The loss of his head caused Loki to begin to die. His death caused him to experience a tremendous amount of pain that made him roar in anguish.
His roar was a silent scream of pain, though. This was because his larynx had lost access to his lungs, so he couldn’t force air through his mouth and produce the appropriate amount of sound needed to express the pain he was feeling.
Fortunately, his death caused his newly acquired ability to activate. Once the Rewind ability was activated, Loki’s consciousness detached from his body and anchored itself to the Fenrir Metac within him. This caused his pain to cut off.
The activation of the Rewind ability also caused the world to fade away and for a colorful river to appear around the Fenrir Metac. Since he was the Fenrir Metac, it looked as if the whole world had been replaced by the colorful river.
Upon closer observation, he noticed that the river was made of tiny, colorful strings. The colors of the strings were different, and some of them even possessed colors that he had never seen before or could name.
Each string didn’t even have one color. The color of the strings was changing along their length. The changes in color were chaotic, but the river, as a whole, had a beautiful kaleidoscopic appearance.
He was mesmerized by the appearance of the river. Thanks to his innate understanding of the Rewind Metac that he gained after consuming it, he knew where he was and what he was looking at, so he didn’t panic.
He knew the colorful river of nets to be the river of time. He also knew that flowing forward along with the river is the correct way to flow and how everyone else moves in relation to the river.
However, despite knowing the normal way things should move in the river, he didn’t panic when the Fenrir Metac began to flap its wings and swam upwards against the flow of the current in the river. In fact, he cheered on the Fenrir Metac.
Of course, his cheer was silent. After all, he still didn’t have a body. He was only a consciousness.
Unfortunately, no matter how he cheered Fenrir on, Fenrir couldn’t avoid being eroded by the river. The friction caused by moving against the flow of current was wearing Fenrir down. So it quickly became clear to him that Fenrir couldn’t continue going upstream forever.
Aside from the friction, there was also the need for energy. Flapping his newly acquired crystal wings consumed a lot of energy. So even if there was no wear and tear from the friction of moving upstream the river of time, Fenrir will still have to stop at one point in time.
Fortunately, Fenrir was able to arrive at the point in time when he awakened it. It didn’t stop here because it ran out of energy or because the river of time wore it down. It picked this spot because it was as far as it could go.
Loki wasn’t sure why Fenrir couldn’t go past this point in time, but he believed that it was because Fenrir didn’t exist beyond the point that he awakened, so it couldn’t exist beyond this point by moving backwards in time.
He didn’t mind anyway. Besides, he had a more important matter to deal with now that Fenrir had arrived at its destination.
After Fenrir reached its limit, it plunged into the portion of the string that contained the scene of him awakening. This caused it to descend from the river of time into reality.
The Fenrir from the future entered his energy well and fused with the Fenrir in it. The two Fenrir merged and became one. This series of events shocked Loki.
Loki had just awakened and had just created his energy well when another Fenrir suddenly appeared within. He was understandably surprised by this. But his surprise didn’t last long because his consciousness from the future fused with his consciousness from the past.
The fusion of the future version and the past version caused Fenrir to gain the Rewind ability, while Loki himself gained the memories of the future.
This made his shocked expression change to that of a smile. He was so happy, he had to fight the urge to shout. He could only grit his teeth and clench his fist with subdued excitement.
As he did these things, he thought to himself, "Nothing can stop me now. Not Slav or his father or anyone else."
The people standing around him noticed his excitement. But they thought it was normal because they thought that he was happy with what he had awakened.
Most of them thought that he had awakened with good potential, while a few of them thought that he awakened with a good talent. But no one could ever imagine the true cause of happiness, no matter how wild their imagination may be.
Loki himself hadn’t displayed any outward sign that he had awakened during his first life. But the events that happened since then were enough to break his composure.
In order to make sure that he hadn’t hallucinated the whole thing, he decided to use the Power Identification on himself to see if he had truly changed.
Age: 19/77
Race: Human
Energy Quantity: 77 × 2 = 154
Energy Density: 1.
Energy Rank: 1.
Body: 0.6.
Soul: 1.5
Will: 4.
Skill: 10%.
Fenrir (Divine): Power Identification. Tracking. Seal. Devouring. Rewind.
Fenrir was able to display information that was higher in quantity and accuracy about himself than what he saw about others. This wasn’t surprising to him because his body won’t resist the Power Identification Ability, while the existence of others would resist it.
