Chapter 8

Magus in Marvel

Chapter 8

By: Pineappl3

Despite the hectic day I had yesterday, I slept relatively well. I contributed this to Athena's masterful ploy. She had successfully manipulated me into calming down by getting me to watch my favorite show with my favorite daughter. Granted, she was my only daughter, but I doubted any other I would inevitably have could match up. Only time would tell though.

I sat up in my bed and noticed the laptop had long since died or powered off from Athena's intervention. 'Huh, there's a thought. Maybe I can create a simple adaptor that allows electronics to charge using mana and sell it. Would probably make me more than those damn rings.'

I huffed in annoyance at the thought. Those enchanted ward rings had hardly sold at all. Despite the cheap price and their useful nature, it seemed everyone was skeptical of my claims that it could stop a few bullets.

I shook my head from my useless thoughts and finally crawled out of bed. My feet touched the cold marbled floor and I wiggled my toes a bit before standing. I began to stretch before heading over to the master bathroom.

Nearing my bathtub, which could almost be considered a miniature pool, I flicked my wrist. Using telekinesis, I twisted the knobs to start the bath. After disrobing, I walked over to the large mirror to inspect my visage for the first time since I had become an Archmagus.

The scar on my forehead was still there, but the one I had gained from the transplant, a vertical slit that ran from the base of my sternum to the top, has begun to fade. The scar was not my only new addition, however.

The most curious addition was the faint, almost invisible, scales that faded in and out of existence around my body. They never stayed in one place, swimming as if they were a school of fish and my body was their ocean.

Just to see if there were any other differences in my body, I began to channel the new energy within me, Chi. My fists started to emit a hazy blue smoke and those ghost-like scales started to congregate around my hands.

As I held my Chi in my hands, I noticed how easy it was to manipulate. It was almost exactly the same as mana, save for the distinctive property differences. I was hesitant to call it another 'flavor' of mana, but honestly, that was what it felt like.

To put these thoughts to the test, I attempted to cast a spell with Chi and noticed a distinctive difference. I had cast a simple healing spell; one that would help my regeneration in getting rid of my scar.

If it was not for the fact Nixie used a magical blade to slow down my regeneration, I doubt the transplant would have been successful. With my artificial Dhampir enhancements alone, it would have taken considerable effort to cut my chest open. So it was perfectly obvious as to the reason why I still had a scar.

With the healing spell I had cast, lesser restoration, the effects that immensely slowed the healing in my chest wore off. I had noted that I needed a considerably less amount of Chi to cast the spell compared to if I were to use mana.

Now, I didn't have divine, nature, or water 'flavored' mana, so the cost was much higher for me, but I did previously have water mana as my base. Using Chi for healing seemed to rival even that of water, if not slightly beating it.

I would need more research for sure, but I doubted my conjecture was wrong. After inspecting my body, I turned and entered my bath. It was now sufficiently filled and with another flick of my wrist, the knobs turned until the water ceased pouring from the spout.

Letting my body sink to the bottom of the tub, I allowed myself to be completely submerged. The warm water did wonders to release the tension in my shoulders, and I remained at the bottom of the bath until my hands began to prune.

Amazingly, I had only needed one breath to stay under, and it just served to show how far the modifications done to my body through rituals and baptisms had taken me. I stood up and allowed as much water as possible to run off of me before stepping out.

Now out of the bathtub, I determined my next course of action. I decided to use a towel to dry myself, rather than magic, for novelty's sake. I walked over to my closet, a large room almost the size of my bedroom, and stopped in the center. It was stocked with clothes that Nixie had picked out for me and I couldn't help but feel intimidated at the large selection.

On three sides were shelves jam-packed with all sorts of styles. From hipster streetwear, all the way to high-class suits, I truly had a tough choice to make. I stood there for a while, deliberating, before finally deciding on what to wear.

'Who bought this for me?' I slipped on a white t-shirt and looked down at it, admiring its beauty. 'Fresh Prince t-shirt. Nice.' I couldn't help but smile from ear to ear at the gift someone had gotten me.

Moving on, I picked out a pair of dark blue jeans and put them on. It was a little snug around the crotch, but I took a little pride in that. "Shoes, hmm." I looked around and eventually found what I was looking for, a pair of clean and white Air Force Ones.

I made my way to the large mirror back in the bathroom and nodded at my appearance, "No one would expect that I would be an Archmagus dressed like this. It's the perfect outfit."

