36 36 Growth and the new deal

"Alright then, try to turn into an animal you have devoured in the past."

"I'll try." I close my eyes and focus as hard as I can, once again on the bear. I imagine all its features and its anatomy, the knowledge I acquired earlier comes in handy for this. Then I go through the steps of transformation and...

success!

In a flurry of shapes and colors I phase into a large Kodiak Bear.

Looking down at my paws in amazement, they look and feel so strange.

'This is awesome. I feel like singing. Tell everybody I'm on my way. New friends and new places to see.'

I quickly turn back into my humanoid form.

'Incredible, I can turn into anything I devour. I'm absolutely going to the Monsterverse and hunt down Godzilla at my earliest convenience. Oooh and Ghidorah! A three headed dragon! Wait, how would that even work? Would my mind split in three? Meh, I'll cross that bridge when I get there.'

"It's amazing, thank you. But my wolf form is way more comfortable and just feels more natural to me."

"Does it feel more comfortable than your humanoid form?"

"Actually, yes it does."

"Interesting. The size of your wolf and bear forms were bigger than any wolf or bear I've ever seen. Is that one of your abilities? Can you grow bigger and become smaller?

"Yes, I can both grow and shrink."

"Have you ever tried to grow in your humanoid form?"

"Really? If I could grow and shrink like that, I'm pretty sure I'd know."

"Once again, that depends if you've ever tried or not. You can't just accidentally stumble upon most abilities. They usually require a certain amount of focus. So if you've never tried before, you should probably do so now. It's better to know you're capable of something and never have to use it, than it is to have to do something, not knowing you're actually capable of it. Besides, growing and shrinking in size is not that rare among gods. Some of us can just do it, others use their divinities like Poseidon. He gathers a large amount of seawater around him and shapes the water into himself. So just try."

"Alright."

And for the umpteenth time in the last forty-five minutes I close my eyes and focus, but this time I focus on becoming bigger. But before I even open my eyes.. *BANG*

The top of my head knocks against the ceiling.

"Damn! It actually worked. Hah! This is amazing, thank you again"

"You're welcome. Now how about you turn into a wolf again and become as big as you possibly can."

"I won't fit in this room."

"Right, let's remedy that." She then snaps her fingers again and the room suddenly becomes much bigger.

"Spatial magic."

"Yes, exactly."

"Do you also know temporal magic?"

"Yes, we're surrounded by it right now. In this room, time moves faster, so a hundred days in here is more like one day on the outside. That's how I can experiment as much as I want with very few disturbances."

"We've been here for an hour, but you're saying no more than tirty-six seconds have passed outside?"

"Yes, exactly. Now, could you become big please?"

"Oh, right." I turn into my wolf form again and become as big as I can.

The next moment I'm standing at twenty-three feet tall. (about 7 meters)

'Hmm, I've grown over the last few years. I'm now bigger than Fenris from Marvel but nowhere near Godzilla's size. He's at least one hundred meters taller.'

"Alright let me use a little spell to see what we're working with here."

Hecate grabs a bag from one of the shelves and walks towards me, she then starts walking around me in a circle and every five feet or so she grabs a handful of shining golden dust from the bag and throws it on the floor.

When she's created a full circle she claps her hands together and the dust on the floor aligns to create a very complex magic circle.

The circle starts glowing brightly and after ten seconds it fades and there's no magic circle or even dust anymore.

"Incredible. Did you know you're in a perpetual state of growth?"

"Yes, I'm aware."

"But not just in size, everything is evolving. Your bone and muscle density, which actually makes sense, otherwise they couldn't support your size when sooner or later you become too big. But also every kind of energy that runs through your body is increasing in both quality and quantity. And what are all these forms of energy? I only recognise a few, but there are dozens. Maybe even more that couldn't be perceived by my spell.

Your existence defies so many things I thought I knew.

What are you?"

"Not sure how to answer that existential question. Let me be blunt here, because this isn't going in the direction I'd hoped. I wanted to find out something you wanted, or even needed that I could give you.."

"In return for my knowledge." She says, finishing my sentence. "In Hephaestus' note she explained that for curing her condition, you, in return would receive her knowledge and various other rewards. And now you want mine."

"Yes, exactly. But while it was obvious what Hephaestus would want in return. The only thing you've been interested in is my fangs." She seems ready to say something at that so I quickly intervene. "Which I'm not giving you."

"Awww." She responds slumping her shoulders in disappointment.

"So, what would you want in return?"

"I don't know what you have to off...er" Suddenly she seems lost in thought, before apparently coming to a decision.

"Where are you from?" She asks, rather suddenly.

"Excuse me?"

"To tell you what I want in return for giving you my knowledge I need to know if you're from a dimension connected to this universe or from a different universe entirely."

"Different universe."

"And will you travel to other universes later?"

"Yes."

"Safe to assume then that some of these worlds will have magic in them, correct?"

"Yes, certainly."

"Good, then I know what I want from you.

I'm going to give you everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. Everything I know about magic, witchcraft, herbs, poison, necromancy and sorcery. Basically all my divinities, at least the ones that could be useful to you in any way.

In return, whenever you learn anything about them that isn't included in the knowledge I give you, you put it in these and send it to me." When she's finished she conjures another empty grimoire.

"A grimoire?"

"Yes, with Hephaestus' knowledge, you'll be able to make these yourself."

"Alright, that's actually pretty easy. But how do I send it to you? I can't make a round trip to this universe every time I learn something new."

"You'd put the grimoires here." She holds her hand open and a magic circle appears, she then puts her hand to my forehead and a magic spell appears in my mind.

"You have your own dimension?"

"Yes, I do. When you fill a grimoire, just put it inside and I'll find it. With the spell I just gave you, you can only put things inside. You can't take anything out.

So, do we have a deal?"