HIATUS

"That was an intense fight", Bucky said to Ethan, Ethan smiled and replied, "Tell me about it. Anyway Ancient One, you can return us to Kamar Taj now", Ethan then proceeded to give the unconscious Erik to Grant, who at first didn't want to carry him but seeing that no one not even Ava wanted to help the unconscious Erik, he reluctantly accepted the task of carrying the knockout man.

The Ancient One then opened a portal and allowed for Bucky and Ethan's 3 students to go first. Both Ethan and the Ancient One were left in the mirror dimension, and the Ancient One said, "You better not forget our agreement".

"Of course, I'll even give you an extra couple of liters", Ethan said with a smile.

"Do remember that I want the real honey, none of those diluted ones", the Ancient One said as she proceeded to enter the portal, Ethan quickly following behind here.

To make the Ancient One agree to teleport them to a different location so that he and his 3 disciples could fight, especially to teleport them in the mirror dimension, Ethan had to bribe the Ancient One. If you're as old as the Ancient One the allure of money is none existent, the only possible way to bribe the Ancient One was by using, Honey. Not any honey, the specific honey that she places on her tea. Ethan had sent his clone to procure him some of those, even paying 3 times the market price from the sellers.

Once they returned to Kamar Taj inside the room of the Ancient One, Grant placed Erik on the floor.

"So we failed", said a dejected Ava. Hearing Ava's comment made Grant sad as well.

"Of course not, don't be silly", Ethan responded.

When the two conscious disciples heard this they were both shocked.

"What?"

"Huh?"

"The three of you pass, with flying colors in fact", Ethan said while showing a huge smile.

"B…but we failed the exam?", Ava said.

"You got it all wrong. The exam was never necessary, to begin with. The reason I fought the 3 of you was to see how powerful you 3 have become and most of all, to see if I didn't waste my time in training you 3. Based on the fight we just had, I say it was time well spent", I said to them.

"Oh", Ava said as she absorbs the news, then suddenly she began jumping and her sad mode change and return back to her jolly self, and she said, "I know I was strong…hehe".

"hahahahaha", Bucky laughs when he heard this. All the people inside the room taught that Ava would be happy about the results, none taught she would say something narcissistic.

Grant sighed when he heard this though.

After Bucky finish his laughter I gathered everyone's attention and said, "After having that fight, I say I am very hungry right now, so let's eat, come on follow me".

The group followed Ethan and they soon found themselves in the training yard of Kamar Taj. Rather than multiple students who wish to become masters of the mystic arts, what was placed in the training ground were multiple amounts of food, all neatly arranged, enough to feed the people in the temple twice over.

"Yes", Ava said as she proceeded to eat. The rest quickly followed behind her,  aside from the Ancient One, one of Ethan's clones handed her a scroll and she quickly took the scroll and hid it. For a moment you could see the delight in her eyes, but it came as quickly as it went. All of us ate a lot that day. It was already 5 hours later when an angry Erik showed up at the training ground.

"Oops", Ethan said. Due to us celebrating we forgot to wake up Erik, and now he's pissed.

Later that night, the clones had already cleaned the training ground, tomorrow all the students who wish to train in the mystics arts could automatically use the area. All the other people had also returned to their rooms, even the pissed off Erik. Only Ethan and the Ancient One were left.

"Do you think I should do it?", Ethan asked the Ancient One.

The Ancient One was in deep thought, the topic they were discussing wasn't something that could easily be decided upon.  For a while, she looks at the beautiful stars twinkling in the night sky. Ethan who wanted the opinion of the Ancient One remained quiet, and only after a while did she respond, "When it comes to your involvement, I no longer know the answer".

During the party someone approach Ethan, the person wanted to ask Ethan a huge favor, this is a Master of the Mystics Arts, Kaecilius. Kaecilius is a brilliant man, proud, and headstrong individual. He was one of the fastest people to ever achieve the title of Master of the Mystics Arts. Even with all his capabilities, the man was in pain, for he has been grieving the death of his child and wife, for who knows how long now. The very reason he went to Kamar Taj was to heal the pain that he felt.

Throughout his studies, from student to Master, he always wondered why the Ancient One had lived for so long, something that was said to be impossible to achieve even as a Master of the Mystics Arts. Why did the Ancient One live through centuries, while his child and wife died way beyond their time? This was a question he was always pondering about.

This would slowly build hatred towards her, in canon this hatred causes him to betray the Ancient One and steal a page from the Book Cagliostro. But in this universe instead of stealing the book, the man went directly to the Ancient One and asked her point-blank why could he live for ages and his son and wife cannot even live past a couple of decades. It wasn't much of questioning though, rather it was him venting all his pain to the Ancient One, like a psych patient would vent to his psychiatrist.

In this world, The Sorcerer Supreme, the Ancient One told Kaecilius the truth, why she did what she did. To top it all off the Ancient One, told Kaelicius that she was no longer absorbing energy from the dark dimension, she told him that Ethan gave her something much more acceptable.

This led Kaecilius to be interested in Ethan, Kaecilius thought that Ethan may have a way to help him, to make him move on. At the party he asked Ethan if he had a way to talk to his wife and son again, Kaecilius called it a final act to finally let go.

Hearing the response of the Ancient One, Ethan just nodded.

"whistle….Bang!"

Suddenly the sky was filled with multiple fireworks, fireworks of different colors. Both Ethan and the Ancient One cherish the view. Due to it being days before the New Year, people would light occasional fireworks, fireworks that could be seen inside Kamar Taj. Ethan was suddenly shocked when the view slowed down, he looks at his surroundings and he realized that aside from the two of them, everything was slowing down, it was like it was moving moment by moment.

Suddenly the Ancient One began to speak and said, "For Kaecilius the best time of his life was with his family, for him it was beautiful. Just like how beautiful these fireworks are in front of us". Then everything returned to normal, the fireworks showed their lights and then disappeared, the stars were the only thing twinkling in the night sky, "And everything was gone, his beautiful life vanish in the blink of an eye. Kaecilius never truly moved on from that", the Ancient One said and she began to walk inside the temple to rest for the night.

Suddenly like a bolt of lightning, a thought came to Ethan's mind and he said, "That's how you were able to fight me, you weren't moving as fast as me, you were slowing my time when we fought". Ethan just now remembered that in canon the Ancient One was capable of time manipulation without the time stone, be it on a smaller scale. The Ancient One did it in the moment of her death.

Sadly for Ethan, the Ancient One did not acknowledge the comment and she proceeded to leave Ethan in the training ground alone.