Charles was sitting at the desk, thinking hard about the next action plan.
There are too many places in the Empire that require magic or soul identification - including the Library where he is now. Therefore, once he leaves here, he will never be able to come in again.
Although he can go to the cafeteria and certain specific buildings, most courses also require identity verification. The laboratory, and even the "Soul Link" in the virtual reality cabin that needs to be used during class, all require identity verification.
If he leaves the university, his movements will be restricted everywhere. Before the war, taking public transportation did not require such strict identity verification, but it is different now. Charles had been saving money before and did not buy private transportation, and there was really no need before. As for buying one now? That also requires legal identification.
He cannot leave this planet at all, because the vast majority of civilian passenger starships are subject to extremely strict control. As for those "space Transit Gate" that can cross the galaxy, the identity review of the users is even more stringent.
'Can I really just expose my identity obediently?' Charles struggled in his heart for a few minutes, and finally gave up the idea.
He turned around and went to the bookshelf to find a lot of magic books about "souls". His best choice at the moment was to do everything he could to hide the mutation in his soul.
In the next two hours, he could only read the book honestly, because he had to wait for the incredible backtracking ability to cool down before he could use it again. As soon as the cooling time was up, Charles immediately activated the ability, rapidly deepening his mastery of the knowledge in the book.
However, he quickly frowned: 'With just these superficial public knowledge, I can only touch the surface of soul science at most.'
He knew very well that unless he could become a top expert in the soul field, it would be impossible to perfectly hide the mutated fluctuations. The intense frustration made him clenched his fists tightly. Charles took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. He knew that every move he made now might lead to imprisonment.
'My best chance of winning is to find a way to escape from the territory of the Empire. Although it is extremely dangerous to survive outside in the current chaotic situation of war, it is still better than being arrested as a heretic. With my talent, as long as I am given enough time to develop...'
For any magic profession, knowledge is the top priority. Under normal circumstances, it is difficult for civilians with no background like Charles to have access to such advanced knowledge. After all, he knows very well how the old nobles monopolized knowledge on his original home planet.
However, in the current chaotic situation of Milky Way Galaxy, it has become easier to obtain knowledge through some crooked ways.
'I need to find access to the black market.'
Charles Although I don't know if there is really a black market on the earth, there is no absolutely perfect Utopia in the world. Even Arcane Empire must have its dark side hidden in the sun. Perhaps, he can find a way to sneak out of this planet from the black market.
'Before I leave, I must acquire as much knowledge as possible.'
Charles plans to make full use of the current opportunity to absorb all the accessible knowledge in this the Library. In order to achieve this goal, he is even planning to purchase "Fasting Pill" from some students from China District.
Fasting Pill is a magical alchemy product produced by China District. It is loved by low-level Arcanist who still need to eat to maintain physiological functions. Usually only Fourth Tier Only mages with and below will use it, because once they reach Fifth Tier or higher, Arcanist can directly rely on absorbing magic power to maintain life and no longer need to eat.
Just swallowing one Fasting Pill can ensure that you won't feel hungry without eating or drinking for two weeks. Although soaking in a the Library for more than a month will definitely attract some strange eyes, Charles decided to take the risk. He just needs to play his cards well and find the most suitable time to stop before leaving school.
As for the destination of his escape, he targeted the low-tech star sector. He planned to hide there first to avoid the limelight, and then slowly search for traces of the black market.
After making the plan, Charles breathed a sigh of relief and prepared to continue studying hard. However, unfortunately, something unexpected happened.
The Library's room suddenly became dim, and the surrounding environment began to twist and fold strangely like countless refracting mirrors!
Charles's face changed drastically, and he suddenly recalled a very similar scene in a movie called <Doctor Strange> that he had watched in his previous life on Earth.
'Mirror Space?!'
Before Charles could react, six mysterious figures had quietly appeared in front of him. They were all wearing dark magic robes with an extremely eye-catching clock logo embroidered on them. What shocked him even more was that the leader turned out to be a strange-looking creature that looked like an alien ET.
The strange thing is that Charles always felt that this creature looked familiar, but for a while he couldn't remember where he had seen it.
"Charles·Wentworth?" the creature asked coldly.
"It's me. Do I know who you are and what your purpose is? Blatantly kidnapping a Empire citizen is a felony!" Charles replied pretending to be calm, but there was a deliberate tremor of "fear" in his tone.
