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maya-chirps · 6 months

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Can you tell us more about Filipino mythology and moneters, cause there's no 1 official website and I almost always barely passed filipino? Can you also list like great sources for me to read? Thanks

I had a pretty busy week last week so it took a while to get to this ask but I'd love to give more info on the topic!

Further Readings and Sources

It's actually pretty hard to suggest a specific source for Filipino mythology given that a lot of them pull from the same reference (Notes on Philippine Divinities) which I had said has some dubious information but Maximo D. Ramos's book that I had referenced is a good read as it collects various myths from different places throughout the country. I myself had been thinking of getting a copy of the book soon as well as his other books.

Some Filipino Monsters

As for Filipino monsters, I could say that its similar with Filipino mythology, in that with so many cultures, there's many different kinds on who you're asking. These ghouls seem to be more widely similar from culture to culture, however, probably owing to the fact that the Catholic Church didn't discourage the belief in them as much as they did the precolonial gods. Whether you go to the northernmost part of the country to the southernmost islands, there is a lot of similarities between the creatures that they could be classified easier than the gods with some creatures even sharing traits from cryptids from other Southeast Asian countries.

I'll give some of them here that you may hear pretty often when looking through catalogues of Filipino monsters. I have to be honest that I may not source as much for this section since I will be bringing up some personal stories and anecdotes that are passed around the community. I'm also open to discuss more about these creatures as well as other monsters later on.

The Aswang

An artwork of an aswang uploaded to Wikipedia by H.M.Bec

Aswangs are often considered as the most ubiquitous of the Filipino monsters. When you look up monsters from the Philippines, this may be the top result. Aswangs are often portrayed as people who transform into ghoulish creatures that feast on human flesh but especially children, babies, and fetuses. There's so many stories and variations of aswangs, however, that some of the monsters in this list are actually sometimes considered as part of the aswang category depending on the source or who you ask.

Aswangs are shapeshifters, often turning into dogs, pigs, and many other creatures, in order to stalk their prey in the middle of the night.

Aswangs are also considered as one of the main stock monsters in FIlipino media so you may see them as the villains of a lot of fantasy series and movies. They're one of the villains that Alexandra Trese faces of regularly on the folklore-inspired supernatural comic book series turned Netflix original animation Trese. They're also the main antagonist in my favorite FIlipino fantaserye series Juan De La Cruz (although I don't particularly like the lead actor anymore lol).

Here's some stuff I've heard about Aswangs from those around me.

Aswangs often won't attack their neighbors and would rather attack neighboring villages/barangays/towns. This is so they avoid detection or suspicion from their community. So, if you suspect your neighbor's an aswang, then you might just be lucky they won't target you.

Aswangs are often said to have come from the province of Capiz. It's an often common joke and stereotype that Capizeños may be aswangs themselves or know people who are aswangs. The people of Capiz are mixed on how they feel about the association with the provincial government seemingly trying to shake off the specific association to their province.

They can go to mass but cannot stay during the consecration of the holy host. Holy water and holy [coconut] oil also boil in their presence.

When you look directly into their eyes, your reflection would be upside-down. They also don't have the dent between the nose and the lips.

They could pass their curse through different ways and may depend on belief or tradition. One belief states that if a person marries an aswang, they also become an aswang.

One of the other beliefs that can turn a person into an aswang is if one makes contact with an aswang's saliva.

According to another belief, a person could also become an aswang if they ingest a black chick alive.

Similarly, an aswang cannot die until they pass their curse to another person (typically a relative). This is done by passing a black stone or chick hidden in their body to the chosen new curse holder.

They hate the typical ghoulish hated items like holy crosses, water, oils, and the classic garlic and salt, but they also hate calamansi (a small Filipino citrus fruit), and my mother had always told me that they hate suha or pomelo (a type of citrus fruit) and the smell of burning rubber.

A typical weapon used to fight against them or ward them off is the buntot pagi or stingray tail that is often sold in occultic shops around the country. You could also buy this from online stores as I've learned (x)(x)(x).

Now here's a story I've heard about them:

A story I had heard was that of the aswang bus. I had heard it repeatedly throughout the years but the basic premise is that there's a bus of a bunch of aswangs from a different province that's traveling to [province you are in] and are hunting down people at night. This is some of the more funny stories about aswangs because I keep imagining an aswang bus driver purposefully running over people and then a bunch of aswang tourists hops off of the bus to drag the body for a snack later.

