After arriving at the core of the World Gate, Edward first looked at the enormous Philosopher's Stone in the middle, then his eyes shifted to all the enchantments in the middle of the white room.
Although he remembered all of them vividly, he still did one last check. Once he was done, he sat in a meditative position and yelled out loud: "Morgana"
"Morgana, server 234 at your service, master."
"Use a Soul Link for me to enter the Virtual World."
"As you wish."
After closing his eyes, Edward found himself in another white room that looked exactly like the gate's core room. Then, without hesitation, he began to draw runes and magic circles.
This time, he was translating the enchantment in his gate from their original magic system to his new Arcane Rune Magic System. The process lasted three months.
All the Spatio-temporal enchantments, the ones that allowed him to survive in the Void, the ones that allowed him to use luck to locate other worlds, the one that allow him to use Harry's Fated Star as a spatial coordinate for his homeworld, the energy distribution ones, all of them and more were translated to the new system.
However, Edward did not stop there. Once that project was done and after he had Morgana optimize these enchantments, he had another crazy idea. To combine them into a 3-dimensional structure that formed a complete system.
So, he did not exit the virtual world and began combining these runes together. With enough data, the virtual space can stimulate the real effect of these runes, so Edward did not have to risk blowing himself in the process.
If something went wrong with the runes, his virtual body will be the one who suffers.
Edward opened his eyes, then groaned in pain as he held his head. He felt like a million elephants were trampling on his mind; he even felt that his soul was about to break.
Luckily for him, Morgana acted in time. Three long cords with an injecting needle came from the ground and inserted themselves in his neck and spine. A green potion was injected into his body, which then immediately started to soothe his mind and soul.
A few minutes later, Edward stopped groaning, so Morgana said: "Master, you should be more careful of using the Perception Dilation."
"I know," replied Edward, who was still a little groggy. "How long has it been?"
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"A year."
He nodded in his head. The reason he had such a large reaction was that he had spent 20 years inside the virtual space while only a year passed in real life. Due to the large difference in perception, he went over his limit and his soul was almost affected.
As soon as his symptoms were relieved, he headed straight back to work. With his spiritual energy or the energy from his soul, he began to create a complicated 3D shape object made of different geometric shapes and runes.
Once he was done, this new magic circle looked like a sphere, but upon closer look, it seemed to be constantly changing shape. Sometimes it looked like it was made of many different triangles, sometimes it was made of both rectangles and triangles.
In general, it was very complex and constantly changing as if it had a life of its own.
As Edward watched this masterpiece of his, he smiled with great satisfaction.
"3D Enchantments? I look forward to 3D spell models," muttered Edward. As he observed this new enchantment, he could see that it was slowly fading away.
He was not surprised by that. Enchantments are different from spells. One is permanent, while the other is temporary. Immediately, he controlled the Philosopher's Stone to provide energy to maintain the shape of the enchantment.
"Morgana, take out the metals we needed for the enchantment."
"As you wish, master."
Immediately afterward, a bunch of magic metals appeared in the core room. These metals included mithril, adamantinium, orichalconium, white gold, purple silver, mana steel, and even the metal he created from the Philosopher's Stone: magicium.
After these ores appeared, Edward took different portions or sizes of them and threw them into the 3D enchantments. Without any pause, these ores were absorbed, and with absorption, the enchantment became a little more real.
Once everything was over, he removed the mana that was keeping the enchantment intact, but it did not disappear afterward. With a wave of his hand, the other enchantments that were engraved in the floor in another magic system were erased.
The core room shook for a few seconds before stopping, then the core started to supply energy to the different sections of the Gate. However, they were not functioning under a new system.
"Morgana, give a status report on the new upgrade."
"There are many updates, like the increase in control of spatial and temporal energy. However, these things are minor and can be experienced later on.
"The most important upgrade so far is the Void Navigation System. Previously, it would take us 120 years to travel back and forth from our universe to this one, but now, it will only take 1 year.
"And if you shut down all other functions and use all energy on it, we could drastically reduce the time."
Edward smiled in satisfaction. His next plan involved a confrontation with Truth. So, he prepared a way for him to quickly run away once something goes wrong.
Honestly, he has no shame about running away from a powerful opponent. After all, he is not some honor-bound knight that would rather die in battle rather than surrender or run away.
He is a wizard that focuses on intelligence and wisdom. And running away can be considered a form of wisdom. And if he wanted to be honest with himself, he can be considered a dark wizard with all the shady things he has done.
As such, running away is not a problem for any dark wizards. As long as their lives are kept.
After taking a moment to regain his thought, Edward muttered softly, "Now, it's time to deal with the issue of my mana and magic core."
(AN: Honestly speaking, the research chapter went longer than I anticipated. So, if you do not enjoy this kind of thing, I recommend waiting for a few days once everything is done to read the actual plot. To be safe, wait until chapter 168.)