“Innight!”

I stirred from the endless Void that has surround me for goodness knows how long it has been. Ever since Master Inoxion sliced me with my Dark Matter Sword I have been stranded in this endless Void, with no sign of anything in sight. I had curled up and went to a deep sleep. How did I ended up into this Void I have no idea, where does it even exist in the Omniverse I do not even know. What I do know is that this place is where I am trapped for the rest of eternity.

Or so I thought. Apparently, someone has accessed into this endless Void that constantly surrounds me. I thought that since Underworld does not exist in this world, I cannot be revived and brought back to the living world, since Magic does not exist as well.  So how could anyone possibly revive me from this world? I will find the answer to that later.

Cracks appeared from the Void and light crept in. Soon the entire Void fell away and the white light surrounded everything and blinded me, I closed my eyes and wait for the light to dim down.

“Innight! Open your eyes!”

My eyes soon become comfortable with the blinding white light, and I opened them up. The people who came into my view were my old friends. Time, Charlotte, Nicki, Luthriel, and Master Inoxion all came into sight. Nicki and Charlotte are in their Archangel forms, Nicki in her frilly black dress with her black feathery wings, with a staff that has a black gem inscribed on the top of the staff. Charlotte is in a white frilly dress with white feathery wings behind her, in her hand is a staff with a white gem inscribed on top of it.

Time is in an orange frilly dress, her bangs are gone and her left eye, which is an inorganic gold clock, is in view of everyone which is usually hidden behind her bang. She carried a musket in one hand and a flintlock pistol in another. Master Inoxion is in his cursed dark armor form with the dark fire of curse flicking outwards of the armor, forming his body. Luthriel is in a dark armor and in his hand is his dark sword.

Something is off. Luthriel was dead long ago after he took the poisoned arrow during our class trip to the Elemental Planes. Why is he alive here? This is probably not a world that I know of. I will ask them for more information. I looked around myself and found that I’m lying in a bed, I laid up. I must treat everything as a normal day first, to prevent any suspicion.

“Wow, why is everybody here?” I begin the conversation.

“You kept staying asleep in the room, no matter how many times we called you, you kept staying asleep! I had Inoxion to use a shocking spell to wake you up from your deep slumber!”

“Um, why is everyone in their magical form?”

“We always stayed like this. You are the only one in this world that is incapable of casting magic.”

“Huh?”

Something really is off here. In the old world, we are the named few who can cast magic in that world itself. I must have been summoned into this new world, no, rather, it should be a new timeline, for some reason or another. Whatever it is, I am not who I was in this world. Everything that I previously known mostly have stayed relatively the same, with some minute changes. I looked around the house. Everything looks as the same as I had remembered in my old world. I stood up and went to the closet beside my bed and opened it up. Inside hung all the clothes that I have collected over the years. I took out a simple green T-shirt and a pair of long brown pants.

“Can you people give me some private space? I need to change out of this pyjamas.”

Everyone quickly evacuated from the room.

I changed out of the pyjamas quickly, and I begin running through the things in the room. I found a Dark Matter Sword that, I think, belonged to me. I cannot touch it though, it stings me the moment I touch the sword itself, even when I touch the hilt of the sword, which is supposedly to be made of normal metal. I also found the blue ball of, what I think as well, purified Mana. This is most likely an indication that the battle with The Unknown took place, though it may not be the one that I remembered.

Then I remembered something, they said that I’m not able to cast magic, when I am supposed to be the strongest magic caster in the world itself. I will test this out myself. Just do something small and simple for starters, like Aqua.

“Aqua!” I tried to cast the spell. Nothing happened. This spell allows the caster to produce water from the tips of the caster’s fingers, but even such simple spells appears to not work on me.

“So, I really am unable to cast any spells…”

I went back and sat on my bed. I can hear murmurs behind the door.

“He still tries to go against the truth, despite it being shown to him so clearly.”

“Inoxion, can’t you make a potion that grants him magic, even if only temporarily?”

“I can’t. He couldn’t form a single connection to the Mana pools all around the Universe. No potion can ever help him to establish that missing connection.”

They must be talking about me, I need more information about this world. I will ask them. I opened up the door.

“I’m hungry. I shall make breakfast.”

“let me do it!” Time cried and instantly teleported away, probably into the kitchen.

