87- Visiting the Mansion

Mason did not wait around to start his plans, and so, from that very day after he returned from Kamar-Taj, he started visiting the children’s hospitals around the city, quietly treating the patients there.

Mason had more than enough Chi to work like this all day long, as even treating the worst-case scenarios did not require much expenditure. After all, to heal others, he did not simply drop his own Chi into them and let it do its work. Instead, he would use his Chi to resonate with their own, slowly feeding it to heal them.

So functionally speaking, all this took was time from Mason, and as far as cultivation was concerned, this was far more effective than silent meditation.

It did not take much convincing from Mason to be allowed inside the hospitals either, as while most people had forgotten his face, the name Solis was still remembered, and a few demonstrations were more than enough to convince doctors and parents both that Mason was helping.

Of course, Mason did not start spending his days and nights in the hospital. Watching the children, all those presumably doomed to die an early, painful death, would tear at anyone’s heart, but Mason’s conscience was clean, because he was saving them from that fate.

He started with the sickest among them, those whose cases were the most urgent, so he could justify taking time for himself too.

For the rest of the day, Mason meditated on the Dao and still had some free time left. As for what he was doing with that free time, other than spending time with Minx, he had bought himself a ‘gaming’ PC for one game that had been released a few months ago, and that was Skyrim.

A game he loved in his old life, and one he still loved in this one. The game had been released while he was preparing the attack on the Hand headquarters, so he did not get the opportunity to play it up to this point.

And it did not disappoint, to the point where Mason wished he had more time to play it. It did make him wonder, though, how his life would have gone, had he been transmigrated to that world instead of this one. Given the choice, Mason would have picked Marvel even if only for the ease of life that came with a modern society, and personal preferences too, but it would have certainly made for an interesting time regardless.

But more importantly, the day for his visit to the X-Mansion also finally arrived, which brought its own share of excitement. Mason was happy to see his little sister, first and foremost, but there was definitely an appeal to meeting with the X-Men, which did come with some apprehension, as he was about to meet with telepaths.

Technically, Mason had already met plenty, as all Sorcerers started with psychics, but most of them were novices who could hardly read a normal person’s mind, not to mention Mason’s enhanced Spirit. Moreover, they were all disciplined enough not to peer.

For the X-Men, Mason did not quite know, as again, he was about to meet real people, not comic book characters. In the comics, be it Charles Xavier or Jean Grey, they had both been depicted as holding people’s inner thoughts sacred and freely reading minds, depending on the writers.

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Although a part of Mason wondered whether they would even be able to read his mind, and if so, whether they could access anything related to his old life. Yao had never tried, or never told him so at least, but he figured that even someone of her station would have had some sort of reaction to his knowledge.

Not an existential crisis, since Mason himself believed this world to be just as real as his old one, but at least questions, or at the very least a change in behaviour. Asking him to direct Strange to Kamar-Taj would have been unnecessary, for example.

So, Mason was excited and eager when he left for the X-Mansion. Sure enough, the trip did not take him more than a few minutes of sailing through the air, making the whole journey in just a few leaps.

The X-Mansion, better known as Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, sprawled out over a large domain, truly earning its name of mansion. The house itself had five floors on the surface, and Mason knew there was at least one more below ground.

But the school was not just the house itself, but the terrain surrounding it also, with vast plains and even a small lake.

When Mason arrived, it was slightly past noon, and students were spread out over the domain, giving the school a feeling of vitality, a far cry from the almost ruins the place had been half a year ago.

Mason arrived from the sky, rapidly descending towards the front of the mansion. Although he was confident in surviving the landing at terminal velocity, he would no doubt ruin the lawn, so as he descended from the sky, he lowered his own gravity and placed both hands towards the ground, rapidly forming flames, in a somewhat similar manner to how Iron Man flew.

Mason’s Fire Dao was unfortunately not strong enough yet to allow him to fly, as even with reduced gravity, his fire explosions were not strong enough for propulsion, but it was still enough to have an effect on his speed, be it to accelerate or decelerate.

Mason’s arrival was not particularly subtle, not that he meant for it to be; so many eyes turned to him as Mason softly landed in front of the mansion, his fall barely disturbing the grass under him.

He expected his arrival to surprise the mansion, but he found himself surprised as he noticed a few figures at the door of the mansion, waiting for him. At the front was a bald man in a wheelchair, Professor Charles Xavier, and pushing the chair was a tall man with a red visor, Scott Summers, also known as Cyclops.

The two were flanked by two women, Jean Grey and Ororo Munroe, respectively, Marvel Girl and Storm.

So not only was Mason expected, but it was by the leaders of the X-Men at that.

The one thing that jumped out at Mason, though, was just how young they were. It was understandable, they had been stuck in time for around thirty years, but it remained no less surprising.

Of course, Mason himself was only 19 biologically, and Xavier looked like he was in his early fifties, while the rest were in their early thirties. So maybe calling them ‘young’ was not the most apt way to put things, but still, it was surprising. Besides, Mason now looked older than he was, as his body had long been pushed to its physical prime.

It was hard to give him an exact age from only his looks, but he would bet that guesses would hover somewhere around late twenties.

Mason felt the urge to scan them with his Divine Sense, but he restrained himself, as it would be a little too rude for a first meeting. Not quite as much as them reading his thoughts, but it would be hypocritical to expect such courtesy from them and not offer it himself.

But as Mason was about to greet them, he was stopped by a loud, animalistic roar, "YOU!"

Mason turned and found none other than the Wolverine, staring at him like he could not believe he was there, nearly frothing at the mouth. Strangely, his chest was partly uncovered, his shirt seemingly burned at the front. And of course, because the world never liked to be simple, right next to him was Audrey.

Mason’s sister had been all smiles at first, but was now looking between her professor and Mason in shock, failing to understand what was happening. A state shared by everyone other than Mason and Wolverine, who were now staring at each other.