Rey was lost in the dead woods. Well, he wasn't lost-lost but more like a little lost in the sense that he didn't want to take the same route as the others. For if he saw them again, he wasn't sure that he would be able to leave again.

  Thankfully, he had taken a waterskin, so he had all he needed. Food he could procure on the way. Though how he would cook was another problem. He would get to that bridge when it was time to burn it. The trees were rotten to the core, so despite that, there were still portions of the trees that could be used to create fire.

  Now that he was alone, he would have to resort to his old ways of creating fire and finding Healing potions. He abruptly stopped walking. His hands shot to his hair as he gripped them tightly.

  Oh, by the Sovereigns, where am I going to find Healing Potions?

  There was only one place in Purgatory that he knew of that sold Healing Potions, and he did not want to go there. He wasn't nearly strong enough. The last time he had gone into the city with the skeletal walls, he had started a riot as demons clashed with each other trying to get at him, and eat his oh, so sweet intestines.

  But thankfully, now he knew how to avoid that. Kassi had figured out how to disguise themselves as demons to avoid getting jumped at first sight.

  Oh Kassi…

  Just the thought of her made him want to turn back. They couldn't have wandered off far. For all he knew, they were still lingering around the same spot, trying to figure out which direction to move towards. They didn't know these woods as well as Rey did. The only reason they had made so much headway was that he was leading them all the time. He could quickly go back and sneak a peek at her. Just one peek and then he would be off again.

  No, you absolutely cannot sneak a peek at her. His inner self growled.

  Yeah, you're probably right. Rey agreed with himself.

  If he went back to look at her even once, he would never return. For all intents and purposes, he had to think that she was gone. Not gone-gone, but gone on her own adventures, and hopefully didn't end up in that triclops's castle.

  Well, she shouldn't. Since it was Rey's decision to search the castle for goods, not knowing that it was the summer palace of the prince of the Kingdom of Night.

  Man, do I hate that place.

  Of all the places he travelled to, that was still his top five in the most hated places in Hell. It wasn't the scariest or the strongest by any means, but it was where his friends dropped like flies. And because she died there.

  But he knew how Fate worked, and if he understood Fate, then Kassi would be heading there eventually. However, with Rey gone, they might be slower and get a few extra months to live.

  His thoughts drifted to how she had looked when they had parted ways. How stricken she had appeared when he had called her Kassandra, instead of Kassi. His worst regret was that he couldn't even see those dimples of hers one last time. That alone made him want to turn back again.

  Okay, that's it. You've done all your thinking about her for today. The quota for today is done. Zipped. Over. You can think about her tomorrow.

  To take his mind off her. He pulled up his stats. After all, it had been a long time since he had opened his stats window, and he must've gained quite a few in the last battle alone.

  Stats: 1

  [Vitality: 21 > 50]

  [Strength: 28 > 38]

  [Dexterity: 56 > 99]

  [Endurance: 26 > 48]

  [Magic Affinity: 14 > 29]

  [Magic Power: 25 > 42]

  [Willpower: 24 > 39]

  [Perception: 29 > 51]

  He rubbed his chin. He had one free stat point to spend. After all, he was Rank 4 now, which meant that he also had another Talent point as well. He would get to that later. As for the stat point, there was only one obvious place—Magic Affinity.

  This would result in increasing his Mana, which he desperately needed. Well, in the last battle, he hadn't run out of it entirely, but it was still good to have more, as this stat would also shorten the recharge time of his Runic Skill—Gravity's Kiss.

  In his last life, he hadn't bothered with them as he simply wanted harder, hitting skills. Who knew that investing Talent points in other things, not just skills, would bear fruit?

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  There was also the fact that he hadn't stumbled onto the dungeon with Ajay in his last playthrough, so he never had the silver ball that he could use, nor, at the time, did he know of any Sovereign runes. So, there was that too. Once again, he had to thank Kassi for showing him the Gravity Element. If it weren't for her, he probably would've been swinging his scythe like it was an oversized axe until Unokir arrived, and then he wouldn't even get a try again since there were no Eternal Hearts to stab around here.

  After his stats, he opened his Talents window and went straight to the Skills sub-menu. He saw that there was only one other Gravity skill that he could obtain at that moment.

  [Gravity's Domain – You can create a localized field of intensified gravity, increasing weight and pressure in a radius set by you. Enemies within are slowed, crushed, or pinned to the ground, depending on how much you dial up gravity. Objects crack. Knees buckle. Even time feels like it's groaning. You don't just increase gravity—you weaponize it.]

  Thanks, System. This would've been really useful three corpses ago.

  The skill went to rest in his Active skills slot. He only had one more slot open until he hit the D-tier, which meant that he had to choose his skills correctly. But given how overpowered these Gravity skills were, he figured he had nothing to worry about.

