The next morning, Kal woke up inside the London base with a massive headache.
"I thought those skills, the Burning Soul, were exclusive to Watchers," the elf mumbled with forcibly closed eyes. "I was too cocky. Despite my powerup, I should have made sure he cannot harm me..."
"Yeah, you should have," Skye agreed with a hard edge to her voice as she sat up in the chair next to Kal's bed. "Ava and I have been worried sick the entire night. Your eyes were bleeding for hours."
Kal brought a hand to his face and noticed thick bandages going over his eyes.
"Eyes are the window to the soul, eh?" Kal mumbled to himself in a joking tone.
[Skill used: Lay on Hands]
"I really should find someone with the talent for a healing class," the elf mumbled as the holy light healed his body and soothed his soul.
"We constantly tell you to grant these powers to other people. What's the hold-up anyway?" Skye scoffed dismissively.
"If your kind gains powers on its own, I am not responsible for the destruction they cause. But if you use these powers to terrorize your fellow men, it's my responsibility," Kal explained and lifted the bandage covering his eyes.
"And if not enough of us exist, demons will take over this world and it's your fault, too," Skye countered, clearly unimpressed with Kal's logic.
"You raise a good point. None of you would have been able to stop a dreadlord yet without a big group of helpers. I miscalculated. In all fairness, though, I had no idea the Legion would send something as powerful as Tichondrius..."
"Well, the Light sent you, no? It didn't send a nameless squire of the Silver Hand instead," Skye mocked. While she liked being special, she had always felt cross with Kal over not 'making' more of them. She knew the dangers that lurked beneath the surface now.
"Friday, track the location of Jane Foster," Kal said to his AI assistant while ignoring Skye. She looked at him with narrowed eyes but didn't comment.
"*Doctor Foster is currently preparing for a date during lunch time,*" the pleasant, slightly robotic voice of F.R.I.D.A.Y. answered almost immediately.
"That's super creepy," Skye chimed in and earned herself a raised brow from Kal. "What?"
"You're a hacker. Don't tell me you never saw or found something you shouldn't have," the elf countered with an unimpressed stare.
Skye gained a pout and indignantly asked, "So? It's not like I hacked phones to get dick pics from frat boys..."
"Did I ask for a dick pic from Jane's date?"
"That wasn't my point..."
"Where's Ava?" Kal asked to change the topic.
"Really? You don't feel her sleeping between your legs?" Skye asked with a scrunched nose.
Sitting up a little, Kal lifted the blanket and quietly commented, "She's like a puppy sometimes..."
Kal gently got out of Ava's embrace and out of bed. The girls had not only taken him to their base but also took off his armor which was lying around in the room. With a thought, the armor disappeared from the room, then equipped on his person and disappeared again.
Nodding to himself, Kal cast some more healing spells on his own weary body to ease his own headache as he asked, "What happened last night?"
"You suddenly shot off to fight that gigantic demon that suddenly appeared on the radar," Skye explained and Kal corrected, "Nathrezim. A demonic dreadlord."
With a nod to indicate she understood, Skye continued, "As you fought the dreadlord and killed the other lesser demons in the vicinity, Ava and I got rid of the few stragglers that managed to slip out of your Consecrate. All of them were hurt just by your presence so it didn't take long. When we came closer to you and 'tagged' the dreadlord like you told us, both of us hid under Stealth. The demon's attacks seemed a little out of our league…"
"You were right to do so. A fully summoned Tichondrius at the height of his power could deal with the current Hulk without breaking a sweat," Kal commented as he pondered the implications of the dreadlord not only living but also being the first big demon to be summoned in this world to his knowledge.
He hoped that its previous death was the reason it could be summoned and in a weakened form no less - otherwise he had to fear Kil'jaeden or Archimonde appearing on this planet… and he did not like his chances of fighting those two alone at the peak of their power even with the Mind Stone and his recent boosts in strength.
