Time Twister

The next part of the plan was going to be the hardest to complete because he had to ensure what he said matched to what the sages would learn about Homer Simpson, his relationship with him, and the people around him and their rapid growth.

Xander shut his eyes and fell into a deep sleep, entering his dream bubble. He saw the saplings of the trees he planted, CDL, and DDL. He had attempted before to try planting the other seeds in his dream bubble, but he couldn"t predict if it was going to be harmful or not for him. What if he accidentally destroys his dream bubble or turns it into an isolated pocket dimension; would he still be able to dream? So he only planted these two seeds.

Xander played around for the rest of the time, tending the saplings and then headed out to explore other people"s dreams near him.

He didn"t want to go further because he didn"t want to go to some unknown dream and cause a ruckus or create a scene that might be traced back to him.

Time pa.s.sed. It was already Sat.u.r.day, and the sun was brightly shining in the sky. Xander had woken up at this time and instinctively knew that it was 8:30 am already.

He headed downstairs and ate the prepared breakfast by the twins, reading the news in his communicator. Surprise, surprise, the news was all about the "eclipse" yesterday evening and the appearance of the giant face.

He saw that there was a lot of infrastructural damage in all countries, with the cost, if converted to Eta currency, would amount to trillions, if not quadrillions of Eta. He continued to check the news as it also reported the number of casualties that had happened globally, causing Xander to feel guilty for a moment.

However, he quickly staved it off, as he believed the problem was caused by the leaders of their countries and conglomerates and ancient clans overreacting to the situation more than a month ago.

He was also able to check if his life essence doll was affected in any way and saw that no new karmic threads were formed nor destroyed, meaning the sentiments of the people weren"t targeted at him, but to the garden spell that he created and the mirror image of his. The moment the two disappeared, so did the threads.

When he was about to finish half of his meal, his smart.w.a.tch rang, and Xander immediately answered the hologram call.

It was the figure of both his father and mother. Majes immediately spoke before Xander could even ask what was up.

"Xander, one of our ancestors will be visiting you concerning your uncle Homer. Please, avoid directly lying to them!"

Faria then followed up, her voice a bit worried.

"My baby boy, the same goes for my family"s ancestors. One of them will be visiting you along with 2 other respected magicians. Make sure you be as honest as possible when answering their questions, ok?"

Xander, not being able to say a word of response, merely nodded, his face nonplussed. He wasn"t really shocked about this, as this was still within the scope of possibilities that would happen after the fiasco.

What he didn"t know was those that would be involved in the group visiting him. He also needed to ensure that besides making his story legitimate, he had to ensure no excess information concerning the situation should be leaked, no matter their prodding.

He then responded with a gentle, calm, child-like voice.

"Don"t worry mom, dad. It will all be fine. Just rest up!" Hearing his response, his parents calmed down a bit, albeit still worried for Xander. They knew that something was quite special with their son, and all they can do to help is guide him as much as they could, and protect him when necessary.

After finishing his meal, he was going to head to his room to take a bath when his spatial perception was triggered outside the villa. He sighed at himself.

It seems they"re here.

Oh well, let"s get this over with, then.

He headed to the door and opened it, his face showing a bright smile.

"Ancestors, welcome to my abode. Please, enter." He said, confusing the guards stationed nearby. They hadn"t seen anyone approach or sensed any magic fluctuations.

Then, they heard a light chuckle, coming from a curious voice.

"Oho, you noticed us even if your guards weren"t?" it asked, genuinely curious at Xander"s abilities.

Xander shyly smiled, saying,

"Hehe, my uncle taught me a trick or two concerning detection, hehe." The moment he said these words, the area in front of him slowly twisted, revealing the figure of 4 people, surprising and alerting the guards outside and inside the villa.

However, before they could do anything, Xander raised his hand, signaling them to stand down; and stand down they did, returning to their normal positions.

He then gestured to the sages the door, giving enough s.p.a.ce for them to enter.

