Yao was lost for words when I told her what I found, and she remained that way for minutes.
"A counter array…" she muttered, "How could I have not seen it."
I shrugged. "The demons made it a point to be very distracting. Their real targets are buried within hundreds of purchases, and their attacks on the mutant and human population were designed to misdirect all who come looking. Not even Isha knew all of the locations. After falling out with Belasco over her little tryst with my brother, he became less than forthcoming with every last location, but she knew 50 out of 80 locations.
Supposedly, the array is to be powered by the soul of the human slaves they've bred and nurtured over the past 20 years—about 400,000 or the lives of a quarter of the demon population," I said with a palpable disgust. "If they succeed, they can merge Earth and Limbo, finally put the sorcerers and demons on equal terms."
"They're relentless…and monstrous," Jean's expression mirrored mine when I found out.
"But for the first time in a long time, they don't have the upper hand," I smiled. "It's a shame I couldn't find more about the virus. Apparently, Isha is not as beloved as she pretends to be. Although, I get the feeling that this virus plan is something relatively new."
"The array changes everything," Yao said. "Beset by attacks on both sides. In all of the possible futures I envisioned, they were defeated long before they set off any array or virus."
"Ilyana," I said. "She's supposed to somehow overthrow him, right?"
Yao nodded. "Her along with an incursion force consisting of the X-Men, and on occasion, particular members of the Brotherhood. She claims his throne and becomes the new Queen of Limbo…but with what I just learned of the army of Limbo, it's a wonder she succeeded at all. A billion demons is not a force anyone can hope to stand against. Even the mighty forces of Asgard would think twice about going up against them."
"So, what are our options, fold or…" a small smile crept to the corner of my lips, "we could always hijack the array for ourself. Use it to permanently reinforce the barrier between our worlds, or break the link between it. Either way, with some precise compulsion done by Jean and speed reading the minds of demons I bet we could avoid the all-out war."
Yao looked at me like I was insane, but slowly, her expression morphed into that of cautious understanding.
"Your plan could…work," Yao said hesitantly. "It would require some clever maneuvering, but if we time it right, we could cut Domina off from the unlimited resources of the demon world, destroy her virus, rescue the lost mutants, and thwart their unification plot simultaneously."
"Let's not forget whatever Fury is plotting," Jean chimed in, and I nodded.
"It will be massively complicated," Yao said. "Nothing can absolutely go wrong…but if we pull this off, we can finally be done with the demons."
"And what a relief will it fucking be," I said. "But for this to work we need to get under Domina skin. Force her off-balance and keep her that way until we're done. And I think I might have the perfect means to distract her." I said, quirking a positively devious smile.
"What do you have in mind?"
"Heroes," I smiled. "It's 2003, the Nation is reeling from the greatest terror attack it's ever seen, I think the world is long overdue for some superheroes."
After grabbing a bite and talking a bit of strategy with Yao and Jean, I resumed my interrogation of Isha in earnest.
I learned about all of the locations of Domina's safehouses, her investments, how her organization runs, the locations of her safehouses, her enchanted workshops, and her Japan headquarters. It was where her space mages are housed, and it was the key to permanently grounding Domina."
I also learned of the locations of the other Cambions, as well as their identities, the array of stations they were supposed to protect, and so much more.
It took 24 more hours to wring her for information before I left her in a collapsed heap, finally ready to return to the compound, ready to work.
Before I left Kamar-Taj, I had one last conversation with Yao. With my new forging skills, I needed new runes to grow my catalog, and she was happy to help.
She started me off with a shield that automatically generated an Eldritch overlay over itself when struck and a copy of the enchantment that doubles the effect of gravity upon activation. The second enchantment especially caught my eye since I figured it'd help me upgrade my Promethean body and rapidly gain stats while I trained.
I also requested several Barrier enchantments, even after Yao promised she'd come to erect a few herself.
Once I got back from Kamar-Taj, I poured over the formulas, going as far as to break out the enchanted under robes that Yao gifted me, and I formed a few powerful runes read for inscription on the weapon or armor of my choice.
Demonic Aegis—Channeling the Raw Demonic energies that flow through you, create a one-use intangible shield durable enough to protect against most physical and magical attacks.
Estimated Durability—150/150
Gravity Seal--Channel energy into your Seal to slowly increase the wearer's gravity. Maintaining a steady current will leave the weight unchanged. Sudden Shifts in energy level will cause a corresponding change.
In a flash of inspiration, I tried combining my protection Seal with the Demonic Aegis Seal. The result was my first genuinely impressive Seal.
Demonic Aegis Seal—Channels your Density and Gravity affinities into a powerful protection seal to create a multi-use intangible shield that surrounds the body of the user. Protects against physical and magical attacks. It is stackable and can be activated without demonic energy.
Estimated Durability 250/250
I whistled. Now that…is a rune.
My progress with runes had me hungry to smith, so I headed up to the backyard forge I'd set up and got to work. I still had infernal metal in spades and the means to make new ones. So, I started with something simple but important.
Bracers. They were easy to make, had just enough surface area to take two Demonic Aegis Seals and had enough durability and space to handle two Aegis seals. They should be powerful enough to withstand any bullets, stray punches, or attacks squishier members of the new X-Men team might run into. I made a starting batch of 10.
Two were obviously for me, another two for Jean and Rin, and the fourth pair for Cyclops. Believe it or not, he was leadership and could use the extra tankiness. The final one was for Beast. He was the brains of the operation, and I needed him alive.
I also forged a second set of four gravity seal bracers. They were for physical training, and the very next morning, I dragged Rin out of bed.
He groggily followed me but thankfully didn't bitch about it. Handing him, the Bracers perked him right up.
"You like?" he nodded, grinning, and I laughed deviously. "You're going to wish you hadn't said that. You're going to be training with them starting today."
When I described the effect of the runes to him, he suddenly wasn't so sure if they were for him.
"Oh stop being a baby. I would've killed for this back when I started training. This will improve your energy control, durability and stretch your pool. You'll accomplish what took me week to accomplish in days, all the while you're getting a workout."
"When you put it like that…"
"Well," I said, popping on the Bracer, channeling angel energy into them. "There's nothing to it. Start jogging, we're going a lap around the property. And don't fall behind."
I slowly ramped up the energy output until I felt a considerable strain. I was bleeding Angel energy heavily, so much so that I estimated I'd be empty in about 30 minutes or so, which was perfect. There'd be no point to this if I could go on for hours.
My meditation skill needed some love anyway.
I shot off into the woods while Rin was still fiddling with the energy level.
"Hey! Wait up," he raced after me with sharp, jerky movements.
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