Chapter 3490: Time Discontinuity, Analysis of Gains and Losses

————It will be later~~

————

Very soon, Xia Duo once again received news synchronized through the Alliance Command Network regarding a new Time-Involving Signal discovered at Xiangshui Lake; he had long since ceased to be surprised by this.

Although he was continuously "fleecing the sheep" to collect Time Force, it was clear that the Illuminati's current reserves of Time Force were still quite sufficient. After two high-level Mages checked repeatedly to no avail, they gave up on the inspection and turned to pushing the ritual process forward with full force.

By the time the Alliance discovered it and sent people over, they couldn't even catch the Illuminati's wake; of course, this was assuming Xia Duo did not actively intervene.

At first, it was out of concern for the Illuminati's frantic counterattacks, coupled with the fact that he was still collecting Time Force, that he did not notify the Alliance in advance. In truth, it would not have been easy to explain even if he had.

Prophecy is not omnipotent; it is impossible to explain everything using prophecy. With the precedent of Beilunuo already in place, Xia Duo did not want to appear too abnormal.

After the Alliance Mages left, Xia Duo still did not leave, but instead stayed for a while longer, only stopping when he could no longer collect any Time Force.

Although it was just one instance, and it had not changed the original outcome, being able to collect ten times the Time Force of a Time Gem still made him feel very gratified.

He had personally experienced the characteristic of Time Force transcending the Time Line. He did not believe that Dafuni could possess infinite reserves of Time Force; it could even be said that precisely because it was not infinite, Dafuni chose to stake everything in the end.

And after realizing that the essence of the Time-line War was the consumption of Time Force, Xia Duo had immediately changed his original plan, shifting from changing the battlefield situation to collecting Time Force.

Of course, this did not mean the battlefield situation was unimportant. The Illuminati currently did not grasp the idea of Time Anchoring the past, but Dafuni could likewise use Time Force to transcend the Time Line. As long as she experienced enough, it was hard to guarantee she wouldn't understand that the key to Time Anchoring the past lay in Divine Power.

Even if the opponent could not use the power of the Lord of Radiance, the power of the Elf main gods was very likely to be utilized by them. After all, every member of the current Illuminati had a legitimate identity in the Elf World, and they had not all been exposed.

Under the condition that the power of the Lord of Radiance had been clearly shown to be able to Time Anchor the past, Xia Duo could not gamble that the power of the Elf main gods could not Time Anchor the past.

Therefore, whenever possible, he would still try his best to change the outcome of local battlefields, though the priority would be slightly behind collecting Time Force.

……

After leaving Xiangshui River, Xia Duo immediately headed to the next key battlefield, which was still a source of a Time-Involving Signal that had been identified in the previous Time Line but had not yet occurred in the current one.

Just as he had guessed, the Illuminati would indeed not easily change their plans. Almost not long after he arrived at this place called "Red River Valley," a team of Illuminati Mages appeared here with great fanfare.

Red River Valley, as the name suggests, is a valley terrain. The mountains are covered with maple trees, and the maple leaves falling into the river look as if they have dyed the river water red, hence the name.

As soon as that team of Illuminati Mages appeared, they began to Spellcast and investigate without any restraint, seemingly hoping to eliminate all hidden dangers before the ritual began. However, Xia Duo's "Parasitic Heaven and Earth" was clearly a cut above, and he did not reveal any traces.

Just as Xia Duo thought he could successfully collect Time Force again like he did at Xiangshui River, a female Elf whose face was shrouded in starlight appeared in the valley—it was the leader of the Illuminati, Dafuni!

"Seeing" Dafuni arrive, Xia Duo's heart sank. Although he did not believe Dafuni could defeat him, he feared that his plan to collect Time Force would now encounter complications.

It stood to reason that the Illuminati, or rather Dafuni, had already noticed the abnormal consumption of Time Force at Xiangshui River, and he had also used this method when he fought Dafuni at Taiweimansa previously.

Although he had not revealed his identity at that time, his trip to Taiweimansa was not a secret. Moreover, he had once debated the philosophy of the Illuminati with Dafuni, which would also expose his true identity.

And regardless of whether he was exposed, Dafuni could likely determine that the person collecting Time Force at Xiangshui River and the one collecting it at Taiweimansa were the same person, and that it was highly probable they were from the Alliance side.

The war between him and the Illuminati was far from over. He was not sure if Dafuni could bring this known information to another Time Line, but he could minimize the leakage of information.

Thus, Xia Duo decisively chose to abandon this battlefield, or one could even say abandon this Time Line. He quickly left Red River Valley, and the first thing he did upon returning to Yongle City was to reshape the Time Line.

But just before Spellcasting, Xia Duo thought of another question: what would happen if he took things from this Time Line to another Time Line?

Normally, this would be impossible, because reshaping the Time Line is almost equivalent to reversing time to return to the past. But if one really wanted to do it, it would actually be very simple: just store the items outside the Main Plane.

In fact, Xia Duo had already done this; previously, when Niya left the Main Plane with Chang'an City, it was equivalent to taking a large amount of matter away from that Time Line.

But because Niya left the Main Plane before the Time Node Xia Duo anchored, it meant that every time Xia Duo reshaped the Time Line or returned to the past, Niya was not in the Main Plane.

But what if the act of taking away matter happened after the anchored Time Node?

Would it cause an alternative effect of Time Anchoring the past, meaning that by taking away matter at that moment, the reshaping of the Time Line could at most only start from that moment?

Or would it have an impact on the Time Force consumed for reshaping the Time Line?

If it were anyone else, it might be difficult to conduct such an experiment; there are mainly two difficulties here.

One is that one must at least be able to have consciousness transcend the Time Line and be able to maintain continuity of consciousness during changes in the Time Line; otherwise, one's own memory would return to the starting point of the reshaped Time Line, and naturally, one would not remember what experiments were conducted afterward.

The other is relatively simpler: one must at least possess the ability to store matter outside the Main Plane. If it were still stored within the Main Plane, then after reshaping the Time Line, those materials would certainly return to their original positions, making the experiment pointless.

Besides this, Xia Duo also wanted to explore the changes in time outside the Main Plane.

Although in theory, reshaping the Time Line can be localized to a certain area, because all things influence each other, to truly change the past, one must start with the Plane as the standard.

Otherwise, wouldn't other creatures within the Plane who were not affected by the reshaped Time Line easily discover the anomaly!

After thinking carefully for a long time, Xia Duo decided to proceed in two steps: first, verify the impact of taking away matter on reshaping the Time Line, in hopes of being able to use this to gain a greater advantage in the subsequent war with the Illuminati.