"There might be something else she lied about.." Said Daniel to the woman with a casual tone.
Irritated by Daniel's words, she took a step forward, and said "Alright, you are coming with me. We'll have a little chat about what happened."
"I'm not going anywhere." Responded Daniel, while smiling faintly.
Due to the fact that she was the head disciple of one of the strongest sect in the city, this woman was extremely well respected. Usually, people would gladly agree to her requests, but Daniel seemed to be very keen on irritating her.
Unfortunately, that was the truth.
Since Daniel had walked all the way from the city entrance to that building, he had noticed Zack's terrified behaviour. Taking into consideration the state his body was in, one could infer what kind of treatment awaited him whenever he would set foot into the city.
He would be beaten up, shamed, and insulted.
But Daniel knew better than others.
If Zack was guilty, there would be no way for the girl's karma to decrease so drastically. The only reason for that, could be that the pain caused to Zack, could be directly attributed to the young girl.
The same was for the young man which was with her.
He didn't know the entire story, but karma wouldn't lie.
The woman thrusted her hand dowards Daniel, in an attempt to grab his shoulder, but he was easily able to avoid her by stepping aside. She quickly reacted, and waved her hand in an attempt to catch Daniel's clothes, but once again, she missed.
For a long minute, she used the fastest speed she could muster to grab Daniel, but she wasn't even able to make her fingers brush against his clothes.
What she hadn't notice.. what nobody noticed, was that the time in the area kept moving backwards for split seconds, and repeated itself over and over again.
While she had spent only a minute in that fight, only able to feel that Daniel was as slippery as an eel, he had spent more than ten minutes in it instead.
He had been forced to rewind time more than once during each of her attempts to grab him, just so that he could avoid her.
He had learned this concept of time the very last time he had been killed. When he had picked his world of origin to be teleported in, and had been killed by Nia for losing the bet. In that moment, he had learned the concept of rewinding.
It is important to understand one thing.
People that had been born in a world with a full connection to the spiritual plain, had never bothered to learn how to control the other essences. Only a specific and rare kind of mage would take the time to do this.
The reason for that was simple. With the amount and purity of their spiritual essence, they could simple take control over the surrounding elements to fight, or use spiritual essence directly.
This meant that their evolution in spells and magic, was at a much earlier stage than that of Daniel's world of origin, where people needed to construct elements by using their limited spiritual essence, and through their comprehension of the various essences.
Because of that, the majority of the cultivators that lived in worlds with a complete connection to the spiritual plain, would instead become some sorts of magical warriors. These magical warriors would use abilities formed by the combination of physical attacks and elements in order to increase their power to a devastating degree.
One example of this, was the Sect of the Instantaneous Sword, which teached a set of sword skill which was created by mixing swordsmanship, and the teleporting concept of space.
The ones who focused on specific types of essence, were mostly researchers, alchemists and people passionate about the subject.
The reason why this is important to know, is so that one can understand the significant difference between spiritual cultivators, and immortal cultivators.
The power of an immortal cultivator would be on a much higher level, but that had caused spiritual cultivators to need to research the full extension of their power, and push it to the extreme.
That's why the young cultivators that had attacked Daniel had been helplessly teleported around, and why the woman wasn't able to grab him despite her higher level of power.
Embarrassed, the woman let her immortal essence out of her body, increasing the speed of her movements even more.
Now unable to avoid her anymore, Daniel decided to put the entire area under a spatial blockade, and create an illusion in it.
He left a wisp of his immortal essence to work as a bait for the woman's attack, and imitated the surrounding essences to perfection.. Leaving only two people free from the illusion.
Zack, and Himself.
Daniel approached Zack, which was looking at the woman trying to grab the empty air around her, and at the crowd that cheered loudly. He then turned to look at Daniel, and said "What is going on? Why are they behaving like that??"
"Don't worry about it.. Let's go." Responded Daniel while grabbing Zack's shirt, and dragging him out of the crowd.
Within the edges of the crowd, there was a person which hadn't fallen for his illusion, and was directly looking at him as he moved away.
That person, was the guard which had helped Zack.
—–
Daniel and Zack were now sitting at a table in a restaurant, and were waiting for the food that Daniel had ordered to arrive.
Zack was extremely sorry for causing all that trouble to Daniel. To a point where he didn't felt any happiness about being able to walk once again.
The two of them spent the following minutes in silence, until finally, Daniel said "So, are you going to tell me the full story of what happened?"
Zack lowered his head in an apologetic way, and responded "Why do you care?"
