"How?" Aldred said. He was so close to defeating Victor that he did really wanted a quick solution to kill him.
"I will have to make a time machine for you as well."
"So using time against time?"
Zaxary nodded. "I cannot make something stronger than his. Not in the short term."
"What can you give me?"
"A few seconds back in time."
"How will that help me fight him?"
"When he reverted the time to hours ago, all you have to do is revert time again. I just watched what he did. The capsule managed to reverted time to a few hours ago in a few seconds. After the reverse time stopped, you have to reverse time back again."
"So it's like throwing a reverse uno card, only for your opponent to throw the same thing."
"What's a uno card?"
"Never mind."
"When can you get this done?"
"I already have it. All I have to do is customize it for you."
"How long will that take?"
"Hopefully, not for long. I never make something for others before, so this might take a while."
Aldred sighed and nodded. "When can we start?"
"But before that, can I really trust you to keep your promise?"
"My goal is to spread knowledge to my people," Aldred said. "I in fact want you to become a teacher in my establishment if possible. If you don't want to, then it's fine, I will give resources for your experiment."
"What will you earn from it?"
"Well, you can share the knowledge you earn from your experience with even more resources and wealth if that is what you want."
"Did he also promised you that?" Zaxary asked Naley.
"He didn't promise me anything."
"Why?"
"I didn't ask for anything," Naley said. "All I want is the freedom for the citizen of Duria. They are helping me doing that."
"And what about Barne? I know that skyscraper-sized robot was his."
"I am not sure about that," Naley said. "What did you promise him?" She asked Aldred.
"I promised him that his creation could be used for anything he wanted, and no one would force him to create robot for others unless he wanted to."
"Hmmmm."
"I have no reason to kill you. Your existence benefits me more."
"So if I become useless, will you kill me?" Zaxary asked.
"After everything is done, whether you are dead or alive won't be a concern to me. But as long as you contribute something you will earn more wealth than you can imagine. With your skills, I believe you can earn so much money that you won't need to work for the rest of your life."
"Also," Aldred continued. "In my empire we have something called potions and elixirs that can even give you an increased lifespan. So you might be able to live for more than a thousand year if you have enough money."
"Sounds so too good to be true," Zaxary said.
"Nothing is too good for magic. You saw my power. If I really want to, I can destroy an entire city with my power."
"Let me give you an example of my power."
Suddenly, a cold blade touched Zaxary's neck. He looked to the side with his eyes and noticed another Aldred appeared behind him.
"It's that easy for me to kill you. For some people who hunted you down, it might be too good to be true, but for me, it's as normal as breathing."
Zaxary gulped as Aldred pulled his sword back.
"So, now you can trust me?" Aldred stared at him.
Zaxary rubbed his neck. "For now."
Aldred clapped and smiled wide. "Great. So let's get back to work. Bring everyone here. And what do you all want? I can buy you all food and drinks that you might like."
Aldred's change in attitude slightly surprised Zaxary. Suddenly, Barne and Sofiel was teleported here.
"Fuck! Can you at least warn me before you teleport me?" Barne shouted.
Sofiel on the other hand shook her head as she got a headache from the sudden teleportation.
"Sofiel! The one that kidnapped you was them!?" Zaxary was shocked again.
"Why, you know her?" Stella asked.
"I… used to be a fan."
Naley laughed when she heard that. "What a loser."
"No worries. Sofiel will sing for us to motivate you all to work," Aldred sing. "In the meantime… what do you all want? I will get us something to eat."
"Tell him what you guys want," Stella said. "That's the Emperor of the Ceraisian Empire asking you."
Aldred's laid back attitude made it hard for them to treat him as Emperor. It was fine though. Aldred did not want them to act all stiff and formal.
Though if he was out in the public, he had to act dignified because his head held the pride and dignity of an entire nation.
That was the responsibility that he had to upheld at all time.
"Can we ask for kebabs and burgers?"
"I think I have some in my inventory." Aldred pulled something out of thin air, and it was stacks of kebabs. It then floated atop a nearby table, still steaming with heat.
"How did he just get those?" Zaxary asked in confusion with a mix of wonder and amazement in his expression.
"Magic," Naley and Barne said at the same time.
"Magic… it's that convenient?" Zaxary couldn't believe that he just found out about this thing called 'magic'. It was much more useful than technology.
Imagine if he could get hot kebabs anytime and anywhere he wanted.
He could live under the sewer with the rats and cockroaches and still be satisfied with his live with that kind of power.
"Don't even think about it," Barne said. "Magic requires mana affinity and talent. What they showed you is the highest form of magic. No one can simply pull food out of thin air even if they are good in the art of magic. These two are anomalies among anomalies."
"Ohh… so it's impossible for me?"
"Unless you can master space and time theories and create device to manipulate them, it's basically impossible to do what he just did," Naley said.
"His magic is that advanced?"
"Well, my magic keep the kebab warm and I kept them in some sort of astral dimension that only I can access it."
"That's… amazing. It's like having a cloud drive where you can store data and access it through your comms devices."
"Exactly like that, but I can store physical objects instead of data."
"Can this power somehow be blocked like a bad connection or something?"
"This power doesn't rely on signals or mana, but nothing is impossible in the world of magic, so someone might have the power to prevent me from accessing my inventory."
"How many items can you store in this so called astral dimension?"
"I haven't checked again, but it's probably as big as a huge island by now. It increased in size every time I get stronger."
"Wow… is it possible that it will be as big as a planet?"
"That is a possibility," Aldred replied.
"You would be a god of your own world. Imagine putting people and animals in there. You can watch over them, change their fate and destiny or something like that."
"Boring," Aldred said. "I don't like playing gods. I like adventure and exploration."
"And yet, you become Emperor."
"I don't plan to stay in this continent for long. I just want to make sure that no one would create chaos before I left. Enough talking, when are you going to begin your work."
"Let us start right away."
