Kapitel 166: Chapter 164
Damian returned to the palace only to find the place empty, of course he was referring only to his family.
"Where is everyone?" Damian asked, stopping a servant and inquiring.
"The queens went to the city with the princesses," the servant replied respectfully.
"Alright, thank you," Damian said, nodding before deciding to go visit his eldest daughter.
With that in mind, he disappeared from the place, giving the servant a start.
Damian reappeared in the Hollow Earth and at first glance didn't see his daughter. Suddenly, he felt two people fighting in the distance.
He immediately knew it was Monica and Maria.
He had given Maria something to teleport to this place, according to Monica, she came every day and spent a lot of time with her, which made her very happy.
Damian appeared stealthily at a certain distance as he watched them fight.
Maria was enhancing her body with magic as she fiercely pursued Monica, constantly sending punches and kicks that were easily blocked by Monica.
Monica didn't even touch the ground, she hovered just inches above it, moving agilely from side to side while occasionally countering the blows.
None of the strikes from either of them reached the other's body, Monica didn't dare to hit her mother out of respect even if it was for practice.
Seeing that nothing she did was effective, Maria suddenly summoned a sword that had no edge, only a very sharp point, it was one of Maria's familiars.
As soon as the sword touched Monica, it immediately hit the ground as its weight suddenly increased.
Monica pursed her lips upon seeing the sword, as if recalling unpleasant memories, before starting to dodge the blows instead of blocking them.
Now the fight turned into Maria using all sorts of feints to try to hit Monica, who was almost spinning in circles to evade.
Suddenly, thinking of something, Monica blocked with her forearm while sending a strong mana pulse before the weapon made contact, effectively blocking the weapon without being affected.
Monica suddenly took the initiative, using small pulses at the moment of impact that acted like temporary armor.
Damian watched them fight for a while before letting them sense his presence, causing both of them to stop and look at him.
"Both of you against me," Damian said, smiling at them.
Monica was particularly excited because she knew she didn't have to hold back with her father.
Monica's clothes and hair fluttered forcefully before the ground beneath her feet shattered as she sped towards Damian.
Maria only felt an explosion beside her before seeing a shadow pass in the direction of Damian.
Damian chuckled as he casually blocked Monica's attack with his hands.
Monica wasn't discouraged and delivered a flurry of kicks and punches in multiple combinations.
The wind howled loudly as Monica moved, trying to at least move her father. Only when she developed her abilities did she realize that her father was truly powerful. Her kicks could literally send any Titan flying, but her father didn't even budge.
Maria watched in amazement at her daughter before quickly reacting and using her sword to attack Damian.
Damian decided to add some excitement to the fight and used the finger of his other hand to forcefully strike Maria's sword, pushing her arms upwards.
Damian caught Monica's wrist before spinning and making her collide with her mother.
They both rolled a few meters before getting up and looking at him, annoyed.
Monica quickly stood up before concentrating and began extracting moisture from the surrounding air for several kilometers, creating a large water sphere around herself.
Damian watched Monica with interest, waiting to see what she was going to do. Monica manipulated the water sphere, turning it into a spear before sending it at high speeds towards Damian.
Damian looked at the spear before creating a dome in front of him, causing the spear to disintegrate and splashing the water upward.
At that moment, several water tentacles emerged from the ground and wrapped around his body, trying to limit his movements.
The water from the spear suddenly formed multiple small spears that were sent towards Damian from all directions, impaling his body.
Maria, who was with Monica, stood up in surprise at the sight of the water spears pierced into Damian's body and blood running down. She couldn't help but think that Damian had become overconfident and got injured.
Unlike Maria, Monica's expression didn't change as she looked attentively at her father, having no doubt that it was fake. Suddenly, she threw a punch backward, which was stopped by a hand on her wrist.
''I knew nothing would happen to you,'' Monica complained.
''Why do you seem disappointed that you didn't hurt me?'' Damian said, looking at her wordlessly while pinching her nose.
''It was a good strategy; I'm proud of you, sweetheart,'' Damian said, caressing her head. Monica gave a childish smile, clearly happy for her father's acknowledgment.
"I didn't know you were so strong, did you hold back that much?" Maria said, looking at Monica, who was complaining.
Monica just looked away uncomfortably.
"If you trained more, she probably wouldn't have to hold back," Damian said, defending his daughter.
"Hmph, be quiet. Since you did that to me, I started training. Just wait, someday I'll give you a beating, time is on my side," Maria said, looking angrily at Damian.
"Something he did to you?" Monica asked, blushing, looking between her mother and father.