"Let's just say that.. It is in my interest to help people with their problems." Responded Daniel casually, while cleaning the spoon he had been given with his shirt. That was the only restaurant that had let them in once noticed that he was along with Zack, and cleanliness seemed to be not one of their main concerns.
"I was part of their sect once.. Joined when I was five.."
For the following ten minutes, Zack recounted of how he had joined the Sect of the Illusory Edge, which ironically enough, was a sect that teaches how to use light in conjunction with swords, to create illusions.
He had entered the sect along with his best friend, and her brother at the age of eight, and the three of them had gone through sweet and rough times together.
Unfortunately, Zack wasn't as talented as the brother and sister were, and that had caused Zack to remain at a lower level within the sect.
As years passed, the three of them had grown further than ever. So much so, that after seven years, Zack had learned that his childhood friend, whose name was Kyla, had been engaged to a talented member of another sect.
Zack was happy about that, as he wished the best for her, but he had soon come to change his mind.
Not long after the announcement, Kyla's brother Kien, had stormed into his room, and had beaten him senseless. Then, he had taken him to be judged by the leader and elders of the sect, which after informing him about the accusations that had been moved towards him by Kyla, had kicked him out due to the fact that there were no actual proofs that the fact had actually happened, with the exception of Kyla's words.
At first, nobody that belonged to the sect had come to torment Zack, but for him, learning the truth about the matter had become an obsession. So, he started to stalk Kyla.
One day, Zack had listened to the private conversation between her and another male disciple of the Sect of the Illusory Edge, and from that conversation, he had learned that the two were together, and that she had lied so that she could get out of the arranged marriage. If that didn't work, she could at least explain why she wasn't a virgin anymore to her consort.
Zack was disgusted by what he had learned, and had decided to confront her once and for all.
Unfortunately, when he had moved her accusation towards her in front of his brother Kien, due to Zack's obsessive behaviour, and his sister's cries, Kien had ended up not believing his words, and instead, he had almost killed him.
He broke both of his legs, and threatened that if he let someone heal them, or even entered into the city once again, he would kill him.
Honestly speaking, Daniel could sort of understand Kien's behaviour. He had a sister, and he could empathize with him. If someone were to touch his sister, he would turn the world into dust just so that the culprit could suffer.. But this was different.
Kien and Kyla weren't the sort of brother and sister that Daniel and Reila were. Reila would never lie to him like this, nor would she do something so vicious to one of her friends.
Just in time for the end of Zack's story, the food arrived.
Daniel pushed one of the dishes in front of Zack's face, and told him that he believed in his version of the story.
When Zack asked why with a pair of watery eyes, Daniel simply said "You don't look like the type of person who would do something like that."
He then started to eat, while Zack tried in every way he could to clean the tears that were uninterruptedly streaming down his cheeks.
It took more than a few minutes for Zack to calm down, and start eating his food.
"What happened to your immortal essence? I get that you are not talented.. But to have none after seven years.. That's ridiculous." Said Daniel with a hint of curiosity.
Zack cleaned his mouth from the grease, and responded "It's called spiritual castration.. They cut away a piece of your spirit, and keep it separated from the rest of your body. It was the sects decision to do that instead of simply killing me."
"Is something like that possible?" Asked Daniel, clearly shocked by Zack's words. "How does it feel to have a piece of your spirit taken away?"
"It's like.. Having a limb cut off, and yet still being able to control it.. I can feel it wherever it is, and at all times.. Because it's part of me.. It's difficult to explain."
From what Daniel understood, such practice was atrocious and barbaric. One's spirit was the most personal and important part of one's body. Having a piece of it taken away from you, was nothing different for actual castration.
After another few minutes, the waiter approached Daniel's table in order to collect the payment.
Instead of paying, Daniel said "We'll stay here for a bit longer. Bring us three cups of tea, and ask the gentleman that's sitting at the second table from the exit to join us."
Without waiting for the waitress to approach him, a man got up from the table which Daniel had pointed out, and started walking towards their table.
Daniel moved slightly to the side, and made space for him to sit.
This man, was the guard that hadn't fallen for Daniel's spatial illusion.
"First of all, I'm very impressed that you were able to avoid being caught into my illusion.. Secondly, why are you following us?" Asked Daniel with a curious and confident smile on his face.
The middle aged man turned to look at Daniel, and said "I may have only been a martial cultivator in the past.. But I'm still well aware of what a spatial illusion is.."
"You come from the same planet I come from.." Muttered Daniel in a low voice. "That's quite the coincidence.." He then added.
The man started to rub his hands nervously together, then said "I do.. I've been here for twelve years, and I've been trying to go back ever since. My name is Der.."
