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Chapter 505 – Mistake
🕑 Added 2025-11-04 07:01:02 +0000 UTCAs expected, Phoebe watched Deimos toy with Percy and the crow, effortlessly ripping them apart. Seeing the Violet preparing to finish the boy off, she knew that her time to interfere was quickly running out. Yet, just as she was about to step in to save him, the broken familiar leapt in the way of the blast, clearly intending to sacrifice everything to protect its master.
The sight made Phoebe hesitate, thinking that letting Deimos destroy the crow first might not be a terrible idea.
She didn’t want to do that, of course – she wasn’t heartless. She’d grown rather fond of Percy and Micky after observing them for so long. The bird’s willingness to give up its life to save the boy was especially moving and the thought of letting either of them suffer didn’t sit well with her.
Even so, she felt that it was better this way. She wasn’t their mother – she was the Order’s leader and Remior’s primary protector. Her duty was to their world before any of its people and the upsides of letting the crow perish greatly outweighed the downsides.
This was quite a strange dilemma, but one that she’d been contemplating for a while. In anybody else’s hands, the powerful familiar would have made for a priceless asset – the realization of the Order’s ambitions for Acton’s family over the last several thousand years.
Had someone told Phoebe that she was going to willingly allow a creature like Micky to die before her eyes one day, she would have burst out laughing. However, Percy’s unprecedented growth had greatly shifted her perspective over the years, making her value his development more than many of his other achievements – the creation of a controllable beast included.
Simply put, Micky had always been more of a liability for the boy than an asset!
Just thinking about it was crazy, but there was no denying it. On the surface, the crow had done an excellent job keeping up with Percy’s strength and aiding him in his ventures. Any outside observer could be excused for thinking that Micky’s contribution to their team was equal to Percy’s, as the bird essentially doubled the boy’s fighting strength.
Phoebe was wise enough to peer a layer deeper than most, scrutinizing the long road that had led them to the present moment.
‘The crow has been holding him back from the very start,’ she’d concluded.
Percy was probably smart enough to see it too, though his loyalty to his friend had blinded him all this time. Not only had the bird consumed enormous amounts of resources and attention to reach its current level, but its existence had also forced Percy to make numerous reckless decisions.
He’d travelled to suboptimal places to train, taken unnecessary risks for the sake of his familiar, and even picked a fight with a Holy Child. If it hadn’t been for Micky, Percy might have stayed in the Alchemists’ Guild the whole time, hidden from everyone – including Phoebe. The only reason he’d put himself out there had been the urgency to earn enough resources to support the crow.
On top of that, there was an even greater disadvantage to owning a familiar: Percy’s limited clone capacity.
For the longest time, he’d only been capable of maintaining two connections, one of which had been permanently occupied by the crow. Even after increasing his limit to six, the boy had foolishly chosen to tie up a second clone to the bird, thus leaving a third of his total capacity unavailable to this day.
That was without even considering the second familiar that he was clearly planning to create. Phoebe couldn’t help but wonder how much stronger Percy would have grown, had he focused his efforts on bettering himself over the past couple of decades.
Looking back, she had to admit that Percy hadn’t made that many outrageous mistakes in the time that she’d observed him, but the biggest ones could all be traced back to that first mistake: Micky’s creation!
That was not to say that she was opposed to the idea of familiars in general. They were certainly an important feature of Percy’s bloodline, as well as valuable assets to Remior as a whole – especially if they could be mass-produced. They could revisit the topic in the future.
Perhaps, the best time to do that would be after a few thousand years, once Percy was done picking all the low-hanging fruit waiting for him out there in the cosmos. As soon as his progress slowed down, they could have him tie up a clone or two to forge a couple of powerful companions. The creatures grew rather fast, so it wouldn’t be too late to start over.
Now was too early, however.
Stinting his growth so early in his journey was inefficient. Phoebe was willing to bet that Percy would have been far stronger if he hadn’t missed out on hundreds of potential clones due to Micky.