I honestly might come back to the aswangs topic later since I had just learned some things from a Capizeña who works to help around our house.

The Manananggal

An artwork of an aswang uploaded to Wikipedia by Gian Bernal

The Manananggal is a ghoulish creature and is often times categorized as a kind of aswang. They are typically humanoid creatures that appear as regular people (often women) during the day, but at night their torso severs from their legs and fly away with bat wings. They often feast on fetuses using their long proboscis tongue.

These ghouls share a lot of similarities with the Southeast Asian ghoul called the Penanggal which is a similar creature but instead of their torsos separating, their heads separate from their body alongside their entrails.

Manananggals are also some of the typical stock monsters in Filipino fantasy stories. I can't think of any specific instances of the manananggal being the main character besides the softer depiction of a manananggal girl named Anna in Dayo: Sa Mundo ng Elementalia who acts as a deuteragonist to the human boy Niko. They are also featured in Trese where a tribe of manananggal is shown. They are also the main lead or love interest in some horror movies and even horror romances.

Here's some stuff I've heard about Manananggals

It's name comes from the Tagalog word "tanggal" which means "to remove" or "to separate" and specifically means "the remover" or "the separator". This of course is a reference to the fact that it removes its torso from its legs or separates its body in half.

Unlike the typical aswang which transform back during daylight, the manananggal needs to find their way back to their body or else die by sunlight.

The unattached legs of the manananggal is their weakness. If found by a person, they only need to sprinkle salt or smear crushed garlic on the legs in order to destroy them.

A lot of the typical things that ward off the aswang are also typically effective towards the manananggal.

Similarly to the aswang, manananggals are also said to had come from Capiz.

The list is shorter because honestly, just take what most you've heard about the aswang and apply it here. I don't know specifically if things like the upside-down reflection or the lack of the dent between the nose and lips could apply to manananggals, however, and I don't think I've heard people claiming that about the manananggal.

Now here's a story I've heard about them:

One story I heard that I find quite funny was something my sister heard from one of her high school friends. This friend was struggling to fall asleep at night and was tossing and turning in bed when she heard bat-like fluttering from outside. She went out to inspect the source by looking out the window and was shocked to see a manananggal climbing up a coconut tree and seemingly harvesting the fruit in the middle of the night. She wasn't flying up the tree, she was climbing it.

The next day, an old woman who was selling her goods door-to-door came by their house. She was selling coconuts.

The Tiyanak

A screenshot of a tiyanak from the movie Tiyanak (1988)

The tiyanak is considered as a demonic baby that would transform itself into a regular looking baby, crying in the middle of the night in order to attract their unfortunate target who may feel pity towards the child. The tiyanak may also be classified as an aswang but is typically considered as a separate thing more often than the manananggal from my experience. This creature has noticeably a lot in common with a lot of other Southeast Asian and East Asian myths about demonic babies and toddlers like the tuyol or the tuyul.

Like the previous two, the tiyanak is also part of the typical stock monster antagonists found in Filipino media, but not as much as either the typical aswang or the manananggal. They are often used to add a bit of a scare factor into a story and isn't typically the main antagonist of a story as of recent horror movies (with only a single short B-Movie I could think of called Flight 666 from the Shake, Rattle & Roll horror anthology series. It is not a good movie but it's stupid fun). They are featured, as usual, in Trese as the main supernatural antagonists of a specific story arc. Their depiction from the comic and the Nteflix show has been changed due to the controversial nature of the comic book depiction.

When they appear in a horror series, there's often a sort of reason or lesson as to why one has appeared and typically based on the typical origins of the tiyanak.

The most common belief is that the tiyanak is the ghost or ghoulish corpse that had come from an unbaptized child.

At times, they may be a ghoulish baby that had been created after a woman gets an abortion, other times it is simply just a baby that had died before baptism often as a stillbirth or even as a joint death with their mother.

I had also heard that it may be an abandoned baby that had died to the elements.

It is also believed, the reason that they are cursed to wander the earth after death is because they were not given a name through baptism.

Because of this, when they typically appear in stories, it is often either a story about the bad that could come from abortion or child abandonment depending on the values of the writer.

The tiyanak would also sometimes lead people astray with its cries.

Speaking of its cries, there are some places that believe if the cry sounds loud and near, the tiyanak is actually farther away from you than if you hear the cries to be quieter and farther.

