Mage Among Superheroes

Ceira's bodyguards sort of faded away as we wandered into the woods. I wondered if I should tell them that I could still feel where they were. One of them was actively using powers, so it was pretty obvious. The other one was just strong.

Well, they were the ones who knew what they were doing, and they weren't trying to be hidden from us.

Various animals ran around, most of which were various different sorts of squirrels. Then a dog, a cat, a dire bat, and a Martian rust mole. We would have been way over capacity for Teleport if bonded companions had to be counted against the limits. The squirrels would have been too much on their own, with at least a dozen of them.

Since we had decided to skip the entrance, it seemed rude to leave out Miss Flutter and Fluffy, even though they might be forbidden from visiting the area normally.

We were currently breaking a bunch of rules, but we were cool and important and whatever so we could get away with it. I was pretty sure Angela had minimized the amount of rules we were breaking by getting permission for some stuff, but I wasn't really sure.

But rules, laws, and norms were all different things. It would be really inconvenient for us to do things the normal way.

I looked up, and up. "You sure these trees aren't magic?" I asked.

Ceira tilted her head. "Who are you asking?"

"Either of you native Earthlings," I shrugged. That would be Ceira, her manager Angela, or Jerome.

"I have no idea," Ceira admitted. "All trees kind of feel magical to me. These are more that way, but they're also just bigger."

Jerome was currently wandering off, but he would be fine. He knew all sorts of magic, including divination. He didn't actually go far anyway. He just walked off behind one of the trees, after which I heard a lot of beeping and booping.

"This is why I told you that you couldn't come!" he complained. It took him some time to circle around the huge base of the tree to reveal Rob held in his arms. "You can't move at all here."

I looked at Jerome and his familiar. "You should learn Fly," I commented.

"Don't encourage bad behavior!" Jerome said. "Rob isn't supposed to be here."

"Hmm. I don't remember including him in the Teleport."

"He latched onto the connection, I guess," Jerome explained.

I stroked my chin. "That's pretty impressive. He wasn't even close by."

"... Yeah, I guess so," Jerome said. "But just because it's impressive doesn't mean it's okay."

"Well, he's here now," I said. "So he should learn Fly."

"Maybe," Jerome said. "But I don't trust him to use it responsibly."

It was clear my apprentice loved his magical cleaning robot. The magical part was his responsibility- Rob had just been a perfectly normal cleaning robot that his mother purchased. Now he was much more effective, because magic was great.

Izzy hadn't said much, but not because she didn't appreciate where we were. She was just running around. I wondered if Scouts inherently became more energetic. Then again, scrambling up fallen logs that were several times your height was rather diverting regardless. The fallen tree she was scrambling about on was over twice my height. These were huge trees, after all.

I supposed from what I had seen most people with movement related powers enjoyed using them. Or rather, most people enjoyed using their powers in general- movement powers were just the most socially acceptable. I couldn't just throw around Meteor Swarms in public. I'd only done it exactly once and it wasn't even that effective.

Then again, Midnight was also running around happily. Maybe being a quadruped helped, or maybe I was just lazy. Not that it was a bad thing, to properly take a day off. I ran so much for fitness training the rest of the time.

Ceira pointed to a couple of Zeb's squirrel friends running up one of the taller trees. "I wish I could do that."

"Even if you can't turn into a squirrel, you can still climb the tree," I commented.

She just gave me a look. "Even if I've become more outdoorsy, druid spells don't suddenly make me good at climbing. I'm also really not a fan of the idea of falling several hundred feet. Not that I'd make it that high. So unless you have magic for that…?"

"You could," I said. "I'm sure you've got a least a handful of points. We'd just need to find a spider."

"... A spider for what?"

"To eat," I grinned widely.

Ceria made a face. "Why would we eat a spider?"

"To gain its powers!" I made a fist. "Look, I'm not the one who made up material components. I just follow the guidelines. Except when I don't."

"How's that working out for you?"

"It's going great," I commented.

Jerome stepped forward. "You're talking about Spider Climb?" he asked.

My apprentice knew, of course. He had access to my most-accurate understanding of spells and their components. "That's right."

"... I think Rob might have a spider wrapped up in his bristles. Do you think that counts?"

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"No idea," I admitted.

Ceira was still caught up on the whole thing. "But why would you eat it? Why would druids eat it?"

"Good question."

I didn't have an answer, though.

Angela looked like she was getting around just fine. She was quite a bit older and her powers didn't lend themselves to hiking, so I hadn't been sure. She was taking the easy route along our meandering path, but even if she exhausted herself we were going to be teleporting back anyway so it was probably fine. She looked quite content to be outside along with us.

The distant bodyguards were still there, feeling like someone normal and someone who had lightning. It had taken me a while to figure out the first one, because 'being normal' was precisely the sort of thing that didn't immediately feel off. It helped if you knew the person wasn't normal.

"This is nice," Ceira said. "Being able to get away from things. Though I guess even now I'm technically training, huh?"

I shrugged. "There's nothing wrong with improving yourself during your time off, if you enjoy it. As long as you're actually relaxing."

