To stop the soul bond, Gaus needed three defensive skills: mind blank, the summoning of the soul-pillars, and cord shedding. The goal was to have at least one skill before the end of this restart. Hopefully, that would stop Tyren or at least extend the loop beyond the current seven days thereby minimizing the cost of the restarts.

So he began with his preferred method of learning - self-studying. Exploring the topic of the dark arts using self-studying was rather difficult. There were only a few books available that talked about the topic. The few that did were poorly understood due to their archaic wording and excessive use of graphics. Linc and every other teacher in the academy had refused to teach him anything related to the dark arts. They all said the same thing: tame your mana first. He could tell them about the soul bond. That would get their attention but it was unlikely going to end well. If they knew about the soulbond then it was only a matter of time before they found out about the Rewind and consequently Tyren. It was too much risk.

The next option was Fredrick, a police detective. Before meeting Fredrick, Gaus had met another practitioner called Heinsman through his old friend Abbas. Gaus wanted to learn the art from them but, unfortunately, it spiraled out of control to involve the marines. He got killed.

Now Gaus was left with little options.

Amid his desperation, he decided to seek out the library receptionist. The woman was strong. In one restart, she singlehandedly took down the marines guarding the old dungeon. She had been escaping the marines for two years now even though she wasn't in the loop.

Gaus was currently being interrogated in a cave. The receptionist asked the questions while three men stood behind him with unsheathed blades. Another curious woman stood just behind the receptionist, staring at him with her brown cat-like eyes.

"You can call me Minorita," the receptionist said. "Tell us about this future of yours. Remember you only have five minutes to convince us."

Gaus decided to go straight to the point. Either she believed him or not, it wouldn't be the end of the world and he could always look somewhere else when the loop restarted.

"You and I and everyone else have already lived through this day," Gaus said. He half expected the woman to burst into laughter but she just glanced at the woman behind her who looked away.

"If we've already lived through this day then why are we here? Did you or someone else send us back?" She asked.

Gaus shook his head. "No, ma'am, I didn't send us back. I don't know if someone else did but considering this isn't the first or the second time we are reliving the same day, I don't think so. The truth is we have lived through this day several times already. I only become aware of it recently but the loop has been going on for some time now."

Minorita narrowed her eyes. "That's... big."

"It's ridiculous," Gaus corrected with a long-suffering sigh, "I couldn't believe it at first. I still don't know why or how the day keeps repeating. I don't even know if there's anything special about this day. All I know is we are trapped."

"And only you can remember what happened?" She asked.

"I thought so in the beginning." He shrugged. "I thought I was special. That everyone is forgetting everything except me. I was damn wrong. There are others in the loop."

There was some silence as he allowed them to contemplate his words. It might be some well-cultivated facade but the receptionist didn't look disturbed at all. In contrast, the woman behind her looked.. frightened. She constantly looked through the door and checked something in her magiwatch. Whenever Minorita glanced at her she would look away with an apologetic smile.

"It's not something I would expect you to believe without experiencing it yourself. All I'm asking is a chance to prove myself," he added.

For her part, Minorita just stared at him. She would probably tell him to scram as soon as she opened her mouth but he somehow didn't get the feeling she would do that.

"Why are you telling me this?" She asked.

"I need you to do something for me. If you do it, I'll bring you into the loop," Gaus said. There was no reason to dilly-dally.

"What do you want?" She asked.

Gaus knew exactly what he wanted. But he was having difficulty with how to say it. The system classified defensive skills as either internal or external. As the name implied, internal defenses came from the body itself whereas external was made from elements or objects. A typical example of this was the mage who summoned a sheet of ice to block a fireball and the mage who turned their body into ice to neutralize the fireball. The former used an external defense as the ice didn’t come from their body. Unlike the internal defense, a mage could use an external defense both to protect themselves and another. Summoning of the soul-pillars, unlike mind blank and cord shedding, was an external defense and Minorita could do it for him as a shortcut before he learned how to do it. She could probably teach him the other skills as well.

"Can you summon the soul-pillars?"

Minorita grimaced. "Soul-pillar summoning?"

Gaus nodded. "That and mind blank and cord shedding. I want to learn all three. But in the meantime, I need you to summon the soul-pillars for me."

She crossed her arms on her chest. "Tell me how you found out about me," She asked, frowning.

Gaus decided to play along in the meantime.

