Magical Marvel

Chapter 66: Greece (870 BC)

870 BC, Random Village in Greece

(Jasmine POV)

It’s been a while since I started traveling. I spent a couple of centuries in Ancient Egypt where I was confused for a Goddess when I saved a couple of villagers from some snakes by speaking Parseltongue. For some reason, they thought I was the snake Goddess Wadjet and started worshipping me. Of course, all of this came back to the Pharaoh, and I ended up as a special advisor to the Pharaoh for a few generations. My lack of aging seemed to solidify the fact that I was, in fact, a real Goddess, going so far as to make me a few temples to pray to me.

The truth was that life as an advisor to the Pharaoh was boring. It was exciting for a couple of decades but that’s it and after a few centuries, it started to become monotone. I even started teaching magically inclined citizens in the capital, to distract myself, mostly. I tried not to get attached to anyone. Humans had such a short lifespan that I knew that if I got too attached to them, I would start breaking down from constant grief. But trying and succeeding wasn’t enough. By the time my first student died, I knew I had to get out of there. So, I left. I left no words, said no goodbyes. They’ll get over it eventually.

When I left, I had no idea what to do with my time and I just decided to travel. I spent my time discovering the entire continent of Africa, seeing rare magical creatures that would be extinct in the future. I even saw the first settlements around what I assume will be the kingdom of Wakanda in the future, considering the mountain of vibranium that was there. Finally, I decided to go back north past the Mediterranean Sea, to Ancient Greece. From what I remembered, during this time period Greece was getting interesting and I was curious to how life was at the time.

I made myself a boat by transmuting earth into wood and shaping it into a boat and enchanted it to steer itself and to accelerate forward. All I had to do was live on sea food for a couple of weeks and I had safely arrived at the other side of the sea. She barely had time to explore before she heard the screams, I would have ignored it, but it was the voice of a young boy and no matter how old I became, I always hated to see children cry. Almost out of instinct, I ran towards the sound and was surprised about what I saw.

It was a village. Well, it could barely call itself a village, it was just a dozen houses that were so badly built that they felt like a particularly strong breeze could knock them over. The village itself was riddled with corpses that seemed to follow a trail towards the center of the town. The village was attacked somehow and not by something human, guessing by the wound on the cadavers in front of me. It looked like an animal attack more than anything.

As I move towards a body to examine the wounds further, I hear screaming once more and I sprint towards its origins. Seconds later, I discover that the source of the screaming happens to be of two young girls being attacked by some kind of golden lions. There was a man in front of them, trying to do his best to protect them but he didn’t have a chance and he knew it. Perhaps, he just wanted to have the girls live for as long as possible, it was something brave and tragic at the same time. Watching the man wielding an axe that was probably made to cut wood and not combat, trying to fight off four giant lions that encircled him, to protect two children, made my heart ache. He was injured; I could see a wound on his chest bleeding profusely and I couldn’t just watch anymore. Children were always a weakness of mine.

I create a shield around the girls and their protector, to keep them safe from the lions and when one of their attackers leapt into the air to finally kill their prey, they hit an invisible wall that stopped them from going further. The girls stopped weeping in shock at what happened, fully expecting their death and the lions started to circle around the shield trying to see for any weak points.

I teleport into the inside of the shield and ask the girls, “Are you hurt?”

They just shake their heads and I sigh in relief. I take a look at the offending lions, and I telekinetically push them away from the shield, hoping that they would just get scared enough to leave. Surprisingly, they were able to right themselves in the air and landed on their feet. It didn’t take them long to run back towards us to attack us as well.

Before they could reach us, I summon some lightning and send it at my attackers. To my astonishment, they were barely affected by the attack. I then conjure spikes of steel and banish them towards us, but they broke when they contacted the lion’s skin. Their skin was magical resistant and unbreakable, it seems. I knew how to deal with creatures with near invulnerable skin like dragons. So, I telemetrically hold the four lions, stopping them from moving and I conjured smaller steel spikes. I force their mouths to open and that wasn’t an easy feat; their jaws were very strong.

I then banish the steel spikes into the roof of their mouths and into their brains, killing them instantly. Thank you, Harry Potter and the chamber of secrets for teaching me how to deal with enemies with invulnerable skin.

 I finally look down to the people I saved. The man was already dead, probably from blood loss. It wasn’t a surprise, really, considering how dangerous his wounds were. He was probably standing by pure will to protect the girls. The girls, are weeping their hearts out, hugging the corpse, in a naïve hope that he could come back to life somehow. After almost an hour of crying, I knew that I needed to feed them.

“Hello,” I say, smiling kindly.

“Hi,” They both answer me.

“What are your names?” I ask.

One answers, “I’m Stheno”

Then the other one continues, “I’m Euryale”

Taking a closer look at them, I notice that they are almost identical. They both had snow white skin and purple eyes, which are associated with a strong magical potential, and oddly enough, purple hair.

