How-not to be an Olympian God!

Alex felt a bit excluded from the conversation and looked at the young man beside Cybele.

He was looking through a window, and Alex just couldn't omit the feeling of familiarity at the man's features. The latter noticed his stare and emotionlessly stared back at him.

He seemed to have taken an interest in Alex's eyes as he glared puzzlingly at them.

Alex felt a bit intimidated by this glare.

'Speaking of eyes, his eye color is the same as the one I got when I consumed Aphrodite's Essence...Wait!' Alex suddenly had a realization.

"Eros?!" Alex accidentally said out loud.

The young man frowned heavily when he heard that name and Cybele turned her attention to him.

"Please don't call Huios by his old name, he finds it distasteful." Cybele kindly requested of him.

Alex put his hand over his mouth and contemplated.

Back in Abdera, he traveled around the city in search of the fragments of the love story between Eros and Psyche.

In the end, when he saw the end of the story in the acropolis of the city, he noticed a statue outside of the temple.

The statue had the same features as those of the young man in front of him, except indifference replaced the melancholy of the statue.

"Also, Huios cannot speak, I hope you understand," Cybele informed him.

Alex nodded and saw Hermes who also had a face of realization.

The latter then asked Cybele, "When did...Huios come to live here?"

"Well, about 50 or so years ago, I found a young man aimlessly wandering through the forest. I brought him in and then realized he was the child of a person I knew very well from the past."

"Please do not speak her name here."

Alex and Hermes both knew who she was talking about, and didn't say it out loud.

Huios, accordingly, didn't seem too enthusiastic about the subject and tugged at Cybele's clothing. She nodded and asked, "I forgot to ask, what made you come here? I know you, Hermes, you wouldn't visit for no reason."

"Alex and I are on a diplomatic trip to the land of the Qin Dynasty and I thought to stop here to pay a visit." Hermes smiled.

Cybele chuckled and said, "Oh, still so devoted to your tasks, that's so characteristic of you, Hermes."

Hermes rubbed his head and replied, "Great Mother, I see you still do the manual farming labor? Why do you wait a year and harvest manually when you can just make any vegetation instantly sprout?"

"Well, Hermes, communicating directly with Gaia is a very humbling activity and the time shows the true value of her gift to us. Anyways, I still have a long life ahead of me, don't I?" She laughed.

Out of a sudden, the door creaked open and they heard a purring sound.

Two lion cubs entered through the door and they groaned in pain. They were severely wounded and some of their bones were visible behind the bleeding wounds.

Their underdeveloped lion manes were covered in blood.

Cybele saw that and screamed, immediately running beside the cubs.

"Little children, what happened to you?" Cybele put her hand on the two lions.

What happened after that was nothing short of astounding, as their injuries rapidly healed and the wound mended.

The only indication that a wound was previously there was the lack of fur in the area previously afflicted.

Alex looked dumbfounded by this extremely overpowered healing ability whereas Huios and Hermes seemed to expect this.

Cybele asked the lions with concern on her face, "Little children, show me every detail of what happened."

She then put her hand on their heads and closed her eyes.

As time went on, her expression got progressively more unpleasant and a frown made the skin around her eyes fold.

She looked furious and exclaimed, "It's the Orphics again!"

'Orphics?' Alex was unfamiliar with this term.

Hermes sensed his curiosity and whispered, "They're cults that worship the Underworld gods and perform strange rituals."

At this moment, Cybele stood up and the entire land seemed to shake in an earthquake-like manner in response to her fury.

"They stole my crops to use in their rituals? I forgave them. They cleared the forest of life for their rituals? I forgave them once again. But now, they murdered my children!? They're really testing my bottom line." Her voice increased in tone and volume like a crescendo.

She bolted out of the cottage and stone stairs the size of rocks sprouted from the ground.

She followed along the path of the rocks and new ones emerged every time she made a step.

"Alex, come with me, we need to restrict her wrath before all of this land goes to ruin." Hermes put his hand on Alex's shoulder and stated.

He looked extremely serious.

Huios disappeared off to a room in the cottage and came back with a golden bow and arrow in his hands.

The three left the cottage and followed the direction in which Cybele pursued the perpetrators of this incident.

Huios used the 'stairs' while he and Hermes flew.

They continued this way and the track ended at the entrance of a dark cave.

The three entered and the smell of blood and wax overpowered their sense of smell.

Alex frowned but he continued deeper into the cave.

Their path ended at a firepit.

Around the firepit, a pentagon was drawn in blood, and candles illuminated the surroundings in dim, eerie light.

There were three corpses of lion cubs on each end of the pentagon, and the two lacking probably corresponded to the two from earlier.

Cybele was standing in front of four men dressed in dark robes and one of the men screamed, "Summon Lord Necrodaimon!"

The four men started reciting a strange incantation but Cybele move her hands and the men's bodies started disintegrating from the bottom up.

Even as this happened, the men kept chanting until they could no longer do so and their skeletons fell to the ground, producing a clanking sound.

Alex gulped in terror.

This wasn't the end of the terror, however.

In the center of the firepit, a skull stood, solitary. Before the men died, the skull started moving and a weird smoke diffused into the air.

The smoke dispersed and then congregated.

It shaped into a goat-like figure, with piercing red eyes. At first, the goat ghost looked around arrogantly but the moment it laid its eyes on Cybele, it screamed in a shrill voice.

"A GODDESS?! I WAS TOLD YOU WERE BUT ANOTHER NATURE DAIMON!!"

Cybele's green eyes shined in indifference, and she moved her hand.

The goat-like figure abruptly dissipated into nothingness and the fire stopped blazing.

A single flower bloomed on top of the skull.

Cybele didn't seem to recover her composure, as she bolted out of the cave.

The group of three followed her outside, and the scene they witnessed was reminiscent of an Armageddon.

Starting with Cybele in the center, the brown vegetation and autumnal flora turned into ash and this deadly aura was spreading very fast.

Alex and Hermes were clueless as to what to do.

Huios, besides them, took out his bow and put an arrow into position. He then drew the bow to its very limits and aimed at Cybele before shooting.

The arrow didn't injure her but strangely, it passed right through her.

Suddenly, the deadly aura halted its rapid spread, and Cybele turned to look at Huios.

"I overdid it and you saved me with an arrow, Huios?" She spoke softly.

Huios(Eros) nodded.

She continued, "I think I will be fine. Can you remove the effects of the arrow?"

Huios clapped his hands and the arrow that he shot earlier boomeranged right back at his hands.

"I'm...going home." Cybele ran in the direction of the cottage.

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