chapters 176-180

chapters 176-180

A Lightspear, wreathed in lightning, came hurtling towards my face! I shifted my head to the side and dodged it with inches to spare. It stabbed into the wall behind me and easily pierced through the thick steel.

I retaliated by waving my hand and conjuring a dozen purple Lightspears in the air all around me.

My opponent's eyes widened in shock. I smirked at her and waved my hand again. All 12 spears locked onto her and moved incredibly fast.

"Dammit!" Akeno cursed as she threw both of her hands in front of herself. A circular shield made of Heavenly Lighting manifested in front of her. All of my spears hit it at the same time and exploded. Akeno let out a small scream as she was blasted backwards.

She crashed onto the ground and skidded towards the other side of the room. She was covered in burns marks and bruises, but still conscious. "That hurt, Layla..." Akeno whined as I walked over towards her.

My Purger of Darkness manifested and I started to heal her. 50 MP and she was as good as new.

"It'll hurt a lot worse in a real fight. You need better strategies, Akeno." I said. She was too used to sitting back and attacking her opponents with overwhelming power. When she faces someone stronger than her–like me–she doesn't know what to do.

"Akeno sighed as she stood up. There was a flash of light and her ruined wardrobe was switched out for a Kuoh School uniform.

I raised an eyebrow at that.

"I have like 10 of these uniforms in my storage space..." She said. "They always got destroyed whenever we had to hunt down strays, so I bought them in bulk..."

"Whatever makes you comfortable." I said. "I think we can wrap up our training for today."

SHIELD had been nice enough to let us use their training facilities these past few days. I'm sure they were also secretly recording Akeno and my abilities, but we weren't exactly showing them anything new.

"That's good then. I don't want to miss my date. I still have to get ready." Akeno said while smiling to herself happily.

"And which one is it with?" I asked. Somehow, Akeno had managed to get both Ororo and Jean's numbers before they headed back home after the whole Percy Jackson fiasco. She'd been giggling like a schoolgirl–she still was one technically–on and off the past couple days while she texted both of them repeatedly.

I was pretty blown away that she was able to pull off two girls at once, but then again, she probably learned everything from me. I'm just an awesome role model like that!

[Wow...Just wow...]

"Ufufu! It's with Ororo first." Akeno said. "My date with Jean will be a few later!"

"Dating two girls at once and they both know?" I asked and she grinned in confirmation. "Good for you!" I told her.

"Ufufu. I know. I am quite lucky." Akeno replied smugly.

The only thing I was a bit worried about was Zeus trying to attack her in revenge, but I wasn't so worried about that anymore. There were two reasons for that. The first is that after these past few days his Bolt has completely merged with her. I can't detect a difference between her powers and it's anymore with my new eyes. There was no way he would be able to either.

The second reason was that this was the Percy Jackson universe. Zeus here was a genuine imbecile. Instead of solving anything himself, he sends his Demigod children and grandchildren to go out and do everything for him. Most of the time, they end up dying in the process. I seriously doubted if he even knew Akeno had fused with his Master Bolt in the first place. I doubt he even knows two of his children are currently in the custody of 'mortals.'

Akeno asked me to portal her back to the penthouse so she could get herself ready. She hopped in excitedly.

Once she left, I turned around to talk to the man who had been watching us spar. "So what did you think, Steve?"

He looked nervous. "It seems that sparring nowadays is a lot different than back when I was enlisted. It used to be just two men throwing punches at each other. Now there's flying, and magic, and everybody seems to have super powers." He finished. He looked a bit down.

"Are you upset that you lost the fight to Ares?" I asked him.

"It's not just him," Steve said. "I feel like most of the people we've been up against lately I wouldn't have been able to beat. I sparred with Natasha the other day and I was even thoroughly beaten by her. The times we fought before that, I usually came out on top."

I used [Observe] to check his level and he was now at Level 14. He had clearly been doing some training, but he was correct that it wasn't enough to match the real threats of this world.

"Well, the truth is, you're not going to be able to beat a lot of these enemies without some kind of boost. I could give you a blessing like I gave Natasha." I said to him. "It will allow you to grow stronger and you'll be able to use some of my Light in combat."

XXX

Steve grit his teeth and looked hesitant to accept my offer. "Am I worthy of such a thing, though? I feel like everything I did ended up in failure. I sacrificed my life hoping that I was ending the war. That didn't happen. It went on for almost another year afterwards! Then I thought I had destroyed Hydra, but they're still around and ended up almost taking over the organization that Peggy dedicated her life to creating! My best friend ended up becoming the most feared Assassin of all time and even killed one of our presidents..." He slumped to the ground and took a seat on the floor.

I sat down next to him and patted him on the shoulder. Things have not exactly been going his way. "Life might be rough right now that's true but I think you're only focusing on the bad. You also might be spending too much time here at SHIELD where all they do is focus on the bad all day. That's their job after all."