For the final touches, I styled my hair—a task Nixie usually took care of. "Looking good is such a struggle." Getting my hair as good as I could possibly get it, I teleported to my nightstand.

I put on my watch, earpiece and slipped my phone into my front pocket. "Now that I think about it, I don't have a wallet." I pressed the button on the side of my earpiece to turn it on. "Athena, get me a wallet, please, and maybe some credit cards."

"I have already received some credit cards in an effort to build your personal credit, the physical cards are located in your desk." After thanking my daughter, I brought my hand out and pulled towards myself.

The drawers on my desk opened and I lifted all the objects. Seeing the cards, I flicked one of my fingers towards myself. This sent the cards flying towards me, and before they could reach me, I waved my hand to the side and all the floating objects above my desk returned to their spot. The drawers closed and the credit cards stopped in the air, inches from my hands.

I simply plucked them out of the air and slipped them in the same pocket as my phone. With that done, I teleported to my kitchen. "Let's see." I began to mentally search through the contents of my kitchen before stopping. "Cereal it is; I'd rather not burn anything. Those damn stoves are so unwieldy."

One of the cabinets opened up to reveal Reese's Puffs. The fridge opened and out came a jug of milk. It floated over to the countertop alongside the cereal and both soundlessly landed. I walked over to the sink and grabbed a clean bowl.

I took a seat at the center island and waved my hand. The cereal box opened and puffs began to fill my bowl. Shortly after came the milk. "Ah, forgot my spoon." As I waved the box of cereal and jug of milk away so they could return to their spots, the dishwasher opened and a spoon flew on a direct path for my hand.

As I ate my Reese's Puffs, I thought about how I was going to enjoy crushing whoever had taken Nixie from me. I imagined that each puff was one of those wannabe Magus and I enjoyed crunching down on the chocolate and peanut butter as if it was their heads.

Before long I was finished and I clapped my hands. A golem rose from the ground and took my bowl from me, before waddling over to the sink and beginning to clumsily wash my dishes.

"Athena, we need better golems. Maybe we can mix robotics." My earpiece chimed, "An excellent idea, Dad. I'll look into building a facility for production after I piece together a few schematics. I believe Oscorp and Tony Stark have enough things to build off of."

"Perfect, get to work on that." I sighed at what I had to do next. I rubbed my temples and teleported down a floor to the residential area. Already in the kitchen was Aldebaran, Balrog, Hakon, and Thora.

Thora looked to be struggling to fit in her chair and both she and Hakon continued to occasionally spark with electricity. "Ah, give me a second." I grasped my hands and a strand of hair from Thora and Hakon flew over to me. I took them with me and quickly found myself in my lab.

I took a few minutes to search my area and was glad I had enough materials. Using their DNA samples, I was able to quickly construct two X-Gene suppression rings. With them in hand, I returned to the common area and sent them over.

"What is this?" Hakon asked as he looked at the simple ring. It had a few runes on the outside of the band, but on the inside was a deceptively large amount. I was thankful for spatial magic since it allowed me to add many more runes for enchanting.

"This some suppression ring?" He had guessed right after taking a look at the runes for a short while. He nodded to his wife and both of them slipped it on. Thora began to shrink, and the couple ceased to shed lightning.

"Alright, with that taken care of." I looked to Aldebaran, "I assume since your divination can get past even my best anti-divination runes, you will be able to get a hit on Nixie's location."

"Well," Aldebaran began as he took off his glasses, "It doesn't really work like th— Wait. Never mind, I found her." He began to mumble a few things and I felt some mana begin to stir. He attempted to construct a spell, but it failed.

"Alright, that didn't work. Can you just take the location from my head?" I nodded my head. "Just think about it, I won't pry. I'm pretty sure I'd go crazy like you if I looked any deeper."

He narrowed his eyes and opened his mouth to speak before falling silent. "He got you there!" Balrog began to laugh before slapping his friend on the back. I rolled my eyes and gleamed the location from his head.

I was able to see the vision Aldebaran had seen. All of us here had made our way to an abandoned subway station on 91st Street, Manhattan. Now that I had the location, it was time to get more information about the place.

"Continue your breakfast, I'll be back." I teleported myself to right in front of the corpse of the man we had captured and began to cast a spell from one of the most useful schools of magic: Necromancy.

The spell I was casting was called Speak with Dead, and it did what its name implied. I would be able to ask the corpse five questions, but since it would recognize me I had to take a different appearance.