"That's the hard part, isn't it? Do you remember the sentinels I talked about in my letter? They follow me around. Something about my time magic affinity and all. And I.."

"You led them to me," she completed his sentence.

"I did. It was unintentional. I didn't know who you were and I didn't know they were following me. I didn't even know I have this high affinity for time magic. I was just coming to the library to study and the clones followed me."

Minorita glanced at the woman behind her again. The woman quickly looked away.

"If it makes you feel any better the marines accused me of diverting their sentinels as well. You and I have a common enemy"

"So the Marines are also part of this loop thing?" She asked.

Gaus nodded. And for the first time, Minorita smiled. She looked exceedingly collected for a woman in her situation. Gaus began to get suspicious. He knew it should be the other way round but he just couldn't help it. Nobody should take in this much information and remain composed.

"You still didn't tell me how you joined the loop." Her tone was now elated. Gaus pretended he didn't notice it and just continue answering her questions.

"I have a skill that allows me to both remember what happened in the previous loops and retain my skills."

"What of the marines? How do they join?"

"I don't know."

"Say I believe everything you've said up to now, how do you plan on letting us join the loop?"

"I will carry your written notes from one loop to the next. Anything you want to remember when the loop resets just put it down on a piece of paper and I'll bring it back to you in the next loop."

Minorita fell silent for several seconds, scratching her temples thoughtfully and occasionally tapping the table. This was the point where she would pull the prank on him. He knew it. Judging from experience, she would probably just ignore him or maybe even attack him. She was rude and he wouldn't be surprised if she was violent as well.

"Mister Gaus," Minorita turned to him with narrowed eyes, "I'll summon the soul-pillars for you."

What? Gaus blinked several times in confusion. Did she believe him? No, she wouldn't believe him this easily unless she was already aware of the loop. But he checked her out in several restarts. She was not in the loop. In one loop, he even counted the number of times she blinked in a minute and compared it to other loops. A human couldn't fake these things.

"You look surprised," She said.

"I would be lying if I say I am not. Hell, I wouldn't believe what I'm saying if I didn't experience it first-hand. And judging from experience, you would probably just ignore me or do something worse. Forgive me, but you don't always see eye-to-eye with strangers despite working as a library receptionist."

She furrowed her brows dramatically but Gaus got the feeling she wasn't angry. "What did you say? I'm always nice to people. Sure, I don't like slavers and most of the people living in the city are slavers anyway, but I still try to be nice to them. The few occasions I decide to be rude is when I meet an educated slaver."

"No, you've always been rude to me. Do I look like a slaver to you?" Gaus pointed at himself angrily.

"You.. do."

"What?" He wanted to punch her. "Shut up."

"Okay. I'm sorry if I mistook you for a slaver and I treated you poorly. Most people who come to the library in fancy clothes are slavers and I don't like them."

Gaus frowned. She didn't sound sorry at all.

"I said I'm sorry." She shifted in her seat so she could face him directly. "I want to join the loop. But your plan to carry my notes over to the next loop is bullshit. I won't believe a mere note from my future self just because a stranger says so."

"Hey, why are you so welcoming to the idea of the time loop?" He decided he wouldn't keep quiet any longer. Something wasn't right here. Most mages would first accuse him of being a spy or something. Even if everything was brought to the table, there were still several variables to be considered before time traveling. So why was she willing to entertain him?

"Of course, I have my reasons. But for now, it's just a trade. You have a story and I have the means and willingness to buy it. By tomorrow, we'll know if you're telling the truth."

She was right. He just didn't think it would be this easy.

"Let's talk about how I can help you to join the loop. You don't want me to carry your notes over. What then will you suggest? I don't have any other way of bringing people into the loop so don't even ask."

"I'm suggesting a memory package that will carry all of my memories from this loop to the next." She gestured toward the woman behind her. "Lilat here can put the memory package safely in your mind. All you have to do is bring it to me in the next loop and I'll believe you."

No. That would involve some serious messing with his mind which he wasn't comfortable with at the moment.

"You've every reason to freak out." Minorita raised her hands in surrender. "Putting a whole package in your mind is something. And I know I'm asking for a lot. But I'm also offering a lot."

"What are you offering besides some skills that I can get anywhere?" Gaus asked. He didn't mean to sound so mean but she deserved it.

She shrugged. "Then why are you here if you can get what you want anywhere?"

There was some silence as they both considered the situation. Gaus had the second loop and Gaus's immortality to back him up if things went south. But he still didn't want to take things for granted.