"Please enter, ancestors."

The 4 began to file in, heading inside into the living room. They saw that place was quite normal and s.p.a.cious, typical of a villa design house in Eteria. They didn"t see any clues that would indicate that the interior style came from other empires and the like.

They were low-key releasing their magic perception, and realized that they couldn"t bypa.s.s through the walls or floors; heck, even the windows are also blocking their perception from extending outside. They were surprised. When they began to focus their magic perception on the walls and floors, they realized that there was a thick, unknown material between the surfaces.

Of course, these sages wouldn"t recognize the new material that Xander had replaced the place with. It was a unique alloy mixture of his own, created after gathering data from different empires that he had visited in the past 3 weeks. It was a ratio of Varmuth, Adamantis, Zycolith, and Hemesith metals, combined and further refined, before being combined with the housing. However, this was the first alloy. Another alloy added to it was the Barlith-Pazril-Carlict-Harzin, which has the magic perception and penetration immunity.

The walls outside of the villa had a different metal alloy composition, using only the Barlith-Pazril-Carlict-Harzin alloy. However, the change in concentration allowed it to increase the range of its effect, and since the walls were enclosing the villa area, it allowed a complete resonance coverage, efficiently blocking anything related to magic perception and penetration.

It didn"t block him from using [Divine Eyes] though, and Xander could actually see the waves that were formed from the metal alloys resonating in the villa; they were quite plain, with a color of white light.

The sages who were still observing the metallic material in the walls were caught off their stupor hearing Xander"s voice once again.

"Ancestors, please follow me to the foyer. The view of the garden is quite exquisite and would be a great place to discuss anything you might want to discuss." Xander said to them, his voice cordial and respectful to the elders, but was also showing his control of the place.

The sages, whether they noticed it or not, followed Xander to the foyer.

Truly, Xander didn"t lie. The garden was flourishing, as he had added different plants from other exoplanets that he had visited (albeit removing microorganisms of course), and grew them in his villa garden.

There were different kinds of flowers arranged near the soft lawn gra.s.s, with well-s.p.a.ced trees arranged and grown symmetrically to one another, with creeping vines and other kinds of plants, such as moss, liverworts, shrubs, and ferns. In the small artificial pond, there were some green and red algae growing, as well as some water-based plants.

Originally, their faces were calm, as they had nothing much to expect with the garden. However, it slowly changed because they saw the fruits produced by trees and other kinds of plants.

All of them were cla.s.s 8 plant materials!! They recognized some species of plants, as Varmin and Carolyn had explored different empires more than the other two.

They were plants that are indigenous in these empires and usually weren"t used to produce usable plant materials by Magibiopharmacists. How extravagant is it to use common plants to the point that they managed to collect and gain spirituality? What kind of environment would they require to reach at least a million years of age?

Xander, upon seeing their reactions, acted accordingly, asking with a child-like curiosity.

"Oh, Ancestors, you seem to like the garden arrangement?"

"It"s quite beautiful. Well, they look quite…extravagant." Varmin responded, his voice a bit awkward.

"Oh that"s quite true. My uncle placed them here for me to eat the fruits they produce. According to him, they"re quite delicious, and I have to agree on that statement!" Xander exclaimed, his face looking like he was remembering the taste of the fruits.

"Oh, so you eat the fruits every day?" It was Carolyn who asked weirdly, and the two ancestors from Cloverfield and Morningstar looked at Xander in the same way as well. They weren"t stupid, and they could feel the elemental concentration in those fruits.

They could estimate it was greater than 1 million years of age!

"Yup, since school started. They do taste immaculate. I like it when I make a fruit salad with these. Just perfect in taste." Xander responded childishly, smacking his lips.

Actually, the correct age for the plants with fruits produced in this garden that they saw were 9,999,999 years of age, the highest quality for Cla.s.s-8 plant materials.

Xander had to rush making this early this Sunday, changing the time flow to 1 second: 19 years in the garden, allowing it to reach 9,999,999 years yesterday.

