"I think I've rested enough, Grace" Leon said as he brought out his pen
"What are you doing?" Grace whispered, refusing to accept his request
"A means of protection for the both of us" Leon replied before immediately began to draw on her finger
About his powers, he had come to understand that intent was the thing that shaped it the most above all else. Hence immediately he was done with her, he began to draw on his own finger as well
"Isn't this a ring? Is this a secret proposal?" Grace asked, a large smile could be seen on her face
"Get your mind out of the gutter, you still need to graduate from university for that to happen" Leon reminded as he flicked her forehead
"Ah.. Then what is this for?" Grace asked
"In Marriage, we are one so we would be able to share each other's abilities" Leon explained as quickly as he could
"So.. It is a secret proposal… I accept" Grace said happily as she examined the temporary ring tattoo on her middle finger
However, just as she raised her hand to examine it, the tattoo immediately came into effect.
She felt a great change within her, it was as though something fundamental was broken and pieced together again in that very instant.
It was very subtle but profound, her power which she thought was already refined due to the tattoo suddenly got even clearer.
She could feel her thoughts diverge into several hundreds before they converged on one in mere instants.
She wasn't just examining the ring anymore, she also simultaneously considered her skin, the ceiling behind her finger, her father sitting beside her.
It was as though her field of view not only got broader, it got sharper. Things she would normally ignore were crystal clear before her.
Solutions to problems that plagued her seemed to just materialize out of thin air. No, it would be best and more accurate to say that she always knew them but refused to acknowledge them due to some reason to the other.
"Is this how you have always felt?" Grace asked as she turned to Leon
However she found him with his eyes closed and a slight frown on his face. If she got his abilities then he also got hers.
Leon was having a slightly harder time adjusting than Grace anticipated. He had gone from a single mind that observed thousands which were in essence partitions of one.
However now he had to manage each thought as well as extend his mind. It wasn't an easy feat, however compared to the average person, he was doing far better.
"You're a lot more powerful than I expected" Leon said as he opened his eyes
"What's that supposed to mean?" Grace asked, somewhat offended
"Don't get me wrong, I never had a real imagination of what Telepathy actually was like, this is above and beyond my thoughts" Leon confessed
It was truly above and beyond what he thought. At the moment his mind was out spread throughout the entire auction house and around it
From even the strayest of thoughts, he understood why Grace had said that the price would go beyond.
"Now lets begin with a starting bid of $500,000" The auctioneer announced
"$1,000,000" a voice announced from the audience.
"$1,500,000" another one was heard
The prices kept climbing but Leon was more worried about the people who hadn't yet bidded.
Most especially it was the Hydra, from what he knew, Hydra was an organization that Captain America had fought and destroyed back in World War II
If he recalled the news articles and online banter about it, The organization that we now know as Shield was formed specifically to combat them.
However, somehow both agents were in the same boot as one organization. Looking at this situation, Leon didn't know if Shield was infiltrating Hydra or the other way around.
The end point of it all though was that he would avoid contact with either people from now on.
They weren't the only ones though, there was a woman in a boot that just didn't sit right with him, even if it was only her stray thoughts… Digging deeper wouldn't take much but the stray alone seemed ancient.
From some organization known as the HAND, many had gathered believing that his Map of the Cosmos was an actual map.
"If my power made it an actual map, that would make sense but how do they expect something that barely allows them to maintain that state for long" Leon thought to himself.