Holy Sh*t

Nathan blinked. Or rather, he opened his eyes after blinking. His mind was in a slight mess.

"Huh?"

He was sure the Shrouded Hero would have killed him and ground him to dust by now. There was no way the Shrouded Hero would have let him live. The Shrouded Hero was also more than capable enough to ensure Nathan stayed dead.

"Don't tell me…—"

However, Nathan's fears that someone had interrupted the Shrouded Hero slowly faded away as he glanced around and actually looked at his surroundings.

"This is…?"

Nathan scowled.

"Is this some sick kind of fucking trick? Huh? Is this a joke?!"

Nathan's shout startled the pedestrians around him, who hurriedly started avoiding the madman shouting at the sky in the middle of the sidewalk. He didn't have a phone or anything in his ears.

Nathan glared at the people around him and tried to conjure his strength to lash out only to look at his hand in frustration when nothing happened. It wasn't because he had used up all his strength in his fight against the Shrouded Hero.

He didn't have any strength.

His hand was smaller and much softer than it should have been.

"What the fuck kind of sick bastard likes toying with dead people like this?"

"Take your bad trip somewhere else, kid, you're bothering the customers."

Nathan glared at the barber or whatever he was who came out to shoo him away.

"Shut the fuck up and get lost, fuckface. Do you wanna die?"

The barber or whatever smacked Nathan in the face.

"Respect your elders, brat. Get lost before I call the cops."

"My elders? Take a look in the mirror, you fucking child. My back started hurting before you were even born."

The tall and inappropriately muscular barber frowned and went back inside only to return a moment later with a mirror.

He held it in front of Nathan.

Nathan frowned.

"What's this picture supposed to do? Is it your deity or something?"

"It's you."

"No way. This fucker doesn't even have a beard."

"Are you blind or something? Or do you not know how a mirror works?"

Nathan glared at the barber before actually looking at the mirror.

He grabbed it and studied the face reflected in it with painstaking attention to detail.

"You're saying this is me?"

The barber nodded.

"What the fuck?"

"Kid, be honest, are you a runaway from a mental hospital or something?"

"Of course not. Are you calling me crazy?"

The barber shrugged.

"...If the shoe fits."

"Oh, piss off. You're lucky I've lost my powers or I would have killed you already."

"Yeah, yeah, are you done yet?"

Nathan frowned as he looked at the face in the mirror. It was familiar. He turned to the barber.

"Hey, do you have a beard I can borrow?"

"I haven't swept the floor from my last customer yet if you want to grab some hair."

"Sure. Thanks."

The barber frowned. He hadn't been serious, but Nathan was already inside the barbershop picking up dark hair and holding it against his chin while looking in the mirror.

"...holy shit!"

Nathan ran out of the store, leaving hair and mirror behind as he looked in a certain direction.

"That's the motherfucking Triangle!"

At once, Nathan found the telltale landmark of Avalio City, a tall skyscraper with a large triangle around its top, held up by a few impressive beams.

Nathan looked around and confirmed that he was in Avalio City.

Combined with his youthful appearance, he could only guess what or how it had happened.

But it looked like he had regressed to his youth, to before the Vijang Syndicate razed the city to the ground, to the time before everything started going downhill.

"Holy shit!"

Nathan didn't think the afterlife would bother doing this to him, regardless of what kind of penance he had earned. It also didn't feel like it.

Granted, he didn't know what the afterlife was like. But shouldn't it be more like punishing him for the sins he committed, not forcing him to suffer through the worst moments in his life?

Nathan would rather believe in somehow slipping back through time than an afterlife like that, even if he had no idea how or why it had happened.

"No way Timeshrew did this, right? Last I saw him, he could barely move more than a few seconds through time."

Nathan shook his head, discarding the idea.

"And he's dead."

Nathan couldn't figure it out.

"Whatever."

He grinned. It didn't matter much to him why or how it had happened.

The important thing was that it had happened.

"Oh, I'm going to have so much fun!"

"Please do so somewhere else and never return."

The barber pushed Nathan away from his shop.

Nathan didn't resist, mostly because he couldn't.

The only thing with his regression that sucked was the fact that he had returned to a state of complete powerlessness. He only awakened after the Vijang Syndicate killed his parents. Since that hadn't happened yet, he hadn't awakened.

"You haven't seen the last of me, you hairy bastard. I'll be back!"

"I'll call the cops."

"You do that."

Nathan patted the barber on the shoulder before turning around and leaving.

The barber sighed and looked at his shop, considering whether he should close down and move somewhere else before a lunatic breaks in and murders him in his sleep.

If he could have afforded it, he probably would have a long time ago. Loony bin youths were the least of his worries.

Nathan didn't look back at the suffering barber. He was busy looking forward to seeing his parents again after such a long time. He had a wide smile and rubbed his palms together in excitement as he skipped back home.

"I can't wait!"

His parents weren't the only thing he was looking forward to.

Nathan could only imagine how frustrated the Shrouded Hero would get now that Nathan had the knowledge of the future to use to mess with him. Even if he didn't have his skill, Nathan was confident he could tease the brain out of the Shrouded Hero.