"…You may refer to me as Oberon."

"Oberon, King of Fairies, husband of Titania. She might take exception to you so easily claiming familiarity." Alexandria said, not reacting in any noticeable way to my name as she hovered across from me.

"If Glaistig Uaine feels my choice has slighted her, she will inform me herself. If such an occasion arises, I will apologize."

"The Faerie Queen is in the Birdcage."

I smiled teasingly. "It is amusing you believe that would be enough to stop her from leaving should she wish to."

"You called Eidolon the High Priest. What does that mean?"

"It is his title – the mantle he carries. Though the fool could certainly do a better job of it. Why bother safeguarding the world when the accolades for pulling it back from ruin are so much grander?"

"What does his title entail?" Alexandria ignored my pontificating.

"Are you asking because you want to know, or because you are stalling for this city's Protectorate heroes, Alexandria?"

"Because I want to know. If I wanted to fight you, I would have attacked you while you were preoccupied with the Empire 88's capes. We don't have to be enemies, Oberon."

"In that case, I suppose I could be persuaded to tell you, but you would not thank me for the information."

"Information is always valuable."

"Even if it has the potential to break you? To break the greatest heroes humanity has to offer? If Eidolon is here, I imagine Legend is as well. Do you really want me to expose the most pure of you to this accursed knowledge?"

"What does Eidolon being the High Priest mean?"

"Hmm… Before that, why don't you tell me why you have come."

"I'm here to ask you to walk into the Birdcage of your own will. There are many Parahumans there that you could take for your court. You could–"

"I refuse." I cut her off.

Alexandria frowned, and I felt the mood shift. "May I ask why?"

"Because I am not yet strong enough to leave whenever I wish to. Glaistig Uaine only entered when she was sure she could leave. I will do the same. If you wish for me to enter the Birdcage, you will let me gather enough power to leave."

"I will not stand by while you commit wanton slaughter."

"A compromise then? I will no longer target PRT or Protectorate personnel. In return, you will leave me to collect the powers of those you deem 'villains' as I please."

"Unacceptable. The Protectorate…I will not accept you murdering as you please."

"You misunderstand, Alexandria. This is not an offer, this is an ultimatum. I will not harm any of yours. In exchange for my mercy, you will stay out of my way."

"I don't think you understand your position, Oberon. You are powerful, but you are arrogant if you think you can face the combined might of the heroes and villains that will unite to combat you."

"Then offer an alternative, Alexandria. A fight here is in neither of our interests. You cannot be certain what exactly I am capable of, and I cannot be certain I would be able to survive whatever hidden force Eidolon has prepared to send against me. You do not want me to kill those you brought to face me, and I do not want them to kill me, but I will not stop collecting subjects for my court. Present an alternative that satisfies us both."

Alexandria was silent for a moment, her face as unmoving as stone. "Can your word be trusted, Oberon?"

"A King is only as good as his word – it is my bond and my oath." I said, meaning every word. A monarch would not break their word.

"You will swear not to harm heroes in the United States or anywhere else in the world. You will swear not to harm villains who have not been judged by a court to deserve the Birdcage. Swear and abide by this agreement, and I will permit you to take villains who have earned kill orders."

"This offer is an insult. I ask again, Alexandria, is your purpose here merely to waste my time?" I asked as Skitter's bugs spread through the area to try to locate any hidden combatants. We'd been talking for close to a minute now, and it was becoming clear that Alexandria wasn't truthfully negotiating with me. If that were the case, I had no need to negotiate either.

Alexandria's eyes narrowed. "Wait." she said, holding a single hand up. "Neither of us want this meeting to become a battle. Accompany me out of the city. We will continue–"

"You expect me to follow you to a battlefield you have prepared, to a trap laid by your allies? Do you take me for a fool, Alexandria?" This whole display had been a farce. I'd thought Cauldron had come to bargain. Instead, it appeared Alexandria wanted me away from civilians so she could eliminate me before I grew to be too powerful a threat.

"You have my word that there is no trap at play, Oberon. Accompany me out of the city and we will continue speaking."

I could not determine if she was telling the truth. Skitter's bugs were present throughout the entire area, but they were unable to discover any hidden combatants – likely some trick of Eidolon's to completely conceal himself and whoever was with him. I exchanged Skitter for Tattletale and set my Thinker on Alexandria. Strangely, Tattletale reported Alexandria was being genuine.