"Nothing can happen. I need the Reality Stone," Kal mumbled under his breath and looked to Skye. "Did we gain anything from Tichondrius' defeat?"
"Ava and I both gained over twenty levels and learned a dozen new skills each. Plus, we found these two items," Skye pointed out and led Kal to a table in the living room.
There laid two items roughly the size of Skye's fist.
One dripped in fel energies and felt repulsive to Kal - he had felt the presence of this thing long before he even came to this room.
The other was a tooth... a fang of something bloodthirsty. The thing smelled of blood.
Picking them up, Kal learned their names with his chat box.
[
[
"Give this fang to Ava when she wakes up. It can help her heal minor wounds mid battle," Kal instructed before he solemnly turned to the fel-tinged object next to the dreadlord's tooth. "The icon is too dangerous. I will not have you inflict someone with the plague in this world and invite the Scourge to this planet by accident."
With a flex of his will, his runic enchanting rod appeared in his hand as he disenchanted the icon to make sure it couldn't bring harm to this reality. Then, Kal flexed his holy energies to get rid of the foul smell of the demonic energies in the room.
"I'll go meditate before we head out to follow Doctor Foster. I want you two to be ready in an hour at the most," Kal ordered and turned to Skye to pat her head. "Thank you for your hard work."
Walking away, Kal missed Skye looking at his back with complicated emotions before she walked away to wake Ava.
As Kal found a quiet place to sit, he concentrated on the chat window in his field of view to see the various notifications that he missed while fighting Tichondrius. Since he fought a greater demon in this world for the first time, Kal was surprised to see that this chat box gave him not only a detailed account on the skills the dreadlord used but also clued him in on how the dreadlord could even come to this world.
And just like he suspected, the scattered essence of the dead dreadlord was needed to be summoned here on Earth as only these shards of his soul were able to get out of the Twisting Nether and into this world. A complete soul, according to the chat, was not able to enter this world.
For now.
"Is that why I was able to come here? Because I had a soul split in two originally?" Kal wondered silently before he zeroed in on one particular line in the chat.
[First dreadlord defeated. Killing blow dealt by a
"I'm a 'Child of Light'?" Kal muttered under his breath. His vision concerning Illidan was still present in his mind. He didn't mind being a Chosen One if it meant ridding his home world, Azeroth, of the ever-present, looming danger of the Burning Legion… but Illidan's reluctance, aversion even, to getting shoe-horned into something under the machinations of fate was also warranted.
The ominous last line in that message 'His permanent erasure was noticed' didn't fill Kal with a lot of confidence either. Was it the mysterious 'Jailer' that noticed? Sargeras? Someone from the Marvel universe? Why did his powers permanently erase the dreadlord's soul when even a fully overpowered Illidan with the legendary artifact 'Skull of Gul'dan' couldn't?
"Too many questions that I shall never learn while sulking. It's time to get a second Infinity Stone," the elf declared and stood up to gather his two assistants.
— — —
Some time later, the three were stalking behind Darcy, Darcy's assistant Ian, and Jane as the scientists entered an abandoned warehouse and found several kids who were messing around with the gravity in there.
"Watch out and don't get stranded in another world without being able to come back," Kal ordered his two tag-alongs and stuck to Jane like glue.
It was her who accidentally found the Aether, which in this reality was the Reality Stone. Kal needed to enter the same space anomaly as her to get it before she could.
After messing around with glass bottles, car keys and weightless trucks, chucking them into invisible anomalies to send these items to different realms, Jane suddenly disappeared as she stepped forward into a narrow hallway that seemed to guide her into it and Kal immediately followed her exact footsteps… only to stay in the warehouse in London.
"Fuck. Stupid canon event!" Kal angrily cursed and ran around in a spiral to see if he could find the space anomaly that brought Jane away.
He found several of these space passages, but none that brought him to Jane. He was in Vanaheim for one moment, then the forests of Asgard, back in London, then on Jotunheim, followed by a quick trip to Alfheim and back to Midgard… but he did not find Jane in any of these space anomalies despite trying for hours.
