Chapter 268: Mysterious Time Leap

Qiu Nuoya couldn’t begin to guess what was going through his mind.

"You were also told to ’leave the rest to him’ earlier, weren’t you? What was that about? And does it have anything to do with the question you asked me just now?"

When Igor still didn’t respond, Viktor pressed him with one question after another.

Igor once again hesitated before answering vaguely.

"You could say it does."

"There’s... something I haven’t told you two."

"Hm? Does it have something to do with this incident?"

"That’s what I don’t know... But I don’t think it’s completely unrelated."

Igor’s answers were as hesitant as ever. Qiu Nuoya and Viktor exchanged glances, silently acknowledging that Igor was probably hiding something important. Neither of them interrupted him, instead waiting for him to continue.

"I’m not sure whether you’ll believe me. Even I think what happened was practically a miracle... But I’m in the same situation as Xiao Tao."

"Hm? The same as Qiu Tailang? You mean you’re a summoned Hero? Wait, are you also from another world?"

"No, that’s not what I mean. I’m saying that, just like Xiao Tao, I skipped forward in time."

Skipped forward in time?

Xiao Tao had indeed come to this world after skipping three years that should have passed before he met them. If Igor had experienced the same thing, did that mean he came from a much earlier point in time than Qiu Nuoya had imagined?

"Xiao Tao skipped three years. I skipped ten."

"Ten years...? Um, does that mean you came here from ten years in the past? When exactly did that happen?"

As far as Qiu Nuoya could remember, Igor hadn’t changed in any particularly unusual way during the three years since they had met. If that was the case, then Igor must have skipped through time before meeting Qiu Nuoya.

While Qiu Nuoya tried to piece everything together, Viktor wore a troubled expression beside him.

"If what you’re saying is true, then it must have happened before you and I met, right? If I remember correctly, we first met eight years ago..."

"Even so, skipping through time would presumably involve space-time magic. But I can’t imagine you possessing such an ability. How exactly did you travel through time? Was there some particular reason for it?"

"You two... You actually believe me?"

Igor looked at them with slight surprise.

But of course they believed him. Qiu Nuoya couldn’t imagine Igor telling such a pointless lie, and Xiao Tao’s experience was already proof that skipping through time wasn’t entirely impossible.

Besides, this was another world where practically anything seemed possible. Rather than immediately dismissing Igor’s story as unrealistic, Qiu Nuoya was more inclined to believe that strange things could happen in a world like this.

After all, he had already experienced magic that he hadn’t been able to use before. This world had repeatedly defied everything he had once considered common sense, so why wouldn’t he believe Igor?

"Since we’re at it, you might as well tell us everything from beginning to end. I’ve already laid bare my own past to you both, so now it’s your turn."

"Haha... When you put it that way, it’s hard to refuse."

Igor gave a wry smile. After thinking for a moment, he began to speak slowly, one detail at a time.

"First, there’s one fundamental difference between my experience of time travel and Xiao Tao’s."

With that, Igor began his explanation. Qiu Nuoya and Viktor listened quietly.

"Xiao Tao is from another world, and he said that he skipped three years immediately after arriving in this one. But I’m not from another world. There’s no doubt that I was born in this world. And unlike Xiao Tao, I didn’t travel forward into the future. I went back into the past."

"Huh...?"

"An incident caused me to return to my ten years younger self. That’s the most accurate way to describe what happened."

Igor spoke with an unusually serious expression. His explanation was slightly different from what Qiu Nuoya had expected, leaving him surprised.

"Um, wait a moment. Does that mean Igor isn’t a person from the past, but rather someone from the future?"

"If you’re talking about ten years ago, then yes. But nearly ten years have passed since I returned to the past, and now I’m living through the same period of time I was in before I went back."

If Igor’s explanation was correct, then he wasn’t a person from the future who knew what lay ahead. He had simply returned to his original timeline from the past and was now just Igor, living his life as usual.

More importantly, Qiu Nuoya was curious about the incident that had caused Igor to return to the past. It might have happened ten years ago from Igor’s perspective, but now that ten years had passed, could that same incident be about to happen again in the present?

"Does you have the ability to return to the past...?"

At Viktor’s muttered question, Igor firmly shook his head.

"No, I don’t."

"But if we assume that you do, then that would explain what Ignis said earlier. He could be your future self, someone who traveled back into the past once again..."

"I considered that possibility too, but it’s not the case. When the previous incident happened, only my consciousness returned to my past self. In other words, it would have been impossible for two versions of me to exist in the past at the same time. If we assume that man is my future self who returned to the past in the same way, then the Igor standing here now would have to be him. That would make my own existence a contradiction."

Hmm... This was complicated. Did that mean the Igor standing before them had lived through two lives in the same body? Had he been given a chance to start his life over? Was this what people called a time leap?

"What did that man, Ignis, say about it?"

At Viktor’s question, Igor silently shook his head. Apparently, Ignis hadn’t explained anything to him.