Loki, adopted son of Odin, Brother of Thor. Prince and Lord Regent of Asgard, God of tricks and lies, master of illusions, and a candidate for God of Stories and master of the multiverse.
He had plenty of titles, past, present, and future. And for some odd reason, he decided to visit Camelot again, and worse yet, since I apparently welcomed him like that last time, he didn't feel the need to show up discreetly.
Not that he was very good at that last time, but this time it was even worse. He at least didn't use the Bifrost to appear inside Camelot itself, but did so right outside the gates, a big random pillar of light appearing, shocking everyone.
That wasn't even the end of it, apparently, whatever little scheme he was working on back in Asgard had somehow worked out without Thor's interference. And now, he appeared with royal guards by his side, as is proper for a king, even a temporary one like him.
I couldn't fault him for it; he was the ruler of Asgard and the nominal ruler of Midgard, so if he wanted to show off? That wasn't my business, he clearly recognized my rule over Camelot and Albion, so why should I bother?
The problem was that he didn't hide himself, or who he was, which made the entire world go absolutely crazy.
It was one thing to have a magic hammer such as Mjolnir appear, with a whispered promise of Godly power, it was another thing entirely to suddenly have a God show up in such a public way.
The whole religious powder keg about me confirming God via the Holy Grail, then confirming Norse mythology via Mjolnir, had only barely been suppressed by other events taking place.
But now?
Yeah, Loki poured fire on that when he showed up. There was just no ignoring that.
And it wasn't like he just showed up once or twice; he seemed to come around a lot, even going on a tour of the world. Everyone gave him a royal welcome, given that everyone with half a brain at least realized that he wasn't from an alien civilization, if they still doubted his godhood.
Not that they dared to say that to his face.
Any civilization able to teleport to and from planets at will was far beyond what Earth could handle.
So they did the most logical thing.
They tried to get advanced alien technology from him.
So he was invited everywhere and given the super VIP treatment.
Though they would all be left disappointed. Asgard had long since reached a level where technology had become magic. There, they just used raw energy to get things done.
No point in a fancy 3D printer when you can just conjure objects with your mind. Not that they did that, but it was pretty damn close.
Asgard wasn't a high-tech civilization, but a high-energy one.
The current Earth was just not even close to entering that stage.
That led people to deem Asgard as a magic-based civilization, and one with possible roots in biotechnology. Or at least that was a theory I heard Reed Richard had thrown around.
He was getting rather famous these days, with other people of his level being far more difficult to get in touch with, and Susan Storm pushing him to maintain a good public image for more sponsorships.
He was one of the leading voices in a theory that all technology would at one point become like magic, and that Asgard had simply forgotten the old technology that allowed them to improve their genes to give them magic.
Much like how humans had forgotten the proper way to hunt and cook mammoths.
I wasn't sure I believed that, but it reassured some people that technology wasn't suddenly worthless and that they should suddenly start trying to learn magic.
So every institution of higher learning was pushing this theory.
These people all turned their focus to something else, namely Wakanda. This little-known African nation had gathered some attention when I called them out at the UN meeting, but that was nothing compared to what happened when they came out and admitted it.
Though it wasn't of their own kindness, they had pretty much been forced into a situation where they either did it or someone else would do it for them.
They tried to control the narrative, to garner pity and understanding, to gradually reveal the true depth of their technology while maximizing the benefits they could get.
Not that it was working for them, it seemed some people knew the truth and weren't shy about exposing their lies. I knew that at least the Veiled Hand, as well as Tony Stark's JARVIS, was partly behind it.
But news about some of their actions had leaked out, how they would steal inventions of others, and assassinate brilliant inventors to stop the world from catching up to them.
The truth about their Vibranium was leaked, even a story about them killing someone who invented the cure to cancer, and then destroying his work, just so people would continue to die from it, because they had a cure, and didn't want others to as well.
I didn't know if that story was true or not, but it didn't matter; people believed it, and suddenly, every death of every very brilliant person ever was under suspicion.
Countless people suddenly claimed that their dead uncle had been a secret genius and that they had apparently done something amazing before suddenly dying.
Or every crackpot out there suddenly jumped up, and claimed to have been brilliant, until those Wakandas came for them and messed with their heads.
And well… there was no way to prove anything, no one believed Wakanda's side of the story, and the people in charge of this smear campaign were good, really good.
News articles disappearing from the internet, hit pieces disappearing. News shows talking about them getting interrupted.
It all looked like they tried to hide the evidence, but just couldn't; it was fake. I knew some of the Veiled Hand members were behind some of it; SHIELD or Hydra might be too. Because they all wanted their Vibranium and tech.
To make it even more poetic, the people reacting the strongest against Wakanda weren't the white colonizers they liked to blame for everything, no, it was their neighbours.
Poor black Africans and African nations were the first to cry for blood.
And it wasn't hard to understand them. because, in their minds, all their problems could have been solved by Wakanda long ago. Slavery would never have been a thing, they would never have been poor, if only Wakanda had stepped up.
