Reincarnated as the favorite of an obsessive goddess: gave me a system-Chapter 36: New skill.

"You know? Your mind is... curiously resilient. But this is still child’s play to me."

Qaxy continued searching for fears among his memories. He saw the village, the training with Allice, Roshia’s grateful face, and Elara’s smile. These were recent memories, full of intense emotions, but there was nothing of his life as a hero.

"Why is there nothing?"

Suddenly, the mental landscape shifted drastically. Qaxy frowned, confused. The surroundings were no longer the world he knew. He was standing on a hard, gray surface, surrounded by gigantic metallic structures that soared toward the sky. Metal carriages without horses zipped past at incredible speeds, and the people wore strange clothes.

"What... what is this place?" Qaxy murmured, his voice tinged with genuine bewilderment for the first time. There was no magic here. There were no monsters. It was a flat, mechanical world. He saw Kai, but in different clothing, walking among the crowd, looking... normal. Bored, even.

Qaxy felt he was wasting his time. He decided to dig deeper. That was when he found something.

A barrier.

A barrier in the middle of Kai’s memories. Qaxy stopped in his tracks, curiosity momentarily overcoming his cruelty.

"What is this?" he wondered, floating cautiously around it. "I’ve rummaged through your mind, Kai. I’ve seen the memory of your parents’ death... a great trauma. But... it’s the only significant memory I’ve found of your life as a hero. Where is the rest? Where are the battles? The victories? The losses? What was that strange place?"

Qaxy’s confusion turned into suspicion. A legendary hero should have a mind full of scars and triumphs. This void... this emptiness was deliberate.

"Are you hiding from yourself, hero?"

Qaxy thought for several seconds until he finally began to laugh. "That’s not it, you just don’t remember! You don’t remember anything. You died and somehow came back, but you remember nothing. That’s why you’re so weak."

"Shut up, you idiot," Kai replied with anger.

"I’ve hit the nail on the head. And that strange place... it was another world outside the great barrier, wasn’t it? You died there too... and Lyla brought you back. That’s why she’s here, and that’s why she’s weak. She spent her power to bring you back... she’s no longer one of the 10 gods... incredible."

Kai tensed up completely. Qaxy had gotten everything right except for the reason Lyla no longer had power; he hadn’t considered the System.

"Let me see something, hero."

Qaxy dove back into Kai’s memories with immense curiosity. Suddenly, everything around them changed again: the memory of the first time Kai spoke with Lyla after dying in Japan. Kai tried to resist, but Qaxy saw and heard everything.

"A system? Is that what you have?" He paused, thinking. "It allows you to hide... to grow stronger and stronger... you wanted revenge on us."

Qaxy began to laugh uncontrollably. "Malk will find this hilarious. I have to tell him as soon as I’m finished with all of you."

Kai tried to attack Qaxy, but the latter simply retreated to the previous barrier. "Anyway, let’s see what you’re hiding here. Let’s unlock your memories and your fears, hero."

Qaxy extended his hand and concentrated his power on a single point, a crack appeared in the sphere. And then, hell broke loose. It wasn’t a smooth flow of memories and fears. It was a tsunami. An avalanche of agony, loss, blood, and despair.

Qaxy gasped, recoiling, his eyes widening. He saw battles, he saw entire armies being massacred, the earth turning red with blood. He saw Kai, the great hero, covered in the blood of monsters and men alike, his face a mask of determination. He saw his companions fall one by one. He saw the moment Kai realized his struggle was endless, a vicious cycle orchestrated by forces beyond his control.

Every trauma, every unhealed wound, every silenced scream that Kai hadn’t remembered was now free. And Qaxy was trapped in the middle of the storm.

"Too much... it’s too much!" Qaxy screamed, desperately trying to withdraw from Kai’s mind, but the avalanche of memories held him anchored, forcing him to experience everything Kai had endured for years in a matter of seconds.

Outside the mind, Kai’s body trembled violently. Chaos reigned around them. Lyla was being forcibly restrained by Allice and Roshia. She was hysterical, her eyes fixed on Kai.

"Let me go! He’s suffering! I have to save him!" Lyla screamed, her nails digging into Allice’s arm.

"We can’t get through that bubble!" Allice replied, her own expression full of anguish. She also wanted to rush to Kai, but there was nothing they could do. Thorne and Mira paced around the bubble, searching for an opening that didn’t exist.

