The plump little bird flapped its short wings and finally flew to the large cloth.
It pried open a crack with its beak and slipped inside. Inside the cloth, it transformed into Anton once again.
But he was clearly in poor condition: pale, sweat dripping, and panting heavily.
Anna rushed over to support him.
Just then, the old wizard emerged from the ground.
"Go back immediately!" Anton's voice was urgent and crisp. "Don't delay!"
"Yes,"
Anna nodded firmly. Her small hand reached into the air, grasped the valve of the Time Converter, and pulled hard. A blue mist filled the air, spreading over several people before suddenly shrinking.
With a crash, the torrential rain completely soaked the dry earth beneath the cloth, obliterating all traces.
...
Anton felt as if he were moving through the colorful passage, like clothes in a washing machine, whirling madly.
Finally, with a pop, he was squeezed out.
Several people fell to the ground.
Anna looked at the giant snake scrambling into a corner in surprise. "Did we succeed?"
Pedro the goblin laughed heartily. "We did! I used mystical magic to check! This is the first time I've changed history! I've been traveling through time for hundreds of years, but this is the first time. It feels wonderful."
Anton pursed his lips. "I just noticed that countless scars suddenly appeared on her body. Apparently, time has automatically corrected itself, treating her as the Nagini who had experienced thirty-eight years."
Anna climbed to her feet and looked at Anton with a smile. "Thank you."
The old wizard was also amazed, gazing at the ten-meter-tall time-twister in the factory. "Time, fate, it's amazing."
After so much, everyone was exhausted, but no one wanted to rest.
Anna took Anton's old wand and used the levitation spell she had just learned with curiosity. She brought down some wine and delicious food from downstairs.
"Ding ding!"
The glasses clinked.
"Cheers!"
Everyone gathered around the small round table in the hall, their faces filled with an inexplicable sense of relief.
Pedro beamed with pride, "It's because I was the first to find Nagini and bring her to you that we came up with this plan."
Anton, with a look of disdain, said, "Come on, you didn't contribute much. You're so powerful, yet you're relying on me."
The old wizard chimed in, "That's right, my foolish teacher is really old. His movements and thinking are slow. He's too slow to react in time."
Pedro was furious, clearly having been right. He turned to Anna, "Don't go into time on your own anymore. It's extremely dangerous."
Anna nodded earnestly, smiling at everyone. "Okay."
They partied all night.
Anton was the first to give in. He'd expended so much energy, nearly collapsing under the table from the alcohol.
Pedro taunted him, raising his glass, but still picked him up and carried him back to his room.
Once back, he helped return Nagini to her room and reinforced the spell on the door.
The old wizard also floated back to his own room.
Finally, the streetlights outside the French windows went out, leaving Anna alone, sitting in the doorway of her mother's room, legs crossed, a smile on her face as she slept soundly.
Everything seemed to have returned to the time before she entered the Time Turner.
Everything had quietly changed again.
...
The next day, Anton gathered everyone again, and everyone's faces were still tired.
Lupin listened in amazement as the old wizard's embellished story unfolded, his face beaming with wonder.
"I was locked up downstairs for just one night, and you've experienced a month?"
Everyone laughed, and Lupin joined in.
Anton tapped the table with his wand, calling everyone's attention. "Pedro has confirmed that Nagini's soul is now between human and snake states. She can be saved!"
"Then the most important thing is to find the memories of the blood curse and cure Nagini and Anna."
"That's going to take some luck. Pedro has too many memories."
Pedro snorted, puffing on his cigar. "Don't try to steal my wisdom anymore. That's for goblins!"
Anton shrugged. "I really didn't mean to, but this is a problem we have to solve. You have too many memories. I don't know how long it will take to find them."
Just then, a hearty laugh echoed from the doorway.
"I can solve it!"
The door swung open gently, revealing a handsome, weathered middle-aged man standing in the doorway, wand in hand, beaming at everyone.
It was Rosier, who had been missing for ages.
"Father," Anna leaped from her chair, flew over to him with joy, and hugged him tightly.
Rosier rubbed Anna's head with a smile. "My dear, I've kept you waiting."
Compared to Anna, the old wizard and Pedro were both startled. Pedro, in particular, was overwhelmed by the sight of his friend and the memory of how Rosier had nearly blasted him to pieces. He felt a mixture of emotions.
And to top it all off, this friend was actually his son-in-law?
This Andre Rosier didn't even want to call him "Dad"?
Anton grasped the key point keenly and looked at Rozier in confusion, "What can you solve?"
Rozier took his daughter's hand and came in front of everyone, and took out a necklace from his pocket, "The lucky pendant of the fairy time and memory explorer, it can guide you to the depths of memory."
Pedro looked at the necklace in shock, "Damn, this is mine."
He touched his neck, which was empty, "When did my necklace become yours!"
Rozier smiled indifferently and put the pendant on the table, "That's a very long story."
"I've been waiting for this day for thirty-eight years." Rozier sighed and looked at Anton seriously, "Little wizard, thank you for your efforts. The Rozier family owes you a favor."
Anton frowned and looked at him, "Do you know what happened? What you just heard at the door? You don't seem surprised?"
"What a keen insight." Rozier chuckled, "I knew it decades ago!"
"What!" Everyone looked at him in shock.
Anna found a chair and asked her father to sit down. She also took a high stool and sat down beside him, smiling happily.
"You've experienced time travel, so you probably all know what happened back then."
Rosier rubbed Anna's head with concern.
"After that, I brought Anna back to the family and froze her. I searched everywhere for Pedro." He raised an eyebrow. "It took three whole years, and I finally caught him."
Pedro was speechless. "I'm right here. What do you mean I caught him?"
No one paid any attention to him. Everyone was waiting for Rosier's words.
The old demon could only shut up in frustration.
"Pedro is not an ordinary goblin. He is the 'collector and traveler of time and memory' among the ancient goblins, a wise man who is proficient in time."
Pedro widened his eyes, "How do you know I am a wise man, this..."
The old wizard rushed over with an unhappy look on his face, provoking him to tremble, "Damn it, stupid teacher, please be quiet!"
He supported his head with one hand and gestured with the other hand, "Please continue talking, ignore him."
Rosier nodded with a smile, "Pedro did forget the memory of the blood curse. I forced him to take me to the time when the curse was cast, but unfortunately, Pedro buried his memory and set a powerful spell. Unless he has a strong instinct to go, he can't get through it at all."
Pedro was stunned, "I buried that memory?"
Rosier sighed and nodded.
"Since there is no way to change the fact that the blood curse was cast, and I don't know how to solve it, I have to keep going back to the time when I killed Nagini and find a way to change it all."
"Wait!" Pedro really couldn't sit still this time, "Keep going back?"
Rosier nodded with a smile, "For the next thirty years, I forced you to take me through time 16,325 times!"
"You're crazy!" Pedro stood up angrily, "No wonder my memory has become like this, I even feel that I am getting older, and I in the past was cursing people in the future for coming back all the time!"
A huge purple goblin statue appeared behind him, "I'm going to fight you to the death!"
"Haha, don't be like this, Pedro." Rosier took a step back quietly, "We have become very good friends during this long time."
Pedro was furious, "Who wants to be friends with you..."
Rosier interrupted, and the two said in unison, "You damn stupid human wizard."
Pedro was stunned.
Rosier shrugged. "Look, we're already incredibly familiar with each other."
The old wizard chuckled beside him. "My poor teacher, forced to time travel over ten thousand times, how miserable! Too miserable! Hahahaha."