Rainbow Efreet

Phasing arrived as a keyword in search of a purpose, and most of the cards that carried it never found one; this Efreet did. The ability converts a fragile 3/1 flyer (the kind of body any burn spell or combat trick erases) into something an opponent can never quite remove. Send it away in response to targeted removal or a board wipe, and because a phased-out permanent counts as not existing, the activation slips out from under spells and sweepers alike. The catch is in the return: a phased-out permanent comes back automatically before your next untap step, on no schedule you control, so the creature sits off the table for a full turn cycle while your opponent develops unmolested. The sharper tension lives in combat. A 3/1 only matters if it attacks, and it has to survive the combat damage step to connect; phasing it out to dodge a block or a sweeper means it deals nothing that turn. You save the body or you land the hit, never both in the same window. The result is a recurring threat you cannot kill but can always outrace on tempo. As a demonstration piece it is hard to top: it isolates the one thing phasing does that no other evasion or protection mechanic of its era managed, which is not preventing damage, not regenerating, not blinking, but stepping out of the game's existence at instant speed and stepping back in on its own clock.