Time. Lyriana's Law could freeze Time. Heck, Vulpiana's Law was directly related to time and allowed him to create Time Rifts. Some of the other beings he had devoured had Laws related to Time as well—again, very weak, but they still existed. Yet... Nux's Universe never accepted those Laws. At first, Nux believed it was because the Laws he had were too weak—just like how Thyra's Law's connection with Death was too weak to be accepted by the Universe—but deep down, he knew he was wrong. His explanation didn't make sense. This was nowhere similar to Thyra's case. Unlike with Thyra's case, he had multiple Laws related to Time. In theory, he should have been able to form a stronger Time Law that should be accepted by his Universe if he combined all those Laws, but... He couldn't. Something didn't make sense here. And finally, after thinking about this for centuries, Nux finally got an answer. He was never able to form a Law related to time because his Universe never had a Time. Time wasn't just one of the Primordial Energies—it was something... much more. It was the only force capable of forming multiple universes. A universe forms when a 'Time' from another universe 'branches' and extends further and further away from the main universe. So in theory, every single universe ever formed already had its own 'Time'—a branched version of another universe's Time. Every universe but Nux's. His Universe wasn't a 'branched' universe like others. It was a universe independent of the rest of the universes. The very concept of Time didn't exist in his Universe. Yes, his Universe didn't have any of the other required concepts either, but that was not as big of a problem. Nux could always comprehend the rest of the concepts and add those to his Universe, but Time... Time was different. Each universe had its own unique Time. Time was like an identity to a universe. If Nux 'copied' another universe's Time, the two universes could clash—it would never work. So in order to add a force of Time to his Universe, instead of comprehending Time... He needed to... create it. Yes, Nux was never capable of forming a Time Law to begin with. Even if he read Tenzin's memory and comprehended his Law, his own Universe would never be able to accept it. Even the Laws he had comprehended in the Temple of Time—although they might work inside the Temple—the moment he returned, his Universe would reject them, and they would become useless again, simply because his Universe had no Time for him to manipulate in any way. 'Fuck...' Nux cursed in his head. "How is one supposed to create time?" He questioned out loud. But then, [Make Time meaningful again.] The Temple's screen appeared in front of him again. 'Right...' Nux realized it. He was still in a zone that was about to be ruined. More and more realities were opening and merging with this one every second. He needed to somehow save it. How was he supposed to do that? Nux had no clue. He, however, did know one thing. He needed to create time, and for that, he needed to understand Time—not just 'one' Time. He needed to understand 'different' types of Time. He needed to understand what differentiates one type of time from another and somehow... create a time unique to his own Universe. Nux felt his head aching just as he thought about it, but at the same time, he also realized that he was incredibly lucky. Everything that happened here was purely coincidental. He had only come here to form a Law. If all had gone according to plan, he would have cleared all six Trials, formed a strong Time Law, only to realize everything he had done so far was absolutely useless. But instead, he had released his aura, weakened the existential boundary of whatever place he was in to the point all the universes started overlapping here, shattering the Balance of the Multiverse in the process—until finally, he fell into this situation. Where he was supposed to differentiate different 'Times' that had overlapped with each other, 'solve' the overlapping problem, set the timelines back in their original form again, and close the cracks in order to prevent this place from complete destruction. It was honestly scary, considering how this was exactly what he needed right now before he even attempted to create his own Time. 'Alright, let's begin...' Nux muttered as he stared at one of the cracks that was still expanding without stopping, and he teleported next to it. Again, he had no idea what he was supposed to do. He just... had to do something. 'Haaahh...' Nux sighed as he stared at the crack again. It was one of the smaller ones—just a thin little line in the large sky, glowing faintly, buzzing with unstable energy. Normally, Nux wouldn't have cared, but now, he could feel the pressure behind it. The crack was carrying the weight of another universe trying to push its way in. If it widened further, the universe on the other side would bleed into this one, forcing itself where it didn't belong. Something that had already happened more than once and could not be allowed to happen again. This place could not become any more chaotic, or else... It would shatter. Nux hovered closer and raised his hand, touching the edge of the crack. The moment his fingers brushed its surface, his vision blurred. "Father..." He heard a voice. "Huh...?" He turned around and saw a barely meter-tall being with three eyes and yellow skin holding his hand with a big smile on his face. He looked around and realized he was walking on a golden bridge under two suns. People dressed in red armor bowed to him. "Father, don't worry! We will win the War!" The child he was walking with exclaimed excitedly. "Huh? What War...?" Soon, however, Nux's expression changed. He couldn't lose himself. None of this was real. None of this was his. It was the other universe—the other side of the crack—something he was trying to keep away. "Haaaahhh!!" Nux forcefully pulled back, gasping. 'I need to separate it.' But how? Nux had one idea. He already understood the 'Time' of the place he was in. Now he just needed to understand the Time of this timeline and differentiate the two. With that thought in his mind, Nux took a deep breath, extended his hand back to the crack, returned to the universe he was in, and then... He watched. Years passed. Nux saw how time flowed in that foreign universe—how people lived, how events unfolded, how their history moved. He started comprehending their Time. And slowly, he began to see how this foreign Time was connecting onto the one he was in. It wasn't random—it was looking for similar points, shared moments it could connect to. That's how they began merging. So Nux started forcefully pulling them apart. He isolated events that didn't belong together. Played with causalities and shifted moments that were trying to overlap. He used his own understanding of Time to build a boundary between what was and what... wasn't. It was like separating two different songs playing at once. At first, they clashed, but as he removed the similar tones and shifted them to different times where they did not overlap with each other, the noise began to clear. Decades passed, and during this time, thousands of more cracks had appeared. Hundreds had grown completely, and different universes coming from them had merged with where Nux was. But the crack Nux was working on remained the same. And finally, on a fateful day, when Nux 'removed' the final connecting point... The crack trembled as it began to shrink. The light dimmed. The pressure it was radiating faded. And finally, the crack closed. Yep, one was done. "Time for a thousand more... Easy peasy!" Nux smiled brightly. Yes, he was already losing his mind.