153 Trick 152: Knowledge vs Power

Ace was sitting in a room suddenly, Yao going through a book as she said "How strong would you say you are, Ace?" Ace scratched his head and replied "Very strong? One of the strongest?" Yao chuckled and replied "I see. You're very cute. Unfortunately, also completely wrong."

Ace was stunned and Yao smiled at him, closing the book as she continued "Your strength lies in the very extensive amount of spells you know. In other words, your knowledge is what makes you strong. However, the strength of these spells is lacking. This is the reason why that Android fellow lived. If I had to put your power on a Universal scale, there are countless people stronger than you."

She smiled gently and went on, "In a fist fight, Thanos would still slaughter you. However this is not fair, because you are adept at Magic, Thanos would also kill me. However, compared to the bigger folks in the Universe, you are but a slightly larger ant." Ace was stunned and replied "Thanks…"

Yao chuckled, "However, this doesn't have to be so! Haven't you ever wondered why you seem to be the only one at Kamar-Taj able to do unreasonable things? I remember telling you that your inherent power was to Warp Reality at a Basic Level, meaning you could perform minor feats incomprehensible, however not truly spectacular. Since then, you have created things that shouldn't exist, turned cities to many different things, among other things."

She tilted her head and asked "Have you once not truly thought about how this was possible? How could it be that all your endeavors work in your favor? Your magic circle for example, the way I see it, it shouldn't exist because it is not possible. Your staff, it is unreasonable to have a metallic wood and yet here it is. Even the fact that you seemed to have taken a portion of Yggdrasil's branch and integrated it in your staff should be impossible for everyone other than you."

Ace was speechless and Yao smiled gently, "Even the Eternal Flames shouldn't be divisible and yet they are also a part of your absurd weapon. Don't you find it strange that Loki simply gave you everything he had on his person? Isn't it weird that the God of Mischief would be so cowardly as to bend to your threats?"

Ace frowned and Yao went on, "It seems that you are simply lucky, or the gods have decreed that your word is law, but it isn't so. You have a very special magic inside of you, Ace. The ability to warp reality isn't limited to creating magic out of thin air, nor is it limited to turning a building into a mass of cards. You have been subconsciously manipulating the world around you without even realizing it. Your body makes true what you desire to see, of course, you have no idea how to use such power, therefore it does not occur consistently."

She chuckled at his discolored face, saying "No, you have not been forcing people to like you. The connections you've made are quite real, until only recently in your life, it had been unable to warp living beings, perhaps you subconsciously rejected such a thing, however it has happened on occasion. Today it has finally rewritten reality to your wish."

Ace asked "So the two-" Yao waved her hand and smiled "Not gone, only eliminated… Which is truly spectacular…" she paused before changing the subject to something else, "If you wish to truly win this tournament, you will have to learn how to harness this power and weave it into your magic, making it a true part of you. Not only will your spells receive strength, you will be able to create scenes unimaginable to you before! However, this process will take excruciatingly long to master. I myself have lived centuries and haven't mastered such an ability even with the power of the Mystic Arts."

Ace nodded and said seriously "I'm ready to learn, Master." Yao smiled gently and nodded, "Good boy."

The next year

Ace and Hela fought again, Ace focused and erased the enemy instantly. He got boos from the crowd, but was pleasantly surprised!

He managed to do it!

2 years later

Ace and Hela were in the final showdown, Hela looked bored and Ace was smiling confidently.

Across from them was a purple alien wearing a black trench coat and the other was a skinny yellow alien with fur, although he was shivering.

Death crossed her slender legs and said softly "You may begin."

Ace waved his hand and the two aliens disappeared instantly. Ace turned and said happily "There you go-" before pausing as Hela flew across the stadium, slamming into the arena's edge.

The purple alien stood there with his hands in his pockets, turning to Ace as he said "You're slow." before Ace could even think, he was slammed in the stomach and coughed up blood, shooting across the arena.