  Before he could even try out the skill, he heard a screech that seemed like it would rip through his eardrums. A shiver went through him as the screech crescendoed and finally stopped. Even after the demon had stopped screeching, Rey could still hear its shrill scream.

  "Oh, your mother must've loved it when you did that," he commented.

  A moment later, the demon appeared. It was a demon with two chicken-like heads. If the chickens had been defeathered, and then their skin had been charred black. The thing stood at about six feet tall and walked on two legs. Its 'wings' were nothing but bone-sharp claws. No matter how strong Rey had become, he did not want to get close to that thing. Funny thing was that this was not the first time he had seen this thing before. Not this life, but as he'd told Ajay before, details were the enemy of good stories.

  [Kreezor (Exiled) – E+2]

  Rey put his hands on his hips and cocked his head to the side. "You do know that I'm twice as strong as you."

  The demon screeched again in response. Rey immediately activated his newest skill, Gravity's Domain under its feet. The demon crashed to the ground as if it had a violent need to hug the ground.

  Rey hadn't chosen the diameter of the circle when he activated the skill, but he figured it was some ten feet across. He hadn't chosen the intensity of the gravity either, but the result was quite good.

  "So, you thought you could come into my neighborhood and screech like that," Rey said, doing his best Tony Montana impression. "Do you know I am?"

  The demon was doing its best to get up off the ground. It pushed against the ground with its claws and trembled as it got its head off the ground.

  "Did I say you can stop kissing the dirt?" Rey barked, still in full Tony Montana style.

  Then he increased the intensity of the gravity to about fifty percent more than regular Hell gravity. The ground itself descended a little, forming a clear boundary of where the Gravity's Domain was in effect. The trees around the circle started to pull inwards, and even Rey felt a little tug on himself.

  The loveable demon was slammed into the ground. It tried to screech, but the sound came out more as screams, and even those were strained, as if the sound itself was having a hard time breaking through the gravity field.

  "If my tandoori friend were here, we'd be making KFC out of you, or well, more like HFC, Hell's Fried Chicken, General no cluck, and all screech."

  He chuckled at his own joke, since no one was here to listen to his awesome jokes anymore.

  He strode toward the downed chicken demon before he felt too melancholy for his losses. But as soon as he stepped into the increased gravity field. He, too, was slammed into the ground. It felt like a giant had just dropped his nutsack on Rey's back.

  Before he smashed his face into the ground, he used Repulsion and shot himself out of the gravitational field. He breathed loudly, huffing to catch his breath.

  "What shit for brains came up with this skill?" he barked. "Why am I affected by it? It's my skill!"

  But there was no one here to answer his totally valid questions. If someone were here from Skills Customer Service, he would like the first one answered first. The second would be a customer support ticket titled 'Bug: Main Character Getting Screwed Over.

  He stared at the monster chicken that glared at Rey with both sets of eyes. Though he couldn't tell if it was glaring at him or telling him to end its suffering. Rey decided it was the latter. He couldn't go inside the circle, but he could increase the gravity. After all, that is what the skill had stated.

  "It didn't give me an upper limit." Rey shrugged. "Since we're at fifty percent more gravity, let's double it."

  The ground in the circle deepened as the demon was thrust further into the ground. The trees around it began to lean in. The limbs that acted like its branches were pulled forward, and a few ripped off the tree and went flying in, like rocket missiles to fall on the ground as if they had twice their weight.

  "I see…" Rey rubbed his chin. "Hey, cluckzilla, should I double it or give it to the next demon?"

  He cupped a hand over his ear. The demon's screeches were slurred.

  "What was that? Double it?" He shrugged. "Two hundred percent coming right up."

  He flicked a finger up, and the demon was crushed to the ground. Its ribs poked out of its back, or rather, the ribs stayed where they were, and the rest of its body was crushed down. The ribs quivered for a moment, and then they too crumbled into the ground.

  [+2 Magic Power]

  [+1 Magic Affinity]

  [You killed Kreezor (Exiled) – E+2]

  There was a loud creak as the first of the trees was uprooted and pulled towards the gravitational field. Rey dug his heels in, and even then, his feet were dragged toward the circle. Not wanting to follow the example of the HFC demon, he shut off the gravitational field.

  Immediately, everything stilled, and Rey felt like he could breathe easier.

  "This is truly a powerful skill, but holy Hell is this thing annoying. Why can't I move around without hindrance inside the gravity circle that I created?"

  He looked at the dead demon, and once again, the deaths of his friends flashed into his mind. Aside from Kassi, he hadn't thought about them for years until he saw them again. But now that they were alive again, things were different.

  There was a part of him that wanted to run back and save them. But a part of him knew there was no point in fighting Fate. It was best to think they were already dead. For their fates would eventually catch up to them, and he didn't want to see their deaths again, especially not hers.

  If life's stuck on repeat, fine. I'll follow my own path again—but with better one-liners.

  He heaved a heavy sigh. "Onwards to the dinosaur-sized pile of hot steaming shit."