wizard-spider-man

[wizard-spider-man]

To Exhaust One’s Wellspring

*Then...*

#In the vast expanse of the cosmos, before the Living Tribunal, Infinity, and Eternity, the Wizard Spider-Man stood resolute.

The Living Tribunal's three faces—Equity, Necessity, and Vengeance—rotated slowly as it addressed him.

#"SORCERER SUPREME, HEIR TO THE MANTLE OF STRANGE, YOUR AUDACITY INTRIGUES US. WHAT WOULD YOU SACRIFICE TO SAVE YOUR PRECIOUS REALITY?"

Without hesitation, Wizard Spider-Man answered:

*"Everything."*

The Living Tribunal continued, its voice echoing through the fabric of existence:

#"YOU WILL GIVE TO US THE PALANTIR THAT CRADLES YOUR HOME UNIVERSE, AND THE VERY ESSENCE OF YOUR SOUL WILL BE BOUND TO THE ETERNAL DOMAINS OF INFINITY AND ETERNITY. SHOULD YOU PERISH, IF YOUR MORTAL COIL IS SEVERED, KNOW THIS: YOUR ESSENCE SHALL BE RECLAIMED BY THE COSMOS, WOVEN BACK INTO THE SPACE AND TIME. THIS IS THE EXCHANGE FOR THE POWER TO SAVE THIS EXISTENCE THAT YOU SO CHERISH."

Wizard Spider-Man accepted the cosmic pact, understanding the weight of his decision.

*Now*

The Wizard Spider-Man floats in the void of space, the remnants of the Staff of Idaldin scattered around him like celestial debris. The Id Stone lies shattered, its power spent. His body is engulfed in the ethereal blue flames of infernal hellfire.

The battle against Exodus and his fellow Aspects of Destruction had been cataclysmic, threatening to tear apart the very fabric of reality.

The world below bore the scars of their conflict, a grim reminder of what is now lost to time. Even the Aegis of Reality, the planetary defense system anchored by their Pillars of Eternity, was destroyed in the climatic battle.

In his final gambit, the Wizard had pushed beyond his limits. The Contract of the Provost, now exacted its terrible price. His mortal form, overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the power it had contained, began to disintegrate. Drawing upon the Staff of Idaldin and the enhancements granted by his Contract, the Wizard Spider-Man had shattered his mana reserves, becoming an anchor for cosmic strength of unwarranted immensity.

As his consciousness began to fade, the Wizard Spider-Man realized the full extent of his sacrifice.

He had given everything—his power, his future, his very existence—to protect the reality he cherished.

In his final moments of corporeal existence, floating amidst the stars he had given everything for, the Wizard Spider-Man felt a profound sense of peace.

The warmth of the sun filled his mind as he uttered his last words:

"It is done."

With that, the Sorcerer Supreme's physical form faded away, his soul reclaimed by Infinity and Eternity.

The Wizard Spider-Man was gone, but his legacy would endure, woven into the very fabric of the universe he had sacrificed everything to save.

[wizard-spider-man]

Tales from Asfelaeia; Pizza Time

#The Study Room, slowly repairing itself from the destructive forces released during the Climatic Battle with Dark Star, was quietly rearranging its dimensional barriers around the Wizard Spider-Man.

**Before long, the front door to the Sanctum would knock once again, swiftly followed by it opening and closing.**

Walking through the Sanctorum Sanctorum once again was Karm, or at least one of his projections. He bore no trace of the struggle they'd just been in, concealing the strain and stress from all onlookers.

"Yes?"

"Wh-!?"

Spidey is surprised to see Karm behind him. He thought he hurt him.

"I saw you poof into Smoke. I was worried I hurt you or worse... what with the Id splashback. Are you also a Void err type? For lack of better description... I should have considered that before unleashing raw creation energy on ya. I apologize for that, either way."

"You're right. I am a void being as you call it. That's how I could consume the remnants of Dark Star and call upon the aspects of extinction without endangering myself. I'm not sure what the staff would do to me if I'd stayed, but I'm not keen on finding out so I left.

Walking up to the room, he looked over the self-repairing home before turning to the Wizard Spider-Man.

“No need to apologize. It happened as it had to. Do you need any help with reconstructing this place?"

“I need help with me. I have left over… traces. I-“

He turns and lifts his mask, puking into a plant in the research room. As it fixed its surroundings the books on the shelves returned, good as new. One would be particularly interesting its spine titled “The Sentry and the Void.” (Marvel property. Fun random character read I recommend on the wikis)

The Wizard would lower his mask, face probably not completely cleaned up from the heave.

“She’s still trying to kill me.”

"So you're still infected? Hmm..."

Karm leaned over to take a closer look. The Wizard Spider-Man was indeed still bearing the traces of the void.

"So... Any suggestions to how we get rid of her? Simply absorbing them right now would risk consuming you too, and I'm generally better at destroying than mending so I'll need some help here."

“If you can tolerate it, I can use my Id staff to anchor my essences and being to this plane while you absorb whatever is left of dark star within my form. I have a lot of resources here in the Sanctum, so if we need to use something to anchor you as well, we can figure it out. Perhaps a void stone on one side of the room and me on the other?”

"That could work. There's far less of the void in this projection than in my actual form so I should be able to tolerate the staff."

The two would position themselves in the room, each anchoring themselves to a powerful object of their respective elements.

“I’ll use the Idaldin staff to try and push the void out of my essences. The middle of the room is a sort of meeting point for the energy outputs in the lab. You should be able to reach out and grab it from there.”

The Staff materializes in his hand, and he grips it with determination.

“I’m ready when you are. What anchor are you going to use?”

"I'm always anchored to myself. That shouldn't be a problem. I'm just a projection after all."

Karm reaches out to the point indicated to him.

"It's this thing here, right?"

The middle of the room held a conduit, built upwards from the floor: a tower-like structure, amalgamated from the work of generations of sorcerers before the Wizard Spider-Man. Its foundation of liquid obsidian seamlessly melded into tiers of shimmering crystal. Arcane runes pulsed with dazzling colorations as the conduit rose from the floorboards.

Brass and copper tubes lined the device, pulsing with contained mana.

Metallic plates etched with circuits of were connected to unseen clockwork mechanisms within.

At the conduit's peak hovered a round crystal, its surface glimmering against the light.

"You up for food after this? I owe you for like. A lot man. Ready when you are."

“Ready as I’ll ever be. Let’s begin.”

The Wizard Spider-Man taps his foot, the Staff glows and whirls with power. He exhales, thoughts slowing to a stop, going blank, he focused on the sickness within him - the darkness clinging to his causality.

*Begone, Dark Star, child of Craterus.*

He extends his hand, wisps of darkness emerging from his form. Like sickness from an infected wound, the tendrils of darkness leave him, and flow towards the conduit. The caustic energies lash out at the container, threatening escape.

The Wizard connects his mana flow to the conduit, powering its containment.

"Alright, I've got it sustained, just say the word and I'll let go."

Karm stands there with eyes closed and a furrowed brow. Touching the conduit and connecting it to his core, he looked at the Wizard Spider-Man with two pools of roiling amethyst glow.

“Send it. I’m ready to consume it.”

The Wizard lets go, and the containment opens, unleashing the remaining essences of the Dark Star.

The entropic energies flowed into the conduit, and through it Karm. For his part, he stood still as stone without breathing or blinking. His mind raced to direct and control the flow in order to deconstruct and consume the power as it reached him. Piece by piece he unravelled the threads of extinction that formed Dark Star, stripping it of direction and identity before passing it on and incorporating it into his own being.

Arcs of void energies lashed out at the walls and floors of the room, and his form began to blur at the edges. It was a race between him and the incoming energies, one he was winning. Gritting his teeth and straining his jaw was completely unnecessary. A reflex from his mortal days, but he did anyway as the energies wore on the body. Eventually though, it was over. The energies subsumed, and removed from this world.

The Wizard disperses the Staff of Idaldin, feeling free of Dark Star's toxic influence once and for all. He sighs in relief.

"Karm. Thanks again for helping me destroy that thing. You down on that offer to grab food? My treat. You still enjoy mortal pleasures don't you?"

Swaying ever so slightly, Karm nodded shakily.

"Yep. I could really go for a bite right now. Just need to find somewhere to sit down fir..."

Tipping over from exhaustion and wear, he dropped to the floor. A few seconds later he raised his head towards the ceiling, his eyes still closed.

"Just... Just give me five minutes."

Swallowing and breathing heavily, he continued.

"That... That took a lot of effort. I'll be fine soon enough."

"Woah woah!" He knelt down to help Karm up to his feet.

"You good there? You're surprisingly fit for a guy made out of nothing." He quips.

"There's a place on 5th called Joe's. Great Pizza, almost as good as Joe's back on my home reality."

Coughing a little, Karm grabs onto Spidey's arm. Remarkably strong for his looks, he thought to himself as he was pulled up from the floor.

"Heh. I suppose I'm still mostly human in my own mind. Joe's sounds nice. Lead the way!"

They would exit the Sanctum and take to the street.

His Spider Sense hums around Karm. It isn't *immediate danger* nor is it a detection of ill intent, malice, or malevolence. It was a familiar signal. He did say he was a void person. Perhaps...

"Were you the odd spirit that used to poke around at key moments a few months ago? I have this sorta sense. Now that we're walking, I'm picking up on this familiarity that I can't shake."

"I think so? There was a point in time, or at least there was from your perspective, that I was sealed away beyond the end. My efforts to break that seal did leave some traces where I observed or even interacted with this world. I think a lady named 'Caraway' had contact with me at one point when that strange face under the prison was locked out of time."

"Caraway..." He said trailing off.

"That Cabal has been a lot of trouble. When I did this vigilante thing years ago, I actually took down a syndicate. Exposed their crimes as my alter ego, turned them in as Spider-Man. Everyone's got magic here. It's hard to keep up." He sighs.

"But what about you? Sealed beyond the end you say? Time and its flow is just a suggestion for you, huh?"

"You could say that. Most people experience time as a linear flow. You go from point A to point B. Some other beings see it as a frozen amber. All moments in time that have been, will be, and are, as one. This is closer to how it actually is, and how I think most diviners see it. That is mostly correct, but unlike the frozen moments that exist of all time which you see yourself as moving through powerful chronomancers can take that amber and nudge things here and there. If I want to show up ten minutes ago I will. A normal perspective would see this as your past being something I experience in my future as I jump from C to B."

Karm looked over at Spiderman to see if he followed. Most people he had tried to explain it to had gone cross-eyed by this point.

"Interesting, so you just... move through it, no biggie. No strings attached. In a way, were you pushed out of the amber?"

Time travel did make his head spin.

"How do you compensate for varying timelines and multiversal splits? Some events change reality into entirely new branches. Do you focus local relative times into a coherent chunk of amber to sift through? Certainly you still *feel* A to B, even if you've jumped to Z and D already."

There he goes...

"Have you run into parallel selves? Do ya'll behave around eachother?"

"It was extremely taxing to begin with. Especially back when I still perceived time as a linear flow. Even now it is an effort that could kill most mages who attempt it without the aid of either some powerful artifact or ritual to alleviate the burden. I can't step through the barrier and step through it without expending a lot of mana myself. Luckily, I can draw mana from several planes. It takes a lot to truly bite into my reserves. "

Taking a breather and slowing his speech down a bit, he continued.

"I suppose you could also imagine it as images in a video. Anyone with a causal relationship with time watches it through regularly and can remember frames or segments. I see the entire movie all at once. Every frame is there, and I can step into whichever one I chose at whatever place I want. I'm not in the movie. I hold the proverbial camera. This also lets me avoid meeting myself. You're right to concern yourself with it. It's a very common point of failure for inexperienced or reckless chronomancers to overlap and cause a paradox. One should never interact with oneself in such a manner if one can help it unless you know exactly what you're doing. I've overlapped with myself a few times, but it's not something I do lightly. For someone who perceives linear time it's like trying to run through a beehive without getting stung. It's theoretically possible, but unless you're wearing some serious protection you'll get stung. Trust me. You do not want to get stung."

The two approach the restaurant. It was somewhat humble, but large, appearing to have once been a diner but has since lost it's devoted following.

The Webhead tosses a web ahead of them to get the door.

"After you."

They step in, and one could probably smell the carpet. It was a little dingy, but the aroma of a damn good pie was impossible to ignore.

"Web-Head! Ya payin the tab or am I adding to it?"'

"Table for two Pete, this is my buddy Karm. You should thank him, he's just stopped the neighborhood friendly from embarking on a pretty bad anti-hero arc. Costume change included."

They'd take a seat, next to a window to watch the passerbys.

"So you mentioned viewing time linearly. You don't anymore, but I posit a question for you. Isn't your own memory, a causal thread of linear time? I've pondered this myself."

“Its not, even though it should be for most beings. At the same time it can be argued that it is because of the way I interact with the world. I remember everything happening at once when I look back at it. Our conversation now, Defeating Dark Star, our fight with Dispater and subsequent return of Catherine’s soul and the complication around it? I see it all at the same time. I don’t remember as much as I observe myself. It’s… a lot of information to process, so I usually choke my own vision and restrict myself to a more human view. That’s when my ‘memories’ indeed become a recollection that follows causal linearity. We see that something ‘A’ happened and then eventually led to ‘B’.”

