Chapter 0187: Throne

Soon enough, Steve also landed and with both him and Natasha supporting Tony, Doctor Strange and Wong were almost strong-armed into conceding their information about the Darkhold and Agatha and cooperating with them.

After another round of debates that included far more threats and dick-measuring contests between Strange and Tony than necessary, both mystic arts practitioners agreed to go to the ominously glowing tomb of the first demon.

Strange cast a portal and sent both Agatha and the Darkhold into one of the secure holding cells within the New York Sanctum. Still frozen in time by Strange's use of the Time Stone, neither the book nor the witch would be any trouble for now.

"Fine, let's go." Strange said and started levitating with the help of his cloak, the anti-magic field didn't seem to affect the cloak's abilities at all. Which made sense, considering that it was a prized relic. Tony followed suit and floated above the ground — the effects of Strange's EMP spell had already worn off. As for Wong, he grabbed onto the cloak and levitated with Strange. Natasha created wings out of thin air and offered Captain America a hand which he gratefully grabbed. He was the most normal person in this gathering and was inwardly thinking that it would've been much better if he'd just stayed up in the fortress instead of coming down with a parachute.

"You seem to have gotten a hang of this new thing…" Steve commented after seeing her use the abilities of her new bio-suit in a much more fluid way, "I can still recall the little note that White Knight left me…"

"Real good that did." Nat shook her head while flying behind Tony and Strange, "I might as well not have done anything about it."

"Well, I appreciate your intentions," Steve said seriously.

"You should thank Apex too," Nat laughed, "He's the reason I have all this going for myself…"

"Your suit?" Steve asked. He'd seen her exhibit the signs of using a suit similar to Tony's and could only assume that that's what Nat was talking about.

"Yeah, he's a living bio-suit that gives me badass abilities and lets me do cool things like shooting lightning out of my finger," She said with a happy tone.

"Good for you," Steve nodded with an impressed expression.

At this point, they landed on one of the broken-down edges of the dilapidated structure behind Tony, Strange, and Wong, "Pretty shoddy work for the tomb of someone as important as the first demon, don't you think? I was expecting something along the lines of the pyramids in longevity." Tony commented as he turned back to see the huge hold in the wall that they'd come through.

"This place has existed for countless years, weathering innumerable storms and tribulations," Wong said, "Being able to see so much of it still intact is in itself a miracle that is only possible because of the workmanship and magic that courses through its veins."

"Right…" Tony didn't argue with Wong and walked in, right beside Strange who seemed more curious than cautious, unlike Wong, who was ready to face the greatest threat to his life.

"The spells within the Darkhold were all inscribed from this place…" Strange commented as he traced his fingers along one of the murals and examined it before moving to the next one.

"Be cautious, Strange." Wong warned, "There's no telling what soulless monstrosities lie within this place."

"You worry too much," Strange said as he walked further in while continuing to examine the murals that depicted the spells that were inscribed within the Darkhold. Meanwhile, the constant, pulsating red glow of the castle seemed to have gotten a bit more docile and subdued than the aggressive pulsating glow from before.

Tony glanced at the murals, but couldn't make much sense of most of them — only understanding the ones that depicted some kind of story or point of history through images. He only gave them an overhead glance, allowing the data to be saved in Friday's database to decipher it later.

As Tony and Strange kept going deeper into the castle, Wong, Steve, and Natasha were much more cautious. Heeding Wong's warnings, neither Steve nor Natasha paid too much attention to the murals and kept walking forward cautiously.

As for Alex, he mostly stayed quiet, occasionally whispering something in Nat's ear. He was busy making sure that his greed for the Time Stone wasn't realized by Doctor Strange or some artifact that he had on him. He was half sure that the Eye of Aggomoto had some kind of spell to detect someone's greed for the Time Stone and take the necessary measures to hide it. He remembered Thanos taking the Eye from Strange and then finding it empty.

Initially, Alex didn't care much for the Infinity Stones since he was mostly sure that their powers would most likely be subdued and restrained due to multiple copies of them existing in the same reality. But seeing Agatha's state, Alex realized that although weakened, the stone was still very much an Infinity Stone with authority over time itself.

'Still, it should still be much weaker than its full power,' Alex concluded. He didn't think Doctor Strange had any idea about the different speeds of time not only between the planets but also within the planet. Just in the MCU, Alex had seen that the Western Hemisphere had twenty-six-hour days while the Eastern Hemisphere had twenty-two-hour days. And even that would change every couple of hours. The overarching Cosmic spell that caused people and objects like clocks to not realize the difference also applied to Doctor Strange even though he had the Time Stone. This told him that Cosmic Energy most likely had greater significance than the Infinity Stones since it was the reason he could even realize the whole time problem.

'Then again. I'm in a prime position to feel the difference in time since I have multiple bodies all over most of these planets, unlike Strange who is only in one place at one time.' Alex thought, 'If he was actively looking for it, things might've been different.'

Alex brought his focus back to Doctor Strange and thought of some way to get the man to give him the Time Stone, 'That's the only way to get it from him… I can't just steal the Eye since the failsafe would probably activate and fuck everything up.'

As they all continued going deeper into the palace, the lines and murals that Strange was tracing over gained a light yellow sheen as he left some sort of marking over them. At the same time, his blue-grey eyes gained a light sheen of red that no one noticed appearing.

Finally, while continuing to follow the weak sources of light along the path, the group emerged on what seemed like another edge of the castle, with another hole in the wall that was even bigger than the one that they came through, though this one seemed to be intentional. The finer edges of the huge hole made it seem like a large floor-to-ceiling window instead. They saw a huge slab with even more inscriptions in the center of the room along with a huge mural opposite to the hold in the wall. It depicted some sort of feminine humanoid figure with glowing red eyes standing above a muralistic depiction of the Chaos Dimension. She had some spells inscribed behind her as if the statue was added in later.

"Are you sure this is a tomb?" Tony asked Wong who had just entered the room along with Steve and Natasha, "Cause this sure as hell seems like some kind of celebratory statue of this woman…"

"The Scarlet Witch…" Doctor Strange said as he looked up at the statue's grandiose form, "This statue depicts Wanda… This… this palace, it's dedicated to her." Strange said with a tone that had hints of awe.

"Wait a second," Nat interjected as she came up to Strange, "You're telling me that this ominous statue with glowing red eyes is supposed to depict Wanda?" She asked.

"Yes," Strange nodded, "The Scarlet Witch is a being of immense potential and power. Someone capable of bringing down entire worlds with her magical prowess. Spontaneous, incantation-less magic channeled through her own being instead of a medium… A being of true unfathomable power."

"And…and you're telling me that Wanda is this…Scarlet Witch?" Natasha asked with disbelief etched in her tone, "I find that a bit hard to believe."

"It makes sense however, doesn't it?" Tony interjected from the side.

"What?" Natasha turned to him with confusion.

"I mean, Vision has never been able to figure out how the stone in his head could give Wanda her powers." Tony said, "If anyone should've been able to figure it out, it should've been him. What if it merely unlocked her latent potential?" He asked.

"I don't…" Nat found it hard to refute Tony's words, "…know."

"Well, we know why the energy signature emanating from this place has Wanda written all over it," Steve said, "Her palace is calling her here." He chuckled, "Thank god we didn't call her."

"Yeah…" Strange chuckled eerily as he glanced at the center of all the magic that was flowing through the structure, "This isn't a tomb," He levitated above the ground and stood atop the slab filled with complex inscriptions, "It's a throne." He smiled as his eyes glowed with an ominous crimson.

He created two magic circles in his hands before anyone could react and in that instant, four distinct roars were heard reverberating throughout the room.

***

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