"It's not as bad as you think." She complained. "Look, I'm taking as much risk as you. What if everything you've said is true? You're here only to learn about these three skills and you will likely abandon us as soon as you get what you want."

Gaus chuckled. The receptionist was not taking as much risk as him. Especially when he knew he was telling the truth.

"Can I think about it?"

"Yes, of course. Come back whenever you are ready. Or should I say in another loop?"

Gaus was escorted out of the forest. He wasn't sure how he felt at the moment. Minorita wasn't what he expected her to be. She fought against the slavers which was a plus in his book. But he still didn't trust her. That would take time. Luckily, he didn't have to trust her to get what he wanted.

He went to the city library and asked Abbas about the memory package and its effects. He also read anything he could find on the topic. He went to a private facility and asked about it. Everyone told him it was advanced mind magic that was 'semi-invasive'. It didn't hurt, they said, but if left for long it could degrade and spill impurities into your mind. These impurities could cause temporary hallucinations and psychosis. A few people had been reported to have amnesia with varied effects.

So one risk was allowing the package to degrade in your mind. On the positive side, he would get the soul-pillars and he would have Gaus's immortality to back him up. It was time to leap of faith.

He went back to the hideout.

"Have you already made up your mind? It seems you're desperate. Maybe there's some truth to your words." Minorita said, surprised.

"How long will the memory package take to degrade?" Gaus asked.

"Three months."

He decided to go with it. If the summoning was successful then Tyren would have a little surprise this restart.

"I want the summoning done before you install the package."

"OKAY."

***

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1:06 am.

It was dark when he left the forest and returned to Crisstar. He didn't feel any difference, physically or mentally, after Minorita had summoned the soul-pillars, or after receiving the package. Sure, there was the emotional turmoil from having two adults clamped your head for several minutes. Other than that it was... plain. No pain, no pressure, nothing.

However, he didn't expect the mana cost of the summoning to be so high. According to Minorita, she paid 68 MP for the summoning alone and 2 MP per hour for as long as the pillars were active. It would cost her 116 MP every day.

He didn't want to go through the tedious process of identifying himself when he came next so he asked her how to avoid that. She gave him a name. A name he didn't expect to hear again.

***

As soon as the loop restarted, Gaus checked the save library. Hopefully, he'd gotten something from Minorita.

Save library

Two skills were detected.

Use CP to activate? Y/N?

If he could just copy the skills then he wouldn't need the receptionist. He pressed yes excitedly.

Soul-pillar summoning

Requirement(s): 15% affinity for soul magic.

NB: you must fulfill requirements to activate the skill.

Memory package

Requirement(s): 5% affinity for mind magic.

NB: you must fulfill requirements to activate the skill.

Dammit.

He didn't have the requirements to copy the skills and would possibly never have because of his low affinity for mind and soul magic. Unless if he could somehow increase his affinities. Otherwise, he had to learn the skills the 'proper' way.

It was time to return the memory package and talk about that name. Whatever happened next would determine his actions for the remainder of the restart.

It was still dark when he arrived in the forest. The sky was covered in a haze but he could see the light of dawn creeping up from below. It was cold in the forest. He would need a sweater if he was going to be here for long.

"In the name of William Wilberforce, we order you to state your purpose and drop your weapons."

Gaus pitied them. How many years had they been repeating the same thing over and over again? Poor souls.

"I'm looking for London."

There was some silence and confused looks among the archers. They didn't know the name.

"How did you know my name?" A voice came from behind him. It was Lilat. Minorita walked behind her among the others.

"Your name? No, I don't think so." He shook his head. "They call you Lilat. That silver-haired behind you is Minorita. Although her future self told me to call her London."

He got their undivided attention. Minorita came forward and stood just a couple of meters away from him, staring.

"My 'future self'?" She asked incredulously.

Gaus nodded. "There is nothing I can say that will convince you, but I have a message for you. Your future self seems to believe the message will be enough to convince you."

Minorita stared at him silently for several seconds. She didn't believe him. "I don't remember anything about any of this."

"Why would you need me to carry a message for you if you can remember it yourself?"

"And what message did my future self send to me?" She decided to play along but the sarcasm in her voice was almost palpable.

"It's a memory package stored in my mind. You can pick it whenever you are ready."

She glanced at Lilat who nodded in response. He got the feeling that Lilat was the mind mage.