At this point Karm leans back in his seat to take out some stress. He was not used to speaking with people who could keep up this easily with something this complicated.

"Spoilers! I haven't even figured out how to get to Dis yet! Good to know we win though... so what kinda pizza you getting? I'm gonna get cheese with pepperoni. It's classic."

He takes a menu, and doesn't look it over, handing it to Karm.

"I haven't met myself in a time travel sense. Multiverse? Different story. That's a big thing. There's this group of Spider-People trying to play Spider-Cop across the entirety of the Multiverse."

He looks out the window, listening. He sees a family across the road, carefully guiding their young one along the sidewalk. The sight made him sad, briefly remembering a past long forgotten.

"So I take it you're not from here, this erm, plane, as it were."

"Ah, yes. My apologies. I will leave the discussions of the future to young couples and soothsayers. I'll have the one with bacon and garlic."

Karm looks over the menu briefly before putting it down.

"Never met many other multiverse aspects of myself. It sounds like a similar thing to an overlap, but with far less risk of a paradox."

Looking out to see what caught Spidey's attention, he continued.

"I'm not. I come from Thraben. The largest city on the plane of Innistrad. Not exactly the most cheerful of places. If you think this city keeps busy with catastophes..."

"I come from the Great erm. New York New York. There's a comma in there. Specifically I come from Queens, a quiet suburb near the Hustle of the regular city. Is your home much like this? Or conceptually different? Thraben and Innistrad sound like real words, and not the gutteral void noises I've been hearing a lot of lately..."

He waves Pete over and recants their orders. He collects their menus.

"What ultimately brought you here, instead of staying there? Did you just see yourself here one day when you mastered time?" He quipped.

""Admit it, it's the pizza." Spidey chuckles.

A smile broke out on Karm's face.

"New York? Queens? Can't say I've ever been there. My home though... It's not too dissimilar to this place. There's magic, monsters, humans, and angels if that's what you're thinking about. But there's no gods, highly advanced technology, goblins, elves... " *he gestures to the restaurant* …"or pizza."

A contemplative silence fell over him, propping up his chin in his hand as he looked down at the table.

"At the start, it was wanderlust. Imagine having lived all your years in Queens and New York only to realize there's an infinite amount of other places you'd never even imagined were out there, and now you can go wherever you want. I spent decades simply traveling around the multiverse. It was liberating. When I learned how to properly step through time? I couldn't just go wherever. I could go *whenever*. I've spent millennia just seeing and learning about the planes. Now? I suppose I just wanted somewhere quiet to stay for a few years or decades."

Looking up with a renewed smile, he added: "The pizza doesn't hurt either!"

"When I was thrust into the multiverse, I felt the same way. Suddenly everything got a whole lot bigger. Infinitely so when I was able to step back further, and see the multiversal tree... The Norse call it Yggdrasil. There's some folks here that seem to align with that Pantheon, albeit with different names."

The Wizard pauses, looking back at Karm. He wondered who tailored his clothes.

"Well on behalf of all of us, Welcome. Or welcome back? Seems like you fit right in, lot of power houses here."

The pizza arrives, and Spidey claps his hands together, sliding his palms back and forth in excitement.

"Ahh here we go. The food has arrived. Hope you didn't spoil the taste for yourself already."

He lifts the lower portion of his mask, taking a bite of his pepperoni classic.

"So were you Human to begin with? You mentioned Humans in Innistrad."

Looking over at the Wizard Spider-Man and wondering why he refused to properly remove his mask, he took in the scent of molten cheese, baked crusts, bacon, and tomato sauce. Picking up a slice to eat, Karm answered between bites.

"Yes. I was human up until very recently. *mmm* You weren't wrong about the pizza. This is very good."

Taking a napkin to wipe off a bit of sauce from around his mouth, he continued.

"A multiversal tree, huh? I've seen world trees before in a realm called Kaldheim and during the last Phyrexian invasion of the multiverse. I guess I shouldn't be surprised to learn that there are more cosmic trees out there.”

He took another short pause to eat a third piece before continuing. The look on his face was… mixed. Part happy, part thankful, but most of all melancholic.

“I appreciate your words. Truly, I do. But I don’t really belong here. As we speak I am not really here. This?” he gestures to himself. “This is a shadow, or projection of my attention. There’s several of me all connected to the true being that now rests in the blind eternities. That is the fate of any being of the void. You saw how the sanctum reacted to me simply being there. If I hadn’t restrained my aura, I’m not sure you’d be here!”

After the small outburst he quieted down. Silently finishing his pizza.

"Well I'm glad you're interacting with this facet of the amber Karm. I think, a budding friendship might be sprouting here. I hope the choices made today make an impact on your ah, chronology? Maybe add another layer to the amber. However one should look at it." He finishes his pizza as well, grinning throughout the conversation.

Once the food was finished, Spidey payed the tab, and the two stood up to part ways. As they exit the restaurant, the Wizard looks up to the buildings.

"This was nice, man. Being? Karm. This was nice, Karm. Thank you, from the bottom of my webbed heart, for saving my life today. Even if Dark Star hadn't killed me, there was likely a lot of potential bad futures that didn't come to pass thanks to you."

Sirens blare, and the cackling of a rogue mage can be heard from behind them. A shadow clone of the Wizard sprouts off of Spidey, swinging in the direction of the danger.

"I'm not sure what communication mediums you use," He conjures an amulet, an amethyst that glitters with the stars of cosmos. It seems to glow brighter as Spider-Man tosses it to Karm.

"but I'm into trinkets. If for some reason, you need the Wizard Spider-Man, which I can't see you being in danger to much but, if ya wanna hang out or something, simply channel your intent into the amulet. I have one in my bag that will glow in response. I'll be able to teleport to you. If you're tricky enough, it might work both ways."

The amulet’s arc through the air slows to a crawl just before Karm snatches it up and pockets it.

“Thank you. I’ll be sure to remember it. If you want to hang out ‘I’ live just eight miles south of the city. You’ll know it when you see it.”

8 miles out? That's a lot of tree swinging. Spidey would have to get out of town sometime, when the time permitted it.

[wizard-spider-man]

The Destruction of Dark Star, A Helping Hand

#2 Weeks ago

#The Sanctum Sanctorum, normally lit with yellow or purple lights, is dark. The Street is dark, and while Undercity itself is a place riddled with dark corners and darker intents, the Sanctum's beacon being gone was a sad sign of recent times in Asfelaeia. The Wizard Spider-Man had withdrawn from the city, all patrolling Shadow Clones absent from sight.

**In response, the Unfortunates and Undesirables took notice, preying on the innocent.**

Where was their Hero in these trying times?

*A blur moved through the streets of the undercity faster than the eye could follow. He knew that he'd left it to Spidey to reach out and take the first step, but Karm was not naïve enough to not follow up on the poor man. Isolation was the last thing he needed now, and so Karm would ensure that he would either be there to relieve the burden before things went wrong or to end the problem* permanently *before it could spill over if he was too late.*

*From inside the sanctum, two swift and sharp taps on the door would resound throughout the halls.*

The Sanctum would respond to Karm's touch, with anxiety and concern the building would glimmer with a Ward. It was magic from the Sanctum itself, and there appeared to be strain in the Ward's casting.

*The Poor thing was hurting.*

There was a rumble from within, and reality seemed to shudder and grow darker around him. People stricken with fear deemed it necessary to run into their homes.

Something seemed to call out from inside the building, feint, almost inaudible.

**...mrmr...**

*Taking it as an invitation Karm opened the door and walked in. The ward at its current strength would have held him back if he hadn't poured more power into his projection. This was not a time for caution or courtesy, but for decisive action.*

Walking through the sanctum, he navigated the labyrinthine construction purely off of his arcane senses. Dark Star was near, and it had seemingly chosen to ignore his previous warning.

The Sanctum seems to disarm at Karm's presence, however the door shuts behind him. A long staircase leads up into darkness, and all other doors are closed. There's a yell from afar.

**Welcome, Void Child.**

Dark Star's voice is whispery, seductive, and echoes from the stairs above.

**Approach my Avatar, if you Dare...**

Shrugging at the threat, he kept walking. It was but a second later before he had cleared the building and saw the artifact and its avatar. For a brief moment he contemplated showing up in person, but this projection would have to do for now. The risk to the sanctum should he show up in person was too great to take for now.

With a weary and calm voice, he spoke up: "I believe I told you to stay in line."

"Who. How...? Karm? Karm. You shouldn't... you shouldn't be here."

The Wizard Spider-Man was on the floor. The room had become a mess of ritual practice, he was surrounded by darkness in far too many forms. He had replicated the items he created to form the Dark Star. And there was clear evidence of more crafting.

However, the room was riddled with the road stories of failure, several objects had broken and "spilled" causing caustic essences to melt the splash zones around them.

The Wizard himself was in a circle, a Triangle formed in the center, he seemed to be in the middle of something dangerous.

"I don't know... I don't know what could happen if someone's here just watching me work... its dangerous work."

He was delirious. Wobbling in his seat on the floor. The Sword was strapped against his back, pulsing.

**I warned you... he's a pathetic creature.**

**And I warned you. Stay. In. Line. Give him time to catch his strength.**

Karm's eyes didn't move from the weakened Wizard Spider-Man for a moment.

"You should have taken my advice. It's going to consume you if you don't stop it immediately. My offer still stands. I could take it now, consume it, or help you destroy it. At this rate, there'd be nothing left of you to fight the aspects even if they show up tomorrow. Either way I've decided to contain this problem before it spills out to the city."

"The Sanctum... would contain it... but..."

He nods out, and a wave of force blasts Karm away from the Wizard. The entire room is immediately trashed, as magical objects explode and flames of multiple color catch the equipment.

**You will do no such thing to Me! Give him time? He can't handle the power he holds, I will consume him and make him my own. His essence is strong, but it is finally faltering. Why do you even care? I have no intents to ruin this world. I merely seek a swordsman worthy of my power.**

His body floats and draws the sword.

**Why shouldn't I just destroy you now!? He is mine anyway!**

*The projection shifts in a blur to resume an upright position. The blast did however succeed in breaking Karm's focus, as was evident in the aura of annihilation that was currently chewing through the equipment and sanctum itself. Brushing dust and wrinkles out of his suit, he lets out a heavy sigh.*

"I would rather you didn't try that. I'm not sure your 'vessel' would survive and I'd loathe to deprive the world of him."

*As all ambient energy seemed to flow towards Karm as water escaping the drain, he let out a cold breath that left a hazy mist in the air.*

"You will find no such thing. The drive of unshackled void is always the same. More, more, more. It will never be enough. Nothing will be good enough. I feel it too, but I have not made it my entire being. As unfortunate as it is, you were forged with a purpose."

**And what Purpose is that?**

The Wizard's Body points the sword at him. The flames burn around them, fueled by the ruined tomes and potions catching alight. The Sanctum blows a wind into the room, silencing the fires.

"You were made as a weapon. To destroy. Without him to guide you, that drive will eventually consume your being."

*Karm bent his knees slightly, preparing a somewhat uncoordinated fighting stance.*

"Drop the sword and come quietly. I will not repeat myself."

**Time to Cut the Void!**

The Dark Star turns the Wizard's iconic suit from red to black, and like an awkward puppeteer, he starts to stumble forward. She was learning to control this vessel, and fast. But the hold over him was incomplete, and awkward.

The Wizard's Body rushes forward, attempting a flurry of uncoordinated swings.

Even with all the speed granted to it by the vessel of Wizard Spider-Man, it remained clumsy and uncoordinated. Avoiding them was trivial for now, but it wouldn’t remain so for long. Sidestepping a strike that cut clean into the wall where his head had just been, Karm began to mentally incant a basic offensive spell. The shock of aging 60 years in a second would hopefully be enough to put the young man out for the fight.

Taking a step back to once again avoid being cleaved in two by a swift downward cut, he unleashed the curse.

The Curse Karm casts takes its effect, landing on the poor Wizard with absolute mercilessness. Trails of dark wispy clouds envelop him, his robes fade to gray and develop holes and tears, his suit fades from black to gray, before pieces crumble into tatters, the puppet wobbles and breaks, collapsing quite simply.

Dark Star was not graceful, or powerful enough to steer Spider-Man's will. Now that age had set in, the Sword was confused, enraged at her puppet's useless dilapidation.

**NO!** **HOW DARE YOU!**

Dropping the sword, it clatters to the ground with an unholy noise, the screech of absence cutting the concept of sound into tatters. Dark Star's rage is childlike, laughable to those powerful enough to sneer at Darkness.

The Sanctum Shakes as these forces are unleashed from within the dimensional barriers. It fortifies itself, preparing for whatever may come next.

The Sword starts to float upward...

Free from Dark Star's grip, the Wizard Spider-Man, now properly bearded *and* Masked, had the color return to his suit, albeit faded with newly acquired time. He stands up without a hint of wobbliness, however his stature slouches and before long a basic staff is summoned into his hands for support.

"Eugh. Kmae hsit sdrow psto!."

A bubble forms around the sword, containing it for just a moment.

Surprised by the effectiveness of his spell, he took a moment to center himself. Frankly, it was a miracle that the Wizard Spider-Man didn't have any wards against basic offensive chronomancy prepared. Had he not limited his spell that might have been the end of the webslinger right there.

