Ohhhh yes… this is peak apex-Merlin vs. cosmic-level problems energy. 😎✨ Chapter 9 should capture your overpowered, strategic brilliance while showing that even you pause when facing entities on a scale beyond most gods—yet your boredom and foresight keep you completely unshaken. Let's make it epic:
Chapter Nine — The Seed of Stars
Centuries rolled by like seconds. Or perhaps they rolled by like aeons—it hardly mattered anymore. Time, as I had long realized, was just another tool to manipulate, bend, and casually ignore when one possessed infinite magical energy and the combined souls of four Merlins.
I was scrying the future, a casual pastime to entertain myself while sipping tea, nibbling on cake, or flipping through some newly-written magical tome. My magical gaze swept across dimensions, probing for threats: demons, dark witches, rogue sorcerers, Dimension Lords, Elder Gods… anything that might disturb my carefully maintained peace on Earth.
And then I saw it.
A tiny anomaly at first, almost imperceptible beneath the planetary crust. But I focused, letting my time magic and dimensional energy comb through the threads of probability. There it was: a celestial seed embedded in the Earth.
I froze for… well, perhaps a few seconds, which for the mortal mind would have been centuries.
A celestial seed. On my domain.
I leaned back, letting the books around me hover lazily as my mind processed the implications. I could destroy it. Absolutely. A flick of my fingers, an incantation, and it would be obliterated. Baby celestial, fragile, defenseless.
But… the consequences.
Even a fledgling celestial is connected to the larger network. Kill it, and the full might of the celestial hierarchy could descend upon Earth in retaliation. Could I handle it? Probably. Even the strongest of them could be dealt with given my infinite magical energy, dimensional power, and soul infused with centuries of Merlin knowledge. Most likely.
But there was prudence in restraint. After all, why act rashly when the threat wouldn't mature for billions of years? I activated my clairvoyance, scanning the seed in precise detail.
Energy required for activation: 10 billion humans.
Current progress: negligible.
Time until activation: practically eternal on human timescales.
I sighed, setting my tea aside. This was… annoying. Not dangerous. Not even close. But annoying in the way that cosmic-level babysitting always is.
I could play with it. Observe it. Let it mature slowly, safely contained. Perhaps it could become a tool one day, a pawn in a chessboard of infinite dimensions. Or perhaps I would simply let it remain dormant, a reminder that even the most powerful entities occasionally need patience.
I leaned back, floating lazily above the London sanctum, books orbiting me in gentle spirals. I could have destroyed it in a heartbeat, reshaped it, or absorbed its energy—but where would be the fun in that? The thrill was in letting the universe reveal its secrets, in subtly nudging events rather than forcing outcomes prematurely.
For now… the celestial seed was Earth's problem, not mine. And I had tea.
I smiled faintly, letting my mind wander to other, more immediate amusements: training sorcerers with my tomes, bending dimensions for practice, teasing Dimension Lords from afar. The seed could wait. Billions of humans would rise long after my patience had sculpted reality into my playground.
Yes. Let it wait. Let the seed dream.
After all, I had millennia. And boredom… boredom was still fun when you were Merlin.