“Please place your ID on the scanner to enter the Underworld.” Said an electronic voice.

“That’s this card?” Kyrion withdrew the ID card he had made while being held captive. It was simple to have his new friend forge it when it got within the system. Wiping it from the creators’ databases and altering where it was actually created was simple. He cut his long hair to fall at his shoulders and removed the overshirt before leaving.

“Yes, great one. That is the card,” a monotonous voice in his head said.

When Kyrion sent his mind into the system through Richard’s phone, he didn’t have enough power to send it further. Thus, it became his eye and stayed dormant for a while. At first, it was too much to take over anything alone, so he cheated by feeding the energy signature from his walnuts into the system. He hadn’t expected it to work, but it seemed to give the entity enough power to break through their defenses.

He had it create an illusion of where he had been sitting while he used his ability to move through walls to get out. From there, the entity had every camera that saw Kyrion remove him from sight in real-time. The recordings would also have an altered view.

The biggest move he had to make was to turn off all the generators in the underground building while he healed the rest of the people present upon discovering them all in lock up. The fact that the guy with bad kidneys and the girl with a damaged heart hadn’t received their treatments angered him.

So, in a brief time, the lights went off, and Kyrion replaced the woman’s heart with a stronger one grown from his mana and the blood he had borrowed. There would be no sign he had done so for all. He also proceeded to rapidly regrow the van owner’s kidneys. Injected his own blood into a few others to purge various viruses and diseases. Which would have been insane for anyone else. Upon completing its job, the blood, along with anything that didn’t belong, would be purged. The last few had internal growths caused by improper proportions of life mana. They were lanced and purged with the surviving tissue, and they were receiving new orders.

It was a simple escape, one of the easiest due to the skills he had learned from his teacher and then developed on his own. So when the ID let him enter the underworld proper, he made certain that the next meeting he had with that group would be with some leverage and a few more cards in his deck.

“What’s the plan chief?” Asked the white weasel.

“Why ask me? Aren’t you the brains of this operation?”

“Clearly not? I wasn’t aware you were capable of using this world’s mana.”

“I did most of this during the ride here, when I gained the ability to know someone’s name on sight.”

“Is it in written form? Do you see letters in your vision?”

“No…I just look at someone and know their name limits seem to be the window washers database. Like the information goes straight into my brain.”

“Did you give life to a construct created in this world?”

“That would be an astute conclusion.”

“I see. Which would mean that technology is a vehicle for magic.”

“Of course. That’s why magitech is a thing.”

“What do you know about technomancy?”

“How to feed my mana into metal objects as well as my consciousness for greater manipulation.”

“Your skillset is quite diverse.”

“Annoyingly so. The limit to talent is time, and if you know how to squeeze out every second, it’s easier to make the best of it.” Kyrion said as he entered what seemed to be a candy store.

“Welcome to Billy’s Silly Candy Consortium! I’m Billy Dee Goat.” A man with a goat head answered. Both of his horns were adorned with decorations that made him look less intimidating.

“You make these candies?” Kyrion picked up a chocolate bar and examined it.

“Yes, I make all sorts of mystical, magical, and tantalizing, terrifical, treats.”

“Uh huh. You say magical, is that true or a falsehood. What does this do?”

“It makes your tongue very happy.”

“That wasn’t a lie. Mind if I…” Kyrion took a bite of the chocolate bar wrapped in a wrapper.

“You don’t eat the mana-cancelling foil! Wait, you didn’t pay for that!” The goat man tried to leap from behind the counter.

“So that’s how antimagic works…Feels like how I imagine indigestion should.”

“You did not just learn antimagic.” The weasel seemed irritated.

“Nope, the effects are minimal. My body is already dissolving the metal. It’ll pass eventually.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Kid! We need to call the poison control unit.”

“No need. About payment. Can you tell me how money works here? Do you use gold or silver? Or did you develop a fiat system of currency.”

“So…A new arrival. Did they not tell you anything?”

“I chose to find out for myself. The people who found me had some slimy leadership.” Kyrion dodged the question.

“So you don’t have any cash. Did they give you a bank account?”

“I have trade.” Kyrion withdrew quite a few of his newer fruits and scowled.

“Are these fruits from your homeworld?”

“Not quite. Some seem to be directly influenced by my mana and have some measure of my own abilities meaning they have little effect on me. Something called diminishing returns.”

“May I?” The goat man picks up the square apple and takes a bite. After some loud chewing and grumbling, the goat looked at the thing curiously.

“And?”

“Sour, almost acidic like a green apple with a hint of sweetness as well. Magically however, it seems to make my skin quite a bit tougher. Let’s see…” The goat man bit his right hand. A human hand, after a few seconds of struggling, seemed satisfied.

“So what’s the verdict?”

“I’ve chewed iron bars softer than what you just made my arm and yet I don’t seem any heavier.”

“Why would you chew an Iron bar?”

“There were these magical jawbreakers I was trying to get right. I wanted to see if I could make it unbeatable. I could not, and found issues at the iron bar tier of durability. Which is pretty good as far as jawbreakers go.”

