Maya Hansen gestured to the surroundings. "I need to talk to you alone, not here. And we'd better move quickly and hide."
Steve agreed, "That's right, Stark. This place has been exposed, we can't stay here anymore."
Tony said, "I know. But if we leave directly, what about the others here? Jarvis, arrange a cruise ship to send these girls back first."
Although the situation was urgent, Tony's sense of responsibility prevented him from abandoning these ordinary people and leaving.
Steve nodded, agreeing with Tony's arrangement, but loudly reminded everyone to stay alert.
Tony led Maya to a room and asked in a low voice, "Do you really have a lead? Don't tell me I have an eleven-year-old child out there I've never seen. I already have an official girlfriend and am engaged."
"He's already twelve."
Tony: "!!!"
"Just kidding."
Maya couldn't help but laugh when she saw Tony's startled expression.
"I really have a lead. I know who the mastermind of this attack is, Aldrich Killian. The weapon he used for this attack is Extremis."
"Extremis?!"
Tony asked, "The Extremis I perfected the formula for back then?"
"Yes." Maya nodded.
Tony wondered, "Why did he attack me? According to what you said, he should be thanking me, right?"
"Because you stood him up."
...
"Oh, where's Lucas?"
Steve suddenly remembered that there was still a god here.
"Lucas? I just saw him leave with Loki." Pietro said.
After those human bombs were identified, Lucas had left with Loki. He could pretty much guess what would happen next.
After the first wave failed to use the information advantage to sneak attack and instantly kill Tony, Killian had no more chances. Tony would not give him a second such opportunity.
And in a head-on battle, an enhanced Tony could easily beat Killian, who had injected Extremis.
Back in the bookstore lounge, Lucas invited Loki to sit down and poured him a cup of tea.
"Have a taste."
Loki said thank you, first picked up the teacup to smell the aroma, then rotated the teacup, taking small sips.
After drinking, he cleaned the area where his lips touched and then rotated the teacup back to the front.
The entire etiquette was impeccable.
As expected of Asgard's second prince.
However, this was not the point.
Lucas lightly tapped the table, and tea emerged from the bottom of the teacup, filling it up again.
"Loki, how is your Time Magic study coming along?"
Loki raised an eyebrow, understanding Lucas's meaning.
He picked up the teacup and drank it all in one gulp, then placed it back on the table.
The next moment, tea continuously emerged from the bottom of the teacup and then disappeared. However, the speed at which the tea emerged was noticeably faster than the speed at which it disappeared.
A moment later, it was full again.
"Not bad, Loki." Lucas praised.
Just now, they competed with Time Magic.
Lucas made the teacup's time flow backward, while Loki tried to stop him. Although Loki still lost, he showed a remarkably good level of proficiency.
Considering that Loki hadn't had access to the Ancient One's library for long and didn't have the Time Stone to assist him, it could be said that his talent for Time Magic was extremely high.
Facing Lucas's praise, Loki just smiled and didn't take it seriously. He simply accepted his loss, picked up the teacup, drank it all again, and then placed the cup on the table.
"Again."
The tea in the teacup repeated the process of appearing and disappearing. This time, the time it took for the teacup to become full was a little longer.
"Again."
"Again."
Loki picked up the teacup and drank it all, then placed it on the table, waiting for the teacup to become full, then picked it up and drank it all again.
After a long while, Loki was getting a bit overwhelmed.
Although they both controlled the energy output intensity, limited to one cup of tea, competing on skill, after many times, Loki still couldn't withstand the consumption of Time Magic.
"Lucas, why is your proficiency so much higher than mine?" Loki couldn't help but ask curiously.
Towards the end, he had reached a limit. Logically speaking, he should be almost on par with Lucas. Even if there was a difference, it should be very small.
It was like a test paper. He was already above ninety points, at most ten points short of a perfect score.
But in reality, the speed at which the tea disappeared was still much slower than the speed at which the tea appeared. This gap was greater than ten points.
Lucas smiled mysteriously. "Loki, do you feel like you've drunk too much and need to go to the bathroom?"
Loki's face darkened, he understood Lucas's meaning.
"Lucas, you cheated."
When competing in Time Magic skills, Lucas also used space magic to shift a portion of the tea over. In other words, the perfect score for his test paper was not one hundred points.
Facing Loki's accusation, Lucas acted righteous. "Loki, how can magic be so inconvenient? Specific problems require specific analysis. When solving problems, different combinations of magic should be adopted according to the different circumstances of the matter, and generalizations should not be made."
Loki stared at Lucas for a moment, then smiled with relief.
This at least showed that his Time Magic skill proficiency was already very close to Lucas's.
And Lucas's proficiency was almost perfect.
Thanks to the accompanying effect of his first talent, Energy Absorption, Lucas was very sensitive to the flow of energy during spellcasting.
Every time he ranked up, this sensitivity would receive a qualitative improvement. This allowed him not only to learn various spells at a glance but also to quickly reach a very high level of proficiency.
Loki stood up, took a new cup, poured some tea, and pushed it in front of Lucas.
He wanted to try again with Lucas.
However, this time it was the other way around.
Lucas picked up the teacup, taking small sips, savoring the sweetness of the tea.
He was confident he only needed to drink it once.
After finishing the tea, he placed the cup on the table.
The next moment, the teacup instantly became full.
Lucas raised an eyebrow.
This was not Time Magic, nor Space magic, but an illusion.
An illusion created by Loki's magic.
However, it was now Lucas's.
The tea in the cup instantly emptied.
"Loki, your illusion isn't working. I saw through it."
Next, the cup continuously alternated between full and empty.
Loki kept stacking layers of full cup illusions. Lucas simply didn't bother to break them, but instead, after Loki stacked a layer of full cup illusion, he stacked a layer of empty cup illusion.
Finally, Loki voluntarily stopped.
In fact, Loki lost the moment the illusion was seen through. He only decided to compete when he saw that Lucas was breaking it with his own spells.
If Lucas hadn't realized it was an illusion, then neither Time magic nor Space magic could have emptied the cup.
Because it was already empty.
But once it was seen through as an illusion, the illusion lost its meaning.
"That's enough, Loki. I need to rest." Lucas started to send him away.
He saw that Gwen had returned.