‘Also, I’m sure that he can do a lot better than the bird…’
Phoebe hadn’t witnessed the familiar’s creation, but it was quite clear that Percy had simply shoved a random mortal’s soul into the first available body, without even understanding the implications. Sure, he’d taught the crow a few useful spells since then and even invested a petal to grant it a composite affinity, but none of its abilities was particularly impressive.
In many ways, what Percy was obviously planning to do with the goddess’s soul and the Starry Wasp was a hundred times more promising – now, that, was an experiment that Phoebe was interested in watching, excusing, and even wholeheartedly supporting.
Even if Percy decided that he needed more familiars in the future, she could help him pick unique souls and useful bodies to pair together. In fact, she was more than happy to let him try several times, until they stumbled upon a familiar lucky enough to awaken a rare affinity.
As for Micky…
It was painful to admit, but Percy was better off getting rid of him. Since he wasn’t going to do that by himself, Phoebe could just let Deimos do it for him.
Watching the crow’s head burst open left a bad taste in her mouth. It was cruel of her to allow this but making the tough decisions that nobody else was willing to entertain was ultimately her job.
Seeing the anguish in Percy’s expression gave her no pleasure, nor did his sheer agony as the bundle of souls slammed into his own, twisting it into an unrecognizable shape.
Watching pain distort his features only solidified Phoebe’s opinion that this had been necessary, however. It was clearly much harder for Percy to assimilate a semi-foreign soul that had remained separated from him for decades than a regular clone. Allowing Micky to survive for centuries or millennia before perishing would have only made things worse.
‘Weird… why are Micky’s cores still drawing ambient mana though?’ she wondered after seeing the crow’s mutilated body circulate the violent snowstorm with even greater vigour than when he was alive.
Truth be told, she had considered the possibility that the bird’s mutation could regrow a missing head, his weird soul and even stranger body having left that door wide open. Had that happened, she would have just forgotten about it, allowing Percy to keep the crow.
However, that ship had already sailed. The extended section of Percy’s Status had vanished and there wasn’t the slightest trace of life left in the frozen carcass.
Charging another blast, Deimos gloated about his sick accomplishment. Slowing down the sadistic Violet’s perception of time to buy Percy a few more precious seconds, Phoebe ignored Hermes’s son entirely, watching with bated breath as the seemingly ownerless cores broke out of the headless sculpture, sinking into the boy’s Cloak!
‘What the hell is happening to him?!’ Phoebe asked herself in horror, having never seen anything of the sort.
Deimos unleashed his attack at last, but she no longer cared about him. She could tell that his pathetic spell wasn’t powerful enough to pierce the raging cyclone of ethereal silk and grey mana spinning around Percy. She was far more concerned with the damage that the boy was inflicting on himself than any external threats.
Yet, it soon became clear that the chain of surprises had only just begun.
Phoebe’s eyes widened as she witnessed the unbelievable scene of a Yellow’s domain tearing a Violet’s to shreds, and the brutal beatdown that ensued. The power that Percy wielded was far higher than anything he and Micky had been capable off before their unexpected transformation.
Thankfully, the boy’s situation appeared to have stabilized, though Phoebe could tell that something major had happened. Time after time, she tried to peer into Percy’s Status – to hopefully shed some light onto his new state – only for her own Decree to ignore her!
It wasn’t until after the fight that it managed to recalibrate itself, finally responding to its creators will. Even then, the information that manifested before Phoebe’s eyes was difficult to accept.
Whether Micky – or even Percy, for that matter – had survived, she still couldn’t say with certainty. The name of the new entity didn’t match either of theirs. Either way, one thing was immediately clear: her assessment that the crow had been holding Percy back couldn’t have been more wrong.
Nobody could have predicted this – not even Percy and Micky themselves – but it seemed that they’d started walking on a path to greater heights a long time ago…
‘Perhaps I was the one who made a mistake then – not him…’ she begrudgingly admitted.