"We are Guardians from the Time Aurors, Empire timeline." The creature from the Novad clan replied coldly.
"You are now officially arrested on suspicion of tampering with the timeline."
'Damn it!' Charles cursed crazily in his heart. 'Did the person in power even arrange the means to prevent time travellers in advance?!'
He couldn't accept that he didn't even have a chance to use his ability to go back in time and escape.
"I think you have arrested the wrong person. I have nothing to do with Time Magic at all. No, how can a weak Arcanist like me get access to Time Magic?"
"You don't need to deny it," Novad clan Auror interrupted him mercilessly, "Our equipment has locked you. Moreover, I can see the time and space fluctuations emanating from you with the naked eye. As for whether you did it on your own or with the help of a powerful magic item, we will naturally find out the truth after we capture you."
Following his order, all the other Time Aurors immediately raised their staffs and assumed a fighting posture.
'Time Rewind! Backtrack quickly! Time Rewind!' Charles shouted hysterically in his mind.
Unfortunately, his plug-in ability cannot be activated continuously at all, and it will take a long time for him to cool down and recharge.
In the end, Time Aurors escorted Charles to an extremely special prison. The underlying laws of this prison could completely block the possibility of him using any time power. The moment Charles stepped into the cell, he desperately felt that his ability was completely disabled, and he could not even use it on a book.
A few minutes later, someone took him to another room filled with various weird machines and fastened him to those instruments.
"What are you going to do to me?" Charles asked in horror. At this time, an old man Arcanist with white hair slowly walked up to him.
"We are just reading the remaining time energy in your body to see what happened before you traveled back to this point in time."
"You can actually do such a thing?!" Charles was really panicking now.
"Of course," the old man replied with a smile, "I like to receive people like you the most."
"What do you mean?"
"Theoretically, it is impossible to change events that have happened in the past. If someone travels back in time and tries to change history, they will only create a 'parallel universe' in which history has been changed. When that person returns to his original timeline, he will find that nothing has changed. Can you understand?"
"I understand. Only in that newly created parallel timeline did things change." Charles replied.
"Absolutely correct. However, there are some extremely unique Time Magic that allow spellcasters to directly change the past without creating a new timeline; they can directly rewrite reality in this universe through their own actions!"
"We call people with this ability 'Time Lord', and you are one of them. Since the establishment of the Time Auror Department, we have successfully captured 12 Time Lords, and you are the 13th."
Charles opened his mouth wide and was so shocked that he could not utter a word. This was the first time in his life that he had such a profound understanding of how horrifying the background and methods of the Arcane Empire, which was established less than a century ago, were.
At the same time, he also felt deeply Envy about the incredible achievements of that Arcane Archon. He even began to regret why he was reincarnated in this hellish place. Here, not only did he have no chance to get ahead, even surviving became a luxury.
"Everything is ready." A researcher at the back reported. The white-haired old man nodded to Charles, then turned and left.
Immediately afterwards, those cold machines started to run. A few minutes later, everything Charles experienced before Time Rewind was clearly played on the screen.
Everything seemed normal until the screen played to the moment when he encountered an accident in the Library and his soul traveled through time for the first time.
Different from the poor quality surveillance video of the previous intelligence department, Time Aurors's equipment perfectly picked up and reproduced the words Charles muttered incredulously when he was first reincarnated:
"I didn't die? What's even more incredible is that I actually caught up with the trend of time travel and was reborn into a fantasy world full of swords and magic?!"
"Reincarnation? Interesting, things are getting more and more interesting. I'm curious about where he came from?" the white-haired old man said with great interest.
"He could come from any corner of Self our universe, or he could come from another dimension, plane, or even a parallel timeline." Another researcher replied, "There are countless possibilities."
"That's right," the old man agreed, while continuing to watch the subsequent scenes of Charles being arrested as a spy by the Intelligence Bureau, and then activating the ability to rewind time.
"This person's situation is much more complicated than we expected, because he is obviously not just an ordinary Time Lord. Immediately send the compiled information to the Imperial Family, and let the highest level of the Empire decide how to deal with him."
A researcher immediately sent all the top-secret information collected directly to Commander Olivia. Their department is a ghost agency that does not exist in the eyes of the public. It only directly serves Imperial Family and has the privilege of reporting directly to the highest level.
Not even a minute after the intelligence was sent, they received a reply from the highest level: a consul's wife would arrive at the scene in person immediately to take over this troublesome mess.