Levana was in Tartarus again.
However, this time she wasn't having a picnic. She was writing up contracts. She wanted to bind the natural laws of the world to her using her divinities over promises, contracts and oaths.
" Whatcha doing?" Tartarus asked looking over Levana's shoulder at the complex contracts she had spent an entire year writing. The glowing words and odd intertwining lines on the magic-infused paper caused this avatar of Tartarus to be slightly dizzy, so he quickly looked away.
" I am making full use of my powers," Levana said not paying the primordial too much attention as she kept herself focused on her self-given task. It had been a year since Levana had visited Camp Half-blood and realised that a war of epic proportions was on its way.
Battle maniac or not, Levana was not arrogant enough to go into a full supernatural war with just her current level of power. So, since she learned of the upcoming war, she dedicated her time to training. However, her improvement rate was starting to plateau.
That was where her contracts would come in. By contracting the natural laws of reality, she was able to manipulate concepts as she pleased...
As long as she paid a price that she felt was fair.
The "fair" part was the most difficult part of writing the contracts. After all, what would count as fair payment for gaining the ability to shift the earth and nature as her adoptive mother did? Or for the ability to destroy anything she wills to destroy? Or to manipulate natural concepts as she pleased?
So, she easily linked her magic power and stamina to the contracts as the price to be paid. However, as a goddess who literally radiated magic power and had near-boundless stamina, using these resources as payment didn't seem very fair to her.
So, she linked her passion for battles to the contracts. Something she also had boundless of. In contrast to the two important resources, she was literally nothing without her passion for battle. A fact that she had found out after several days of meditating.
Levana was still coming to terms with the fact that battling strong opponents was everything to her. It made her uncomfortable just thinking about it although she knew that it was true. Was she a psychopath? A functional one, maybe?
She quickly convinced herself to see Hanok after she was done writing out all the contracts. Levana nodded to herself with her eyes closed as Tartarus stared a little confused with his adopted daughter's antics. Levana had decided to see Hanok in a few days.
In the meantime, she decided to continue writing the contracts. Paying the price for being an essential God with a capital G. The price of omnipotence for a few seconds would be paid with her magical power and with her stamina. If she REALLY needed more time as an omnipotent being, she would use her passion for battle as a last resort.
...
It was days later and Levana had completed her contracts. With a flick of a hand, the fifty pages of contracts began turning into tiny glowing letters, runes, symbols and lines which then floated and landed on Levana's naked body. Levana gritted her teeth as she felt the contracts bind themselves to her soul and in the process bind her soul to her body and anchor her mind in her soul.
It was her magnum opus, with the soul bound to her body, her body bound to reality, and her mind bound to her soul by her contracts, she was essentially unkillable AS LONG AS no being beyond reality decided to end her in which case she would probably be fully destroyed.
" With this, I am ready..." Levana said and clenched her fists. The process had been painful but worth it. She wondered for a moment why gaining power was always painful but quickly brushed it off as unimportant.
She glanced at the avatars of Tartarus and Gaia. Both her adoptive parents had forgone their plans for world domination in exchange for spending some time together as a family. Levana smiled at them and waved at them.
" Bye, Momma and Dad, I am off to test my power and meet my teacher." The primordial duo said nothing and simply waved at her from where they were. They were eating cookies and watching mortal television through divination.
Mentally preparing herself, Levana activated her slowed perception of time and took a deep breath. Allocating what she thought was 5% of her stamina to the contract her body began to hum with power. For a hundred milliseconds, Levana felt indescribable power. She was invincible, omnipotent and omnipresent. Then, as quickly as the power came, it was gone leaving her feeling empty.
Levana looked around confused as she realised that she had spent the entire 0.1 of a second relishing in her power, instead of using it to teleport to the Mansion of learning. The feeling of being so powerful only for it to be taken away from her less than a fraction of a second later was maddening. However, Levana kept herself in check.
She had made the price of having so much power fair for the exact reason that unrestricted and unlimited power would likely drive her mad. Also because she was afraid that there was some kind of guardian being that would kick her ass for breaking reality.
Either way, she had put a price tag on unlimited power for reasons and had to deal with it as she had intended.
Taking another deep breath, she activated her slowed perception of time once again and allocated yet another 5% of her stamina to the contracts in her soul. Immediately, the feeling of being omnipotent returned. However, she didn't relish in the feeling and instead did what she had to.
Instantly, she found herself facing Hanok who was already staring at her position. However, in the nearly stopped time that Levana was experiencing. Levana found that having unlimited power for 100 milliseconds was actually a lot of time. So, she manually dismissed her omnipotence and went back to regular Levana in a simple snap of a finger.
Levana cringed as she felt her "stamina" return to her body. Causing her to feel all sorts of weird sensations.
" So, the student has returned far more powerful than she once was." Hanok's voice rang out as he stared at Levana. The book he always held was closed and he was smiling. A rare thing indeed.
Levana smiled at her teacher and looked around for her chair. Seeing it with the rest of Hanok's godly students' chairs, Levana's smile widened.
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