With a simple disguise self spell, I looked like a completely different person. I now looked like a balding fifty-year-old man and my clothes changed to reflect it. The illusion made it seem as if I was wearing loose baggy jeans and a sweater.

As I finished with my disguise, the corpse was finally ready. Its eyes glowed white and the head moved to look at me. "What organization are you a part of?" In a raspy voice, the corpse responded, "We are. . . the Servants of Malcolm."

I frowned at that. "Is your leader Malcolm Jager?" The corpse's mouth hung open. "Yeeeesssssss." I cursed at that. 'That bastard.' I pushed down my feeling and continued, "How many members do you have?"

The jaw of the dead man began to clatter quickly. "We-we ar-are maaannnyyyyyy." I pinched my brow, 'I better ask Aldebaran to divine some more information.' "How strong is Malcolm?" The eyes began to flare, "He is our god! He is mightttty."

I held in my frustration as best I could and asked the last question. "Where is your base located?" The head snapped down then back up, "Texas!" At that, I let go of my emotions and punched the head of the corpse. Greymatter splattered everywhere but harmlessly slid off my shields, keeping me clean.

"At least I got something out of it. Looks like I get to personally torment Malcolm." I looked down disdainfully at the corpse and returned to the residential floor.

"Yo, my main man Baldur!"

I rolled my eyes at Aldebaran's greeting. "So. I already have everything you want. Map? Got it. Numbers? You bet I got it. How did it end? For some reason, I can't see that." That had me raise my brow, "What do you mean you can't see how it ends?"

He threw up his arms in defense, "Hey man, I can only do so much." I turned to look at the table. All the food they had been eating earlier was gone, and in its place was a crudely drawn map on a scrap of notebook paper.

There were plenty of labeled stick figures. From what I could gather, it depicted me fighting off against Malcolm with the rest of the group fighting off against what Aldebaran had labeled 'goons.' "Well, I'm glad you did all this, but where is Nixie?"

"Ah. Forgot about that." Aldebaran pulled out a pencil and drew in Nixie's location. Balrog got up from his seat and walked over to me. "Leave the rescue to us. Alley says only you can fight that Wizard."

I looked at the group and they all nodded. "Once this is over I hope you'll let me get back to smithing, I'm not really interested in all this fighting." Hakon pipes up and his wife responds by rolling her eyes.

"Well then," I began, "let's get you outfitted." With a snap, all of us were teleported to my lab. I gestured to the many items on the table, "One ring per person, and take a gun, enchanted with anti-magic runes. Do keep in mind that they do not work on me."

Aldebaran whistled at that and picked one up. "These are those shield rings you sell, right?"

I nodded at that. "Sadly they don't sell well. If they can protect against magic missiles, I don't see why they can't stop a few bullets."

"You definitely need these." Balrog laughed and handed his ring to Aldebaran, who gratefully accepted it. Everyone grabbed what they were offered and I started to prepare myself mentally.

I had memorized the crude map and had a group of mutants to help me. I raised my arms and began to draw a circle. A giant portal appeared at the entrance of the abandoned subway station and I walked through first.

Instantly, I was able to notice the illusions and wards. Not wasting any time studying the wards, I found the locations of the key runes. Using Spatial Cut, I was able to destroy all manners of protection.

"I really wish I remembered my spells or had mana to use." Aldebaran shook his head as he walked out of the portal. I noticed that he wasn't wearing his glasses, and his gun was raised.

In his hands was one of the many M1911s I had enchanted to fire anti-magic bullets. The gun itself was only enchanted to not shoot me, so the real magic came from the bullets.

They were made from silver and had the effect of dispersing the mana around them. In theory, this would cancel out my runes to prevent them from being used on me, but using a clever trick, I was able to overcome this.

The runes were not completed until they were fired, so unless they could manipulate metal without magic, I was safe. Aldebaran blindly fired, and as soon as I saw his barrel flash, I heard a grunt and a thud.

"Just go left. We've got it from here." Balrog came barreling through the portal and took off his ring. He began to grow in size, and flames washed off his body in droves. Electing to take the opportunity they gave me, I started moving down the left side of the station.

As soon as I entered the left passageway, three men came forward. "Fucking Warlocks." I looked at them in disgust as I realized they all seemed tethered to an outside source, which in turn provided them with mana.

It was dark and I could already see its effects on their faces. Their eyes were sunken and the area around it was cracked like dried mud. Of the three men, the one in the center seemed the least corrupt, but it was obviously because he had much less mana than the others.