The purple alien reappeared, kicking Hela into the stands before turning to Ace, saying "Now it's only us." Ace got up and wiped his mouth, frowning "How-" The alien cut him off, saying "Because you're too weak. I had to drag the ant I had with me, finally he's gone."

Before disappearing.

Ace rolled to the side, but was kicked in the face, smashing into the ground, crushing the stone under them. The purple alien looked at him saying "I thought you would be stronger." before kicking Ace in the face, sending him rolling away.

What followed was a unilateral beating!

Ace was smashed into the arena, who knows how many times. Over and over again as the purple alien stopped speaking.

Eventually, Ace was laid out on the ground, staring at the black sky in a daze, his vision and consciousness fuzzy to the extreme.

The alien looked down at him and snorted, stretching out his hand, but Ace suddenly rolled to the side and the alien missed. He frowned and Ace jumped up before twisting as the alien frowned deeper asking "What are you doing?"

Ace flipped in the air and landed on the ground with 3 points, holding his staff in his free hand, he snorted and said "So that's how it is then. I get it." The alien frowned at him, saying "What?" Ace cracked his neck and spat out some blood, tapping his temple with his staff as his wounds healed and he replied "You can manipulate time for a bit, makes sense."

He jumped off the ground and touched his staff on the ground, holding himself up as the alien's foot was suddenly on the staff as Ace added, "Sorry, skip time. That's how you avoided me… Hmmm. Difficult."

Ace put up a shield in front of his face as a fists was on it. Ace looked at the alien asking "What's your name?" The alien frowned and ignored him, saying "Even if you figured it out, you can't win. You're too weak."

Ace landed back on the ground and frowned, putting up a shield in front of his neck as he muttered "Maybe…" before tapping his staff on the ground as a huge amount of gravity fell on the duo.

The alien snorted and still hit Ace, sending him back a few steps as Ace held his hand over his stomach, blocking the punch.

Ace jumped back a few times, getting further and further away as he continued tapping his Staff on the ground over and over, setting a glowing run on the ground across the entire stage, producing an arena wide gravity field.

He frowned at the alien in the middle before waving his hand, closets popping up around the edge of the arena. Ace disappeared into a closet behind him as the alien appeared exactly where he just was.

Ace appeared at the other end of the arena and smiled "Over here." The alien frowned and said "You're annoying." Ace curled his lips and said "Possibly." before going back into the closet and appearing outside of another one.

Ace continued the teleporting until the alien started destroying closets. On the fifth one, the closet exploded and blew the alien away into another closet that opened up behind him.

The door slammed shut and it transformed into an iron maiden, swords piercing it like a hedgehog before it erupted into flames. Ace poked his head out from a closet before he was blown away, smashing the closet behind him.

The alien appeared, somewhat ragged, saying "I will kill you." slight anger in his voice.

Ace flew off the stage and fizzled out of existence, standing next to the alien, looking at himself as he nodded, "Mhm." before a fist was through his neck, splashing blood everywhere but he fizzled out again.

Hundreds of Aces appeared all around the arena, walking in and out of closets constantly, apparently all in a daze, only one of them was smiling and the alien snorted at the obvious trick.

The smiling Ace pouted and waved his staff as all the Aces turned to the alien, pointing out their staves and shooting an array of different spells. The alien disappeared and attacked the pouting Ace, who smiled and bubbled like a balloon, exploding entirely, the rest of the Aces jumped on the alien before erupting into a fiery inferno, shooting into the sky!

The dust cleared and the alien stood there, a little charred but otherwise fine. However, he was getting annoyed now. This wasn't fun at all. It was really boring for him.

Ace was indeed weaker than this alien who could skip through time and seemed to be immune to all attacks…

However, Ace was sure he could get him, just how is the question. He crossed his arms and frowned, thinking hard as he stood next to the alien, invisible.

The alien suddenly frowned and punched to the side but Ace stepped out of the way, freezing in shock.

Did he just?