"What's on your mind," Maria said, gently hitting Monica's head with her fist.
"Go train with Carol, she won't hold back and will make sure you develop battle instincts," Damian said, chuckling.
"Remember how competitive mom is with Carol, she wouldn't stand getting beaten up every day," Monica said, laughing.
"Well, then don't say you didn't have options," Damian said, shrugging.
"Whatever, later accompany me somewhere," Maria said, before starting to walk back to the cabin.
Monica laughed before approaching her father and giving him a hug.
"How long will you stay here, sweetheart?" Damian asked, stroking Monica's head.
"I should leave soon, I've documented almost everything, and I also found out that there are actually Titans on the surface, it's just that they've been asleep for so long that they're indistinguishable from the environment," Monica said.
"Hm, there are probably many mountains that are actually dormant Titans," Damian said, nodding.
"I'll publish my book and I'll be home for a while before deciding to simply travel through space. I'll go give our family a name," Monica joked.
"Well, you won't be able to go to space until you have a certain ability to protect yourself," Damian said, pinching her cheek.
"I'll train with Carol," Monica said, nodding. She would have to use her familiars.
"Good," Damian said, nodding with a smile.
"I'm ready, take me to my office," Maria said, approaching Monica and giving her a kiss before touching Damian's shoulder.
"Alright, see you later," Damian said, saying goodbye to Monica before teleporting them both to Maria's office.
"Follow me," Maria said, gesturing to Damian before opening the door and starting to walk towards the cell.
''I captured someone who seems to have some psychological problems, do me a favor and check if it is due to magical causes,'' Maria said, leading Damian.
On the way, many agents saw Damian and couldn't help but whisper, further confirming what they already knew.
Their organization has a great boss behind them.
Maria quickly led Damian to a rather large cell.
Damian immediately saw Loki, causing the corner of his lips to twitch slightly. He had always wondered where Loki was.
"So you captured him," Damian said, causing the cell door to open.
Maria looked at Damian speechlessly because he was about to enter the password.
"Damian, I suppose," Loki said, trying to maintain his smile but it inevitably faltered upon seeing Damian.
The amount of magic and power from his father was like a firefly in front of the sun compared to the man in front of him. Being a magician himself, he was much more sensitive to that kind of thing.
Damian also looked directly into Loki's mind and realized that it was indeed a bit fragmented under the influence of the Mind Stone.
His fragmented mind could only indicate that he had been tortured, and the faint yellow energy surely indicated it was from the Scepter.
Damian communicated with Cortana and told her he would use the stone for a moment.
Removing the stone doesn't affect her, it just decreases her computing power.
Under Loki's fearful gaze, Damian conjured the Mind Stone in his hand and sent a small ray into Loki's mind.
The yellow ray repaired Loki's mind while absorbing the remaining energy in his mind.
Loki took a quick, deep breath until the ray left his mind.
Touching his forehead, Loki looked cautiously at Damian, while all the things he had done came to his mind.
Loki couldn't help but show an ironic smile, all his unfounded resentment against his father and brother seemed to make no sense at that moment.
"There was a certain energy in his mind subtly manipulating his decisions and pushing several of his emotions to the extreme," Damian said before waving his hand to return the Mind Stone to its place.
''You were right to call me, even if I had disappeared over time, it is possible that I would have left aftereffects.''
"I'll leave it to you," Damian said, nodding towards Maria before disappearing.
Maria looked at Loki, who seemed very confused. Through several conversations with Loki, she realized that there was something strange about him. Many times he contradicted himself, sometimes he seemed remorseful for what he had done, but the next moment he acted as if it were normal.
"How do you feel?" Maria asked, bringing a chair and sitting at the entrance of the cell.
Even if he had been influenced to do everything he did, she wasn't going to let her guard down.
"I'm fine, it's just that my head hurts," Loki said, massaging his forehead with an irritated expression.
"Hmm," Maria hummed, nodding.
"He's gone?" Loki asked, looking around.
"Yes, he's gone," Maria said, nodding.
"Your husband is really terrifying," Loki said, making a face.
"Pff, he's not my husband," Maria said, laughing.
"Don't you have a daughter?" Loki asked in surprise.
"It's complicated, but in reality, we're just friends. In fact, his wife is my best friend," Maria said, still amused.
"But indeed, he is really terrifying. I even wondered if there are more people like him in the universe," Maria said, looking at Loki.
"It's quite strange, he's not mortal but he's not a god either. If I had to say something, I would say he seems like a cosmic entity but clearly that's not the case," Loki said, furrowing his brow in thought.
