Hp/Marvel: John Wick The Witch King

Agnes paused, her practiced, neighborly smile snapping back into place. "Aren't you Mr. Wick? I remember you." She tapped her temple lightly. "From Vanity Fair magazine. I quite enjoy reading it."

"Is that so?" John said, his voice a low, noncommittal rumble. "What an honor."

His gaze remained fixed on the blonde woman kneeling at the front pew. From the back… he couldn't be certain. It had been years since he'd last seen his sister. He drew his wand, a smooth, familiar motion that caused a predatory glint to flash in Agnes's eyes.

"This place is… peculiar," John muttered, glancing around the sanctuary. The air itself felt thick, warped. "Is it the church?" In a world with beings from other dimensions, the existence of demons and angels was a given. Mages often borrowed power from such realms. It wasn't impossible that this place held the lingering aura of a powerful entity.

He took a step forward. Agnes's smile widened, becoming more sincere, more encouraging. He walked slowly, deliberately, towards the figure he hoped was Ariana.

The woman at the pew sensed his approach and slowly turned her head.

The moment their eyes met, her face—his sister's face—split into a grotesque smile, the jerky, unnatural movement of a marionette.

The next second, the illusion shattered. An invisible shield erupted in front of John, deflecting a swarm of fleshy, purple tentacles that shot towards him from where the woman had been. Through the writhing mass, he saw the decoy body split open, unleashing an endless torrent of appendages.

A blast of bizarre purple energy slammed into his back. John didn't flinch. The amulet hidden beneath his shirt flared with light and then shattered, absorbing the attack completely.

He glanced over his shoulder. The neighborhood big sister, Agnes, stood with her hair flying wildly, purple light swirling around her hands like captured nebulae. Her smile was still there, but now it held a soul-stirring wickedness.

"Since you're here," she purred, "you might as well stay, Mr. Wick."

Two streams of purple energy wrapped around his shield, sizzling as they rapidly eroded the magic. With a sharp twist of her hands, Agnes shattered the shield charm.

John remained unnervingly calm. He raised his wand, and a flash of silver light severed the tentacles coiling around him, but they regrew in an instant.

His eyebrow twitched. "Power from an external dimension." He looked back at Agnes, his voice flat. "You're no orthodox wizard."

"I am an orthodox wizard!" she shrieked, intensifying her assault.

John scoffed at the claim. A true wizard didn't borrow power like a common sorcerer. Agnes had a wizard's foundation, but she mixed it with the dangerous, sacrificial abilities of a mage.

Chaotic particles twisted in the air before him, coalescing into the form of a great serpent. It opened its maw, spraying a torrent of black mist and venom.

John raised his right hand. A sheath of silver metal flowed over his arm, and with a forceful clench of his fist, the magical serpent was crushed into nothing.

Attacked from both front and back, he was caught. The tentacle creature possessed a powerful regenerative ability, and when he tried to Apparate, he found the air around him as solid as stone.

"Stop struggling," Agnes said, her victory all but certain. "I've already set up anti-spatial magic in this church." She had come prepared, well aware of a wizard's capabilities. Her eyes locked onto John's face with a greedy hunger. "Your magic is so strong. It will make for excellent nourishment."

She controlled her magic, binding him tightly and suspending him in mid-air. Moving her hands in a complex pattern, she wove a strange, dark purple spell.

When John saw it, his gaze turned glacial.

"Draining magic?" he asked, his voice dangerously quiet. "This isn't the first time you've done this." He didn't recall such a spell existing in the magical world; the evil of it surpassed even the Unforgivable Curses.

Hundreds of crimson tentacles were still waving, clinging tightly to him, trying to crush the life from his body. At the same time, Agnes finished her spell. A thick, rope-like conduit of energy formed between them, and he felt the greedy magic begin to siphon the power from his core like a thief in the night.

John smiled. It was a terrifying, unsettling sight.

"You want it?"

"You have no chance now," Agnes gloated.

"Is that so?" John tilted his head. "If you like my energy so much, then take it all."

On his chest, a square-shaped mark began to emit a brilliant, cold light. It was connected to the core of the Casket of Ancient Winters, one of the great artifacts of the Nine Realms. Other than the Frost Giants, only John could control its power. And so, he simply let it loose.

As she absorbed the torrent of energy, Agnes began to realize something was terribly wrong. The power flooding into her was not just immense; it was arctic. The Casket's energy was eroding her magical channels, freezing her from the inside out. She watched, horrified, as frost began to creep along the energy conduit, spreading rapidly towards her.

