Chapter 13 (Patreon)

Sanctum was a positively curious ability.

It magically affected the world on a metaphysical level, seamlessly transmuting the entirety of our little bunker into a moderately-sized, expensive looking apartment suite that hinged around a sleek, modern gothic design. How it managed to incorporate working power and running water completely confounded me on a ‘logical’ level, but the more arcane side of my brain just barely recognized the magic for what it was - an innocuous warping of space and time aimed towards a virtually infinite set of ‘prefabs’ created by my own brain.

Otherwise known as ‘bullshit’.

Later that night found me lying beside a quietly snoring Cassie, wide-awake and full of energy after a nap and shower. It was funny - after everything that happened between us, I still didn’t know the girl’s last name or backstory. We survived a nazi attack, became roommates, slept in the same bed, made passionate and animalistic love, and she was now my…girlfriend? Fuckbuddy? All without us knowing each other’s actual story.

‘...I like the term ‘girlfriend’ more,’ I decided, brushing a strand of black hair out of her face. Her nose scrunched up at the sensation of my finger, and she whimpered quietly as she tucked her head closer into my side. A dry, humorless chuckle escaped my throat. “A week in Earth Bet, and I’m already falling for a hot chick.” I wasn’t angry at it, though - I’d already decided that I was gonna figure out a way to get the fuck outta Worm and take her with me, Celestial Grimoire-sponsored or not.

I wasn’t the type to just lie down and be mopey about shit, so the next obvious course of action was figuring out omnidimensional traversal magic myself if the Grimoire didn’t give me a better option once I was done on Earth Bet.

It wasn’t as if I was completely out on my ass when it came to options, either. Over the course of the last week I managed to gain quite a few magical abilities, and some of them could be useful when it came to leaving Worm. That was the kicker, too - leaving Earth Bet just wasn’t good enough. Scion was fucking ridiculous, and from what I remembered crossing different dimensions was as easy as walking through an invisible door for him. He could destroy countless alternative Earths as easily as he destroyed a single one, and unless I escaped this multiverse I was pretty much a sitting duck.

Unless, of course, I obtained the power to kill the Warrior Entity myself, but I could only take things one at a time.

That’s where magic trumped these alien assholes, though. The Grimoire was bullshit. Magic was bullshit. I practically fathered the birth of a new dimension purely by accepting the Winds into Earth Bet with a mental nudge of my soul. If I managed to crack the arcane code of birthing an omnidimensional spell that allowed me to jump between dimensions outside of the Entities’ cognition, then I was pretty damn sure that Scion wouldn’t be able to follow me without magic himself. And if I managed to take out the Slaughterhouse Nine before leaving, then I’d even give Earth Bet another essential few years of survival before the Cycle continued.

The results of that?

I could leave, amass even more power and possibly allies in more lucrative worlds, and come back to stick my arcane foot up Scion’s depressed and lonely ass. Preferably while keeping Cassie in a safe and decidedly non-grimderp location. The plan wasn’t fool-proof, sure, but it was a lot more solid than ‘destroy the nazis and wait for the grimoire to give me more shit’.

I already had a beginner’s grasp of the Path of Convoyence, as shitty as the ‘one dot’ ten foot limitation was. What was stopping me from training its efficiency, increasing my ‘dots’ up to five without pulling the upgrade directly from the Grimoire? Absolutely nothing.

Except…I was still old me, intellect-wise. Above average if I had to guess, now with photographic memory, but I wasn’t some prodigal spellcrafting wizard. Developing the Path of Convoyence was well within my grasp, in addition to honing my mastery of the Winds and increasing my martial ability. Heroic Aptitude practically guaranteed that I would eventually become a legend in skill the more tribulations I faced, and it was helping me with adapting to and using my magic effectively.

However, it didn’t guarantee the creativity and knowledge needed to finagle together a spell the likes of which could bridge the gap between Earth Bet and the larger omniverse.

I could try, for sure - and I would. I was nothing if not resolute and stubborn. But, I would be looking out for a perk that would also assist me in my intelligence and magical aptitude. So far brute force had worked out nicely, but just brute forcing magical attacks wouldn’t work forever. I had to remember that.