His focus now, however, was on the sword. He knew that a projection would not be enough to control the sword. Even the Wizard Spiderman's spell would falter soon. Either way, he could not leave anything to chance. He was there with two goals: save Spiderman and handle the Dark Star. Stepping into a parallel flow of time, he picked up the now geriatric old wizard and ran to the sanctum entrance. He'd be safe there. Or at least Karm hoped so. If the sanctum was truly alive it would hopefully push him outside if things went poorly.

As he went back to the room, it was clear that his initial suspicions about the blade was correct. The swirling darkness that threatened to tear the room to pieces was too much for a mere projection. He would need to step in personally. Opening a tear to the blind eternities he stepped through and filled the projection. The change was immediate. Where the darkness just a moment ago had threatened to overwhelm his senses there was stability. Where the void had battered his wards there was now a vague numbness. In the grey smoke that had once been a projection two motes of amethyst lit up with power.

#Very well.

The Wizard Spider-Man let himself be carried, the age making him a little senile. He knew a time spell had been unleashed upon him, but having been knocked unconscious by Dark Star, he was lucky to be alive, having been in such a precarious position.

The Sanctum locked the doors, and seemingly strengthened its barriers. It would seem Spider-Man's contingency for the Sanctum did not account for letting him escape it.

This did not deter him however, as the Wizard still took the time to try and stand up.

"Karm. Thanks for reminding me I am in dire need of backup plans regarding my health."

He stands with the staff in hand, regaining some composure.

"I appreciate you coming to help me. You were right. Let's go destroy this thing."

His hand glows with a green circle, a dial of runes spin; he turns back the clock on his chronology, bringing himself back to youth.

"Huh. I broke all the rules there. Told myself I'd left myself get old naturally. You ready?"

Karm's voice was twisted and strained as if some magical power was trying to replicate it.

#"Yeah. Just do me a favor and stay a few feet away from me right now. My presence can destroy just as easily as the blade's edge now."

The Wizard Spider-Man nods, casting a few wards, binding the threads of causality that surround his form with strengthened uniformity.

In the study, which had now turned into a swirling maelstrom; the Dark Star was lashing out at reality around it, trying to deter Karm's approach.

**NO! YOU TOOK MY VESSEL!!**

Its screech was horrifying, audible from Spidey's position near the front of the Sanctum.

"Vessel? I hate to think I was becoming another host. Been there. Done that..."

They ascend the stairs into darkness. As the climb extends higher up, movement becomes unfamiliar and difficult - entropic void had seemed to have completely swallowed this part of the Sanctum.

"Hope you saved some of the books Sanctorum, Strange gave me a lot of those and I don't know if I can get them back..."

His voice seems to be muffled, barely leaving the confines of his lungs. It starts to take considerable effort to manipulate the forms of matter around him.

How long was he standing in the dark alone?

"Karm?"

Far above his comprehension, the Dark Star was battling the true form of Karm, eldritch powers clashed in destructive waves as time and space became pointless words in a soup of ideas and uncreation.

The child of Craterus while inexperienced and unfamiliar with its being, demanding autonomy in the face of its inevitable obliteration.

**YOU WILL STOP!!**

Cloaked in monochrome abyss, Karm uttered a dread incantation.

***"Aspect of Extinction: Hunger"***

A field of all-consuming nothingness erupted from his body, ravenous energies that annihilated and consumed everything they touched. In the middle of it was Karm. Beyond the grey was talons of black. Talons of a great reptilian beast.

#“I warned you. You refused to listen.”

Every move he made was a blur. The causality of time no longer shackled him. Claws of unmaking met the Dark Star in a furious flurry.

#“It was you who forced my hand. Your own decision led to this.”

***Back down in the broken pieces of the Sanctum’s Study.***

*"I got to put this place back together. I can't see what's going on… I can sure hear it though."*

The Wizard Spider-Man starts to incant aloud, hands raised upwards, his voice booming across the void. With each word spoken, thunder would start to clap, and lightning would coalesce around the gathering of clouds.

The Dark Star and Karm's forms blurred together as the malicious talons of Craterus lashed out at its progeny. The Dark Star's Sword form was immediately broken.

What spilled forth was more entropic void, tendrils of black inky shadows lunged forward towards Karm.

**I Will Subsume You. I Will Take Back My Father's Power!**

"You won't." The Voice of Spider-Man booms around them.

More clouds form and light begins to shine in the form of twinkling stars. The Sanctum was helping the Wizard put itself back together, starting fundamentally with Space.

"I appreciate you scaring this thing into submission, let's try and not blow up the house!"

The moment time returned to a somewhat nominal state in the room it was over. With an almost lazy motion, Karm raised his hand. A probing defense meant to halt time for the being currently trying to consume him.

As this happened his own void magic had laid itself as a slick layer to shield his soul from outside interference. There was nothing to grasp. Nothing to hold onto.

#“Very well. I’ll restrain myself.”

In the same defending motion he began directing the hunger to one target. The ravenous energies were let loose on its essence. Striking like a swarm of serpents, the spell transformed from claws and shield to tendrils poised to meet the Dark Star. This time feeding off mana and its essence.

The tendrils impact the blade, and they annihilate its pieces. The void energy explodes, threatening to destroy the carefully held together space time that the Wizard Spider-Man was weaving back.

**NO!! NO!!**

The Wizard Spider-Man claps his hands together, summoning the Staff of Idaldin. He slams it into the ground, commanding the Id Force of reality around them.

"Alright Universe. Let's Dance."

He twirls the staff, cyan and pink energies sparking around him. Spidey points the staff at the dark clouds in the room, and blasts them with a pure beam of creation energy.

The Dark Star takes the hit, Karm may feel splashes.

"Look out! It's a little unsteady!"

*The Id is wild, untamed, the Wizard's willpower still strained from the grip Dark Star had on him prior. The Idaldin Staff however was a cooperative ally, unlike the caustic void sword.*

Unconcerned with the touch of the void, Karm lets the scattered essence of Dark Star be absorbed on contact. The forces of creation, however, shook him greatly. Their unguided attempt to correct reality were not distinguishing Karm's entropic form from the scattered essences of the void. Knowing that his time would be cut short, he began to draw the entropic energies of Dark Star into himself.

Ignoring the dissolution of his form, he acted decisively. Using the last powers of hunger, he consumed as much of Dark Star as he could. The scattered power was left without a strong will to challenge his own. Following this, he only had moments left before the staff made his stay untenable. Once he had absorbed what he could, he too disappeared as a wisp of smoke.

The Wizard Spider-Man in his hastiness to contain the sword, may have hurt the being who saved him. He disperses the Staff immediately whispering thanks in numerous mystic tongues.

"Karm!?"

**Tune in to the Epilogue of this Thrilling Adventure in Tales from Asfelaeia!**

[wizard-spider-man]

To Dive Feet First into Hell

#The Wizard Spider-Man stood in the center of his research room. He had collected a number of trinkets and artifacts from the deeper recesses of the Sanctum; and from around the realms itself.

**Today was the day he'd breach the barriers between planes and step into Dis itself, all in the name of an associate.**

*The Idea was insane by all accounts. After spending time in Cania, many would wonder why the Wizard Spider-Man would ever want to return to hell.*

He began by clearing a space in the center of the room, meticulously sweeping away all of the dust.

From a locked cabinet, Spidey withdrew his prized and dangerous collection of items for the ritual:

A vial of hellfire, stolen from a pit fiend's lair. The smoky liquid within radiated with an orange glow.

The desiccated heart of a Demon Lord, acquired by Doctor Strange an untold number of years ago.

A contract penned in Spidey's own blood, detailing the terms of his return—a safeguard against Dis's tendency to trap visitors.

This one was extremely necessary as Spider-Man knew his soul would be immensely valuable to the demons below.

Three black candles rendered from the fat of a hanged murderer.

And lastly, a knife of cold iron, its blade etched with prayers to the gods of safe passage. This one felt required for posterity more than anything.

With tender care, the Web-head arranged these components in a complex pattern on the floor.

Etching runes and sigils, He spent hours inscribing various symbols around the circle, utilizing specially prepared chalks and paints to help strengthen the circle's properties.

As a final precaution, the Wizard Spider-Man activated the Sanctorum's more powerful wards. Circles of protection flared to life along the walls, ceiling, and floor. These would prevent any unwanted entities from following him back through the portal, or worse, trapping him inside Dis, as well as anchor his being back to the Mortal world if he is in mortal danger.

Breathing deep, the Wizard begins to chant. The words were guttural and painful, languages of devils twisting his mortal tongue. As he spoke, he used the ritual knife to slice open his palm, letting droplets of blood fall onto each component in turn.

**Ouch. Why was this part necessary?**

The air grew thick and sulfurous. The candles ignited on their own accord, flames glowing an unnatural purple. The hellfire in the vial bubbled and hissed, while the devil's heart gave a single, thunderous beat.

With a final, shouted syllable, the Wizard Spider-Man throws the knife, plunging it into the heart. Reality opens before him, revealing a swirling vortex of crimson and black. Heat blared from the opening, carrying with it the distant sounds of agonized screams.

The Wizard Spider-Man steps back to admire his work. The portal to Dis stood stable and ready.

But the hardest part was yet to come. Carefully placing a thin silver chain around his neck, within dangled a small crystal vial. Inside, a strand of his own hair was suspended in shimmering, opalescent mana infused oils.

This was his lifeline, his way back home. As long as this remained intact, he could open back up this portal home, no matter how lost he became in the infernal realm.

Steeling himself, the Wizard Spider-Man straightened his robes, checked his component pouches one last time, and approached the swirling gateway to Hell.

This was for Catherine.

*"Let's go kick some Demon Ass!"*

[wizard-spider-man]

The Dark Star is Born

The vast emptiness of space envelops the Wizard Spider-Man, stars glimmering in the distance like scattered diamonds on black velvet. He floats, suspended above the planet, his mind was grappling with the news of Catherine’s demise. He holds an amulet in his hand that has since lost the soul light that powered it. The beacon was gone.

Despite their limited acquaintance, a profound sadness radiates from him, creating fractures in Spider-Man’s emotional defense.

In this moment of vulnerability, a whisper emerges from the depths of his consciousness. At first, it's barely perceptible, like the faintest breeze. As the Wizard's grief shepherds his mind to darkness, the whisper grows stronger, more insistent.

With a jolt of horror, he realizes it's the voice of the Dark Star.

Why do you mourn?

The sword inquires, its tone a mix of curiosity and disdain.

Such attachment… it is beneath us.

Sweat beads under his mask as he frantically weaves incantations of protection, desperately trying to reinforce the walls of his psyche.

Spidey’s voice, tinged with fear, rings out in the vast emptiness of space.

"Be quiet," he commands, his tone somewhere between plea and demand.

"You will have no power here."

But Dark Star is relentless. Its influence seeping through the cracks, a malevolent mist that curls around the edges of the Wizard's thoughts. Feelings of doubt and inadequacy flood his mind, chipping away at his resolve.

The sword's voice echoes within him.

I am part of you now. We are one.

The Wizard's resistance falters, his will buckling under the onslaught of the sword’s corrupting influence. With each heartbeat, Dark Star's presence grows stronger within him, its whispers becoming a deafening roar that drowns out his thoughts.

Dark Star, impatient with Spider-Man’s attempts at preservation, unleashes a void scream in his mind that likely was the “roar” of its entropic ancestor. All attempts at defense against the sword’s influence was destroyed. A cold chill spreads through the Wizard Spider-Man’s body, as if ice water doused his veins. His consciousness, crumbles and dissolves.

Dark Star's voice is no longer an intruder within his mind, its malevolent timbre resonating from inside.

Panic rising, the Wizard manages one last personal thought: "Will I be okay?"

To which the response comes immediately, in his own voice yet toned with Dark Star’s:

“We will be just fine."

[wizard-spider-man]

The Weight of Entropy

The Wizard Spider-Man stands outside, in a field somewhat far from Asfelaeia.

His mind has gone adrift. Numerous Shadow Clones patrolled the Planet and the Outer Solar System, carrying a faint headache from the information being transmitted from each. He'd have to find a way to safely close off his consciousness without disturbing the anchor that keeps the clones aligned and tied to him.

The Dark Star pulses ominously in his grip. Its otherworldly glow casts long, writhing shadows across his face, a visual echo of the turmoil within its wielder. He can feel the sword's hunger gnawing at the edges of his consciousness, an insatiable void that threatens to consume him from within.

As Spider-Man contemplates the weapon he's created, the Wizard realizes the profound irony of his situation.

In his quest to defend reality against the Aspects of Destruction, he has forged a blade that embodies those very forces.

Dark Star, with its power to unmake and quite literally *cut* existence, it demands a constant influx of energy to maintain the hunger.

He recalls the various stopgap measures he's employed to keep the sword sated so far - siphoning energy from distant stars, channeling the essence of long-dead dimensions, even sacrificing some collected soul gems. But these were temporary solutions, and he can feel the sword's patience wearing thin.

The Wizard Spider-Man knows that Dark Star craves conflict, it yearns to test its edge against the fabric of reality itself. It whispers to him in strange tongues, tempting him with promises of grandeur. Part of him actively contends with a mixture of excitement and dread - and a desire to give in to these urgings.

