Tactical Retreat

Invisible wind discs flew wildly, a thousand orange fireballs zig zagged across the clouds, purple lightning flashed in waves and acid rain sprayed like a leaking hose. However, with all these flashes of power it hit no one as the four fought in a melee while levitating in the air, appearing and disappearing a kilometer or two away until someone got a single hit and this cycle would continue for minutes.

The Gatekeepeer specialized in melee but with three opponents having the same power level he had to go all out with his full power. He covered himself with three layers of almost invisible armor – wind armor which was the outermost layer protecting him from physical attacks, mana armor which shielded him from elemental damage and his specialized armor which only he can create void armor which had a knockback effect. As long as his void armor held strong all his enemy attacks would reflect to the attacker which made him effective during mob fights. His new enemies however weren't ordinary, once they learned he had some sort of 'reflect attack' skill all their attacks were layered with their own mana force which enabled their own attacks reflected at them harmless. However, it didn't make their allies immune to their attacks. So, the melee lasted for hours, each of the fighter suffering light bruises but the monster lords weren't getting tired at all. Centuries of being trapped in different states due to the world's mana exhaustion has left them in a frenzy once they were freed.

Snow was the most irritated fighter since she couldn't cast her area-of-effect spells which would usually end a fight in seconds. Though she wasn't as good in close combat as the other two monster lords she knew to make hidden attacks to hit the Gatekeeper's blind spots, but it hardly wounded their enemy. Her annoyance to this seemingly weak human grew as her hidden attacks were barely scratching the agile human who seemed to be smirking while punching a few air jabs as he effectively defended himself against two more domineering attackers. In fact, Snow had been hit critically a dozen of times in the past hour and if not with her super regeneration those wounds would have been fatal to her.

Anu, the golden berserker wolf-man seemed to be attacking wildly with his four limbs grasping at times in the empty air. It would seem that he was the slowest among the monster lords, but he had never been hit by the Gatekeeper at all. Only the reflected attacks of his allies hit him, but he had hardly experienced any damage at all. He would have been as annoyed as Snow if his attacks weren't hitting the fast human, but his attacks did connect. Even with the 'reflect skill' of their opponent he managed to create piercing attacks with his extending claws that only rebounded 20% of his attack force. His attacks were so powerfully precise that the Gatekeeper would be knocked away with his piercing jabs a few hundred meters away when he was hit. Anu however expected that the human would have stamina at least on par with them so he never let his guard down and became his allies' tank even when it was a three versus one.

The monster lord called Iso despite missing one leg seemed to be the fastest of the three, flashing here and there creating after images of himself where his copies also manage to release attacks that could cause damage. This skill seemed like instant cloning, but all his clones have but a fraction of his power. Though simultaneous attacks from his clones barely caused a scratch to the powerful human, it added mental stress to their target since the Gatekeeper wouldn't know where the real one would strike next. When Iso's attacks squarely hit the human with almost an impregnable defense it would cause a banging sound as if he was hitting a large gong.

If someone was watching this fight far away and if they were strong power users as well, what they could see would be three beings seemingly orbiting a human while flying in the air. They would hardly see the attacks unless it really hit the target or if it was clearly blocked by the defender however there were more misses than attacks that could connect.

The Gatekeeper was getting impatient after three hours, he attacked more often as minutes were dragged on to hours. Even though he still had a lot of stamina he understood that only being in the offense would make these monster lords injured. His speed even increased more than thrice when the fight began and even his opponents could see as if he had eight arms simultaneously blocking, openly attacking or parrying while his whole body spun like a top as if he were spinning in a tube. It almost seem he has become a whirlwind if not for his black suit that seemed to self-repair the tears made by the monster's attacks.

Snow's countenance had a slowing effect on her opponents but even when the Gatekeeper slowed it seemed he was faster than them. She would cast ice blasts with her mouth every now and then as through the hours she was recovering her casting abilities. The blasts rarely hit her target but was effective in covering her allies' attacks. A swipe of claws from Anu, then successive piercing mana waves from Lord Iso got the Gatekeeper on his toes who was now bleeding internally after four hours of fighting defensively. He managed to hit all three monsters many times in the past hours but he was surprised they regenerated faster than his past opponents. It would seem all his counter attacking was for nothing as he didn't seriously injure any of them.

The gatekeeper seemed more like a prickly spinning top as time passed on, he was consciously spinning while tumbling in the air as if being tossed to and fro by the wind. Iso was now grinning as he has sensed their enemy has lost his patience.

"Anu, prepare your strongest attack because I'm going all in." Iso telepathically sent a message to Anu.

"I'll cast you some defensive spells while you're at it" chimed Snow.

As they noticed the Gatekeeper trying to change his pace in defending and attacking like an endless spinning top with a fixed pattern the three spun in the air like three comets overtaking each other and suddenly spun among each other before crashing violently to the spinning Gatekeeper.

"Got his heart!" roared Iso while holding a beating red heart which he crushed as he raised his blood-drenched arm.

"Sliced his neck!" a gold-glowing Anu snickered. A fountain of warm blood sprayed across the sky while the human's head disappeared as it fell to the ground a hundred feet away.

"Finally he's dead!" the incensed Snow mentally rejoiced. Going back to the Gatekeeper's corpse with her elongated claws trying to dice what was left with the human's body.

