1 Prologue

I tried to pry open the metallic lock of the book once more. At one time, I would have been careful not to damage it but over the years, my patience had worn thin. The book in question was said to have been left with with me on the doorstep of the orphanage around 12 years ago, on the night February 29th. Since I could begin understanding, I had tried every conceivable way to open it. Even with the help of some of the nuns in the orphanage, but no luck. Some of them even had started saying that it was a book of the devil and wanted to get rid of it. Thankfully, mother superior wasn't so narrow minded. She made sure to keep it safe until the orphanage was closed down.

Following that, most of the children, including me were sent to foster care. I got pushed around foster homes like a pinball for one reason or another and throughout that, I only revealed the book to select few. This had been because some of the less, kind foster families I had had either tried to steal it or sell it or just destroy it for no apparent reason. Luckily, I was able to fend them off and keep the book relatively safe and I also made a rule to not willy nilly show people the book.

I turned the letter opener as hard as I could. Nothing happend for a while until I felt something give away. Unfortunately, it was not the lock on the book but the letter opener. The item in question snapped in half sending several shards flying. One of which dug into the tip of my finger making it bleed. I muffled a scream as I cradled my finger, trying to lessen the pain.

Thankfully, the Johnsons, my current foster family had gone to a PTA meeting of one of their youngest sons. So I was able to make my way to the first aid kit, pull the Shard out with a pair of tweezers before disinfecting the wound and put a band aid over the cut without any awkward questions. I then walked back to my room, making sure I didn't bleed anywhere on the house because I knew that Mrs Johnson was going to flip if she found her rugs stained with the blood of a peasant aka, me.

After making sure that the house was spotless, I looked back at my book and saw a translated blob on blood near the lock. I watched as the blood circulate around the lock before flowing inside. Soon after, a loud metallic click reverberated through the empty house before the lock on the book opened.

I couldn't help but look at what had unfolded with wide eyes. For as long as I could remember I wanted nothing more than to finally open this book. But now that it had, I found myself frozen in place. I had clearly seen the blood circling around the lock. It wasn't natural.

I stood there for what seemed like hours before walking towards the now unlocked book. I soflty grabbed the cover of the book before gently flipping it, opening the book. The first thing I saw was the title.

"The Magical Almanac of Dr. Theodore Hampton."

I frowned at the title. I wasn't some snot nosed kid who still believed in Santa. As such a part of me was quite skeptical about it. However, the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Moreover, recent events made it difficult to disregard it. After all superheroes were believed to be fictional but now we had tens of superhero teams in each state, at least including the Avengers who has a nordic god another thing thought to be myth, in their ranks.

I flipped to the first first page and found it written in an unknown language. I was about to curse under my breath when the words began to morphs into a more familiar alphabet. Namely English.

"Hello my dear readers. My name is Dr. Theodore Hampton, a surgeon, a writer, a philosopher and an quite recently, an avid seeker of the occult and supernatural. Let me explain.

I was born in a quaint little town near Birmingham on July 5th 1886. My father worked in the mines and my mother walked in a noblemans house. Growing up was difficult for me with my entire family barely getting by our meager salaries. It got worse when my father took up drinking which forced my mother to find a second job to support us.

Nevertheless, seeing how my parents were living, I was determined to make something off myself. So I began working myself, earning money to attend a better school. It wasn't easy. There were many sleepless night or painful ones when father became angry.

Still my efforts didn't go to waste as I caught the eye of one Bertram Leonards a heir to a very prosperous trading company. He agreed to sponsor me in exchange for looking after his son who was to attend the same academy as I was. I was to act as a sort of a bodyguard and a butler to him during his time their.

As years passed I graduated the academy and won a scholarship to study medicine in a prestigious college in Sweden. Thus with my debt fulfilled, I bade farewell to Bertram and the England and set out to Sweden where I spent the next decade and half. During that time, I had learned from some of the brigtest minds of our generation. Acquired medical knowlge from around the world and built a reputation for myself as an exceptional doctor.

My skills would be put to the ultimate test, with the emergence of the Spanish Flu. Me and my colleagues were sent all over the world, in an effort to contain it and cure it but came short. For all the knowledge all the gadgets and the reputation that we had, we could only watch as the victims succumb to their deaths.

It was around then I met 'him'. I was in Asia, travelling from country to country examining the victims of this plague. I had just finished examining a man not long for this world when a monk approached the tent. He didn't wear any protective garments or had any medicines or equipment yet the people let him inside before promotly asking me to exit despite my protests.

A few short minutes later, the monk exited the tent and the man who was previously death door followed behind him. Now healthy as a horse. The shock I felt was only overshadowed by the joy of the people outside as their thanked the monk profusely.

I later approached the monk, begging for him to impart how he had cured that man. He was hesitant, outright refusing to divulge the knowledge safeguarded by his order. But I was persistent. And at long last, he agreed to teach me, so long as I pass a trial and agree to become his disciple if I succeed. Naturally I agreed without realising just how much my world was about to change because of it. "

I tried to read further only to hear the my foster family arrive back home. I shut the book in one smooth motion, and the lock fell into place almost instantly. I then hid the book unded a hidden compartment in my suitcase before making my way down just as my foster mother called for me.