With images flashing so fast that to others they’d look blurry and indistinct, Ben sat and watched with all of the bodies he had, taking in information with interest as the known multiverse was laid out before him.

Even as powerful as the grey were, there were limits to what they could perceive if the laws a reality contained were too different. Some were just too alien from their perception, either holding too many spatial dimensions to be able to comprehend or worse, multiple time dimensions, but through all of that there was wonder and mystery. Universes that seemed empty and barren of life at first glance yet had towering structures that seemed designed by living minds, their construction able to be seen as it happened by either a strange law of that universe or else being made by other things their technology couldn’t see like the spirits of his current world. Realities that weren’t empty but instead akin to primordial seas, with no void between their equivalents of stars, allowing all life that evolved within to access every other part of that great ocean as it spread and so much more still.

They were able to tell him of worlds using alien magics whose principles defied everything Ben had already learned and things that were either gods or like gods who called it home and the ways they’d rule, forcing him to be just marginally more grateful for the ones he had to deal with in comparison.

It was too soon to tell if worlds like the grey’s, pleiaden’s, and Earth were the outliers, holding no gods nor anything that could be called magic, at least not from his current sample size and even not when looking at their total observations when comparing a million realities against a potentially endless multiverse but all of it filled his interest and captured his imagination, with questions already forming in his head.

Like, did the summoning and terraforming spells actually come from this universe originally? Given what we know, the timeline for some ancient civilization to have appeared and created these things currently doesn’t make sense but there are still errors in the current model of the universe; it’s possible it’s much older than it seems but what if that’s not the answer? What if something more advanced passed through from outside, played around a bit to figure out the rules, left some of its creations laying around to be found and then just left for somewhere else? It’s not exactly possible to know but I sure as hell want to hope I can find an answer to that someday.

Of course, a larger part of him knew that that someday would almost certainly never come, even if he had millennia to see it. How was he or anyone supposed to search out such answers in the cosmos when so many who might hold a clue about these ancient histories were going to be long dead? The two spells he had were by all accounts randomly discovered by some of the void gods too, even if the terraforming spell may have at one point been in possession of a star race, he just didn’t have any hope that enough information about their creators could have lasted to the present day.

Which in itself is a shame because one more spell would probably give me some easy access to new mana modifiers but for now-

The shop door opened, breaking his line of thought and paused the displays as Thera entered, stopping as she noticed Quilith with him and all of the projections around.

“Sorry, am I interrupting?”

“No no, of course not. Quilith, you mind if we stop here and pick back up the next time?”

“Of course, be well until then, Ben.”

The alien left from there, blinking out of existence with each of his displays, leaving the shop instantly emptier for Ben to focus his attention back on his girlfriend.

“And like that, I am completely free. What’s up?”

“Just wanted to spend some time with you.”

She could see his eyes light up as soon as the words left her mouth.

“And does that mean…?”

“Yes, you are somewhat forgiven for very traumatically almost dying on my lap.”

“Mmh, I appreciate that but somehow the way you said it makes me kind of feel like I’m not.”

“Largely forgiven,” She clarified. “But Ben, I took master of all today.”

“Oh, seriously? That’s great!”

“Yeah, and among other things, would you like to know one particular change that came with it?”

“...My gut is telling me I probably don’t.”

“Stress resistance, Ben. It gave me the skill stress resistance and I do in fact blame you for that.”

“To my meager defense, I’d like to think that all of your stress from work has been adding to that too.”

“It’s going to be around fifty-fifty. But you know the worst part? Getting it didn’t seem to lower my stress at all.”

“It might not be so much lowering the amount of stress you feel but the responses that come with it,” He offered. “High blood pressure, headaches, anxiety, that sort of thing.”

“Oh joy,” She said dryly before shaking her head. “But, in my endless compassion, I’m trying to appreciate the fact that even if you seem bound and determined to die, I don’t want to waste too much time being mad at you when we might all die anyway.”

She walked over as she said it, resting her chin on his shoulder and giving him just a bit of relief from the act.

Man, having her mad at me sucks so much. A shame I’m about to completely blow it.

“Well, like I said before, if I’m going to do anything dangerous for power again then even if I don’t think I can tell you all of it, I’ll at least let you know.”

“Which is still not even remotely reassuring but fine,” She sighed in his ear, sounding resigned to the fact that he had no regard for his own safety.

“And on that note-”

“Ben-” She started, warning in her voice that wasn’t enough to stop him.

“There’s something a little dangerous I’m looking to try.”

“Ugh, you’re such a bastard, you know that? I literally just forgave you, you couldn’t even wait a day before doing something again?”

“I know, I’m the worst and I’m sorry but it’s going to affect how fast I can finish the third tiers’ jobs if this works and I should be going to do the next group of them tomorrow so I just want to know if it’s possible first.”

“Gods above, fine. So how hurt might you get? Should we try to grab another healer first?”

“Ahem, so that’s the thing,” He started, suddenly sounding far more nervous for however Thera was going to react. “The good news is that I’m pretty certain doing this isn’t actually going to hurt me at all.”

“And the bad news then?” She asked through narrowed eyes, already seeing that wherever things were going, she wasn’t going to like it.

“The bad news is that if things go wrong, and I want to clarify that I really don’t think they will, I’m going to need you to cut my arm off.”

“...I think I’m retracting my forgiveness.”

“Honestly, fair.”

“But fine,” She went on, pinching her brow as she did. “Even if it seems like you’re already trying to get me to level my stress resistance, I’d rather know so let’s get this over with. Are we doing it here?”

“No, it’s just a small walk. Come on.”