‘Time for more reckless magical experimentation,’ I smirked, channeling my mana and activating my sorcery. This time, however, I tried to focus on how the spell worked as I casted it.

The Path of Convoyence worked through what was known as ‘linear magic’, or ‘hedge magic’. It was a form of spellcasting that was ultimately seen as less open-ended and powerful than, say, ‘dynamic magic’, or ‘true magic’. Point A to Point B. In other words, the sorcery that I gained from the Grimoire was made for baby mages whose eyes were barely even open to actual magic - otherwise known as being ‘unawakened’.

This type of magic was inherently difficult, and almost impossible, to mold into something more than itself - hence the term ‘linear’. Fortunately, Convoyence still utilized the universal mana pool that the Grimoire granted me inside of my core, which saved me from having to keep track of a dozen different sources of magic at once.

Honestly, the fact that I was multiple leagues higher on the wizarding totem pole than a ‘hedge wizard’ was probably the only reason I could utilize Convoyence without the significant restrictions placed upon the sorcery, like a ‘ritualistic vehicle’ and other nonsense. Did that fact fill me with confidence that hedge magic would be of great assistance in my current ultimate goal? No…but understanding a bit more on how it works could do nothing but help.

A hedge wizard was like a red-haired stepchild dutifully asking Mama Reality to let them play a little outside, and only in the safe part of the playground. Fortunately, Mama Reality was relatively kind to the black sheep of the family, even if she obviously favored her biological children, ‘The Awakened’. I could work with being the unwanted stepchild though, at least for now.

Becoming ‘Awakened’ was exceedingly difficult, but not impossible. Just another task to work on amongst many, and one that I didn’t need to rush towards just yet. I had to take things step by step in order to not become overwhelmed, and increasing my mastery and understanding of Convoyence was essential to broadening my understanding of the magic from the World of Darkness.

In a quiet woosh of air, I was standing, half-naked, in the doorway of what I was tentatively willing to label ‘the master bedroom’. This time, I felt the way that the magic transported me - the way that my body simply ceased to exist in the bed, and was reformed instantly through the power of my own mana in the middle of the doorway. Seamless and clean, but extremely straightforward and rigid. The spell moved me exactly ten feet. It was a heady sensation, opening my mind up to how my own magic affected both my body and reality.

“Huh,” I breathed, turning my attention away from the magical introspection and taking in the rest of my ‘lair’.

I’d already memorized the layout of the Sanctum after getting up to grab some food a couple hours ago, and while it wasn’t the biggest place in the world, it was definitely larger than before and many times more cozy and clean. The modern gothic aesthetic continued throughout the rest of the Sanctum, and in total there were two floors. On the second floor was the master bedroom, a computer room filled with Cassie’s scavenged technology, and a nice looking office that I immediately claimed as my own. Every badass modern-day mage needed a decadent office, right? I was happy that the Sanctum agreed.

The first floor was quite a bit larger. Heading down the stairs brought me into the living room, a relatively large and cozy space complete with a couple of leather lounge chairs, a nice-sized couch, and some miscellaneous decor that didn’t look like it would be too out of place in the Addams Family. No flatscreen TV, though - which wasn’t too surprising, since my office lacked a laptop or computer setup. The kitchen definitely had a brand new refrigerator and stove, though, so that didn’t really make much sense…

‘Eh, I’ll just buy ‘em.’

A relatively small kitchen was attached to the living room, stocked to the brim with…leftover pizza bagels, some cheap coffee pods, a stack of frozen TV dinners, and a half-eaten box of Cinnamon Crunchies - which were a lot less tasty than my world’s Cinnamon Toast Crunch. We were in dire need of actual groceries. The leftovers would last for another night or two, maybe, but it wasn’t as if we were hurting for money at the moment. Cassie had a couple grand stowed away for a rainy day, and I…actually wasn’t sure how much money I was actually working with. Parian hadn’t given me a price because we ended up shooting the shit instead of hashing out payment plans right before she had to dip.

I doubted the costume would cost too much money, especially since it was pretty much just cosplay made with normal materials. Sliding my smartphone out of the pockets of my sweatpants, I quickly navigated to Parian’s contact info and typed out a quick message.

(9:08 PM) Avalon: Yo, good evening. How does 2k sound for the whole outfit?