As he paces the field, a multidimensional model of his causation he created pulses in sympathy with the sword. He sees within it the intricate dance of creation and destruction, of void and matter, of past and future.

The Wizard ponders the nature of his creation and his own role in the grand scheme of things. Has he, in his hubris, upset the delicate balance he sought to protect? How should this error be rectified?

He knows he must find a worthy opponent soon, not just to sate the sword's appetite, but to truly understand its nature. As he contemplates potential adversaries, a chilling thought occurs to him: what if the true battle isn't against some external threat, but against the possible corruption of himself?

As the skies seem to grow darker, the Wizard Spider-Man steels himself for the challenges ahead. He knows that the path he's chosen is fraught with danger, not just to himself and his flow of causation, but to the very fabric of reality as well.

To turn back now would be to surrender to the forces of destruction he's sworn to oppose.

With a determined grip on Dark Star, the Wizard Spider-Man begins to formulate a plan. He must find a way to channel the sword's hunger, to direct its terrifying power towards a greater purpose. And in doing so, he hopes to find a balance within himself - between creator and destroyer, between protector and conqueror, between the man he was and the cosmic force he's becoming.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

[wizard-spider-man]

Tinkering with Darkness - Learning the Art of Void Craft

In the weeks following his expedition to the brink of reality's collapse, the Wizard Spider-Man finds himself once again residing in the depths of his sanctum, surrounded by an array of arcane instruments and glowing vials.

The collected essences of Craterus pulse with an otherworldly rhythm, each containment vessel a window into the very nature of oblivion.

The Wizard's fingers dance across the surface of his workstation, adorned with spiraling runes that seem to shift and change with each passing moment.

As he dives deeper into his studies, the Wizard Spider-Man begins to grasp at the fundamental nature of the void. It is not merely an absence, he realizes, but a force unto itself—a hungry nothingness that seeks to consume all it touches.

Through careful manipulation of annihilation's essences, he learns to create micro-voids, tiny pockets of non-existence that hover in the air like shimmering black pearls. They float around him, threatening to become unstable. He coalesces these voids into a large nullification crystal - a dense orb.

He would make use of this orb for something else.

The Wizard sends it into a carefully designed containment chamber. Should something in that place fall off the shelf, that place will just cease to exist entirely, away from everything else important.

The nullification crystals prove particularly intriguing. When exposed to the basic energy, they resonate at frequencies that threaten to unravel the very fabric of space-time.

Spidey constructs elaborate containment fields, weaving together strands of quantum entanglement and mystical wards to hold these volatile elements in check. He places the crystals gingerly on the table.

The Wizard turns his attention to the viscous, dark liquid essence of primordial fear. Using careful, nuanced movements, he levitates the whole of the volatile substance, suspending it in a containment field of pure force. As he probes it with arcs of power, the droplet reacts violently, expanding and contracting in rapid pulses.

It was similar to the Klyntars, children of Knull, brethren of Venom...

He condenses the primordial fear into a small black ball of swirling goo... The Wizard then sets the goo ball on the table, its energy seeming to hum in interaction with the nullification crystals.

The Wizard, driven by his encounters with the Aspects of Destruction, begins to focus his efforts on forging a weapon capable of standing against these cosmic threats. His experiences with Illum, the Light of Annihilation have instilled in him a sense of urgency.

In the heart of his sanctum, the Wizard reignites the arcane forge, a nexus of energies powered by the Sanctum Sanctorum and the magical essence of Asfelaeia. This forge burns with the flames of creation melting down the flametal for careful crafting once again.

He begins the forging process by carefully melting down the nullification crystals, its absolute darkness seeming to devour the very light of the forge. To this, he adds a measure of temporal residue, causing the molten material to flux between past and future states. Spidey would imbue burning light back into the forge, channeling the Id Stone's will to twist the paradoxical energies together.

The unstable elements solidify into a darkened bar of rogue, interdimensional metal.

The Wizard bolsters the forge, adding a bolt of lightning to super heat the void steel.

He then introduces a carefully measured amount of the fear essence, its viscous nature lending a fluid adaptability to the amalgam. As it's added, the mixture writhes and pulses, embodying the spectrum between absence and presence. It seems to twist and bend the metal into itself, requiring an active temperance to keep the unstable amalgam together.

Next, he infuses the blend with the captured entropic energy, causing the material to swirl with chaotic patterns that simultaneously represent decay and renewal, the endless cycle of endings and beginnings. The metal takes a mind of its own, lashing out at the fires of the forge.

Mercilessly, the Wizard begins to smash the metal into submission, each blow of his hammer forming it into a tamed shape. He would start to temper a blade out of this twisted void steel.

Existential echoes left behind from Craterus are woven into the blade's very structure, their whispers of lost realities and forgotten timelines giving the weapon a keen edge that can cut through the fabric of anything it touches. The very nature of this blade would rend and destroy its foes utterly.

As the forging process reaches its completion, the Wizard uses the Id Stone to shape the remaining material into a hilt. It's not a sword yet in any conventional sense, but a collection of pieces that seems to flicker in and out of reality.

The final step involves tempering the blade with a shard of the fractured Reality Stone. As it's integrated, the sword's appearance stabilizes, though it still shimmers with an otherworldly iridescence, reflecting the multidimensional nature of space itself.

One could glimpse into the sword and see the future. If an enemy, a future destined to lose.

The result is a weapon of impossible nature - a sword that embodies the framework of all cosmic forces. In its depths, one can see swirling galaxies and yawning voids, expansions and contractions, a microcosm of the universe's grand cycle.

It could cut anything, and remove it from existence in the wake of his swing. It was an extension of annihilation, a Sword of Creation's Bane.

The Wizard Spider-Man would name this weapon "Dark Star" - the Void Edge. As he holds it for the first time, he feels its immense destructive potential.

He knows that in forging this blade, he has created not just a means to combat the Aspects of Destruction, but a key to understanding and potentially harmonizing the very forces that shape existence.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Something something, warriors find God through the sword, balance in the soul of the blade? Something like that.

Causality, and the threads that bind him seem to pull towards this weapon. He must not use it recklessly if at all, lest he destroy himself completely.

[wizard-spider-man]

[wizard-spider-man]

The Oculi Anathema - Shadow in the Mirror

In the city of Asfelaeia, the Wizard Spider-Man, a self-proclaimed guardian of the mystical metropolis, embarked upon his nightly vigil, the patrol of the city.

Without warning, his spider-senses were overwhelmed by a searing pain; A bolt of crimson lightning, from the dark corners of the unknown struck him mid-swing, sending him plummeting from the starlit sky into the alleyways below.

He awoke in a void of absolute darkness, disoriented and wracked with pain. A sinister energy pulsed within him, bypassing his arcane safeguards and infiltrating his very being.

It was emerging, a malevolent force given form, and he knew he had to act quickly.

With a swift incantation, words of power flow casting starlight, he uttered a protective spell around himself and transported himself into an alternate dimension.

It was a simple parking lot, mirrored from a mortal realm, but within the confines of the Sanctum Sanctorum.

Here, he knew, whatever horror was about to unfold would be contained.

He examined himself, searching his form for any physical manifestation of the corruption that now coursed through his veins.

"What is this? ...something's off. I feel... wrong," he muttered, a sense of dread washing over him like a tide of shadow.

The dark energy within him began to manifest, forming a figure before his eyes. Red and black swirls of malevolent mana radiated from his body, coalescing into a form that was eerily familiar, a twisted reflection of his own visage.

He stepped back, arcane sparks dancing on his fingertips as he pointed them towards the nightmarish apparition. "What are you? Why are you here?" he demanded, his voice echoing in the empty lot, a graveyard of empty cars.

The familiar red and blues were present, but they were accompanied by ominous black robes that seemed to drink in the light around them. The sight disturbed the Wizard Spider-Man, making him grimace.

"No..." he muttered.

"Yes," the figure replied, its voice a chilling echo of his own, devoid of warmth or humanity.

"What are you?"

"A dark spell has stricken the chosen in this realm. Without rhyme or reason, they must face their mirrored opposites. So. Here we stand," the opposite replied, his voice as cold as the void between stars.

"A little late, I might add."

"Opposites, you say? Is that what you are? My shadow given form?" Spidey says, his scowl worsening.

"We've done the clone dance, let's not do it again."

"Indeed," the figure replied, casting a bolt of lightning, as red as blood and as dark as the blackest night.

"This is more than a mere Clone Crisis."

Spidey saw the attack the moment it was unleashed, his spider-sense barely warning him of the strike. He leapt back with grace, avoiding the crimson blast as it scorched the air. He landed on his feet, his eyes never leaving the shadow. He had witnessed himself perform this similar casting countless times, yet the sight of it now made his blood boil with righteous fury.

It was corrupted, a mockery of his own power.

"So we're just gonna fight then? Simply because some spell demands it?" he asked.

"We would come to blows at some point, why not now? Should I go kill off some innocents to give you a better reason?" the Shadow quips, his voice filled with malice that dripped like venom.

"No. I'm gonna send you back to whatever hell you came from." he retorted, clenching his fists as arcane energy crackled around them.

Green mana, vibrant and potent surrounds him, empowering his form with celestial might. He held out his hand, sending a pulse of magical energy towards the shadow. The figure absorbed it, laughing at him with bullying intent.

"You would really hold back. Against me?" the Dark Wizard taunted him, his voice a twisted mirror of Spidey's own. It lacked empathy and compassion.

"You're me," the Wizard Spider-Man spoke through gritted teeth, his words laced with determination. "I know the extent of your strength. I know your tricks."

But his spider-sense, that mystical warning that had saved him countless times, was suddenly blind to this dark reflection. The Dark Wizard appeared behind Spidey with the speed of thought, kidney punching him with a magically enhanced force that could shatter mountains.

THOOM!

"Die!" the figure shouted, his voice echoing with otherworldly power.

The impact of the strike against his back sends him crashing into the unyielding earth. After the initial shock, and successive rolls, he stands back up with some spring in his step still.

"Die? My opposite says boring things like 'die'?" he quips, taking a stance.

"What's next, resistance is futile? Your soul is mine?"

Raising his hand, he casts a glowing web of pure magical energy at the shadow, hoping to ensnare his legs in its arcane threads. The Dark Wizard leapt over the web trap with typical inhuman agility, firing his own volley of webbing. It grabs Spider-Man by the ankles, and the Dark Wizard tosses him into a grouping of cars with the force of a missile strike.

Crashing into the heap of steel and glass, he groans in pain, feeling as if he had been struck by the entirety of the cars in this magical lot.

He grunted in frustration, forgetting to account that this was still another Spider-Man.

He leapt from the pile of marred metal, lunging at the shadow with the speed of fury, attempting to pin him to the ground in a futile flurry of punches that shattered the ground beneath them.

The Dark Wizard kicked Spider-Man off of his person with force, and stood back up, hardly phased by the onslaught. He cracks his joints in a display of arrogant confidence.

"You really want to do this the old fashioned way? What's wrong, Mage? Is your arcane might not strong enough?"

Spidey sighs, rising once more into a fighting stance, his body channeling mystical energy.

In a flash of arcane brilliance, he fires a pair of crystalline projectiles at the shadow, aiming for his wrists with unerring accuracy. Consequentially, the figure burned them without a second's notice, the mystical diamonds turning to ash in an instant.

"Ha! Again with the silly tricks," he sneered, dark energy crackling around his form like a storm of shadows.

The Dark Wizard Spider-Man melted into the floor, becoming one with Spider-Man's shadow.

"What the hell- Where did you go?" he asked, looking around frantically.

A choking feeling descended upon him, as if the very air had turned to poison. He grabbed at his throat feeling his lungs turn against him, betraying their purpose. He tried to breathe, but even the slightest gulp of air was like drinking liquid fire.

He looked down at the ground, his vision swimming. Within his shadow, he saw the dark figure, his doppelganger, with one hand raised in a gesture of dark power. Like some nefarious Sith Lord.

"I... should have... seen this...coming..." he gasped, the life-giving oxygen becoming more and more restricted with each passing moment.

"Stupid... evil... sorcerer..." he gasped, his words barely audible.

"Your soul is mine." the Dark Wizard continues to mock Spider-Man, his voice dripping with malevolent glee.

He dropped to one knee, desperately trying to keep the last of his precious air inside his burning lungs. Spidey felt helpless, unable to fight back against this unseen assault.

Frantically, he casts mage light, a spell of pure radiance that drowns out his shadow in a sea of brilliance. The dark form reforms next to him, and kicks him in the chest.

"Choke on that, buttercup!"

The kick sent Spider-Man flying backwards through the air like a ragdoll caught in a hurricane. He landed with a hard thud on the unforgiving ground, the impact reverberating through his bones and inside his head.

Coughing and wheezing, the fight to breathe was forcing desperation into the Wizard's mind, each moment a battle against passing out.

Attempting to gain footing, each breath coming in short, shallow gasps, he was starting to feel dizzy, the world spinning around him like a maelstrom.

The Dark Wizard stepped into his field of vision, crouching to meet his level, a twisted smile playing on his lips.

"Looks like you're fading, old friend."

Determined to defy the encroaching darkness, the Wizard forces in a painful gust of air, using mana to send life-giving oxygen surging into his bloodstream like a river of pure vitality.

