Meta Essence Gacha in Marvel-Chapter 104: Working on Power-ups

Hector P.O.V.

It's common to read that eventually you get bored of things and that life gets dull... Immortality is a curse and all that, buuut... I don't think I will get bored of this view.

"Hmm~ Ahn~ Hng~ Destroy my ass, Mistah H!!"

I mean, how could I? Harley's pale asscheeks bouncing on my lap as she faces away from me is a sight to die for. She even made a tattoo for me on one of her cheeks, hidden from view from everyone normally.

A spiral inside a card. She must have done this with Cortana's help when she erased the other ones.

Not complaining... Life is never simple, but I love being me.

....

"Time to go, my love." I kiss Harley's sweaty forehead as she lies exhausted above me. She really put that enhanced physique to work.

"Hm... Just more five minutes." She is acting spoiled, but I like spoiling my girls, so I carry her like a princess and I clean the whole place with my powers.

I don't have any convenient "Clean" magic, but a quick use of Telekinesis and other powers makes the place look spotless. Then I teleport us to her new apartment. A penthouse obviously, it's big and spacious to her hyenas, who had an illusion on their collars to look like dogs, and to Poison Ivy and her plants in the future.

She is sure that I will bring her one day... Let's hope that she is right and that the Gacha give me her Poison Ivy.

Cmon, Gacha... You have some intelligence, right? You do what is best for me, right? It would be a poor design otherwise...

With a last loving kiss on the forehead, I leave Harley on her bed, so that she can sleep peacefully. I also prepare a good breakfast for her when she wakes up...

I'm only rough with her during sex, after an abusive relationship, the best I can do is treat her well.

And she is maxed on the Relationship Loyalty, so is very easy to treat nicely the people that you know that love you.

I teleport to my home, instantly scanning and seeing that is empty beyond Isabella, Power, and my pets... I pause for a moment, remembering that I still haven't seen Saeko today and in the next second I'm appearing at her home.

"Did I make it too big?" I ask myself seeing the traditional Japanese garden. It looks like a Yakuza compound... A small bridge over a koi pond, trees, bamboo, and statues. The whole package.

She has robots to clean and all, but knowing Saeko she would still try to clean her own mess. And maybe she feels lonely too... Why did she not visit more?

"Why don't you visit more?" I ask as I teleport behind her, giving her a tight hug from behind. She tenses in surprise because of the sneaky attack but relaxes instantly after noticing that is me.

"I was a little busy with homework." She answers while leaning back, from over her shoulder I can see her school books.

"Just give to Cortana to do it in 0.2 seconds."

'You're underestimating me a little too much, Master.' My girlfriend AI says in my mind.

"That wouldn't be right. I still want to complete High school properly." Saeko smiles

"Boring~ Who completes High School nowadays." I brag, after all, I skipped it. "Do you even have any career that needs High School in mind?"

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"Hmm, no." She admits "I was thinking of maybe opening a dojo... But having a high school diploma here is the minimal to not being looked down."

I scoff. In the future, she will be living like a queen in my nation, but I will not take the fun of living from my girls.

"Just say if you want any help."

"I will." She nods

"You say that now, but ends up not asking for help... Like how you said that you would spend more time at my home, to not get lonely." I accuse.

She then gives me a mischievous smile "I just noticed that... If I go there, I will share you with everyone, but if I stay here... You would come and I would have all of you to myself.!

"..."

"Fufu~"

"Where did you learn those things, huh??" I laugh and attack her with tickles.

"Haha! All women know how to manipulate their man a little."

Scary~

.....

Later, I decided to make an experiment that appeared in my mind recently.

"I think that you are really crazy, Master." Cortana, in a standard gynoid body, says at my side while I make the preparations.

"It's not gonna kill me." I answer as I sit on a chair and move the metal table in front of me.

"Yeah, but I don't think that you should think about auto-mutilation... I don't like it." She says

I know that she is just worried about me "Sorry for making you see this, my love. But I want to try. I will start small for you..."

"Fine..." She finally relents. She can't stop me but is good to have her approval.

Then without wasting more time, I put my forearms on the metal table, grab my left little finger with my right hand, and... rip it off.

