Super Detective in the Fictional World

2075 The Ancient One’s ‘Teaching Method’?

In the end, Dr. Strange found Jonathan Pangborn, a paraplegic who had regained the ability to move again.

He had once refused to operate on Jonathan because there was no chance of the surgery succeeding.

Unsurprisingly, Jonathan still remembered how Strange had rejected his case, and he didn’t look like he had let bygones be bygones.

When Strange asked, however, Jonathan told him about how he had recovered, as well as about that most important place — Kamar-Taj.

Strange refused to accept his fate, and set off to look for Kamar-Taj.

Luke was too lazy to pay attention.

Where was Kamar-Taj? That wasn’t important.

Given the Ancient One’s methods, she could open a portal anywhere she needed.

This bald female bigshot usually stayed at 177a Bleecker Street in Manhattan. When she was free, she could go out and buy a cup of milk tea and sit on the rooftop to bask in the sun.

For the Sorcerer Supremes, the most important thing in the end was the person themselves — even the knowledge wasn’t the most important.

Only those who passed muster could learn their spells.

To be more precise, how much a person could learn depended on how ‘qualified’ the person was.

Otherwise, why hadn’t there been a second Ancient One or even a second Strange in the battle in 2023?

It had to be pointed out that the Strange over there had died in 2018, and it had only been two years since he became Sorcerer Supreme.

But he was a fast learner and very capable.

Other sorcerers trained in Kamar-Taj for ten years or even decades, but Strange was far more stubborn than they were, and completely unreasonable.

After returning from 2023, Luke learned of the existence of Sorcerer Strange.

He then cut off all possibility of Strange entering the circle of the bigshot who sold everything. At the same time, he set up a reminder not to let anything that could be restored fall into the doctor’s hands.

In fact, Luke had a lot of ways for Strange to return to being a top surgeon.

The life potion and Light Dagger were limited edition products. It was normal for Strange not to be able to get his hands on them.

But his goal could be achieved with nanotechnology, or even amputating his hands and then reattaching two Stark Industries artificial limbs.

Thankfully, Strange had ‘forgotten’ the ‘conventional’ alternative of amputation; following the ‘plot line,’ it wasn’t long before he went to look for Kamar-Taj.

What was the chance that the Ancient One had foreseen this outcome? Luke pondered.

After confirming that Strange had come into contact with Kamar-Taj, Luke stopped paying attention to him.

Now that Strange was in the hands of the Ancient One, it wasn’t Luke’s problem if anything went wrong.

At this stage, there was no need to bother keeping an eye on Strange every day.

…

It wasn’t until March 2017 that Shuri’s second draft of the plan to remove the Stone was fully verified.

On 1 March, Vision officially underwent surgery, and it was a success.

Without the Mind Stone, Vision’s energy output was significantly reduced, but at least he didn’t have to rely on the Mind Stone to survive.

He was a combination of a vibranium body, Jarvis, the Mind Stone and Thor’s power as the God of Thunder.

The Mind Stone and the power of the God of Thunder enabled Jarvis to perfectly fuse with the vibranium body. After this process was completed, the Mind Stone could be considered his ‘heart.’

Thanos had directly dug out this ‘heart,’ so Vision naturally died.

This surgery was more like stripping off the old heart and prompting his body to quickly ‘cultivate’ a new heart.

This new heart wasn’t like the Mind Stone, which was a source of energy itself, but was completely under Vision’s control. It no longer had to be in his head all the time, and could be any part of the vibranium body.

To put it simply, Vision had lost his Achilles’ heel, which in this case was both his biggest strength but also his biggest weakness.

There was no difference in the pros and cons.

But this was the decision Vision had made himself after he and Luke analyzed the various possibilities.

Vision was very satisfied with this outcome.

As an irregularity, he had enough strength to protect himself, and didn’t need an uncontrollable power like an Infinity Stone.

Sometimes, he had really felt like a puppet restricted by the Stone.

Without the Stone, he was a completely independent and intelligent being.

So, in the afternoon after the surgery, he thanked Luke solemnly, then flew off.

Standing next to Luke, Shuri asked uncertainly, “So, this is my first time doing this sort of surgical removal. Can’t he stay under observation here for a few more days?”

Luke shook his head. “There’s no need. He’s in constant contact with the Avengers. If he falls halfway, someone will go pick him up.”

Imagining Vision falling from the air, Shuri couldn’t help but laugh.

As an irregularity, Vision was pretty cool.

He drifted along soundlessly, and could pass through walls and change forms with just a thought; these abilities were much cooler than what Luke had.

Coupled with the odd logic that came with his non-human intelligence every now and then, Shuri had always thought that he was very cool. In the end, what Luke said suddenly made Vision seem more down-to-earth.

Luke’s good mood from dealing with this pesky issue lasted for two days before he learned a piece of bad news.

Looking at the surveillance feed of a street in New York, he leaned forward suspiciously. “Is that… the Ancient One?”

On the screen, the Ancient One, who was wearing a yellow robe, fell from the sky to the sidewalk below. There was a lot of blood on the front of her torso.

Then, Luke saw Strange, who was dressed in his Sorcerer outfit, appear. His face was full of worry as he sent the Ancient One to the hospital.

Luke frowned. “Strange was sent to the hospital in the morning, and now it’s the teacher. Is it so dangerous for Kamar-Taj to take in disciples?”

Right after that, he recalled the Karma-Taj sorcerers in 2023.

Their hands had lit up with orange runes as they lunged forward to punch and kick Thanos’s soldiers.

So, Kamar-Taj’s foundation was actually melee magic?

However, it was possible that the Ancient One really was seriously injured.

But this bald bigshot who had lived for hundreds of years was a real old fox.

Given her strength, as long as Luke didn’t use his trump cards, he might not even be able to touch her.

This had nothing to do with power levels; it was purely because what this mega bigshot played with were the laws of nature.

The ordinary way to deal with her was through a battle of wits and courage.

Thinking for a moment, he murmured, “So… someone in the same circle?”