New York City, America

He stepped forward, appearing in New York amidst the regular hustle and bustle of the people around him.

All around him he could feel it. The resonance of a thousand deaths. The fires of hundreds of souls, stomping to the beat of a drum. Waiting. Ready. Angry. These deaths were abrupt. Nearly instantaneous, and they had left their victims souls in a state of perpetual confusion and rage.

Behemoth.

New York was familiar to him. He had been here many times, and on his pilgrimage had found himself stepping back here with relative frequency. He had a friend here, and though said friend couldn't see or hear him, he still applied much of his power to assisting the man.

Of all his former teammates, Legend was the one who would benefit the most from his gifts.

With a flex of his will, he quieted the raging spirits. With another, he called to them. Those that wished it could serve with him as his [Wards]. Those that did not could be purified, freed of their resentment and sent on to whatever came after.

He could probably find out what it was, exactly that came after. It probably wouldn't even be that hard. He was Hero - and he could [Do Anything] if he put his mind to it. If there was a heaven he could improve it. If there wasn't - he could build one.

But that was the influence talking. The mantle that the world draped across him with its every pulse and breath. It was what everyone believed - so it was what he could do.

As far as limitations went he had experienced worse.

Nodding to himself as his cleansing was completed, he allowed the pure sensation of the now undiluted power welling up in the area to wash over him.

Then he stepped again.

Madrid, Spain

His foot tapped lightly against the ground as he landed, flaring the rockets in his boots to slow his movement. The rockets weren't real - nothing he 'made' nowadays was. But the idea of them - that mattered. His boots were for moving about, and as [The Greatest Tinker Alive] they should naturally be able to do things like take him from one place to another at will.

It didn't matter how much distance was between those two points. It didn't matter that if he actually was a living body moving this fast he would almost certainly disintegrate into a fine mist before reaching his destination.

What mattered was that he wanted to move and his boots provided a narrative excuse to do so.

It was absurd how much his afterlife seemed to function on dream logic. He yearned to study the effect. To poke and prod, to study and to learn.

But sadly that too was the mantle talking. As much as the world at large thought of Tinkers as the 'smart' or 'sciencey' Parahumans, the truth was… they weren't. The closest actual equivalent Hero could think of was more like entering into a shamanistic trance. An altered state of mind wherein your power took the tinker's very vague understanding of what they were doing, and filled in the gaps.

His current state of being did give him the ability to fake something approaching a true understanding of science.

But he didn't have time for that. Not with the sudden explosive light of dozens of soul wells gushing energy across the planet, like shining beacons of power waiting for someone unscrupulous to notice them.

He nodded lightly to the single man sitting idly in the wreckage of what was once Madrid as he traversed the area. Even years later, it still seemed drenched by the second Endbringers passing. Cold. Abandoned.

Leviathan.

There were no souls here for him to calm though. He had already been through here, and extended his blessing to a blind man he had found wandering the area.

A fragment of his soul, infinitesimally small, and yet no less powerful for it. The man - Joseph - was empowered by his gift. His sight was returned, and his body strengthened, and in exchange he would nurture the piece of Hero's soul inside of him, making it ready for when he would need that power most.

That was why Jospeh say quietly in the wreckage of Madrid, moving only to eat, sleep, and fight.

He was guarding that well of power from predators.

All across the globe such men and women were empowered by him. Day in and day out, Hero had traveled to seek those who would accept his gift, those near enough to death that they could barter with him.

It wasn't lost on Hero that his chosen targets were essentially people in trigger worthy situations, nor was it lost on him that - as he had come to learn - his methodology was so similar to that of Scion itself.

He chose to believe however, that there were no evil powers. Only evil people.

And Scion, whatever else it was, was definitely evil.

His inspection done - the well was still safe - Hero adjusted his golden armor, and stepped away.

He ignored the golden bow that Joseph drew from the ether behind him, just like he ignored the masked creature that crawled into view when it sensed him getting ready to leave.

It was a small one anyway.

Lausanne, Switzerland

"Ghost." The creature that had recently been following him around called to him as he appeared in the center of a mass grave.