Blood splats over the metal table while my skin stretches to the limit before I can pull the entire finger.

"..." From the corner of my eye, I can see Cortana narrowing her eyes a little, maybe in a wince.

The blood stops instantly, and there's only a momentary pain like I ripped off a band-aid.

"Now, I can make the tests." I put my finger on the center of the table and pulled some items and books.

"Couldn't you just do it a little more cleanly?" Cortana asks "You have a lot of powers that can separate your body, like the Bara Bara no Mi, the quirk of Tokage Setsuna, Bucciarati Stand power..."

"I need to remove it from my body... Separate from my being. It's a psychological thing." I explain.

What I'm trying to do is probably something that went through the mind of every tryhard power-hungry guy. Enhance my body piece by piece.

I think Thanos did that, and Doom too.

I want to turn my body into a high-quality treasure. I will obviously not use cybernetic enhancements, like the two examples, or Project X.

No, I'm gonna use meta powers and magic.

First, my most reliable asset... Meta-powers.

The idea is to make my body passively stronger... The first thing that comes to mind is to use Biokinesis, which I still don't have the perfect one from Panacea or Elixir, to enhance my body chemically and biologically.

From mixing some super durable material with my bones, increasing the density of my muscles, to even rearranging my organs in a more efficient way.

Do I really need all my guts? I can very well make my stomach a pocket dimension.

And my heart? What if I transform it into a core with both properties of magic and technology?

Maybe I can increase my brain size? Nah, too ugly. And the Maker and the Leader have done it already. Maybe on layers... Create more brains like Muzan...

Smaller brains around my body so that the synapses can move even faster...

The possibilities are endless.

Heck, let's not even talk about mixing with a little of other species' physiologies...

But now, before I get my hands on the perfect biokinesis(seriously, Elixir... Awaken already), I'm gonna do another something.

I don't have Panacea's shard power, but I have Dauntless's shard power. The ability to reinforce any object with power, the great synergy with the fact that I have hundreds of thousands of powers makes it one of my most valuable abilities.

So... What if I charge individual parts of my body with powers?

I mean, initially not super-powers per se, but maybe some super passive abilities like super-strength or super-durability. Combined with the existing super-strength... It will be like Super-strength².

I think that maybe this would be a good countermeasure against power nullification or power blocking. You are blocking my power, what about the power of my little finger that can shoot lasers? It's not on my genome.

And I have limited body parts... Wrong! I have infinite body parts, I can make a lot of clones with different and specialized bodies that look normal to anyone but are in truth treasure troves of superpowers.

This will also be a good way to go over the limits of powers that normal bodies can hold. Because the power will not be connected to my DNA. It's on my body, but is like an item, like a prosthetic... Many advantages and fewer drawbacks.

One of those downsides is the fact that if I lose that body part, I lose the power... But is not a problem. I will just need to put countermeasures so that people cannot use that body part too.

Not that I plan to put cheat-level powers in my body parts. There will be need a for balance.

Well, nothing is easy... The first problem is that Dauntless's shard power only works on objects.

But maybe there's a way to circumvent this limitation... As a last resort, I can use Power Boost Cards, but for now, let's try other methods.

I remember that in certain words, weapons are many times made of parts of powerful monsters. Like a dragon fang or something... that is the part of someone's body, right?

But is an object.

Why? The time passed as an object? The owner is dead? Or maybe is a question of understanding... A mental block...

It happens a lot with limited powers that don't work on other people or on yourself... In many cases, it was never a real limitation, only a mental block born from their morals and their understanding of the world.

That's why crazy people are dangerous. And that's why those characters gain boosts when they go crazy too.

"I will try to imagine this finger as an object... Not part of my body." I say. That's why I ripped it off.

I can put it back later... Another question appears, it would lose the effect when it got back on my body?

"Let's try."

I extend my hand and try to charge my torn finger with power... Trying to imbue it with a small durability power.

"..."

"....."

"..."

I try and try, and try, and try a little more... But nothing happens.

"Ugh, I know that is possible... Should I try with a corpse first?" I make a pause "Let's try the other method."