Lilat came forward and put a hand on his head to retrieve the package.

It was fast. He didn't even feel it. Lilat whispered something to Minorita before they turned to him with grave expressions.

"We'll need at least ten hours to look through it. Come back in the evening."

"We don't have much time. If you read the package you'll know what I mean. How about in two hours?"

"Just come back in the evening," Lilat snapped.

Gaus was forced to leave.

Ten hours were just too long. He needed to figure out how to deal with this in the next loop.

Instead of wasting the day, he went back to the loopers academy. He would be expelled if he missed one more day. Then other temporary loopers in the city might spot him and cause him trouble. Despite all its risks, the academy was the best cover he'd got. He could go anywhere in the city and do what he wanted without the fear of being found.

He went to see Linc in his office.

After the initial Introductions, Linc went straight to the point. "Use levitation only to pull the dagger out of the ground."

Gaus put his hand a few inches above the dagger and pulled it out using levitation.

"Good. I didn't expect you to do that. Can you levitate five daggers at a time?"

Gaus retrieved five daggers from his inventory and levitated them simultaneously.

"Throw them at me."

He threw all the five at the teacher, using spinning to change the course of the daggers so he could attack from different angles. Linc deflected the daggers with the wave of his hands. He pulled a sword out of his drawer and threw it at Gaus.

"Use it."

Gaus caught it midair and with practiced ease, he stabbed it on the ground and pulled it out using levitation. He levitated it just above his palm and then threw it at the teacher.

"Excellent!" Linc said not trying to hide his excitement. "You've learned spinning, levitation, sharpening, javelin, and even multiple levitation. Now all you need is to get five more skills to tame your mana. Excellent. Well done."

He hurriedly flipped through some files on his table before he turned to Gaus again. "Why don't you take the mentor-mentee program and become my apprentice?"

Gaus opened his mouth but was immediately interrupted. "If you become my apprentice I won't mind teaching you my secret skills."

"I'll.." Gaus started.

He was interrupted again. "I need to become your mentor. I have a lot to teach you. Do you understand?"

"Okay, okay. I will accept you as my mentor."

"Good, good. Now all you need is to sign this."

He retrieved a paper from a file on his desk and gave it to Gaus. Gaus skimmed through it and signed it.

"Good. But this should be kept a secret, you know."

Gaus nodded.

"We'll focus our energy on taming your mana. Let's start with the practical applications of mana taming."

He marked a point on the wall and shot it with an arrow. Gaus watched him in silence and secretly copied archery.

Archery

Rank: ordinary

Shooting arrows with a bow is an ordinary but life-saving skill. It will add to your long-range skills.

Cost: 1 MP (speed 5m/s)

"Now," Linc pulled the arrow out of the wall with levitation and made it flew to him. "I'll shoot the same spot again. Your job is to make sure I miss it. All you've to do is to levitate the arrow mid-air before it hit the target."

"But you told us not to levitate a moving object," Gaus said.

"I know what I told you." He threw the bow at him. "Shoot me. Let me show you how to do it."

Gaus reluctantly pulled the arrow. It felt right in his hands. He could roughly gauge the speed with which the arrow would fly after he released it. "Are you sure about this?"

Linc gave him a mild glare. "Just shoot, boy."

Gaus released the arrow. Hopefully, Linc was fast enough to dodge it. He closed his eyes, secretly wondering what would happen to the rest of the restart if he were to kill a teacher during a training session.

"Open your eyes," Linc snapped.

Slowly, Gaus opened his eyes. The arrow was floating in the air just a few inches away from Linc's heart.

"Did you... stop it?" Gaus asked slowly.

"I did. It's an advanced levitation. If you master it you can affect a moving projectile. You can stop an arrow or a spear thrown at you from a distance. You can even deflect an enemy's sword. Can you imagine how much help that will be in a real battle?" Linc explained.

Yes. He could very well imagine that. But just pulling a dagger out of the ground and throwing a sword didn't mean he could stop a speeding arrow. He might as well just try his luck with the save library.

No skill was detected.

What?

So far there had been only two categories of skills he couldn't copy. Category A couldn't be copied because the save library couldn't detect them. Magiwatch skills and bloodline skills belonged to this category. Category B skills couldn't be copied but that was because of requirements. Take for example elemental skills that came from spirits. He needed a specific spirit to copy a specific element. He could already copy levitation and all the other mana taming exercises. He should be able to copy this so-called advanced levitation.

