The meeting eventually ended.
One by one, the holographic screens vanished into darkness until only my reflection remained staring back at me through the glass walls of my office.
Silent.
Cold.
Thinking.
The Foundation was stable.
For now.
SHIELD was becoming irritating, but manageable. HYDRA remained fragmented. World governments still danced on invisible strings without realizing who held them.
And the Marvel timeline itself?
Still dormant.
Tony Stark hadn't become Iron Man yet.
The Avengers didn't exist.
Thor hadn't arrived.
Loki hadn't fallen.
Humanity still believed it lived in a normal universe.
Which meant—
There was time.
Time to prepare.
Time to evolve.
Time to become something even greater before the storm began.
I leaned back slightly in my chair and exhaled quietly.
"There's not much to do right now…"
At least, not directly.
Most of the current work involved preparation, infrastructure, and long-term manipulation.
The boring kind of godhood.
A faint blue screen suddenly appeared before my eyes.
[SYSTEM SHOP — MONTHLY REFRESH COMPLETE]
Rows of items immediately appeared across the holographic display.
Artifacts.
Abilities.
Technologies.
Genetic enhancements.
Most were absurdly expensive.
Others simply weren't useful enough to justify the cost.
Super Soldier Serum (Prototype Variant)Price: 3,000 Points
Ancient Grimoire of the Seventh AbyssPrice: 10,000 Points
Psionic Amplifier ImplantPrice: 5,000 Points
Interesting.
But nothing exceptional.
Nothing that truly caught my attention.
I continued scrolling casually.
Then stopped.
Item #29.
For a moment—
I thought I was hallucinating.
Madam Herta MemoriesPrice: 200,000 Points
Description:The host will inherit the memories, knowledge, talent, and cognitive capabilities of Madam Herta.
Potential side effects may include personality trait synchronization, emotional divergence, increased narcissistic tendencies, obsessive curiosity, social detachment, and behavioral quirks.
Warning: Memory integration may cause temporary psychological instability.
My eyes narrowed instantly.
No hesitation.
No debate.
No second thoughts.
"Oh my God."
Herta.
Herta
Member #83 of the Genius Society.
Creator of the Simulated Universe.
A woman whose intellect bordered on cosmic absurdity.
One-in-a-trillion intelligence.
An existence capable of researching concepts that entire civilizations couldn't even comprehend.
And now—
I could buy her mind.
I checked my balance immediately.
Current Points: 280,000
Enough.
Barely.
I purchased it instantly.
[PURCHASE CONFIRMED]
The moment the notification disappeared—
Agony exploded through my skull.
I slammed forward in my chair violently.
Pain unlike anything I had experienced tore through my mind.
Not physical pain.
Mental.
Existential.
Thousands of memories.
No—
Lifetimes.
Equations I couldn't comprehend.
Galactic theories.
Dimensional mathematics.
Cosmic simulations.
Quantum architecture.
Research notes on concepts humanity wouldn't discover for millennia.
And worst of all—
It didn't feel artificial.
It felt real.
Because to my brain—
It was real.
I wasn't watching memories.
I was living them.
I stood in laboratories beyond stars.
I manipulated simulated realities.
I debated cosmic truths with incomprehensible geniuses.
I solved equations capable of predicting stellar collapse.
I reversed aging.
Created autonomous puppets.
Built systems capable of simulating higher-dimensional entities.
The Simulated Universe.
Aeons.
Nous.
Concepts so vast they made human intelligence look primitive.
I staggered out of my chair, gripping the edge of my desk hard enough to crack the reinforced metal.
"Gh—"
My breathing became uneven.
The room spun violently.
I remembered saving planets.
I remembered growing bored of projects that would redefine civilizations.
I remembered abandoning world-changing discoveries simply because they stopped being interesting.
And through all of it—
One overwhelming feeling remained constant.
Detachment.
Cold, overwhelming intelligence stripped emotion apart piece by piece.
People became variables.
Governments became equations.
Civilizations became experiments.
For a horrifying moment—
I understood why Herta used puppets.
Why she isolated herself.
Why social interaction became tedious.
Because once your mind reached a certain level—
Normal conversation became unbearably slow.
The pain intensified again.
I nearly collapsed.
Fragments of personality bled into my own thoughts.
Arrogance.
Confidence.
Curiosity bordering on obsession.
A terrifying certainty in my own superiority.
I hated how natural it felt.
Countless formulas streamed through my thoughts instinctively now.
My magical perception sharpened violently.
The Fairy Eyes reacted immediately.
Suddenly magic itself looked…
Simpler.
Understandable.
Like a puzzle waiting to be solved.
No.
Not solved.
Optimized.
My breathing slowly stabilized after several agonizing minutes.
Maybe longer.
Time felt distorted.
Finally—
Silence returned.
I stood motionless in the center of my office.
The world around me suddenly felt slower.
Smaller.
Primitive.
And then—
Without thinking—
I looked toward one of the Foundation's most advanced quantum processors connected to my office systems.
My mind instantly identified seventeen inefficiencies.
Three catastrophic design flaws.
And a way to improve processing speed by nearly four hundred percent.
"…What the hell?"
I blinked slowly.
Then frowned.
Because somehow—
That solution had seemed obvious.
Dangerous.
Very dangerous.
I walked back toward my desk carefully, thoughts moving faster than ever before.
Already I could feel it.
My behavior shifting slightly.
Tiny changes.
Subtle.
But noticeable.
I was calmer.
Colder.
More efficient.
And annoyingly—
A small part of me genuinely understood why Herta referred to herself as THE Herta.
Because once you reached that level of intelligence…
Comparisons to others almost felt insulting.
"…That's concerning."
And yet—
Despite everything—
I smiled.
Because this changed everything.
The Foundation's technological growth?
About to accelerate massively.
Interstellar expansion?
Now laughably achievable.
Artificial intelligence?
Child's play.
Anomaly research?
Potentially revolutionary.
For the first time in centuries—
I felt genuinely excited.
Not because of power.
Not because of control.
But because the universe had suddenly become interesting again.
And somewhere deep in the back of my mind—
A quiet, amused voice whispered:
Finally.
Something worth studying.