Seen

It was viewed almost immediately.

I paused in the middle of the kitchen, eyeing the screen patiently, but no ‘Parian is typing…’ popped up even after a full thirty seconds. Two thousand was probably pretty heavy for what she usually worked with, but I wasn’t sure just how much the prices for Cape-related shit inflated in comparison to, say, Gucci or Prada. I wanted quality, and I’d made that clear earlier. Parian didn’t seem like the type to fuck me over, especially with the, dare I say, friendship we seemed to have roused between each other. And, in the case that she did, well…I wouldn’t even know until I was already jipped out of the cash, so fuck it. I’d head to Brockton U. and rob her dorm or something if need be.

After a couple more seconds of waiting for her to respond, I shrugged my shoulders and headed out of the kitchen. A short, relatively plain hallway with dim lighting connected the kitchen to the last room created by my magic.

This addition was a bit of a head scratcher purely because I didn’t remember having it in mind when forming the Sanctum - and I always remembered. It was by far the largest room in the…apartment? Bunker? Whatever - bottom line, it was pretty fucking huge. Two large, gilded wooden double doors at the end of the hallway opened outwards into what could only be described as an empty dueling/training arena. The floor was made from a smooth dark wood that refused to give me splinters no matter how much I slid my bare foot against it, and both the walls and the ceiling were made of some ebony colored stone that reminded me of obsidian.

If I had to approximate the general size of the room, I’d say it was probably comparable to a high-school gymnasium - just enough to run around and play sports with a dozen or so people. Or, rather, it was just big enough to practice and experiment with increasingly dangerous and destructive magical spells without exploding or setting important shit on fire. I would need targets and other such things to actually attempt certain spells on, but as far as just being enough open space to let loose with…it was definitely good enough. Good thinking, Sanctum.

Maybe I could even purchase some actual workout equipment, turn it partially into an actual gym? I hadn’t actually thought about doing genuine workouts, but if I placed myself under a decent amount of stress wouldn’t Heroic Aptitude also optimize and accelerate my muscle growth? Just because Link was a twink didn’t mean I had to be.

Those were purchases for later, though. I had things I needed to purchase for our new place, but they could wait for the morning. For now, I wanted to mess around with some of the ideas that were floating around in my head. Just to make sure that the protective magic was working, however…

I demanded Aqshy and Hysh to hearken my call, snagging onto the trace amounts I could feel hovering around my body and gathering the Winds like a looter would bag treasured items. They mushed and writhed together beneath my curled fingers, sparks and bright white light visible even through my skin as I chanted loudly in Anoqeyån.

The words just came to me - there was no specific spell I had in mind when smashing and cording together Aqshy and Hysh, just pure radiant destruction. A beam, perhaps? To purify and cleanse both the body and soul with overwhelming holy fire? That sounded suitably badass - but whether it succeeded or failed was unimportant. I just wanted to see if my defenses would hold.

“-kulak mahl ul chaka!”

The Winds screamed. They lurched and fought to heed my direction, but the channeling was too abrupt and heavy-handed. I could feel the Aethyr buckle and rampage beneath my control, only barely restrained, but even that restraint was quickly disappearing. In only a matter of a fraction of seconds, the spell would lose all cohesiveness and blow me away or turn my soul into corrupted sludge-

Woosh.

Only, it didn’t. The winds abruptly calmed and went silent like a blabbering child absconded by its mother. I sagged, letting out a breath of air so heavy that it blew locks of my hair back out of my face. My heart was beating rapidly, but there was a large, crooked grin on my lips. The Sanctum worked, that much was clear - even better than I thought it would. It allowed me to fully cultivate the Winds, albeit in a rushed and fundamentally incorrect manner, up until the point of no return. Only until I was at the precipice of destruction and self-harm did it activate and soothe the Aethyr.

This place was a fucking gold mine for training the chaotic and spontaneous arts of magic. Absolutely incredible.

As I breathed in and out, calming my racing heart, there was only one thing on my mind at that moment.

“...Hehe, let’s fuckin’ do it again.”