He knew without being taught that the amount of information that he could gain about other people would be highly dependent on his strength and the strength of the target on whom he was using the Power Identification Ability. Even so, he was still surprised by the information that Fenrir provided to him about his state of existence.
He was so surprised by what he saw that his eyes widened in surprise. This was because not only had he confirmed that he had truly gained the Rewind ability from Slav, but he also gained something else that he didn’t expect at all.
His source of surprise is his energy quantity. He had checked it when he awakened in his last life, and his energy quantity was only 77. But after devouring the Rewind Metac, his energy capacity had doubled. This wasn’t something that he knew was possible.
He can sense that within Fenrir, there is a space for energy. This space is exactly the same size as the energy well containing Fenrir. This is why he has twice as much energy capacity as he should have.
This made him ask himself, "Is the extra capacity specifically from Rewind because the Rewind Metac is special, or will Fenrir gain an extra space for each Metac that it devours?"
He didn’t know the answer to this question, but that didn’t stop him from smiling. As he smiled, he said to himself, "Fortunately, there is a way to confirm which is which."
He smiled because the question of why he gained an extra capacity of energy is something that he can easily confirm by repeating the actions that led to him gaining the energy capacity in the first place. Things are even easier for him because he has the resources nearby to repeat his experience.
According to his observations in his last life, there are three other people who awakened aside from him. So he has three choices to pick from, but he still looked towards Slav first.
Slav will always be his first choice for devouring. This is because of his hatred for Slav and the fact that Slav gave him a great present in his last life.
His hatred for Slav has cooled down after he killed Slav in his last life, and because killing Slav now is only a temporary death, since he can rewind time. But no matter how unpleasant killing Slav can be, he is still looking forward to gaining another boon from Slav.
But as he turned his gaze on Slav and used the Power Identification Ability on him, he saw something that made him surprised for the second time in a row.
Race: Human
Energy Quantity: 95
Energy Density: 1.
Energy Rank: 1.
Body: 0.4
Soul: 0.9
Metac: Danger Sense (Divine)
So not, not only had Slav awakened a new ability, but the ability he awakened is also very powerful.
What he saw made him open his mouth in shock before he asked himself, "How? Why?"
To be specific, he wanted to know why the Rewind Metac disappeared and why Slav had awakened a different ability. He also wanted to know how abilities awaken and what determines the abilities that will be awakened.
But no matter how curious he was, the truth is that those questions were too far ahead of him right now. Besides, he still had more pressing matters to deal with.
He still had the previous question of extra energy capacity to answer. So the shock on his face morphed into a grin as he said to himself, "No matter. I’ll just take this one too and see if I gain an extra amount of energy and if he awakens a new divine ability.
He planned to do the same thing he did in his last life. But just as he thought of this, the Danger Sense Metac within Slav sensed the danger and activated.
The Danger Sense Metac alerted Slav to the danger and even pointed out the source of the danger to him. This made Slav turn to look at him with surprise on his face.
In the last life, Slav had been smug when he awakened. He had thought that the entire world was his to ride on, however he wished, so he had looked down on Loki. But this time, he knew that Loki was willing to disregard the rules and kill him, so he couldn’t be careless.
After he became surprised, he became wary of Loki. Loki saw how he was behaving, and he knew why Slav was behaving like this, but he still couldn’t stop thinking about killing Slav.
His face became grim as he thought to himself, "Damn it. He already knows that I want to kill him. I want the Danger Sense Metac even more."
He knows that he shouldn’t think about killing Slav because of the Danger Sense, but this only made him think about killing Slav more so that he can get the Danger Sense Metac. This led to Slav becoming more and more wary of him.
Loki even thought about killing Slav now, right in front of everyone. Since he now had the Rewind Metac, he thought that he had nothing to fear. If he failed, he could just restart.
But his thoughts were sensed by the Danger Sense Metac, so Slav took steps to avoid danger. The steps he took were to move closer to the front of the room to where Muni was standing. While he was doing this, his face was full of fear.
He might have come from a powerful family, but he had never experienced danger, and he wasn’t strong himself. So he was very afraid of death.
He even had more reasons to be afraid after knowing that Loki was willing to sacrifice his life to kill him. After all, the worst enemy is someone who is not afraid of death and is willing to sacrifice their life to kill.
But amidst his feelings of fear, there was also the feeling of confusion. He was confused because he couldn’t understand why Loki would choose to behave this way.
