Global Awakening: Only I Can Respawn

Alecton took YuWon\'s offer and was willing to leave. But the Chiron weren\'t the only ones leaving. Almost all awakeners were going with them. They had heard about the fight with Ignis and the werewolves.

As such, they didn\'t think it wise to continue the journey, and YuWon didn\'t stop them, either. It was good they recognized their weakness and stepped down.

"Alright, let\'s head back," YuWon nodded.

Everyone walked back to the forest. They even reached the end, but as they were about to exit, something weird happened. A mountain of corpses blocked the path ahead.

Centaurs, humans, and even werewolves were piled on each other. Two men were standing in front, their backs turned towards the crowd of Centaurs and humans.

YuWon had a bad feeling about it. Something about these people... felt off. He gestured for Yeji, Anna, and Gina to step back. The rest of them were to be used as shields.

"You took your sweet time," a man spoke, wiping the blood off the crimson blade. "I hope you didn\'t mind me killing some of you to pass the time."

Everyone was shocked and turned towards YuWon. The voice was eerily similar to his. Anna was the first one to react. She grabbed YuWon\'s arm and made a run for it.

"Tsk, you\'ll never change Anna," the other YuWon smiled, showing his face to the rest. "That\'s why I always kill you first. Leaving a regressor alive is always a pain in the ass."

Saying so, the other YuWon took a step, but the Chiron stood in between. No one knew what was happening, but they didn\'t care. Someone meant to cause harm to their savior. It was their duty to stop them.

Alecton was hiding behind the soldiers. He was confident they\'d defeat the man before them. Unfortunately, he was way too optimistic.

In the blink of an eye, the Chiron\'s were slaughtered. Everyone was shocked as their corpses hit the ground.

"Filthy insects," the other YuWon snarled. "Hojin, deal with them."

"...alright."

Hojin pressed his palms together and a weight scale appeared in his hands. He pushed the scale before the Awakeners and they began collapsing one after the other.

No one got a chance to fight back. Yeji, Gina, Alecton... everyone fell to the ground. Just like that... they were dead. Everyone on the floor except Anna and YuWon had died because Hojin wished for it to happen.

But there was a huge price to pay for it. Hojin looked at the fallen people, and soon ghostly visages began to rise from the corpses. Yeji\'s spirit was the first to meet his eyes but there was no hint of animosity in her.

Hojin closed his eyes. It was the curse of using the mythical item. Anyone he killed will follow him for all eternity. Their souls would ensure the user of the reaper\'s clock would never have a moment of peace.

The artifact was also the reason why YuWon never killed him. The sadist wanted Hojin to suffer alongside him. But this time Hojin was nearing his limit.

"You\'ll pay for this," a spirit whispered.

Hojin didn\'t open his eyes. By now, thousands of spirits had surrounded him, cursing him to die with them. Only then would the souls leave for the afterlife and find peace.

"Die with us."

Hojin\'s chest tightened. He took a step back, then another, until his legs felt weak and he fell to his knees. Unable to take it anymore, he covered his ears, yelling to drown the voices of the souls he doomed.

"Coward! You must suffer as we have!"

"Go away!" Hojin screamed.

"Weak..." other YuWon scoffed. "Maybe it\'s time to put you to rest."

But he shook his head and turned away. There was no time to deal with Hojin now. After all, he had to kill YuWon before the bastard jumped to some other timeline. He had to hunt him down before that fool destroyed everything and doomed the world.

Because of that fool, the gods have already arrived here.

If they couldn\'t even handle the werewolves meant that people weren\'t strong enough to fight back the world tree\'s influence. Moreover, the otherworld\'s appearance was tied to how strong the awakeners were.

Their average strength didn\'t matter. As soon as an Awakener is deemed strong enough to enter the world tree, the world will evolve, forgetting about the rest.

In other words, if one person became too powerful while everyone else stayed weak, the gods would field day hunting them down. That\'s what happened to the other YuWon\'s timeline.

He learned the lesson the hard way. No matter how strong one human was, they could never beat an entire group of gods alone. That\'s why it was more important to get stronger together than to keep all the power for yourself.

Thus he had made it his mission to hunt down the doomed versions of himself and kill them. When only one timeline remained, the other YuWon would do everything perfectly and save everyone. Even if it meant killing the people he once cared about.

***

"What the hell is going on?" YuWon asked.

Anna didn\'t reply and kept running. She hadn\'t seen the other YuWon before. But she knew a crazy bastard when she saw one.

"He\'s here to kill you," she finally spoke.

"Thanks, Einstein!" YuWon commented sarcastically. "I know he\'s here to kill me, but why the hell are we running? We can--!"

"No, we can\'t!" Anna yelled, coming to an abrupt stop. "Didn\'t you see? He killed everyone who was on this floor. You think you can defeat someone like that?"

"...I\'m different now."

Anna opened her mouth to say something, but before she could utter a word, a sword impaled her. Shocked, YuWon turned around to see the other YuWon standing further away. He threw his sword to kill Anna before she had a chance to say anything.

"Finally, we can chat without interruptions," the other YuWon smiled, pulling out a new crimson blade.