章節 44: Chapter 44
With that in mind, Liam summoned Incursio around him and walked closer to the volcano. "I'll let Incursio adapt to this environment first," he said as he felt toxic fumes going through the armor. He sat down and slowed his breathing. Slowly, the armor began to adapt, though it was much slower than he expected.
'It's adapting, but it isn't that fast,' he thought. 'During the fight with the fiend, Incursio adapted to the higher temperatures quickly. But then again, it didn't need to adjust much—it already had strong fire resistance. Still, why is there such a difference?' He realized how little he truly understood about Incursio. 'Knowing it from the anime isn't the same as understanding how it functions here. I'm so naive. I used to study ancient artifacts for a living, and now I forget to study my own weapon.'
Liam closed his eyes, paying close attention to the armor's response to the toxic environment. 'Come to think of it, I don't even know how I breathe inside Incursio. The armor is completely sealed—so where's the air coming from?'
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, repeating this several times until he noticed the armor's mechanism. 'Incursio has an airlock system. When I breathe in, it closes off the front and opens the area close to my nose, and after I breathe out, it releases the air and allows fresh air to enter. There's a small space between inner and outer layers that holds the expelled air temporarily.' He noted this thoughtfully. 'For my training to survive in lava, I'll have to improve that space, or I'll suffocate.'
With a training plan forming in his mind, Liam decided to work on the toxic air problem first. 'Filtering out poison first is necessary. Once that's done, I'll start on heat resistance.' He thought about the upcoming challenges, knowing how much he needed fire resistance for future encounters. 'Between the Extremis soldiers who burn at 3000 degrees Celsius and beings like Surtur—and even the Hell Dimension itself. Fire attacks and extreme heat are common.'
Liam also realized how weak he actually was to toxins. Sleep gas could have knocked him out if he couldn't hold his breath long enough, and poisonous gases could kill him if he didn't notice in time.
After three hours of training, taking short breaks to let Incursio recover, he began to notice physical effects: irritation in his eyes and more difficult breathing. 'Incursio's close to adapting, but the poison's been going through this whole time,' he thought. 'Just a little more…'
After one more break, he continued training for another ten minutes. Finally, he felt he could breathe easily again. 'Finally,' he thought. 'The armor adapted to filter toxins—it even changed how it handles airflow, adding tiny filters to the front opening. And the oxygen capacity seems to have increased too.'
He examined the armor closely. 'It's not just storing more air, Incursio's filtering the CO₂ when I breath out, allowing me to reuse the same air more efficiently.' He was amazed at this change.
Leaving the toxic fumes, he unsummoned the armor, took a sip of water, and laid down, looking up at the clear sky. 'When did I last take time to just relax like this?' he thought, feeling nostalgic. 'This new life… it's truly something.'
After a few moments, he stood up and summoned Incursio again. 'This journey—the training, the progress—it's all so much fun.' With that in mind, he approached the lava, descending the steep edge of the volcano's mouth. 'Time to test Incursio's adaptation in lava. Surface temperatures here should only be around 1000 degrees Celsius.'
He crouched down, dipping a finger into the lava. Bits of the intense heat went through the armor, feeling the heat around his finger, but the lava stayed out. After about five minutes, he shook the lava off his finger, noticing a change in the armor's color. 'The lava was too hot, the armor's starting to melt slightly.'
Studying the damaged area, he noticed a different type of energy going over there. 'It isn't my own energy. Is this coming from the Tengu power source? It doesn't look like energy from this dimension. It's the same white glow I saw when I went to the Dream Dimension.'
The armor began to repair itself, with the damaged area absorbing additional energy, gradually reinforcing itself. 'It's like the armor remembers what was damaging it and builds resistance to it,' he observed, dipping his whole hand into the lava this time. After five minutes, the same changes occurred, but this time it happened faster.
'It's like the armor develops a sort of immunity, similar to a vaccination,' he realized. As the armor completed its adaptation, he scooped up some lava with the same hand, noting that it took longer for any damage to appear. 'It's not adapting as quickly as it does in battle, but the process is still remarkably fast. An active fight must activate more of Incursio's instincts from when it was alive, speeding up its adapting state.'
A thought crossed his mind. 'How strong was this creature in life? And more importantly, how did it die?'
Looking at the lava, he steeled himself. 'Well, time to take a dive.'
As a safety precaution, he put Neontote above the lava, making sure he'd have a way to pull himself out. 'Well then, here goes nothing,' he thought, he slowly climbed down, into the lava.
To his surprise, he found that the lava wasn't very deep at this spot—his feet touched the bottom. Only his helmet was above the surface as he stood within the lava, he moved carefully, knowing he couldn't risk sinking into an unexpected drop that could lead straight to Earth's core.
Feeling the intense heat around him, Liam sensed Incursio working hard to manage the internal temperature. After a few minutes of continuesly walking up and down to get fresh air, he climbed out of the lava with Neontote's help.
Sitting on the edge of the volcano, he allowed the armor to finish adapting. Once the adapting was finished, he stepped out of the toxic plumes, unsummoned Incursio, and took a moment to catch his breath.
As he sat there, he suddenly remembered something crucial. 'I completely forgot to check the news for Tony's announcement. Let's hope it hasn't happened yet.'