"Sir, are you using pure mana to stop the arrow?" Gaus asked. He strongly suspected that Linc was using either his magiwatch or bloodline skill or something to block the sword.

Linc nodded. "Yes. Why are you asking?"

Was the teacher lying about his skill? Gaus got the feeling there was more to it than just pure mana manipulation.

"It's nothing, sir. I'm just curious."

"Then keep your curiosity to yourself and focus on the task at hand."

"Yes, sir."

"Make sure I don't hit the target." Linc fired the arrow at the same spot.

Gaus focused on the arrow. It would miss the target if he could levitate it for just a fraction of a second...

Dammit.

The arrow hit the target.

"Let's try again." Linc fired another one.

Gaus failed again. Levitation could be explained as using invisible hands. These hands were both invisible and imaginary. But with enough practice, you could grab a stationary object. But moving targets were just... difficult. He had to wait for the projectile to enter his range first before he could even attempt. And the arrow was just too fast even when it was within range.

After firing ten arrows in a row and Gaus couldn't stop a single one, Linc got curious. He slowed down the arrows by minimizing the mana cost, hoping that would be enough to encourage Gaus.

Five more tries and Linc became agitated. His 'gifted' student was turning out to be a failure.

"Okay. Maybe I'm slightly overestimating your capabilities. Let's try something else."

He retrieved a few practice stones from his inventory.

"I'll throw these at your head and you'll deflect them. It won't be as effective as deflecting a speeding arrow but it will be a good start."

The first stone went directly to his head. He tried to deflect it and when he couldn't, he dodged it.

"No, no, no. You can not dodge it. You aren't allowed to move an inch. This is supposed to test your ability to stop moving projectiles. Got it?" Linc was getting deflated by the second. He was probably regretting his hasty decision to become a mentor.

"Just don't dodge, please."

Hell, no. Gaus would dodge any stone before it hit him on the head. That wasn't what he signed up for.

By the time he left the office his face was swollen. He didn't deflect a single stone. Damn it. What was Linc thinking? That should be level 100 difficulty.

The day was nearing its end. He went to the academy clinic to get dressed before he left to meet up with Minorita.

***

"I'm sorry about what happened earlier," Minorita apologized. This was the first time the woman had genuinely apologized to him. "I'm constantly at war with the marines, so forgive me if I was a bit hard on you."

She immediately summoned the soul-pillars for him as an apology. The cost of the summoning didn't seem to affect her.

"There are two things we have to settle first," Gaus said. "First, you should tell me your real name if we are going to do business. Are you London or Minorita? Second, you have to come up with a way of identifying your memory package faster. We can't be wasting ten hours every day."

"I'm Cinder. Though nobody calls me by that name nowadays. And I'll do something about the package that will help me identify it as an emergency."

Gaus nodded. The next thing was to figure out why Minorita accepted the time loop as a possibility. Many would have called him mad.

"You told me you had your reasons for accepting the time loop as a possibility. I want to hear about it."

"There are two reasons. One, my friends and I are planning to launch an attack on the slavers in a few hours. We've been trying to predict our success through divination and the results have been unnaturally skewed. It doesn't matter how little time passed between individual divinations. We've even tried to divine the future after today. Do you know what we found? Nothing. It was blank. It was as if there's no tomorrow. That everything will just disappear after three o'clock the next morning."

She cleared her throat and pointed at the woman behind her. "I told her there's something strange going on with the world. She didn't believe me. She said it was because of the pilgrimage."

So that was why she was looking apologetic.

"It still didn't explain time traveling," Gaus said. "I don't know your perception when it comes to the dark arts and specifically time magic, but I kind of feel there are other things that can come up to explain your findings before time travel."

"I did say there are two things, remember? You see, while most mages may consider the ability to turn time back as impossible, I don't. Difficult? Yes. But not impossible. It has been done before. Let me take you back a little."

"It has been done before? When? How? Where? Who did it?" Gaus was getting excited.

"Do you know the Commandments?" She asked.

Of course, he knew them. Nobody talked about the Multiverse without broaching the two Commandments. The First Commandment said: 'people can't live together in harmony'. The Second Commandment said: 'for any two people to live in harmony, one must lead and the other must follow and obey. The most popular religion in the Multiverse was built upon these two Commandments.

"The First Commandment is tyrannical," Minorita said, "the world government used it to send people down from the First World to the six lower worlds. Before the Commandments, everyone used to live in the First World."