I chuckled lightly. "A woman embroiled in lies speaks the truth. Very well. I thrice swear to maintain civility provided you do not attack me first. I will be ready when you attempt to betray my good intentions." I said as I flew to the north at a easy clip pace so as not to spook the many PRT personnel whose weapons were still leveled towards me. I slowly accelerated as I drew away from the PRT building. If Cauldron wanted to speak to me, it would be foolish not to hear them out, but I needed to be cautious. Eidolon and Legend at least were likely still lurking somewhere nearby. If nothing else, I would draw this meeting out as long as possible. By the time Alexandria and her allies inevitably move against me, Eidolon's power will hopefully have faded, allowing me to escape with Strider.

Alexandria easily matched my pace through the air, keeping her eyes fixed on mine as she held a hand up to the PRT forces below us when they moved to follow. She touched a finger to her ear and said, "All Protectorate and PRT personnel are to fall back immediately. I repeat, fall back immediately. Fortify our defenses and begin search and rescue operations for civilians caught in the crossfire." I didn't need Tattletale to tell me she was speaking into a radio.

"Negative." she said firmly, the slight downward curve to her lip informing Tattletale someone had taken issue with her order. "Fall back. That is an order."

"Is there a problem, Alexandria?"

"No." she assured me. "We are alone, and we will not be disturbed."

"It is unbecoming to attempt to deceive the fae. Half-truths and misleading facts are my domain, not yours, Alexandria. We are not alone. The High Priest tracks our movements."

Alexandria's eyes narrowed minutely. "You believe you are a faerie?"

I smirked. "What is a faerie but a visitor from beyond the grasp of the world, alien and magical to the mortals they influence?" I said, not giving a clear answer. Tattletale informed me Alexandria was supremely confused by what I was saying. She'd determined that I was telling the truth, but was intentionally leaving key context out.

"You are from another Earth."

"I will speak no more of myself." Her thinking I was from another Earth didn't harm me, but talling her more had the potential to give her information she could use against me.

We were close to the outskirts of the city now. Skitter rejoined me in Crusader's place to once more observe our surroundings. It was possible Alexandria's powerful Thinker ability fooled Tattletale's. I needed to be wary of an ambush. I could try Strider's power again, but I wasn't sure enough time had passed for Eidolon to have lost hold of the power he was using to keep me here.

"If you will not speak of you, will you speak of the High Priest? What is it? Why is it so important?"

"Are you familiar with Pandora's Box, Alexandria? Once free, this secret will never again be confined."

"What is the High Priest?" she repeated more firmly. Though her face was immutable, Tattletale informed me she was getting frustrated, irritated. Her Thinker power had told her I was not bluffing about her regretting hearing the knowledge. That had made her all the more desperate to hear what I had to say.

"You will have to forgive my silence, Alexandria, but knowledge is powerful. This knowledge in particular holds the potential to be incredibly valuable to me." We were well out of the city now. A few minutes longer and we would begin to lose sight of it.

"How?"

I smiled, motioning down towards a collection of trees at the edge of a forest a few miles away. "I believe this will be a suitable location to continue our negotiations. Unless, of course, you have decided to attack now that civilians are not at risk?"

"I only intend to speak with you. I don't want a fight to break out here. I gave my word that I was not leading you into a trap, Oberon."

Two shapes suddenly appeared ten meters behind me, pushing through the small bugs Skitter had maintained around us. Tattletale screamed into my mind to dodge. I stopped flying, falling through the air just as a wave of force that caused the space I had occupied to ripple and shift passed over me.

"I didn't." a male voice growled. A newly-appeared man in a green hood lifted his arms, the space near his hands shifting unnaturally as he prepared to attack again.

"Eidolon! Sto–" Alexandria began to yell, arm held out placatingly. I was not willing to wait for her words to fall on Eidolon's deaf ears.

Regent appeared in Skitter's place, altering Eidolon's aim just enough to prevent him from hitting me with his space-bending attack. I was under the effect of Othala's invulnerability, but I was not willing to test whether or not it would be effective against the strange attack Eidolon had prepared specifically to combat me. For as arrogant as he was, he was one of the most experienced capes on the planet.

As Eidolon's second attack shot over my head, a blue laser zig-zagged around him, turning a ninety degree angle to fire towards my head. Kaiser took the hit, immediately fading as Purity took his place. Her golden power fired towards the man in a skintight gray-white jumpsuit who turned into light as he dodged, streaking through the sky as fast as a lightning bolt. He reformed his body and fired more lasers at me that Purity blasted away with her own.

