You know, these are really getting hard to write, I’m not sure anyone’s even reading them.

  — Excerpt from Book of Optimism

  Day 239, 6:35 PM

  Well, that could have gone better. While Lady Frostgrave didn’t kill me outright, she crippled my arms and legs, freezing a good chunk of my internal organs while she was at it. And yet, despite all the damage, she didn’t go for the kill.

  The guild and the empire both would have prosecuted her had she used lethal force without solid proof, even if she was right. Especially since no cultist ever exploded on death and that would correctly paint me a different type of anomaly.

  Her conservative stance saved Newstar’s life and spared me a lot of awkward questions, because there was no way he wouldn’t have figured out something was wrong if he moved back two weeks into the past into his still living, fully awake body.

  That didn’t mean she had good intentions. She would’ve handed me over to heresy hunters beyond a doubt, and if those guys pushed and interrogated me long enough, they would’ve gotten some of my secrets. Worse, they probably could have stopped me from killing myself, making life as a Dandelion a complete failure and possible centuries of living hell. I could even imagine them using me as a convenient source of Redo. Worse, if that happened, it was only a matter of time before the outer gods found me, and they possibly had the means of breaking my mind for good.

  As my mind processed doomsday scenarios, I focused on my hands. I looked at the failed potion, my brewing interrupted by the shift in my consciousness. That one was a success and made me forty second realm manarium crystals, so I’ll be a bit poorer, but richer in experience. I needed some sort of certain-death killswitch. And even more than that, I needed the ability to think on my feet.

  With a heavy heart, I opened my status screen and increased all mental attributes by fourteen. The ability to think fast had become paramount. While my new processing speed was merely equal to a newly ascended fifth realm mageknight, it would have to do. If only advancing my core increased the stats, cheating would’ve been easier by orders of magnitude. I would’ve already matched someone at the seventh realm.

  If wishes were fishes, and all that. What I needed to do was figure out answers to all questions higher realm mageknights might ask me, have them ready, and if possible hypnotize myself into believing them or something. The last bit was probably impossible, but shaping my lies into shadows of truth should achieve the desired effect of beating runic seals meant to do just that.

  I prepared the answers and interrogated myself over and over, coming up with different questions in each iteration as my slightly different answers pushed the monologue in one direction or another.

  Fortunately for me, the guild’s rentable labs offered complete privacy, so nobody heard me discuss the nature of amnesia with myself, which wasn’t even in the top ten weirdest things I interrogated myself about.

  Two days later, I went to the adventurers’ guild to sleep and eat, then headed outside town to sit and observe people coming and going. According to Newstar, I was more than a day early, but the loop was a scrap, so sitting outside the city and waiting for Newt to arrive wasn’t such a waste of time.

  Come to think of it, I’ve never heard rumors about stuff happening outside the city. Possibly it was an oversight; possibly someone paid the rumor-house to keep quiet about events at the gate.

  I considered the matter as I waited, but nothing overly irregular happened. Two brigands at the second realm scammed bits and pieces of manarium from newcomers now and then, with nobody doing anything. People minded their own business, because when things got out of control a guard came to support the scammers and make the person in question bleed even more crystals in the process.

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  Maybe I could install the kill switch inside my realm? That way I could trigger it with a thought, and nobody could possibly detect it.

  As I was refining my idea, Newstar entered the stage. The completely oblivious kid was a mark spotted from a mile away with a bullseye the size of a house painted right at the center of his forehead. The bandits didn’t even give him ten seconds before hitting him.

  Now, the reasonable thing to do was to intervene right away, but I wanted to see how well he handled himself, and his performance was as abysmal as I expected it to be.

  Finally, when I saw the guard getting involved, it was time to act.

  “Greeting officer, what seems to be the problem?” I didn’t know the man, never did him a favor, and he didn’t seem to recognize me, which was fine. Amicable plus my charisma should handle everything.

  “Move along. This young man is causing a scene, and he has assaulted a lower-realm awakened.”

  “Dandelion! No, I didn’t!” Newstar shouted, torn between greeting me and vindicating himself, struggling to figure out which was the priority.

  “Is he a friend of yours?” The guard looked at me, and the vultures also had an extra sparkle in their eyes. They had smelled manarium.

  I would find a better solution for the final loop, but for now, I wanted to see what would happen after I led Newstar into Thunderbluff.

  “So, what’s the fine for this young man’s transgression?”

  “Twenty first realm crystals,” the more eloquent scammer said immediately.

  They were as cheap as they came. Twenty first realm crystals were nothing to me, and I gave him a handful. Still, giving money to such scum went against my principles, but they weren’t so bad I needed to kill them. Annoying. Had this happened before Everrain, I would’ve just killed them and permanently solved the problem, but in the Eternal Light empire, scrambling for manarium was the norm, and inconsequential scams such as the one Newstar had suffered were a fact of life.

  The scammer looked at me, as if ready to ask for more, but my glare sealed his mouth, and Newstar and I entered Thunderbluff without further harassment.

  “Why did you give them the manarium?” Newstar hissed.

  “Because you don’t have enough and you got yourself into trouble with no idea how to get out of it.” I didn’t spare him. The kid should’ve thanked me first. He had started taking my help for granted.

  “Sorry, thanks.” Or maybe not; maybe Newstar was just too angry. “What was I supposed to do? Kill them?”

  “Well, no. Killing them near guardsmen and with so many witnesses is a horrible idea. It would land you in prison immediately unless you have some connections you haven’t pulled yet.”

  As expected, Newstar shook his head. If he had had anyone to call, he wouldn’t have spent ten days in prison for starting a “brawl” and disturbing the peace.

  “Anyway, that’s behind us. All it cost me was a bit of manarium and that’s a cheap price to pay to get out of an unpleasant situation. Now, what’s your plan for the imperial city? Any places you want to visit?”

  “I considered what you said,” Newstar dragged out his words as we moved forward in line, swiftly approaching the gate. “The two places I wish to visit and join are the scribes’ guild and the adventurers’ guild. Which do you think I should visit first?”

  “It doesn’t really matter.” I said with a shrug, the scribes’ guild entrance exam isn’t for a while yet, and if Newstar wants a one-on-one like I had, he would have to pay for Barb to conduct the test.

  Newstar gazed at the ground, considering his options.

  “I think we should head for the adventurers’ guild first.” He finally decided as I paid the entrance fee for us both.

  I couldn’t help but notice how his eye twitched when I paid two pieces of first realm manarium.

  “All right, follow me.” I said, pretending I saw nothing. He would have to work a lot on that pauper mentality of his. Hopefully accumulating a bit of wealth while working as a mercenary should fix that.

  “Dandelion!” Hairman waved me from his stall, heralding the start of the crowd of people greeting me and wishing me a good day. Newstar looked at me with wide eyes, and I must admit the sight was difficult to believe.

  “Sir Blackfist, how long have you been here?” He asked a very good question.

  Some six-seven weeks had passed since we last saw each other, but I should also take into account the times when I visited Thunderbluff before I met Newstar. The thing is, decades or possibly centuries separated me from those times, and I really had trouble recalling.

  “Ten to fifteen weeks, I think.” I said honestly after taking the time to consider the question. “Sometimes I lose track of time beyond what has happened in the last two weeks. Anyway, here’s the adventurers’ guild.”

  I motioned him through the door, and I very nearly froze behind him when I saw a familiar woman staring at us, dissecting us with her gaze.

  “Are you Dandelion, once called Blackfist the Brigand, the former townlord of Hailstown?” she said the familiar words in a very familiar tone.

  Iceflow Frostgrave had obviously spent quite a while waiting for me in the previous loop.