We know nothing about the true nature of consciousness, and we can't describe time except through our own subjective experience of it. Spacetime might not even be the fundamental layer of the universe, it's just what we all collectively experience through consciousness. So until we figure out what we are, these questions will remain unanswered.

In a sense, time is just different fractions of counting the number of times a planet of monkeys goes around the sun. The monkeys then apply this limited concept of time to the entire universe. But then in the grand scheme of things, everything that is now was nothing at one point and presumably will also be nothing again, then the only evidence of time are the monkeys who tried to keep count of how many times they orbited a star. When everything returns to nothingness, time will have been an illusion.

Isn't time related to the distance between objects eg. space. So if the distance is 0, time does not exist

Lunchtime doubly so"

--Douglas Adams

Time is an illusion but not causality

Perception rather than illusion.