I felt sorry for the few orcs who were just trying to get along in New Bay. Not the ones working for Doctor Doomsday, just ones from other worlds with orcs. Some ill-mannered reporters seemed to think all of us knew each other, and I was related to one of the big incidents. People mass abducted from New Bay was a big deal and would remain so for at least… another couple weeks. Or until some other disaster came up. It couldn’t be standard villainy- that wasn’t novel enough to make the news on most channels. Maybe another portal incident.

  Sadly, we weren’t anywhere close to relevant holidays. April Fools day brought out a bunch of supernatural pranksters, but it didn’t seem to go beyond what people could do. Easter had never caught on as a supernatural phenomenon. Not enough monsters. Were there random eggs around the city? Absolutely, but they could have been put there by anyone. And barely any of them had rabbits inside. Mostly branded chocolate that I was pretty sure was corporate advertising.

  Ultimately most people would forget about it within a month anyway. But until then, people kept trying to interview me.

  “Excuse me sir!” said a woman who wasn’t actually polite. “Have you heard about Mage and the Isekai Abductions? What is your opinion on the matter?”

  “Uh… I heard that some kids got caught up in that. That sucks.”

  “What about-”

  “Listen, I’m just trying to take my dog out to the park.”

  Midnight was a dead giveaway right now. He found it preferable to disguise himself rather than not hanging out with me. He also found it very ironic to become a small dog. He barked at the reporter. I almost ‘lost control’ of him.

  Then they were gone a few moments later. Everyone knew better than to mess with tiny dogs.

  Everyone who mattered probably already knew too much about me, but making the clips not worth publishing would limit information spread just in case. My tusks weren’t ever really hidden, so people could figure it out. I was just waiting to fade from the public consciousness so I could relax more and hang out with friends without bothering them. Some of them really didn’t need media prying into things.

  If I ever really needed to get places, I could Teleport around. I was trying to get better at that stuff anyway. Obviously there were a limited number of places I could appear without risking people noticing, but that was just how things were.

  -----

  “Mage! Mage!” Some dude came running up to me. I could just brush him off and say he was interrupting my patrol, but it was pretty obvious that I wasn’t doing anything important right now. Maybe a call would come in and save me. “Is it true that you had to sacrifice the lives of citizens to save just a few people?”

  “I’d gladly sacrifice you even if it didn’t save anyone.” … was something I didn’t say. But I sure thought it, and Midnight could tell. I also didn’t punch them in the face.

  “I already gave an interview,” I said. “Why don’t you license that and perform your own blathering commentary?”

  Some people might say this was bad for my public image. However, being blunt was just part of my official persona now. The Brigade had been working with me on how far I should go with these things.

  The man didn’t give up. “Personally, I find your answers during that interview lacking. And seriously, channel 72 news? They’re nothing! Now, how do you explain the deaths on your hands?”

  I could probably punch this guy just a little. As long as I didn’t break the camera it should be fine, right?

  “You afraid?” I wasn’t the one that said that. Instead, that came from my backup, who they had been ignoring. Probably because Midnight was harder to make look bad. Everyone liked cute cats. They also liked cats that were full of cutting words, so Midnight couldn’t really loose. “That must be why you’re not talking to the angel who literally can’t lie. Worried she’ll reveal that you’re cheating on your partner?”

  The man’s eye twitched. “I’m not-”

  “Must be something equally bad then.”

  I remembered hearing about that incident. Apparently, even angels had a limit to their patience. Malaliel could read deflection nearly as well as direct answers, and one reporter had been… destroyed. Malaliel’s truth reading might not always be allowable in court- certain powers were treated cautiously in such scenarios since not everyone could be trusted- but it wasn’t a situation that required everyone to believe her. Just one person. Or apparently, three or four people, some of which hadn’t known the man was with someone else. All that and she only asked two questions that the reporter mainly responded to out of surprise.

  Needless to say, she kept people on track after that. She was a lot better at sincere grief for those people who had died that I never saw. I was also upset that they had died, but realistically some of them died before anyone even knew there was a problem. Then there was a while before I managed to find a way to that world, and I saved everyone who was around me. Nobody should expect better. And even if I sort of did, random reporters shouldn’t.

  The reporter was still not willing to give up.

  “If you would just answer a few simple questions-”

  Maybe I could purchase some sort of mind reading spell and reveal dark secrets about the man that way. I just needed the right way to prompt his thoughts.

  Then a window shattered. “Sorry, got work to do.” I was going to be particularly gentle with whoever did that. That was what I decided.

  Ten minutes later I was helping a young speedster pick glass out of his torso- except for that one big shard the ambulance would deal with. Though I would offer to toss it into Storage once they were there to staunch the bleeding.

  “... I can’t believe you caught up to me,” the fellow mumbled.

  He wasn’t that fast. Nothing that a combination of Haste and Slow couldn’t manage, anyway. And that wasn’t even counting the fact that his shoes began to fall apart two blocks down. Lucky for him none of the glass went through his soles, but they didn’t hold up to his power.

