December 18th, 2015, Friday—one week before Christmas.
The Sorcerer Supreme dispelled the enchantment covering the dungeon and awakened Solomon from his stasis. This was the exact time Solomon had preset for his awakening five hundred years ago. Had the Sorcerer Supreme failed to wake him in time, the time-bound spell would have expired on its own. Solomon had specifically reserved a week for preparation—to give himself time to think. To avoid running into his counterpart from this timeline, Solomon chose to stay inside the dungeon, relying on the life support systems of his powered armor to survive the next seven days until the final battle. Apart from transcribing scrolls and reading, he also spent time discussing with the Ancient One how best to handle the Eyes of the World.
The Ancient One believed the Eyes of the World must not be destroyed.
Though the Eyes did not rival the Time Stone in raw power, they offered an alternative means of time manipulation—something the Silver Key could not achieve, and something far more accessible. Especially in the looming disaster involving the Infinity Stones, if all of Solomon's preparations were to fail and the Time Stone itself be compromised, retaining the Eyes of the World would mean preserving a final contingency. Since the soul-sea was already in upheaval due to the Eyes' imbalance, the best course of action was to find the counterpart—the Eye of Light, belonging to the lineage of sages. Combined with what Solomon had witnessed five hundred years ago—in a timeline where Bayonetta had never been sealed—the Ancient One and Solomon made a bold decision that utterly violated Kamar-Taj's core tenets.
They would interrupt the current timeline's time loop, extract the Eye of Light from another timeline, and ensure that the Chaos God Asa's power was eradicated forever—eliminating any possibility of someone gaining full control over the Eyes of the World.
To accomplish this, they would have to raise the young Cereza carefully, ensuring she recovered swiftly from her mother's death and was never sealed underwater by Jeanne. Additionally, they would need to bring Balder—the bearer of the Eye of Light—into this timeline, restoring balance to the Eyes. The Ancient One and Solomon used the Time Stone to simulate tens of millions of outcomes for the final battle. No matter how the process varied, the end result always led to the Prophet reclaiming the lost half of Asa's power, seizing the Eyes of the World, and ultimately fusing his soul into Balder's body, causing the Sun Island Incident—a complete time loop.
However, Balder had once sent young Cereza into the future, which led to her never being sealed. This proved that in another timeline, the Sun Island Incident could never happen—revealing a window where the Ancient One and Solomon could manipulate the timeline, executing a seamless swap and merge between loops. As long as the right events were triggered at the right times, the timeline could be altered without violating critical temporal nodes.
Such a plan obviously couldn't be executed in just one week.
In fact, the plan had begun long ago, when the Sorcerer Supreme used the pretense of searching for the Darkhold to arrange a meeting between Solomon and Bayonetta. Details were relayed by Solomon's future self to his past self through the Time Stone via the Ancient One. Though the logic and causality were exceedingly complex, it amounted to another time loop: Solomon guiding every step of his past self, ensuring that all actions aligned with the plan—an ouroboros biting its own tail.
The only part Solomon hadn't anticipated was the Ancient One throwing caution to the wind, pushing the plan even further. If they had already come this far, why not push harder? Why not alter some non-critical temporal nodes?
For example—why not use the Time Stone on Rosa's corpse and reclaim her soul from her contract demon?
Balder was still reeling. As for Bayonetta, the calm and poise she had fought to maintain nearly crumbled.
Solomon himself didn't take it well when he learned that Rosa had actually been living in Kamar-Taj for five hundred years. Especially not when he found out she had changed his diapers when he was a baby. Worse still, the dungeon warden he had seen five centuries ago had long since died of old age and been buried beneath the crypts. The person who had shown him the dungeon the first time... had been Rosa, hidden beneath an illusion spell. Solomon had no one to blame—everything was the result of his own scheming, and now he was just reaping the consequences of his actions.
"No time for shock, Balder!" Rosa shouted as she charged toward the Prophet—still recovering from the pulse cannon's direct hit—under the cover of the war machine's secondary weapons. Solomon quickly followed. He didn't ride Pegasus but ran straight toward the Prophet's impact point. Constantine, true to his role as a Royal Guard, followed close behind, clearing out the remaining angels and demons along the way. The three of them were among the few combatants who remained unaffected by the power of Chaos God Asa.
But they alone were not enough.
That's why Solomon, the Sorcerer Supreme, and Marbas had jointly designed a magical version of the war machine—serving as an insurance policy for this mission. The twin cannons mounted on the machines' shoulders, from energy conduits to the runes etched within the barrels, were all personally designed by the Sorcerer Supreme and Solomon, intended solely for the complete annihilation of Chaos God Asa.
In the future, humanity could no longer rely solely on Kamar-Taj and the Sorcerer Supreme to resist extra-dimensional threats. Other definitive forces would be necessary. These two experimental war machines were a first attempt. The science-only versions would be deployed on future battlefields, and when facing enemies who wielded magic, the union of magic and technology would become the backbone of warfare.
————————————
"Post-Battle Logistics and Impact Report: Fimbulwinter Mountain Conflict," Page 5,364
Appendix B, Section 17: Personal Recollections
Authored by: Victoria Hand, Intelligence Division Chief
[Source] Immortal City Database Alpha-00
[Requester] █████
[Database Level] Crimson - Top Secret
[Clearance Level] Crimson - Top Secret
[Access Code] *************
[Genetic Sequence Authenticated — PASSED]
[Voice Print Authenticated — PASSED]
[Iris Scan Authenticated — PASSED]
[Arcane Authentication — PASSED]
[Clearance Fully Verified]
[WARNING: Unauthorized access strictly prohibited]
This was the second time I witnessed the Monarch's power.
The first was during the Chitauri invasion of Earth. The Monarch stood atop Stark Tower, fighting back against the gate that endlessly poured aliens into our skies. Even after the invasion, I remained skeptical of how powerful a single person could be—after all, I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. Yes, all of Manhattan and New York remembered the terrifying beam of light that pierced the heavens, and sure, every glassmaker in America remembers how much business that beam brought them. But as an agent stationed in a secret S.H.I.E.L.D. base, I believed only what I saw and verified myself—not redacted reports or blurry TV footage.
This time, I stood on the command deck and watched the Monarch's power through satellite and comm feeds. From that moment forward, I no longer had any doubts.
I can say this with certainty—he is the most powerful human being I've ever seen.
"Human"—that's what he calls himself.
It's not just me. Many of my colleagues have debated whether the Monarch can even still be considered human. No one believes a being with that kind of power could still be human, even if he looks no different from anyone else.
[I suggest we approach this rationally. Just as the Asgardians were really aliens, maybe the Monarch has some... peculiar lineage.]
[WARNING: Reading the above blasphemous speculation requires a purity audit.]
(End of Chapter)
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