Putting aside the plan to enhance my body with powers, I will use the other thing... Magic!

What if I put enchantments on my bones? Like runes and inscriptions to protect myself against the esoteric bullshit of magic.

I studied a lot of this on Kamar-Taj and in Asgard.

I peel the skin of the little finger, leaving it only the white bone, and remove a scalpel and my Elder wand from my inventory.

"If this works, I will do it on my whole skeleton." On the skull will be trickier, but I can figure out some way. Like mirrors, or removing my head, or only the skin...

"You really don't plan to die, right Master?" Cortana deadpans, seeing the lengths I plan to go to get stronger.

Like from the beginning, I don't want to only trust my Cheat... To me the Essence is like a battle pass, it gives me the tools so that I can get stronger on my own. I should do more! If I hadn't gone to the Hero Academia world, things would have been much harder.

So if I stop trying, I can Imagine how hard the future will be.

Imagine being cornered for something that I would be able to deal with if I put more effort into the past. No, no, no! I wouldn't be able to live with the regret.

"I don't plan on losing, Cortana." I answer before putting my undivided attention on my little bone.

......

"At least the enchantments and runes work" I comment while walking through the hallways of my Space Station, my eyes focused on my little finger. With my x-ray vision and All Seeing Eyes of God, I can see the inscriptions shining on the three little bones of my finger.

Nothing fancy, just some words to ward off unpleasant things and negative effects... This is just a test. If I want to make better protections, it will be better to enchant a bigger bone, or/and important bone... Like my skull or spine... Ribs too.

"Let's try it now." I enter one of the storage rooms to bodies... I would call it a morgue, but those bodies are kept alive, so that would be incorrect.

It's not hard to choose a body, I will just take one of the "normal" ones. Using my telekinesis I take it from the drawer and bring it down. The "coffin" opens at my command, morphing into a reclined chair with many machines to keep the body alive.

It's me, in pretty good shape, and naked...

"Nice cock, bro." I joke before moving behind my vegetative body while sending commands to the machines to inject the body with coagulants, I don't want to divide my attention to stop the bleeding.

Humming to myself, I use an adamantium scalpel to cut the top of my head, removing my scalp... Huhu~, I'm using a scalpel to what is meant to be.

Jokes aside, I peel off the skin of the top of my head to reveal the smooth white cranium underneath. Now, taking my Elder wand again, it's time to try to write some protections.

Protections to the Soul. The brain is where most of our soul stays, the other part is the heart, but the abdomen also receives a lot of energy.

I have the theory that a soul has more than one core.

Anyway, let's continue carving my own cranium... I really say some weird things, huh? My life is strange...

Let's use Latin... Not a good idea to carve symbols of powerful figures on my body. Runes are okay, though.

"Yes, it's working but..." I stop myself after writing an entire phrase, like a prayer, that protects this body against possession. "The bone will not last."

Other people would not notice, but the durability of a normal's person bone is not enough to hold enchantments, figures...

Holding my chin I think "It will probably not be a problem on my strong body, but I want to test everything before using my main body. Combinations and effects..."

I sigh, putting this body aside, I go to use the stronger ones, made with a mix of stronger races from the One Piece world. And the ones that I upgraded normally, like by increasing the density of the bones and other pretty "normal" things.

"It will be a long and boring afternoon." I'm already seeing it.

.......

"Okay, I have a good idea of the limits of enchanting my own bones." I say to myself while cleaning my bloodied hands.

The thing is, for now, it's not worth the trouble. The protections will not increase my defenses by much.

Like a +1% in a game, but because my bones are like slots, I can't allow myself to put low-level enchantments on them, right?

I made a full enchanted body to be "Invisible" to magic. I think it will be useful... That body coupled with my Anti-magic swords, will probably be the terror of many magic users.

But it only started being useful after I covered 146 bones, mostly the important ones, with redundant runes and enchantments to that.

"Not worth it..." Let's research stronger runes and enchantments.

I know that there are "Magic words", filled with great power.

"League of Legends has runes, right?" Hmm, maybe I should go there earlier than later... I still have that Project of fusing Magic and technology.

