From darkness to light, another blink of an eye, and once again returning to the initial starting point, completely unaware of the current situation in reality.
All operations seem to only begin from this moment, with only a one-day time limit.
No matter how many times it restarts, no matter how tortuous the process, it will only keep looping within this single day.
Law opened his eyes, looking at everything around him as it was at the beginning. His gaze shifted slightly, falling on the nearly extinguished fire. He couldn't help but raise a hand to rub his temples.
In the previous illusory scenario, that killing intent-inducing Hellbell actually affected him too. If he hadn't used his willpower to forcefully suppress it at that time, the jade-white phantom's palm strike would have undoubtedly killed an unprepared Biscuit.
Such a realistic experience would surely leave a shadow in his heart.
'How exactly can I break free from this?'
Affected by the killing intent, Law finally felt a sense of crisis. Squinting his eyes, he sorted through the differences in the dozens of experiences, only to feel that the clues were truly too messy, tangled into an unsolvable ball of yarn.
The sound of wind and rain outside gradually ceased. Just as silence completely fell, the slightly familiar bell sound once again came in.
This time, it came more urgently and quickly, and its effect was even more brutal.
Killing intent gushed out from the depths of his heart like a spring, a red glimmer flashing in his eyes.
Law subconsciously tried to summon Shin, but there was no response. Instead, Kuro emerged from the back of his hand, his sharp claws stabbing towards his heart.
"Domain."
An invisible shock force shattered Kuro's claw, simultaneously blasting him away and embedding him into the tree wall.
But almost in the next second, Kuro activated his Nen, instantly regenerating its shattered arm.
Several streams of Aura stirred up waves within the tree hole. The wind force caused by their collision scattered the embers of the fire into sparks, vanishing into the air.
The entire enclosed space was filled with a frenzied, cold killing intent, like a storm shredding all human rationality.
'Kill them, crush every inch of their flesh.'
The demonic sound pierced into his mind, circling incessantly.
Several veins bulged on Law's face, his eyes flickering between clarity and darkness.
"If... I... find you... I... definitely will..."
Law gritted his teeth fiercely, attempting to divert the killing intent towards the 'it' behind the scenes, but the effect was minimal.
He could only rely on tenacious reason to hold on, preventing himself from being completely controlled by the killing intent.
Thump.
Law suddenly retreated backward, raised his hand to blast away the bark sealing the tree hole entrance, and jumped outside, landing directly on the damp ground.
Seconds later, several black figures jumped out from the tree hole: Kuro, Tonpa, and Biscuit.
The killing intent, like ocean waves, continuously washed over Law, causing his body to tremble slightly.
He looked up at Biscuit and the others descending from above, had a thought, and once again, Tonpa instantly died due to heart issues.
After mercilessly eliminating Tonpa, he immediately created distance.
Kuro landed, transforming into his panther form. Contrary to his usual behavior, he didn't spare any of the hard-saved Nen, causing his body to swell several times in size, charging towards Law.
Biscuit followed closely behind, her body covered in killing intent and Nen.
Kuro's speed was even faster than Biscuit's transformed state. In a few seconds, he arrived in front of Law.
"In the end... I still don't want to die by your hand."
Watching Kuro charging over full of killing intent, even though he knew death would end it, Law still chose to dodge, disappearing from his original spot.
Kuro's sharp claws swept through the air, a few strands of hair sent flying by the gust.
Dodging Kuro's claw, Law appeared dozens of meters away, holding a book in his hand.
The killing influence from the chime grew deeper, like a wild horse about to break free from the reins.
"Haah."
Law exhaled, suppressing his reddening eyes, and shattered the book in his hand. At that moment, he destroyed the Ability of God Hand.
Simultaneously, Kuro, pouncing from behind, turned into points of light and dissipated.
Tonpa and Kuro, two outlets for the killing intent, were now gone. So then...
The red glimmer in Law's eyes grew brighter as he saw Biscuit charging over.
"I know what you want to see, but... dream on."
Law grinned, overriding the killing intent, allowing Biscuit to punch his head into pieces.
Once, twice, three times...
The script kept running, but the result was the same every time.
Tonpa died first, then Kuro.
Bruna acted cute, Biscuit killed Law.
Every time the script played through once, one could sense a trace of urgent emotion contained within the moment of scene transition.
Law discerned this point and vaguely understood that 'it' wanted him to use cruel methods to torture and kill Biscuit and Bruna.
Moreover, the method 'it' used wasn't a Manipulation-type Ability with set conditions, it merely used the Twin-Tailed Snake's ability to influence him.
This indicated that 'it' wasn't the director and couldn't control the entire situation. Otherwise, it could have used much more forceful methods.
Although he had grasped some important information, the pain at the moment of death and the agony of being affected by the killing intent were continuously tormenting Law's nerves.
Compared to the pain of the instant of death, the influence of the killing intent was the most troublesome.
It was a situation where one couldn't even take a deep breath, like a saw blade grinding against bone, like holding one's breath to the point of suffocation, wanting to open one's mouth but being unable to, like countless bugs burrowing into the heart, causing an itch that couldn't be scratched no matter what.
But, it didn't matter how many times it came.
Law was like a stubborn, hard stone, enduring wave after wave of torment. It was also a real baptism and tempering of his will each time.
That 'it' had 'destruction' as its main goal. What it wanted to destroy probably wasn't the physical body, but the spirit. Or perhaps 'it' had some kind of demand regarding the spiritual aspect.
However, although every torment 'it' launched against Law made him endure pain unimaginable to ordinary people, Law stubbornly resisted, instead making his will's endurance stronger and stronger.
If he fell once, he would lose completely.
If he never fell, then the other party would have no more chances.
Perhaps there had already been over a hundred repetitions. Law gradually became able to resist the influence of the killing intent more easily.
This was thanks to each experience being so realistic, and every memory detail being completely preserved.
In reality, the sound of wind and rain outside had unknowingly ceased. The tree hole was pitch dark, only cold ashes remaining where the fire had been.
In the darkness, the beetle-like round shell object on Kuro's body had swollen to over ten times its previous volume. The seam on its back split open, revealing a grey vertical pupil.
The round shell object on Tonpa's body had swollen five times. The one on Biscuit's body had swollen to twice its size. The one on Bruna's body had swollen over ten times.
Except for Biscuit's round shell object, which only had half an eye slit open, the round shell objects on Tonpa and Bruna, like Kuro's, each revealed a grey vertical pupil.
Among everyone, only the round shell object on Law's back not only hadn't swollen, but its apple-sized volume was visibly shrinking at a rapid pace, reducing all the way down to the size of a soybean.
With a click, the round shell object fell to the ground.
The round shell object landed bottom-up, a row of dense, numerous needle-like feet moving gently like waves, from fast to slow, until finally becoming completely still.
The faint vertical mark on the back of the round shell gradually disappeared without a trace.