They raised their hands to cast their spells, but with a horizontal flick of my arm, space cracked. All three men were bisected instantly and they continued to try and cast their spells, only to look in horror as they fell apart.

I rose, choosing to hover above the ground and I began to speed through the halls of the winding subway tunnels. I did my best to follow the mental map I had, but it seemed Aldebaran had missed a few passageways.

A large explosion could be heard from where I assumed Aldebaran's group to be, and the walls around me shook. Dust fell from the ceiling and I could hear footsteps rushing close to me.

A group of about six rounded the corner—as soon as they did, I cast a simple but effective spell. "Hope you like fireball without the cinnamon." The group of Warlocks quickly tried to turn around and run, but it was too late.

A small ball of fire originating from the center of the group expanded until it reached forty feet in diameter. My side of the subway station shook violently and I quickly flew over the remains of charred corpses and debris.

I expanded my senses as far as I could and sensed my target. I could feel Malcolm from where I was. His strength would put him to about Archmagus level in strength, but his mana pool paled in comparison to mine.

It was also clouded with many types of mana. If I had to hazard a guess, he had also become a Warlock in an effort to grow in strength quickly. Locking on to his presence, I quickly cast an arcane eye spell to get a visual of his location.

I lost vision in my left eye for a second before I was able to see the space around Malcolm. He was hastily erecting wards that would prevent me from casting spells, and as soon as he finished, my arcane eye fizzled out. Sadly for him, I already had his location.

Instantly, I teleported to the room he was in. It was a large antechamber with exactly six pillars placed at the points of a large magic circle on the ground. Each pillar held a rune, and the sum of the effects would negate spellcasting for anyone who wasn't the caster. North of Malcolm was a set of large enchanted iron doors that didn't seem to have any mana signatures behind them.

"You do realize the fatal flaw with this version of the anti-mana runes, correct?" I looked disdainfully at Malcolm from across the room.

"Shut it, you old fool! It was a mistake for you to come here. Now, you're dead! And once I kill you, all that mana you've been harvesting will be mine for the taking."

I began to fly, the spell costing me much more than usual. "How? What?" Malcolm began to panic and started to throw spells at me, all of which bounced harmlessly off my shields.

"You didn't answer my question, so I guess it's my job to educate you as your senior." I flicked my wrist and both of Malcolm's legs were cut. "GAAAAH! FUCK." He roared out in pain and all I did was shake my head.

"The fatal flaw of these types of spells is that it was made for protecting against mass amounts of foes. Not one, very strong opponent. Especially not against the runes' creator."

I gave a chuckle before swiping my arm to send out another spatial cut. To my surprise, Malcolm dodged it. He teleported away and began to pant heavily. He began to whisper something, but I was having none of it.

I cast a zone spell that would cancel out sound, effectively stopping all spells that needed verbal components. Which, in Malcolm's case, was mostly all of them. He silently yelled and I smiled. I was enjoying this—perhaps a little too much, though.

Something felt wrong and I quickly teleported away from my spot. Shooting out of the ground was a suit of armor. It looked high-tech, and I noticed the familiar sight of Stark's Arc Reactor.

'What is that? A Gundam?' The armor certainly looked like one, aside from the Arc Reactor and large staff. On the staff was a large crystal that had a paltry amount of runes.

Malcolm mouthed something at me before waving his arms. The Gundam-looking suit of armor moved towards me with an arm outstretched. It waved its staff and it began to glow.

Meanwhile, Malcolm was busy trying to dispel my silence spell. His hands started to glow with ominous mana and I was reminded of the hint of dark mana within the Ancient One.

I met the Gundam's arm with my own, using the full extent of my strength and some Chi to punch it. My fist began to glow with a smokey blue haze and I watched in satisfaction as the arm crumbled from my punch.

Whatever the Gundam was doing with its staff almost reached completion and I saw almost all of its runes were lit up. To prevent whatever effect it would create from happening, I kicked the staff from its hand.

Empowering it with Chi allowed me to easily destroy it. As the gem broke, a large soundless explosion followed. I felt one of my shields break and I frowned. Casting another two to replace it, I turned to look at Malcolm.

It seemed as if whatever he was doing seemed to be finished as his legs had regrown. This time they looked demonic and bug-like. 'I've let you play around too long.' I sent him a telepathic message while simultaneously destroyed the anti-mana runes.

I cracked my neck, and four spears of ice formed around me. Not wanting him to dodge, I teleported all four to him. Instantly, all four limbs were impaled and he began to squirm, practically foaming at the mouth.