__________________________________

Two hours later…

Sweat poured down my body in streams, pooling beneath me in a lukewarm puddle that was honestly disgusting. Exhaling softly, I called upon the glimmering rays of Hysh that were still drifting through the air. Cleansing Glow lit around both me and the puddle of sweat before dissipating, revealing clean and smooth chocolate brown skin and a dry, spotless floor. Such simple, yet useful magic.

Originally, I hadn’t planned on turning my magical experimentation into a physical training collaboration, but I enjoyed working out and I figured my spellcasting would only improve if I attempted channeling and casting while doing handstand push ups and sprinting laps. Surprisingly - or, possibly unsurprisingly - the Winds were a passive amplifier to my physical state if I allowed and trusted them to be.

Aqshy seemed to bolster my energy, strength, and speed, giving me what could only be described as ‘adrenaline drips’ the more I enveloped my body with its Wind. Shyish, curiously enough, seemed to do roughly the same thing - only, it seemed to deaden my flagging exhaustion if I allowed the purple Wind to fill my lungs and muscles…which felt weird and distinctly uncomfortable. Hysh wrapped it all back around together, revitalizing my stamina whenever I felt my body aching and energy beginning to flag. Using Healing of Hysh to heal my body after becoming extremely sore also seemed to rebuild the muscles a fraction stronger and tougher than before - or, at least it felt that way.

Obviously I wouldn’t know for sure unless I had someone like Panacea help me with testing, but…I wasn’t really trying to knock up that particular tree just yet, if I could help it. I still had options.

Overall, I’d say that the experiment went exceedingly well. I was still pretty damn tired and not too much closer to solving omnidimensional spell creation than I was before, but I still felt pretty good about everything. At the very least, I was more in tune with the Winds, and they were giving me the feeling that what I sought was definitely attainable. The specifics were lost to me at my current level of understanding, but my gut hinted at Ulgu - the foggy and mysterious Grey Wind of Magic. I’d simply have to learn and experiment more, and the thought was an optimistic one.

And then, there was my newest gift from the Grimoire. I turned my head lazily, eyeing the small box of colorful potions that rested on the floor beside me.

Potion Package (Legend of Zelda: Hero of Worlds - 100 CP): Health, Magic and Stamina potions, which replenish weekly.

Straight up magical potions. My soul charge was beginning to lack after attaining the ability to grant powers and become the world’s greatest detective, so I’d been hesitant about accepting the potions at first. But then I got to thinking - I already possessed multiple Legend of Zelda-derived abilities. What would stop me from reverse-engineering more of these potions?

As far as I could remember from the game series, they fully healed your ‘hearts’ along with your stamina and magic. I also played through the entirety of Breath of the Wild, so unless the recipes changed greatly between the continuities I already knew the ingredients needed to make more as long as certain things like ‘bokoblin horns’ could be replaced by more mundane creatures.

And if it didn’t work? Well, I now had a box of six that would fully replenish every week. If nothing else, I could use these for emergencies where my usual magic spells were unable to heal me for whatever reason. Two health potions, two stamina potions, and two magic potions…not a bad haul for such a small charge.

“There you are, Jason. Holy shit, have you seen the rest of the bunker? Or, I guess it’s like…an apartment now? Kinda?”

My heart jumped at the sound of Cassie’s awed voice echoing in the large training room. I wasn’t surprised by her arrival - this was her home as well, after all, and I hadn’t exactly locked the doors. No, my heart was beating faster because of the sound of her voice. The logical, more adult side of my mind recognized this fact distantly, almost amusedly. I had sex one time and just hearing her was making my heart skip beats. ‘Ridiculous, Jay.’

I lightly leaped to my feet in a smooth and practiced motion, exhaling any frayed nerves out of my chest before turning to Cassie. She was looking around the room, eyes wide in wonder and amazement as she took everything in. There wasn’t much to take in, admittedly, but normal people tended to be shocked by random gymnasiums being magically created with the snap of a finger. Her arms were crossed around her bare stomach, seemingly for warmth - understandable since she was only wearing a bra and black pajama bottoms.

My eyes narrowed, and I peered closer. My brain and eyes tingled as insightful information began flying through my skull.

