The amulet still hummed faintly against my skin as I stood in the center of my lab, letting the last traces of cosmic resonance settle through the room. Runes dimmed. Null-field stabilizers clicked back into standby mode. The Reality Stone's power thrummed like a gentle heartbeat inside the metal frame I had crafted.
But I wasn't finished.
Not yet.
There was another project—one I had put off until the amulet was complete. A project born from the memories of Rick Prime buried deep within my mind like stolen stars. A project I knew I would one day need.
A permanent, invisible personal shield.
Something no one could breach.Something no one would even know existed.Something that would keep me alive even if a god decided to throw a tantrum.
I walked to the far table where Rick Prime's old schematics—those impossible blueprints written in multidimensional calculus—hovered in holographic layers. Some of the designs weren't even understandable by human logic; they folded into impossible geometries, twisting in ways that only made full sense to me because my mind was no longer bound by traditional physics.
"Rick," I muttered, "you may have been a maniac, but your genius is unparalleled."
I slid on a pair of spectral-interfacing gloves and manipulated the designs.
A multi-layered shield.Quantum-reactive.Adaptive.Self-repairing.Anchored to my bio-signature and powered by the Reality Stone's ambient field.
Untouchable.
The core of the shield wasn't technology, nor magic, nor physics—it was a blend of all three, tied together with Rick's principle of quantum negation. A principle that essentially meant: the universe refuses to let anything hurt me.
I placed my hands on the device and ignited the activation sequence.
The world pulsed once.Then twice.
A ring of invisible force snapped into existence around me with a sound like a single drop of water falling into infinity.
Then silence.
The shield wrapped around me in a perfect sphere—weightless, invisible, undetectable. Even I couldn't feel it unless I focused. Only the faintest tightening of reality itself hinted that it existed.
I tested it by snapping my fingers.
A bolt of test lightning shot out of a nearby generator.
It curved.It bent.It dissolved before it touched me, disappearing as though it had never existed.
Perfect.
"I think this is going to keep me alive for a very, very long time," I whispered.
Not even a senior reality warper could breach something like this—not without enough effort to level continents. And even then… maybe not.
Satisfied, I shut down the lab systems and headed toward Luna's room.
Her bracelet's faint red glow shimmered beneath her door—she was awake.
The moment I stepped inside, she squealed, "Mommy!"
I hadn't even finished closing the door before she barreled into me at full speed, her tiny arms wrapping around my legs. Her hair brushed against my hands—silver-white and impossibly soft, a little wild from napping and playing.
I scooped her up easily and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "There's my moonflower. Were you behaving?"
She nodded, her eyes sparkling like twin galaxies. "I drawed a picture of you! And me! And a kitty! And then—um—then Orochi said I shouldn't make the kitty real yet, but I didn't! I didn't make it real! I promise!"
Her earnestness made me laugh softly.
"You're doing very well," I murmured, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "You're learning control."
She beamed.
Her bracelet shimmered a little, the sigils pulsing gently. Within the radius of her room, her reality bending abilities remained potent but contained. A smart design—one I had spent more time on than any Infinity Stone research. Containing a Level 4 Reality Bender wasn't something most people would attempt. Doing it in a way that kept her happy? Nearly impossible.
But Luna wasn't an SCP to me.
She was my daughter.
And at that moment, she tugged at the collar of my coat and whispered, "Mommy… hungry."
Ah.
I settled onto her bed, a soft blanket draping around my waist as I adjusted her in my arms. She curled against me, already comfortable, already trusting, her tiny hand gripping my shirt.
"You really are growing fast, little moon," I murmured, stroking her hair.
She nuzzled closer, warm and soft, her reality energy faintly glowing around us like fireflies dancing.
"Mommy milk…" she mumbled sleepily.
I held her gently and let her feed, her small fingers resting against my chest, her eyes half-lidded with comfort. She always seemed so peaceful during moments like these. Like the whole universe narrowed down to two people: her and me.
No threats.No politics.No O5 Council.No SCP anomalies waiting to devour worlds.
Just my daughter.
Just Luna.
When she finished, she curled against me, resting her head on my shoulder. I rocked her slowly, humming a tune that my mother once hummed to me—a faint echo from a life long gone. She didn't speak again; she simply breathed softly, her arms around my neck.
After a few minutes she whispered, "Mommy… you're warm."
I blinked.
Warm?
Emotion flickered in my chest. "Am I?"
She nodded sleepily. "Mhmm. Warm. Safe."
I swallowed.
The shield I had built.The Infinity Stones.The experiments.The battles.The power.None of that mattered in this moment.
Luna was here.Luna was safe.And I was the only one she trusted.
I held her until she fell asleep, her small smile pressed against my shoulder, and for the first time in a long time, I felt something gentle settle in my chest.
Peace.
My little moonflower.My daughter.My brightest creation in all the cosmos.
And I would burn reality itself before letting anything harm her.