75 CHAPTER 75
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After settling Yelena in with her parents and leaving Fury in charge of them, I decided to take a trip to Switzerland with Emily, Natasha, and Bucky for a short getaway to break away from the monotony.
Once in Switzerland, we took a cab to our hotel, and our vacations officially started.
The girls wanted to go to the Matterhorn, and Bucky really didn't care where we went, so without any objection, we took the first train to the mountain with the intention of taking a few pictures the very next day, after our arrival.
"Do you think they will let us ski?" asked Natasha with a smile on her face as she looked at the scenery outside the train.
"I don't really know," I replied since outside of my missions exterminating Hydra, I had never been here for pleasure. "But it would be a waste of touristic cash if they didn't let anyone ski."
"If they do," Bucky replied. "They have several areas designated for that," he added.
"How do you know that?" Emily asked with an excited smile.
"I read it in the pamphlet," Bucky replied, showing said pamphlet. "The seats have one each," he added.
Confirming what he said, I looked under my seat, finding a pamphlet under it, which made me chuckle. "I think I need to pay more attention, haha."
"I can't wait to ski!" Natasha said with a wide smile. "I always wanted to, but... you know." she sighed.
"Well, let's make this first time memorable." I smiled, ruffling her hair as I eyed the view outside the train through the window. It was really beautiful, breathtaking, a sight to behold.
"I wanna make a snowman!" Emily exclaimed proudly, tackling into a hug. "Three, one for you, one for me, and one for Nat."
"I can help and beat you by making mine faster," Natasha smirked.
Emily gasped. "Betrayer!"
Natasha winked, "Let us battle in a snowman sisterhood war." she grinned.
"I will vanquish thee!" Emily giggled.
As for me, well, I was smiling at the sight of the two getting along so well.
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It took us a few hours to reach the Ski resort thingy, mostly because the girls stopped at every corner to take pictures and throw snowballs at me, which I could handle until Bucky joined, and well, I was at a disadvantage.
After a few all-out wars of snow, where I drowned Bucky on snow more than once, we finally arrived at the Ski resort.
Now, here came the hard part, I had no freaking clue how to Ski, meaning I was about to suck at it; I should've bought a book in skiing, now Bucky will steal the spotlight.
"Now, before we go out and start skiing, I am legally bound to tell you, our gift store at the entrance has a book with clear instructions on how to Ski." That's an odd legal clause, oddly specific, why would-- books!
"Where is it?" I rushed to the guide/guy that was here to make sure we didn't deviate from the safe path.
"The gift shop?" The guide, whose name I hadn't bothered to learn, or ask said.
"Yes." I nodded with a smile.
"Oh sir, there is no need to hurry." the guide smiled at me. "We will have time to go there later."
"I will give you two hundred bucks to shut up and take me to the gift shop." I smiled at him, one of those smiles that said, shut up and do as I command.
"As I said, let's go." The guide smiled, guiding me to the gift shop, while Emily, Bucky, and Nat stared at me, wondering why I was so eager to go to the gift shop.
In a way, I didn't need the guy to tell me where the gift shop was, with my map and all, but I had promised before coming here to detach from my powers for the week, to truly live the experience, reason why I was asking, and yes, I know rushing to the store to buy books about skiing to consume them goes against that, but... I make the rules.
"Here we are." The guide smiled as I gave him the two hundred bucks.
Rushing to the book section, I grabbed three books about skiing, paid for them, and rushed to the bathroom to consume the books.
"I'm ready." I declared, kicking the bathroom door open.
"You didn't know how to ski, didn't you." Bucky grinned.
I sighed, "No."
"And you bought all those books to try and learn, right?" Bucky asked.
"Yes, but enough about that, now I have the skiing skills of a dummy, according to the books." I shrugged.
"Where are the books anyway?" Bucky asked.
"I burned them." I lied, rushing with the girls, Bucky and 404 error name not found guide back to the start.
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14.28$ I wasted on nothing; here was Bucky looking like he was born with Ski equipment, while I was barely better than the girls. Skiing for dummies volumes one, two, and three, I will buy your company and fire everyone within.
"Don't feel sad, daddy." Emily hugged me. "We all suck together."
"I suppose we do." I chuckled.
"Talk for yourself!" Natasha declared full with determination. "I will learn how to ski!"
"I believe in you!" I smiled.
"It's not that hard; all you need is balance," Bucky said, doing a fucking cartwheel as he turned around us.
"Are you showing off?" I narrowed my eyes.
"Yes, I am." Bucky smiled as he continued to majestically ski around us.
I chuckled, oh well, sooner or later I would learn, that was the nature of my power; it was never an if, but a when.
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We continued skiing for the next few hours as I passively leveled up my newfound skiing skill.
"I'm hungry," Emily said.
"Same here," Nat nodded.
"Bucky, take the girls back to the hotel; I want to stay a bit longer here," I said, tossing the man my credit card.
"Can you open us a portal?" Bucky asked.
"No!" Emily jumped. "I'll do it!" oh right, she was now a proficient portal user.
"You heard the boss." I chuckled as Emily proceeded to open a portal for them to go back to the hotel room; I wonder if the hotel will wonder why they suddenly appear without going through the main entrance, oh well, if push comes to shove, I'll buy the hotel.
As Emily's portal closed, I continued skiing, finding that I really liked the feeling; it was relaxing, the cold air on my face, the sounds of nature around, it was all beautiful, it really was.
I don't know how long I continued skiing, but eventually, I went off the safe zone, finding a cave; and in my childish curiosity, I stepped inside the cave, wondering if I would find a bear or something.
I mean, I knew no wild earth animal could hurt me, maybe a giant squid could, I don't know, but a bear, or a wolf, heck no, which made this entirely safe mission, fun in a childish way.
However, inside the cave, I found nothing.
It was empty, but as I was about to leave, I felt something, a pull, a magical pull, a very weak one, a very old one.
Now, my completely safe mission had been upgraded to a somewhat dangerous mission. Caves and magic usually lead to intriguing scenarios.
Using my knowledge of the Eldritch arts, I followed the magic signature; it felt like a candle about to go out, very old, and very weak, and very unfamiliar, its magic didn't feel like the Eldritch arts, or like that of witches that attacked me, it was different.
My search for this little ember of magic led me to a dead-end, facing a freezing wall of rock and nothingness.
But even then, I could feel it; behind that rocky wall, the faint ember of magic was there, so I did what any responsible adult in my position would've done, I blasted the wall off.
In retrospect, I should've considered the integrity of the cave as a whole and such, but I was having so much doing this, I forgot for a minute I could've brought the entire cave down on my ass.
With the wall down, I now had access to a new section of the cave, which I entered, once again following the magical signature.
Each step bringing me closer to the magic I was chasing until. Eventually, I reached another dead-end, one that I was about to blow until I noticed the walls had writtings.
Nordic, by what little I could understand.
"Gátt gata at Ásgarðr..." I hummed, reading the runes out loud; from what I could understand, this was at one point a place of worship to the Norse gods, though I wonder why did they write Open path to Asgard, were they trying to open a portal there?
All of a sudden, the runes started to shine in a bright blue color as I cursed internally. "I shouldn't have read these out loud." checking my mana, I noticed a small portion of it was gone, "Yep, definitely shouldn't have read those out loud." I sighed as magic started to engulf me.
