Chapter 23: The Time Bending

You hear Asual telling Qyren, “You said others get killed, but they’ve only been hurt, they are not dead.”

Luar steps forward quickly. “I’ll cover their wounds. You guys go after the enemy.”

Zephric speaks, his voice calm but firm. “Don’t go after them. It’s no use. They are too strong for us.”

Asual nods. “You have a point.”

Mateo turns to him. “Why don’t you use your power?”

“So you side with me? I have the ability to move faster,” Asual replies.

“That’s something you only get with it,” Mateo says.

You mount your horse with the others, feeling the wind brush past. Ofurd thinks to himself, This is very interesting. Even though we are not in the real world, I hope we don’t forget why we came here in the first place.

Thrynn pulls an arrow from his quiver and shoots one of the guards down. One of the royal guards, 9242, shouts, “One of us is down!”

All the royal guards draw their swords. Then, you see the third princess of Astrina, Maelis Gray Hart.

Maelis shouts to her soldiers, “Attack! Kill these useless creatures!”

But none of the soldiers move.

She closes her eyes in frustration and then something terrifying happens. All the soldiers start bleeding out.

Maelis screams, “What… What is this place? Don’t kill me! Spare my life!” She collapses to the ground, terrified.

Suddenly, Asual appears behind her. He leans close to her ear and whispers, “Boom.”

Maelis jumps back, startled. “How did you get here?” she asks.

In less than a second, Asual has her on his back. Mateo, Luare, Ofured, Kamil, and Thrynn exclaim in relief, “Finally! Our brother is up! Thank God they’re alive.”

You look around and see everyone Mateo, Luare, Ofured, Kamil, Thrynn, Valtor, Qyren, Zephric, Orvian, Kryndel, Jorvek, and Lorfer gathered, confused by the strange magic happening.

Mateo thinks to himself, So this is what this power does… Time bending. I thought I couldn’t be seen, but I’ve owned this ability before, so unfortunately, it doesn’t work on me.

Asual thinking silently, Timeless time bending…

Mateo approaches him. “Hey, I can see you’re having a lot of fun, but don’t use it too much. Time has stopped.”

“Why can’t I use it unlimited times?” Asual asks.

“You can’t. You’ve already used it eight times today. You can only use it ten times per day,” Mateo explains.

Asual nods. “Okay… I think you should go back to the others.”

Mateo leaves the air, and you hear Asual speak to the princess: “Hey, princess. We will escort you to the palace.”

Maelis hesitates. “Will you let me live?”

“Yes, but we’ll expect a reward. Gold, silver… something of value,” Asual says.

Maelis hesitates again. “How can I trust you? You just took my soldiers’ lives, did you not?”

Asual is confused, thinking, What the hell should I even tell her?

He stops time and asks Mateo for advice.

Mateo whispers, “You could tell her that a monster killed them. It was so fast you couldn’t even see it. Or, you could say her people attacked first, and that’s why you fought back.”

Asual lets time resume. He turns to Maelis. “You attacked my men first. We did nothing to them. It was you who started this.”

Maelis shudders, considering your words. After a moment, she thinks, Okay… maybe we can offer them everything they want but I have to talk to my father first.

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