His strength returned, even if just for a fleeting moment. He smashed a fist into the ground, cracking the pavement and sending tremors through the earth. He glares at his shadow in front of him, his eyes burning with defiance.

"I'm still here. This battle is far from over..." he said, his voice confirming newfound focus and determination.

"Then rise, and face your death like a man."

The Wizard Spider-Man pushed himself to his feet, unsteady but regaining his composure, arcane energy crackling around him like a thunderstorm of power.

"Your strength is impressive, I'll grant you that. But you're just my shadow. A pale imitation," he said, circling the figure, analyzing his moves with scrutiny.

The Dark Wizard chuckled, a sound that could freeze the blood in one's veins, taking a step forward. "A mere copy? You underestimate the depths of your situation. I am you, but so much better."

"Your lack of ambition is your downfall. Always holding back... always fretting over the 'greater good'. It's pitiful, really. You simply drown your guilt with the problems of lesser people."

The Wizard Spider-Man scowls, hearing his voice twisted with malice, mocking everything he stood for.

"My guilt is what I draw strength from to aid others. It is what sets me apart from your darkness," he retorted, jumping backwards with a flip. He casts fireballs from his wrist, each a miniature sun, attacking the shadow with the fury of a thousand infernos.

The Dark Wizard dodges the fire with an amused smirk, the flames barely singeing his dark robes.

"Your guilt is a shackle that binds you. It's what prevents you from gaining real, true power. You cower in fear. Afraid of seizing control. Afraid of the chaos that you know lies dormant within you. I am unburdened by such weakness. I embrace the darkness, I even revel in it."

Lightning cackles around him, surging with dark energy that could rend the very fabric of reality. Several Dark Forms, each a manifestation of pure shadow, surround Spider-Man, and shock him with their red form lightning.

The blast overwhelms Spidey, and he is brought back to his knees once again, feeling as if the weight of the cosmos itself was pressing down upon him. He casts a ward, a shield of pure magical energy, only for it to shatter like glass against the onslaught. He casts another one, stronger, infused with his indomitable will, and it too breaks as if it were nothing more than a child's toy.

Quick on his feet, channeling the very essence of his mystical might, he phases through into the ground, becoming one with the earth itself.

This was a mirror dimension of his design, a realm shaped by his will. He had to change the rules.

The desert becomes an ocean, vast and fathomless, and the Dark Wizard Spider-Man simply stands atop the water as if it were solid ground, a dark god surveying his domain. Rain starts to fall, first a light current, then, a mighty cascade that could drown worlds. Thunder and lightning illuminate the clouds, and the sky turns black as the void.

The Dark Wizard grows impatient, his inner rage a palpable force, and raises his hands towards the clouds. With a gesture of cosmic might, he parts them, turning the clouds into balls of water, dropping them into the ocean.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5 lightning strikes, each carrying the power of a thousand storms, blast the shadow, sending him plummeting into the water. The water itself turns to steel, encasing him in a suffocating coffin of solid metal, a prison forged from the very elements themselves.

Relentlessly, the Wizard Spider-Man gives in to his dark side, and crushes the ocean itself, the very laws of nature bending for his anger.

He generally had rules against the taking of lives, but this shadow could not be allowed to escape, to threaten the world with its malevolence.

The gigantic crumpled mass sits upon a surface of molten rock and magma, slowly turning against the unstable flow of the ground beneath.

Spider-Man compresses the air between his hands, crushing the mass into a denser, smaller, denser, smaller ball.

"You told me to die, Let's see how you handle this."

This was out of character, relishing in darkness he rarely allowed to surface. He would rein it in, only too late, seeing blood ooze from the pores of the ball.

His guilt would be wasted, however, as the shadow would regain form, rising from the blood pool like a dark phoenix.

"You really are a fool. Trap me in an alternate dimension? I *am* an alternate dimension."

"That doesn't even make-"

The Wizard Spider-Man is flung like a ragdoll, drawn immediately in vicinity of the reflection. His chest is pierced through, with the Dark Wizard holding his still-beating heart in a grip of iron.

Without a second to spare, a last word to whimper, the shadow crushes his heart with malevolent glee.

"Your soul, will be mine." He says, withdrawing his blood-covered arm, a triumphant sneer on his face.

Spider-Man collapses, and the alternate dimension begins to crumble around them. The Dark Wizard allows it to, as he teleports out the palantir, stepping into the realm of mortals once more.

He steps out onto the fresh air of Asfelaeia, taking in the sounds of a town busy beneath him, unaware of the cosmic drama that has unfolded. Satisfied with his victory, he breathes in the stench of society, and draws a sinister smile under his mask. So many plans, so much more time.

SNAP

The Shadow falls to the ground, his triumph cut short in an instant.

The Wizard Spider-Man, alive and well, had taken the ultimate risk; letting him out. He knew himself well enough, and knew that if he had abandoned all sense of responsibility, the only alternative would be to relish in his ego.

He knew that the spider-sense did not work around the Dark Wizard, so logically it had to work both ways. He also knew that the Dark Wizard was Mortal like Him, and would be susceptible to death.

However, like he, it wouldn't take long to overcome it.

Muttering an incantation of ancient power, words that could reshape reality itself, the Wizard Spider-Man burns the body of his double, flames of purification consuming the dark form. With a gesture of cosmic might, he chains the malevolent soul to a runestone, binding it to the gem with permanence and scrutiny.

Holding the runestone in his hands, its surface pulsing with barely contained darkness, he ponders the consequences of losing this battle. There were many safeguards, many fallbacks, woven into the very fabric of his own soul to ensure something like this didn't happen. Yet here he stood, holding the essence of his own darkness made manifest.

Spider-Man opens a portal, the howling destructive forces of the End of All Things beckoning from beyond, a void of absolute nothingness that could unmake creation itself.

He throws the runestone into it, damning the shadow to an existence with its peers in a realm beyond mortal comprehension.

He closes the portal with a gesture, sealing away the darkness, and opens another one, this time to the Sanctum Sanctorum. It was time to heal, to reflect, and to think upon the nature of light and shadow, of power and purpose.

Have no doubts, true believers, the Wizard Spider-Man inherited the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme for a reason: he is a being of incredible power and boundless potential, a guardian standing at the crossroads of reality and myth.

And with Great Power... Comes Great Responsibility.

[wizard-spider-man]

Preparations, the Third Defense.

The Sanctum Sanctorum stood as a beacon of mystical energy amidst the streets of Asfelaeia, its windows dark save for an eerie glow emanating from the topmost chamber. Within, the Wizard Spider-Man, Sorcerer Supreme of the Planet, stood motionless, his spider-sense probing the fabric of reality itself.

With a thought, he recalled his Shadow Clones, spectral copies of himself that had been patrolling the city. They faded from existence, their vigilant watch put on hold as a greater threat loomed on the horizon. As the last clone dissipated, Spider-Man felt the fragments of his consciousness settle upon his shoulders once more.

He would need to be clear headed for this.

The Wizard's gaze fell upon the Staff of Idaldin, resting in an ornate display across the room. This display was not a trophy stand, despite appearances... it was a holding chamber to temper the immense primal forces within the staff itself.

With a gesture, he summoned it to his hand. The moment his fingers closed around it, he felt a surge of primordial power course through him.

The Staff of Id was no mere magical tool. At its heart lay the Id Stone, a crystalline nexus that pulsed with the raw, unfiltered impulses of the universe.

Neither Magic or Anti-Magic, it was a cosmic force of unmitigated, raw, power.

Galaxies swirled within its depths, each spiral a window into the fundamental forces that shaped reality. Spider-Man could feel the stone reaching out, trying to connect with the basest parts of his psyche, tempting him with unimaginable ability.

Steeling himself, Spidey closed his eyes and allowed his consciousness to merge with the Staff. In an instant, he found himself in a realm of pure concept, surrounded by the swirling chaos of the universe's base instincts.

"Alright, universe," Spider-Man's voice echoed through the cosmic void, "let's chitchat."

The void pulsed in response, images of infinite possibilities flashing by in rapid succession. Spider-Man felt the weight of eons pressing down upon him, the raw power of creation and destruction swirling around his essence.

"I offer a part of myself," he continued, his will unwavering, "in exchange for the protection of Asfelaeia. A little bargain, if you will."

The universe seemed to consider, its forces coalescing into patterns of increasing complexity. Spider-Man pushed further, drawing upon his unique perspective and on brand wisdom.

"Think of it as... a relationship," he proposed. "My consciousness as an anchor, your power as a shield. Together, we can create something special, something we can call Mom about."

For a moment that seemed to stretch into eternity, the universe was silent.

Then, with a surge of energy that threatened to overwhelm his senses, it accepted.

**The deal was struck. The Staff would play today.**

Reality snapped back into focus. Spider-Man found himself once more in the Sanctum, the Staff of Id pulsing with intense, nauseating power in his grasp.

Spider-Man raises the staff high, its energies intertwining with his own.

"By the power vested in me as the Sorcerer Supreme," he intoned, his voice resonating with authority, "I activate the Aegis of Reality...again!"

The air itself seemed to ripple as the Aegis sprang to life. Ancient runes etched into the faces of the Pillars of Eternity blazed with divine essence, forming intricate patterns that stretched across the world.

Spider-Man felt the strain as he guided the power, shaping them with his will and the Staff's.

Invisible to mortal eyes, a shimmering bubble of pure metaphysical energy expanded outward from the Sanctum. It grew rapidly, encompassing not just Asfelaeia, but stretching to the very edges of the Planet itself.

Within this cosmic barrier, the very nature of reality became unmalleable.

Time itself fragmented into crystalline shards in the Aegis, each moment preserved in perfect clarity. The past, present, and myriad of possible futures coexisted in a delicate balance, anchored by Spider-Man's will and the Staff of Id's connection to the universe's base forces. The Timeline became incorruptible, what will happen must happen, and what must happen, must be. And so forth.

The World Would not Cease, Not Today, Not Ever.

As the Aegis's Third Defense settled into place, a soft iridescent glow became visible in the sky above Asfelaeia. To most, it might have seemed like an unusual aurora, but those sensitive to mystical energies would recognize it as a shield of cosmic proportions.

Spider-Man lowered the Staff of Id, exhaling from the exertion. Strange wasn't Superhuman, he wondered how the guy handled these cosmic exposures to the unknown - how it practically felt like a workout and being hit by a train 4 times.

The immediate task was complete, but he knew it was only the beginning. The threat that had spurred him to such action was still out there, waiting.

With a complex motion, he opened a swirling portal before him. Beyond its shimmering surface lay the unknown – realms uncharted and dangers untold.

Spider-Man took a moment to center himself, feeling the reassuring weight of the Staff of Id in his hand and the subtle pulse of the Aegis of Reality at the edges of his consciousness.

He returns the Staff to its display, floating it over with grace.

"Well," he quipped to the empty room, "into the spider-verse we go. Again."

With that, the Wizard Spider-Man stepped through the portal, venturing forth to face whatever cosmic horrors awaited him. The portal snapped shut, leaving the Sanctum Sanctorum silent and still, guarding its secrets as it had for centuries untold, while the Aegis of Reality shimmered protectively around the Planet.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

[wizard-spider-man]

Finding Annihilation Incarnate; The Quest for Knowledge, Essences of Craterus.

Research, Development, studies of the aspects, of fundamental building blocks to causality, string theory, and circular bubble that encompasses the entirety of matter and anti-matter, and the anti-anti-everything-matter-not-matter that exists outside of it.

**Amidst the dimly lit shelves, ancient grimoires whispered secrets to one another, their leather-bound spines etched with sigils that pulsed like dormant stars. The Neurotic Scientist, once a skeptic of cosmic forces, now traced intricate patterns in the air, invoking forgotten incantations.**

The composition notebooks, their pages yellowed and brittle, contained cryptic formulae—a blend of quantum physics and arcane magic. Scribbled notes hinted at the existence of parallel dimensions, where time flowed like a river with tributaries branching into infinity.

In a corner, an old telescope stood, its brass tubes tarnished but still functional. It wasn't meant for stargazing; instead, it focused on the interstitial spaces—the gaps between worlds. The Sorcerer Supreme had once used it to glimpse the whole of creation, Now, the Spider adjusted the lenses, seeking patterns in the void, hoping to find a weakness, a loophole to exploit.

The workshop buzzed with energy. Crystal vials containing captured starlight lined the shelves, their luminescence casting dancing shadows on the walls. A mechanical arm, salvaged from a crashed inter-dimensional spacecraft, tinkered with a fractured Reality Stone shard.

Outside, the Sanctum Sanctorum's wards hummed—a symphony of protective spells woven into the very air around the street. The Wizard Spider-Man had added his own modifications: layers of quantum encryption, metaphysical firewalls, and a touch of chaos theory. As the moons ascended, casting elongated shadows across the cluttered floor, the Wizard stood at the center of it all.

Focusing his energies, he casts a rune onto the floor. It rises up to eye level, and starts to turn like a dial.

It opens; a portal to another place in time.

The Wizard Spider-Man steps through the shimmering portal into a carefully created proxy room, an access point he had created to access this moment at the cusp of reality's near-end.

He opens the doorway, and steps into darkness.

