❝Tell me about the shooter.❞ Toni sipped her coffee involuntarily, her fingers fidgeting uncontrollably against the porcelain. Natalia tilted her head, waiting for Steve's answer to her question. The Stark girl stared at Captain America. The tension in the room is so thick, she could cut it with a knife. Steve briefly looked at Toni before turning his attention back to the red-headed assassin. ❝He's fast, strong...❞ he trailed off as he glanced back at Toni again. The Iron Maiden raises a brow at him, wondering what's stopping the blonde man from speaking. ❝...had a metal arm.❞ As soon as he said the last statement, Natalia's stoic expression hardened. Toni's second brow rose. This was the first time she saw fear in her eyes. ❝Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists,❞ Black Widow walked towards Toni's direction, hands leaning over the table. ❝The ones that do call him,❞ she paused, levelling her emerald gaze at Toni's electric-blue ones. Toni dropped her gaze, a knot forming in her throat. The arc reactor grew heavy on her chest. Her heart beats loudly in her ears. Natalia scrutinized the Stark girl. It would seem as though she could see past the brunette's silence. She inclined her head so her eyes would meet Toni's and parted her lips. ❝The Winter Soldier.❞ Across the multiverse, Earth's blessed with a wonderful mechanic. On Earth-1218, we have the, ❝Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist,❞ Tony Stark. Then, in Earth-3490, we have Reed Richards' alternate reality in which the Civil War ended differently, where, of course, Natasha Stark (Iron Woman) married Steve Rogers. But few know about Earth-239, briefly visited by the Young Avengers while searching for Speed. This is the universe where we're going to explore the infamous Maria Antoinette ❝Toni❞ Stark. Created on April 29, 2021.

Sawa ka na ba sa romance? Yamot ka na ba sa mga cliched stories na nababasa mo? Very well then...

I have a confession to make: I'm not a big Harry Potter fan. Oh, I read and enjoyed all the books (maybe except for Book 5), and watched all the movies (still think the 3rd was the best), but every time the story would try to present itself as being a worldwide magical conflict, I'd have to battle an urge to sigh. I just didn't see a lot of non-Western magical types/motifs represented in the Harry Potter world. As for specifically Philippine magic, yeah... no. While that's hardly surprising, that kind of thing still keeps me from truly immersing myself in that world, even if I found aspects of it very inviting, because it felt like a world that has no place for people from my neck of the woods. And that's a shame, because there's a rich diversity of magical practices in the Philippines. So I've always thought about what a Philippine magical school might be like, one which used and taught magic in a way that magic has appeared in our culture, our old stories and urban legends. When I was asked to contribute to the first issue of LONTAR (https://lontarjournal.com/), I realized I didn't want to submit a story. What I wanted to do was imagine that Philippine school of magic, and in providing a list of courses that are taught within its hypothetical halls, give some insight into our own traditions of magic. It was a... much more daunting task than I'd originally anticipated, and in no way does the list I created even scratch the surface of the myriad magical traditions, ancient and modern, found in these islands. But it's a start. (Cover image is tangentially related, an inforgraphic primer on Philippine sorcery by Mervin Malonzo and myself for Kwentillion.)