Can she even cook? I have never seen her cooking, let alone taste it. I’m not sure if she can even cook without working out a storm in the kitchen. We all sat down on the table in the living room, waiting for Time to cook our breakfast. I twitched around with unease as I think about what Time will cook.

“It’s ready!” Came the voice from the kitchen.

Soon, plates begin flying out from the kitchen and laid down on the table. On the plate is some black sludge with purple steam steaming out of it.

Is this even edible?

“I cooked this with all my heart, Innight! Hope you enjoy it!”

“Uh…… I’m not sure I would want to eat this…... Look, it’s producing purple steam. Anything that produces it is probably not going to be edible. I would prefer to starve.”

“Don’t say that, Innight, at least have a taste!”

“Have you taste your cooking yourself?”

“I did, it was delicious!”

…Is her sense of taste even normal?

“Look, Time, I don’t think anyone would be able to eat any of ...this …thing. It doesn’t even look the least bit appeasing to my eyes. Just from the sight of this alone I have lost my appetite. You finish this as your breakfast, Time. I will grab a slice of white bread as my breakfast instead.”

I left the table with a disappointed looking Time and went into the kitchen. In the kitchen, I can see everything is in a mess, which is definitely a sign that Time was messing around the kitchen equipment and materials. Well, at least she tried.

I found the load of bread on beside the oven and took out a slice from it. I munched on it as I walked out of the kitchen, and found that Time is munching on the “things” that she cooked for everyone with a delighted smile on her face, while everyone else is going towards the kitchen, possibly grabbing a slice of bread as well.

I just can’t understand her.

After everyone had their breakfast, I cleared up the dishes, despite the other girls begging to do that instead. I lectured to Time about proper cooking, and banned her from entering the kitchen until she had properly memorized on a cookbook that I have wrote. She pouted at me but ignored her.

Then we get ready to go for school. But…

“How do I get to school? It’s floating in the sky! I can’t teleport!”

“Did you lose all your memories, Innight? You have the machinery in the garage that you have always used. You called it your “Void storm” if I still remember.” Charlotte spoke. “We will be waiting for you just at the main school gate, don’t make us wait!”

After that, they all teleported away using a magic circle. I went to the back of the house, where the garage is, and found this machinery sitting in the middle of the room. It is the size of a small airplane, painted with violet, and takes on a shape of a UFO. I approached the “Void Storm” and almost immediately a mechanical arm shot out and a beam of light scanned over myself.

“Identity confirmed. Welcome Master Innight.”

The mechanical arm retracted back into the Void Storm and a rectangle – which I suspect is a door, formed at the side of the machine. I stepped into the machine, and almost immediately I was overwhelmed by how big the inside of the Void Storm is. Even though the size of Void Storm, from the outside appearance, looks like a small airplane, but on the inside, the size is of a house.

I went to the front of the Void Storm, there lies what I think is the control panel of this machine. There were 6 large computer screens and a huge keyboard, with many switches, flips and buttons all over the control panel.

Did I really make this? I never I was such a genius at making such mechanisms. I have always relied on magic so much that I never knew I was so talented in making such things. I looked around the ship and found a thick book lying around. I flipped it open.

It appears to be an instruction manual, which is written by myself. I flipped over the first page and was immediately challenged by the complicated diagrams and atrocious handwriting on the sides. I found no difficulty in understanding the diagrams and annotations though. Perhaps I am indeed gifted in the field of mechanical engineering, it is just because I was too engrossed with magic I failed to notice this. I then looked over at my watch, which says 8:30 a.m.

“I better figure out how to start up this thing before school starts in half an hour time.”

I found a bracelet that has a note attached to it. On it says:

“This is most likely going to be useful. It is sort of a tiny remote control of the ship itself. I can use it to teleport back and forth the spaceship without using a jetpack to do so as well. I have installed a code so that others can’t access my ship. I better write it down here so that I won’t forget it, it is 1987.”

So, this bracelet acts as a teleporter to the ship itself. A useful tool indeed. Now I really should find a way to start and control this ship. I went over to the control panel and flipped through the pages of the instruction manual.

I skimmed through the pages and found the operating manual. I followed the instructions on the manual and soon the screen blared up. I used a mouse to navigate the giant computer and select the school compound as the destination.

