9

Sitting in front of Coil's comatose body, I peered with my new sense at the portal originating from his brain. Based on my meta-knowledge and the fact it was coming from his brain, I could assume that this was the portal the Shards used to power their hosts.

While, for now, I didn't dare to access it more directly, Coil's Shard would enable me to experiment directly, as while Scion was depressed however if somebody were messing around with his network, he would drop the hammer of god on them.

Standing back up, I walked back to my Grimoire and flipped it open. I had a few ideas, and my new understanding of the world would allow me to enchant a lot faster and slightly better. While I couldn't improve a whole sphere in enchanting, I could eke out a few improvements and streamline the items to work better.

However, first, it was time to level up; grabbing my Adventuring Card out of my pocket, I saw that I had leveled up quite a few times, which meant I had a decent number of skill points to use and a good amount of options.

While I had several skills and spells I could purchase, my current weak point was my survivability, with pathetically low HP and my Monster body being receptive to the emotions of a person striking me, as evidenced by Alabaster earlier, I needed more HoPe.

I placed my thumb on the HP section of the card and saw it rising as the number grew. I found my mandible, despite all biology saying otherwise, grin. After putting the card back in my pocket, I flipped open my Grimoire to see what I could improve.

The main improvement to make was on my clothing in general. The main thing was that the clothes I wore were designed for a person with flesh that could hold it up.

My lack of said flesh made it so that things like socks and sneakers were almost impossible to wear, and my pendant didn't help because it was only an illusion. While tapping a finger on the open Grimoire, an idea struck me.

I could enchant the clothing to, on a command, appear as if my pendant form was wearing them and, on other phrases, would return to how they looked now, baggy and barely holding on.

Stripping, leaving just my boxers on and moon white soul thrumming in my ribcage, I got to work. While the work was simple on its own, and my various sources of knowledge and power helped to speed up the process massively, it still took over a day to complete, which was a far cry from the week or more it would have taken before.

Around nighttime the next day, I had finished altering my clothing. I decided to test it out. I walked over to a tiny cracked mirror leaning up against the wall; I then picked it up and, with a muttered "Cast On" in german the clothes filled out, looked as if my original form was wearing them. With muttered "Cast Off," in german the clothes shrank back down.

As I picked up my Grimoire, I felt something crawling over my third rib. I brushed a hand over my shirt to get it out, the small insect fell out of my shirt, and I froze. The date was the 26th which meant that Taylor was going out for the first time in around twenty days. However, with the Empire imploding, she might have gone out early. Running my hands over my skull, I mimed the action of breathing in and out.

I could just be overthinking things; it could be an insect that simply was crawling on me. I snorted in response to that thought; insects and other bugs did not crawl on me because I was literally just a bag of bones as I thought about my following actions.

A grin snuck out as I turned my mind back to the possible parahuman who now knew about my hideout. I let a name tumble through my mind as I focused, on Taylor Hebert, Skitter, Weaver, Kherphi, and with nary a sound, I appeared outside next to a figure clad in black with yellow-tinted glass in her mask.

She jumped away, and I heard a buzzing sound as a massive black cloud blotted out the crescent moon. Raising my hands, I spoke quickly and with a whisper.

"Hey, no need to go all 8th plague on my ass; I just want to talk."

Her head darted to my skull, and skeletal hands before a voice snuck out of her helmet.

"8th plague?"

Leaning down a little so that I could look her in her covered eyes, my mandible grew into what must have been a disturbing smile as she flinched back. Chuckling a little, a spoke again, hands still raised.

"I know I'm scary and sorry for teleporting next to you like that. May I ask why you are out so late and sneaking bugs in my ribcage."

She sputtered for a moment before finding her voice

"I was patrolling when I felt strange bubbles that my bugs couldn't go in, so I spread them out, which must have let them crawl on you, sorry."

Her voice got softer and softer as she spoke, and by the end, her head was downcast and mumbling. Holding my hands as if she were a scared animal, I injected a little humor into my voice.

"That's fine. I didn't feel it anyway; I'm just a bag of bones. So your planning on doing hero work, that's good for you"

She perked up a little at the response before her shoulders hunched in again and mumbled.

"You really think so?"

"Course, anyway, I have work I'm attending to, so if you mind meeting for tea, maybe sometime tomorrow morning?"

I let my voice go slightly sing-song towards the end and pushed a little mana into my words as I used hypnotism on her to make her somewhat more suggestible.