He looked towards the large doors near him and twitched his nose. The doors opened, and an object came flying out too quickly for me to see. The object embedded itself into Malcolm, and instantly the ice spears melted.

A wall of fire began to surround me and I couldn't help but be puzzled. 'No mana in this fire. Malcolm was a mutant too?' Before I could study the fire any more, Malcolm stood. He angrily pointed at me and pulled out a vial from his pocket.

It was smashed, but a few drops still remained. He hastily drank the few drops, and I felt the strange dark energy within him expand. A portal began to open behind him and I felt something very very wrong. I tried to close it with my spatial control, but the space the portal led to seemed to be controlled by someone much, much stronger than me.

I saw a large eye and instantly the room around me froze. Tendrils began to seep out of the portal and wrapped themselves around Malcolm. He mouthed a few more words to me and snarled before getting dragged into the portal.

As soon as he entered the hole in space closed, I noticed I was sweating. "FUCK!" I unleashed a swath of spatial cuts, totally destroying the room around me.

Once again, some being many times stronger than me had interfered with my plans.

As the room collapsed on top of me, my barriers managed to push all of it to the side, leaving me completely unharmed. I floated above the wreckage and moved over to the room that the iron door led to.

The room was small, about half the size of the antechamber, and much darker inside. I illuminated the room by conjuring an orb of light, and instantly I was stunned. The walls were covered in blood, but it wasn't the blood that shocked me.

No, for what was actually drawn with the blood was far more shocking. As I read the Azum script on the walls, I realized it detailed a ritual that took the soul and flesh of a target to create an artifact.

'That explains his mutant abilities. . .' I continued to search the room and found what I was looking for. In the far corner of the room was a corpse. It was missing large portions of its flesh, and surrounding the corpse were the exact runes the script on the wall described.

I took out my phone and began to take pictures of the scene, even going as far as to remove a layer off the walls and teleporting the inside of this room to my underground lab.

"Athena, we must study this, with due haste. Combo this with that Summers kid and we could have truly infinite power." My earpiece buzzed, "Right away Dad. And did you rescue Nixie?"

I sent out my senses and located Aldebaran and his group. Locking on to his space I teleported. "Yes." As I looked around the room, I found myself in a torture chamber of sorts. All around the room were chunks of burnt and charred flesh. A few corpses were intact, but they all had bullet holes in them.

Hakon was currently helping Nixie out of her bindings while the rest seemed to be looting the place. I walked over to Hakon and Nixie before placing a hand on his shoulder.

He looked up at me and we nodded at the same time. "Are you alright, Nixie?" Looking undamaged in the slightest, she nodded. "They just used me to lure you here. Your assistant Malcolm seemed to want to harvest your mana for a large ritual he was planning. Something about bringing this world under a being named Dormammu."

I nodded, "Sadly I have met this 'Dormammu.' I'm too weak currently to battle him. He was strong, but not as strong as that firebird." Nixie gave me a soft smile and looked my outfit up and down.

"I don't think you should ever dress yourself again." I frowned and gave her a wounded look, "What? Don't like it?" Looking at her 'really?' expression, I nodded my head. "I'm an adult. I bathed myself, changed myself, and even cooked."

Nixie looked surprised and continued to tease me, "Oh my. Looks like my little Baldur is all grown up." She stuck her tongue out at me and turned around, walking out of the torture room.

"Thank you all for your help in rescuing me." Nixie gave a small bow to Aldebaran and his group before turning to me. I let out a sigh, "Yes, thank you for your help."

Thankfully, Aldebaran had his glasses on. "So? What happened with Malcolm?"

The group looked at me with interest and I sneered. "The bastard ran away with this tail between his legs." Balrog shook his head and said, "Don't worry. We'll get him next time. You won't have to do it alone."

Everyone nodded, but it didn't help relieve any of the unease I had. That being, they were so full of dark energy it was suffocating. 'Looks like I'm going to need to have a chat with the Ancient One soon.'

I looked to the group, "Are you all done desecrating the dead?" "You mean looting?" Aldebaran asked. I pinched my brow and created a large portal. I stepped through and set the portal to dissipate in a few minutes.

I stepped through and I was instantly in the lobby of my Magus Tower. I elected to ride the elevator to the top floor, and I used the time to reflect on the battle. I had wanted Malcolm alive to pay for what he had done, but in doing so I had allowed him to go free. "I'm going to have to reserve torture for non-spellcasters and teleporters. Fucking Malcolm."

