Brockton Bay's Marvelous Mage - Chapter Ninety Three

We hung around Canberra for quite a while longer, helping out where we could, even as more and more of the city was declared "safe" and properly searched. While my healing was no longer in constant demand, I was instead serving as a bit of a swiss army knife, using druidcraft and my other magic to build, clear, blast, extinguish, and various other tasks. It was a bit hectic, teleporting all over the city or riding Troy to places I hadn't been yet to put out dozens of fires, sometimes even literally.  

While officials weren't looking to get the city officially going, with power, water, and other essentials within the next week, according to the people I was talking to, the guardians and I had hastened that eventual milestone by at least a few days. 

As noon came and went, the number of people helping started to dwindle, as it became clear the city wasn't about to burst into flames. The civilians had their own lives to contend with, while most of the other capes returned back to wherever they came from. It was understandable the civilians had to leave, and I could even understand most of the capes leaving as well. There wasn't much of a point hanging around to help when all you could do was spit acid or shoot lasers from your eyes. Still, it was a bit disappointing how even some of the heroic brutes left via Strider or other teleporters. 

That said, I was very pleased that the teleporter was still making trips, as after a quick conversation and a thousand bucks, he let me tag along on a dozen trips around the country, as the primary teleporter for the US branches of the Protectorate. Even though he refused to take me outside the country, at least for now, having access to most of the major US cities was a massive boon. If nothing else, my options for interesting and unique materials for rituals were now well and truly open.

I could have possibly pushed for trips out of the country or found another teleporter, but in all honesty, my sphere of influence had grown enough. Brockton Bay was my primary concern for now, and I could open myself up to the worries of the world another time.

My last act before we left Canberra behind was to finally grow a massive, quick-harvest orchard. I got permission both from the mayor of Canberra and the PRT on site, before gathering a few bags of different fruits and planting them all in a huge orchard. It was a temporary measure to reduce the strain on the city's emergency infrastructure and keep people healthy and happy as they were forced to live off emergency food for a few weeks. 

Thankfully, with the third level of druidcraft, I was able to link the orchards together in groups, meaning while I would still need to tend to them, I wouldn't have to work on each tree, just once per grouping. Just as with the other orchards, all of the fruits and nuts that the trees produced were sterile, and they would quickly die without my consistent care. While I grew them, I had explained the entire concept to a few different people, not the least of which was the mayor and local PRT director. They seemed to understand that they were pretty safe, and they were glad they would promptly die when we wanted them to.

While the small orchard I had at home, or the slightly larger one I made for the community, were too small to have a significant impact on the local economy, that was not the case for this one. There was enough food growing in these orchards that it could have very easily affected local supermarkets, as well as the farmers that tended crops.

When I was done planting and growing, the former of which was aided by my golems and guardians, I finally gathered everyone together. We had been there for quite some time, but now, over twenty-four hours later, it was time to go home. I gave a few people around the city my number, but after that, I took us home, one trip after the other.

Returning home was like tipping over a cup of molasses. By the time I brought everyone back, the stress, fatigue, and just general malaise we had built up the last twenty-four hours started to flow off of us like a slow wave. The golems were sent to a corner of the compound while the guardians claimed the lounge area, decompressing in their own way. Olivia and I immediately crawled our way into the hot tub, both of us way too tired to care that we were using our underwear instead of bathing suits. 

Kali, bless her heart, dropped off plates of fruits and cheeses, an honest to god charcuterie board, for us to eat while the heat and currents of the water helped us decompress. The Endbringer Truce would last for at least the rest of the day, most likely the following day as well, so we had nothing to worry about for at least several hours. 

After a good thirty minutes of soaking, talking became a bit easier, as if the hot water had thawed us out.

"So… what's the likelihood that the E88 leaves you alone now?" Olivia asked. "With you working with the Protectorate and with Piper being your creation…"

"Depends on how good the PRT is at convincing everyone we had nothing to do with it," I explained with a shrug. "If they do a really good job, then the Empire would have no reason to be concerned."

