Leander shot through the clouds, a wide, unrestrained smile plastered on his face. The air screamed around him, but within his golden aura, there was only the low hum of power and the rhythm of his own heartbeat. He pushed his flight speed to the absolute limit, hitting Mach 10. At this velocity, the world below became a smeared painting of blues and greens, a beautiful, abstract tapestry that he finally had the time to appreciate.
For the first time in what felt like forever, Leander wasn't rushing to save someone, threaten a mob boss, or make it to homeroom before the bell. He was just moving.
He glanced down at the Pacific Ocean, its vastness stretching out like a sheet of hammered sapphire. On a whim, he angled his body and dove.
Splash.
He hit the water at a sharp angle, the golden light around him acting as a hydrodynamic shield that sliced through the waves. As he descended into the depths, he switched his body to internal circulation—a state of deep meditative breathing that allowed him to survive without oxygen for extended periods.
The silence of the deep was a shock after the roar of the stratosphere. His eyes, glowing with the Delusion-Breaking light, adjusted instantly. He saw everything: vast schools of silver fish darting in unison, luminescent jellyfish pulsing like alien hearts, and ancient sea turtles paddling through the warm currents.
Leander drifted along with a thermal stream, watching the brutal yet beautiful cycle of the ocean. A small shark circled nearby, eyeing a group of smaller fish, but it steered clear of the glowing golden boy. Leander spotted a juvenile sea turtle struggling with a jagged gash on its flipper—likely a run-in with a boat propeller or a predator.
He swam closer, his movements fluid and weightless. He reached out his hand, dispersing the protective light around his palm just enough to touch the turtle's shell. A soft, warm pulse of golden energy flowed into the wound. The turtle didn't flinch; it seemed to recognize the benevolence in the energy. In seconds, the gash closed, leaving nothing but smooth, healthy skin.
Leander patted the turtle's head, a sense of profound peace washing over him. It wasn't until his lungs began to burn with the need for fresh air that he kicked off, surging toward the surface.
"Yahoo!!"
He erupted from the water, a fountain of spray trailing behind him. He felt truly free—no school, no mobsters, no expectations. Just the sky and the sea. He spread his wings and began a vertical ascent, punching through the clouds at six thousand, then ten thousand meters.
As the sky deepened from blue to a dark, bruised purple, Leander entered the stratosphere. At thirty thousand meters, he could see the curvature of the Earth. He kept pushing, reaching the edge of the ionosphere at a hundred thousand meters. Here, the air was almost non-existent, and the temperature dropped to a bone-chilling minus fifty-five degrees. Shimmering curtains of aurora danced in the distance, their ethereal light reflecting in his golden eyes.
He felt the resistance of the Earth's gravity, a tether he wasn't yet strong enough to break. He couldn't go into orbit—not yet.
'Mach 10... is this the limit of the Nirvana Golden Wings?' he mused, hanging suspended at the edge of space. 'No. My eyes are stronger than they were when I first arrived. My bones are the key. Once I finish the Iron Bone strengthening, my physical limits will shatter. I need more Vibranium.'
He banked right, turning his heading toward the African continent.
Ten minutes later, the lush, hidden canopy of Wakanda appeared on his HUD. He didn't slow down. He plummeted through the virtual camouflage layer, a golden comet entering the sovereign airspace of the world's most advanced nation.
He bypassed the Border Tribe's sonic sensors by fluctuating his magnetic frequency and smashed through the secondary defense shield like it was made of wet paper. The Wakandan Royal Guard saw the blip on their screens—a signature too fast to track and too familiar to shoot down.
In the Royal Palace, King T'Chaka sat on his throne, his brow furrowed as he watched the playback. The golden light had entered the city, bypassed their perimeter, and vanished into the mountains.
"He's back," T'Chaka murmured, his voice a mix of respect and weary frustration.
His Kimoyo beads vibrated, and the holographic projection of T'Challa, the Black Panther, appeared. "Father, the intruder has reached the mines. He didn't go to the previous excavation site; he's moved deeper into the raw ore veins. We've lost visual."
"Recall the drones, T'Challa," the King sighed. "He's a guest we cannot evict and a ghost we cannot catch. If he wants to hide in the dark, let him. He'll come to us when he's hungry or finished."
"Yes, Father." T'Challa cut the feed, but he didn't stop. He turned and headed toward his sister's laboratory.
Deep within the Great Mound, Leander had carved a new burrow. He was surrounded by the raw, pulsing purple glow of unrefined Vibranium ore. He stripped off his shirt, carefully sealing his clothes and phone behind a two-meter wall of rock he'd manipulated into place.
He sat cross-legged in the center of the cramped, glowing cavern. He reached out, and several chunks of high-grade ore floated into his palms. The pale purple energy began to bleed out of the rocks, spiraling around his arms like ethereal smoke.
Tiny golden beads—concentrated points of his own internal energy—emerged from his skin, dancing with the purple Vibranium radiation. The process began.
The energy surged into his marrow, grinding against the 77% completion mark that had been his plateau for weeks. It was a slow, agonizingly meticulous process. He could feel his skeletal structure becoming denser, vibrating with a frequency that surpassed biological matter.
A small smile touched his lips as the progress bar in his mind finally ticked forward.
78%.
He closed his eyes, sinking into a deep trance. Around him, the walls of the mine seemed to hum in sympathy with his pulse.
"Brother, if you don't start knocking, I'm going to install a sonic pulse behind that door," Shuri snapped without looking up from her workstation. She was currently adjusting a set of Vibranium gauntlets, her movements precise and impatient. "What is it? Did you break your suit again?"
"Leander is back," T'Challa said, leaning against a table.
Shuri froze. She dropped her laser-welder and spun around, her eyes wide. "What? He's here? Why didn't he come to the lab? I have three new theories on his energy signature I wanted to test!"
"He went straight to the mines. He's hiding again," T'Challa said, looking at his sister's dejected face.
Shuri's eyes suddenly sparkled with a mischievous, intellectual fire. "He thinks he can hide? I've spent the last month upgrading the scouting drones with sub-harmonic scanners. They can see through four meters of solid Vibranium-reinforced rock. If he's in that mountain, I will find him."
She began frantically typing on a holographic keyboard, a dozen drones chirping to life in their docking bays. "He's not the only one who can play hide and seek."