"This shit wouldn't have happened if I had taken the Space Stone instead of the Mind Stone," Kal angrily cursed as he stopped trying to find Jane and walked outside towards Darcy instead.
Lifting his invisibility in front of the woman who was debating whether or not to call the police because Jane had been missing for four hours already, Darcy screamed like a little girl when Kal appeared.
"You asshole!" Darcy chided angrily before she jumped onto Kal and hugged him fiercely.
"I haven't seen you in over half a year! Did you not promise me more booty calls this year?" Darcy indignantly demanded with a pout.
"I have no excuse, dear Darcy. Do you want me to grant you power to make up for it?" Kal asked with a calm smile to distract the young woman.
"Yeah, sure. Will I be able to kick your ass? Or maybe Thor's ass? Jane's been in a bad mood since the Battle of New York and someone has to take care of him," Darcy quickly agreed with a mischievous grin.
"It will take some time for that to be possible, I'm afraid," Kal admitted with a thin smile and placed one hand on Darcy's forehead as the other supported her ass since she still clung to him.
[Individual with unearthed potential detected: Focus to initiate power awakening]
[Talent recognised for: Priest, Monk]
A much more modest selection compared to the powered individuals of the Marvel universe, Kal was eager to see what Darcy would select among those two classes. He just hoped it wouldn't be Brewmaster just to get the ability to conjure kegs of alcohol at her convenience.
Several minutes later, when Darcy's beauty turned even more pure and refined, the woman placed a deep kiss on Kal's lips before leaning back and pondering out loud, "Holy and Shadow profiles? Level 3? What does that mean?"
"You were given the information on what these specializations could do, no?" Kal asked and received an unsure nod. "Then it means you've embarked on the path to become a healer of the holy light, and someone who deals damage with shadow magic damage. Levels indicate how many skills you may learn and it also helps in keeping track of your progress. The highest level of those I have given these powers is 118. But Pietro is kind of a cheat like that. He roams all of Europe just to save damsels in distress…"
"Wait, healer of the holy light? Does that mean I have to live like a nun now? Nooo, I don't wanna be celibate! I didn't choose the monk specializations just because of that!" Darcy shouted in horror after something weird connected in her mind.
"No worries, you can still enjoy yourself even as an acolyte of the light. It will take some time, but you may eventually even heal the most grievous of wounds. It's a very rewarding experience. Just don't tear yourself apart to please everyone. People around you will die because of their wounds and diseases, not because you didn't heal them. Always remember to live for yourself," Kal patiently explained before Darcy tried her first spell.
"Shadow Word: Pain!" She shouted as she pointed her hand at Kal's shoulder.
"This isn't an anime. You don't have to shout the skill's name for it to cast. Just think about it and follow the instructions in your mind until the spells become second nature to you. I'll have Skye and Ava explain the rest to you," Kal said with a roll of his eyes at Darcy's outburst. Naturally Kal was way too powerful for a level 3 priest's Shadow Word: Pain to do any damage, let alone even take effect.
Just then, both women he mentioned before appeared next to Kal and Darcy with the use of Shadowstep.
"How enviable," Ava muttered under her breath and earned herself a slap to the shoulder from Skye as she complained, "Head out of the gutter."
"Did the two of you find Jane in any of the space anomalies?" Kal asked and allowed Darcy to hop down from his arms.
"Negative," Ava answered curtly as she looked at Darcy with narrowed eyes.
"What do we do? Jane could be anywhere with the space all wonky like that," Darcy asked, only now realising the dire circumstances of Jane's disappearance once more. Seeing Kal had taken her mind to a completely different place and she could not help but feel guilty.
"It'll be alright," Kal reassured and looked to the sky. They were in England, so rain clouds weren't rare. But the sky darkened considerably in the last few moments. The air was starting to feel electric.
Thor was already on Midgard.