The Alien turned around and frowned "Invisible? Hmmm…" before kicking out and feeling his foot hit something soft. He smirked and punched to the side, smashing a far away closet to pieces.

Ace revealed himself and said "What the hell!" The alien curled his lips and said "I can feel you, or rather, your magic." Ace frowned and muttered "God damn it…" as he flipped his staff over to the sword bit, saying "Whatever, I don't care anymore."

He stabbed the ground with the prongs of his staff and shouted "Cronvs Lacrima!" A purple wave spread across the field and the Alien looked around, saying "You locked time?"

Then he sneered, adding sarcastically "That won't help you." as he shot forward, appearing in front of Ace in an instant, but Ace blocked him, curling his lips "Just locking time? Sorry. I'm more capable than that."

His movements turned to afterimages as he used the staff like a spear, stabbing at the alien several dozen times, getting blocked at every turn as the alien blocked them all, replying "You sped yourself up? Interesting, but you're too weak!" as he knocked the staff up punching Ace in the stomach.

Ace swung the staff into the alien's way, blocking the punch but sliding back as he cleared his throat.

The Alien appeared in front of him and kicked out as Ace jumped into the air, stabbing his staff at the alien's head, however he tilted his head and dodged the thrust, shooting his hand out, punching Ace in the face, sending him flying across the stage as he shot after him.

He appeared above Ace and slammed his fists down as Ace blocked with his staff, holding it with both hands, spinning it around several times as the alien fired several hundred punches in a second, all aimed at Ace's vital spots.

Ace flew down and raised his staff in the air, making a circle as a few ripples appeared. A reversed version of the alien stepped out of the ripples and jumped at the alien, mimicking him exactly, blocking all his punches and movements.

Ace flickered behind the alien and stabbed the staff in the ground by the broken blade as he sucked in a breath before roaring through the prongs, a massive ripple undulated at the alien, who frowned a bit painfully while fighting himself.

He shot at Ace, but his double appeared in front of him, charging at him as well.

Ace separated into clones that formed a circle around the alien, they all shouted as well, creating a mass of soundwaves in the middle on the alien, who groaned painfully. Ace stepped out of himself and fell backwards, falling into the stone arena as it flipped under him like a door.

He flipped back up behind the Alien, back to back with him as he said "What's your name." The alien held his ears and groaned "Mezorak." while spinning quickly, shooting an elbow at Ace's neck.

Ace disappeared into an illusion as he smiled "Cool name." Mezorak looked around in confusion, the world started fracturing all around him as he looked up, Ace smiled down at him, saying "I had fun, Mezorak. Maybe you could come work for me when this is over. You don't seem like a bad guy, your soul is only gray."

Mezorak felt the time restrictions lift on him as he snorted "You're so confident?" Ace smiled happily and nodded, "Yeah because I won a long time ago." Mezorak didn't understand and Ace smiled gently, saying "Let me show you."

He walked forward, but he wasn't walking forward at all!

He walked forward but moved downwards closer to Mezorak as the world started twisting and shifting, warping around Mezorak, showing him where he was.

Turns out, he was already out of bounds, looking at Ace through a clear ice sheet as he was frozen solid in time, Ace only gave his mind the illusion of combat!

Mezorak was stunned and said in shock "How did this happen?!" Ace walked into nothing and appeared behind Mezorak as though he had been walking straight the whole time while tapping his chin, replying "Probably when I first asked you your name."

Then he chuckled, walking through Mezorak, adding "It was so long ago now that I forgot~!" Mezorak suddenly found out that he was talking to Ace face to face, even his mind couldn't keep up with Ace's world!

He shook his head and said "It's impossible! We were fighting for 5 minutes at most!" Ace sat on the ground and smiled "Not true. That fight was a year ago." Mezorak couldn't understand what was going on anymore…

Ace scratched his head and sighed "You don't understand? Hm.. Okay, so here's what happened. When you knocked Hela out of the stage and then beat me to a pulp, I set up a time freezing ritual all around the stage. Every time you knocked me around, I landed in the spot to place another marker on the ritual circle."