  “You do realize you can use powers to make money legitimately, right?” I prompted the young guy as I tried to preserve what was left of his t-shirt. If he was lucky, he was a teen and the sentence wouldn’t be that long. “Even training for newbies pays pretty well.”

  That policy was precisely to prevent events such as this. Yeah, heroes weren’t going to be rich unless they became famous, but people had to last from day-to-day. Newbie mercenary salaries weren’t that exciting either, but once you stuck around for a while or got some active service in, things changed significantly.

  “The point was not to work.”

  I was going to pretend I didn’t hear that for the sake of any trial. “And spend all day running from super trackers? That’s not a relaxed lifestyle.”

  “Pfft. There’s no way they could catch me.”

  Midnight rolled his eyes. “You have to sleep somewhere. And I doubt you’re in with any villains who could shelter you.”

  The guy just made a face.

  When the medics arrived, they had someone who could stop blood flow in certain spots. Guy could have made a killing as a mercenary, or literally as a villain. But a medical profession was a great option.

  “You do that, and I’ll make the shard disappear,” I explained. “That way it won’t cut on the way out.”

  Technically, it probably shouldn’t have worked. After all, the shard was in someone’s side. I couldn’t use Storage if someone was holding onto something. But after a little bit of effort to consider how magic could work in the opposite direction of Gift, I figured if the guy wanted to hand it to me it should work without a fuss. Alternatively, from a certain perspective it was outside of him. A very limited topological perspective, but I had sufficient magic to cheat a little.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Either way it worked the first time, so I didn’t have to worry too much. The foolish speedster wasn’t going to bleed everywhere, and it would be way easier to stitch him up. I also didn’t have to deal with that reporter because he couldn’t keep up and I had legitimate reasons to knock people out if they were approaching an active crime scene. They were probably better off speaking to the owners of the jewelry store, because those people wouldn’t try to figure out some way to make the reporter’s life bad.

  -----

  Suddenly, we were surrounded by people. Midnight didn’t think I should be surprised.

  “What did you expect to happen?”

  I frowned. “I don’t know. I didn’t think people were that civically minded.”

  “It’s the grand opening of an embassy. An alien embassy. With people that look like cats. Despite Extra’s best efforts, there aren’t that many, and less than half are on Earth.”

  I nodded. “I guess they’ll have to seek out more people that look like cats, then.” I looked around at the group of important people near the front. Technically, I was one of those. I was in my mercenary garb because it related to enchanting, but Midnight was related to important people on Celmoth and the other half of the enchantment crew.

  There were a few Celmothians I didn’t recognize. I noticed Angelica was present… which didn’t mean much. She could probably be present everywhere. I did wonder if this was the one usually on Celmoth, though. I hadn’t transported her back, but she could probably just stop being there. I wasn’t sure, though, because I hadn’t looked deeply into Madame Multitude’s form of splitting. She wasn’t a combat threat at literally any point in her life, especially not at her current age.

  Some Celmothians I didn’t know. Probably actually involved with the ambassadorial roles. As it turned out, I didn’t know most Celmothians. Not even the famous ones.

  I was trying to figure out who one clearly alien woman was. She was next to some man with a very long neck and an extremely odd waist that was double bent and looked terribly inefficient. Maybe it was just an extreme form of alien scoliosis or something. Anyway, the two of them were surrounded by several guards. People with powers that I could feel the strength of but none of which I recognized.

  “Who’s that maroon woman?” I asked Midnight.

  “... the one with the stomach mouth?”

  Now that he mentioned it, her stomach mouth was rather prominently displayed beneath her nicely tailored business suit. “That’s the one.”

  Midnight sighed. “She’s the president.”

  “... of what?”

  Midnight was both clearly annoyed and had expected this of me. “The United States.”

  “Oh! That one.” I thought for a moment. “She’s the first extraterrestrial president? Or extrasolar at least.”

  “There hasn’t been a Martian one yet,” Midnight said. “So both.”

  “Neat.” Apparently, that second mouth could eat energy beams. I wasn’t sure if it was all of them, though, because the online data was rather sparse on such things. Wherever her parents were from, their people weren’t well known on Earth. Zyanya was born and raised here, though. “And that guy?”

  “The head of Extra. And no, I don’t mean the New Bay branch.”

  Obviously. I knew most of the leadership here. I guess it made sense that he’d be in attendance.

  There were also other heads of state from different countries. The embassy wasn’t actually to the United States, it just happened to be that New Bay was part of that. It would provide some benefits to the host country, and New Bay in particular.

  The reason it was here was obvious. New Bay was one of the places most open to aliens… and also most of the Celmothians on Earth were here. Including Midnight. The New Bay branch of Extra was also one of the most influential on Earth, given the area’s supernatural attraction. Everything added together to it being natural. Though the Celmothians did eventually plan to spread out, it would be a slower project. The fact that anything was approved in less than a decade was already amazing.

  -----

  Grand openings were boring. It was just a lot of talking. Even so, I didn’t even once wish someone would come cause trouble to make me not bored. So it wasn’t my fault when it happened.

