Inside a quiet room in the Apostolic Palace of the Vatican.
Adrian sat cross-legged, the elemental light around him flickering and flowing, seemingly in sync with his breathing. Suddenly, a silent breeze came from his body, and the entire room trembled slightly.
"Finally met the basic requirements."
He slowly opened his eyes, a golden glow flashing in them for just a moment.
The ability of Elemental Control was way more powerful than he'd expected. In just about a month since escaping the lab, his body had recovered from a near-death state to its theoretical human peak.
"Next up, time to re-cultivate the power of the Cosmo."
Adrian stood up, clenched his fist slightly, and clearly felt the surging power within his flesh and blood.
Sure, there was still some distance to reach his previous life's realm of surpassing mortals, but with the power of Elemental Control and the fact that he was re-cultivating, he was confident he could re-sense and awaken his Cosmo within a month.
After all, this wasn't the original Saint Seiya world. Even if the Marvel Universe was inclusive and let different power systems exist, cultivation would definitely not be as smooth as in his native universe.
It was basically impossible to recreate the glory days of the Saint Seiya world, where people grasped the Seventh Sense at age eleven or twelve.
According to Adrian's estimate, in the Marvel Universe, anyone who could successfully grasp the Sixth Sense would already be considered heaven's favorite.
This was because, in this world, there was a huge gap between mortals and Skyfather-level beings, a chasm that was crazy hard to cross.
Even by refining the Sixth Sense to its extreme, you could have power comparable to Skyfather-level.
That was already the upper limit countless beings dreamed of. The famous villain Thanos, whose power level was just Skyfather-level, was already able to rule over more than five thousand life planets in the universe, with his Black Order and Sanctuary being the nightmare of countless civilizations.
Even some of the gods in Marvel didn't necessarily have Skyfather-level combat power.
In the days that followed, Adrian fully dedicated himself to re-cultivating the Cosmo. The most basic condition for cultivating the Cosmo was to temper the physical body to its extreme.
Only by developing the five senses to their limit was it possible to grasp the profound Sixth Sense.
The Vatican had specifically set aside a training ground for him within the Apostolic Palace. It was also during this time that the Vatican publicly announced the establishment of the "Star Saint Legion."
As soon as the news broke, higher-ups from different countries talked about it like crazy.
Over the past few thousand years, the Catholic Church hadn't been without its own armed forces, but as tech advanced rapidly, individual power became increasingly insignificant against modern weaponry.
Combined with miracles being absent for so long, the Catholic Church gradually pulled back to the realm of pure spiritual belief, and its armed forces had been disbanded ages ago.
After nearly a thousand years, the Catholic Church suddenly announced it was rebuilding its armed forces, naturally attracting countless theories and prying eyes.
Deep within Kamar-Taj.
"The trajectory of destiny has taken a new turn..." The Sorcerer Ancient One slowly opened her eyes, the Eye of Agamotto hanging quietly on her chest, not giving off the unique glow of the Time Stone.
Though her face was aged, her gaze was sharp as hell.
As the guardian of Earth and one of the most powerful sorcerers in the universe, Ancient One's power didn't need the Infinity Stones to prove anything anymore.
With her mastery of White Magic alone, she'd already stood at the top of mortals and many gods, reaching the peak of Skyfather-level, someone even the Asgardian Allfather and numerous dimensional demon gods were wary of.
For hundreds of years, she'd been like a stabilizing force, firmly guarding the reality dimension. But right now, she clearly sensed an unexpected deviation in the timeline.
In this universe, where Mutants kept popping up and the timeline was naturally fragile, reboots and deviations weren't uncommon.
Ancient One had always stayed detached, never bothered by them. Only this time, even she felt that the future was shrouded in fog, hard to see clearly.
"Sorcerer Supreme, the Catholic Church has publicly put out a statement announcing they're rebuilding a legion called the Star Saint Legion. Should we..." A grand master respectfully stepped forward, his tone hesitant.
"The Catholic Church?" Ancient One looked up, her gaze seemingly piercing through endless space, landing in the direction of the Vatican.
She knew that the one the Catholic Church worshipped had vanished ages ago, but the fact that they chose to rebuild their armed forces at this time was no coincidence.
"The root of everything, maybe, lies here..."
"No need to interfere."
Ancient One muttered quietly, then pulled herself together.
"A great era is coming. The existence of the Catholic Church might be a wild card, but it could also become help in the future."
The grand master respectfully left after hearing this.
Ancient One understood: God had actually existed, and was even an extremely powerful ancient deity. But at some unknown point, the deity went into hiding, the divine light faded, and that being, proclaimed as all-knowing and all-powerful, gradually faded from the stage of myth.
Unlike the active pantheons of Asgard or Olympus, God's level of existence might even go beyond ancient gods like the Vishanti, who represent the fundamental essence of the universe.
"God... is she truly returning?"
Ancient One had no plans to interfere. The Kamar-Taj's job was to protect humanity and stabilize the reality dimension. As long as it didn't involve Earth's survival or human extinction, they rarely messed with secular affairs, dedicating most of their energy to fighting dimensional demon gods and Loki invasions.
Meanwhile, Logan, who'd split up with Adrian ages ago, also saw the statement put out by the Catholic Church.
"Did you do this?" He muttered, though his words carried a slight question, he was already sure in his heart.
Behind all this, Adrian had to be the driving force. He hadn't expected the guy's moves to be this fast.
"Interesting..."
And the various dark forces of the underworld and the lurking dark creatures also noticed the Catholic Church's statement.
Most of them just laughed with contempt. In their view, the Catholic Church, having lost the backing of extraordinary power, didn't have any scary factor anymore. Rebuilding its armed forces was nothing more than a joke, and they didn't think much of it.
Time quietly passed.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
In the training ground deep within the Apostolic Palace, heavy thuds echoed nonstop.
A specially made sandbag weighing nearly four hundred and fifty pounds swung violently in the air, each impact making a muffled thunderous roar. A sandbag this heavy would be crazy difficult for a normal person to even push, let alone hit this hard. One wrong move could even hurt yourself.
"Boom!"
Finally, with a tearing roar, the sandbag snapped in half and flew backward.
"Your physical condition has probably already gone past human limits, hasn't it?" The Pope had showed up at the edge of the training ground at some point, quietly waiting for Adrian to finish his training.
"Pretty much."
"Have the candidates been picked?"
Adrian grabbed his towel to wipe away sweat, his breathing steady as usual.
"The people who can meet your requirements..."
"Within the entire Catholic Church, only four have been screened so far."
The Pope handed over a document.
"Oh?"
"There's actually four? I thought there wouldn't even be one."
Adrian raised an eyebrow, a rare hint of teasing in his voice.
The profiles showed three guys and one woman. When he saw the only woman among them, a hint of surprise flashed in Adrian's eyes.
Besides physical condition and potential, the Pope had added faith as an important standard for this selection.
"Not bad."
"We can set up a meeting now."
Adrian closed the document and nodded.
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