The elevator dinged and I stepped out onto my private floor. I sat down on my couch and turned on the TV. "Athena, is anything planned for today?" With a chime in my ear, Athena responded. "Yes. In five hours you have a meeting with Xander, the boy who applied to be a human test subject."

"Ah yes, that one." I flipped through the channels before stopping on Nickelodeon. "What else?" Drake and Josh came on after a commercial and I set the remote down.

"After that, you have college classes if you are still attending."

I sighed. While I enjoyed college, it wasted so much time. I glanced at the TV and realized I was wasting time watching Drake and Josh too. 'I'm only going to talk to Richards. I need to prod his brilliant mind. Yeah, that's a good excuse.'

"Athena, text Dr. Richards and let him know that I have a proposition for him. If he does it, I'll fund his research." As I watched Megan prank Drake and Josh, I felt familiar hands wrap around my neck.

"What did you guys do to the Warlock base?" Nixie began to rub my shoulders and leaned close. "We made sure they suffered before taking anything valuable. Hakon wants to know if you have a forge for him to use."

I practically melted in Nixie's hands but managed to sit up straight. "I did manage to get it built actually. Subfloor three has been reserved as the new crafting area. I was going to have him make me new enchanting gear as well."

Nixie's hands left my shoulders and I turned around as she walked around and sat next to me. She leaned her head on my shoulder and stared at the TV. "You really love this thing don't you?"

I couldn't help but nod my head, "It gives me a glimpse of other worlds from the comfort of my seat. It matters not if you think it's all fake. Odds are, somewhere out there in a multiverse far far away exists a world that embodies exactly this media everyone seems to take for granted."

I stood up and spread my arms wide, "The world as we know it is but a speck in the grand universe, and to think there are an infinite amount of them." Nixie laughed, "Oh? And how are you sure there is an infinite amount of universes?"

I pulled Nixie up off of the couch and carried her to my room, "Every decision we make causes the creation of a new universe. One where we act on said decision, and another where we don't. Every possible outcome is a new universe, a new world to learn about."

Placing Nixie on the bed, I began to pull off my shirt. "In this universe, I do this."

={db}=

"So, I hear you want to be a test subject." I looked across from the table I was sitting at. It was on the second floor of my building and had been redecorated for more business-oriented work. I was currently in my faux office and the only employee I had deemed worthy to hire sat across from me.

"Yes, sir." Xander gazed out the window, seemingly lost in thought.

"Is everything alright?" I asked, not really curious, but more to put on the airs of someone who did. He took a bit to respond, "Yes. I was just thinking about if I had enough money to feed my brother dinner tonight. He has a few learning disabilities. Not to mention his stunted growth."

I gave him a heartfelt look and simply nodded. "Well, everything checks out. An orphan who takes care of his brother. No known relatives, other than the brother of course, and currently living at a homeless shelter."

I stood up and moved towards the door, holding it open. Xander stood up and slowly made his way over. "Does that mean I got the job?" I gave him a smile and held out my hand to shake it. "Welcome to Baldur Technologies. I've gone ahead and had my assistant send you this month's pay in advance. I'll see you bright and early tomorrow."

I took the time to show Xander out of my tower and once he was gone I was able to drop my act. "What a sad man." Not wasting a moment more, I teleported to the university in hopes of catching Richards before class.

As I teleported to the school grounds, I found the girl who would constantly annoy me to no end: Emma Frost. She noticed me but quickly looked away. Her whole aura seemed off and I once again let my curiosity get the best of me.

I made my way over and sat next to her. Surprisingly, as I mentally put up my 'knock before entering' sign on my shields, I saw Frost outside my mindscape. It was as if she was leagues better than before and she even managed to walk past me, breaking four of my shields before she was stopped.

'I'm impressed. You have gotten much better in the last few months.' As she had already destroyed a few of my shields, I quickly created a much sturdier shield around my inner mind before opening the door to the outer reaches.

I conjured a table and two chairs. I motioned for her to sit and she silently moved. She walked past the table and began to take a look at my mindscape. It was a library of all the knowledge I had amassed, the nonsensitive knowledge that is.

I left copies of all that I had gathered and was willing to share for anyone who managed to break my shields. Of course, the information was tagged with my signature. That way if anyone actually decided to absorb or copy it, I would basically gain free access to their mind as long as they held even the tiniest bit of my knowledge.

Of course, if they were strong enough, they could just scrub the mental trojan horse, but I doubt they would since they were hidden in very intuitive ways. Frost picked up a book from my mystic arts shelves and began to read.