As he stepped away from Loki, he asked himself, "Why would he throw his life away now that he has gained access to the Four Directions sect? Does he hate me so much, or does he think that the Four Directions won’t kill him if he kills me?"
Loki’s intentions to disregard everything to kill him were perplexing and incomprehensible, to say the least. It can even be called stupidity. But no matter what he thought of Loki’s intention, he breathed a sigh of relief when Loki stopped looking at him and stopped trying to kill him.
Loki had indeed given up on killing Slav. It was not a ruse that he made up to deceive the Danger Sense Metac.
He had no way to deceive the Danger Sense Metac. As soon as anything could endanger Slav, the Danger Sense Metac would notify him. So instead of wasting his time dealing with him now, he decided to grow stronger.
The quickest way for him to grow stronger now is to devour another Metac. So he began checking out the two remaining people who awakened an ability.
The first one is a young man with the Sword Heart Metac. The second option is an older man with the Beautiful Woman Metac. He already knows what the Sword Heart Metac does, so he focused on the Beautiful Woman Metac to see what it was capable of.
After learning what the Beautiful Woman Metac can do through the Power Identification Ability, he decided to give up on it. This was because the Beautiful Woman Metac turns the target into a beautiful woman.
He doesn’t care for beauty, and he definitely doesn’t want to turn into a woman, so he decided not to bother with the Beautiful Woman Metac. He decided to focus on the Sword Heart Metac and acquire it as soon as possible.
With his decision made, he left the awakening room with the others. Then he listened absentmindedly to Muni’s speech about what they will be taught for the one year of their initiation.
After Muni finished his speech and led them to their accommodations, Loki followed the young man to his place. As for Slav, he decided not to live in the dorms at all. He can’t rely on the rules to keep him safe, so he decided to stay in the city where it is safer.
There is a city beyond the sect grounds. This city belongs to the Four Direction Sect too. In fact, the entire central plain, an area that is ten times the surface area of the Earth, including its oceans, belongs to the Four Direction Sect.
The sect grounds that the initiation program is holding on is just one of the many outposts of the Four Directions sect, and the city it is standing in is also one of the many settlements under the control of the Four Directions sect in one way or another.
As for the core of the Four Directions sect, that place is still too far away. Loki could never have reached it alive with his current level of strength. He could only come to an outpost of the sec that was nearby.
The proximity of the outpost of the Four Directions sect to where he was living as a slave also means that the Rein Family, the family that used to own him, is close by. So it is easy for Slav to return home.
But Slav isn’t going home yet. He decided to stay in the city with his elder brothers. Only someone like them, who is powerful and will always protect him, can make him feel safe when he is up against someone who is willing to sacrifice their life to kill him.
Of course, the option to stay in town is a privilege that not everyone can enjoy. He can only enjoy this privilege because he is here to acquire strength, not to buy his freedom, and because he is rich enough to pay for the permission slip to leave the sect grounds.
People like Loki, who are former slaves, don’t have the opportunity to leave the sect grounds at all. They will have to earn their freedom by becoming members of the Four Directions sect, or they will be killed.
The best that can happen to anyone like Loki who fails to join the Four Directions sect is to be enslaved by a cultivator. But that rarely happens because no cultivator will want to enslave a useless person who couldn’t even pass the initiation program.
What is most likely to happen is that he will be killed and his corpse will be butchered and used to feed the beasts and pets that the true disciples of the sect raise.
While Slav escaped, Loki continued his hunt like a wolf stalking prey. He hasn’t forgotten about Slav. He has just decided to let Slav go until he finds a way to deal with him.
This time, his prey isn’t aware that he is being hunted, so the prey wasn’t wary or careful regarding the people who could approach him. In fact, his designated prey is allowing just about anyone to approach him, and there are a lot of people who are doing so.
He had awakened an innate Metac, and some observant people noticed this. Since some people know about it, everyone else might as well know about it. After all, the only way that something can be a secret is if only one person or no one knows about it.
The people who discovered that the young man had awakened an innate Metac told other people, so nearly everyone now knows that he is incredibly talented. This made some people jealous, but it also made some people try to approach him to get in his good graces.
The fact that he awakened an innate Metac means that it is highly likely that he will be strong and will survive the initiation program. So if they can get in his good graces or become his friends, he might help them survive the initiation program.
At the very least, as long as they are not his enemies, he won’t go out of his way to make them fail. He might even spare them when he doesn’t need to kill them. So they all came to him to congratulate him and give him gifts.
