Life of A Young Demigod: Of Blood and Magic (Percy Jackson reader insert)

I Try and Fail to Become Midas

When we got back to Percy's apartment, his mom went and printed out a map of the museum for us. We sat around a coffee table and began to plan our entrance.

"Alright. Percy, 'Meda. You two are free to suggest an alternative, but this is what I'm thinking. The ball starts at 10:30, so at 10:15 exactly we will get in through that window we saw looking out into the park."

They nodded.

I pointed to the spots on the map we marked as covered by security cameras. "Alright, so we have to be careful around there. I'll be able to disable them, but we just have to make sure we don't get spotted before I can hit them, just stay behind me and hug the wall where you can, and we should be fine. The big atrium between us and the stele is going to be our biggest problem in terms of keeping out of sight. I think I have mapped the camera angles properly." I pointed to a rough diagram I had made the other day at the museum. "But I can't be sure. If something goes wrong, we bluff. I've been practicing manipulating the Mist, so we should be fine if we get confronted, but I've never actually like used it to trick a mortal or anything, so I can't be sure about that either. Worst case scenario, you two just run, I'll take the fall if we need to. It'll be my plan that failed so that's only fair."

Andromeda gave me a look of frustration at the last part, but sighed and nodded.

I pulled out a project I'd been working on the night before. It was a replica of the rod made from a metal pipe I'd enchanted to look like it, and, more importantly, give off a similar magical signal to it.

"This was a complete pain to make, but it should fool even Johnathan if he's not actively looking for an illusion. We will replace the real rod on the statue, which I'm assuming and hoping will just slide out easily."

I took a deep breath. I didn't much like this next part, but I felt like I had to do it. "After that, we will wait for Johnathan to reveal himself and try the spell. I don't much like the idea of confronting him again, but I made a promise to my mother that I would try to convince him to turn against Kronos."

Percy nodded grimly. Andromeda stared at me for a moment, seemingly conflicted. I didn't blame her. Last time I faced Johnathan, I nearly died. We didn't necessarily need to face him again, at least right now. But I told my mom I'd try and turn him back from Kronos. I had to at least try.

She sighed. "Alright. Just be safe, ok?"

I smiled. "Promise. I'm going to have Sally make copies of this in the morning, I want you two to study them. You need to have this plan memorized."

Percy groaned. "Ugh. You sound like Annabeth. I think those Athena kids you're staying with back at camp are rubbing off on you."

Sally burst in with a plate of cookies. Blue cookies, of course. "Anyone hungry?"

We nodded happily and began eating. As we did so, Andromeda turned to me.

"So what does it feel like? Doing magic, I mean. I just realized I've never really asked about that."

I hadn't ever really thought much about how to explain it either. "Uh... well like physically sometimes I feel like a small tug in my arm. Not entirely sure why, I should probably ask my mom about that at some point. But mentally it varies. You've seen me basically collapse sometimes, right?"

She nodded. "Unfortunately, yes."

"Well depending on what I'm doing, it can be either basically effortless or feel like I just ran a mile in thirty seconds. The way my mom put it was that I'm basically manipulating reality itself. Strictly speaking, what I do with magic is unnatural. Energy isn't supposed to work that way, but it does if I force it to. You know how mortals say everything is made of atoms and whatever? That's technically true, but it goes deeper than that. Those atoms and everything else ultimately originate from pure magical energy. It changes and shifts naturally, so when I, say, summon a bit of fire, I'm taking energy that would normally have either just stayed pure energy or turned into something else and forcing it to turn into that fire."

Percy's eyes went wide. "So you could also just, like, change this table into a massive rock?"

I thought for a second. "Theoretically, I suppose, yeah. But it would be a lot harder than just making that rock from raw magic, because I'd have to convert it back first, and energy doesn't really like going the other way. Solid objects in general are hard. The more similar something is to raw energy, which is sort of like a gas I suppose, the easier it is to make, at least in general. Back to what you were asking about, though, even my mom has a bit of trouble with transmutation, so I doubt I'll ever be particularly amazing at it."

Percy frowned slightly. "So you can't turn my pencil into gold."

I shrugged. "I can try. Last time I tried something like that it just kind of disintegrated though, so fair warning about that. Might not get your pencil back."

Percy handed me a pencil. "Go for it man."

I put the pencil on the table in front of me. I closed my eyes and imagined it transforming into a pencil-shaped piece of gold. I felt something begin to happen, but I was startled by Andromeda kicking my leg out of shock. I opened my eyes.

"Ugh. Damn thing disintegrated again."

Percy chuckled a bit. "Hey well at least you can disintegrate things, that's pretty cool!"

As if on cue, my mind began to spin. Andromeda put her arm around me. "Woah. You ok dear?"

I nodded. "Yeah, it's just draining to do that. If I tried it on anything bigger I'd probably pass out halfway through."

I ate a cookie. I'd found out that a bit of sugar tended to help calm down the symptoms of overexertion a bit. I'd still be drained of energy but my head wouldn't be spinning quite as much.

"Anyways, that's basically how it all works. Any other questions?"

Andromeda and Percy shook their heads. I looked up to the clock. 9 pm.

"Alright well I'm a bit tired after that so I'll probably head off to rest. Y'all can come too or stay up a bit longer, just make sure to get enough sleep. Don't want one of you nodding off tomorrow night."

Andromeda smiled and gave me a kiss. "Sweet dreams, (Y/N). Love you!"

I smiled back at her. "Love you too, 'Meda."

Percy raised an eyebrow. "Sheesh. When'd you two start that?"

I called over my shoulder as I walked into the bedroom. "Knock it off, you're just jealous!"