More importantly, she couldn’t help but linger on a single detail – the very piece of information that she had hoped to see in Percy’s Status one day. She hadn’t expected it to appear nearly this soon though.
‘An Extreme spell!’
This was the hallmark of a paragon – a mortal capable of slaying gods!
Of course, a true paragon needed a Clear grade too, which Percy paradoxically still lacked, even though it was generally considered to be the simplest of the two requirements to meet.
Regardless, even Phoebe’s ancient heart that had weathered countless seasons without wavering couldn’t help but skip a beat as she pondered over the implications of the boy’s achievement.
Comments
K1llsh0t_87
Kinda disappointed that extreme is the tier that allows demigods to fight gods, mc got one way too early and us learning about the fact that there are plenty of people capable of fighting 2 or 3 tiers above them would have been the perfect opportunity to add a tier between while also elevating paragons even more
Sebastian Kristoffersen
I hope that he just kill all the gods and then takes his family and leave the planet
R. Maxwell Steele
If Percy ends up working for the same Gods that tortured his grandfather for the last few years, that's the end of the story for me. Now if he kills them, that I'm on board to watch.
R. Maxwell Steele
"she wasn’t heartless." Proceeds to rant about how much she wants Percy's familiar to die so he can focus on himself. Not to mention she spent the last year or so sending people to kill him... her people... And literally watching them die over and over without stepping in. All while she has Percy's grandfather and mentor tortured. I hope the first Gods Percy kills are Remoire's gods.
KyoDaDungeon!!
Look Pheebs by that logic you're a liability to Percy
Tim
Pretty sure she did not know about the Queen situation only that Percy wants a wasp familiar. Which now becomes irrelevant with Percys new Familiar. And Phobes suboptimal training / unnecessary fights comment, makes no sense because that is exactly what Phobe wants to happen (Percy being forced into pressure to adapt. Which might not happen in the order.). But i don't think that is what she is saying, she is saying from Percy POV it would have been smarter not to bother with micky.
AL
I wouls like to see more of these POVs chapters. They really help to show the bigger picture, understand better the different character development, and it is a great tool for pacing and plot advancement.
Rah
Ooooooooo
Andrew P
Perhaps his first decree is different because he picked it up with a newborn?
Lrodee
It says "Phoebe hadn’t witnessed the familiar’s creation" ...
Bryce Oakes
This really feels like it's out of the blue, I really think Phoebe should should have another chapter slotted earlier where she expresses some of these frustrations as foreshadowing. Currently it kinda comes off as overly contrived. She references watching Mickey be created? Maybe actually show that, slot it earlier and have her express her expectation that Micky will hold him back?
Andrew P
Makes me wonder how much stronger it'll be of he's able to artificially raise his cores grade temporarily.
Derze
Can’t really fault Phoebe for her thinking but damn. hopefully we get them to talk soon, and Percy gets support from the gods going forward.
NetWon
It could be why they have Archie locked up. He's a hostage to use against Percy. Yes, it makes no sense because it will forever sour Percy against them and only be useful while Archie lives (and he seems the type to off himself to get Percy out of that situation), but its very clear the gods in this story have little to no common sense. The smartest play would have been to push Percy's family all the way up the social ladder. Then Percy would be grateful instead and have a place he knows his family is safe at and he can always come back to. That ship has long sailed since they forced his family to exile him and locked up Archie. It would look like blackmail if they did it now.
NetWon
Her logic makes no sense. "He’d travelled to suboptimal places to train, taken unnecessary risks for the sake of his familiar, and even picked a fight with a Holy Child." And think of how much further he would be with the Order's resources behind him, instead of wasting so much time avoiding them and all the people sent to hunt him. Yes, you could hamd wave it away by saying its to pressure him to advance faster, but she knows, even admitted it last chapter, that Percy is the kind of person to push forward regardless. This very much feels like a retcon. Author forgot Phoebe was watching and needed to retcon why she didn't interfere. This chapter (and the previous) feels very forced. Also, she apparently knows about the White that stole the queen's egg? Is she going to do something about that? Seriously, he is pretty much jeopardizing the whole world. None of this makes any sense.