“Destination selected. Please allow up to 5 minutes for preparation of space warp.”

I sighed. I took a walk around the ship and opened up the cabinets at the side of the ship. Most of them are empty, but in one of them, I found a black suit with strips of neon blue. Beside the suit is a crimson sword, on it was inscribed with letters of unknown origin. Is it rune language? I can’t tell.

I found a note in the pocket of the suit. I took it up and read it.

“This is one of my most precious inventions. I have to wear this whenever I go to school because of how dangerous the others treat me. This suit has all the mechanisms that perform most of the simple magic functions, and is made of a secret synthetic material that I made myself, so simple magic attack is not able to hurt me at all. This will grant me the some basic self-defence, sadly it does not grant me the permission to attend the magic classes.”

It almost seems as if the original Innight of this Timeline knew that I’m coming and stuck up all these instructions everywhere. I wonder what did he actually do to force me out of The Void and into this Timeline? I will figure those questions later, once I do have the time to do so.

“Preparations complete, undergoing Space Warp.”

I put on the suit just in case that the school is indeed as dangerous as the previous Innight described it to be. I took up the rune sword and to my surprise, it dissolved and a small microchip is formed in my hand and it slotted into somewhere in the suit. Perhaps I can use my willpower to control it?

I used my willpower to force the sword out, and I did it with success. I wonder what that sword is made out of. Well I can find that out later.

“Destination arrived.”

I stepped into the teleporter and is teleported immediately outside of the ship. What I failed to notice was the ship docked itself just outside the school, so I immediately fell into the sky. I heard many people laughing as I fell through the sky, for what reason I do not know.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“There must be a flying device in this suit. I probably need to activate it using willpower as well.”

I purged deep into my wind and imagine a jetpack forming at my back. Then I felt a tingling sensation behind my back, and my body is propelled upwards. I opened my eyes and saw that I have a jetpack behind my back and it is propelling myself upwards. I controlled the jetpack using my mind and slowly I climbed all the way back up to the schoolgrounds. I landed on the schoolground and saw many people made a disappointed looking face, but just for a split second, before they hide the looks with a normal face and went back to their own things.

This is a sign, a sign that most people are not a friend of mine, let alone an ally. I need to be careful of my step. I need to analyse my surroundings and take caution on every step I take in the school itself, since just about anyone is looking to end my life. I walked into the school and found my friends (and my 3 beautiful wives) all waiting for me.

“You are late, Innight!” Nicki cried, brandishing her staff.

“Sorry, I can’t be blamed. The machine is taking its’ time to load. I had to fix the inner mechanisms a little.” I lied. I can’t tell them I have absolutely no idea on how to operate the Void Storm in the beginning, because it will probably result in some complications. I will find a time, when it is right, to explain to them the real situation of myself.

I followed them and went in the school. Everyone greeted my group but seems to give a glare at me, or perhaps that is my imagination. We assembled in the classroom and settled down. Master Inoxion is already a Master of Magic since he is the ruler of the Darkness Elemental Plane, so he does not need to attend school. He waved at us before leaving the classroom. The three girls were almost immediately surrounded by other guys who are asking them out, but they all rejected them.

A guy came up to me and placed his hands onto my shoulder, he said:

“Yo, having a nice day, Innight?”

I don’t like how strangers try to be close to me, especially in a place where the previous Innight mentioned as full of “non-trustworthy individuals”. Furthermore, I hate people touching me.

“Take your hand off me. I don’t like it when strangers are touching me.”

“Oops. Sorry about that.” The guy retracted his hands away from me. “Well, if you treat me as a stranger then I guess I will not disturb you.”

He then walks off. Almost as he left I immediately felt a sharp pain at where he just touched me. I closed my eyes and entered state of Alzelea. It showed that a needle has penetrated into my suit and is injecting poison into my body. That guy who just touched me must be the one that have done that. I cannot blame him because these authorities probably will not perform Tracing magic (which is forbidden, even in the previous Timeline, since it is dangerous) to find out who is the culprit. Also, given that poison caused by magic is not able to be detected through normal magic, they cannot be held responsible for it. I will have to remove the poison first.