He then canceled the time acceleration, and forced the plants in the garden to absorb the dense amount of elements in the area, purifying their forms, turning to a crystallized state before returning to normal. The fruits were technically Cla.s.s-8s, but the plants themselves were Cla.s.s-9s.

Under the eyes of the sages, Xander went to the garden and plucked several tens of fruits, arranging them on a plate, and then placed it on the foyer table styled quite fancily, but actually contained the same material as the walls and floors of the villa. Even the chairs were also reinforced the same way.

"Please, ancestors, sit down, and eat." Upon hearing Xander"s words, the sages weren"t ashamed to sit down and began to take a fruit and take a bite.

Immediately, a fresh sensation flowed from the fruit into their mouths and throats, exciting the cells of their body. As they continued to devour the fruits, the effect changed as well. Some were cooling, moisturizing their mouths and throats, some were warm and carried a hint of spice and burn, while some had an earthy taste. They closed their eyes to savor the flavor.

Xander calmly took a bite of the fruits, chewing them as usual. Truthfully, these didn"t have much effect to him except for recovering magic energy and the flavor. Cultivation wise, it didn"t bring about any changes, which quite confused him, since when the same fruits were given to Faykes, he was able to increase the age of his foundation.

After a few minutes of silent eating, with only the sound of munching of their mouths echoing the tranquil garden, Xander asked the important question to the four.

"May I ask, what"s the purpose of your visit to my villa?"

It was silent. Moments later, it was Hailey who answered his question.

"Xander, you might not know me, but I"m one of the ancestors of the Cloverfield family, your father"s ancestor. We came here to talk about a person you might be familiar with: he goes with the name of Homer Simpson."

"Ah! You mean Uncle Homer? How is he? He just left yesterday when the whole sky suddenly turned dark and everything." Xander asked, his voice containing curiosity and a hint of concern.

The other sages looked at one another before staring at Xander, who c.o.c.ked his head to the side, puzzled with their looks.

It was Hailey who cleared her throat and introduced these people one by one to Xander, who nodded respectfully to these people, but generally non-plussed.

The sages were genuinely confused by Xander"s reactions. Generally, if someone would hear that a sage-cla.s.s cultivator is going to visit them, either they would be in fear, in happiness, or in reverence. Clearly, Xander didn"t fit in any of these molds and was just cordial to them.

They held their curiosity and came directly down to business.

"Xander, we just want to know when you started meeting with your Uncle Homer." Varmin asked Xander, the latter then furrowed his eyebrows, squinting his eyes. After a few seconds, he responded, his voice quite unsure.

"Hmm, around 6 years ago? It was just after my 2nd birthday if my memory serves me correctly. He appeared in my room, and began to teach me a lot of stuff!"

"Oh? What kind of stuff, Xander?" Margus asked, curious. Xander looked at him, his face having the look of a child attempting to look serious.

"A lot of things! He explained things to me about the elements and stuff, and even information concerning cultivation."

"Ah, I see… do you know why he came to look for you, Xander my boy?" Carolyn asked gently, her eyes attempting to see into the near future, but failing to do so, as all she saw was a heavy white fog covering everything.

��Hmm… no. He"s just a friendly uncle to me, giving me presents and stuff. Why? Is Uncle Homer ok?" I asked, my voice worried about "his" safety.

Hailey, seeing him, couldn"t help but her motherly instincts to activate, soothing Xander.

"There, there child, the man you call uncle is safe. However, we are not sure if he plans to return here again in the near future."

"Oh… yeah, uncle Homer does that, disappearing for months and then appearing again. It"s good that his safe, hehe." Xander said jovially, his mouth wide, forming a smile. It was these subtle actions that Xander was able to influence the emotional states of these sages. A few social cues here, dramatic voice there, poof! We got a good scene.