Kaladin
How short sighted is Phoebe? You don't need to coddle everyone, but currently her world is set up so poorly culturally. You over spoil the Green born so they feel entitled and don't feel any debt to the world. I can understand the rest of it, putting resources into those who may behind Gods and make a difference but it seems with the Green born you're creating really poor combatants as their mentality is too fragile and they're incapable of teamwork or unity. However the main reason I say this is that I'm sure fighting over powerful individuals happens across the multiverse and keeping talented people in your faction is important. Right now Reimor and the world hasn't endeared itself to Percy. Letting the beloved "pet" die because it'll help him in the long run might be fine pragmatically, but you would at least want him to have strong ties to his family and life here. Right now she's playing with fire with him just leaving. She isn't aware of his relationship with metatron but a simple deal with him would see his family moved, safe, and remior with all their gods and Titan wiped out. Hell he would probably just do it for the ring, the knowledge of where the soul source is, or even just making many of his green Borns have dual cores. Phoebe really needs to start looking into why Percy needs Remoir instead of just them wanting him...
Amazon Shopper
not to say i called it... but damn, did I call it. The chapter we learned about paragons I said my guess was that it was a mortal capable of killing gods, lets go!
MinE
Honestly, I would like there to be a scene where Phoebe apologized, and Percy split off again just so he could yell at her for a bit.
ZaA
His does include his dance though. If it didn't include his dance and then he also had dance in top of that, yeah he could probably fight whites
Sheldeen Walker
And he has to do all this before clear grade he has to become a TRUE PARAGON by the time he is white at the latest
Sheldeen Walker
Just hear me out to be a paragon one will have to be clear grade with an extreme spell and other worlds already have those the dude that made the rings of sacrilege was a paragon and he died so Percy has to be stronger allot stronger now Percy’s next step is to make more ultimate skills and create a skill more powerful than ultimate and become a “TRUE PARAGON”
Keven Leigh
Percy and Micky essentially died. In the previous book Micky's character motivations were starting to develop. Percy's relationship was a bit more well defined. If the end goal for having a familiar is to mesh souls to the point a new being is born then why spend 4 fucking books building up personality and goals if your just going to shove both characters together into a more powerful but distinctly different being. Micky is no longer a crow with the soul of a Gladiator on another world. He is now the lone wanderer. Percy is no longer a driven red born trying to reach godhood. He is now just the lone wanderer. It seems like you have plans for this to possibly happen again. Unless they gain some ability to become distinct outside of combat the character is ruined for me. It's upsetting cause I really liked this series
MinE
In hindsight, it was pretty obvious with him basing Extreme on Magi where they are literally the most powerful spells.
MinE
I hate the fact that I agree with her choice from a Utilitarian view. She was a bit short sighted in the fact that Percy would genuinely hate her if she saved him and not Mickey; I mean he likely wouldn't try to kill her, but it would be difficult for him to work with someone who was responsible for Mickey's death. They would've been able to escape without her interference, so I would consider her actually more responsible than Deimos. Mostly because that brat is incapable of being responsible for anything.
MinE
Odd that Extreme spells are considered strong enough to fight up three Grades by themselves; assuming that no other extreme spell includes the Dance that means in Devil mode they should be able to fight Whites pretty soon.
Aureus
Well I guess that answers my question from a number of chapters back. So Percy is a Quasi Paragon. Only need to increase his grade to actually make it a truth. In reality though the standard for a paragon is to be capable of killing a God as a mortal, as I read this. Thus based on his growth and capabilities he may reach that before the clear grade. I hope what's his face from the lion people world is ready to court death when Percy goes to see him at some point.
Uroš
Bad Phoebe! *hits her with a slipper*
Meir Banon
Tftc
Poutine Au Syrop d'érable
Holy shit. Dude did the hardest part already. Well for him, we know he'll have to do even harder stuff to get to clear.