“I’m guessing that you two are sisters.”

“Yeah,” Stheno exclaimed, “We’re twins.”

I smile at her innocence.

“Girls, I know what I’m going to ask you will be hard, but I need you to be brave. Alright?”

They nodded.

“Alright, girls. Can you tell me what happened?” I asked.

Euryale was the one that answered, “The lions, they came out of nowhere. They killed everyone. Mama tried to hide us, but they got her. Papa was the last one. He tried to fight them, but nothing could hurt them.” She then broke down into hysterics.

I started to rub the girl, trying to console her. I now had a good idea about what happened. It seemed like a standard magical creature attack. These lions are definitely magical, considering their size and their impenetrable skin. I’ll take a look at them later. Those two girls are the last survivors in the entire village.

“Is there anyone left to take care of you? Any family or friends outside the village?” I ask.

They both shook their heads and I sigh internally. I knew that getting attached to them will hurt me in the long run but what’s another heart break in my lifetime. I cursed myself for always being weak willed against children. They were so cute though, perhaps this time will be different, I hope, even if I know that eventually they will leave me too.

“Do you want to stay with me?” They look at me with wide eyes. They fully expected me to abandon them in a ruin where they would die of hunger in a couple of days. They teared up once more and leapt towards me and each one of them grabbed a leg and hugged it. It was a bit uncomfortable for me, but knowing of their tragedy today, I chose to let get whatever comfort they needed. A couple of minutes later, they were fast asleep from exhaustion. I conjure a small hovel and some beds and levitate them into them so that they could sleep comfortably.

Without them noticing, I enter their minds to find out the names of every former resident in the village and their faces, and I levitate the bodies and magically dig up graves. For every person dead, adult, or child, I dig up a grave, burry them and transmutate some earth into marble and create gravestones with their names on them. I chose to do this when the girls are asleep so that they wouldn’t deal with the trauma of watching the bodies of every person they had ever known. I group the graves by families so that it’s easier for the girls to visit them when they’re ready.

With the bodies gone, I need to clean up the place. I first create a stone wall all around the village, except for the side looking at the sea. I then transmutate the hovels they considered houses into actual structurally sound houses made with wood and stone. I then manipulate the ground and create actual roads instead of the loosely carved stone that was there before.

With the cattle dead in the attack, I needed to find wild cows, pigs, and chicken to raise and breed to feed the kids. I put some basic protection charm around the house with the girls to notify me if something tries to get in or if the girls are up so that I could teleport there.

A tracking charm later, I get the location of the nearest wild herd of cows, and I bind them and teleport them to the village where I create a pen for them to live in. Similarly, I find some wild chickens and pigs to breed later on.

The only thing remaining was the crops. During my stay in Egypt, I devised multiple rituals to turn the earth fertile and accelerate crop growth using ambient magic. I use that ritual to help with crop growth in the village. In term of drinking water, I just create a well where I inscribe some runes into turning the humidity in the air into liquid water. With the sea being this close, the atmosphere is very humid so that’s the drinking water taken care of for the foreseeable future.

With that done, I summon my ship from where it landed and create an impromptu port for it to stay there. The ship would be useful for fishing, I suppose. I will need to teach the girls how to feed themselves when they grow up.

With that out of the way, I notice that it’s almost night. I lost track of time when I was making the village livable. It seems that it was a very productive day. Suddenly, the wards notify me that the girls are waking up. I teleport myself to them so that they could wake up feeling safe.

It’s sad watching them realize that what happened to them wasn’t a dream or a nightmare, that they truly lost every single person they ever knew. They were alone in the world, well they had me but no one else.

It took a while to coax them into leaving the house and exploring the village and they were amazed at how I fixed and improved their homes. I did explain to them what I did with the graveyard and that they could visit there anytime they wanted but they seemed to avoid the issue.

We were now, sitting together in front of the beach. They were both cuddling to me, and it was almost the middle of the night. They felt sleepy and I was quite exhausted as well; I didn’t have any time to rest from my trip.

“I never asked. What’s the village named?” I asked.

“I heard Papa call it Korinthos once.” Euryale answered.

With a wave of my hand, I conjure a flag on the beach with the name ‘Korinthos’ written on it.

The girls giggled for a bit and then the previously silent Stheno asked, “Why are you so nice to us, Medusa?”

I was startled for a bit, “Why did you call me that?”

“You never told us your name, so we made one for you. It means guardian and protector. Because you protected us from the monster.”

I smile kindly at her and answer, “Medusa is fine.” I then sigh, “Protecting children should always be done without thought. You are the future. If no one protected the children, then who will take care of us when we’re old and grey.”

They giggled again and I sighed internally. It seems that I have a role here to play. That name was not a coincidence. But this was not the time to contemplate this. I have two little ones to put to sleep.