The fabric of existence unravels around him, resembling a cosmic weave coming undone. The air hangs thick and gelatinous, making each movement a concentrated effort. Colors fade and blur, as if the very concept of hue is being drained from the universe. Particles of matter float suspended, no longer bound by physics' laws.

Looming in the distance is Craterus, the Avatar of Extinction - a colossal, otherworldly presence defying description. Its form shifts through various manifestations, a visual representation of reality crumbling. The entity stands frozen in a moment of near-triumph, its Aura of Doom expanding outward in a visible shockwave of nullification.

The Wizard finds his arcane abilities behaving erratically in this unstable environment. Spells flicker and warp unpredictably. To navigate this paused slice of time, he must draw upon his deepest understanding of magical principles. Each movement requires intense visualization, as if willing himself through space rather than physically moving.

Before him, the scene unfolds in suspended animation: At the center lies the now-inactive ritual circle. Nearby rests the unconscious Paleomancer, free at last from malevolent possession. The imposing form of Craterus towers above, a terrifying visage of churning entropy caught in the act of disintegration.

With an air of practiced precision, the Wizard begins his delicate work. His fingers, nimble and sure, dance through the ether as he extracts glowing, sand-like particles of temporal residue - the last fragments of time itself. Each grain shimmers with a faint, otherworldly light, casting eerie shadows on the ancient stone walls of his sanctum.

Swirling tendrils of pure entropic energy, dark and dangerous, are carefully contained within crystalline vials. These tendrils writhe and twist, seeking escape, but the Wizard holds them in check. He captures faint, ghostly existential echoes, the spectral imprints of beings and things that once were. These echoes whisper of forgotten memories and lost souls, their voices a haunting chorus in the still air.

Small, perfectly black nullification crystals form where Craterus' Aura of Doom has erased existence entirely. These crystals, cold and unyielding, absorb all light, creating pockets of absolute darkness. The Wizard handles them with utmost care, knowing their power to unmake reality itself.

A viscous, dark liquid trembling with terror - the essence of primordial fear - is sealed away in a rune-inscribed flask. This liquid quivers and pulses, a living embodiment of dread. The Wizard's eyes gleam with a mix of fascination and caution as he completes his task, the tools of his trade arrayed before him like the instruments of a dark symphony.

As he works, the oppressive presence of Craterus bears down upon him. Even in this frozen state, the Avatar of Extinction seems subconsciously aware of the intrusion, lending a palpable sense of urgency and danger to the Wizard's task.

The last wisps of Craterus' form dissolve into the ether as the first true rays of sunlight pierce the gloom. Recognizing his window of opportunity closing, the Wizard wastes not a second. He slips back through his portal, returning to the present with his precious, world-altering cargo.

As the portal seals behind him, only the faintest ripple in time's fabric marks his passing. In the restored reality, life flourishes anew, blissfully unaware of its brush with utter annihilation. The Wizard stands as a silent guardian, now armed with more tools to study, more facets against the dark days should they ever loom again.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

[wizard-spider-man]

The Second Defense; Barriers against Discordant Chaos

#As an otherworldly threat looms on the horizon, Wizard Spider-Man in his capacity as Sorcerer Supreme, initiates the arcane protocol to awaken the Pillars of Eternity to their secondary defense mechanisms.

**This action sets in motion a series of events that subtly but powerfully reinforce the planet's protections against entropy and disruption to the natural order and balance of it.**

Atop the Sanctum Sanctorum, the Wizard Spider-Man begins an intricate ritual. His movements are precise, each gesture a communion with the fundamental forces of nature. Golden strands of energy weave before him, forming a complex runic plate in his hand that mirrors the Aegis of Reality surrounding the world.

With a whispered incantation, he releases a pulse of pure magical essence that resonates with the Pillars of Eternity across the globe.

As the energy reaches each Pillar, it reacts and reawakens the active runes etched into their surfaces. These ancient symbols begin to glow brighter with ethereal light. To the untrained, it might appear as nothing more than a trick of the eye, but those attuned to the mystic arts witness a profound spectacle.

The runes shift and flow, telling the story of reality's delicate balance. Symbols of creation and destruction, order and chaos, past and future all dance in harmony, representing the eternal cycle of existence.

The activated Pillars emit a deep, resonant hum that vibrates at the frequency of the planet. This sound, imperceptible to mortal ears, ripples through the fabric of reality around it. The air shimmers subtly, like the surface of a calm lake disturbed by a gentle breeze. This is the manifestation of the planet's reality barriers reaffirming their own laws and structures.

These barriers between dimensions are reinforced, not as impenetrable walls, but as permeable membranes that allow the natural flow of energies while maintaining the integrity of each realm. The natural balance to keep these realms separate could be compared to the divide between salt and fresh waters, floating freely in a pool of cosmic essence.

From each Pillar emanates an aura of harmonization, invisible yet palpable to those sensitive to the ebb and flow of natural energies. This thin veil stretches out, seeking areas where the balance has been disrupted by void particles or other corrupting influences.

Rather than destroying these elements, the aura gently reintegrates them into the natural order, carefully rebalancing the discordant chaos within their essences.

Withered plants find new vigor, through magical restoration and a gentle reconnection with the life force of the world.

Stagnant waters begin to flow again, finding their natural courses. The air itself seems to breathe easier, as the planet's rhythms have been restore to a proper tempo.

Deep beneath the surface, the Pillars resonate with the planet's ley lines, ancient rivers of energy that form its magical circulatory system.

These lines pulse with strength, with a new source of power, triggering a reawakening of the planet's life forces.

This network adapts to the encroaching threat, creating new defenses, and enhancing the natural resilience of the world itself.

At the intersections of these lines, brief flashes of light may be seen, reminiscent of the aurora borealis – a visible manifestation of the planet's own immune system activating.

In arid regions, the Pillars encourage the natural water cycle. They don't create water from nothing, but rather facilitate the movement of moisture through the atmosphere, gently nudging weather patterns towards balance.

Near volatile areas, the Pillars enhance the environment's natural ability to process and neutralize toxins. Ever so slightly does mana alter the atmosphere, supporting the ecosystem's capacity to maintain equilibrium.

In seismically active zones, the Pillars work with the world's natural flexibility. They don't prevent earthquakes but help distribute their energy more evenly, reducing the risk of catastrophic damage while allowing for the necessary release of tectonic tensions.

The spinning dial runes on the Pillars' surfaces begin to rotate with increasing speed, their movements blurring into a continuous band of light. This hypnotic display aligns with the planet's own rotational and orbital patterns, creating a powerful temporal harmony.

As the rotation accelerates, it establishes a fixed reference point in the river of time, anchoring the planet within the cosmic flow.

This process doesn't impose an artificial "now," but reinforces the world's natural place in the celestial dance, ensuring that even if reality itself is rewritten or the timeline altered, the world will remain tethered to its proper cosmic rhythm.

The very concept of "now" becomes more solidified, a bastion against temporal manipulation while still honoring the planet's inherent causational flow.

As the final Pillar activates, a surge of mystical energy sweeps across the planet, balancing and harmonizing the world's magical currents. The air becomes charged with arcane potential, causing those sensitive to such energies to feel a profound shift. It's not merely a slight amplification of power, but a deepening of their connection to the world's inherent magical energies.

These users would feel at their peak potential.

The background noise of the universe seems to quiet, allowing for clearer perception of the magical streams that have always flowed through reality.

Spells resonate more strongly with the natural world, cast with greater ease and potency.

Even latent magical abilities in seemingly ordinary individuals begin to stir, not as new powers, but as an awakening to the magic that has always surrounded them. The entire planet becomes a vast, living conduit for mystical energies, humming with potential yet maintaining its delicate balance.

With these formidable yet harmonious defenses in place, Wizard Spider-Man stands atop the Sanctum Sanctorum, his cloak billowing in a wind that carries whispers of arcane power.

His posture reflects both the humility of one who respects the forces of nature and the determination of a guardian ready to protect the world's equilibrium.

The Pillars of Eternity resonate in perfect harmony with the planet's own signature, creating a stable shield around the world.

As the darkness of the unknown approaches, the very fabric of the world stands prepared – not as an unyielding barrier, but as a resilient, adaptive force ready to face the greatest of cosmic obstacles.

The air crackles with anticipation, and in the eyes of the Sorcerer Supreme, there's a glimmer of hope mixed with profound reverence for the city he has sworn to protect. The stage is set for a confrontation that will test the limits of reality's natural order and the power of practiced magic.​​​​​

Was he ready? Is anyone ever ready to face the end, or the inevitable? No, but as far as he was concerned, given the cryptic warnings, and the calls from the beyond, this was suitable.

If it all went to shit, if everything *did* fail...

He could save it. The Dimensional Stability of the Planet was secured.

**The Wizard Spider-Man, true believers, can save us.**

[wizard-spider-man]

To Layer One's Defenses; Causality Conditioning and the Routine Care over one's Modified Destiny.

#In the heart of the Undercity, where skyscrapers pierced the caverns and darkness danced in lantern-lit alleys, there stood a peculiar brownstone building. Its windows glowed with an otherworldly light, and if one looked closely, they might catch glimpses of the impossible within.

**This was the Sanctum Sanctorum of the Wizard Spider-Man, a manor of mystical energies hidden in plain sight.**

He was still getting used to walking around such a huge house. Despite attempts at reducing the footprint, there wasn't much you could do about the sheer size of it from the outside. Smaller-on-the-inside-wasn't exactly dimensionally stable or appropriate.

Midst swirling incense and the soft chiming of arcane instruments, the Wizard Spider-Man sat cross-legged in the center of an intricate mandala.

As he delved deeper into meditation, the room shifted around him, impossible colors blooming in his vision. Suddenly, a tremor ran through the threads, and one began to fray. Spider-Man immediately reached out, drawing on his recently relearned magical knowledge to mend the weakening strand.

Reality is a web," he murmured, eyes closed in concentration. "And I am both the spider and the fly."

Outside, a shadow clone of the hero swung through the city streets, a conjured construct of magic and will. It patrolled tirelessly, allowing the Wizard Spider-Man the free time he needed for this crucial study.

As he worked, the Wizard Spider-Man's mind drifted to the lessons he had relearned in recent weeks. His journey back to basics had been both humbling and enlightening. He had created a structured curriculum for himself, starting with the most fundamental magical principles, many of which seemed to dance on the edge between arcane mysticism and quantum physics.

The first lessons had involved manipulating mana, the raw essence of magic that permeated reality. Spidey had spent weeks learning to perceive the flow of mana, visualizing it as streams of bioluminescent particles that swirled around him. He practiced drawing this energy into himself, feeling it resonate with the unique frequency in his own biosignatures.

From there, he had moved on to more complex techniques. One particularly challenging exercise involved creating micro-portals, tears in space-time no larger than a pinhead. He would open these portals in pairs, using them to redirect beams of light or bursts of magical energy. This required intense concentration and precise control over both mystical forces and the fundamental laws of physics. The practice was insightful however as he learned how to regulate unstable power streams in the process.

As he stabilized and reconditioned the fraying thread, Spidey sensed the borrowed cosmic energies within it - chaotic forces threatening to consume the delicate strand. He could feel the fierce, primal energy of the tear in causality, its entropy seeking to unravel his very existence. Alongside it, cold tendrils from his encounter with Craterus sought to corrupt and twist the thread's purpose. Most concerning were the faint echoes of the Id Stone's power, each a siren song tempting him to reshape reality on a whim.

The Wizard Spider-Man knew all too well the dangers of relying heavily on these external sources. Such power, while immense, exacted a steep price - a gradual erosion of his own agency and an increasing vulnerability to forces beyond his control. With practiced precision, he began the intricate process of rebalancing the discordant energies.

He focused on his own unique energy signature, In his mind's eye, this manifested as a shimmering web of blue-white light, pulsing with vitality and limitless potential. With subtle manipulations of both his physical hands and mystical will, Spidey began to weave this personal energy into the fibers of the causality thread. It was painstaking work, requiring him to integrate his essence on a quantum level while simultaneously maintaining the thread's fragile integrity.

Carefully and methodically, the Wizard Spider-Man shaped his mana into a stabilizing force. Where the frays burned too hot with chaotic energy, his essence cooled and tempered the destructive flames. In areas corrupted by entropy, his light pushed back the encroaching darkness. The reality-warping echoes of the Id Stone were gently but firmly redirected, their power diffused and integrated more harmoniously into the thread's structure. Cleverly, the Wizard convinced the Stone to assist in the healing process.

With each careful adjustment, Spidey could feel the thread becoming more stable, wild fluctuations smoothing out into a steady, controlled flow that resonated with his own magical frequency.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

As the ritual reached its peak, reality bent around him. Strands of pure magical energy wove into his being, strengthening his connection to the cosmic web. The orb of causality strings was less like a rubber band ball and more like an organized ball of yarn. It spun and flowed with renewed balance in his hand before dispersing into the beyond.

As the energies settled, Spider-Man realized this complex process of maintaining his causality would need to become a regular part of his routine, a necessary sacrifice to safeguard both his powers and the fabric of his causality.

Exhausted, Spider-Man rose and approached a nearby bookshelf. The gifted tome "On the Nature of Mana" sat on the table, open to the page describing this very ritual for attuning one's essence to the fundamental forces of reality.

[wizard-spider-man]

To Layer One's Defenses; the Staff of Idaldin.