No one in Lausanne was alive anymore. It was the first place the Simurgh had attacked. Back then, no one had known it was another Endbringer. It's appearance, the feelings it had inspired, the distinct lack of immediate carnage that followed in its wake - all carefully designed to lull them into a false sense of security.

They hadn't known how to handle the Simurgh at the time. How to mitigate the threat it posed. And the citizens of Lausanne had suffered for it.

"No." He responded before the creature - a floating iridescent orb of wispy green energy not unlike a willow wisp - could continue with it's pitch.

"You already safeguard the planet in your chosen role. It is a great honor to be made a Grand-"

"No. I don't need to protect the planet for long. Just until that thing is handled. There are new Heroes who can take over after that. I don't plan on being like this forever." He said bluntly. He didn't mean being dead. He honestly didn't mind that. What he refused to suffer for all eternity was the constant tug of war between what he knew to be true of himself, and what the idea of him had mutated into over the years. The ever present stress of having to sort his own memories regularly, in order to be sure that he could ignore the ones that simply weren't true.

Which didn't detract at all from the pain he felt when thinking of the fake memories. Of a marriage that was never real, with an Alexandria that would never have even considered it. Of two conflicting sets of memories of friendship and romance - because for reasons he couldn't quite grasp, about a third of the planet believed he was in a secret relationship with her.

So no, he wouldn't agree to 'serve his planet' in perpetuity. Not when it meant an ever shifting landscape of memories and feelings that not only weren't his - but that rarely held any actual continuity.

Hero ignored the creature's continued requests for parlay. It had never attacked him before, and for all it tried to argue the point with him, he had quickly found it wasn't really all that smart either. Closer to a magical robocall than a real person. A very complex one - capable of answering most questions as though sapient.

But not actually all that smart.

Again, the faint urge to pull it apart and examine it came to mind, but he ignore it.

He often found himself returning to Lausanne. In the absence of anyone nearby to empower for it's protection, he was forced to spend significant amounts of his time ensuring nothing dangerous was closing in on the place.

The taste of the power in the air here was like… well it was like nothing Hero could reasonably describe. If pressed he would say it was like… nails on a chalkboard. The flavor of cacophony. The color of despair.

Absolutely nonsensical he was aware, but it wasn't like he was ever going to explain this to anyone.

Focusing his intent, Hero directed his gaze to the sky. To the spot the thing was hovering in. It - Scion - was staring straight down at the point where the well of spiritual power emerged from the ground in a great pillar of light visible only to the dead. It had been doing so at locations all across the earth from the minute the things had ignited.

And Hero had made it his mission to ensure it never got anywhere near them.

With an effort of will that was significantly greater than he would have applied to anything else, he prepared to throw all of himself into the attack that would - hopefully - obliterate the thing.

Only for it to immediately rush away as though stung - no doubt headed towards another well.

Hero did many things in passing. He empowered humans in need. He protected the wells from spiritual predators.

But this was what he dedicated all his time to. He could only use the attack he had in mind once - but he had never actually had to use it to force Scion away. As though sensing the danger it was in, the thing always fled the moment he committed to preparing the attack.

Things would be easier if he had more power. If he could commit to using the attack even if Scion fled. If he had the strength to survive the attack itself.

If Scion would stop trying to poke its head into the surplus of magical power the planet was currently pumping out at astounding rates.

Unfortunately, all he could do was continue to give chase. Continue to provide assistance.

And continue to threaten the thing anytime it looked too close to actually achieving whatever it wanted to do with all that power.

Right now, he was limited. He was just a man. But with the stone cold determination his Mantle gave him, Hero, [The Greatest Tinker Ever] would eventually succeed. He would eventually become powerful enough to win.

He would eventually become [Almighty].

A/N: This is one of three, since I'm now catching back up on Sidestories - all of which I hope to have completed so I can go back to main story stuff by sunday night.

While I've got you here - please go check out Haven Quest, another Superhero Quest that I'm sure you'll all enjoy. It's just entered Chargen so if you want to be a Shoggoth - go vote.

Not that I am biased towards Shoggoths or anything.

Shoggoth.

As always, I wrote this entire update in about fourty minutes while sleep deprived on my way home from work - so forgive me for any spelling or grammar errors, please.