Sitting on the bed, I sifted through the memories of the body I had merged with—well, technically, I fused with the soul—but even after burning most of my soul's power (and with it, my cultivation), I still retained a second-tier spiritual domain. The soul of a freshly awakened mage couldn't possibly overpower me, not with my mastery of spirit magic.
When I looked into my spiritual world, I saw six constellations: five were mine from my previous incarnation, and one had come from Mu Bai. I stood up and looked into the full-length mirror on the wall.
What I saw was a handsome young man—around sixteen—with a well-toned body, dark blue hair, and matching eyes.
"Well, hello there, old friend."
The person staring back at me was someone who, in another parallel world, had been my comrade-in-arms—almost a brother. We'd watched each other's backs in countless battles, chased girls together, and fled from emperors and warlords more times than I could count.
"I don't even feel guilty," I muttered as I sank back onto the bed. "Not for merging with his soul. Not for erasing his personality."
But guilt wasn't what weighed me down. It was the crushing loneliness. This world wasn't mine. I wasn't some regressor from a Korean manhwa who turned back time at the brink of death and now gets to save old friends, smack the final boss, and build a happy little harem.
No. My old world was gone. I died there. And humanity? It's being torn to pieces. Mo Fan had already wiped out the last powerful undead on the surface just to keep the cycles a secret. Now humanity will have to rise again—only to repeat the cycle in a few thousand years.
"This time… I won't let that happen."
I clenched my fist until my nails dug into my palm. I had one shot—my ultimate gambit from the last life: travel between parallel realities.
It had worked.
Combining my sacred gifts—unique to mages at the Forbidden Curse level—essentially personal laws of reality, with spirit magic and fusion magic, I created a masterpiece.
My time element law was Reversal. I could rewind time for a specific object or area as much as I wanted—even recharge my magic reserves that way. That said, it only worked against enemies of comparable law strength. Against someone like Mo Fan, a demigod of magic, I was completely suppressed. I could still use my law, but barely, and certainly not to regenerate mana.
My spatial law was Penetration. I could phase through anything: defenses, attacks, even the boundary between dimensions. That meant entering the Dark Plane or walking through spells as if they weren't there. Again, it only worked if the target wasn't above my level. Otherwise, I'd get hurt—or worse.
By merging these two laws, powering them with my soul and cultivation, and reinforcing the whole thing with spirit magic to protect my consciousness, I created it: a spell to walk between parallel worlds… that just happened to be in the past.
"Ahem. Might need to workshop the name," I muttered with a cough, trying to shake the gloom.
Since I'd merged with this Mu Bai's soul (a random choice, really—the only requirement was magical potential), I was now a true inhabitant of this reality. There was no going back. My old world was now a future parallel reality… Let's not dwell on how that sounds.
What I should focus on is my current situation. My elements from the previous world—well, technically the future—had regressed to the beginner tier, first stage. But I'd already tamed the stars within them. I could use them freely, casting spells as flexibly as a high-level mage, which made sense; control was a skill, and I had decades of practice. I had a feeling that once I broke through again, nothing would change.
More importantly, I still had access to my laws. My soul was already marked by them. Sure, they were limited by my current mana reserves, but they were still mine.
"Now for the real test," I whispered.
I focused on merging Light and Healing—the "simplest" fusion I knew. Of course, nothing about fusion magic was truly simple, especially without the assistive gloves. But I'd never tried it during combat; too risky, too slow. One second too long, and someone got hurt. Or died.
A few minutes later, a pale green sphere floated gently around me.
That confirmed it—I wasn't going to be lacking resources in this life. Not when I could stroll into parallel timelines stuck in the past and harvest materials with the knowledge of the future.
A predatory smile spread across my face.