With a flash of displaced air, Newt followed the card's guidance and brought everyone to a house adorned with an eye symbol.
"An eye symbol?" Aiden looked at the strange marking outside the house.
He could sense this was a special alchemical tool with very powerful magic attached to it. It could ward off all malice directed at the house's owner, and there was something familiar about this rebounding aura...
'Resentment!' Aiden's eyes widened in recognition.
The owner of this house had so brazenly cut off a piece of a Deep Realm King and processed it into a magical tool to hang outside their front door?
"Come on, Aiden, stop spacing out and hurry inside!" Newt urged impatiently.
Everyone entered the room together, and Newt couldn't wait to open his case and dive straight in.
"Oh for heaven's sake." Tina sat to the side and rolled her eyes in exasperation.
"Hey, Newt, buddy, Tina's alone up here. Maybe you want to come up and keep her company?" Jacob felt this teammate was really too much for him to handle.
Aiden went upstairs, where a pale old man who moved slowly heard the commotion and opened his door to come out.
"Friends, hello there. It's been decades since anyone has visited here." The old man smiled warmly at Aiden.
Aiden removed his hat, placed it respectfully on his chest, and bowed to him.
"Pleased to meet you, Mr Nicolas Flamel."
"A Prewett dragon-person. Who are you planning to wage war against this time?" Nicolas asked with obvious curiosity.
"No, I've come back from the future. You should have foreseen my arrival and had someone bring me the Emerald Tablet."
Aiden pulled out a book from his pocket—the Emerald Tablet he had transcribed from Edmund's notes.
"Such opportunities are rare indeed. Come, let's have some tea together."
Seeing Aiden produce the ancient book, Nicolas felt genuinely pleased and excited.
He led Aiden to a door and pushed it open with careful reverence.
On the other side of the door lay a vast grassland with perfect sunshine and gentle breezes. A small cobblestone path extended from the door to a charming courtyard where an elderly woman appeared to be sitting peacefully.
After spending considerable time walking the winding path with Nicolas, the three sat down comfortably in the sunlit courtyard.
"This is my wife, Perenelle." Nicolas introduced her with obvious affection.
"Pleased to meet you. I am Aiden Prewett." Aiden nodded respectfully to her.
"So, did you bring that thing?" After the polite pleasantries, Nicolas immediately became excited and eager.
"Of course." Aiden opened his hand, and a pink Philosopher's Stone lay quietly in his palm.
"Why is it pink? Well, at least it was successfully passed down." Nicolas first frowned in confusion, then seemed genuinely relieved.
"So where did you extract the life force?" Perenelle asked Aiden with professional interest.
"I can travel through different timelines. This Philosopher's Stone was created during the earliest goblin wars." Aiden replied smoothly.
However, this was a deliberate lie. In reality, Aiden had not actively collected the goblins' life force at all. Rather, during his battles with them, the Bone Church had automatically seized their life force without his direct intervention.
Afterward, Aiden had carefully reprocessed the life force according to the Emerald Tablet that Nicolas had given him. For some unknown reason during this complex process, the blood-red stone had mysteriously turned pink.
"I theorise the reason your stone changed colour might be that you used too little of Hell's component, but that's not the key point here. What's the next target? You've conquered the Philosopher's Stone, one of the three supreme achievements. Which of the remaining two is it?"
Nicolas rubbed his hands together eagerly, somewhat excited by the possibilities.
"Artificial humans." Aiden revealed the answer without hesitation.
"But artificial humans involve a very serious problem." Aiden crossed his hands and rested them thoughtfully under his chin.
"Emotions, or rather, complete minds and souls, right?" Nicolas immediately identified Aiden's core dilemma.
"Yes, the soul issue is secondary. The key is the mind itself. As wizards, our minds carry our own will, making them very prone to infecting and distorting our creations. Unless we can find a powerful mental entity that carries absolutely no will of its own."
Aiden cupped the tea that Perenelle had poured for him and took a contemplative sip.
"You mean Folly?" Nicolas understood exactly which target Aiden was referring to.
"What are the odds of success?" Nicolas became genuinely interested as well.
"You're not planning to go capture Him right now, are you?" Aiden saw Nicolas's eager expression and felt concerned.
"Well..." Nicolas scratched his head somewhat sheepishly.
"We've already captured Him in the future. I believe when conditions are right, we should be able to begin proper experiments." Aiden reassured him calmly.
"What a pity I won't live to see it. But at least there are still successors continuously embarking on this path." Nicolas suddenly felt somewhat comforted by this knowledge.
"Well, I'll go make you something to eat." Perenelle stood up gracefully and walked toward the door.
"I'll go downstairs and check on things first. You two take your time strolling."
Seeing the two seemingly running and walking with all their might toward the door, Aiden decided to go ahead first.
Downstairs, Newt had already dealt with the Zouwu's magical chains and was now working carefully with Tina to remove parasites from the unconscious Kama.
Newt handed the squirming parasite to Jacob, who grabbed the tweezers with a thoroughly disgusted expression.
Just then, Aiden came down from upstairs.
"Oh, Aiden, look—squid tentacles!" Jacob showed the parasite to Aiden with obvious revulsion.
Then the parasite in Jacob's hand suddenly became extremely active as if it had detected something, struggling desperately to pounce toward Aiden.
Aiden stared in confusion. "What the—?"
"Dragon parasite—keep it away!" Aiden directly breathed out dragon fire in pure instinct.
He froze the parasite into harmless ice shards, incidentally freezing half of Jacob's body as well.
"This is a water dragon parasite. You shouldn't bring it near Aiden..." Newt wiped his hands with a cloth, wanting to warn Jacob, but it was already too late.
After some considerable commotion, Jacob sat on the sofa wrapped in thick blankets like a bundled infant.
"Achoo!" Jacob sneezed violently.
Aiden's staff emitted warm, healing light to gradually restore Jacob's body temperature.
"Sorry about that—instinctive reaction. That was such a large parasite after all." Aiden apologised sincerely to Jacob.
"Forget it, it was my fault too. I really didn't know, achoo..." Jacob pulled out a tissue and wiped his nose thoroughly.
"Alright, I need to go report to the Ministry!" Tina stood up decisively and started walking toward the door.
"You didn't mention fire salamanders or anything like that, did you!" Jacob looked up with obvious concern.
"No." Newt stood frozen in place like a statue.
"Then hurry, achoo, hurry and chase after her!" Jacob was so anxious he nearly stood up despite his condition.
Only then did Newt snap to attention and quickly chase after her.
"That guy really..." Jacob looked at Aiden beside him with exasperation.
"Looks like Tina's path to love is destined to be rocky." Aiden raised his eyebrows meaningfully at Jacob.
"What do we do now?" Jacob asked helplessly.
"Oh, the elderly gentleman upstairs has invited me to dinner. Would you like to join?" Aiden asked courteously.
"I shouldn't..." Jacob had just started to decline when his stomach's loud growling betrayed his true feelings.
"Come on."
Aiden waved his staff with practised ease, directly dispelling the remaining cold from Jacob's body.