Chapter 55: Time Anomaly

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In a dark room, Edward was carefully carving onto a silver pendent. It was the most simple kind of pendents, a chunk of silver so to say. However, Edward's engravings were turning it into a beautiful piece of jewellery.

It wasn't just that though. As Edward made the last stroke onto the pendent, he let go of the carving knife and made several strange hand signs before a potent energy started entering his body.

His Chi awoke from it's normal state as it became abnormally active to fight off the energy. It was doing a good job at it, but the energy did not come as a burst, but as a stream, entering and leaving his body.

When the energy left his body though, it went for the pendent in front of him, turning it into a magical artefact.

About a month had passed since the Fantastic Four debacle, Dracula's fight and his date with Diana at Moso. And after this month, his expertise in magic had improved by a lot.

This pendent, alongside the watch right he had carved runes into earlier, were now magical artefacts with several effects. One was to enhance the holder's luck, another was to provide a strong magical field as well as to tell Edward the holder's position, and alarm him if the holder was in any danger.

To have so many spells cast onto one artefact, even if their functions were simple, it wasn't something anyone could do. Edward owed his success to several factors.

First was Merlin's guidance, through his book. Merlin was one of the greatest refiners to have ever existed, so obviously a book in which he put all of his knowledge about runes and arrays was a treasure.

Second was Edward's ability to learn, which had already been high in the beginning, and was only further boosted by his cultivation.

As for the last point, it was the type of runes he used. As mentioned in the past, the runes used nowadays would work on their own, drawing the energy and converting it. In comparison, Edward's runes only had to work with the refined energy passing through Edward.

Obviously, the arrays Edward used were much less complicated, and the different energies wouldn't reject each other as they all had the mark of Edward's Chi branded onto them.

Anyway, the watch was for his father, and the pendent for his mother. Like this, he wouldn't have to worry about their safety in the future, anyone who attacked them would trigger the two items, offering his parents protection and warning Edward, who could reach their place in an instant with his portals.

Actually, those weren't the first he had made, he had gone through a lot of testing to get it right, and the first similar artefact he had managed to create was a bracelet he had gifted to Donna, although the brat didn't know it was magical in nature.

Once he was done working on the two, several tendrils of fiery crackling energy appeared from his palms as they quickly assembled two gift bags.

That's right, not only did he master runes, he also mastered Eldritch Magic, allowing him to use it for different matters. He was far from reaching Merlin's or even Stephen's mastery with it, but he could now create all kinds of weapons or smaller objects, which he could manipulate with ease.

Once the two gift bags were made, he opened a portal to his parents house, put the bags in front of their doors after sensing them within the house, and rung the bell before closing the portal.

He could have stayed there to give them the gifts himself, but not only would that be a little awkward, they would probably worry seeing him come so often. He was supposed to be very busy with his job after all.

As Edward pondered on what to do though, he felt something vibrate in his pocket. Taking it out, it was a coin. It wasn't just any coin though, as it was the first artefact he ever made, and it came in pairs. He called them the Twin Coins.

It was for communication, as long as one rubbed one of the Twin Coins, the other would vibrate. The reason he created this was because he was making his artefacts inside a dark cave in the Himalayas.

Here, no signal could be found for his phone, so no one could contact him. So he decided to craft something that would replace the phone, and work anywhere.

For now, it was only a prototype, and no information could be passed on, only a vibration, but it was a work in progress, and it was more than enough. Moreover, no matter where they were, even if they weren't in the same dimension, the coins should still work. Presumably.

Anyway, since the coin had trembled, Edward created a portal home. He was surprised to see the Ancient One and Diana drinking tea on the other side.

He quickly stepped through the portal, and the Ancient One greeted him, "Hello, Edward. Your Twin Coin is a very interesting artefact."

Edward cupped his fists and slightly bowed, "It's good to see you, Ancient One. Thank you for the compliment."

"I'm not just complimenting, I really think it's useful. If you need help to improve it, I can help too. Although I haven't reached Merlin's level, I would say I am quite good at it."

Edward smiled at the proposal, but refused politely, "Thank you for the offer, but I treat this as a challenge. I would like to make it on my own. When I finish it though, you will be free to use them as well."

The Ancient One's small eyes seemed to disappear as he smiled, "That is very generous of you. Don't mind me acting shameless in the future then."

Edward nodded, and went to sit next to Diana, pouring a cup of tea for himself. Then, he asked, "So, what brought you here? I believe someone of your standing have better things to do than drinking tea."

The Ancient One lightly stroked his tea cup as he replied, "Well, the tea is quite special in itself, if I knew I would come here more often."