"So they are just leaving you to the wolves?" She asked. "I thought they wanted to protect you. If they just let the news spread, they could make it clear the Triumvirate is directly involved with your safety."

"I might have been able to hide behind being important to keep the Empire off my back, but it would have attracted a lot of attention that they clearly think I can't handle," I explained. "I guess they think I can handle the local issues and are focusing on keeping the Slaughterhouse 9 and the Fallen off my back."

"So the PRT keeping secrets means the Empire will keep targeting you, and the bigger threats will hold off."

"Basically. Though, to be honest, even if the Empire did back off me, we would still clash since I will be going after them now," I pointed out with a smirk, already looking forward to it. "All that's left before I can start putting pressure on the E88 is one last patrol group. After that, we are ready to go." 

Slowly our conversations drifted to other topics, staying away from heavier things. A lot of her questions were about my magic, as Olivia seemed to have developed a certain level of interest in it after I explained the truth to her. At first, I was pretty sure she was trying to catch me in a lie, but now she seemed genuinely interested.

Eventually, it was time to get out of the hot tub, after which Olivia decided to call it a day. She happily accepted the offer of sleeping on one of the bunks, which I had remodeled internally to be a bit more realistic in terms of living space. They could only hold two people each, but you didn't feel like a sardine sliding into a can every time you got into one of the beds. 

With my partner heading to bed, I made my way to the fire pit area. I pulled out one of my notebooks to idly sketch out an idea while Piper, Kali, and Smokey joined me, though Kali didn't still for very long. She did give me a hug, however, sending feelings of warmth and support. Alya pulled around us to coalesce into her semi-solid form, though she sat down outside the primary circle of seats. 

"The guardians have already been sent out on light patrol," Smokey explained. "They will find some area to cover, but seeing as it is getting later, they will likely find a place to stake out for the night."

"They didn't really need to go out tonight at all," I pointed out with a frow. "The Truce will linger for at least the rest of the day, probably into tomorrow as well."

"William, we are guardian spirits," Smokey responded with a shrug. "It's an integral part of our foundation. If there wasn't a city nearby, we would likely be doing laps of the forest and compound, keeping you safe and protecting your home."

"Yeah, just make sure they get proper rest… I'll make the fourth patrol group in a bit so that they can take more relaxing patrols," I assured them with a frown, closing my notebook. "How do you think all of that went? Going to Canberra, helping out, healing, and using my magic to help?"

"Better than it had any right to," Smokey responded, shaking his head. "I still can't believe that is what they considered an easy Endbringer fight. I can't imagine how the terrible ones look…" 

"I'm glad I could help, even if it seems to just be a strange power interaction," Piper added while Smokey was deeper in thought. "When do you plan on fulfilling the PRTs order?" 

"ASAP," I explained, letting out a long breath. "I'll probably start trying to crack it tomorrow, then start experimenting after that. With any luck, I'll have a solution in a few days so I can start working on it. If it was just one or two items, it would be relatively easy, but making stuff in bulk is difficult with magic." 

We talked a bit more before both guardians left with their golems, plus a few more. Their first destination was the Dallon household, where they would drop off their golems, plus the Pelhams. I didn't actually know where the Pelhams lived, so the Dallons could take care of watching their golems until their relatives could pick them up.  

For the rest of the day and into the night, I worked on making more golems and guardians. I was getting pretty quick at the process of making golems, so they were done first, followed by all of the steps to build a guardian, save the last one. I wanted to wait for Smokey to be there while I woke them up. Again, I felt a bit bad about passing their responsibility to Smokey, but these were only the beginning. I was hoping to have dozens of guardians moving into other cities, and when that happened, Smokey being in charge from the start would solidify his leadership.

Smokey returned later that night, so I put the spirits into their golem frames, greeted both of them, and introduced myself, before leaving the rest to Smokey and heading to bed, getting a solid six hours. 

