Watching the Yithian invited into the carriage, Lynch felt a shiver run down his spine.
It wasn't fear, but absolute shock.
I was just casually thinking about it and showing off in front of the ladies! How are you actually showing up? Don't tell me this is a coincidence—there's no such thing as a coincidence like this in the world.
Yet it was actually happening.
The Yithian boarded the carriage, still wearing that dull, wooden expression. He gave the three of them an impassive sweep with his gaze.
“It should be about this time. I'm not too early, am I?”
...
The three of them found themselves at a complete loss for words. Lynch's face had gone numb, and he gave a wooden shake of his head.
“Then can we set off now?”
“Huh? Wait a second,” Diana stammered out. “Isn't setting off right now a bit too hasty? Shouldn't we at least make thorough preparations before leaving?”
“Preparations? Prepare for what?” The Yithian froze for a second, then realization dawned as he offered an expression that could barely be called a smile. “Ah, this operation isn't like what you understand. It doesn't require any preparation—or rather, preparations would be useless anyway.”
“Then how long will we need to stay there?” Natalie pressed. “If it's going to take too long, I need to notify my colleagues first.”
“There's no need, it won't take long,” the Yithian smiled again, seemingly recalling something amusing. “When the time comes, you'll understand what I mean. If it's convenient, let's set off right now. I'd rather not delay too much, and I'll explain everything clearly to you on the way.”
“Where to?”
“Wilson Town, the Milt siblings' home. They have proper items to help you enter the River of Time. Moreover, the Silver Key is in their hands. Without the Silver Key, you cannot enter the Silver Gate.”
“Alright.”
Seeing Lynch nod, Diana called out to the old steward outside. The carriage immediately started up again, heading toward the eastern suburbs.
“As for how exactly you can enter the River of Time, the Milt siblings will explain that when we arrive. I am only responsible for helping you evade the pursuit of the Hounds of Tindalos. That was our previous agreement—do you have any objections?”
Saying this, the Yithian pulled out a box from somewhere and held it out to Lynch. According to their agreement, Lynch was to go to the Corner of Time, visit the Lord of Tindalos residing there, and hand this box over to him.
The problem was, what happened to the “small” box they agreed upon?
Lynch stared at the “small” box, which was roughly the size of a rice cooker, feeling completely speechless.
It was quite exquisite, though. It had a gleaming golden exterior with a metallic luster that looked as enticing as real gold to Lynch. Densely engraved patterns covered its surface—very beautiful textures that lacked the eerie and chaotic feel typical of mystery relics, looking more like a fine work of art instead.
The object wasn't heavy and could be lifted with one hand. Lynch turned it over and over for quite a while without finding a single seam, as if it were a solid block of metal.
“How should I go about this? You can explain it clearly now, right?”
“Mm. First, you need to have a concept of what the River of Time is.” The Yithian slowly gathered his words, speaking deliberately against the sound of the rolling carriage wheels.
The River of Time wasn't an actual river, but a concept distorted by mystery. It didn't exist in the mortal world, nor did it exist in the Dreamlands; it existed solely within human cognition.
This concept was extremely difficult for human minds to comprehend—much like how summer insects could never grasp the meaning of ice and snow. The mind's self-correcting capacity for cognition thus distorted this incomprehensible concept into a tunnel-like structure. Time flowed right through this “tunnel,” which possessed no spatial concept, resembling a river—hence the name “River of Time.”
Of course, none of this was real. Human language was incapable of describing things outside human cognition; the moment words were spoken, they became distorted fallacies. But out of consideration for three humans who hadn't gone completely insane yet, he could only use this vivid description to introduce it.
Even so, having been baptized by all kinds of crazy ideas on the internet in his past life, Lynch could barely follow the line of thought, whereas the other two ladies had fallen into complete confusion, their sole thought being What on earth is he talking about?
What Lynch needed to do was enter this “tunnel,” travel upstream against the rushing torrent of time under the guidance of the Silver Key, enter the Silver Gate that existed only within the River of Time, and grant an audience to Tawil at'Umr.
And the Hounds of Tindalos were the native inhabitants of this “river.”
In reality, the Hounds of Tindalos had not a single connection to actual hounds. It was even difficult to consider them living organisms; they were purely distorted existences. However, because they possessed certain characteristics of living creatures, they were barely categorized under the umbrella of heteromorphs.
To them, time was more like a physical space. They traversed and patrolled within this “tunnel,” tirelessly chasing after the dust of time—their food. In the past, present, and future, at any point in time—whether at the primordial beginning or the end of time—their forms would appear.
Therefore, anyone who established a connection with the River of Time—whether relying on an authority to physically travel through time or using their mind to journey downstream and peer into the future—could potentially run into these eerie existences. The longer the distance traversed in the River of Time, which meant the greater the span of time crossed, the higher the chance of encountering a hound.
Once targeted by them, it was a fight to the absolute death. They would relentlessly pursue the target, no matter where the target hid—even if they hid at the end of time, they could not escape their hunt.
Counterattacking against a hound was meaningless. They weren't immortal per se—a rank two or rank three Soul Severer could destroy a single hound. But destroying one achieved nothing, because from the previous second, the next second, the previous millisecond, and the next millisecond, endless instances of it across the long river of time would converge from every single moment to hunt the target down. Moreover, they always roamed in packs; numbers lost all meaning before their vast count. No matter how many were killed, one would eventually be overwhelmed by the hounds and torn to shreds.
It was precisely this relentless, endless pursuit that earned them the name “hounds.” Once targeted by them, the only way to survive was to do as the Milt siblings did: hide forever inside a building with no angles sharper than one hundred and twenty degrees, which could temporarily evade the hounds' hunt.
Because the hounds dwelled within the “corners” of time, if they wanted to leap from the River of Time into the mortal world, they had to pass through the concept of “corners” in the mortal world, utilizing conceptual similarity to shuttle between inside and outside.
Yet even this was not foolproof. The moment a building suffered damage, it signaled the hider's doom, unless they could find another hiding place before being slain.
The vast majority of those who knew of their existence believed that they were, without a doubt, the most insane and terrifying existences among all heteromorphs, bar none. Even the Great Old Ones who wandered in the depths of the Dreamlands harbored deep apprehension toward these crazy entities and would not provoke them lightly.
It was said that the Lord of a Billion Radiance, who wielded authority over time, had once fought a war against the Hounds of Tindalos. No one knew when that war began, but it continued all the way to the end of time, never once ceasing.
And Lynch, with the Yithian's help, had to thread his way through endless hounds, willingly follow them into the depths of their den, and slam that weird box right onto the face of the Lord of Tindalos.
Fuck.
Rate on N.U.