The world around them showed the scene of Ace landing on the ground, flashing purple for not even a tenth of a second.

Ace explained "The trigger was when I asked for your name. At that moment…"

The space around them showed Ace land on the ground and flash purple and he landed in a three pointed posture, marking the ground in the final rune as he asked "What's your name?"

The scene showed what happened after that moment.

Mezorak froze in place along with nearly all the souls in the crowd, only a choice few still able to move.

Death stood up and said "It's over." Yao clapped her hands, smiling gently as Lucifer cheered and Mephisto clicked his tongue with disdain, muttering "Cheap trick."

Death looked at Ace and said "You and Hela come see me in 1 year." before she disappeared.

Ace froze Mezorak and took him away as Yao waved and shattered the time stop ritual and everything around Ace and Mezorak shattered as well, revealing the endless wasteland of the Realm of Death.

Ace smiled at him, saying "You're definitely much stronger than me, but I know more things than you do. So here we are. Surprisingly, the Time Stop ritual will only have this effect in the Realm of Death, the Universe is too big to stop time just like that, plus the big guys won't be happy with me so…"

Mezorak broke free and frowned "So you won just like that. Why am I here?" Ace snapped his fingers and winked "See! That's the question! I want to know why your soul is only gray and not pitch black like the rest of the contestants."

Mezorak frowned and stared at Ace, who was smiling the whole time, not afraid or nervous or anything. He looked around and said "I was an assassin." Ace nodded, "I see. Makes sense now."

Mezorak turned to him and Ace waved a circle over his palm, showing a bright white glowing orb, explaining "Imagine this is your soul at birth. As you go through life some things happen and maybe you kill someone. If you kill someone just for the sake of killing…"

The orb turned blackish, and Ace went on, "And if you keep killing more and more people for no reason or purpose…" the Orb turned so black it was as though there was a hole in space itself!

Ace snapped his fingers and smiled "However!" as the orb turned white again, "If you kill out of defense or for some other justifiable reason…" the orb started turning gray and Ace added, "Karma is a lower form of Magic, but Cause and Effect is a Natural Law. The more you kill, the darker your soul gets, but if you kill to survive only, the penalty is less. If you kill to save people, the price is negligible… And if you don't kill at all…"

Ace sent the orb away and pulled on his own chest, pulling out an extremely bright white goopy substance as he smiled at Mezorak, "Your soul will never change a shade." Mezorak blinked at Ace, slightly stunned, asking "You've never killed anyone?"

Ace put his soul back and shook his head, "Destroy the body in the Tournament, but kill someone? No. Life is very precious. Too precious to be played around with." then he smiled at Mezorak, "That's why I had to win, a lot of those guys had extremely black souls. Killing machines that exist only to bring pain. That's not fair for the people who killed them."

Ace stood up and patted his hands, stretching his hands out as he said "I'm Ace, by the way! Magic Historian and Full time hero." Mezorak looked at him sarcastically, asking "You expect me to shake hands with you and become friends? Are you joking?"

Ace nodded and said "Yep! I'm not joking at all! Thing is, I don't have anyone to take care of my Realm. I don't really want to be cooped up in that realm for the rest of eternity… kinda sounds boring. Wanna join my group?" Mezorak snorted at him and replied "No." before walking away.

Ace said to his back "You'll be a servant of death if you don't! That's not fun! Imagine being a servant your whole life! A strong guy like you!" Mezorak stopped and Ace went on, "You're only dead, doesn't mean you are done! Maybe you can go back…"

Mezorak turned his head and frowned "What are you talking about." Ace grinned and replied "I can make it so you go back to the living world… at a price, of course." Mezorak frowned deeper and Ace dusted his hands, smiling "Not too steep, probably the best of the Death Gods."

Mezorak sighed, "What price?" Ace grinned, flashing his sharp canines as he replied "Just a job."

A while later