Here's a story I had heard about them:

A common Filipino story of the tiyanak is the parking lot story. Story goes that in certain parking lots of buildings, typically malls, you may hear a baby cry in the middle of the night when you're alone. This is a tiyanak that's trying to lure you in by seemingly tricking you into thinking that it is just an innocent abandoned baby which is sadly common in the country. It is common enough that there are some people who would often want someone to accompany them when they're alone in a parking lot at night.

Further Readings and Sources

As much as I had stated that The Aswangs Project and their handling of discussions about Filipino mythology, specifically Tagalog mythology, is dubious at best, they have a lot of good articles about aswangs that do align with local beliefs so reading through their website for monsters specifically could be a good and free resource. They had also made a documentary that you can watch for free on YouTube that covers a lot of this and more about aswangs.

For written works, I would suggest any of Maximo D. Ramos's works as I've brought up before. There's his published paper The Aswang Syncrasy in Philippine Folklore which is considered as basically the holy grail of Aswang research, which, as I had stated, take up a bulk of the FIlipino monsters. It's hard to find easily accessible PDFs of the paper and I remember that I found a copy of this or a similar work by Ramos but the link has eluded me.

For a less academic and more fun fictionalized source for Filipino monsters I suggest The Lost Journal of Alejandro Pardo: Meet the Dark Creatures from Philippines Mythology by Budjette Tan and David Hontiveros which is available through Amazon here. It follows a fictional researcher and his discoveries of Filipino monsters and other creatures. It's a pretty easy read with a lot of good information about cryptids and monsters from the Philippines, owing to it's style of found media. If you've seen something like Gravity Falls's officially published Journal 3 from the show's universe, it has a similar vibe to that.

That's all I have for now, but I am looking more into this topic! My PC has issues right now so I might answer questions more slowly than my already slow answering speed. I hope this post helped you learn a little more about Filipino mythology and cryptids.

#mayaposts #mayaqna #mayapino #filipino mythology #kapampangan mythology #tagalog mythology #filipino folklore #filipino monsters #bathala #apolaki #mayari #aswang #manananggal #tiyanak #long post #very long post #philippines #filipino

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eloisegrant · 2 years

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We need Another Deity

A/N: Okay, so this story is based on Filipino mythology because I fell down a wormhole surrounding Moon deities. Also I have Filipina heritage so this is very close to me. Would kill to see more superhero characters from less popular countries, some fun. And After re-watching Khonshu’s stoning scene, this concept popped in my head because it seemed to be a cool concept for all mythologies to have common ground.

Background information: Reader takes form of the Philippine deity, Mayari Halla (last name taken from her father, God of all Gods ‘Bathala’), she also has a brother called “Apolaki”, God of the Sun. She is the Goddess of the Moon, Strength, War, Beauty (among other things). Also she’s blinded on one eye due to a civil war between her and her brother.

Summary: This story takes place in the MoonKnight timeline once Khonshu is trapped in stone. Steven alerts Marc at once, causing them to reach out to the only individual who can help, a Goddess herself.

Warnings: none necessarily, bit of fluff and violence

Marc was at a lost for words. Why did the big bird find it necessary to escalate this far? Steven should’ve known better, yet unfortunately, here they were.

So as Marc rummages through the hotel room, constantly stuffing the luggage as quickly as possible. Steven intervenes through the reflection on the broken mirror, “Could you just let me know who exactly we’re getting?” Steven’s voice was nervous.

“Khonshu talked about another deity…” Marc continues packing up, looking for his passport and clothes for the trip, “One capable of persuading the Egyptian gods and goddesses; at least that's how he put it.” Steven scrunches his nose confused with who they were going to fetch.

“And where exactly is this other deity?” He glances back at Steven in the mirror, as he places the luggage in his hands.

“Manila.” Marc laments, putting his dark blue cap, wiping away smudges of dirt on his face as he looks in the mirror.

“Excuse me? Manila? Ammit could be released any second!” Steven panics.

“Without Khonshu, there’s no suit. No suit, no me and you. And whoever else is up there.” Marc explains to Steven, “So we need to hurry.” Marc glances down his phone, seeing the flight to Manila was leaving in 45 minutes.

Without hesitation, he gets out of the hotel, hailing a taxi in one raise of the hand. He needed to get to Manila, look for this deity and convince them to help him. He wasn’t even sure who this deity was, all Khonshu gave him was a name and some stories.

“There’s another one?” Marc fixes his shirt over his head, the previous mission ruined his favourite jacket so he needed to change.