Steve let out a sigh. "I've heard that all too, and I've tried getting out there but the City is just so much different than it was when I grew up."Rêạd new chapters at novelhall.com

"Well there's more places in America than New York City, you know. Back during the war, you used to tour the country all the time promoting War Bonds. Maybe you should get back out there and see the rest of the country again." I suggested. New York was definitely one of the craziest cities in existence and it definitely would freak someone out who grew up in the 1930's. There are still plenty of places in Rural America that I think Steve would enjoy.

He looked like he had come to a decision. "You know, I think I might do that for a few weeks. Just get out and tour the country. Clear my head a little bit. And once Hydra comes out of the woodwork I'll be ready to smack him down again!" He declared with a renewed passion.

I smiled at him and stood back up. I held out my hand for him And he took it. As I pulled him up I said, "After you've had your break and you're ready to fight again you can know that My Light will be with you to grant you strength when you need it." I gave him my blessing, and some of my Light Energy slipped inside of him. Over time it would enhance his body and allow him to grow stronger. He'd stand a better chance against the future opponents that I knew were coming.

...

I had been hanging around SHIELD's HQ, on and off, to make sure the magic disrupting collars I had created kept functioning. So far they had been. Ares had tried to escape 16 times, but he had failed every time. Artemis hadn't made any escape attempts, but she hadn't exactly been a model prisoner either. She refused to answer any questions and mostly just sat in her cell in silence. As for Luke, I wasn't sure what was going on with him. Fury had some kind of plan for all of the Greek Demigods at camp Half-Blood. I was heading to a meeting for us to discuss that very thing.

I entered the command room and saw that Natasha, Fury and Agent Coulson were all inside. I ignored the two men in the room as I made my way straight towards Natasha.

She smiled at my approach. "Hello Layla, you're looking quite–"

Natasha was cut off when I immediately kissed her. She was startled at first, before she wrapped her arms around my back and started reciprocating the kiss. We were momentarily lost in our own little world.

Someone in the room loudly cleared their throat and Natasha and I separated. Fury was glaring at the two of us with his one eye. I'd offered to heal it, and so had Asia but he'd refused both times.

Coulson looked embarrassed, by our personal display of affection, but he didn't actually say anything.

"Sorry, I've hardly gotten to spend any time with Natasha in so long." I said.

Despite the two men's reactions, my sexy spy girlfriend went back to her usual calm self and acted like nothing happened. I reached down and placed her hand in my own.

"Now that you're here, Layla, we can get started." Fury said with a sigh. He pulled out a remote and pointed it to a nearby large TV screen. It turned on and I saw an overhead view of a few log cabins on the screen. "Camp Half-Blood," Fury started. "Home of the Greek Demigod child soldiers."

Natasha clenched my hand tightly. She was a child soldier herself...

Fury continued. "According to Percy Jackson, the son of Poseidon, the Demigods are only safe at this camp. When they go into the outside world, they are hunted by immortal monsters constantly. The more powerful the Demigod, the more the monsters hunt them. Hardly any Demigod ever lives into their 30s because of this." He explained. Fury then clicked the remote a few times and a sideshow went by of mutilated corpses of children and young adults. I grimaced at the sight.

Coulson spoke up. "For years, bodies like these have been popping up on the East Coast sporadically. The government kept quiet about it to not cause a massive panic. We had been under the impression that a brutal and uncatchable group of serial killers had been plaguing our nation for decades." He said with a sad look. " We now know that was not the case."

XXX

"How many bodies have there been?" Natasha asked with her eyes narrowed at the screen.

Maybe I needed to start taking notes from my niece... She was pulling out all the stops here. Although, I'm pretty sure she was using my money to pay for that limo.

[Your looted money...]

Akeno made her way to the elevator and headed down. We all watched her go. I turned to Asia and she looked jealous. Not of the fact that Akeno was going out with someone per se, probably just the fact that she was going out to a fancy restaurant. After being exposed to good food in her life, Asia was becoming a bit gluttonous. We made sure to keep her portion sizes down though... I didn't need Gabriel judging me for being a bad guardian and getting Asia fat while she stayed here.

"Why don't we all go out to dinner too?" I suggested.

Asia's eyes lit up. "Yay! I'll go get changed." She said as she ran up to her room.

"Where do you want to go?" Natasha asked me.

"Anyplace we can get in should be fine."

Natasha stared at me dryly. "You're Layla of the Fallen. You can get a table anywhere you want just by showing up." She stated.

That's fair. "Let's go to a swanky steakhouse then!" I declared.

XXX

"Here is your order, Mademoiselle." I was already salivating as our waiter placed my Filet in front of me. It was $150 a cut and I didn't care. I could tell that Natasha and Asia were equally excited. I don't know how much Natasha makes, but government agents typically don't make enough to come to places like this whenever they want.