Just as she was about to sever the connection, John spoke, his voice slow and deliberate. "The energy I've already released is more than enough to freeze you solid before you can even think of escaping." He smiled. "Finding a wizard of your power in such a remote place… it's quite a surprise."

Now, she was trapped. If she continued to absorb his power, she would become a frozen statue. If she stopped, she would become one instantly. A wizard's frail human body couldn't survive being frozen solid. The moment the ice took hold, her life would end.

John watched leisurely as his own power was turned against his attacker, encasing her in an ever-thickening layer of ice. This bit of cold was nothing to his own formidable physique.

His wand tapped the air, and a flash of red light struck Agnes's frozen form.

She was not weak; on the contrary, she was a powerful witch, likely a level seven talent. Dealing with her in a straight fight would have taken considerable effort. But her greed had been her downfall, instantly reversing the course of the battle. A single Disarming Charm was all it took to strip her of any remaining resistance.

The Casket's eternal winter froze the entire church, and even the immortal tentacles stilled, their life force extinguished.

John casually broke the frozen appendages from his body, brushing the ice chips from his clothes. He looked up at the woman, now a perfect ice sculpture.

Is she cosplaying Captain America? he thought, amused.

He walked over to her. The tentacles on the floor twitched feebly but couldn't break free from their icy prison. He waved his wand, and the outer layers of the ice sculpture shattered. The illusion of his sister, cracked and frozen, broke into a thousand pieces.

He stood before Agnes. She was completely encased, only her eyes able to move, darting around in sheer panic. She tried to use her magic, but the Casket's power could freeze energy itself.

The wand that had so easily crushed her crimson binder now tapped against the ice on her head, again and again. Each light tap sent a tremor through her mind. She stared at John, unable to make a sound, her expression shifting through a kaleidoscope of terror.

John observed for a moment and reached a conclusion. "There's no air inside the ice." Hmm, very reasonable. A frail witch was not comparable to an Asgardian who could drift through the vacuum of space.

Under Agnes's horrified gaze, John swung his wand fiercely at her neck.

Crack.

The ice didn't shatter. Instead, a clean fissure appeared in the crystal layer, running from below her nose to her neck. The section of ice exploded outward.

Agnes, finally able to breathe, gasped, "Stop!"

She was truly terrified he would tap her again. Her freed mouth moved, the words tumbling out in a frantic, desperate rush. She never expected her time-tested routine to fail so spectacularly. That freezing energy had instantly neutralized the creature she had summoned.

Agnes looked at John's smiling face, and a chill deeper than the one encasing her body rose in her heart. The last time she had felt this powerless was years ago, when the terrifying Wizard King had first set foot in America. When had another monster like that appeared in the magical world?

"I'm willing to make a deal with you."

Hearing the word 'deal', John's eyes showed a flash of disappointment. "Sorry," he said softly. "You don't have the qualifications to make a deal with me."

His words struck her like a physical blow. Her face, already pale, turned as white as death.

His wand gently tapped the ice on her forehead.

"Wait! I know where your sister is!" It was her last resort.

The tip of the old wand stopped a single centimeter from the ice.

John looked into her terrified eyes, a flicker of familiarity in them. "That sacrificial summoning circle in the basement… it was yours, wasn't it?" he asked calmly, withdrawing his wand. "How many have there been?"

"What?"

"How many wizards have you absorbed?"

He narrowed his eyes. This witch's power was immense. If they had fought head-on, he would have needed to exert himself. For someone like her to prey on other wizards, few could have resisted. John's gaze seemed to pierce through her lies. "All your power… you stole it, didn't you?"

"I absorb the magic of passing wizards every year," Agnes confessed, her voice trembling. Seeing the cold fury in John's eyes, she hastily added, "Not that many! The absorption has limitations. Ordinary wizards aren't worth the effort, and I can't risk provoking the truly powerful ones."

Summoning the crimson binder alone required a considerable price. Using it on weaker targets would have been a waste.

"I met your sister because she came here," she said, her words sincere under the pressure of his unblinking stare. "I sensed a powerful force within her, so I didn't act rashly. Besides, she was already being targeted. I had to give up on her."

"Targeted by whom?" John's right hand was once again covered in silver. He reached out, ready to crush her frozen form to dust.

"I don't know!" Agnes cried out. "It was a powerful Hell Lord! I couldn't get anywhere near that place! But I know that when a Hell Lord comes to this world, they require sacrifices. Perhaps your sister was taken by his followers."

A pure maiden with immense magical power. For a being from Hell, there was no more tempting prize.

Ariana was the perfect sacrifice.

(End of Chapter)

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