But is a High-level World. Let's think about it later, now let's see how that other project is going...

"How things are going, Nemesis?" I unceremoniously enter her room, only to see her lying lazily while eating chips, and watching some TV. "Don't tell me that you are procrastinating?" I raise an eyebrow at her

"You scared me!" Nemesis sits up from her fortress of pillows "And no, I did not procrastinate... I'm a genius. I completed the task assigned to me pretty easily."

"Is that so?" I ask, showing doubt. I do not really doubt her, but doing this will make her show me.

"Yes. Look!" She raises a hand and her brown smooth hand shifts in a crystalized form... It's like a dark version of Emma Frost's Diamond Physiology.

"So you really fused well with Promethium..." After that, the next step will be to absorb the Aether.

"Exactly, check this out." She then points her hand at me, and like a Dragon Ball character shoots a blast of energy from her palm.

I simply slap it away to the wall of her room. I did it on purpose... She deserves it.

"Aaah! My room!" She shouts

"Don't provoke me just extract a reaction, Nemesis. You may not like the reaction that you find..." I glare at her.

This brat loves pushing my limits. Not for any evil or traitorous reason, just because she likes it. She likes messing with people.

"Ooh~ Are you gonna punish me?" She gives me a smug smile

"I see... You see me being lenient with the others and you are getting a big head..." I nod to myself as I start approaching her.

"What are you gonna do?"

"Spanking you."

"?!"

Time to to start using what I saw on those brat correction doujins... Just a little.

"Wait, wait..." She tries to crawl away but she doesn't have where to run in this limited room.

"Nope..." I roll my sleeves again, I just put them down after I pulled them up before to not get blood on them. "Are you gonna come lay on my lap or should I tie you up to the ceiling?"

I calmly sit down on her bed, not forcing her to do anything...

"..." I don't speak anymore because what is the use of more threatening words?

I just stay silent and stare at her, tapping my finger on my thigh, the only action showing my impatience... showing that the clock is ticking and there's a time limit for her to come willing before I really tie her up to the ceiling.

Eventually, she stands up, half-glaring at me, her fingers grabbing her dress... But then she smoothes her features, showing again that smug brat face.

"Hehe, you are really a pervert~ Already abusing your power over me to satiate your twisted desires?"

"..." I keep my face stony and point to my lap

Now I see her smile falter.

With a twitching face, she walks to me... Good to know that the obedience to the summons extends till here. Her Relationship Loyalty is only 3/10, because she stayed grounded for a long time, and even so she is obedient when I give orders.

She hesitantly and slowly walks in front of me, giving me one last look to see if I would give up, but the only thing she finds in my eyes is coldness.

She finally lies on my lap, belly fist...

"It's your first offense... So 10 should be enough." I say "Don't worry, I will not gonna really hurt you... Just enough to sting and remind you every time you sit... For some days."

"Okay, you can stop joking..." She laughs nervously "You are kidding, I was kidding... Sorry. I will not do it again..."

*PAH*

"Kyaah!" She yelps at the first strike

"One..." I say emotionless

"You... You..." She turns to me, tears in the corners of her eyes

"This hurts me more than it hurts you." I shake my head regretfully

"Bullsh-Hyah!" *PAH* Another strike interrupts her.

"Two..."

Hm, this looks effective... Should I do it with the others? I guess it will be more enjoyable having a much more voluptuous body on my lap... And if the area of strike is bigger too.

But first, I need to discipline this brat.

*PAH* "Three..." "Kyaah! Ahn~"

Is she... starting to enjoy it?

...

Time to don the mantle and focus on the work as Eidolon.

At this point, I'm already used to controlling multiple bodies, so I can keep Eidolon hero acts almost 24/7. Sad that even this much is not enough.

My Modus Operandi is making a randomized globe-wide patrol, dealing with all kinds of problems that I see, and only moving out of my way if something big happens, like this ship that was sinking.

It's a rich people's yacht, so I will not go all out and fix it for them, after all, it broke because of their stupidity and recklessness. So I will just patch the problem and bring them to the port.