Khonshu, standing over him, answers, “Yes. Mayari, beauty and terror wrapped into the ideology of the moon.”

“And you said she’s half blind?” Marc asks to keep the ball rolling.

“Her brother was a treacherous man, he changed once he saw the pain he had inflicted her with.” Khonshu moves a hand and balances on his staff.

“Sounds like a good family.” Marc vocally says but internally he thought they were crazy.

As Marc entered the plane, all he could do was wait. Wait for Manila. Wait till Mayari. But a man in this position didn’t have enough time to wait, they were in desperate need of a literal hero.

———>Metro Manila, Philippines

Exiting the facade of the Philippine airport, Marc is met with Steven’s reflection against the shiny metallic pillars, “How are we going to find her here?” Marc pushes back his curly locks away from his face, adjusting his glasses.

“I may know a guy.” As Marc walks through the exterior of the airport, a fully bearded man holding up the sign M.K. caught his attention. Once they met each other's gaze Marc moved to his direction.

The man greets him with a smile, “You’re Khonshu’s avatar, I presume. My name is Antonito, I am the servant to the Halla family.” He grabs Marc’s luggage and brings it over to a pearl white Land Cruiser parked on the side of the road.

“When word of Khonshu getting stoned came, not all the deities were informed. It was only a matter of time until you reached us.” Antonito prompts Marc to sit on the passenger’s seat as he maneuvers to the driver's seat.

“I wouldn’t have reached out if it wasn’t absolutely necessary.” Marc adjusts his hips as the car begins to move, “Khonshu’s methods are becoming a bit extreme.”

“I must let you know Mayari may be kind and pleasant. But she is also unsure of most things. You must convince her that the tomb of Ammit is in real danger of being exposed.” Antonito bustles through the busy streets of Manila. Marc nods as a response and glances at Steven in the rearview mirror, “Mayari?” He mouths to Marc who ignores his voice. He didn’t need to concern this man with his condition.

As the roads eventually turned into more residential ones, Antonito turned to the right through curved and unpaved roads. Marc clutches his seatbelt, cursing Khonshu for having made a decision without even thinking about the consequences.

About five minutes later, they reach a tall gate, the words Halla encrypted in golden metallic styles.

The sight was incredible, the gates opened to a garden of Eden, trees filled with fruits and bearing flowers. It seemed to be entirely picturesque, like a piece of heaven on earth. As they went further in, people by the hundred surrounded the tall white facade of the mansion in the middle of this heavenly parade.

“The Hallas are having a party.” Antonito turns the car to one of the many parking slots, “It would be intimate, you know what they say… big parties are the most intimate places.” He backs up to the parking easily, turning the car off before letting Marc hop-off next. As Marc closes the car’s door Steven’s reflection comes to ask more questions, “I’m sorry but is the deity we are about to meet Mayari the Philippine Goddess of War, the Moon and so much more?” He asks kind of giddish in a way.

“Don’t tell me you know Philippine Mythology too.” Marc shakes his head at his reflection.

“You kind of get pulled into it a bit when you study history.” Steven mentally pats himself on the back, gaining a not shocked expression on Marc’s face.

He gets pulled out of his mind when Antonito opens the trunk of the land cruiser, handing him a bagged up suit. “Meeting the Gods and Goddesses of our country means looking the part.” He hands Marc the bag, as if to automatically ask him to put the suit on. First, he hesitates, but eventually caves in since the man did have a point. Antonito makes his way to the house as Marc tries his best to be inconspicuous, changing outside of the car.

Once all dressed, he takes a good look at his reflection on the now dimming sky’s reflection on the car. “We look dapper.” Steven admires his own reflection as Marc nods in agreement, “Showtime.”

Entering the mansion, a butler opens the house to expose a facade that appeared much bigger that what it let on outside. He fixes his tie and tuxedo, glancing around to find where the Goddess Mayari was.

There!

Steven’s voice echoes in Marc’s ears as his body is directed to the woman leaning by the staircase in a glowy blue gown, hair draped ever so slightly in a bun with a few strands out to frame her face.

“You sure?” Marc whispers to himself.

Yes. 100% positive.

Marc grabs a drink from one of the waiters and asks Steven one more time, “How do you know? I don’t just wanna approach a woman randomly.”

The eyes. Mayari lost one of her eyes and that gorgeous woman over there has the exact depiction.