Natasha was also right of course. The second I walked into the restaurant, people all stopped and stared at me. The three of us were immediately ushered to a private table and the manager himself came out and promised us their very best service. Being famous came with some pretty nice perks sometimes. Of course, I also took us to a different place than the one Akeno was going to. I wasn't going to creepily spy on the girl.

"Oh Lord, even though you are dead, I thank you for this bountiful meal." Asia placed her hands together and said a pretty morbid prayer. She then started digging into her own food with a gusto.

"Well that was disturbing," Natasha laughed at Asia's quick prayer. "Where do dead God's even go? Super Heaven?"

I snorted. "I'm not even sure that they can actually permanently die. Not as long as they have believers anyway. It honestly wouldn't surprise me if the Old Man ended up resurrecting himself one day." I said. All that faith energy had to be going somewhere after all... All things considered, the Angels didn't actually need that much to sustain themselves. Only a little bit. The Fallen Angels, of course, didn't need any.

That being said, I don't know if it would actually be him or just a new being created by his follower's perception of him. Or maybe nothing would happen at all!

Natasha shrugged as she started eating herself. This place really was giving us their best service because the food was amazing.

"That was so good." Asia said happily.

"Mmm, it really was." Natasha added.

"Do you two want to get dessert?" I asked. Of course both of them immediately nodded.

...We never got to order dessert sadly. A loud and angry voice echoed across the restaurant.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN WERE NOT ON THE LIST!?" A man shouted out loudly. I turned my head towards the source.

Standing at the entrance of the restaurant was an obvious mutant couple. The man had silver skin and black eyes while the woman had very pretty butterfly wings. I could easily tell what was happening here and it disappointed me.

I stood up from my table and started walking over.

Because this was a higher-end establishment, the people dining here had been respectful during my group's meal and had not been recording us. That was obviously no longer the case as I could see almost everyone had their phones out and were recording the altercation going on at the front. They also started recording me as I walked over.

"I called this reservation months ago for our anniversary. I even called your host Jake this morning to confirm our reservation!" The mutant man said angrily.

"I'm sorry...Sir...but you're simply not on the list. You probably called the wrong establishment." The manager, who had been very kind to my group earlier, said disparagingly towards the mutant couple. He obviously didn't want them in his restaurant and was lying. Purely because they were mutants.

"What seems to be the problem here?" I said once I made it over.

The mutant couple's eyes widened upon seeing me standing in front of them. The manager looked at me nervously.

"It's nothing you need to worry about–" He was cut off by the gushing woman with wings.

"Oh wow...it's Layla the Angel! It's an honor to meet you! Your wings are really pretty! I'm Kate by the way." She said.

"It's great to meet you as well, Kate. Your wings are incredibly beautiful as well. I love butterfly wings. They make you look like a beautiful fairy." I complimented her. She had been nervous of me until I said that. Afterwards, a large smile bloomed on her face!

Mutants mostly remained in hiding right now, and this was the first open pair of them I had seen roaming blatantly in public. Good for them.

"You don't hate mutants?" She asked me with tears in her eyes.

"Of course I don't." I replied immediately.

"...God... doesn't hate mutants?" The whole room had gone quiet at her question.

"Who told you that? I would never hate someone for their appearance and God loves everybody." I told her. I didn't know if that last part was true, but he wasn't exactly here to argue it. "Did you need a table? My group has just finished eating and I would be happy to give it to you and your fiance." I said to her. I turned towards the manager and stared him right in the eyes. "That wouldn't be a problem would it?"

Natasha and Asia had both made their way over towards me as well and stood at my side. Natasha was glaring intimidatingly at the manager. Even Asia was doing her best to scowl at him but the best she could do was an adorable pout.

He caved under all of our stares. "No... It won't be a problem. Of course they can have your table..." He almost whimpered and trailed off weakly.

All the people filming started cheering about mutant equality and all that like they themselves participated and didn't just stand around watching...

[If this couple got kicked out, none of them would have said a thing.]

I nodded my head to the manager. "Good. I suppose we should be going now." I said to my two girls. I reached into my inventory and pulled out a couple hundred dollar bills. I placed them all in the manager's hand nonchalantly as we walked out.

"Thank you so much!" Kate called out behind us as we walked out.

"That was a very nice thing you did, Layla." Asia said. "That girl had pretty wings and the man had cool silver skin. He looked like a cool robot! Why would anyone hate them?" She asked me.

I told her that was just the way people were. I hadn't realized quite how much hatred mutants faced in this world because I hadn't run into any besides Jean and Ororo yet.

"You know your deed is going to be posted all over the internet by tomorrow right?" Natasha said. "You might have just lost a whole bunch of your loving followers...all the ones who hate mutants at least. Or maybe you ended up changing some people's minds about them. Who's to say?" She finished.

I shrugged. That would be something we could only wait to find out. For now though...

"We didn't get dessert yet. Let's go get some ice cream!" I said cheerfully.

XXX

Ice cream makes everything better XD!