Inside Kai’s mind, the chaos was reaching its peak.

[ SYSTEM MESSAGE ]

[ System adapting... ]

Kai remembered. He remembered everything. Every technique, every spell, every moment of despair that had forced him to become stronger. Qaxy, feeling the shift, desperately tried to use the last of his control to deal a final blow. If he couldn’t break Kai’s mind, he would kill him with fear.

Using Kai’s newly discovered traumas, Qaxy forged one final, terrible illusion. Kai saw Lyla, Allice, Roshia, Elara... all lying on the village ground with their throats slit, their lifeless eyes accusing him. And above them, a monster he vaguely remembered from his first life, an abomination he had failed to stop, prepared to deliver the finishing blow to him.

"Die with your failure!" Qaxy’s voice shouted within the illusion.

The System’s voice resonated once more, this time with a tone of finality.

[ SYSTEM MESSAGE ]

System adapted.

Due to the recovery of all your memories, a new unique skill has been created.

Skill: Return

Return: All your strength, speed, agility, endurance, and mana from your first life will return to you for 60 seconds.

Cooldown: 1 week.

[ WARNING! ]

The use of ’Return’ is dangerous.

Your current body is insufficient to house the power of your previous life.

Using ’Return’ will force me to restructure your form to withstand the power. This will push you to the limit.

Your muscles will tear, your bones will break, and your internal organs will suffer massive damage.

Once the time expires, you will be left completely exhausted and on the brink of death.

Kai did not hesitate. If he died, Qaxy would kill everyone else. The village would be razed. Lyla... Lyla would suffer a fate worse than death. There was no choice.

Kai, with his mind now unified, uttered a single word.

"Return."

[ SYSTEM MESSAGE ]

Skill ’Return’ activated.

Initiating bodily restructuring.

Time remaining: 60 seconds.

What followed was not a glorious magical transformation. It was a scene of pure horror. The scream that escaped Kai’s throat was a howl of absolute agony, a sound that tore through the silence of the forest and paralyzed everyone present. Lyla froze, her heart stopping. Everyone recoiled, horror painted on their faces.

Kai’s body began to contort. Sickening cracks rang out, like dry branches snapping, as his bones fractured and reformed by force to accommodate a denser, more powerful skeletal structure. His muscles swelled violently, and blood seeped from his eyes. The System was forcing an immense amount of power into an unprepared vessel.

Kai felt as if his blood had turned into lava, burning him from the inside out. Every nerve in his body screamed in protest, a chorus of pain that threatened to shut down his consciousness.

Qaxy, who still had his hand on Kai’s shoulder, was the first to feel the change. The mana emanating from Kai was no longer what it had been. He recoiled instinctively, his expression of triumph replaced by a look of pure shock and confusion.

"What... what is this power all of a sudden?" Qaxy stammered. "It’s not possible!"

Kai stopped screaming.

[ SYSTEM MESSAGE ]

Return activated. Time remaining: 58 seconds.

Kai opened his eyes. Without a word, he moved and appeared directly in front of Qaxy. His fist buried itself deep into the enemy’s chest.

The sound was like a cannon blast. The shockwave of the impact was so powerful that Lyla, Allice, Roshia, Mira, and Thorne were thrown back several meters. Qaxy was sent flying, his body cutting through the air like a projectile before smashing brutally against a massive rock. The rock fragmented and collapsed over him, creating a cloud of dust and debris.

The silence that followed was absolute, broken only by the sound of falling rubble and Kai’s heavy breathing. He wasn’t in a mindless rage, he was fully aware of what was happening. The experience of his previous life allowed him to manage the pain and power with perfect efficiency. He knew exactly how much time he had left. He knew every second counted.

Qaxy emerged from the wreckage of the rock, coughing up blood. His expression was no longer mocking; it was a mixture of rage and terror.

"You..." Qaxy hissed, his voice trembling. "I don’t know what trick you used! I don’t know why you fight like you did before, but..." His face contorted in a mask of hatred. "I don’t care! I have lived for millennia. I am a demigod. You are still an inferior mortal, a toy of the gods."

Qaxy raised his hands and used the same trick from before. In the blink of an eye, twenty Qaxys surrounded Kai, all of them laughing.