Sometimes I pause and second-guess myself if this is some sort of unfair treatment, but then those rich people don't even care about the broken yacht and...

"Eidolon! Eidolon! Picture!" And just come to take a picture with me.

"..." Obviously I will let them.

They are not bad, or criminals, or even arrogant rich people... Just with a different sense of priority. I think that to them, making good memories and collecting good stories are more valuable than money.

Can't blame them, but...

"Be careful next time." I say to them and they obediently give me playful salutes.

They are a little drunk. Tch, a bunch of second-generation rich kids... Oh wait, I'm one too.

Whatever, Cortana just informed me that some gangs started dick-measuring too close to civilians... Are they forgetting that I exist?

........

Looking down at the dozen gang members sitting on the ground, restrained, I shake my head while waiting for the police.

"All of this because someone made some signs?" Unbelievable those people. "Hur dur, this sign is only mine and no one can use... Let me kill everyone who uses them to show that I'm tuff. Hur dur." I talk to them with a mocking voice "Even if is just some stupid kid that posted a picture... He can't do it because he doesn't deserve it. Hur Dur. Or that one that doesn't even know that I exist... He must be challenging us."

They look away from me. It looks dumb when I put it like this, huh? I want to slap the back of their head. Stupid kids... And they are only 2 or 3 years older than me.

"Why don't you go make jutsus instead of that cringe bullshit?" I say

They look at me confused because they don't know what jutsu is, maybe this is why they are like that. Much better be a weird otaku that runs with his hands behind him than a gang member.

"In the past, even criminals respected civilians, letting them out of the criminal business, but nowadays you guys have no respect. That's why a bunch of people wants to give you the chair..." I think there's still hope for those idiots.

One of my mottos as a hero is that I try to "not attribute as malice what can be attributed as youthful stupidity".

It's a paraphrase of the rule of thumb called Hanlon's razor. As a hero, I try not to think that everyone is evil, just stupid... Especially those youngsters that don't know better.

Like Flash Thompson, who was a bully, but as an adult, he is pretty respectable.

Obviously, there's a limit to everything and I can see the evil in people, but I will give them at least a chance.

"I'm warning you... You guys start thinking that just because you have guns you can do whatever you want, I will make sure to make your life very unpleasant. Is this really the life you want? Constantly looking over your shoulder afraid of being caught lacking and blasted?" I ask them, obviously, they will not answer "Now imagine if you need to look over your shoulder afraid of me..." I glare at them while putting an intonation on the last word. I watch them get really uncomfortable.

Sometimes... Well, most of the time, they only listen to some "tough love".

...

That meeting with those wannabe gangsters annoyed me enough that I made my mission of the day to go around disorganizing Organized Crime.

From street thugs to huge mafia groups, today is a bad day for them.

I normally ignore the bastards because I know it's pretty much pointless, but I can go give them some setbacks. Hitting where it hurts... Arresting some personnel, confiscating shipments, destroying guns...

Just enough to scare them back to their holes and make them too terrified to stick their head out for some time. If not for the power vacuum that it would create, I would uproot all of them.

"I need to go visit Johan to see how the things are going in his end." The way to deal with crime is by changing it to harmless crime.

The last time I talked with Johan he said that the Punisher started moving... I warned them to not kill Frank Castle, but Uvogin is not known for being a calm and reasonable individual.

And the Punisher is not a moniker you have for being a merciful and forgiven person.

Conflict between them is inevitable. This is a problem, like keeping two Dobermans in a bathtub.

I can't let each side kill the other, but they are bound to butt heads forever.

I like the Punisher... But his crusade only ends with his death. A pity that his family was killed before I can do anything. I can't save everyone from their tragic backstories, it seems. It's already good enough that I forced my growth to accelerate so that I can prevent even more tragedies.

"Oh... Don't break their legs, Shadow. A hand is enough..." I am taken from my thoughts after watching Cassandra being a little too rough with a criminal "And if you break their ribs, don't break anything else, it's punishment enough..." Broken ribs suck!

"..." Cassandra turns to me and gives me a nod before going back to lessen the workforce of organized crime. The Hospital bill will be huge. Come to mine! We will take care of you like any other law-abiding citizen!

