The rest of the day passed quietly.
No calls.
No new surprises from Fury or HYDRA.
Just silence, broken only by the faint hum of the city outside.
Liam spent the evening unwinding, cooking peacefully for the first time in what felt like months, testing his Clean Hold ability on everything he touched, and staring out the window at the Manhattan skyline until night fully claimed it.
When he finally went to sleep, his thoughts settled on only one thing: the Eight Gates Scroll.
And by morning, he had already made up his mind.
At dawn, the city was still half-asleep when Liam woke. He washed up, dressed simply, and stepped onto the apartment balcony. The cold air hit his face, crisp and alive, carrying that faint smell of early winter.
He focused inward.
The familiar hum of energy from his Flight ability answered almost instantly.
Energy gathered faintly around his feet. No glow. No burst. Just weight slipping away as the air bent to his will.
And then, with a gentle push, he rose.
The skyline fell beneath him, the morning sun glinting off glass towers as he soared higher. The world below turned small and distant, streets like threads, cars like toys.
He banked eastward, ascending further until he was just a shadow against the pale light, high enough that no one would notice and no camera would track him.
The wind rushed past, but the Aerodynamic Shield kept his flight smooth and effortless. He could breathe normally, see clearly, and feel perfectly balanced despite the altitude.
He smiled faintly.
"Alright. That's one hell of an upgrade."
The trip didn't take long.
Twenty minutes later, he descended through the treeline of Inwood Hill Park, one of the few remaining stretches of natural forest near Manhattan, a quiet, secluded place where no one would bother him at this hour.
Liam landed lightly among the damp leaves, brushing a hand across the bark of a tree as if grounding himself. The forest was still, the air fresh and untouched by the chaos of the city.
Perfect for training.
He opened his inventory and pulled out the Eight Gates Release Scroll.
The long parchment appeared in his hands, glowing faintly with blue light. The moment he unfurled it, the ink shimmered like liquid energy, ancient symbols glowing brighter and brighter.
Then, before he could even react, the scroll dissolved, breaking apart into countless fragments of blue light that swirled around him like fireflies before merging directly into his chest.
He inhaled sharply as knowledge poured into his mind. Sensations, breathing patterns, muscle pathways, anatomical diagrams. Everything about the Eight Gates Technique embedded itself perfectly, fitting into his body's awareness like it had always been there.
When the light faded, Liam exhaled slowly.
"Alright," he muttered. "That was different."
The knowledge was precise. Detailed. But slightly altered from what he remembered from Naruto.
There was no chakra. No mystical flow of life energy like in the anime.
Instead, the scroll had restructured the entire process, replacing chakra with a specialized form of Blue Wheel energy, the same internal current that powered his system abilities.
Every human had limiters, it explained. Biological gates that controlled physical output. The technique allowed the user to override those limits temporarily, flooding their body with enhanced energy circulation at the cost of strain and damage.
Liam flexed his fingers slowly, testing the flow.
The first step was simple. Focus on the first gate. The Gate of Opening, located in the brain's inner limiter, the mental chain that restricted muscle output.
He sat cross-legged on the forest floor, closing his eyes as he visualized his body's internal energy flow.
His breathing slowed. His pulse steadied. His awareness sharpened.
Minutes passed.
Then, faintly, he felt it. A thin barrier deep inside his mind, like invisible glass holding something back.
He focused on it.
Pressure built behind his eyes. His heartbeat quickened.
Gate of Opening, he thought. Open.
A rush of power surged through his muscles, wild but controlled. Heat flooded his chest and arms, every fiber of his body vibrating with potential.
The ground beneath him cracked slightly from the sudden burst of physical tension.
Liam didn't feel any pain because of his Perfect Pain Immunity. Even the damage caused to his body by opening the first gate healed the moment it appeared, keeping him at his absolute best state.
His eyes opened, glowing faintly blue for a heartbeat before fading back to normal.
The energy settled. Stable. Controlled.
He stood, taking a single step forward, and the ground beneath his foot dented slightly from sheer force.
A grin spread across his face.
Yeah, he thought softly, the thrill pulsing through his veins. That's more like it.
He exhaled, releasing the gate slowly, letting the excess energy fade from his system. His breathing returned to normal and his muscles relaxed.
He could feel it now. The difference between normal and limitless.
And that was just the first gate.
If he could master the rest…
He looked up at the morning sky through the forest canopy, the sunlight breaking through the leaves in thin golden beams.
After observing for a bit, he went back to training, determined to master the Eight Gates one by one, no matter how long it took.
Unfortunately the scroll didn't register itself as an ability. It was considered to be an item by the system, so when he checked the blue wheel panel, he didn't found the technique under the ability head. This meant that he had to to progress this training with his own hard work as he wouldn't be able to use the plot points to advance it.
Two more days passed in a quiet rhythm of discipline and repetition.
Liam returned to Inwood Hill Park before dawn and left only when the light began to fade. He trained alone, away from paths and people, pushing his body again and again while carefully regulating the flow of Blue Wheel energy through the first gate.
By the end of the second day, the Gate of Opening no longer felt wild.
It responded.
He could open it without hesitation, maintain it without losing control, and close it cleanly without any lingering instability. The surge of strength no longer surprised him. His muscles adapted instantly, his movements smooth and deliberate rather than explosive and reckless.
Control.
That was the difference.
Standing in the quiet forest, Liam flexed his hand and slowly released the gate, watching the energy fade exactly when he willed it to.
"…I've got it," he murmured.
And that realization made another thought surface.
This was fast.
Too fast.
Even in the Naruto world, Rock Lee had needed time. Pain. Endless repetition. Guidance. His progress with the gates had been brutal and slow, each step carved out with blood and effort.
Yet Liam had gained solid control over the first gate in just a couple of days.
He frowned slightly.
'There's no way this is normal,' he thought to himself.
The only explanation that made sense was the Blue Wheel itself. The energy it provided was refined, stable, and perfectly integrated into his body. It didn't fight him. It didn't resist. It flowed exactly where he directed it, reinforcing his muscles and nerves instead of tearing them apart.
Perfect Pain Immunity and regeneration handled the consequences.
The Blue Wheel handled the fuel.
If that was the case, then the next step was obvious.
The second gate.
The Gate of Healing.
He steadied his breathing, pushed the thought aside, and resumed training, repeating the opening and closing of the first gate until the motion felt as natural as clenching a fist.
--
Far away from Manhattan…
In Sokovia.
The rally ground was soaked in blood.
What had begun as voices and banners had dissolved into screams and gunfire. Bodies lay scattered across the cracked concrete, unarmed men and women cut down as they tried to run, to hide, to shield each other with their own bodies.
Smoke drifted through the air. Sirens wailed somewhere in the distance but never came close.
Militia gunmen stood at the edges of the square, rifles still smoking, boots splashed red as they stepped over the fallen.
At the center of it all, amid the chaos and carnage, Wanda sat on her knees.
Her hands were trembling.
In her lap lay Pietro.
Her brother.
His body was riddled with bullet wounds, his jacket torn apart, blood soaking through the fabric and pooling beneath him. His eyes were half-open, staring at nothing, his chest still.
Gone.
Wanda didn't scream.
She didn't cry.
She just stared down at him, her face empty, lifeless, as if something inside her had shattered too completely for sound.
Blood stained her hands.
Blood stained the ground.
And the world around her kept moving, shooting, shouting, killing.
As if nothing had ended at all.
***
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