Testing the Waters

However, Tanner's observations were far from perfect. One crucial piece of information had escaped him because he had been unable to infiltrate Midtown High School.

He did not know who exactly belonged to Peter Parker's closest circle. He had seen Peter frequently visiting Osborn Tower or following Harry Osborn to Osborn Manor, but he knew nothing of Lin Hai's existence, let alone the deep bonds and hidden powers within that small group.

Recently, Lin Hai had hit a bottleneck in his Mirror Dimension magic and needed extensive time for meditation and experimental construction, while Gwen's basic magic studies had also entered a critical stage that required a great deal of practice and accumulation.

As a result, after school on weekdays, the two devoted more of their energy to Professor Connors's laboratory. Gwen needed to finish all of Professor Connors's assistant work during the week, while Lin Hai helped her at her side.

On weekends, they were completely immersed in Kamar-Taj's library and training grounds, so the time they spent meeting and talking with Peter outside school naturally decreased.

On top of that, Peter himself was busy with his experiments and his "part-time job" as Spider-Man. As a result, the person he interacted with most often lately had instead become the equally busy Harry.

This was precisely what Tanner, lurking in the shadows, had been unable to fully grasp. In his mind, Spider-Man, Peter Parker, was merely a high school student who occasionally hung around that rich kid Harry Osborn, but otherwise kept to himself and had a pitifully simple social circle.

Still, that was hardly strange. According to the records preserved by the Inheritor Family, most Spider-Men were indeed like that—without parents, with one or two friends, solitary, and somewhat withdrawn.

Thus, the coincidence, coupled with the stereotypes born of