Some people also wanted to chat with Loki to confirm if he had awakened an innate Metac. They had witnessed his outburst of emotions during the awakening, so they suspected that he awakened an innate Metac.
He lied to all of them and said that he didn’t awaken any innate Metac. The fact that he was also trying to get close to this talented young man made his words believable. They thought that he, too, was trying to ingratiate himself with the talented young man.
Unfortunately for Loki, he was just one of the many people who wanted to meet the young man, so he had to wait his turn. But he didn’t mind the wait.
Instead of being anxious or impatient, he smiled to himself and said, "I have all the time in the world."
No one knew what he truly meant by saying that. They only thought that he was being humble by claiming that he could wait for as long as needed.
Just like that, Loki followed the tide of people who came to befriend the young man without being suspicious. Just like everyone else, he also brought a gift for the man. But unlike their tangible gifts, his gift was secret information that only he knew.
In order to receive this gift, he asked to be alone with the young man. The young man felt nothing amiss with the request, so he agreed.
After all, killing was forbidden, and a secret is only valuable when there are few people who know about it, so he didn’t think that there was anything to worry about. He thought that the request for a private discussion was perfectly normal.
Unfortunately for him, he realized just how wrong he was to think this two seconds into their meeting. Loki moved close to him as if to speak into his ear, then he stabbed him in the throat with his wooden knife.
He always keeps his wooden knife with him because it is his only weapon and means of self-defense. He uses a wooden knife because he can’t afford a metal one. That’s how poor he is.
But his poverty is perfectly normal for a slave. After all, a slave is not allowed to own anything and doesn’t have the money to own anything, even if they were given permission to own anything.
What isn’t normal about all of these is killing someone on the sect grounds. And even more abnormal is that Muni was able to notice the transgression and appear at the scene of the murder a few seconds after it happened.
Fortunately, he had devoured the Sword Heart Metac before Muni appeared. The new Metac also caused Fenrir to change the way that the Rewind Metac had caused it to change.
The Sword Heart Metac was a round, white, silver ball. It seemed to be made of metal because it had a metallic sheen to it, but it was also light and felt hollow to Loki.
After devouring the Sword Heart Metac, it fused with the white wolf and took up the space right in the middle of its chest. The entire body of Fenrir also took on a metallic sheen after the fusion.
Loki was savoring this change when Muni appeared. Muni appeared behind him and looked down at him and his bloody handiwork.
This time, Muni was confused by the situation. His confusion was obvious in his tone as he asked, "Why did you kill him? Did he offend you somehow? Were you jealous of him?"
"But why would you be jealous of him? Did you not also awaken an innate Metac? Was his innate Metac better than yours? Or did you do this because you are just plain foolish?"
He chuckled and said with derision, "Or maybe you thought that because you awakened an innate talent, I won’t kill you for breaking the rules. So you thought that you had the right to eliminate a competitor. If you thought so, then you must be more foolish than I thought."
As he spoke, he became angrier and angrier. This was because a talented person had died on his watch. He didn’t like this at all.
His lack of understanding regarding Loki’s motive for killing the talented young man, combined with his anger, is like fuel being thrown into a fire. He felt that what Loki did was unreasonable, so he became angrier than usual.
His anger made him gaze coldly at Loki and say, "You think you are the only one who can be unreasonable. I’ll show you that I can be unreasonable, too, when I make you wish for death."
"You will beg me for the sweet release of death, but I won’t give you the privilege. Let us see if you can remain unreasonable then."
As he said this, he waved his hand at Loki four times. Each time he waved his hand, the blue crescent mark on his hand lit up and produced a sharp and curved water blade that shot at Loki.
The curved blade made of water struck Loki in four different places with an extraordinary precision that ensured that they didn’t cut anything too important to maintain Loki’s life. The four blades of water struck his limbs and severed them at the joint, which caused Loki to scream in pain.
It was clear that Muni didn’t want to kill Loki, and if his words are to be believed, he didn’t want Loki to die an easy death either. This made Loki decide to activate the Rewind ability now instead of letting death force him to rewind.
The activation of the Rewind ability caused the Fenrir Metac within him to flap its large crystal wings and ascend from the physical plane of existence into the metaphysic domain of time called the river of time.
Fenrir took his consciousness with it as it ascended into the river of time. Once it got to the colorful river of time, it made its way upstream to the past with his consciousness.