I searched through the functionality of the suit, and found that it can use simple forms of magic. I used a piece of The Void to remove the needle and used healing magic to cover up the wound. I then returned to the Physical World. The pain vanished as quickly as it came. The person who injected the poison made a “tsk” sound after the found that I neutralized his poison, and walked back to his seat.

I secretly set up a barrier around myself so to prevent anyone from touching me again. Then the bell rang, people ran back to their seats. I send some microrobots surveying around the room so to ensure no one is setting up any sneaky tactics to take me down. I need to be cautious around everyone that is not my friend, they all have only one purpose when they approach me, that is to eliminate me.

With this mentality, the entire period of me being in school becomes a danger. Come to think of it, I could not perform magic, so why am I still attending school? My position in the current society is probably the lowest of the low, since I cannot even perform simple magic without this suit of mine, and I have no idea what the limit of the suit is. What is my intended action from coming here? What is going to happen to my future? I wonder…

A teacher walked in. It was Luricerite, the Grand Master of the Light Elemental Plane. I guess in this Timeline he is not responsible for any craze action, and is not involved in the rise of The Unknown, if it even had happened in this Timeline. I will have to snoop around the library later to find it out.

Everyone stayed at their seats. Luricerite pointed at me, saying:

“Innight, you know the routine. Visit the library for your own studying. Come back 3 hours later for lessons on Magic Mechanisms.”

I left the classroom and head for the Library. Luckily for me, there are signs placed everywhere to show where each location is located. I walked up the stairs and turned left on the next floor, and walked along the corridor. Many people were rushing for their classes, but all of them gave me a (what I think) glare. No surprises here since just about everyone has only one thing on their mind when they see me, that is to kill me. Is there even someone, other than my close friends and the teachers, that I can trust?

I turned around another corner and found the library. I waited for the door to slide open and then I walked in. Inside were stacks of bookshelves, with the librarian sorting out certain books on some bookshelves.

“Oh, hello Innight. Came here for your own self-studying again?”

“Indeed.”

I strolled into sea of bookshelves and glanced over the indexes. I know that since I cannot perform magic, more than half of the resources in the library is probably useless to me. The rest is on the mechanisms of magic, which is not based on the usage of Mana, but on how Mana functions to provide the caster the ability to cast magic spells. From how I perform in this current world, which I can’t perform a single spell without this suit of mine, I can only contribute to the society by providing mechanisms that helps to enhance their control over the pool of Mana.

The sad thing about this job is that the workers are often not respected for the work they put in, have the lowest pay in the entire society, and is often ignored by the other members of the society. From what I can tell, the school appears to be a highly ranked magic school, focused on creating the best magic casters. If that was not the case, Master Inoxion and Luricerite, both of which are Grand Rulers of the Elemental Planes, wouldn’t come here.

I stopped at a shelf labelled “Astral Realm” and start looking for a book that describes the mechanisms of the Astral Realm. I am always intrigued about the Astral Realm since we almost have next to no knowledge about the Astral Realm, even though we know that it is the foundation of magic and without it the current society as a whole will collapse. I wonder how much does this Timeline knows about the Astral Realm.

Then a thick book caught my eye. The title of the book is “Timeline”. I took the book off the shelf and start reading it. The moment I flipped open the first page a skull projected outwards from the book, blocking the book, and started speaking:

“Beware, humans. This book contains deep secrets that are dangerous once they are misused. Be wary of how you use the information in this book, else you will be chastised by the Master of Time. You have been warned.”

After it finished the speech the skull vanished into black mists. I then took a look at the first page. On it was the warning the skull have just mentioned. The book has also been heavily vandalised on the first page. I continued reading the book and flipped over to the second page. The second page was almost unreadable due to how badly vandalised, but I can just manage to read out the content of the page.

Basically, it describes that Timelines all originated from a single Timeline, but due to certain choices, or otherwise better known as Events, nodes forms from the singular Timeline and diverge into many other sub-Timelines, all independent and disconnected from another. However, there is an exception to this rule, people who are able to manipulate Time (which are very rare) and people who can transverse through Timelines (which are also rare). They can cause Timeline to be rewritten or result in an abnormally to be formed in the Space-Time Continuum, which may lead to corruption of the Timeline, causing the Timeline to collapse, finally resulting in the whole Timeline to be destroyed.