Even though the human was decapitated and lost a heart it took effort for Snow to actually dice Gatekeeper's body as it now accelerated downward due to gravity. This made Snow so angry now that even in death the human's corpse was harder than most of their kind.

Then everything became silent.

A few thousand kilometers away –

"Did you sense that?" said a very old man with a cane wobbly walking with a middle-aged man while crossing a pedestrian lane.

"Could he really be dead?" the younger man who is nearing his 60s paused for a second before following his senior who seemed to have one foot to the grave already. " Fighting against three monster lords is his limit?"

"I would be glad if he was dead" the old man growled while panting as he reached the end of the pedestrian lane and on to the side walk. "It might be his limit now but remember he managed to disable the both of us 30 years ago and I'm still limping even today." Hatred flashed in the old man's eyes as he remembered the only fight in his life that he lost and it was with his son-in-law fighting with him who was also his walking companion now.

"Father, please come down. Your blood pressure is rising again. You might get hurt this time."

"Right, like I haven't had this bloody condition when I scourged the endless plain."

"Well, it's better to side with caution. You'll never know it might kill you." the concerned younger man reminded his senior.

*Whack* The sound of a walking cane hit the younger man's head but instead of the man getting injured the cane broke.

"Now I have to get a new cane!" the old man trembled in anger. "Your head broke my cane! You better buy me another one. Something stronger than this!" the senior waving his broken cane at his companion.

"Why? You're the one who hit my head! " the younger man's mood changed. "I might be respectful of you because you're my wife's father but don't test my patience any longer."

"You have been saying that for years but you won't dare to hit me back" the older man limping ahead of his companion swinging his broken cane in the air. "If only I could crush that Gatekeeper again, he's on to his tricks again."

"Are you telling me he's not dead?" the old man's companion quizzingly asked. "I thought it was luck that he paralyzed and knocked us out of Europe."

"Blasted! Of course, it was because you fainted before me so you never saw it – We were so close!"

The old man stopped walking then he turned to look at the direction where the three monster lords had ended the Gatekeeper.

"Father, what do you mean I didn't see it? You mean he still had a hidden card after all that?"

"Yes, he finally showed his trump card before we could finish him. He has a unique innate talent that would keep him from dying – it's called Time Reversal."

Other pedestrians on the sidewalk began looking at this two arguing men weirdly. What shocked them more however was that the two men's trailing footprints were marked with blood. The stench filled the air but the two men seemed to not notice it.

If only the onlookers were brave enough to trace these bloody footprints where it began, they would find it at a huge empty lot a few blocks away which seemed like an abandoned construction site. Aluminum sheets were used to fence around this multi-hectare property but the gate nowhere to be found but instead a trail of bloody footprints would start from inside this no-man's land.

In the middle of this forgotten property was a huge pile of monster bodies brutally chopped into body parts which almost towered a rusty crane which was left in the open field. There must be a hundred monsters since dozens of monster heads were part of the pile and they were similar looking to the three monster lords the Gatekeeper fought. Only they were mercilessly slaughtered by the two men a few minutes ago who forgot they massacred a lot of monsters in no time

"Something isn't right." Snow mind messaged the other two monster lords. "Why are the clouds flowing differently."

Anu sniffed the air " The scent is the same but the same is happening to the trees and the forest. "

Iso analyzed their surroundings "It's definitely not an illusion but indeed there is something weird."

"Everything is going backwards!" the other two monster lords almost shouted together. Then the three realized that they couldn't move their bodies as their surroundings moved faster in reverse.

"What on earth is happening?" Anu inquired trying to break away using his brute force but to no avail.

"It can't be – could this skill be actually mastered by a human?" Lord Iso murmured to himself casting layers of defensive spells to himself with his mind. Snow almost panicking noticed what Iso was doing so she mimicked him in a matter of seconds.

Then something even weirder happened. The bits and pieces of the human's corpse rose to the air as if it was a video taped being rewinded but unlike how they dismembered Gatekeeper his missing body parts began appearing from thin air. Even his burned and torn suit self-repaired itself along with his glasses and top hat. The Gatekeeper was levitating again with the same relaxed posture when they first found him.

"Finally, I learned how to put you three back again" the Gatekeeper smiled innocently looking at the three as if he wasn't chopped to pieces a minute ago.

Then he opened his two palms as if about he was to clap but weird runes that formed a sphere appeared between his palms radiating a strange power.

"Now who wants to go first." Gatekeeper suddenly dashed through the air heading for the three.

"Run he's going to seal us again!" the once confident Iso suddenly teleported far away leaving hundreds of after images in his route. Snow self-destructed herself into a blizzard but actually propelled her real body to the north while being invisible and stealthily rode the northern winds.

Anu who acted a second too late dove to the ground but as he travelled a few minutes underground a strong sucking force kept him from travelling further. As he was helplessly sucked out of the ground he looked to where the sucking force came from and saw the rune sphere rotating wildly – then he remembered. This was the same arts that he used to keep himself from dying. It was supposed to be a forgotten art even long ago when he rediscovered it. Shock filled his eyes and as he was about to be sucked into the sphere Anu said his last words.

"It's not just the Time Reversal. You could also read memories!"

The Gatekeeper smiled innocently while looking at him in pity. It was the last thing Anu saw before everything went dark.