''How do you know he is not a god? When I think of a god, the closest thing I know is him,'' said Maria, remembering the things she had seen him do.
''Energy, his energy is not divine in nature, but it's not cosmic either, it looks like normal magic, but ridiculously powerful,'' Loki said with some uncertainty.
"Anyway, tell me about yourself," Maria said, looking at Loki with interest.
"You don't know much about capturing people, do you? You usually don't talk too much to them unless it's to torture them for information," Loki said, pursing his lips. He had also felt in the few moments the door opened that he was the only one in this prison.
"I'm curious," Maria said, not caring about what Loki said.
"What do you want to know?" Loki asked, wondering if she wanted information about Asgard.
"Tell me about your life, how did you end up here?" Maria said, thinking for a moment.
"Hm... well, it's a long story," Loki said, taken aback a bit. He expected her to ask about secrets of Asgard, like his army or weaknesses.
"Time is something we both have plenty of," Maria said, smiling.
"Well, actually... I'm not a god," Loki said, laughing quietly, feeling somewhat liberating to say it.
"Over two thousand years ago, there was a war between Asgard and Jotunheim, clearly Asgard won. When the Asgardian army was retreating, Odin... my father, found me in a temple. I was too small for an ice giant, so he took me with him," Loki said with a somewhat melancholic expression.
Maria had a shocked expression as she continued to listen.
"As if it were a coincidence, my father also had another son, Thor. We were the same age, we grew up together, fought together. Of course, I didn't know I was adopted. I always thought I was my parents' son and Thor's brother."
"As we grew up, I realized I was physically weaker than Thor, so I learned magic. I turned out to be very good at it. While Thor received praise from my father, I received praise from my mother for my talent in magic."
"Then came the day to choose the successor to the throne. No surprise for me, my father chose Thor. Although I was resentful, in a way I could admit my loss. Thor was stronger than me, and even though I believe I have a better ability to rule, in this universe, what matters is how powerful you are."
"Although I had admitted my loss, of course I didn't resist creating problems for my brother. So, on the coronation day, I helped a few ice giants sneak into the palace treasury," Loki said, laughing quietly.
"My brother, who at that time was an irredeemable arrogant idiot, reacted dramatically as I expected. One thing led to another, and we were in Jotunheim to demand explanations from King Laufey."
"That's when everything started to get out of my control," Loki said, smiling ironically.
"Not only did a war break out between Asgard and Jotunheim, but I also found out that I'm an ice giant, the same ice giants I had always despised."
"Even so, I still didn't tell my father anything. I went to the palace vault and took with my own hands the weapon of the Jotunheim that was plundered in the war. When I touched it, all my skin turned blue and my eyes turned red."
"With anger, I confronted my father, telling him that now I understood why only Thor could be king. There was no way he would put an ice giant on the throne, right?" Loki said, laughing as he shook his head.
''Affected by my words, my father fell into the Odinsleep, I took control of Asgard and began to plan how to destroy Jotunheim. I wanted to erase that stain in my life, so that no one could associate me with them."
"That's when Sif and the three warriors went for Thor. At that moment, I... decided to kill my brother along with my... friends," Loki said, without a clear expression on his face.
The result, I think you already know, was that Thor returned to Asgard, defeated me and I threw myself into a wormhole,'' Loki said, looking at Maria, who was silently amazed by the story all the time.
"What nobody knows is that on the other side of the wormhole, I was captured by a rather terrifying guy, Thanos. He's quite famous, the Mad Titan. Almost no one dares to mess with him. He tortured me with the Scepter, I'm not even sure for how long."
"He told me to bring him the Tesseract and in return he would give me Earth."
"The torture really affected my mind, thinking that he would actually succeed. Normally, I would have pretended to accept and would have escaped with the Scepter," Loki said, laughing quietly.
"I see, it was interesting to hear your story," Maria said, getting up, now understanding Loki a little more.
"I'm also curious about your story, how about you tell me?" Loki said, interested.
"How about after a meal?" Maria said, stepping out and closing the door.
Loki looked at the walls where he could see runes. He had been greatly surprised to see them the first time since they were very similar to Asgardian runes.
Because of those runes, he couldn't use magic. What he most wanted to do at that moment was to contact his mother.
His thoughts went back to his captor, she had red eyes that looked really beautiful, but what was even more striking was that both Damian and his daughter had the same eyes, which made him think that it was a racial trait rather than a coincidence.
He hopes she's not kidding about telling her story after a meal.
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