What a rather interesting book. I thought. Usually no one writes about Timelines as they have no relation to magic in general, even they do, it always almost rounds back up to Magic in the Astral Realm. I can have a good read about Timelines, which is something of my interest. I should burrow this to read when I have the time.

I picked up the book and registered it as a burrowed item. Then I continued strolling through the bookshelves looking for books on Mechanisms on magic. I came across many interesting books, which ranged from Science of Magic to The Future of Magic.

“Innight.”

I looked up from my book. It was Nightius.

“Oh, it’s you Nightius. What is it?”

“I’m trying another experiment today; do you want to come and watch it?”

“I will. I can’t bury myself in books constantly for over 3 hours. What is your new experiment?”

“Wait until you see it. I’m sure you will be amazed!”

I followed Nightius out of the library, down the hallway and into a room labelled “Magic Laboratory– Do not enter unless accompanied by a teacher.” I guess that this is a room used for experiment with magic. Common sense tells me usually such practices are dangerous in nature and are not performed by any students unless given permission to.

I entered the room.  Inside the room are around 20 benches, excluding the teacher’s bench. On each of the bench there is two cauldron, and behind the room are rows of shelves, which are piled up with bottles of coloured substances. Nightius stopped in front of one of the shelf and pressed against one of the bottles, the shelf slowly swings open, and we walked through it.

It was dark at first, and I could not see anything at all. I activated a lighting system of the suit and it glowed brightly in the dark. Nightius has vanished from sight.

“Where is the switch…… Ah, found it.”

The lights suddenly came on. I turned off the lighting system of the suit, and Nightius came into my view. I realized that we are in a large room filled with many magic apparatus, spell books and bottles of unknown substances. In the middle of the large room is a Magical Condenser. This must be the preparation room.

“So, what is your new experiment about Nightius?”

“It’s rather intriguing, to simply put it. There will be many others who don’t understand the benefit of such an experiment, but Master Inoxion, you and the group of your friends, will. It will revolutionize the World of Magic that we know as a whole. Give me a moment while I set up the Magical Condenser.”

I waited at the side and took a stroll around the room. Everything in the room is either ingredients for potion brewing or for experiments on magic. This room is hidden and is thus inaccessible to the other students, for a good reason too.

“Alright, Innight, come over and take a look.”

I walked over to Nightius. Inside the Magical Condenser is a mixture of coloured liquids, all separated into layers.

“What are those liquids that you are using?”

“Very complicated extracts. Some include solar extract, undead essence and Core of Darkness. You see, once I mix them together…”

Nightius turned on the Condenser, a roaring sound came from the Condenser and the liquids starts to mix together. As it mixes the liquid, the volume of the liquid becomes to shrink and the various colour condense into one colour, jungle green. The entire liquid finally shrank into a cube and dropped into the bottom of the Condenser. Nightius opened up the Condenser and took out the cube.

“So, this is the experiment? That is rather… plain. If I must say.”

“Now, now, Innight. This cube is much more than what you perceive it to be. This cube grants the users an ability of using Time itself. If you do not believe it, let me show it to you. Let’s say I want to travel 5 minutes into the future. I allow the flow of magic to access the cube, and tell it through the language of mana to do so. Then…”

While he is saying this, he closed his eyes and focused all his mana on the cube. Then suddenly a flashing light enveloped him and he vanished from sight. I believe he must have really time travelled using the cube. If he is showing me this cube, it means that he must have manufactured many other similar cubes like this. I wonder where he stored all of them?

I looked around the room to search for more of the greenish looking cube, but to no avail. He must have brought those to his own domain in the Plane of Darkness. That is a wise decision, however did he write down the recipe for it? I will ask him about that when he comes back.

A blinding flash of light appeared where Nightius has vanished, and Nightius came back into existence.

“See? I did Time Travel into the future! This is a Time Cube, a Cube that allows people to be able to gain control over Time itself, we would be immortal!”

“Nighitus...”

“Imagine it. All our foes, no matter how powerful they are, we can destroy them by eliminating them from the Timeline itself! We would be invincible!”

“Nightius…”

“Not just that. Whoever that we have sacrificed in any battels we can easily bring them back by accessing other Timelines and bringing them across Timelines!”

“NIGHTIUS!”

“We can…… yes, Innight?”