When it reached its limit in the river of time, Fenrir plunged back to the physical world. During this process, all Loki saw was darkness. He was a little bit disoriented, but everything was mostly fine.
A while later, he awakened at the moment in the past when he just awakened the Fenrir Metac. But this time, only the Fenrir that had devoured the Sword Heart Metac descended from the river of time and fused with him.
After absorbing his memories of the future and getting his bearings, he hurriedly used the Power Identification Ability to see his situation.
Age: 19/77
Race: Human
Energy Quantity: 77 × 3 = 231
Energy Density: 1.
Energy Rank: 1.
Body: 0.6.
Soul: 1.5
Will: 4.
Skill: 10%.
Fenrir (Divine): Power Identification. Tracking. Seal. Devouring. Rewind. Sword Heart.
After seeing the result of the Power Identification Ability, he clenched his fist and grinned as he said to himself, "So it is confirmed. This means that the sky is the limit."
The sight of his power, specifically the part that shows that he now has three times as much energy capacity as he should, made him elated.
But it isn’t the extra 77 units of energy that made him so happy. It is the fact that he now has a verified method to increase his energy capacity in the future that made it difficult for him to control his emotions and display his happiness for others to see.
The people around him noticed that he was usually happy. This made them start guessing what could make him so happy. Most of them guessed that he had a high potential, while a few of them guessed that he had awakened an innate Metac.
Loki didn’t care about what they were thinking or that they were looking at him weirdly. He continued to focus inwardly into the Fenrir Metac and saw that the two extra spaces for energy were within Fenrir.
So the extra energy used Fenrir as its foundation, not his body. He didn’t understand the significance of this arrangement, but that didn’t stop him from thinking about increasing the extra energy capacity. So he turned his predatory gaze to the people around him and began plotting how to hunt and devour them.
The first person that he checked out as a possible candidate for devouring was Slav. But just like his last life, Slav had awakened the Danger Sense Metac and was able to sense his ill intent.
Slav glanced at him in surprise when he sensed the danger from Loki. This made Loki grumble before looking away.
This time, Loki had only briefly entertained the thought of killing Slav, so Slav only sensed that Loki wanted to kill him. This made Slav sneer in disdain after he overcame his surprise. He was both surprised and disdainful that a slave would think of killing him.
On the other side, Loki had turned his predatory gaze to the young man whom he killed in his last life. What he saw overturned what he had experienced so far.
Race: Human
Energy Quantity: 54
Energy Density: 1.
Energy Rank: 1.
Body: 0.5.
Soul: 0.6
Metac: Sword Heart
This made him ask himself in confusion, "Why did Slav awaken a different Metac while this guy only awakened the same Metac? What’s the difference between them? Is the difference between Slav and this young man, or is the difference between the types of Metac that they awakened, or both?"
Fenrir couldn’t tell him why the young man had awakened the Sword Heart Metac in this timeline, while Slav awakened a new Metac, so he could only count on himself to figure out the reason.
As far as he can tell, the difference between Slav and the young is the gap in their talent. The young man has a potential of 54, while Slav has a potential of 95. So there is a massive difference of 41 units of potential between them.
There is also a difference in the types of Metac that they awakened. Slav awakened a divine Metac in every timeline, while the young many awakened a normal Metac.
It could be that the difference in potential is why Slav awakened a different Metac, but he doesn’t believe that this is the case because Slav only awakened a different Metac after his first one was devoured.
Slav didn’t awaken a different Metac when Loki left him alone, so even if having a high potential means that the kind of talent that one can have isn’t fixed, Loki is more inclined to believe that there is something special about the Rewind Metac that made it impossible for Slav to awaken it after he had taken it.
At the end of the day, he shrugged and said, "I’ve only reversed time two times and experienced three timelines, so I don’t have enough sample size to draw a conclusion. For now, I should just eat what I can eat and see where it leads me."
He decided to hunt the young man and eat his sword heart again to see if the young man would awaken a different Metac or continue to awaken the same Sword Heart Metac. So he did the same thing that he did in his last life and followed the young man until he killed him.
After a series of identical events, he activated Rewind and returned to the point he awakened in the past. The first thing he did was to check his power. He did so with excitement and anticipation.
Age: 19/77
Race: Human
Energy Quantity: 77 × 3 = 231
Energy Density: 1.
Energy Rank: 1.
Body: 0.6.
Soul: 1.5
Will: 4.