In the shadowy undercroft of the Sanctum Sanctorum, an air of anticipation hung thick like incense in a smokey room. The Wizard Spider-Man, stood steadfast, feel firmly planted the cold stone floor, his eyes closed in intense concentration. The chamber pulsed with the potent energies of creation, emanating from the ancient Akashic Codex that rested nearby.

Its carved glyphs seemed to writhe with arcane knowledge and divine secrets, empowering the cosmic ritual about to unfold.

((https://www.reddit.com/r/wizardposting/s/RcxDcg1lDF))

The Wizard Spider-Man had spent weeks preparing for this moment. In the scheme of his studies, the ritual he was going to undertake truly was years in the making.

He had traversed countless dimensions, studied under several different mystical masters, and fell into the vortex of cosmic mysteries that would shatter the minds of lesser beings.

He carried the blessing of Infinity, Eternity, the Living Tribunal, and even Aldin the Cosmic, Aspect of Consciousness. His friends in Asfelaeia counted on him, counted on *Spider-Man* to save them.

Stephen Strange thrust this mantle upon him, prophesying great purpose for the Wizard Spider-Man.

It was time to make something of that.

It was time to prove his worth. If to anyone, to himself; to the ever present doubts that plague his psyche.

To his Uncle.

His Aunt.

His Wife...

Their children.

Now, at this recent peak of magical prowess, he was ready to forge a weapon that would safeguard reality itself. Not just this one, but the totality of absolute creation. The Sorcerer Supreme does not deal in half measures. There are no take backsies.

As Spidey approached the lectern upon which the Codex rested, the air crackled and shimmered with mystic energy. The hallowed tablet pulsed with an ethereal radiance, its cuneiform etchings shifting and undulating as if it were alive.

The Codex's aura was as intimidating as it was inspiring.

With reverence born of hard-won wisdom, the Wizard traced his finger along the godly glyphs, his eyes locked and focused on each rune.

These were no ordinary words, they were the divine etchings of the High Gods themselves, sacred utterances that compelled the very facets of reality itself to obey, the forgotten tongues of worldshapers marked Zathran's cuneiform.

***"Who? One. What? Sunlight. Where? Soil. When? Now. Why? Stars. How? Soul."***

In dual tones the Wizard's Sanctum shakes with each spoken word, the Universe resisting the commands of power.

***"eswi euriensv, i ekcnbo ruoy deenbieoc, deeh ym dmanocm, i lilw ton thru uoy."***

The very fabric of reality seemed to bend and flex around him, acknowledging the power he was invoking.

Drawing a deep breath, Spider-Man began the Sacred Rite of Zonei, an intricate incantation that would unlock the Codex's mastery over the fundamental particles of reality. As the primordial word sounds spilled from his lips, the air shimmered and warped, matter itself bending to his will.

#eswi euriensv, i ekcnbo ruoy deenbieoc, deeh ym dmanocm, i lilw ton thru uoy!

In the center of the room, a mechanical forge of his own design hummed to life. Its furnace glowed with an intensity that rivaled the hearths of home, slowly melting the precious fragments of flametal within.

This godly steel, said to be forged by mighty titans in the cores of the First Born Stars of Creation, would form the foundation of this masterwork.

With a graceful wave of his hand, the Wizard summoned the molten metal towards him. He guided it through the air with arcane finesse. The liquid flametal danced and swirled, gradually taking the shape of a staff fit for a god.

As the metal cooled and solidified, Spider-Man called upon the Genesis Invocation.

A whirlwind of cosmic energy engulfed him, infusing his very essence with the immeasurable might of first-reality-born creation energies. He could sense the guiding influence of Zathran, the Archmagus Ascendant, guiding his spirit with profound purpose.

Rainbow energies from the ancient tomes surrounding him wove themselves into the metal, etching intricate sigils and runes upon its surface. Each symbol pulsed with potential, sealing within the staff an immense and untapped ocean of magical energy.

The final component of this divine project floated before him: the Id Stone. This limitless gemstone shimmered with an ethereal blue glow, embodying the essence of Aldin's boundless intellect and the raw, untamed energy of the cosmos. It was a gift meant to defend reality, created from the fusion of an Infinity Stone and Aldin's own primordial life force.

((https://www.reddit.com/r/wizardposting/s/UMIQHsTLtL))

The Id Stone represented more than just power; it was a sentient echo, a thought form that personified the cosmos itself. It thrived on instinct and survival, defying the conventional rules of magic and natural order.

As the Wizard Spider-Man bound its power to the flametal staff, he felt the weight of the staff's immense potential settle on his being.

The union of the Id Stone and the staff was cataclysmic. Energy surged and crackled, transforming the staff into a glorious and powerful spear—the Staff of Idaldin.

It shines with an inner light, sparkling with electric potential that made the air itself hum with anticipation.

As the transformation came to pass, the Wizard Spider-Man grasped the Staff of Idaldin firmly in both hands. It responds to his touch, the hum of its power growing louder.

The rush of unadulterated aether was intoxicating, threatening to overwhelm his entire being. For a moment, his mind teetered on the brink of madness, feeling the raw chaos of the cosmos surge through it.

For a brief second, the vortex of causality screams inside Spider-Man's eyes, and everything that will ever come to pass, or has already passed, flashes across the screen of his inner sight.

#Focus.

The Wizard Spider-Man had not come this far to falter to the latent ramblings of the cosmos.

Drawing upon years of discipline and the unshakeable moral core that had guided him through these countless trials, he silenced the tide of cosmic temptation. The Vortex grows quiet, the Staff, sensing the strength of its wielder, calms in his grasp.

The Artifact has Chosen its Curator.

The Wizard realized then that the purpose of this Staff was not to be a weapon of destruction, but a tool of stability.

In his hands, it became an anchor, a fixed point in the swirling storm of reality. Through it, he could channel the immense power he now commanded, shaping it with precision and purpose rather than being consumed by it.

As the energies settled, the Wizard Spider-Man opened his eyes, now glowing with an otherworldly light.

A satisfied smile crept across his features, weathered by years of both physical and mystical struggle.

He had crafted not a weapon, but a symbol of hope and order, in a Universe often threatened by darkness and chaos.

The Staff of Idaldin pulsed gently in his grip, a reassuring weight that reminded him of the responsibility he bore. With this tool, he would defend reality itself, standing as a bulwark against forces that sought to unravel the very fabric of existence.

As he ascended the stairs from the undercroft, emerging into the main halls of the Sanctum Sanctorum, the Wizard Spider-Man felt a renewed sense of purpose.

The challenges ahead would be great, the enemies fearsome, but with the wisdom he had gained, he was ready to face whatever the multiverse would throw at him.

The dawn of another day had begun, at its center stood the Sorcerer Supreme, a guardian of reality itself. Asfelaeia's vigilant protector.

The Staff of Idaldin gleamed in the morning light, a beacon of hope in a world that would need heroes to light the way.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

The Wizard taps the ground, the staff crackles, reacting to the thought and will of the Spider. The plot of ground that he stands on summons two Eternity Pillars.

From the dirt of Undercity rises the Sanctum Sanctorum, a proud symbol of the mystical Sorcerer. The enchanted building would serve as another dimensional barrier for the world to turn to when times needed it.

He looks at the Sanctum, and at the people passing by. In a sense, this was a formal announcement; Spider-Man is home. Spider-Man is here to stay.

The Wizard then steps into the Sanctum, closing the door behind him.

[wizard-spider-man]

A Gift from the Cosmic.

Asfelaeia, Hell's Favorite City.

The Wizard Spider-Man felt an unsettling vibration in the core of his being. A feeling he couldn't shake since he first appeared in the realm.

It was the Spider-Sense, a gift once shared by his variants across the multiverse, but one rarely acknowledged for its true nature. More than a mere danger sense, it resonates with the web of reality.

And now, it hummed incessantly, a discordant note that spoke of impending doom.

The city was abuzz with fearful whispers, sparked by the proclamation of a known liar named Krask. While many dismissed his ravings, the Wizard couldn't shake the feeling that this time, the Father of Lies might have stumbled upon a terrible truth.

In his sanctum, the Wizard sat before his palantír. Arcane objects cluttered every surface, their latent power crackling in the air. With practiced motions, he began a ritual of contact, his senses hyper-aware of the delicate balance between worlds.

"Aldin," he intoned, his voice resonating with mystical energy. "I initiate this ritual to make contact. An individual named Krask has declared to the city of Asfelaeia that reality itself approaches the void."

The Wizard's voice grew heavy with the weight of memory.

"My universe was destroyed by the essence of absence itself, tendrils of crimson red extinguishing the stars. I fear this experience may be indicative of the entity in question."

His fingers traced symbols in the air as he continued, "I seek counsel, maybe guidance. Particularly information. The planet itself could be utilized as an anchor to stabilize our own self-sustaining bubble in the storm."

The air thickened with potent magic, and the artifacts around the room trembled with energy.

Suddenly, a shimmering portal opened in the center of the chamber. The Wizard leapt to his feet, momentarily startled by the abrupt intrusion. He had expected a more gradual reveal, a failure in the series of mystical barriers that exist before reaching his most inner Sanctum Sanctorum.

Taking a deep breath, the Wizard Spider-Man stepped through the portal and into the Nexus of Aldin. The transition was instantaneous, reality shifting around him like quicksand.

The Wizard stepped into an arcane dimension, an outer spacial area that sat anchored on the precipice of eternity. The Windows within the nebula-splashed marble interior revealed the swirling coils of creation itself, churning stars and universes swirling about the great expanse.

ALDIN'S NEXUS.

"Aldin?" he called out, his voice echoing in the vast cosmic space. "It's me, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man. I'm here finally. Sorry I'm late on the offer. I had to stop a robbery, you know how it goes. Guy said stick 'em up, I said sure, he took a web to the face..."

The Wizard's quip trailed off as he took in his surroundings. The Nexus was a marvel beyond words, a grand hall that seemed to stretch into infinity. Ornate pillars of starlight supported a ceiling that shimmered with the birth and death of galaxies. Through cosmic windows, he glimpsed churning seas of nebulae, their colors more vivid than any he had ever seen.

"Ah, hello Spider-Man, glad you could make it!" A voice resonated within his mind, warm and welcoming, yet tinged with an otherworldly quality that vibrated his skull from the inside.

The Wizard spun around, searching for the source of the voice. "Glad to be here..." he responded cautiously, his mystical senses on high alert.

In a shimmer of cosmic energy, Aldin materialized before him. The being was a vision of ethereal beauty – a strapping figure clad in a suit that seemed woven from the very fabric of the universe. Long, flowing hair framed features that suggested an Elven appearance.

"Hello!" Aldin's physical voice matched the one that had spoken in the Wizard's mind. "Sorry. I do the disembodied voice thing to all newcomers, but I prefer this form. It's the most... 'Me' I can be, I think."

He extended a hand, earlier caution melting away. "Oh hey there! Nice suit. Very cosmically-important. So, I need to know everything there is to know about a variety of topics. Shall we explore your library?" the Wizard Spider-Man asked, his eyes gleaming with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.

Aldin's lips curved into a knowing smile. "Why thank you! Now, what exactly are you looking for?"

The Wizard fumbled in his robes, producing a tattered notepad. The pages were filled with hurried scrawls, arcane symbols, and what appeared to be doodles of spider webs in the margins. He cleared his throat and began to read:

"Craterus. Anafabula. Fundamentals to Reality Creation, Wards against Absence and Lacking Of; how to create against uncreation..." He paused, a hint of sheepishness creeping into his voice. "Oh! And the most universally aligned cheeseburger. That's more a bonus seeking, given the offer and opportunity. I've searched many libraries, in many dimensions. There just isn't a good guide to be found. Unless..?"

Aldin's brow raised in curiosity.

"Hmmm, one moment." With a graceful wave of his hand, tomes began to materialize around them. A book on Craterus, its cover weathered and ominous.

A small volume that resembled a diary more than a scholarly text.

Several weighty books on magic and anti-magic, their pages seeming to whisper with arcane secrets.

Tomes on wards and the void, their bindings pulsing with ethereal energy. And finally, a collection of personal notebooks labeled 'experiments' in elegant script.

"I shall go look for some more..." Aldin said, turning towards the endless shelves that stretched into the cosmic distance.

The Wizard Spider-Man accepted the books with reverence, carefully stowing them in his bag of holding. The magic thrummed against his fingers as he placed them inside, a reminder of the power contained within their pages. He kept the book on Craterus and the diary-like volume on the table before him, an inexplicable connection drawing his attention to them.

As he began to leaf through the pages, the knowledge within threatened to overwhelm his senses. The book on Craterus held a wealth of information, including at least three methods of stopping it, but this threat had come to pass. Perhaps the essences in Time could be used for a later purpose.

The diary belonged to Anafabula herself. Its pages chronicled her early life and her descent into madness, filled with increasingly frantic writings about returning to the Absence.

The Wizard felt a chill run down his spine as he read, the words seeming to writhe on the page like living things.

His contemplation was interrupted by Aldin's return.

To the Wizard's surprise, the cosmic being now sported a chef's hat perched atop his flowing layers. "Oh, and here," Aldin said with a grin. "You said something about the most universally aligned cheeseburger."

The Wizard's eyes widened behind his mask. "Yes actually," he said, closing the tome before him. "What do you got for me?"