I sat down at my table and summoned tea to my hands. I took a sip before talking, "Feel free to read anything. I will warn you that my knowledge comes at a price." She merely nodded before taking a few more books and bringing them over to my table.

She completely ignored me and continued to read slowly, engraving each bit of what she read into her own mind. As she did so, I slowly felt the many back doors to her mind get created and I slipped in.

I just took a cursory glance at all her surface thoughts and I was appalled at what I saw. So many people hated her—were disgusted with who she was. They feared her for being a mutant.

It was what occupied most of her mind currently, though I could see she was trying to suppress it. She also occasionally thought about a man named 'Mr. Kendall.' He was a teacher of hers from a long time ago. They had dated recently and it did not end well at all. He found out about her mutant status and basically crushed the poor girl.

'Ah. That explains it.' As I continued to look, I saw a fellow mutant: Astrid Bloom. She was much more skilled than Frost and taught her everything she currently knew. Well, she had learned from her, but even with her lesser skill, her innovative mind and raw talent allowed her to defeat Bloom in a battle of the mind.

The victor, Frost, absorbed all the knowledge and skill Bloom had. It explained her rapid growth. I kept searching and found the cause for her current mood in particular. Her parents had also found out about her mutant status, thanks to Mr. Kendall and they were sending her to a clinic.

They were waiting for her outside the university and she was stalling until she could think of a way to escape. Learning everything I needed, retreated back through the backdoor and took another sip of my tea.

"How would you like to work for me, Frost? I can hide you from your parents—until you're strong enough, that is." That seemed to get her attention. "What's in it for you?" She looked a little skeptical at my request.

"I get an employee and another student." I conjured two pills, one red and one blue, and held out my hands and quoted Morpheus: "This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill—the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill—you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Remember: all I'm offering is the truth. Nothing more."

Frost swallowed hard and took the red pill. She ate it and I flicked her forehead. "It was symbolic, you didn't really have to eat it. I smirked as she rubbed her head. I stood up and we both appeared outside my mental walls. I put up a 'closed' sign and returned to the physical world.

"Nixie will take care of you." I placed my hand on Frost's shoulder. "What?" Before she could ask any other questions, I teleported her to the residential floor of my tower and filled Nixie in on my plans for Frost.

I would have Nixie help Frost get settled and have her 'go missing for a while.' It would give her time to study—or copy, in her case—knowledge on everything she wanted to know. I had a good feeling she would make a great addition to my company and to my band of apprentices.

'I have quite a few female apprentices. If I was on the outside looking in, it would seem as if I was biased.' The truth was that I was able to offer power to the weak and it allowed me to earn their trust. 'Trust. That's it.'

I had a thought on how I would be able to fix Grey's mind and it would seem that I needed to earn her trust, or have someone else earn her trust and fix her mind for me. Frost was a great candidate for said idea as they were both female telepaths.

No one would understand their situation better than each other. 'I should have Athena and Nixie judge this idea, they would know better than I would.' Finally free of the immediate problem, I searched the campus for Richards. I looked in all the spots he would normally be in when not in class and eventually found him.

He was standing in the shade of a tree and he seemed to be looking at something. I silently approached from the side and got a better look. He was looking over a photo of a blonde girl and would occasionally stoke it. 'Little odd.' I made myself known and he instantly put away his photo. "How's it going, Dr. Richards?"

He looked over to me, "Please Baldur, Reed is fine. I'm doing fine. How about yourself?" I sat down and looked up at him, "Did you get my text?" He shook his head, "No. My phone blew up in my latest experiment and I have yet to get a new one."

"Ah, that's a shame." I gestured for him to sit and he proceeded to do so. "So, what did you text me about?" I gave him my biggest car salesman smile turned to face him. "I have a business proposition for you. You do this for me, and I'll fund whatever research you want."

He raised a brow, not quite sure if I was serious. "All I want you to do is design me a personal computer." I tapped my watch. "It has to be the best computer on the market, once you do that, I'll put it in a watch and sell it."

He laughed at that. "You want me to put a supercomputer in a watch? We don't have the current technology to make any computer that fast in a watch." I frowned and shook my head, "You misunderstand. I don't care how big it is. I just want a supercomputer, built by you. I'll take care of getting it to fit in a watch."