The crossing of her arms weren’t only for the sake of generating body heat - there was tension along her shoulders and neck, a nervousness that seemed familiar to me. Her eyes were wide in wonder, but the slight scrunching of her nose hinted at something bothering her. She was purposefully not looking at me, because the direction of her gaze and the position of her head would have put her sight on a natural rotation directly aimed towards me unless otherwise shifted. Goosebumps along the pale skin of both forearms combined with the slight tinge of Ulgu and Aqshy on the air only cinched the obvious:

Cassie is nervous and unsure about how I view her after our rigorous fucking earlier in the day, and is avoiding eye contact because looking at me would cause her emotions to bubble over and force the ‘after sex’ conversation. She wants me to-

I winced and forcibly shut that specific part of my brain up.

Hidden Intuition was about as efficient and useful as I’d originally thought it would be when I accepted the perk into my arsenal, but holy shit was it dense. There was no headache or pain from the influx of insights, but I was a little overstimulated from the sudden rush of information. It all happened in the span of a brief second or two, though I instinctively knew that I could stop or lighten the process with sheer force of will.

I’d never have Tattletale’s problem of knowing everyone’s deepest and darkest desires or secrets solely because I could control just what sort of information I received and when I received it, if I deigned to even activate the ability. For now, I willed it to its lowest ‘setting’. More insight was always useful, but I didn’t need the full force with Cassie of all people.

Seeing as she was still studying the walls and ceilings in a very obvious manner, I stifled an amused snort and walked closer to the petite girl.

“Cass,” I said lowly, gently grasping her chin and turning her face up to look at me. She shivered at the sensation of my fingers against her skin - aroused, nervous, hopeful - and silently stared into my eyes.

“...Yes?” Her voice was high, squeaky, and decidedly not cool. It was clear that she was completely in unknown territory and was relying entirely on me to make my stance known…so I did.

“I don’t like to pussyfoot around things, never have, so I’m just gonna give it to you straight: I want you. Badly. And unless I’m readin’ things waaaay sideways, you want me too - feel free tell me if I’m wrong.”

For her sake, I dutifully ignored the way that her eyes were beginning to glimmer with tears.

“Y-you’re not wrong,” Cassie breathed, her cheeks turning scarlet. She swallowed heavily, closing her eyes and shaking her head from left to right. “I- fuck, asshole, I swear I’m not crying. I’m not a-a crybaby or anything. I just-”

I softly wiped a traitorous tear away from her splotchy cheeks. “You definitely are. Crying, that is. But keep going.” A lopsided grin was on my face, but I could feel my own body heating up as a particularly addictive mixture of happiness, anticipation, and something that I was not going to name just yet pierced through my beating heart.

Cassie opened her eyes again, sniffling and pinning me with a heated glare. “Shut- shut up. I just t-thought that you’d see this as a…one night stand kinda thing, y’know? I spent the last couple hours trying to figure out how to, um…approach the situation.” The heat drained out of her eyes as she spoke, and she suddenly seemed tired. Tired and hopeful. She smiled a watery smile and let out a loud, minty breath. “But yes, I want you. I wanna be with your cocky ass.”

I tilted my head. “We’ve been living together for the past week. You’re gonna have to be more specific.”

She laughed and wiggled her head rapidly, twisting out of my soft grip. I let her go. “Oh no, we are not doing this. You have to ask me!” Still splotchy-cheeked and teary-eyed, Cassie placed her hands on her hips and glowered.

“Says who?” I arched an eyebrow.

“What? I don’t know, gender roles? Modern-day media? Societal expectations?”

“The only rules I follow are my own.”

“I said ‘roles’, dummy. And ew, edgy much? I’m not the biggest fan of adhering to society’s standards, but you-” I blinked, ignoring what my cute little hacker was saying and instead observing her body language. She was smiling and snorting at our usual banter like always, but I could see that she was still not very confident about the whole thing. She needed me to make it abundantly clear where our relationship lied, outside of our very obvious mutual attraction.

I could also do that.

“Ugh. Jay, are you even listeni- mmf…?” My lips cut her complaints off at the source. This kiss was softer, less sexually charged and dominating - but no less sweet and heated. I could feel all of the worry and stress practically ease out of Cassie’s body as she collapsed against me, wrapping her arms around my neck and breathing harshly through her nose. She was an inexperienced kisser, and if not for my own talent at locking lips we probably would have had a clumsy teeth-colliding accident, but that only made it all the more sweet.