Opening a portal back to the Sanctum, he hurried to his laptop, searching for any live news streams. He found no live news, what he did find were short video's and the new No.1 trending post. 'I was too late, I missed the most iconic moment in Marvel history.' Liam thought, blinking away a tear as he watched an uploaded clip from some news channel.
Even though it wasn't live, he couldn't help but smile as Tony declared, "I am Iron Man."
章節 45: The Antarctic
After watching the clip, Liam thought, 'In five months, the Whiplash incident will happen. I could try to kill Ivan Vanko now to prevent that.' But he realized he couldn't. 'I'd need to know more about where he lives. When I opened a portal to Coulson's locker, I only had to focus on a few specific details, since SHIELD HQ is a known location and I had a clear mental image. For Ivan, all I know is that he's in Russia and I have a vague memory of the couch his father died on. For longer-distance portals, I either need very simple targets—like 'ocean' or 'desert'—or highly specific locations.'
Realizing that killing Vanko now wasn't possible, Liam opened a portal back to the volcano to continue his training. Stepping into the lava again, he paid close attention to the strange energy flowing through the armor. 'I still can't tell where it's coming from,' he noted. 'If I keep training, I will eventually get used to this energy and maybe even track where it's coming from.'
'This energy moves through my body, but I can't direct it at all. It just flows where it wants to. If I could control it, I'd not only have access to more energy, but I could also channel it to specific parts of the armor, making Incursio adapt faster in a fight.' Liam thought.
Eventually, he climbed out of the lava again, this time lasting longer than before. While waiting for his armor's cooldown, he returned to studying the Latin book. 'I'm almost done with the words for the Icy Tendrils of Ikthalon,' he thought, interested in the spell. 'It'll allow me to trap dozens of enemies in ice and kill them in an instant. It'll take time to master, but it'll be worth it.'
Once he could summon Incursio again, he went back into the lava to continue training. By the end of the week, he could endure the 1000-degree heat for 25 minutes straight. 'Not bad—my activation time has increased by three minutes,' he thought, pleased. 'Stimulating the armor like this improves activation time a lot faster.'
This week of training also brought new thoughts. 'The amount of energy flowing through me seems to have something to do with how long I can stay in Incursio,' he noted. 'And thanks to being under lava for so long, Incursio has adapted further, allowing me to store more oxygen inside. Now I can last around 15 minutes without fresh air.' The speed of this progress surprised him.
'Maybe I should try swimming deeper,' Liam thought, diving down into the lava pool. Slowly counting in his head, he stopped after a minute as he felt the temperature increase by a lot. Any further, and he risked melting the armor and killing himself.
Hovering in place, he felt a faint bit of dimensional energy below him. 'That's way too deep for now,' he noted, estimating the energy to be tens of meters further down. 'But what kind of energy would be under there?'
Knowing he can't investigate it right now. He swam back to the surface and climbed out, heading to his things. 'It's nice that no one comes here; I can just leave my books around without worrying.' Picking up his belongings, he opened a portal back to his room at the Sanctum. The night had already settled over the volcano, and he couldn't read his book anymore. Returning to the Sanctum would give him time to practice his magic spells and read through spell books.
His new training routine was well underway, beginning each day with resistance training, with breaks in between for reading and spell practice, before ending the night with more reading. 'It's not exactly fun to sit under lava, but I have to train myself,' he reminded himself. 'I've also started learning the dimensional energy detection spell the Ancient One recommended. It's called Eldritch Sight. It lets me detect dimensional energy within a sphere around me. Right now, the range is around 50 meters.'
'Once I improve the range, I'll start hunting dimensional tears. They'll be the best way to train Incursio and myself.' Liam activated Eldritch Sight while meditating, this was the way to increase the distance he could reach. Though the spell didn't let him see everything around him like Enel's observation haki, it showed dimensional energy sources very clearly. 'This ability also lets me detect attacks made by dimensional energy. If I can keep it active all the time, I won't need to worry about surprises from dimensional creatures.'
He continued training until he finally went to bed.
The next morning, Liam was woken by a knock on his door. Dressing quickly, he opened it to see the Ancient One standing outside, smiling.
"It's time for another mission, young Liam. This one is more challenging," she announced.
"Higher difficulty? I can't handle that without risking exposure of magic's existence or endangering innocent people," he replied.
"Not all dimensional tears are in populated areas," she explained. "Some higher-dimensional beings place tears in hidden places far from civilization. Their goal is to weaken the barrier protecting our world, as these remote tears are harder to locate and eliminate."
"Where, exactly?" Liam asked.
"Places like Antarctica, the Sahara Desert, and other abandoned areas," she responded.
"So, which one am I being sent to?" Liam pressed.
"You'll be heading to Antarctica," she replied with a calm smile.
"And how am I supposed to find a tear in that area? I haven't mastered the Eldritch Sights spell yet." he asked.
"I'll open a portal to the general area. After that, it's up to you," she replied.
"When do I leave?" Liam inquired.
"Right now." With that, she opened a portal beneath him, sending him plummeting into the freezing snow.
Liam cursed as he landed in the cold, he got up on his feet again just as the portal closed. Instantly, he summoned Incursio so he didn't have to endure this cold. 'Curse that woman,' he thought as he activated Eldritch Sight, but no energy signatures were in his detection range.
He started walking through the snow, and it didn't take long before he picked up a faint energy signal in the distance.
'Atleast she was slightly humane by putting me close.' He thought, having no idea about what he would be fighting.
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