By the way, I brought Shadow because it has been a long time since we had a Hero-Sidekick moment.

"Good Job." I say to her.

I think is enough for today, my anger disappeared already. I don't hold grudges that easily.

"Let's go meet my other sidekick."

"..."

......

"Teach me how to hit pressure points." It's the first thing Illyana says to me after I appear

"Good Evening to you too, Illyana." I smile calmly at her.

"Good evening..." She corrects her behavior and then goes back to her usual self "Can you teach me how to hit pressure points?"

"From where this came from?" I ask with amusement

"I was fighting your avatar in the Danger Room and you used those annoying moves to paralyze my body." She explains as we start walking, to the Danger Room, I guess.

"Oh."

"Super annoying. I couldn't let myself be hit not even one time. It took me all day to win against you No Powers version." Illyana huffs while Cassandra and I follow her.

"But completing that exercise in only one day is already very impressive. I predicted that you would win eventually, but I expected you to take some days of self-reflection." I say "You are more talented than I hoped for."

I can see Illyana preen at the praise before she tries to act cool and nonchalant "Yeah, yeah... Now teach me how to paralyze people with a touch."

"Okay, but first, let's review your training." I said to her "We will watch it together and I will point what where you can improve and your mistakes."

"Fine."

As we made a turn we met a group of the X-Men.

"Oh, Eidolon! Shadow! I didn't know that you are here!" Kitty exclaims, going to hug Cassandra.

"I sent a message to Illyana so that she could open the door to me, I don't want to attract attention." It's a problem even with my weekly visits

"Hi, Eidolon." Jean greets me with a smile

"Hi, Jean. How are you?" I ask. The Dark Phoenix Saga can happen at any time this year.

"I'm good. Nothing that I can complain about." She says, not lying... So we still have some time. I will remember Harley to pay extra attention to Jean during their therapy sessions "And how is the hero's life?" She asks back

"Busy, but nothing bigger happened recently. Just some minor villains."

"That's good. Better boring and peaceful than exciting and dangerous." She nods to herself

"I can agree with you on that..."

The mood got a little strange... Why is everyone staring at us so intensely? I ask myself what those girls say behind my back.

Probably some girl talking about shipping me with Jean, or Rogue... I'm not so dense that I don't see the playful smirks that the other girls give to those two while I'm around.

Talking about Rogue... I put it aside for too long... Today I will create an opportunity to copy her power.

Despite what many believed, it's not easy to get in contact with a girl that doesn't touch anyone... Crazy, right?!

I also didn't want to overwhelm myself with extra things while I was learning magic. And her power sucks to master!

But now? After my breakthroughs in creating clones of different races and artificial zoans of any race, Rogue's meta power is the best tool to collect those physiologies for me.

And I'm on my power-up arc... Again.

After talking with everyone, I finally addressed Rogue.

"And you, Rogue? I'm still worried that your absorbing me gave you permanent side effects..." I say with worry in my voice "Any problem?"

"O-Oh, no no... N-not a problem! More advantages, re-really!" She gets a little nervous, letting her accent escape a tad thicker than normal.

"I'm glad to hear that." I give her a gentle smile "Don't hold back and come to talk with me about anything. Any suspicion of a problem, don't hesitate. I will be at your disposal." I don't think that there will be any problem, she just got juiced up on my energies, unlocked her Nen nodes(that's a surprise) and still carries some muscle memory.

Better than when she got Captain Marvel in the comics. That's why she was able to fly for a long time. Or it was Ms. Marvel at that time?

"O-Okay. Ah will." She nods eagerly, her accent slipping out, a little shy. It's easy to see because of her pale complexion. I also didn't miss Kitty giving her a smug grin and doing some weird things with her fingers. Must be an inner Joke.

"I was about to take Illyana to a lesson. Make her review her training, why don't you join us, Rogue?" I ask, I need her power.

"M-me?"

"Yeah, you absorbed some of my expertise, it will be a good experience. There's that boy too, right?" I say suddenly remembering something "The one that can copy expertises, and got mine on our first meeting... Davin Alleyne." He is Prodigy, I plan to recruit him too.

