"Nah, man, it was just the way you reacted when we talked about it before," Magnus says -- reassuringly, he thinks. "And I could access Midgard, but technically nope. I spent most of my time in other worlds."

His mind is whirling as he talks. It makes so much sense that this cultivation stuff he's been hearing about exists beyond the veil Annabeth calls Mist and he calls the Glamour of Ginnungagap. Probably there are cultivators just walking around China hiding their abilities from mortals, right? But are they all gods, or is it more complicated than that And Shen Qingqiu - would that make him a demigod, too, or just someone who got recruited for having the right qualities, like some of Magnus's friends? "Did you have any connection to the world you got pulled into?" he asks. "Before you died?"