The sages continued to ask trivial questions, but they were layered with pitfalls that Xander had to quickly avoid. For example, he was asked if he knew what the fruits he had served to them. When Carolyn began to explain the fruits incorrectly, he noticed that there seemed to be something eying him, checking for the tiniest fluctuations in his emotion and thoughts.

Inwardly, Xander rolled his eyes. These were quite petty tricks, but for the sake of acting, he had to "look serious" and agreeing with what Carolyn had said about the plants" nature and origin like he truly had no idea where these came from.

He was getting a bit impatient though because they kept doing the same tactic with different variations. He just wanted to snap at them because he felt they were wasting his time.

This continued on until lunch. When it was lunchtime, Xander ate a few of his favorite cooked dishes, while the sages began to communicate with one another using magic perception.

"What do you think? Everything fits, doesn"t it?"

"Yes. We can be a.s.sured that our descendant has nothing to do with the recent events."

"Hmm, I still feel something is off."

"Why do you say that, Carolyn? Margus detected that the emotions and feelings exhibited by Xander were normal."

"It"s just that, can"t you agree that he"s just too calm about the situation?"

"That"s because we don"t know if that Homer Simpson had exposed Xander to places outside Eteria, where he could have met cultivators like us or even stronger cultivators."

"Maybe, the child was then called to witness killing people that he basically learned to control his emotions?"

"That"s too far-fetched, Carolyn. Face it, he"s innocent in this."

"However, do you think he is the person that Homer Simpson is looking for the past 7 years?"

"Highly possible."

"Yup, most likely it is him."

"Then doesn"t it make sense if he would return here in the future, then?"

"…that"s a possibility. Or maybe, he already imprinted the information to Xander"s mind of where to meet him?"

"That"s most likely the case. But didn"t we ask this question already and saw that he wasn"t lying?"

"Hmm, maybe the information will only reveal itself once Xander reaches a certain level of cultivation? There are spells that lie dormant like that."

"True, true. So should we end the questioning and leave already? After all, the necessary information had been gathered already. We also have a profile of that Homer Simpson. We just needed to look an eye out on the empires we reside in if he pops up in the radar."

"Agreed. Let"s inform the other sages as well."

The conversation happened within a span of two minutes, and Xander was just about to eat his dessert when the ancestors all stood up, causing him to stand up as well, and look at them confusingly.

It was Hailey who explained the situation to Xander.

"Xander, thank you for your time. However, we have important matters to attend to, so we have to leave now."

"Oh… Ok! Goodbye, Ancestors! Stay safe!" Xander was "dazed" momentarily, before thumping his chest, a form of salutation to them.

They all nodded back, and immediately left the villa, flying up in the sky.

For the next few minutes, Xander continued to eat, "acting" like he didn"t know the Sages were still eying him high above in the air.

Jokes on them though, Xander really just wanted to eat food.

For the next 30 minutes, that was what he all did, and soon, the sages for real left the area. Confirming nothing was left in the area, Xander finished up eating and headed into the living room, planning to relax and watch some series in Metflix.

It was a chill Sat.u.r.day for Xander, a bit surprising, but everything came to its rightful place in the end, anyway._____________________After the short visit, the sages have begun leaving the planet en ma.s.se, rising high up into the starry s.p.a.ce beyond the planet, their destinations unknown.

The contents of their conversation were not privy to the members of their families and clans, so no one knew what they had in plan.

Xander looked up in the darkening sky, seeing the numerous sages flying upwards like comets in the wide s.p.a.ce. He didn"t care much about them, but at least he could go back to his normal life for now.

He visited his laboratory and Eden, enjoying his time spent inside these places.

He took his time exploring the revamped Laboratory, spending a total of 144,000 years inside or 2 hours outside. The planets and other stars were forming nicely, but he didn"t have the patience to explore the area.

What he did, however, was read through the research and projects of the Cerulean and Helennic empires, allowing him to test them out in a span of 144,000 years. However, it was roughly 1/4th of the papers, because some of the projects were going to take too long.