She was practically panting when I pulled away. “Wha- why? Huuuh.”

I grinned like a cat who caught the canary. “Would you do me the honors of becoming my girlfriend, Cassie?”

Her confused and stupefied expression cleared in an instant. I almost thought she was calling on Hysh with the amount of radiant beauty that brightened her smile. Fortunately for her ego, no more tears were shed. “Hm,” she breathed, leaning forward and pressing her forehead against mine. Her next words were practically whispers when she said them. “I guess I can do that. Si- since you asked so chivalrously.” Her spotty attempt to seem cool and graceful could not hide the giddiness in her words. It definitely couldn’t hide the relief and pure joy that I could see in the tiny, extraneous microexpressions displayed throughout her entire face.

“Sweet,” I smiled, placing another chaste kiss on her lips before pulling back. “Now, as my cute and adorably nerdy girlfriend, I gotta ask…do you want power?”

Cassie stopped nuzzling her face against my chest in order to give me a puzzled and deadpan stare. “We’ve already been over this, Jay - I have powers. My super awesome and badass coding magic - you called it that yourself.” She took a step back and tilted her chin up proudly.

I waved a hand. “Yeah, and I stand by what I said, but earlier today I gained an ability that lets me share some of my powers. I’m not the biggest fan of leaving you alone with nothing but Snapchat to defend yourself with, so I figured I’d buff you up a little.”

I’d thought about it over the past few hours, and I decided that giving Cassie a small magical core of her own was worth it for a small number of reasons. While I would be sacrificing a bit of my own overall mana to charge her core, I already had a large amount of mana - a small drainage off of that was nothing in the face of Cassie being able to defend herself. Furthermore, my most powerful abilities at the moment - the Winds of Magic - didn’t even use my inner supply.

Additionally, unless I was understanding my ability wrong - and I didn’t think I was - granting Cassie a portion of my mana would make her compatible with whatever types of magic I was already attuned to via the Grimoire. While she wouldn’t be able to utilize the Aethyr without the connection to it that I possessed, teaching her Weapon Magic wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. She wouldn’t have my instinctive grasp of the magic, and it was doubtful that she’d be able to do large-scale attacks with only a fraction of my mana, but even a little bit was better than nothing.

Hidden Intuition was a godsend - that whole thought process only took a couple seconds to fully flesh out in my head.

Cassie was still chewing on my words when I returned my attention to her. “...Alright,” she sighed, taking her hands off of her hips and swinging her gaze back to me. “But only if I get to choose what color my badass energy attacks get to be. Like, a dappled fuchsia or a glimmering emerald.” She made finger-guns and aimed the sights down at me, a glare on her brow.

“Bang!”

I rolled my eyes, bemused. “I didn’t even tell you which power you were getting.” I commented drily, walking over to the small box of colorful potions and picking them up.

“So? You’re not the only smart one, babe.”

I paused at the pet name, but Cassie continued without realizing what she called me.

“Honestly, you’ve got to get a handle on that arrogance bucko. Just because you’re super hot, fit, beautiful, have an amazing voice, and a big di- um,” she hesitated, blushing hotly, “Penis doesn’t mean you’re the greatest thing since sliced bread!”

I paused in front of her, the box of potions held firmly under my left arm. “...Uh-huh. So how’d you figure out that-”

“I-it was a guess, alright?! Geez.”

I snorted. Loudly. “Alright, smart one, go grab the uzi from the bedroom - it’s in the upper left drawer of the dresser. The magazine’s empty, but we won’t need actual bullets.” I ruffled her hair with my free hand, easily avoiding her counter-swat, and made my way towards the exit of the training room.

Cassie followed me almost immediately.

“Ugh, it’s so weird how you remember the specifics of everything so clearly. Unfair, too. And are those magic potions?! Like, video game magic potions?” She went to grab one, and I smoothly dodged out of the way.

“Yes.” I smirked, holding the box on my head where the bratty hacker couldn’t reach. “They do exactly what you think they do. Imma place ‘em in the fridge.”

“How do they work?” Cassie gaped, walking backwards in front of me so that she could stare at my newest pet project. The hallway wasn’t the longest, however, and we were quickly approaching the door to the kitchen, so I clicked my tongue and gestured for her to walk normally. She pouted, but obliged immediately.