Skill: 10%.
Fenrir (Divine): Power Identification. Tracking. Seal. Devouring. Rewind. Sword Heart.
The result of his investigation left him disappointed. He even had to check within Fenrir for its energy chambers just to be sure that he hadn’t seen the wrong thing.
Unfortunately for him, an in-depth investigation into the Fenrir’s state only revealed two energy chambers within it. This confirmed that devouring the second Sword Heart didn’t increase the number of extra energy chambers in his possession.
This unfavorable situation made him grit and grind his teeth in frustration. His bad mood only increased when he checked Slav and the young man and discovered that their state was identical to the previous timeline. Both of them still possessed the same Metac.
As he gritted his teeth in anger and glared at the young man, he thought to himself with immense frustration, "I ate the Rewind Metac and it refused to appear again, but I ate the Sword Heart Metac twice but it only provided one benefit to me, so I’m willing to bet that there is something special about the Rewind Metac or it would have appeared again like the Sword Heart Metac."
The people around him saw the look of anger on his face and came to the unanimous decision that he had failed to awaken an innate Metac and might even have poor potential.
No one considered that he awakened an innate Metac this time because he looked angry and because he was glaring at someone who appeared to have awakened an innate Metac. So some of them snickered at him while others felt a feeling of kinship with him.
Many of them were sad, and some were even angry about the result of their awakening. But only Loki was angry at other people for having a good talent.
At most, they were jealous of the guy who awakened an innate Metac. The fact that Loki could be angry and was even angry enough to openly display his anger could only mean that his potential was very poor.
For the people with poor talent, Loki’s poor talent is heaven-sent to them. His existence made many of them sigh in relief that there was someone else in a worse situation than they were.
Muni also noticed Loki’s behavior. So he smiled at them and said, "Just a friendly reminder. Fighting and killing are prohibited on the sect grounds. Breaking this rule will most likely result in receiving the punishment of death. You might even be unlucky enough to be tortured until your mind breaks, and you can’t beg for death anymore."
"So, for your sake, I advise you to control your emotions. Don’t lose hope because your talent is poor. Talent is not the greatest determinant of success in the initiation program. There is also hard work and a strong will."
He didn’t look at Loki and spoke as if he was addressing everyone, but Loki knew without a doubt that the words that Muni said were all directed at him. His source of confidence lay in the fact that Muni didn’t say these words in the previous timelines.
But he didn’t care about the targeted admonishment because he had more important issues to deal with. After venting impotently about the uselessness of the Sword Heart Metac, he began to contemplate targeting the Beautiful Woman Metac.
The Beautiful Woman Metac is the only Metac in his vicinity that he has never devoured before and can devour now. But he wasn’t sure that it was a good idea to devour the Beautiful Woman Metac.
As he thought about this option, he rubbed his chin with his hand and asked himself, "Will the conversion into a woman be immediate, or will it slowly occur over time? Will the conversion be temporary? Will I be able to change back into a man if I deactivate it, or will I remain a woman even if I reverse time and return to the past?"
The thought of turning into a woman permanently made him shudder as if a cold draft had just blown over him.
He shook his head and said, "There is no need to risk it. I’m sure that there are many Metacs out there. There is no need to risk turning into a woman when I can get something else out there."
"Didn’t Muni say there are other people participating in the initiation program? And there is Muni himself. I can get him when I become powerful enough."
The more he thought about his options, the more he nodded in agreement. Eventually, he declared to himself, saying, "I’ll just wait. Waiting is a good idea."
With his mind made up, he sighed in relief. It was as if a great weight had been lifted off his shoulders.
This reaction made him chuckle inwardly and say, "Muni was right. I need more dedication. Apparently, I am not willing to turn into a woman in order to acquire power."
But then, he shook his head and said with a wry smile, "Then again, it is because there are other, more palatable options for me. So I have the right to be picky."
After he said this, he raised his eyes to the roof, hardened his gaze, clenched his fist, and said, "But, if I didn’t have the option to be picky, I would only hesitate slightly about becoming a woman. After all, being a free woman is better than being a slave."
Meanwhile, the world continued to progress around him. His internal conflict and the ensuing resolution were unknown to the people around him. They ignored him as they filed out of the awakening room.
Since he had made up his mind not to get the Beautiful Woman Metac and decided to wait for a better, more masculine option to show itself before he takes action, it meant that he wouldn’t be reversing time any time soon.