Maybe make him a "Robin". His power and my existence is a cheat code to boy.

"I think is a little late and he is young. He will go to bed at any time." Jean says

"Too bad." I say regretfully "Maybe another day I can teach him a thing or two."

"By the way, shouldn't you be going to bed too, Illyana?" Kitty approaches the girl with a teasing smirk

"Hmpf, I only listen to Eidolon." She replies, getting behind me.

"So you become conveniently obedient when it favors you, huh?" I deadpan at her

"Yes." She nods without shame. Where does this girl learn to be shameless?

After a good laugh, the rest of the X-Men decided to join us in watching the training.

It seems it was movie night, but this can be more interesting.

...

"There! You have to admit that that is bullshit, Eidolon!" Spyke exclaims while pointing to the screen.

We ended up not even going to the danger room, opting to watch the recording of Illyana's training on the screen of the living room.

It's a damn big screen, so it's okay. The Professor is rolling on money. Rolling, pfft~

"I fail to see the bullshit  that you are talking about." I say calmly, knowing exactly about what he is talking about, but is fun to mess with him.

"You must be kidding me... Look! You are making afterimages! I only saw Quicksilver doing that! And how are you sticking to the ceiling?"

"Aaah, those things." I act like I just noticed "Yeah, they are pretty much bullshit." I reveal, making some laugh "But possible to anyone. After a loooot of training. You have no idea of the human potential."

"So you are saying that I can do that with training?" He asks, many others appear to be interested too.

"A loooot of gruesome training, yes." I nod. And with someone to awaken the power system on you.

But here there are also inner energies. Iron Fist is the better example, and he is special, but his abilities are not that exclusive to him. He only has a little cheat.

"Even that thing of shooting slashes and invisible bullets?"

"Yes, but the externalization of your inner energy is very difficult, and let's be real... Not everyone has the reserves for that." I say to him

A certain scene appears on the screen and I turn to Illyana.

"After that parry, you lost your balance, maybe you should have used the momentum to spin on yourself completely." I explain, pausing the video "In a normal fight, turning your back to your opponent is dumb, but we are not normal. And I know that you can alter the weight of your sword... Think many moves ahead... 'He is gonna parry, I'm gonna use his strength to spin and strike him after that'."

Spinning moves do more than look cool to the audience. Yes, I need to defend my boy, Levi.

"I see." She nods obediently.

It goes like this, I point out her mistakes, praising other things... Heh, she really abused her advantages, but she is not wrong. If you're not tryharding you are not even trying.

After a certain scene, I pause again "See that? That is also an application of inner energy and internal martial arts." I make the video go back a little to show what I'm talking about.

It's very subtle and most of the people would miss it.

The screen shows Illyana extending too much to hit my avatar, and my avatar lightly taps her elbow from below and she is sent spinning over his shoulder.

"The hard and soft martial arts... Soft martial arts mostly uses inner energy."I start "If you wanna win a street fight, boxing, muay thai, or something that punches or kicks efficiently is enough. Things like aikido and tai chi are not gonna do much, it's because normal people can't use inner energy, and that's why some have the misconception that those martial arts are frauds." Most of the time it only works on animes

I stand up "Let me show you guys..." I look around, my eyes landing on Rogue "Rogue, please help me with this."

"A-ah? Okay..." She stutters before standing up, some of the girls giving her teasing looks. Teens... I roll my eyes on my mind.

"Here, give me your hand." I reach for her gloved hand

"Oh, so lewd~" Kitty, the Otaku exclaims, covering her eyes with her hands but keeping gaps between her fingers.

Ignoring her, I continue "Check this out." Holding her hand, I press her palm with my thumb and force her wrist a little...

"Ouch... Whoa!" Rogue eyes widens when she was forced to her knees.

"Try standing up," I say, while pressing that acupoint.

"I can't... My legs..." She tries to hit her own thighs to take away the numbness of her legs.

