Once Peter was clean and fresh, he sat down in front of the holographic table where a miniaturized Cortana was with her eyes closed.
Once Cortana opened her eyes, he waited patiently for her to speak and give him the information he was waiting for.
"What you are looking for is in the main office. We will not have to worry too much about it since the place is being rebuilt after the damage it suffered," Cortana said.
"Good. Access the SHIELD servers and carefully gather everything you need to gain some knowledge of the security of that place. Also, stop the weapons assembly on the Web-Jet and increase the upgrade speed. I want to install some things that Richards so kindly provided us. Once we have what I want, we will upgrade the ship to install the weapons."
"Understood. Do you need something else, Peter?"
"No, that would be all-...." He did not finish the sentence because his spider-sense activated, alerting him to nearby danger, which surprised and worried him because no one knew about this place.
His thoughts stopped when he heard the sound of sparks, which also surprised him.
In front of him some sparks began to appear, and then after a few seconds more sparks appeared, and those sparks formed an orange circle from which a person dressed completely in yellow robes emerged.
Rising from his seat, he expelled his stingers and went into defensive mode in case she tried anything against him.
Hundreds of questions began to appear in his head: why was she here, what had he done to make her seek him out, what rule had he even broken. Anything and everything appeared, but he did not have the answer to any of them. So he decided to ask the source.
"Who are you? How did you find this place? What do you want?" he asked while keeping his guard up. Instead she moved her hands to her head and took off the top part that hid her face, revealing the face of a woman in her thirties. But he better than anyone knew that was not her real age.
"You probably already know who I am, Peter Parker. As for why I am here, well, that question has many answers, but the main and essential one is to get to know you and talk about certain things," she said with a calm smile while putting her hands behind her back.
"I hope, Ancient One, that among those answers there is not one where I am a danger and must be eliminated to maintain a stable future or any of that mystical business," he exclaimed while retracting his stingers.
"Do not worry, young Parker. You pose no danger. Well, not to us. But your enemies cannot say much." She said this with a touch of amusement while he nodded in agreement. "Now, if you will excuse me, we have things to discuss. Let us go." She mentioned this as she headed back toward the portal with him following behind.
"Cortana, please do as I asked," he said while briefly glancing at her before turning to follow the Ancient One.
From one second to the next he went from being in a highly technological cave to being in a strange living room.
While looking at the ancient place he moved toward a table. There was no one in the room except the Ancient One and him. On the table were two cups of tea.
"Please," she said while pointing to the seat in front of her. Without any objection he sat down and took a sip of tea.
"Now I understand why you like tea with honey so much," he said, making the female Saitama smile at him.
"I would ask you how you know, but a certain acquaintance told me about you and your knowledge of the future through dreams," she mentioned while taking a sip of her tea.
'Acquaintance?....' he thought.
'Damn you, Cassandra. Next time I see you we are going to have a not-so-friendly talk about why you divulge my things to people I do not trust.
Oh, and I know you are listening, you pervert. And do not think I do not know. I know very well that your vision extends to the point where you see every Spider-Man doing "It."'
"Do not worry, I will not say anything," the Ancient One said. "As for why you are here, it is because I have some things to give you and I want to talk about a few others."
She said this, making him stop his mental rant and look at her with a touch of surprise. "Judging by your surprised face, you are surprised that I am going to give you something without asking for anything strange, huh?"
He nodded.
"Well, what I am going to give you now I would give you a little later, but why avoid what I am going to give you one way or another? So I will give it to you now instead of later. It might be more useful now than later."
After she said that, she moved her hand and several volumes appeared on the table. The old woman took each one and placed them side by side.
"I will explain what each of them is," she said.
"This one," she pointed to the first one, "is about runes. It has several types, their uses, and their history. The book may seem small, but it has an expansion spell, just like the others. So there is more to it than meets the eye.
This one in particular contains four volumes. I cannot give you more because you are not the Sorcerer Supreme or a future aspirant, and I doubt you want to be." He simply nodded. Although the mystic arts were impressive, he did not want to learn them yet. He already had enough on his plate without more things.
"This volume has the warnings in the first few pages, so do not worry about going to the back of the book to find them."
He let out a sigh of relief, because if that book had an expansion spell, he did not want to know how long it would take to reach the end.
"This one," she pointed to the second one, "is about languages. It contains a wide variety. I recommend you study it first. It will help you read some things that are not translated in the other volumes. It also contains the writing system. Take this."
A triangular object with some gray, black, and red parts appeared. "This will help you when speaking and listening to other languages. It is used by the students we give the task of learning the other languages. Press the red button to make it start working."
He nodded with a little enthusiasm at the power of new languages. Who knew, maybe when he traveled through space he could find a conversation partner worth having.
"The third book, which deals with the mirror dimension and the astral form, was written by me to help you understand it better.
With it, you will not need the other books to use these two tools, which are very useful in certain situations. I do not need to teach you how to gather energy from the dimensions. As the Totem, you have access to very powerful energies, so the mirror dimension may be much stronger for you than it is for me, probably."
He looked at that book for a few seconds. The astral form and the mirror dimension were very powerful abilities. One of their shared uses was that they could be used for infiltration, and another use of the mirror dimension was as a prison. Very useful, to tell the truth.
"And the fourth one is the one you will like the most. It is to protect your mind from unwanted invaders. You do not need to know any language other than English for that book, because I rewrote it and added some suggestions. I am giving it to you because I can understand what it is like to want to protect your mind from wretched mind-rapists," she said while making a face.
When he heard the mythical Ancient One curse, it almost made him drop his tea.
He was in shock. It was official. He could die in peace after hearing that. That little moment made him feel extremely special because it was probably the first and only time he had heard the Ancient One curse.
Ha! Suck it...
Mordo 0 and Strange 0 Peter 1
"That is all. Now how about we have a pleasant chat? It has been a while since I have had one, especially with a future ally, right?"
She said this with a small smile. He just nodded in agreement. There was nothing better than being an ally of someone as powerful and influential as the Ancient One.
"You also have good stamina in bed, and I apologize for knowing that. I went to talk to Cassandra about some things and found her watching one of your private moments with your aunt. According to her it is not possible to block her view at those moments, so I has to see it," she said with extreme amusement.
He felt a laugh coming that he barely managed to suppress.
Parker 2, Strange 0, Mordo 0.
He would have loved to know what Strange's face would look like when he found out that Peter possibly had the best version of the Ancient One, kinder and more fun, than the strict and serious one Strange had.
"I do not see why I would not have one," he said while taking a sip of tea. "And I already suspected about Cassandra. I feel like someone is watching me when I am having certain moments," he said in a funny and mocking tone, making the Ancient One chuckle.
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