“So a jawbreaker is a type of candy?”

“Yes. Looks like there are seeds. Can these be grown?”

“Yet but the first fruit is weaker than what you ate. It takes a few years and care to get them past the tier I can produce with my runoff.”

“Runoff?”

“Yeah, when full of mana, my core produces fruit to compensate. It’s self defense, when my body produces more mana than I can contain it turns into fruit. Like an unconscious manifestation of my powers. It’s possible that eating those everyday could cause the power to rub off on you. Some effects are temporary while others are permanent. High consumption can make some temporary effects permanent.”

“I see, and the banana?”

“Something fire based.”

“Curious.” The goat didn’t peel the red banana as he took two bites. “Tasty.”

“Powers?”

The goat coughed up a ball of fire before sighing. “The meat gives fire resistance while the shell causes fire breathing. Eat the banana then the rinds. Eat them backward and you’ll be in trouble. Good thing most people don’t eat the shell first.”

“I see. That one may permanently increase your defense against fire magic a little while give you a temporary fire attack, if you have no magic then it could be permanent. I also suspect that fire breathing is what you get if you already have magic. Does Billy have magic?”

“Billy does indeed have some magic. So you’re saying with some refinement, these could grant someone magic?”

“Correct, I was told not to heal regular people as it could have side effects. Like giving people access to magic.”

“Yeah…The Janitors can only cover up so much. If people were to start appearing with powers and little sense of secrecy then things could get bad quick. Not all take to power well.”

“Is that so?”

“A phrase from some old guy went like this: Great power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

“That’s pessimistic.”

“You’re going to tell me, you didn’t use your own powers to escape confinement and manipulate the system to get what you want?”

“Huh. That’s obvious?”

“I assume you aren’t a criminal as you don’t look the type. But you have power and you used it, when you could have waited.”

“They did threaten me with torture. Would you have let them do that for no reason?”

“T-torture?” Billy looked about before sighing. Can they not tell you’re a kid? I don’t really blame you for leaving a bad place like that. But that doesn’t change the fact that you used your abilities to escape a predicament where you were detained.”

“I see. It isn’t that I broke the law, it’s because I escaped with my powers. Would I have tried the same thing if I had no power? Probably not. I think I get it, it’s kind of how some people back home lose track of how much a single life is worth when they get a great deal of power and prestige.”

“So you are aware of others?”

“I have learned that there is always someone stronger. But this…Strength isn’t about having power and using it. It’s having power and resisting the urge to abuse it whenever necessary. It’s all about restraint. “

“Correct, now on an unrelated note, how much for a fruit?”

“Huh?”

“Right what do you need most right now?”

“Food. Preferably meat.”

“Ok. So a cheap burger is worth a dollar, that is one hundred cents, pieces of metal that people give you as change.”

“So a dollar is one silver, and one burger is a dollar. How big is a burger? No, what is a burger?”

“I think I have one in my fridge, although it could be old.” Billy left and returned with a burger.

Kyrion looked at the small, sad sandwich carefully. “This is one dollar worth of burger. I wouldn’t pay a silver for that.”

“This is the base burger. I microwaved it, eat it.”

Kyrion ate the burger at an astounding speed and looked wistfully at the wrapper. It had been seconds, but he had tasted heaven. Sadly, it was short-lived.

“I could eat a hundred of those a day. How does five fruit for one hundred dollars sound?”

“Sounds like a steal. Are you sure you want to sell them for that low?”

“Do you want me to drain you of resources? I want your research to bear fruit sooner rather than later. Also, I have other means of making money quite quickly.”

“So you’re willing to take a bad deal if it means you gain access to a powerful good supply chain of sweets that grant magical prowess.”

“Yes, this world will soon face cataclysm. Do you think you could make enough to give one candy to everyone in this world?”

“I’m a small-time sweets purveyor. Due to the scale of my work, I lack resources for mass distribution.”

“Well that’s not going to work then.”

“This cataclysm you’re speaking of. What can you tell me about it?”

“Lots of death. As well as a mass influx of mana. The specifics are beyond me however.”

“Did you inform the Janitors of this danger?”

“Do you think they seem the type to let me escape after learning such information? I’m ninety percent sure that I’ll be followed after meeting with you. I’m sure you’re capable of informing the proper authorities. I’m on vacation right now.”

“You’re a bit free spirited aren’t you?”

“If that’s how you want to describe it.” Kyrion sighed as he created a box out of stone and drew a few runes on it, linking it to his current domain.

“What’s that?”

“Put money in, get the fruit. Put anything else in, get nothing.”

“Just like a vending machine.”

“A what now?”

“It’s a mystical box that gives you food if you give it enough money.”

“So it’s like a fridge, but it costs money to open.”

“Sure.” Billy looked to the side.

“Huh. It looks like you’ll be getting some customers soon, so I’ll need to go.” Kyrion sighed as he teleported behind the people entering the shop and walked away. He’d pay Billy a visit later, but first, he’d need to procure rations. Who knew when hunger would strike him in this very strange world?