Chapter 277 – Free To Play With Time

“Ha, I do to try to improve any faults I see in my students,” Phyllie says, her tone flat but laced with dry amusement. “Now, any other questions?”

“Those crystals you use that have more mana than an essence, are they natural or one of your creations?” Emily asks immediately.

“My creation. Maybe I’ll tell you more next time we meet.”

“That’s all, then. Thank you for your time.”

“No, thank you for yours,” the Queen of Gems replies, her gaze fixed meaningfully on Emily’s metal bicep, as if staring straight through it. “You’ve given me plenty to think on; the universe’s creations are truly profound. I’m sure you don’t yet realise just how great that artefact of yours is, but I’m certain you’ll understand once you reach ninth circle. When you do, seek me out, and we’ll have a fruitful exchange.”

“I will.” Emily nods.

“Until then,” Phyllie waves her hand, drawing crystalline spurs up from the floor between them and forming them into a glistening archway, “if any of my equals attempts to pressure you, feel free to mention my name. If they’re reasonable, they should respect that, and if not, well, good luck.”

Space within the crystal arch collapses, breaking away into a swirling spatial tunnel leading right back into Emily’s workshop.

“Understood.” Emily rises from her seat and strides towards the archway, nodding once towards Phyllie in farewell and catching a glint of approval in the crystals staring back just as the twisted-but-stable space between places swallows her view.

Stepping out into her workshop, Emily takes a few paces before turning to watch the portal crumble into crystals behind her. A swirl of time and spatial mana with the familiar, rich magic signature of the Queen of Gems bursts from them as they fall and, within a heartbeat, they reform as Phyllie’s crystal avatar.

The avatar nods before vanishing in a silent twist of space, leaving Emily alone with her thoughts.

It’s only a few minutes, however, until Silvia strides into the room, breaking the silence and absolute stillness, meeting Emily’s flat, distant gaze with a grin.

“We’ve arrived! I thought you’d like to know.”

Emily nods and shifts back into gear, setting her mind to utilising her new skills.

“That I do. I take it we don’t have long till the next cycle?”

“Two hours.”

Emily wraps them both with spatial mana before warping them to the exit mark in her room. The moment they arrive, she releases a burst of lime-green mana and weaves it into a complex, shifting matrix of runes and balancing geometries that fills the room.

“Would you like to join me on a little forced infiltration that no one will ever remember?” she asks as she activates the spell: Temporal Shield.

Nothing visible happens, but Emily feels a shiver pass through her as the sense of being watched settles into the back of her awareness.

“Maybe. What was that?” Silvia questions, narrowing her eyes as any trace of the spell fades away. “You’re not going to cause any trouble that will get us held up here, right?”

“That was a time spell I developed recently with a little help. It means I can freely rewind within the next hour without anyone detecting it,” Emily explains with a grin, glancing at her bed and watching Silica sit up to shake off her sleep at the sound of her mother’s voice. “So, I’m going to cause trouble, but it won’t get us held up.”

“Rewinding time…” Silvia mutters with a mixture of disbelief and burgeoning realisation. “That something you’ve been able to do for long? You ever plan on mentioning it when I’ll remember?”

“Yes, and maybe.” Emily shrugs, releasing a burst of spatial mana and carefully building a teleportation spell to get them as close to the Jump Gate as possible, letting the twisting runes fill the room. “You already know more than I’d willingly tell most others, so maybe one day, if you play your cards right.”

“Well, I look forward to that then. Let’s go cause some chaos; I take it this is because you want a closer look at their tech?”

“Exactly! See, you already know me so well.” Emily activates the spell, ripping everyone out of her room and into the open vacuum of space.

They shimmer back into existence a kilometre from the hulking metal body of the Jump Gate, right in front of a thin, barely visible energy barrier that hums a loud tone to Emily’s senses. Mensacus and Silica both position themselves at their mother’s heels as she reaches out, laying her palms flat on the barrier and ignoring the high-voltage shock that tries to melt her in return.

Silvia watches with intrigue, her innate barrier visibly bulging with extra qi, just in case, as the Lichtenburg scars and electrical traces decorating Emily’s face ignite with cold blue and silver light. Emily’s eyes are flooded with light, and the hum of static fills everyone’s ears despite the vacuum between them.

She remains frozen for a second before pursing her lips and blowing a single long, whistling tone. The barrier quakes in tune with her. She releases a pulse of mana, charged with lightning and the magnetic component of metal, that weighs on the shivering barrier before her. It immediately cracks and shatters inwards, the edges of the gaping wound sizzling with charge and unmoving.

“Let’s go,” Emily declares, her words seeped in an electric hiss as she propels herself through the fracture.

Silvia kicks off nothing, flying forward to float at Emily’s side. Mensacus wraps an arm around his little sister before following.

The moment they’re all clear, Emily drops her elemental connections, and the hissing crackle around the border of the barrier’s fracture cuts out. The opening quickly heals over, resealing as if nothing happened.

Emily doesn’t glance back, leading the others towards the edge of the large ring of metal and scanning its surface for weapons. Several pop out and point towards them, but Emily casually casts a few spells, conjuring a cluster of lightning bolts that rocket out towards the defences before they can fire.

Her attacks melt the weapons into inoperable messes, but otherwise barely scorch the surrounding alloy plating.

Several energy signatures flare within the Gate’s structure, but only one of them feels like it could be seventh level, so Emily ignores them. She flies forward, coming to a halt inches from one of the large metal panels making up the outside of the megastructure. She places both palms on the metal and lets out a flood of machina, drinking in as much of the structure as she can reach.