“To be honest with you…I’m not too sure. My powers apparently don’t just give me new abilities - they can sometimes give me items too.” We stepped into the kitchen, and I headed straight for the barren refrigerator. Potions didn’t need to be refrigerated, but I figured they’d taste better chilled rather than lukewarm. The lack of food in the freezer was depressing, but I ignored it in favor of carefully putting each glass bottle orderly towards the back, where it was coolest.

Cassie sat her wonderfully cushiony ass on the counter, her brow furrowed as she listened to my half-baked explanation. “Sort of like premade Tinkertech? You can’t just casually throw ‘Tinker’ onto your bullshit list of ‘fuck you’ powers, Jay.”

“It’s something like that,” I responded noncommittally.

When I closed the freezer and turned around, I saw her staring at me with an unamused glare - probably because of the lackadaisical way I was explaining my abilities. To be fair, I didn’t want to lie to my new girlfriend about the origins of my powers, but there was too much I wasn’t sure about when it came to the chunk of alien bullshit attached to her brain. Until I could properly disconnect her Shard from its network and sever that connection completely, I was going to stay consistent with my ‘overpowered Trump’ lie. It was already failing, but I knew she’d understand. Hopefully.

“Look,” I sighed, walking over and brushing a strand of hair out of her narrowed eyes. Cassie cocked a brow and frowned, but it was obvious that she enjoyed the physical attention - she practically nuzzled into my hand. “There’s a lot I’m still learning about myself and my powers. There’s a lot happening beneath the hood, Cass. Just trust me.”

And she did trust me - that much I could tell, even without my inhuman intuition.

“Mmm,” Cassie grumbled, softly nipping at my finger. “Fine. I trust you more than you know, jackass. You came out of nowhere and tossed my quiet life completely on its head, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. You can keep your secrets for now.” A smile played on her soft lips. The words came from the heart, so sudden and warmth-filled that it had me of all people tongue-tied.

“...Uh. I-”

She giggled - a light, bell-like sound. “Hehe, don’t say anything. It’s nice to get the last word against a smartass like you.” Cassie hopped off the counter, kissed me on the cheek, and skipped towards the living room, leaving me watching her go with half-lidded eyes. “I’ll go grab the gun!”

I rubbed a hand down my face. “She’s gonna be the death of me…”

The Grimoire chose this moment to remind me that it did, in fact, still exist. A lurching in my gut turned my attention inwards, and I felt the hook fly towards a small mote of light.

Magic Mirror (Terraria - 100 CP): A simple fancy mirror that can be designated with a ‘spawn point’, and which, when you gaze within, will teleport you to that exact point, shifting you to the next clear area if that spot is occupied. Must be within several hundred miles of the ‘spawn point’ for this to function.

‘Hah, Tinkertech indeed.’

It didn’t take me longer than a second of thought to accept the magical item - several hundred miles wasn’t an extreme distance when you took into account just how big the world was, but it was definitely impressive enough. I’d be able to return to my Sanctum in an instant if things got too hairy out in the field as long as I stayed in the Northeastern side of the United States. I’d be able to make riskier moves, thread the needle of danger just a little bit more as long as I retained the ability to look into the mirror.

Brockton Bay really wouldn’t know what hit it. Preparations were being made, nests were kicked, and all I needed was my costume to be completed before I made my official debut. Overall, things were looking to be on the up and up. It was a curious feeling, actually looking forward to the mayhem and fighting that awaited me in the near future. It was a far cry from the original despair and misery that overwhelmed me when I was first dropped into this world. Better, though, in basically every way.

I just wanted to make sure that Cassie was prepared as well.

__________________________________

Perks Received:

Potion Package (Legend of Zelda: Hero of Worlds - 100 CP): Health, Magic and Stamina potions, which replenish weekly.

Magic Mirror (Terraria - 100 CP): A simple fancy mirror that can be designated with a ‘spawn point’, and which, when you gaze within, will teleport you to that exact point, shifting you to the next clear area if that spot is occupied. Must be within several hundred miles of the ‘spawn point’ for this to function.

350 CP Remaining.