In Marvel As Dante

A technique formed in my mind—like one of the many inspired by Devil Trigger, but I didn't unleash it.

This technique harnessed my Time affinity, and my experience with Moment of the Time Sage gave me a pretty good idea of what it would do.

I just had to know when to use it.

I activated Dimensional Jump again, picking a destination—right behind Lumos's head.

A line of fragmented light and reality streaked around me as I stepped into my Simulacrum and back. I appeared behind Lumos, Rebellion drawn, mid-swing, blade packed with Anathema Flame.

His body was part light energy when I emerged from the gate. He dematerialized before my blade could touch him, transforming into a streak of light that regained form several hundred feet away from me.

His eyes were wide with surprise and fear as his Cloak technique reactivated, bathing him in a golden glow.

"How?" he asked. "That shouldn't be possible. You should be dead."

My wings flared, activating Gust, and I rocketed forward. My blade swung down, this time armed with Wind and Dimensional affinities.

Lumos leaped and twisted, but not quickly enough. A line ran down the length of his body, fountaining blood. An impossibly deep rent appeared in the ground behind him. It was deeper than any cut I'd managed too far, and it was obvious why.

A new Angelic Ascension technique blossomed in my mind—Dimensional Edge.

It sent everything my projected energy blade touched into another dimension.

Lumos face warped in a rictus of rage. It looked almost alien on the overconfident Prince's face. I thought I'd have to dig even deeper before touching him, but it seemed the Demon Prince was making this easy for me.

The difference that overwhelming speed made was astounding.

I activated Gust again, this time at maximum output, and tagged on all of my speed buffs—Density Cloak, Density Shift, and Osiris.

One moment, I was across from him; the next, my blade clashed against his floating spear.

It rang out like a gong as Lumos finally got serious. He pulled out another Cloak form. His considerable aura shrunk, adhering to his skin like a tattoo.

It was my turn to be blindsided. He was in front of me, spear inches from my eye when the word froze.

The technique I'd been nursing finally bloomed.

TIMES STOP.

I knew I'd made a mistake the moment the technique flowed out of me. It was beyond me despite how far I'd come. I instinctively knew deactivating it would likely yank me out of Angel Ascension.

But I didn't worry. I could hold the technique for as long as Angel Ascension held.

I could almost taste the panic rolling off of Lumos's frozen body.

"Now this is more my speed," I cackled, raising Rebellion high and swinging it down with a finality.

Lumos aura exploded outwards in one last desperate outpour. The temperature rose to staggering degrees, and I felt the slightest bit of resistance all around me as Lumos attempted to undo my technique.

He wrenched himself out of the path of my blade in jerky, unnatural movements, puppeting himself with pure Telekinetic energy.

Lumos tried bombarding me with a mental storm, but it barely phased me. Between overtaxing his mind to remain lucid in the extreme time dilation and all of the other technique he was juggling, it was child's play to break his hold.

He fell back with a scream, blood gushing from his mouth.

"Don't do this!" he sent. "There's still a deal to be made."

"I think I'm good," I sent as I slashed with Rebellion, channeling dimensional and Wind energy.

I immediately knew something was wrong the moment the attack landed. My time bubble popped, Lumos's body dropped, and I suddenly found myself jerked out of Angel Ascension, blood gushing from my nose and ears. Rin and I shared a look before I was suddenly yanked through a dimensional gate. The world came into focus long enough to catch myself with Telekinesis as I came inches from crashing through a large Tower Bell.

I had to Telekinetically lower myself to the ground with a grunt, dropping into the parking lot of the building. I banished my armor with a thought and just sat there with bone-deep scars, my body crisscrossed with wounds I didn't remember getting.

Not crossing my time and dimensional affinities should've been the most obvious thing in the world. It was probably why Ascension ended. I hoped using TIME STOP wouldn't have this effect on me every time I did it.

I pulled myself up with considerable effort and triggered Angel Regeneration but was shocked when the ability didn't work. Several notifications popped up.

You're experiencing an Affinity Strain for your imprecise manipulation of two of the four fundamental aspects of reality. All angel abilities are unavailable for 4 hours.

You've killed. Lumos, Second Son of Belasco. 500,000 Red Orbs.