  Fear. Panic. Chaos. It all happened at once, springing up in the middle of the crowd as Lynk- that was the important guy from Extra- gave a speech. There wasn’t anything that caused the panic… or rather, the panic was the direct effect, not caused by something else.

  It was familiar. I had no idea how Gloom had snuck into the area, but clearly she could suppress her powers well enough not to be noticed. And, importantly, well enough to create a horrible rush of people without causing them to pass out from fear. Or die.

  I was shaking, even from further away. How annoying. Just willpower wasn’t good enough. “Midnight. Pick some targets for Mental Freedom. I’m starting on this side and including us.”

  I didn’t know whether Gloom was stronger since we’d last clashed- some powers didn’t grow much. But Mental Freedom was certainly stronger. I picked out a few of the strongest people around the important bunch… and Madame Multitude. It didn’t matter to me if the guy on the microphone was shaking so hard he was almost falling over.

  I looked into the sky for incoming Bunvorixians. There were indeed some of those… but there was already someone punching their saucers. Some flying super that maybe didn’t have quite as much super strength as they needed. Much further up, far more of them had been intercepted by various things I couldn’t quite make out. Some drones, maybe, and some sort of barrier. New Bay itself wasn’t a place aliens could just drop in easily.

  The only thing missing was… ah, there she was. The flying guard was tackled by a bright black blur. Darkstargirl was here.

  “Get inside the embassy!” Midnight had already cast Mental Freedom on some choice targets, and was now urging the important people to flee to safety.

  It might have seemed rather callous, only telling them to reach the defenses… but realistically nobody was actually after the civilians. Even so…

  I found my way to Madame Multitude. I cast Haste on her, which I could have done from a distance, but I needed her help. I also included myself and Midnight, plus a large man that had the president held to his chest- and he looked about ready to pick up Lynk in his other arm. The other targets were random guards that were nearby, anyone that looked like they had their head on straight regardless of if they had Mental Freedom.

  “Hey. You need to direct the civilians.”

  “Absolutely,” she said. “But I’m not particularly fast.”

  “You are now,” I said. “Don’t worry if your powers feel sluggish. Remember to slow your speech. Something… like… this…”

  Normally when crowds were panicking, adding more people to the mix was precisely the wrong way to go about it. But Madame Multitude wasted no time reaching the outside of the group and directing people… away. Into nearby parks, into the streets, or anything like that.

  She really wasn’t fast. She wasn’t even really running, but her fast walk with Haste was good enough for her to catch up with the general flow. Those people that were actually fast could handle themselves if they got away from the crowd.

  It was the first time I had really seen it. She split and split and split. I lost track sometime around where she hit 128 or 256 bodies. She did need the speed, because she wasn’t content to simply direct people. Some of her rushed into relatively open areas, helping someone climb to their feet before either suddenly disappearing or splitting off into other directions to assist.

  She wasn’t strong, but she wasn’t as frail as she let on. Since I’d met her, I was pretty sure she’d gotten into better shape. Then again, I met her shortly after she recovered from horrible burn wounds.

  Madame Multitude did exactly nothing to Gloom, she couldn’t even think about the Bunvorixians, and it was laughable to say she would go up against Darkstargirl. Even so, she was likely the most instrumental in saving civilians. Many of them recognized her, and with her enhanced reaction times she could avoid being trampled by those who were too crazed to realize she was helping.

  The people who would be the actual targets were herded inside, with Midnight and I holding up the rear. Fortunately, Gloom wasn’t any more interested in being trampled than the rest of us and seemed happy with whatever chaos she had already caused, so she left the crowd to its own devices, instead focusing on people as they tried to rush inside.

  She basically flew at us, a black and spooky form that was more ghostly than physical. I knew that the effects of her power were at least tenfold when actually touched, and I was not looking forward to it. But then she ran face first into an energy barrier, suddenly getting knocked backwards.

  Midnight wasn’t surprised, but he noticed I was. “Did you think Celmothians couldn’t deal with transsubstantial assaults? Besides the fact that Bunvorixians have tried things like that in the past, I did give an overview of every villain I’d personally faced. She can probably just walk in but I’m not telling her that.”

  “Impressive,” I said. Too many Bunvorixian saucers had already started landing, and Darkstargirl seemed about done with her first brawl. I’d probably have to make her attack me instead of whatever more efficient thing she could be doing.

  There was one thing missing though. Spot was nowhere to be seen- or felt. I ducked under incoming blaster fire as we slipped into the embassy. The doors were flanked by soldiers.

  “Should we deny civilian access?” they asked Midnight.

  “... Better let them in. But they’ll have to stay in the secondary lobby.”

  Some people were running in the wrong direction, even with Madame Multitude having told them the correct course of action. They would be more at risk in the embassy, but people weren’t always rational.

  What a pain. Now we couldn’t shut the doors, and Darkstargirl fanatics might slip in among them. Maybe that was part of the plan the whole time. Time to start checking people for powers. Midnight could handle all the ‘important’ people.