Yes, the most influential races all lived in the First World. It was something he attributed to the 'strong prey on the weak' mode of life in the Multiverse. But the inhabitants were okay with it. And if they weren't okay then nobody was showing any concern.

"The First World is rich," she went on, "rich and big enough to take the entire population of the Multiverse. But the world government took control of it forcing everyone else to live on the lesser worlds. The Second Commandment is also just a cover to enslave us. It's the basis of the Jinzidal competition at the end of the year. Countries will provide slaves and they will fight for them. The winner takes all the slaves."

Now Gaus might accept the First Commandment but the Second Commandment was bullshit. No bloody idiot would agree to send their people to slavery just for the sake of a stupid competition.

"I wonder why everyone just accepts this as their way of life. Even the world government can't deny the collective voice of the people," Gaus said, puzzled.

Minorita chuckled. "It's not that simple. The Second Commandment conveniently prohibits all conflicts between countries. If you have any dispute with another country then you have to wait and settle it during the competition. This stopped the many wars that plagued the six lower worlds. People were happy. Especially the smaller countries. But it was just a cover for the real slavery. And don't forget the world government doesn't call them slaves, they call them 'followers'. If you lose the competition then your people should 'follow'. Also, the countries use clever guidelines in selecting the slaves. The people don't complain because most of them consider it as a price for the peace they enjoy."

He got it, but... he didn't like it. The world government lived on the First World and the six lower worlds were considered lesser worlds. This should be enough of a punishment without enforcing slavery on poor people.

"We digressed," Minorita said, looking at her timer, "let me tell you a little bit about the past. Before the Commandments, our grandparents lived in the First World. The world government didn't just ask them to leave, they were forced to leave. In the year 12BC, there was a demon invasion that consumed the entire world. Before the final human city fell, the King called upon his council to save what was left of humanity. They came together and cast the Universal Rewind, a spell that would take the world back for twelve months, which would be a few months before the demons appeared. The King would have defeated the demons with this, after all, he already knew where they would come from and what they would do when they appeared. But one of the four mages that cast the spell deceived the King. He changed the spell formula when the others weren't looking. As intended, the world Rewound for twelve months to the period just before the invasion. But instead of disappearing into oblivion, the current timeline continued thereby creating two timelines. In the first and original timeline, the demons have already conquered the world. And in the second timeline, the demon invasion was yet to occur.

"While the King and the others lived peacefully in their timeline, the deceiver planned another attack in the original timeline. He found a way to control the demons and connect the two timelines. A few years later, he attacked and killed the King and the other three mages that cast the Universal Rewind. He joined the two timelines to build the Multiverse. If those mages could Rewind the entire world for twelve months, I wouldn't be too surprised with a time loop." Minorita explained.

Gaus just stared at her in disbelief. If it were true then he would have heard about it somewhere or read it in one of the books in the library. At least, someone would have told him.

"Why didn't I hear about this before? You can't tell me that something this big will just disappear in a puff of smoke." He asked.

Minorita shrugged. "Why wouldn't it disappear? The deceiver who killed the King is now the leader of the world government. He's still alive and he rules the First World. He founded the marines and the Multiverse Intelligence Agencies (MIAs). This part of history was intentionally erased and the people who knew about it are all conveniently dead. The knowledge has been buried under the sea for hundreds of years."

"Then how did you know about it?"

"I'm part of the resistance, aren't I?" she said.

A period of awkward silence passed. He would need time to digest everything he'd just heard. And honestly, it didn't matter that much, the fact that she believed it was good enough for now.

"Tell me," she went on, "how long have you been in the city? I've done some background search on you. There are no records about you in all the seven worlds. I've asked our contacts to check every Register in all the libraries but still nothing. It's as if you don't exist until this morning."

She scrutinized him silently.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked.

"It can only mean one thing: you aren't from this plane." She said with a shrug.

He didn't expect that. The woman sounded as if 'coming from another plane' was the most normal thing in the world.

He furrowed his brows. "Not from this plane? You are kidding, right?"

"No, I'm not kidding." She punctuated her words with a jab. "You should tell me right now if you are from the Parallel Timeline."

What the hell? The woman knew about London so she was either from Earth or she knew someone from Earth. But what's this about a parallel timeline? Did that mean people were coming from that timeline that was supposed to be destroyed?

This was too much information for a single day. He was lucky he wouldn't miss anything because of the save library.