"Of course, Professor!"
"I certainly won't cause that kind of trouble for mutants!"
"Besides, if any schemers come looking for trouble, just tell them about me."
"Before, my energy reserves weren't very substantial, so there wasn't much I could do. But now?"
"Heh! All I can say is, if they dare come looking for trouble with me, I'll show them what true power means!"
Li Ge understood the Professor's concerns, but he was no longer worried about anyone provoking him.
Previously, he had lacked energy, and the abilities he designed and manifested could not immediately reach their intended strength.
He could only slowly accumulate energy to strengthen his abilities.
But now?
Once his redstone had absorbed enough energy from the source of the universe, or even begun replicating itself...
What ability couldn't he design and manifest?
And it could immediately reach the strength he had designed it to have!
If anyone dared cause trouble for him, he had countless ways to show them what true power meant.
He could also teach them what it meant that the strong must not be insulted!
After hearing Li Ge's answer, the Professor said nothing more.
He merely made a silent resolution to pay close attention to Li Ge's mental state.
After all, when a teenager of Li Ge's age suddenly gained immense power, there was no telling what he might do once someone provoked him.
If things reached that point, relations between mutants and humans would grow even more strained.
Even though Li Ge had already amply demonstrated his maturity and steadiness, and had shown himself to be a genius since childhood.
But that was precisely what made it most frightening!
Once provoked, a mature, levelheaded genius would cause destruction even more unpredictable than a hotheaded fool.
"Li Ge, has your redstone gotten a little bigger?"
At that moment, the observant Phoenix noticed something unusual.
She had been watching the redstone in Li Ge's hand all along. After all, it looked just like the clearest ruby, deeply appealing to a woman's natural love of jewelry.
"Ah! Yes! Jean, you're not imagining it."
"The final size I designed for the redstone isn't this tiny thing. Its final form is a standard cube measuring one cubic meter."
"And the bigger the redstone is, the more efficiently it absorbs energy from the source of the universe. That's also why I needed to absorb Cyclops's optic blast energy."
"I did that so I could manifest a sufficiently large piece of redstone. Otherwise, I could have manifested redstone right at the start, but it might only have been the size of a grain of sand. You can imagine how efficient that would have been."
Taking an ask-and-I'll-tell-you attitude, Li Ge explained to Phoenix in detail how efficiently redstone absorbed energy.
As he spoke, he even brought the redstone in front of her so she could get a clearer look at it growing bit by bit.
The others nearby were also listening to Li Ge's explanation.
At that moment, something occurred to Storm, and she voiced her question directly.
"Li Ge, if the redstone will eventually become a one-cubic-meter cube like you said, how will you carry it around?"
"Can you shrink it and carry it on you?"
The others thought of this as well, fixing their eyes on Li Ge's face with a hint of anticipation in their expressions.
They also wanted to know how Li Ge would carry around redstone that would eventually measure one cubic meter and could even replicate itself.
By then, Cyclops had recovered.
In fact, Cyclops wanted Li Ge to leave the redstone at the school, but that would carry the implication of wanting to control Li Ge's energy reserves.
It would be bad if that created a rift between Li Ge and them.
Besides, it wasn't as though Li Ge couldn't manifest more redstone. Doing that would only make him resentful.
They couldn't make such an unwise choice.
Off to one side, Wolverine, who had been silently listening to their conversation, had lit the cigar between his lips at some point.
Li Ge's ability had astonished him too, and the tough guy needed some nicotine to settle his emotions.
The Professor had regained his initial composure, a kindly smile returning to his face as his penetrating gaze rested quietly on Li Ge.
Phoenix was still examining the redstone. When she heard Storm's question, she merely looked up at her.
"Hmm... Ororo, that's a good question, but I've already worked out how to solve it."
"I can design a spatial storage ability for myself. I'll just connect the space directly to my soul. That way, no one can take my things away."
"The redstone doesn't have much energy yet, so I'll just manifest a small space. Once it has more energy later on, I can gradually expand the space."
Li Ge did not tell them that the space he was about to manifest was the starting point of a dimension.
Let them think I've only designed an ordinary storage space!
Once they find out I've designed a dimension, and that I'll become a Dimensional Demon God like a creator god...
Their reactions will definitely be interesting then!
Li Ge deliberately displayed the manifestation of his designed ability in front of them.
He kept the redstone in one hand and turned his other palm upward, holding both hands before his chest.
Under the gazes of the Professor and the others, a red glow gradually rose from the redstone, which had already grown noticeably larger, guided by Li Ge's thoughts.
Wisps of red energy gathered into a stream, slowly flowing into Li Ge's open, empty hand.
The red energy gradually began emitting a rainbow glow, the sign that Li Ge's ability had activated.
As the redstone's energy flowed in, the rainbow glow gradually became a ball of light the size of a longan, with something indistinct slowly taking shape inside.
The Professor and the others gathered around, their eyes fixed on the ball of light in Li Ge's hand.
The redstone's energy continued flowing toward the ball of light, whose rainbow glow had quietly faded away, leaving it transparent.
Now they could clearly see a translucent blue cube floating inside the ball of light, like a glowing sapphire.
As for why the spatial ability took the form of a blue cube, of course it was because Li Ge felt that the blue of the sky best represented space, while a cube best expressed humanity's understanding of space.
So naturally, that was how he had designed it!
By then, the ability had already been designed and manifested, but Li Ge did not immediately merge the ability seed into his Divinity.
Since I'm showing them the result of manifesting an ability, I might as well show them the manifested form of an ability I can give to someone else!
In a flash, Li Ge had already designed, manifested, and inscribed a new ability within his Divinity.
An ability to seal things in the form of pictures!
Why was designing and manifesting it so fast?
Because designing and manifesting things had never taken Li Ge much time in the first place.
Once he had decided on the result of the design, Li Ge could manifest what he had designed with a single thought.
He was merely deliberately slowing things down now so the Professor and the others could clearly see the process.
Using the versatile ability he had manifested back at home-telekinesis-Li Ge took a card-sized piece of white paper from his pocket.
It was a card he had cut from ordinary drawing paper and casually tucked away on his person earlier.