With a flourish, Aldin placed an absolutely mouthwatering burger on the desk. Golden-brown bun, perfectly melted cheese, the aroma of perfectly seasoned beef wafting through the air. "Hope you like it!"

Together, the Wizard and the mysterious Aldin sat down to share the massive, universally perfect burger. As the Wizard took his first bite, flavors exploded across his palate.

It tasted like the very essence of culinary perfection, as if it existed at the intersection of all possible ideal burgers in the multiverse.

Between bites, the Wizard couldn't contain his curiosity.

"So tell me about yourself. This Nexus of yours, I get the feeling this place is very cosmically important. With a threat labeled 'reality ending' I'm sure I'm in the right place to coordinate some plan of action here."

Aldin's eyes seemed to glow with an inner light as he began to speak.

"I am the aspect of knowledge, and consciousness. In the beginning, and I mean THE beginning, before there was even the concept of nothing, we existed in the sense that everything always has, but there was no thought. No concepts, only the Singularity, and the Anafabula which surrounded it. From them, I was borne into the vast and empty void. But still something was missing.... what? Why? When? Where? Who? And how? These were questions. THE questions. They formed my first thoughts. The first thoughts. And they have been the driving force of all sentience ever since. That is who I am," Aldin said, his tone humble despite the cosmic weight of his words.

The Wizard Spider-Man's jaw dropped, the half-eaten burger forgotten in his hand. "So wait. You're basically God?" he sputtered. "Or like The God, in a Pantheon of Other Gods? Forgive my lack of class, I should have given you much more courtesy. Manners. Oh Honorable one... This burger by the way, is exuberantly delicious."

His words tumbled out in a rush of awe and confusion. "So you're telling me, that we're speaking the very essence of knowledge, itself? This is... a lot.

My brain is frying and tingling. Do I need to like get on my knees and kneel? Should I pray to you? Will you strike me down with a thunderbolt of judgment? Should I sacrifice a goat or sheep? Most importantly, what do you need of me to save the whole of existence?"

Aldin chuckled, the sound reminiscent of stars chiming against one another. "Not *The* God. And technically not even *A* god. My first living creations named themselves as *High Gods* though. I'm more of... a fundamental piece of reality. I am part of it as it is part of me. Is this making sense?"

The Wizard leaned back in his chair, which seemed to mold itself perfectly to his form, both comfortable and slightly unnerving in its perfection. "You're a part of reality, reality is a part of you. So you're telling me you know the secret to the universe, don't you? Of course you do. There's no question you do."

Aldin's expression turned wistful. "That's just the thing... I don't! If I could answer those six fundamental questions.... maybe we wouldn't even be here right now. But I cannot. At least... not yet."

"Hence the library?" Spider-Man said, his words muffled by a mouthful of cosmic burger. He swallowed hastily. "Nevermind. Your cosmically-ness is distracting me from more important matters."

Setting aside his plate, the Wizard placed his bag of holding on the table. As he rummaged through its impossibly vast interior, he continued,

"I'm trying to understand my role as what this guy Strange called the Sorcerer Supreme. I feel destined or at least compelled to protect this reality, after the catastrophic loss of mine. I was hoping we could discuss ways to save reality. I've got a few ideas, but I don't know what exactly we might be dealing with."

Aldin's gaze turned distant, as if peering into the very fabric of existence. "Well, whatever it is, it's a power that rivals the Anafabula. She too was an entity outside of reality in the beginning. It is quite possible we are dealing with something of her kind, if she was not singular in her being. Or perhaps there is yet a higher plane. And multiple realities sit upon it at once. I know of other universes, even of other multiverses, the omniverse if you will. But... suppose there is.... something else, something higher. Something... beyond," he replied, his eyes following the Wizard's movements as he continued to search through the bag.

The Wizard Spider-Man leaned back, his mind reeling with the implications. "So the best case scenario is we deal with an anomaly, and the worst case scenario is beyond understanding, as the concept of higher reality, and the possibility of something beyond it is beyond our comprehension."

He ran a hand through hood, frustration evident in his voice.

"So. Crap. What do I even do against that?" The weight of responsibility seemed to press down on him, time ticking away in his mind. He needed to find ways to empower himself, to stand a chance against the encroaching void.

A spark of inspiration hit him. "You said you're a part of... reality itself. Can I ask for a blessing? And maybe some more books."

Aldin's brow furrowed in deep thought, the cosmic energies around him swirling in response to his contemplation. "Hmm... the thing always shunts the Nexus into the void... but if you could wield the Id..... one moment."

In a blink, Aldin vanished, only to reappear seconds later. His form had subtly changed, radiating an even more potent aura of power. "Take this," he said, his voice resonating with newfound authority. "It shall allow you to use a portion of my power. The Id. Neither magic, nor anti-magic, but sheer force of will."

The Wizard Spider-Man, sensing the gravity of the moment, reached into his bag of holding. From its depths, he withdrew a glowing red gem – the Power Stone, one of many legendary Infinity Stones scattered across the multiverse. With reverence, he passed it to Aldin.

This was what he was looking for in the bag. It was as if the two of them had the same idea, at the same time.

The stone floated between them, pulsing with contained energy. As Aldin takes it, he infuses his essence into it, the Power Stone's glow intensified, shifting and changing as it interacted with the Id Forces being subjected to it.

The air crackled with potential, reality itself seeming to bend around the merging of these cosmic powers. The Red Stone grows a new layer of facets, colored cyan. The red fades to pink, and the stone grows slightly larger.

When the process was complete, the stone had transformed into something new – neither solely an Infinity Stone nor purely Aldin's power, but a fusion of both.

"There... that should do it," Aldin said, a note of wonder in his voice. "I must admit, putting the essence of a concept into a stone... not a terrible idea. Just... be careful not to let it slip from your grasp."

This was a gift.

The newly forged Id Stone drifted towards the Wizard Spider-Man. With utmost care, he stored it in his bag of holding, acutely aware of the immense power now in his possession.

"I have an idea for this," the Wizard said, his mind already racing with possibilities. "Thank you, Aldin. Is there anything this friendly neighborhood wizard can do for you? I feel like I owe you for this. Your generosity does not go unnoticed, or unappreciated."

As the Wizard spoke, the nexus faded away in a wispy wind of shimmering glass.

He was back at home, looking over the city.

[wizard-spider-man]

Fundamentals to Reality Creation; the Akashic Codex by Archmagus Zathran

**The Akashic Codex, an ancient cuneiform etched from the very threads of existence itself! Inscribed by the celestial hand of Zathran, the Archmagus Ascendant, this hallowed tablet resonates with unfathomable power, a testament to the godly might of its creator.**

**For Zathran was once a Man, A Mage like You or I, in his Wisdom upon Ascension from this realm, he left us these texts to decipher for knowledge.**

**This Codex is a repository of ancient knowledge, its arcane etchings pulse with an ethereal radiance, beckoning those bold or mad enough to unlock its secrets. Within its glyphs and runes lie the key to shaping the very foundations of nature's law and order.**

**Through the Sacred Rite of Zonei, the Codex unveils the intricate mastery over the fundamental particles that weave the fabrics of reality. With a mere thought, one can bend and reshape matter itself, conjuring objects from the ether or transmuting existing forms into new configurations.**

**The Codex grants dominion over the currents of time, allowing the wielder to traverse the vast expanse of chronology at will. One can accelerate or reverse the flow of moments, freeze instants in perpetual stasis, or even create temporal paradoxes, bending the fabric of causality to their whim.**

**Among the Codex's myriad of secrets lies the "Genesis Invocation," a ritual that allows the wielder to tap into the Xonai Singularity, the essence of the latent cosmic ether. This divine wellspring of mana imbues the practitioner with cosmic might beyond mortal comprehension, at the consequence of Zathran's will compelling the user's spirit. This ensures the energy can only be wielded for benevolent purposes, and never with destructive intent, lest they are destroyed by Zathran's influence completely.**

[wizard-spider-man]

"Wards Against Absence and Lacking Of" by Sevritus Arenuius

**This ancient tome, bound in otherworldly leather and adorned with intricate runes, shimmers with an unnatural glow. Indeed this book holds the great secrets to safeguarding the very essence of existence.**

**Penned by the long lost mad-man-mystic Sevritus Arenuius, its pages are the amassed collection of mad scrawlings, experiments, and rituals of the one (or many, it is hard to say,) who dared to pursue the darkest questions of the cosmos.**

**Seeking a means to shield reality from the insidious forces of the void, Arenuius embarked on the dangerous task of unravelling the mysterious workings of existence itself.**

**In the fathomless void that lies beyond the veil of creation, a malevolent presence lurks, an existential threat that predates the dawn of reality itself. The antithesis of all that is, to consume the very fabric of existence, eroding the foundations of the multiverse until nothing remains but emptiness.**

**And yet, many things seem to take on the definition of such a thing. This was a simple but profound realization.**

**Absence.**

**It was this looming peril, that drove Arenuius to abandon the comforts of the known world and pursue the most forbidden realms of knowledge he could find. Truth it would be that his own home world died as a result of his descent into madness.**

**The tome carries weight of the lives of countless, some even bound to its very pages. A cruel fate for the departed.**

**Risking his very sanity, Sevritus pursued the lore of ancient civilizations long forgotten, deciphering cryptic texts and unraveling the mysteries of eons past, all in the pursuit of a means to ward off encroaching oblivion.**

**These bygone realms were said to wield arcane forces that defied the natural laws of the natural world. Whispers spoke of civilizations that harnessed the very fabric of reality itself, bending it to their will through intricate rituals and esoteric knowledge.**

**Other societies thrived on the mastery of these mystical arts, their ways of life inextricably intertwined with the ebb and flow of cosmic power. Yet, for all their supposed might, they ultimately faded into obscurity, leaving behind only fragmented accounts and enigmatic relics, or in some cases just trace essences from moments in time.**

**Beyond the veil, the enigmas that dwelled within the void were enough to chill the blood of even the most resolute truth seekers. Yet, it was the very horror of the unknown that fueled Sevritus' relentless pursuit, for only by unraveling the secrets of absence could one hope to stand against it.**

**Just as the deepest trenches of the ocean remain largely unexplored, harboring unspeakable horrors in their lightless depths, so too does the abyss beyond existence, beholding terrors that defied comprehension. The inky blackness that enveloped these realms was a palpable presence, a malevolent force that seemed to devour all semblance of hope and reason.**

**To dive too deeply into such mysteries was to risk losing one's grip on all they hold dear.**

**This tome hums with otherworldly energy, the mana binding it together being anchored to the pure quintessence of numerous dead realities.**

**Through years of relentless study and experimentation, Arenuius unlocked the secrets of these ancient magics and cosmically, each work of spellbinding more potent than the last.**

**One such powerful enchantment, was crafted by tapping into the primordial energies that birthed existence itself.**

**Drawn from the teachings of a mysterious Conclave, an order of star-seers and cosmic scholars, the Hymn of Aurelia harnesses the raw potential of creation; the Celestial Glow.**

**The Celestial Glow is an energy directly funneled from the mythical, chaotic all-spark that creates a Universe. When it was discovered, it was that one Universe's Dominant Magical Essence.**

**In the darkest depths of the Obsidian Spheres, a dimension of shifting causalities; a grim civilization of shadow-wreathed sorcerers practiced forbidden arts, channeling the very embrace of cosmic terror into their dark rituals.**

**Yet, through these paradoxical rituals, their mastery of cursed tongues and eldritch glyphs allowed them to harness the pure energy of stars, weaving spells of brilliant mystical starlight. The life-affirming power born from the very heart of existential dread. Grass would grow, trees would bloom. Until the Obsidian King returned the verdant spheres to darkness.**

**The Radiant Glyphs of Obsidia would bring the light of life to the darkest of shadows, curing the worst wastelands, and restoring the most corrupted plains.**

**Beloved and revered throughout a prosperous realm of evergreen, the benevolent witch Elara dedicated her life to the pursuit of healing and renewal. Her enchantment, a masterwork of divine sorcery, drew upon the boundless love she held for all living things, channeling that pure, nurturing essence into a blanket of rejuvenating magic.**

**Wherever Elara trod, withered landscapes bloomed anew, and the infirm found themselves suffused with vitality, a testament to the transformative power of selfless affection. The people loved her, and they destroyed their world mourning her.**

**The Veil of Elara Verenia could heal the deadliest of illnesses, the greatest of plagues, and the strongest of pains.**

**Yet, for all its power, the tome is a double-edged sword, for the knowledge contained within its pages is a burden too great for most to bear. Arenuius himself, it is said, succumbed to the weight of his own revelations, mind shattered by the cosmic truths he had unearthed.**

**His final words, scribbled in a frantic hand upon the tome's innermost pages, speak a truth too terrible to comprehend, a reality-shattering revelation that drove him to the brink of madness.**

**Many, very many things in this reality came from the Abyss. The essences that these beings, Absence, was present in all of them, no matter where in the multiverse Sevritus would go. This truth reduces his final pages to runes and cyphers, and unintelligible language potentially from the Beyond.**

**While not inherently malevolent, the careless or ill-informed use of the wards and enchantments detailed within this tome could unleash catastrophic consequences, unraveling the delicate balance of reality itself once again.**