So Legend was here. This was bad. Strider appeared at my side as I flew towards the ground. Once more, his teleportation failed to fire correctly. Eidolon still had a hold of the power preventing me from teleporting. Othala's flight was slow on the scale of cape flight. Alexandria and Eidolon were two of the fastest capes in the world with Legend being the fastest when he entered his Breaker state. I couldn't flee via teleportation nor flight. That meant I had to stand and fight, but facing all three of them simultaneously was a death sentence. I needed to split them up somehow.

Purity continued shooting at Legend and blasting away his lasers as she grabbed onto my arm and towed me towards the ground as fast as she could. I had an idea. Eidolon and Legend followed as soon as I began descending, covering each other and being careful not to overextend lest I enter a position to pick one of them off. Alexandria on the other hand was still hovering in the air where we'd been talking. She looked conflicted, her fists clasped tight as she watched us trade ranged blasts below her. It seemed she made up her mind when she flew down towards one of the nearest trees. If I had to guess, she intended to use it as an improvised weapon. Like Glory Girl, her greatest combat potential laid in her strength. Unlike Glory Girl, however, she was experienced enough not to immediately charge a Striker that could kill her with a touch and punch him in the face.

Strider and Purity vanished as I neared the ground, Labyrinth taking their place. All of my spirits were gone except Labyrinth now. I was close to the ground. I needed to be fast. Labyrinth's spirit raised her arms. The entire forest around us flickered like a glitch in a video game. Suddenly, the landscape was warped into something else entirely. Large crystals of varying colors jutted out of a limestone floor that had replaced the soil. The crystals were packed close together. Only a few centimeters separated those that were furthest apart. The crystals grew out of one another, choking away the sky and creating a domed maze of colorful geodes that was impossible to traverse. At least, impossible for most.

I fell towards the crystals, passing through them as if they weren't even there as even more grew out of the ones already present. Labyrinth's power recognized me as an individual able to pass through her structures, and thus they did not bar my way, allowing me to occupy the same space as them with no issue. Legend on the other hand was stuck on the other side. He tried to flow through the crystals after me, but he found a physical barrier in the crystals I had easily phased through. He turned to light to slip through the cracks between the crystals, but a newly summoned Purity blasted him away, passing through the crystals to follow him as easily as I had. Out of the effect once more, he summoned bright red lasers that leapt from his hands into the crystals nearest him as he started to burn his way through them. I grinned as more crystals rose to replace those lost at Labyrinth's command, destroying the minute progress he'd made.

Crusader and Othala appeared at my side. Crusader's ghosts appeared all around us, and Othala hastily empowered them with flight and invulnerability before she faded away. Crusader's ghosts, much like myself and my spirits, passed through the crystal maze cocooned around me with no issue, leaping out of the effect of Labyrinth's power to engage Legend. Legend easily dodged their strikes and blasted them back, but the protections laid upon them by Othala kept them from scattering with his attacks. In the end, Legend let out a frustrated grunt and turned into a ray of yellow light that zipped past them, flying around the perimeter of Labyrinth's effect to search for weaknesses in the defense.

Alexandria had abandoned her quest to retrieve a tree the moment she saw Labrinth's power alter the area. She was at the outskirts of the effect, slamming her fists into the crystals, each blow blasting away jagged chunks as she slowly carved a path deeper into the crystals. Others rose up behind her as she progressed, trapping her in a small pocket. The moment she realized she was stuck, she doubled back, shouldering her through crystals and out of the pocket she'd been trapped in before I could move towards her. Unfortunate. I could have taken her power if she continued moving towards me. I sent Crusader's ghosts to harry her. They wouldn't be able to harm her, but they may at least be able to keep her distracted.

I looked up and frowned. Eidolon had not moved since I'd phased through the crystals Labyrinth's power created. I sent one of Crusader's ghosts at him, but it was blasted away by Legend before it could get close. The man of lasers was still streaking through the area as a beam of light, materializing at random intervals to fire lasers into the crystals, seemingly testing the defense I'd created.

If Eidolon was still, it was likely he was calling up a new power. Strider was at my side the next moment, enveloping me in his teleportation. Once more, it was negated. Eidolon was committed to preventing me from teleporting it seemed. Even as he swapped powers, he held tight to the one that caged me. I had to alter my strategy. If I couldn't run, I had to fight to kill, not to flee.