Marc was trying to convince himself that what Steven was suggesting was enough, but he had no time to banter and just walked up the stairs to meet the mystery woman by the staircase.

It didn’t take Mayari long enough to notice this olive-skinned man approaching her slowly and nervously.

So she starts to speak to him, “Why hello, handsome.” stepping down to meet Marc by her chest as he looks up to her. He grabs her hand and kisses it slowly, “I have never seen you around.” He gets a better glance at her eyes, one was beautifully deep chocolate while the other was an icy white

“First time here.” He steps up to meet her gaze as she looks him up and down as if he was a slab of meat. Mayari was known as the Goddess of a lot of things, one of which being beauty, and Marc looked very beautiful in his attire.

“I’m sorry but I’m here on business.” He catches on with how Mayari was slowly examining his physique, though she was an ethereal character, they didn’t have much time.

“I see.” She bows her head down and lifts one hand to Marc’s temples, confusing him. She just wanted to read his mind, trying to understand what his purpose was without having the stress of verbally communicating. As if lightning, 3 seconds and she already had the full story.

“My my… what has Khonshu done this time…” She gulps the drink in her hand, earning a relieved sigh from Marc’s lips, he didn’t have to explain anything like Antonito said. She grabs Marc’s hand and escorts him up the stairs to a more private and less noisy ground. Leading him into a room by the right wing which opened up to a massive dome shaped room filled with artifacts, armory and even its own coffee maker. Nice. He thought to himself.

Mayari began to speak once the door was shut, “When the night sky turned back to 2,000 years I thought it was a practical joke.” She moves to Marc, “It appears Ammit has tainted someone so desperately it drove Khonshu to madness.” She looks up at Marc who nods and shares what he needs.

“I wouldn’t have gone here if it wasn’t this-” Marc is cut off by Steven’s reflection roaming around Mayari’s hall of weaponry.

Mayari notices Marc’s glances behind her and looks, spotting Steven at a glance, “Appears like your mind is crowded.” She smiles back at Marc.

“Y-yeah…” He breathes out, causing Mayari to put her hand on his shoulder.

“He seems to like my things.” She looks at Steven who was gasping at the bolos in racks.

Marc shakes his head and chuckles, but gets back to the point of all this, “I need your help.” He clasps his hands into one another.

Mayari tilts her head and looks at Marc, “To bring Khonshu back?” She genuinely asks.

“Yes… No Khonshu means I can’t fight back… Which means, Ammit could be released.” He admits, making the woman tightly smile and nod in agreement.

She moves past Marc and changes as if in a blink of an eye, “Where do we start?” Mayari, now in casual attire, ties her hair and has both her eyes, instead of one.

Marc recalls what Steven said about her eye and couldn’t help but question it, “Um, how did your eye get better?” He asks.

“It’s already healed.” She walks towards Marc, “Whenever I have meetings or fights, I make it appear as the iconic look it has been for the past millennia.” She grabs a backpack with a swoosh of hand, as if she was ready to leave the house. Marc was sort of confused but let it slide but Steven was fangirling inside him.

“Not now.” Marc speaks to himself.

Marc just let me have the body on the way back and I promise.

Mayari laughs at Marc’s adorable banter to himself which makes her wonder why he was being so mean to the double in his mind, “I’d like to meet him.” She comments in the midst of Marc’s words.

“You do?” Marc raises his eyebrows as if to say no fucking way you do. But alas, Mayari nods in the most sweet and genuine way imaginable. Making Marc look at himself in the mirror, “Go ahead.” He allows Steven to front.

As soon as Steven turns around, he is met with Mayari and this makes him leap in excitement, “Is it true? That stuff about your eye?” He immediately asks.

“Ah yes… Well, I did truly get it from Apolaki.” She eyes him, “But when it healed, I decided the look was so badass, I made it stick. Plus, all my paintings are in that image.” Steven smiles softly at the thought of Mayari doing that for aesthetic purposes but it was something a Goddess of beauty would probably do. He didn’t even realize that he was staring at her with the biggest awestruck look until Marc’s voice echoed.

Hey, Loverboy. Remember. Egypt. Khonshu.

“Sorry, sorry” Steven stutters, “It’s just that… You truly are the Goddess of beauty.” His words make Mayari blush, he was quite a charmer.

“Please don’t forget, I am the Goddess of War, too. Amongst other things.” She prompts her walk towards the door, causing Steven to follow suit. “Now, let’s go to Cairo shall we?” Her hand reaches out to the body Steven was fronting but before anything, an abrupt knock disturbs them.