"I am," Ceira nodded. "I was so worried that we would have been attacked by monsters or I would have gotten an emergency call by now."

I looked around. "I don't think you can get an emergency call out here." I could be wrong, though.

"I would relay it," Angela said. "Of course, only after determining it was an actual emergency. You get about a hundred non-emergency calls per day, by the way."

Ceira sighed. "I'm so glad you're the one who deals with that."

Angela nodded. "I'm glad to. This is something I can do."

Izzy wandered back over. "I thought you weren't supposed to mention trouble," she commented. "Isn't that a superstition here?"

"It's not true," I pointed out. "Mentioning potential trouble doesn't have any effect on how often I get attacked."

"Right," Izzy said. "Sure. Don't you get attacked pretty much every day, though?"

I sighed. "I wish. It's usually weekly at best. Most of the time people surrender when we show up, so I don't even count that as a villain encounter. And it's not every day you get portals like…"

"Like the Doomsday incidents?" Izzy prompted.

"Well, yeah," I nodded.

-----

We sat down for lunch, with Midnight and I pulling out a whole bunch of food. It was still hot, but not because Storage did anything special. Instead, we had loaded up some special carrying containers that preserved stuff without letting things get all weird. With 15 upgrades in Storage- now Basic Spatial Magic- we had both a high capacity and ability to store relatively large individual items.

"Who are the bugs for?" I asked. I checked but they were mostly beetles and stuff, no spiders.

"Oh, oh!" Zeb bounced over. "That's for Miss Flutter. And Fluffy."

We handed out all of the food, including for the bodyguards who came to eat with us. Normal Person and Lightning Person ate in shifts, with one always on the alert. I wondered if they would spot trouble before Izzy. Even if she wasn't specifically paying attention, her class abilities were geared towards that sort of thing. I don't think either of them were, but it could be included in their secondary powers.

Everyone- except for Rob- ate their own meals as we sat on a huge stump. It had mushrooms and stuff growing all over it, and only about half of it was still solid and not rotting but that was still enough for our entire group, including animals.

It was a nice relaxing afternoon. My psychiatrist told me I did need those, and at least right now I agreed. I would be fine getting into real battle five or six days a week most of the time, but we weren't even a month out from Midnight being abducted so a bit of calm was nice.

After everything was over, I swept up all the containers at once, tossing them into Storage without touching them. Most people didn't even notice that I missed a couple and had to do it again. It seemed I was still quite some distance behind Wrickle, but then again she was old and wrinkly and I was still young and scarred.

"... Should we head back?" Ceira commented.

"I thought we were staying out all day?" I asked.

"Well, yeah, but it's afternoon now and we've been walking for hours."

"We're teleporting out," I reminded her. "When we're done we'll just go. A few more miles here or there won't make any difference."

"... You know, even with how much magic is part of my life now I'm still not used to it," she admitted.

"Same here," Midnight said. "I only expect teleportation to work within urban areas."

Izzy shrugged. "I never had the spare cash for something so extravagant."

"I'd teleport more," I said. "But New Bay has restrictions." Maybe I should get an official Teleportation license? If I saved ten or twenty minutes getting to work each day, would that make up for the mana cost? No, not just yet. But it got close at the half hour mark, which was sometimes the case with traffic. But if I split with Midnight…

I wondered if dropping something heavy from Storage on people's heads was worth experience. Or if Teleporting them into a precarious position counted. Spatial Rift was a bit too much to use in a city.

After lunch we got up and our group continued vaguely towards the portal I had felt earlier. A little at a time other people began to become aware of it. I wasn't going to blame Ceira, of course. It would have already been there even if she said nothing. And I hadn't bothered to route us away from it.

Jerome and Midnight figured it out at about the same time. "Is that…?" Jerome began.

"I think so," Midnight turned to me. "Turlough?"

"Yeah, there's a portal over there," I said. It was still pretty far, and I hadn't picked our direction of travel. It was just a coincidence.

"Hmm…" Ceira squinted. "We should probably do something about that."

Angela shook her head. "We shouldn't expose anyone to danger."

"We should at least get close enough to confirm its coordinates," Midnight suggested.

Angela nodded, then turned towards Ceira. "If anything happens make sure to use me as bait."

"But-"

Angela flicked the younger woman on the forehead. "This version of me isn't real, remember? You're the one with only a single body."

"Ugh, I should have brought weapons…" Izzy grumbled.

"I told you we could carry stuff," I said. "Did you get a firearms license?"

Izzy shook her head. "Not yet."

It took two casts of Stoneskin to get everyone. That included Lightning Person and Normal Person, because it would be a waste not to. We just wanted to get visual confirmation, so we weren't planning to go that close.

There was a sudden shriek. Lightning Person threw herself in front of Ceira. Normal Person was standing conveniently off to the side where he or she would probably do something. I looked for the source, and I spotted Zeb running towards it.

Lightning Person transformed into actual lightning, which was awesome. She looked ready to zap, but I held her back as Zeb was tackled from the sky. Zeb was a big strong member of the Power Brigade, after all, and didn't need any interference.