The tea was indeed special, it was made from tea leaves Edward had infused with his Chi, like the noodles he made, so the tea made from them was indeed quite special. However, he only gave a doubting eye to the Ancient One.

Seeing this, the old man lightly coughed and said, "But I have indeed come with a purpose. A particularly strong time anomaly is about to take place, travellers from the past are coming to our time."

"You want me to check it out? Why not send one of your Sorcerers?"

"You underestimate your own power. From what Strange told me, your physical strength itself it quite scary, and I believe that with your talent and foundation in magic, you ought to have learned a few spells already. You should be more than capable enough for this."

"Not far from here, close to Breakstone Lake, just outside of Salem Center. The travellers are definitely from Earth, and come from less than a hundred years ago. As for the rest, you will have to discover by yourself, if you accept that is."

Edward looked at Diana and pondered, "Would you like to come with me?"

Diana grabbed his hand and answered, "I would have loved to, but I have to make a trip to Paris for my job."

Edward hadn't been the only busy one in the past month, Diana had quit her job at the museum and started designing clothes. She was only starting, but she already accumulated several contacts over the years in different kinds of domains, one of them being fashion.

From what he heard, Diana was doing really well for a beginner, but he didn't know much about the world of fashion so he simply took her word for it.

Still, he probed, "What if we use my portals? You could come with me and get there in time?"

She smiled fondly, "Come on, you know we can't use portals on official trips, the probability is low but if someone ever checks whether we took a plane or not, they would notice something is amiss. Don't worry, next time we will do it together."

Edward sighed, disappointed, "I know, I know. Next time then."

He then turned to the Ancient One and asked, "Do you have a precise timing for their arrival? And a precise location?"

The Ancient One nodded, "In about 30 minutes, and I already pinpointed the location. I can open a portal for you."

Edward thanked him, "Thanks, I never went to Salem Center."

One of the rules for creating portals was to visualize the place one wanted to go to, and usually that needed one to head there. Of course, there was also google maps, but it took more effort for the first time, so having someone else prepare the portal for him was good.

He turned to Diana, and planted a kiss to her lips, whispering, "See you soon."

Diana slightly moaned in agreement, and Edward nodded at the Ancient One, who easily opened a portal. Behind the portal was a great expense of water, the Breakstone Lake.

With a last nod to the two, Edward stepped through the portal.

The moment he arrived, he felt something was amiss. Through his Chi Sense, he could feel a strange aura he took a few seconds to recognize in the surroundings.

It was the aura from the spacetime tunnel where he met Eru, the feeling was quite unique so it took him a few seconds to recognize it.

He could also feel the aura was stronger in some places, and weaker in others. Edward thus began walking around, trying to find the area where the aura was the strongest. If he was right about his assumptions, then that would be where the travellers would arrive.

After a couple of minutes, Edward eventually managed to find the spot he had been searching for, and immediately started to work.

If the Ancient One had given him this job, then it meant he didn't know what would be coming to their time, meaning they could potentially be dangerous.

Since he already knew where and when they would be coming, wouldn't it be foolish to simply stand there and wait for them, doing nothing?

Had it been a month prior, maybe Edward would have been helpless, but now he had something in his sleeves he could use.

Arrays!

Arrays were generally stronger than spells, with their sole limitation being the expenditure and the fact they could only work in a certain area where they were built.

But since he knew where they would be, one of the weakness could be ignored, meaning his only problem would be the expenditure of energy.

After pondering on which array he should use, he realized he shouldn't create the strongest one he knew. The reason he could use the peculiar arrays he used was thanks to his Chi, and they even allowed him to cultivate his Chi more quickly.

However, while having a strong energy in his body could benefit him, his Chi also had a limit, and making an array stronger than his limit would instead be disastrous. Since he already had created a bracelet for Donna, a watch for his father, a pendent for his mother and the Dual Coins, he already had four energies stimulating his body.

On their own, those energies weren't much, but not only did they add up to one another, they also formed a strange kind of synergy when they entered his body as they fight against his Chi.

So he had to consider how strong this synergy would become if he introduced this fifth energy to his body, even temporarily, to decide the strength of the array.

After some consideration, Edward finally started creating the array. One way to do so would be to trace the array on the ground like he would on a small artefact, but not only would that be hard to replicate without a mistake, it would even be a waste of time.

Instead, with a few hand signs a large energy construct appeared above the ground, before imprinting itself into the ground. At the same time, a new flow of energy stronger than any of the other three entered Edward's body.

Thankfully, even as it entered the synergy as Edward expected, it did not reach his limit. Now, all that was left was to wait.