“Listen closely to me, Nightius. This tool is incredibly powerful, yet also incredibly deadly. It is incredibly dangerous to play around with Time. Time and time again, no puns intended here, we have seen how people who tried meddling around with Time happened to them. Erased from all the Timelines, past or present, lost in the complexity of the Void between Timelines, destroyed and broken down into Time particles and becomes a part of Time Itself. These has always been the destiny for anyone who tried to mess around with Time too much, regardless of them using tools with allows them control over Time, or them having Time Magic.”

“I want you to terminate this experiment. I do not want to see any Timeline abnormality happening again. I already had enough of people being sacrificed from meddling around with Time. We do not need any more people dying. Isn’t that the real use of magic, to keep the in Peace and Harmony?”

“No. You don’t understand, Innight. This will revolutionize the World. Gone will be the days where people that have to weep because their dearest person died, where people have to constantly worry about them dying, where magical reactions takes ages to finish. We can make this world a better place using this Time Cube!”

“Nightius. You have to understand, this is going to take more than just a cube to solve all that problems. Have you not heard me? This is going to corrupt Timelines, disrupt the flow of Time, and worse, create an army that is invincible which can be used dominate the world. This is something dangerous that we are dealing with. It can change the course of History that we know of. Worse, create an entire new Domain of Magic never seen before, and not even The Void knows how dangerous can that be. Do you understand the danger of this?”

“Innight, this tool will create a new field of magic which can drive production of world class magicians easier. Did you not catch my point? We will not suffer if another Common World Domination attack happens.”

“Common World Domination attack? What is that?”

“Did you forget? That was a huge disaster! That was the invasion of the group known as Commoners which neutralized most but our strongest magic. They only have one motive in their attack, that is to form a single planet where no magic exists. It took the power of the 6 Grand Master of the Elemental Planes to banish them to the far ends of the Omniverse. We know that, for now, we are safe from their attack, but we never know that if another hidden group is going to attack us, the World of Magic, again. This can be our strongest defence!”

“Fine, if I cannot convince you, so be it. However, be warned, this is going to bring the world more danger than any good that you think that it may bring. Hide your experiments until you can fine tune them until there are no implications of Time usage anymore, I shall advise you first. If any Time Abnormality appears, the first blame arrow is going to fall onto you, I will warn you this. Think carefully before you act. Also, I will report to Master Inoxion about this little incident. We have to consider the effect of this before we can mass produce this object. This is for the better of this world.”

Saying these, I left the room and went back to the library. I took out my book on Timelines and randomly flipped to one page. Then something caught my eye on the page.

It was the same diagram of the Time Cube.

That can’t be possible. This thing has only been just manufactured by Nightius. How could the book record about this? Unless… the Cube has been manufactured before. I quickly flipped the page to see any records about the Cube.

But there is nothing. The following pages were blank yellowish-white paper.

Odd. If the author has record of the Cube, this means that it has been manufactured before and thus there should be a record of it. Why does it has a drawing of the Cube but not any explanation of it? Curious. I will have to read the whole book to know more about what this book is about. I wonder who wrote this book?

As I think about it, I took a look on my watch. I totally lost the track of time while I was in the room with Nightius. I have to go back to the classroom.

“Ah, Innight, leaving already?” That was the librarian.

“Yes. Ah yes, I’m burrowing this book.”

“Strange, I have not seen this book before.”

“Are you sure that it is not your memory who has failed you?”

“Positive. I have an elephant memory when it comes to the books collection in the library. Once I have seen a book I will never forget it.”

“So, you won’t be wanting this book back then?”

“I guess so? You can keep it.”

“Thank you.”

I left the library, went down the stairs and towards the class. Just as the classroom door slides open a blast of magic spell flew straight at me. Luckily for me, I still had my barrier active so it was blocked.

“I’m dearly sorry for that Innight.” A girl whom I don’t know said that. I guess she casted that.

Right. Lies. Very clearly, she is lying. She must have known that I’m coming and aimed that at me. Well, whatever.

I sat down at my seat and wait for Luricerite to begin his lesson.

“Innight, we are still practicing, please do your own self studying while you wait.” Luricerite said.

I took out my book on Timelines and started reading. Hopefully this wouldn’t be too long before he starts the lesson.