He stuck out his hand for me to shake it, "I'd build the computer just to see you put it in a watch. I'll consider it a challenge for both of us. We can talk about funding after I make the best and smallest wrist-sized computer." He seemed to take my talk of worrying about getting it to fit in watch as me saying I could do it and he couldn't, which I did nothing to correct.

"Here's my address." I handed him a business card, "You can use my lab here. I got better stuff than the labs here, I promise." We finished our handshake and I looked down at the campus below us. "So, who was that girl?"

Reed looked embarrassed and scratched his cheek. "It's, uh. Sue, this girl I like. Sadly, she's dating someone else." I looked at my friend, "Oh? Do you know who she's dating? I'm sure you are a better fit, intellectually that is."

He gave me a halfhearted smile. "She's dating this girl, Gwen Stacy. They both are majoring in Biology here." I scratched my chin. "If she swings that way, I don't know if all the charm and the world can turn her." I gave him a pat on his back then stood up.

"My place is open twenty-four hours a day, come on over anytime." Reed gave me his thanks and I made my way around campus before finding a nice spot to disappear. As I was about to teleport away, I heard a large explosion coming from the city nearby.

"We really live in a society where people just do whatever they want." I shook my head and teleported away. "I wonder how many times this city has had to be rebuilt. I could probably make some good money with a city restoration company."

I walked through the third sub-level of my tower and looked around at all of the large machines. On one side I had a massive forge where I could see Hakon working. On the other side, I had a largely-automated plant for fabricating whatever I needed on short notice.

It was able to 3D print a great many things. Through a strange combination of magic and technology, I think it was quite nifty. It consisted of about 70% magic and the rest was technological. The fabricator was currently making something and I couldn't help but inspect it.

From what I could gather, it seemed to be some sort of armor. "Athena, what is this?" It took her a moment to respond, but when she did, it came from behind me rather than my earpiece.

"That is version two of my body." I turned around and got a good look at Athena. She looked like a suit of armor and had three Arc Reactors—one in her chest and two in her hands.

"Working on this without me?" The face didn't move, as it was a faceplate, but I'm sure she frowned at that. "No! Not without you, I just wanted to get a head start. I know how busy you are."

I moved over and gave the armor a quick pat on its head. "It's fine. You're smarter than me anyway. I have confidence you can do it. I wonder. . ." I rubbed my chin. "Can you make a techno-organic body? Like a homunculus, but a machine."

I could tell Athena's eyes light up since it was quite literal. "That's a great idea." She began to mumble and I could tell her main partition would be occupied. Leaving her alone, I walked over to take a look at what Hakon was doing.

He was currently working on an Orichalcum ingot. He was hammering it flat, possibly into some armor. He seemed to be in the zone, and I decided to just watch him and try to glean as much as possible.

After a few hours, I was able to notice something interesting. At first, Hakon's strikes were normal, but eventually, he began to infuse mana into the metal as he worked. It was divine mana, confirming what I heard about him being a Cleric.

It got me thinking though, Clerics worshiped gods, and I doubted his god existed here. So the question was, where did he get his divine mana from? Regardless of where he got it from, it was incredibly pure, as if he was the only follower of the religion he was a Cleric for.

He had almost boundless mana, more and more continued to seep into his flesh and he was seamlessly able to use it to aid him in smithing. Of course, I could tell the magic was taking its toll on his body.

Eventually, he needed a break and he put down his hammer. On the anvil in front of him was a half-completed breastplate. It was rather plain, but I could tell it already provided much better defense than anything I had seen back on Azum.

"Ah? Sorry, Mr. Baldur, I didn't realize you were there." I waved my hand, "It's quite alright. I enjoyed watching you smith. I did have a question though. Who do you worship?"

He had a look of understanding and pointed to his anvil, to his hammer then to the forge. "I worship Smithing. Simple as that. Not some god of smithing or someone named Smithing. I worship the idea of smithing, the concept itself."

He stood up and walked over to a side table where he had a few things set. He reached into one of the bags on the table and pulled out some bread. He took a bite before walking back over. "Belief is a powerful thing. You could create a god with enough of it, and you can do impossible feats with it. Remember that, Mr. Baldur."

"I believe you might be onto something." I left him and entered my room. I sat on my bed and looked out my window. "Knowledge. That's what I believe in. Nothing is as important as it, without it we are nothing. With it, we can do anything."

Something in me broke and I felt as if a dam burst. Holy mana began to flow into me and I couldn't help but laugh. "Looks like I'm a Cleric now too. Muahahahaha!"

"Shut up, Baldur."

"Sorry, Nixie."