Turning to the rest I explain "What I'm doing can look pretty useless from an outside perspective, but I'm inserting my inner energy through this acupoint- Yes, I will teach you later, Illayna- My energy is overwhelming Rogue's, going through her arm till her legs. She can't move because she can't circulate her energy. In truth, not even her body can circulate it with her blood... It's how normally goes, by the way." I turn to Rogue "Try fighting it, Rogue."

Meanwhile, I'm copying her powers.

"I... I think I feel... whut ya are talkin' 'bout." Her southern accent appears once again while she puts in an effort to resist my move.

Yep, she is doing it... I can feel her energy coalescing around mine. Trying to force me out.

"Yeah, just like that... Try to feel your blood. I know you can do that, you absorbed a little of me." I motivate her a little.

After some more minutes, that I do not complain because her power really takes this long to be copied... She finally succeeds.

My hand is forced back and she breathes heavily, standing up.

"Did you guys say how my hand was pushed without any movement? That's her inner energy pushing me..." I say to the audience "Those fictional moves of people making others sleep with a simple touch come from this... They use inner energy."

"Like Spock?" Kitty asks in awe

"Like in Kill Bill? The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique?" Spyke asks too

"Yes and yes. Wanna see?"

"Yes, wait no! Not the heart exploding Technique! But put someone to sleep!" Kitty answers excitedly

"Any volunteers?" I ask, looking around "No one?"

"Sam wanna try!" Paige Guthrie, aka Husk, pushes her brother to me, aka Cannonball forward.

"Wait! Not me-EeeEe~~" He protests but is too funny to pass so I pinch that spot between his neck and shoulder and he passes out. I at least grab him.

"Wow~"

"Cool~

"Now teach me the pressure point thing!" Illyana urges me

"Of course, any volunteer?" I ask around again, while still carrying Samuel Guthrie.

"..."

"..."

"..."

"No one?" Where are those guys' curiosity? I thought that they were students first and foremost.

....

"Sometimes doing things like this is nice too." I comment while Cassandra and I fly back home.

We decided to do some hero job before going back, enjoying the cool breeze of the night.

I'm an introvert, but I can't deny that is nice to hang out with other people. Especially when those people are interesting... There are the X-Men, for fucks sake! It's pretty cool when I think about it.

I even flirted a little with Ororo. God damn, woman! Don't make me challenge T'challa to a fight for your hand... And all the thick rest of your body.

Jokes aside, I did what I came to do... I copied Rogue's power! For now is fully deactivated, but I will do some tests in the future.

In the worst case, if the power is really that uncontrollable and unstable, I will give it to a clone and use it to go around harvesting physiologies. Or maybe to a summon...

Hm, who is reliable enough to do that?

While I was contemplating this, I noticed Cassandra from the corner of my eye...

"You are quieter than usual, Shadow." It has been for some time already. It can't be, right?

I have a suspicion, I'm not that dense, but... for real?

"..." She looks at me in silence then turns around, almost pouting.

"..." Oh my... "Are you... by any chance... jealous that I took Illyana as my sidekick?" I ask the thousand-dollar question.

"..." She doesn't say anything but her flight got a little erratic for a little.

"Pffft Hahahahaha!" I can't help but burst out laughing.

"..." She gives me a deadpan glare.

"Sorry, sorry. Oh~, you are simply too cute~" I reach out and grab her, she tries to escape but is pointless.

I can't help but chuckle again while we start falling, hitting the ground heavily in an empty forest. Obviously, I hit it first, protecting her, even though she is super durable.

"There, there... I'm not making fun of you, Cassandra."

She struggles just a little more in my arms before giving up.

"You know that you are my favorite, right?" I say.

"..."

"It was so fun training you. You got everything so easily. I just wanted to keep making you stronger and stronger. And we fight so similar... You are Eidolon's successor, Shadow." I say softly while caressing her hair.

"..." Her back is to me so I can't see her expression, but I hope she is happy to hear my words.

"It's just that is time for you to do your thing, so I took Illyana. She is a troubled child with a lot of potential. But you are still my cute disciple even if you graduate. Haha." I pat her head

"...okay." She says in a very soft voice.

I chuckle again, she is really cute "Let's go break some criminal bones..."

Seriously, despite everything, I can't complain about my life.

.....

A.N.:Hello there. 

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