She seemed to blue screen at the question before looking me in my green flaming eye sockets for the first time during the conversation and spoke with a note of hope in her voice.

"Really? You want to talk over tea with me? I-I mean yes!"

"Well then, would around ten work for you. Also, the name is Aidan."

I then extended my hand for a handshake. She reached out and shook my hand before replying.

"Uh, I don't have a cape name, but my name's Taylor."

"Nice to meet you, Taylor; see you tomorrow."

With that, I gave her a short nod and teleported back to my lab. I then puttered about for another five minutes, a smile tugging at my non-existent lips.

My mouth then opened wide as high-pitched hiccupy laughter spilled from my mouth. I had just talked to the Talyor Hebert, the person who in another had slain Alexandria and Scion.

I had found this girl who could become something enormously powerful just when she was at her lowest, desperate for a scrap of affection.

I knew what I had to do now; I had to befriend her; all it would take was a few nice words in the right spot, and as an added side benefit, I could study Queen Admisntrater. However, I now needed to see what places served tea and where the tea was good as well.

As I paced back and forth, mind swirling with thoughts, I felt the Grimoire's power bubble up again. Power overwhelming began to flow through my marrow. I felt more magic rush through my SOUL, and my body improve.

Simply moving around, I was faster, and a thrown punch caused the air around my body to snap. Wiggling my fingers, I could feel how my stores had improved were as before; I could keep up Castle Brunestud for a minute at most now, and I could hold it open for ten or more minutes.

That was discounting the physical benefits; while I still was fragile to attacks, the magic making up my skeleton became denser as it would now not break from things that would break a normal bone.

Rubbing my hands together, I got to work setting up another circle around my batteries. This one would work two-fold; the first is that it would divert attention except for mine, and the second is that it would be an actual illusion of a blank warehouse wall.

While it did take a few hours, most of that was ensuring that it did not interfere with the gem that collected energy and sent it to me and so that fed off the energy produced by the parahumans inside the circles.

As I stretched, I checked my mental clock to see the current time. It was around eight, so I had two hours to find a good tea shop. Muttering the command word under my breath and slipping on the pendant, I headed to the Boardwalk.

While on my walk, I saw the results of the Empire's short rampage. They had only rioted for around two or three hours; however, that was still hours of people with superpowers lashing out in fear and anger, and while I felt a bit bad for the Protectorate as their identities were leaked, which meant they would be shuffled out as they brought in new people.

I did not feel the slightest bit of remorse for the Empire; they all were capital N Nazis who murdered people because they did not fit their hair-brained ideology that should have died out when its leader blew his brains out in a bunker.

Hearing a slight grinding sound, I unclenched my jaws as while I did not have to fear cracking a tooth, I did not want to risk it.

My walk ended as I walked into the untouched Boardwalk and started looking around. While many shops sold teas and coffees, most were shitting bagged tea, and while I wasn't a major tea snob, I wanted a good cup if I was spending time going out for tea.

However, after another fifteen minutes of searching, I found a tiny hole in the wall run by a woman with auburn hair, circles under her eyes, and a chipper smile. Walking in, I shot her a grin and opened my mouth as I stood at the counter.

"Hi, names Aidan. I'm looking for a table for two. My friend should be here shortly."

Grinning back, the woman replied in a cheerful voice while gesturing to one of the many empty tables in a corner.

"Of course! Would you like anything to drink?"

"A mint tea for me, please."

"You got it."

She said as she got to work making the tea. I then walked outside to wait for Taylor. A few minutes after ten, she stepped onto the Boardwalk, eyes darting about and shoulders hunched. I strode up to her, and she turned towards me as I stepped behind her.

"Hey, it's Aidan. I found this nice whole in-the-wall place that you might like. I ordered already, if you don't mind."

She nodded her head no and followed behind me as I opened the door for her and gestured to our seats. Settling down as she ordered, I started a quick circle into the napkin and activated the coil with a slight push of mana to prevent people from hearing inside our table.

As she sat down, I pushed a small bit of mana inside my eyes and hit her with hypnosis to make her more compliant with the conversation that would follow.

Powers Gained

Power Overwhelming

If one thing above all else defines a dragon, it is POWER! You contain within you the might of an entire raging storm, a torrent to drown any insects who try and match their magic to yours, and the physical strength to snap steel chains as if they were a minor irritant.