1500/2500 HP

Quite the bump in rewards, but then again, he'd been inordinately strong. I was certain the fight would've gone on for much longer if I hadn't frozen time. I had been right about my hunch. Angel Ascension was orders of magnitudes stronger than I anticipated. Both of my modes were. I just was never in any of them long enough to really appreciate them.

I let out a long sigh. I would be falling back on both of them in the coming weeks. Everything had essentially gone tits up after Ulyetrix's declaration. No cajoling or mind-bending would put the genie back in the bottle. Fury likely already knew, as did Magneto and the rest of the Thunderbolt.

Confronting them would likely be the most difficult conversation of my life, and I expect that the double-crosses are already happening as we speak.

I was likely in for a world of hurt, yet I found myself oddly…relieved. I didn't need to bother with the charade anymore. None of them could stop me, and I had the power to take on the rest of the cambions—except number One, SHIELD, the Brotherhood, and Sebastian Shaw's little Cabal.

Heck, even the counter array plan was a complete breeze now. Our greatest obstacle was penetrating the Spatial strongholds where the demons regulate the portals. Jean and I had been running a long con using Telepathy to slowly hypnotize several Array operators to shut down their spatial shield from the inside out. I was supposed to run in and plant several Anathema Flame bombs while Domina was distracted by Collen Wing and Matt Murdock, but Dimensional Gate took care of that problem entirely.

As for the arrays, Jean and the Sorceress Supreme have been working on several demons and cambions that reside on the surface, slowly altering their minds and corrupting them with false information.

The work had already taken months because of Lumos. We had to take it extra slow so as not to show our hand, but that didn't matter anymore now that he was dead.

The only thing I couldn't do was raid the demon world alone, but that could change if the Tesseract were in my possession.

I couldn't fight the grin on my lips as I realized I was becoming even more untethered from death and potential consequences.

I only cared about how my very few friends would react to learning about my origin and mission.

I let out a tired breath and broke into a coughing fit as I rose to my feet, switching to casual wear. It was then I heard voices coming from the edge of the lot. My tired brain and body only caught the end of the conversation.

"Stay back, Ken," a woman screamed. "I'm not kidding."

"I saw you stuff my watch into your bag, Gabby," he snarled. "It cost me 5 fucking grand. There's no way in hell I'm letting you walk away."

"Kah—"

"Just give it!"

Two rounds rang out into the night, and I heard a thud. Three quick steps carried me to the scene of the crime as I watched a man with his fingers wrapped around a gold watch, bleeding out through a hole in his gut.

"You sure fucked him up good," I said casually, not looking up at the woman. She was a Redhead with thin lips and big green eyes. Freckles dotted her cheeks, and she quivered under the attention.

"Stay back!" she yelled. Two rounds rang out, splashing harmlessly around my reinforced skin.

Her eyes popped out as she tossed her gun to the side.

"Oh my god. Oh my god, please don't be hurt."

"Jesus," I grunted. "That hurt a lot more than it should've." Deflecting or stopping the bullet with Telekinesis would've likely been the smarter choice. But I was bone tired and already regretting stepping in.

"You're not hurt?" the girl said, then slowly scanned me up and down. "Well, not any more than you currently are. You're one of those mutants, aren't you? You have to help him."

"Are you sure about that. You did just try to kill him after robbing him." Talk about flipping the gender dynamics.

"I didn't mean for things to…please just help him."

"Where's the nearest hospital?" I asked with a sigh as I picked up the body of the dying guy she shot.

"Fourth street," she quickly said.

"Which is in what direction?"

She blinked and pointed north. I was off with a flash, covering dozens of blocks before depositing him at the emergency room and speeding back to the parking lot. The girl was gone when I returned, likely trying to get a head start on the police. I could've made a bigger deal out of this and chased her down, but I was far more concerned with making the best of my downtime.

Four more hours until my world went to shit.

I sped back into town and tracked down a bar. Naturally, all attention turned to me when I walked in, and they were understandably freaked out. I was still bleeding out of several wounds, covered in strange pock marks and cuts. It would've been a bigger, fucking problem had I not ordered everyone to pretend like I was just anybody else.

Ordering a bottle of whiskey and visibly healing from my wounds as the night progressed didn't help much either.