While she’s fully devoted to expanding her blueprint collection, Silvia looks towards the awakened defenders coming to force them back. There are four of them total, a seventh phase humanoid-crystal, translucent and cut from dark, muddy hues, two sixth stage synthetic humanoids wrapped in matching rings of metal seeped in crackling plasma, and a fifth circle mage who appears completely human other than his glowing green eyes and cloak of churning winds.

“I’ll take rock man,” Silvia declares, cracking her fingers before splaying them with talons of blood forming at the tips, glancing over at Mensacus and Silica. “Will you be able to keep the others off your mother’s back alone?”

“We’ll manage.” Mensacus nods, flooding his enchanted tattoos with mana and waving his tentacles, tearing open several small holes in space to let out his wendigos.

Silvia rockets forward before the defenders facing them have time to speak, lashing out towards the phosphelite’s face. She’s fast enough to gouge a deep line across what constitutes the living gem’s cheek, but he leans away from the attack just as quickly, kicking back and swiping up with a qi-charged kick that catches Silvia’s chin, knocking her back a step.

“I’ve heard you crystals don’t bleed.” She swallows the blow without batting an eye and pursues him with a grin. “Let’s put that to the test.”

Mensacus watches her go, exchanging blows heavy enough to crack steel and quickly forcing her opponent away from Emily’s silent focus, before turning his gaze back to his own targets. The twin synths both try to attack Emily with arcs of charged plasma from the strange machines orbiting them, but Harriet and two of Mensacus’ wendigos throw themselves in front of the beams. The familiar latches onto the beams, leeching off their energy, and the wendigos soak up the remainder, letting out pained screeches as the surface of their thickened skin melts and they direct baleful glares on their attackers.

Neither of the synths flinches at the targeted malice, letting out streams of machina and tapping several commands into their machines. Mensacus charges his arm to fire a shot back, but it’s blocked by a thin shield of energy. While Harriet latches onto the energy barrier, Mensacus releases a flood of malice, conjuring a writhing mass of dark snakes and tendrils to coil around the synths, slowly constricting their shields while he charges his throat and third eye with mana before opening the latter and letting out a guttural, hissing whisper, washing the synths in milky-white light and trying to worm his way into their minds.

While he’s distracting them, the final wendigo is locked in a gnashing storm of teeth and claws, trying to rip the humanoid mage asunder and keeping all of his focus as Silica slings shards of sand from afar.

Emily doesn’t glance towards the fighting, leaving a single thread to keep track of everyone else’s health as she works her way through several layers of anti-mechanic measures. The Gate is built in compounding layers, with those closer to the outside specifically designed to stop meddling mechanics getting a look or finger inside.

First, there are multiple layers of alloys that resist her machina flow, but converting her energy to lightning mana allows her to slip through them without too much trouble. Next is an electromagnetic stasis shield, an entire layer wrapping the protected mechanisms in a constantly fluctuating net of magnetic fields that repel any other magnetic forces. To break through the shield, Emily tries a few forceful methods before giving up and creating a simple spatial spell, using a conical drill of spatial mana to tunnel through to the next layer.

Finally, she brushes up against the first of the structures for folding space, but she finds the feedback she receives is a strange, distorted blend of what it should be.

These results are gibberish. None of this is a valid structure, so how is my machina reading it… anti-observation enchantments! They must have some that work to distort machina scans. In that case…

Emily begins casting several more abstract spells, focusing on the concept of vision and revealing the truth. She keeps getting nonsense back, but she doesn’t stop trying.

“How’s the petty knowledge theft going?” Silvia asks with a laugh as she’s thrown into the side of the Gate ten metres or so from Emily, denting the thick outer plating.

“Alright,” Emily responds, glancing over at the beaming vampire and casting yet another spell that returns nothing useful. “They have several magical protections in place as well, which I’m struggling to break through.”

“Okay, I’ll keep this guy distracted then.” Silvia spins and lashes out, sending a thin blade of blood flying towards a colossal fist of rock falling down on them. “You may want to look at helping your youngest before too long, though.”

Emily hums in acknowledgement as Silvia kicks off the side of the megastructure, turning her head towards the sandy-fox in question. She’s still unharmed, running circles around the wind mage, but he’s already pulled the wendigo harassing him to pieces, leaving the monster a limbless husk unable to keep him distracted.

Emily raises a hand towards the mage as he conjures a swarm of spinning wind blades to dice her daughter with, opening a small portal to her Factory. There’s no warning in the silent void before a heavy hunk of metal is flung out from one of Elisime’s railguns, punching a hole clean through the top layer of the mage's barrier cloak and sending him flying in a spray of blood.

She can feel his energy signature still going strong as his body flies away without control, but she pays him no heed, considering him down for now and calling Silica back to safety at her side.

She keeps casting different observation spells until finally one of them clicks, cleaning up the messy readings she was getting and giving her a full look at the Gate’s blueprint. Emily commits every detail to memory before glancing over at Silvia, still mid-fight with a look of glee on her face, and Mensacus, standing in place, glaring down two blank-faced mechanics with his mana nearly completely depleted as Harriet happily fries their machines’ internals.

“We’re done here!” She activates The Clock.

***

Emily blinks back to awareness the moment she and Silvia left her Factory to enter her room, this time with the Jump Gate’s full blueprint sitting comfortably in her mind and not a single mark on the universe’s main timeline to show where she got it.

“Two hours?” she says, comfortably slipping back into the conversation. “Well, we best go make the most of it and have a look then.”

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