The next morning, after waking up Olivia and showing her how the showers worked, I headed off to do my morning work, including a short patrol, a visit to the docks community, and finally, a visit to the hospital. From there, I met up with New Wave, or at least Lady Photon and Flashbang, to discuss our first moves against the Empire. 

"I don't see why there is any reason to delay," I said with a shrug after exchanging pleasantries. "At any given time, at least three guardian teams are patrolling the docks, with another patrolling downtown." 

"They were already pushing at the borders," Flashbang agreed. "The Truce is already passing. Tomorrow would be a perfectly reasonable time to start squeezing in on their territory."

"They probably won't take long to respond," Lady Photon pointed out. "They may have been suspiciously quiet, but that doesn't mean they are blind. They will see what's going on, and they won't react well to us tightening the noose."

"We can handle it," I said confidently. "We have plans, and we have the power to drive them back. Hell, if we include the guardians, we even have the numbers. There is no reason to hold back anymore."

With our plan set, I returned home to work on a few more ideas. I had been focusing so long on the guardians and their designs that I had really put my other magical development to the side. I ended up working on and almost finishing the ritual for what I planned on giving Velocity, assuming he would accept it. My first instinct was to try and solve his problem in its entirety, which, according to Dauntless, was that the faster he was going, the less he could interact with the world around him. However, despite feeling confident that Dauntless wouldn't intentionally mislead me, that wasn't nearly enough information to attack the issue directly. 

Instead, I decided to focus on giving him options that could easily be carried with him, since he also apparently has issues carrying anything that can be worn as sight clothing. He couldn't even wear armor! It made me wonder what exactly the intent of his power was. It was a well-established fact that all powers were "designed" for combat, whether directly, like having the ability to shoot lasers from your hands, or indirectly, like the ability to create a gun that shoots lasers. And yet Velocity has shockingly little combat ability. It made me think there was an aspect of his powers that either he didn't understand, or that he knew about but kept a secret as a backup, or because it wasn't PR-friendly or something. 

Smart money was on the latter, since handicapping a cape because his primary method of attack wasn't PR friendly seemed right on the money for the PRT. 

On top of working on Velocitiy's upgrade, I also spent a few hours working out how to bless something with luck. Well, more specifically, how to do something like that en masse. I could pretty easily add a bit of luck to pretty much anything I could ritualize. I even had my own blessing of luck spell, though it was of a much smaller scale than Pipers. But considering that the PRT and Protectorate wanted a whole bunch of whatever I ended up making, it needed to be something I could ritualize en masse.

I spent the rest of the day puzzling out a proper ritual, each attempt getting more and more complicated and expensive. When I finally cracked the design, I couldn't help but wince at the result. As I had experienced a few times already, the more complex and specific I was looking to make something, the more complicated and bloated the ritual ended up being. Since I was looking for one specific thing, a blessing of luck, I had to control the effect tightly, which made the whole ritual a power hog and overly complicated. 

Add in that I wanted to do this to dozens, maybe even a hundred objects at once. The result was the most complicated, mana-intensive, and expensive ritual I had ever designed. 

"I hope they don't get too shocked when they see my list," I said, Kali watching me over my shoulder as I listed out the different materials I would need. "I'm gonna have to make an even bigger ritual platform for this too…"

Once my list was complete, I tried my best to go to sleep, only to fail miserably. I was a bit wired at that point, the anxiety of our new patrol getting to me, as well as my poor sleep schedule. After sitting in my room for an hour, I eventually gave up and got up, heading out to the ritual platform. I spent two hours completing and performing the rituals for Velocity "upgrades," which I would deliver when I dropped off the list of what I needed for Director Piggot. 

Technically, they were prototypes since I wasn't a hundred percent sure they would work with his powers, but I wasn't going to tell them that. If they worked, I would just leave it at that, so telling them they were prototypes would be pointless. It's not like they were dangerous to him or anything. 

Having completed another project, I finally tried sleeping again, this time managing to catch a few hours, even if they weren't the best quality. I definitely needed the anti-sleep spell when I woke up.