Some movements out there seemed racially motivated, calling for a black empire to rise and oppress the white population, but those weren't too large.
No, the true reaction from the majority was hatred and blame on Wakanda, which had already led to armed conflicts on their borders.
Wakanda wasn't weak; their neighbours couldn't do anything at all, they were effortlessly defeated, but every drop of blood spilled only caused more hate.
That conflict, together with the mutant stuff led by Magneto, had kept the world busy; Even Doom was mostly left alone as everyone was too busy to care about some small nation they figured they could crush at any moment.
Truly, going to that UN summit had been well worth it. Everyone I want off my back did so, leaving me able to focus on stability within my realm.
It was almost perfect.
Only two things annoyed me.
One, Morgana. She continued to push me, trying to find weakness. To sow chaos within my kingdom. Curses were found placed on farms, on wells, and entire districts in London, cursed with misfortune.
Cursed objects containing demons were shipped in, either through normal imports, what little remained, or smuggled in in secret.
My knights could handle demons, they could handle her pawns and servants, her slaves, the vampires she sent at me, the countless magical minions.
What they couldn't handle were the curses; my knights were no mages. They were mighty warriors, proud and loyal knights, and none within my realm could handle those magical curses.
If you couldn't kill it with a sword, they were helpless.
Only I could deal with that, with my limited magical knowledge, my divine might, and sacred objects, I could deal with them.
One surprising discovery was that one of my weapons could clean up a curse like those with ease.
My mop, yes, the divine mop of my maid, rider, summer spirit origin.
An utterly ridiculous item, from an equally unlikely version of myself.
In what strange universe would I, King Arthuria Pendragon, Ruler of Camelot, King of Knights, ever become a maid?
While my more naïve and younger saber self might be foolish enough to be tricked into acting like a maid, it was hardly easy; she had her own pride.
And it wasn't that saber that worked as the foundation for that Maid Spirit origin. No, it was my Alter self, the darkened, corrupted, and far more evil version.
Only in the utterly ridiculous universe of Fate could someone like my alter decide to become a swimsuit maid and use a sacred mop and gun as her weapons.
It was one of the spirit origins I didn't use much; it affected me, but not much. It was definitely one of the least impactful ones.
Though I did like the bike, that one is great, the gun and mop… or the maid uniform and swimsuit… I didn't really use those.
However, that mop… was surprisingly useful when it came to dealing with curses, it had the ability to clean up a mess, and be used as a weapon.
But it was the cleaning part that was important, because it could clean up a curse just by mopping the ground a little.
Though only I could use that function, which meant I had to spend time running around mopping up the mess Morgana left behind.
The duties of a king are many.
Beyond that, the other thing keeping me busy these days was Loki himself, who liked to spend time in Camelot.
And as King and Ruler, I had little choice but to host him personally. He was, after all, someone who could try to kill his brother time and time again as they grew up, and destroy an entire planet just to prove himself to his father.
With someone like that, I couldn't leave him alone for too long, not with Mordred around.
So, I was kept busy, though thankfully not as busy as my foes.
"Just be patient Mordred, soon enough, I will take you with me as we go to France." I finally said after getting caught in my own thoughts.
"France? Ew! Do we have to go there?" She said with disgust on her face.
It was funny, I wasn't sure why she even reacted like that, or why I shared her disdain for France.
After all, in our time, we haven't had the Hundred Year War to build up that dislike. Maybe it was just something that was so ingrained in the British spirit that it affected us, who were worshipped on the throne by the British people?
"If you don't want to go, I will bring Lancelot or Sir Lionel instead, given that both hail from there, they might be a better choice." I said calmly.
Mordred however didn't take it calmly at all.
Mordred's eyes widened as if I had just offered her sword to another.
"What?! No way! You're not taking him," she snapped, crossing her arms and stepping closer, practically bristling. "You can't be serious, Father. Lancelot? He's… he's French. He'll betray you the moment some blonde princess bats her lashes at him. And Lionel? Who even is Lionel?!"
I raised an eyebrow at that. "Sir Lionel was one of your uncle's most trusted companions."
"Exactly! My uncle's. Not mine." She huffed and looked away, arms still crossed. "You promised me we'd fight together."
I had to suppress the amused smile tugging at my lips.
"You just said you didn't want to go to France."
"I didn't say that!" she snapped back instantly, then paused, thinking through her words. "Okay, I did say that, but not like that. I meant… I meant France smells funny or something. But if you're going, then I'm going."
"You are very determined to contradict yourself in record time," I mused, turning back toward the balcony edge. "Tell me, is it the battle that draws you… or the time with me?"
She flinched just a little, barely visible, but I saw it.
"You said we'd do something together," she muttered, her voice dropping slightly.
(End of chapter)
For next chapter, I plan a bit of a flashback to some Loki content, before setting off for France.
This chapter was largely just catching up to what was going on with everything. We will touch more on some things from time to time, but there is too much politics to get into, so gonna skip over some of it.
But Loki stuff is Important!
I'm changing a ton of stuff, so need to do it alright or we will never have that damned New York invasion.