At some point, I got tired of re-applying Telepathy and just summoned a hat, ridding myself of the attention. An hour into my bottle, brooding and idly watching the game, the same woman I'd spared slipped into the bar. She avoided direct eye contact with everyone and searched the room carefully. She missed me, my silhouette hidden behind a barrel-chested man enjoying the game on the bar's frustratingly small singular TV set.

She ordered a sweet drink to take the edge off, and I settled beside her almost without her notice.

"Shouldn't you be out of town by now?" I asked, startling the girl. She nearly spilled her drink, but I steadied it with my hand. She stood up, putting some distance between us. Her abrupt action drew some eyes that I had to forcefully divert.

A thousand thoughts ran through her mind, all bad and desperate. She was about ready to book it when I spoke.

"Calm down," I said. "If I was after you, I'd have found you thirty minutes ago."

"I didn't mean to run away."

"Of course you did," I said, "And I don't fight demons."

"You're that guy with the fire powers," she said, eyes widening in realization. "What do you want from me?"

"Honestly? Nothing. I'd like a conversation. Out of curiosity mostly."

"And if I don't want to talk to you?" She said, shifting defensively.

"Then nothing…" I said. "I'm off the clock, and you're no criminal mastermind. A crappy thief with itchy fingers, yes, but a danger, hardly."

Her lips twisted in annoyance. "Anyone told you you're kind of an asshole."

"A few times," I said. "But I don't take most people seriously."

"Maybe I should take your advice," she said. "Let your comment roll off me."

I raised a brow. "I'm sorry, would you like to graduate from novice thief to murderer? Because those type of people get radically different treatment."

She raised her hand placatingly and settled down beside me. "Geez. You're sassy. The news makes you out be the root of evil, not some emo-kid drinking away his problems."

I said, rotating the glass in my hand. "They may have been onto something with that report."

She looked at me, a bit alarmed, then slowly asked. "What are you talking about?"

"I got forced into a deal with somebody powerful a long time ago, and an old enemy exposed the details of it. Suffice to say the terms are a bit concerning for everybody on earth."

"Why are you telling me this?" she asked in a small voice.

"Because I've lied to everybody I've met for so long now it's getting hard to keep it all straight," I said. "I'm more powerful than I could've ever imagined, yet I've never felt so terrible."

"Can you tell me exactly what you agreed to?" she asked.

"I won't bore you with the details, but let's just say I'm working around them."

"Then you have to get over yourself and come clean if the earth really is in danger," she said. "I might be going to jail, but I like breathing…like a lot."

I raised a brow. "I just told you I might've sold out the planet to save my hide. Where's the outrage?"

"I did just shoot someone," she said. "I'm in no position to judge a real-life superhero."

"I told you I'm no hero."

"You're not a monster either," she said. "Monsters generally don't reflect and go out of their way to help people when they really don't need to."

"My deal got people killed."

"A deal you were coerced into," she pointed out. "Unless you're ready to start giving me hard facts, I'm not really changing my mind about you. I'm not saying you're a saint, but you're leagues beyond the true sickos of the world. Cut yourself some slack," she finished with a small smile, and I folded my arms, leaning back into my chair.

I gave her words some thought. I had no idea where the confession came from, nor did I feel any ounce of regret for how things had unraveled.

But it was there, buried underneath all of the one-liners and violence.

I have to level with Rin and be honest with Jean about everything, including the initial deal for the Phoenix Flames.

"Thanks for listening," I said, getting up. I materialized a wad of cash and handed it to her. "For your commissary or escape—if you manage that much. Good luck, Gabby."

"Hey, I never told you, my name?"

"The guy you shot did," I said off-handedly as I strode towards the exit. Before I left, I took one last look back and connected to her mind with Telepathy.

"Forget ever meeting me and our meeting until I say otherwise. Also, stick in town." I ordered. I'd had no intention of interceding on her behalf, but I enjoyed the conversation, and I was feeling generous. I was also going to stop by the hospital and make the police drop, and the victim drop the entire matter.

Was it fair? Unlikely. But I was also going to hand him a fat wad of cash for his hospital bill and compensate him for his pain.

He'll likely spend the rest of his life wondering who shot him, but I was okay with that.

I pulled out one of my many burners from my inventory and dialed a phone number I hadn't in weeks.

Regan.

"The timeline has moved up," I said. "It's time you meet Wenwu."