"Oberon!" Alexandria's muted voice called from the edge of Labyrinth's effect. Her words echoed off the crystals as they bounced to me, giving them a distorted effect. "Stop this! Lower the effect so we can talk!"

"I attempted to make terms with you. Mine was not the oath that was broken." ten voices called back, unaffected by Labyrinth's maze of jagged crystals.

"Lower the effect, Oberon! We can still–" Alexandria was interrupted as Eidolon exploded with power. A violet halo of pulsing, shimmering energy surrounded Eidolon as he dove down towards me. "Eidolon, stop!" Alexandria cried, her words going ignored once more.

Eidolon held his hands in front of him as he dove towards me head-first, his violet energy swelling up in his palms. A scant meter before he made contact with the first crystal, the crystal in his path vaporized into gravelly particles. Eidolon kept moving through the thick barrier I'd created, rapidly approaching me. Legend zipped around to follow Eidolon, but Crusader's ghosts distracted him long enough for Labyrinth to summon new crystals behind Eidolon, trapping Legend and Alexandria on the outside.

"Eidolon, pull back!" Alexandria roared, her voice colored by fury and concern. She had officially lost her cool. She and Legend began drilling through the crystals together in an attempt to catch up to Eidolon, but they were far slower than Eidolon. They were breaking and burning their way through the barrier. Eidolon was unmaking it.

"I am going to end you!" Eidolon growled as he grew closer and closer. "I will not let another monster loose in the world!"

Despite the fact the single most powerful parahuman on the planet was less than thirty seconds away from atomizing my body, I smiled. Was that how he saw things?

"You speak of monsters, High Priest? You were surely listening when Alexandria inquired about your title. Do you want to know what it means?" I asked nonchalantly. Crusader's ghosts had all converged on Eidolon, doing everything they could to slow his progress. Eidolon disposed of each of them with a simple flick of his wrist, transmitting the same power that was destroying Labyrinth's crystals to the ghosts, but the ghosts continued harassing him as Crusader summoned more and more, buying me precious seconds to enact my plan.

"Eidolon, fall back!" Alexandria roared, too far away to make it to us in time as she tried to desperately punch her way through the thick crystal forest. Next to her, Legend turned to light and again began slipping through the cracks in the crystals to get to me faster, but Purity appeared in his path and blasted him back, buying me precious time.

"You're a child playing god. I will–"

"Be the hero? Be the man praised and adored by all?" I asked snidely, flying back through another row of crystals as Eidolon grew dangerously close to me. I was almost in range of his matter annihilation power. It was now or never.

"Shut up!" Eidolon roared, enraged.

Good. It was working. He had grown angry. His emotions were running rampant. Now to go in for the kill. "Let me tell you what caliber of hero you are, High Priest. Your power grants you what you need, does it not? You needed worthy opponents. The Endbringers gave them to you!"

At the same time, Canary appeared next to his ear and whispered, "It was your fault. Your fault. Your fault. Your fault…"

Eidolon froze fifteen meters from me. The energy surrounding his body winked out, vanishing into nothing. His hands began to tremble. He fell into the crystals beneath him as his flight failed him. His arms shook as he knelt down, cradling his face with his hands. Canary followed him down, whispering poison into the ear of the world's strongest hero.

"David!" Legend roared, turning into golden energy and blitzing through Purity, desperately weaving through the maze around him to support his friend. Alexandria redoubled her efforts against the crystals, shattering them into fragments to carve a path to Eidolon as fast as she could.

Labyrinth altered the makeup of the crystals surrounding Eidolon, turning them into steel.

"No!" Legend screamed, disbelief, grief and agony in his voice. Alexandria had stopped smashing through the crystal. She hovered a foot off the ground, fists clenched at her sides as she stared unmoving at the sight before her.

Hanging suspended by dozens of metal blades between the crystals his power had drilled a path through, Eidolon's body was limp, leaking blood from innumerable wounds.

Labyrinth's power flickered, then vanished, returning the landscape to the forest it was before. Eidolon's bleeding form fell heavily into the dirt. Legend was beside him the next moment, rolling him over and cradling his head.

"Now," I said as I banished Kaiser, summoning my newest spirit to my side as I drifted towards Alexandria. A green-hued spectre in a flowing cape stood at my side as I approached. "Shall we try this again?"