Mayari sighs and turns away from Steven, promptly letting his hand go. Steven was enamored at the thought that a Goddess like Mayari held him.

To Mayari’s demise, it was Apolaki, drunk out of his mind knocking on the door. “Hello sistaa-“ His words were slurred but he maintained composure as he leaned on the doorframe.

“Hello Apo, what do you want?” She shifts her weight between the left and right leg, replicating Apolaki’s lean.

Apolaki glances to the back of Mayari and spots Steven, well he didn’t know who he was so he assumed Mayari dear was getting jiggy with the man, “Oh sorry, was I interrupting a sensual moment?” Apolaki winks at Mayari. “A little too early in the night to be doing it, hm?” He wouldn’t stop teasing his sister.

In an attempt to shut him up she uses her mind control to shut his mouth, “This isn’t like that I’m afraid.” Apolaki grabbed his mouth and couldn’t open it up. He furrows his brows which was enough to earn a chuckle from Mayari. With a quick wave of the hand, she stops her mind control.

“Fucking-“ He breathes out as if he was gasping for air, “Who is that mortal anyways?” He adjusts his jaw, sobering up from his drunken stance.

Steven weakly waves at Apolaki, “The mortal is Steven.” Mayari answers his question, “… and Marc.” She adds on.

Apolaki, confused, looks behind her again. Wondering why Mayari mentioned two names when there was clearly only one man.

“They’re in the same body.” Mayari senses his confusion and answers before he could be vocal about about it.

“Ah, well…” Apolaki nods as if it was a totally normal thing, there have been more crazier things they’ve seen. But, in this world where giant purple aliens and metal men are constantly on the news, a man and another sharing one body didn’t seem to be impossible.

“Father wants me to ask you if you were going to do anything about the sky last night.” Apolaki becomes more serious with his tone.

Mayari smiles at her brother, “Yes, that’s what Steven and Marc are here for.” She extends her hand to the back for Steven to grab, which he openly accepts. Their hands intertwined.

Apolaki raises his eyebrow, “And who exactly are you?” He turns his head to the side.

Steven looks at Mayari who was staring at him, seemingly awaiting a response too. Wanting to see how he would answer. “I’m uh…” He stutters, “We actually are-“ He points to his chest, “…Khonshu’s avatar.”

Apolaki practically screams in joy, “Khonshu that son of b-”

“Apo!” Mayari scolds Apolaki before he could continue that statement.

“How is he?” Apolaki asks with a huge smile on his face.

“He is currently stoned.” Mayari answers, looking at both the men in front and beside her.

Steven nods to Apolaki’s shocked face, “Unfortunately, he pissed off the Gods and Goddesses enough… which isn’t fair cause we only want to stop Ammit from getting resurrected.” Steven explains, making Apolaki visibly change his expression.

“Ammit? Are you serious? Maya why aren’t you panicking?” Apolaki pokes his sister gently, wanting to gain a violent reaction of some sort.

“Because, if you panic you get distracted.” She confidently says with a smug smile on her face.

Steven nods and agrees with Mayari’s statement, “You gonna help?” Mayari questions her brother.

“Sadly this is on you. Send a post card though!” He screams as he exits their sights down the hallway.

“What a dick.” Mayari shakes her head, “Come on.” She pulls Steven’s body down the back of her room to a huge door that appeared to transform to a location Mayari sought out to go to.

“Ta…” she pushes a button, “…Da!” The door presents the streets of Cairo. Making Steven vibrantly clap, “That was amazing!” Steven compliments Mayari.

Blood rushes to her cheeks but she tries to be coy with it, “Oh please. It’s nothing.”

“No no, genuinely… You are amazing, Mayari.” Steven steps closer and looks down at her eyes, unaware of what he was even doing. He just knew she was hypnotizing.

She giggles at Steven’s poor attempt at flirting cause she finds it cute, “You can call me Maya.” She pinches his cheeks, “Both you and Marc can.” Marc’s voice was heard in Steven’s brain.

She sure is a beauty.

They stay like that for a couple of seconds until Maya moves away and brings them all back to reality.

“Right, so… Cairo.” She gestures to the portal door. Steven blushes at the embarrassment from his awestruck nature, so was Marc.

“Right you are.” Steven follows as Mayari crosses from her bedroom to a hidden alleyway in Egypt.

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