I Became a Prophet in Greece, Part 24

This Oceanid, who had never seen any gods from the land, was filled with goodwill toward the young Zeus, admiring every one of his fine qualities.

The two spoke pleasantly, and Metis even devised a complete plan for Zeus.

They decided to first rescue the gods Kronos had previously swallowed—Zeus's brothers and sisters.

Gods could not be killed. Even though they had been swallowed by the King of Gods and their corresponding laws inherited, they were still alive.

Metis planned to use the purest water and the water laws unique to the Oceanus Lineage to brew the most enticing wine. This wine could intoxicate gods and induce vomiting; even the King of Gods would be affected.

Gods had alcohol even now, and they often drank at banquets. However, most of it was condensed by the gods using laws, possessing all sorts of beneficial effects and even increasing divine power.

It was not the wine drunk by later humans. That was something created by the god of wine.

Metis needed time to brew the Divine Wine. During that time, Rhea arranged for Zeus to serve as a wine attendant on Mount Olympus.

Zeus was already very powerful. He could use his own laws to conceal his aura, so even if Kronos saw him, he would not sense their father-son connection.

Kronos did not care at all that Mount Olympus had gained another attendant. After the birth of the Golden Humans, many gods brought a few humans to their temples as servants, making life much more convenient for the gods.

In Kronos's eyes, this was perfectly normal. As the Queen of Gods, Rhea was responsible for all affairs on Mount Olympus, while he, as the King of Gods, could not possibly concern himself with every detail.

Besides, he had other matters to deal with. His mind was entirely occupied with how to handle Theron. A tremendous sense of crisis hung over him, forcing everything else aside.

At Rhea's suggestion, Kronos had also developed a fondness for drinking.

That hazy state, in which his mind temporarily emptied and he did not need to think about anything, allowed him to briefly forget the fear in his heart and his helpless confusion.

However, due to his cautious nature, he did not drink much. At the very least, he never completely lost his reason, merely enjoying that faintly intoxicated feeling every few days.

He did not know that every time the young attendant brought him wine, whenever the attendant lowered his head, his eyes gleamed with restraint and calculation.

Soon, several more centuries passed.

Kronos still had not found a solution that satisfied him, which made him somewhat irritable. As usual, he summoned the wine attendant once more.

This day was no different from any other, except that the wine in his cup seemed exceptionally rich and fragrant, giving off an enticing aroma.

The naturally wary Kronos found it strange, but when he looked up and saw that the attendant was still the one he had known for centuries, he relaxed again.

He began to drink, then discovered that today's wine was not only fragrant but exceptionally delicious. Before he realized it, he had drunk too much.

The familiar surroundings and the familiar attendant gave Kronos a sense of security. Rarely, he let down his guard and felt that getting drunk once would not be so bad.

So he gave up on moderation and began drinking continuously, hoping to cast all his troubles to the back of his mind.

Kronos soon became muddled, while a violent churning rose in his stomach. Without even realizing it, he began to vomit.

One figure after another came out of him, from Hestia, who emerged first, to Poseidon, who came last—a total of five figures.

The five children he had swallowed were vomited back out, yet numbed by the Divine Wine, he did not even know what had happened.

The King of Gods Regrets

Kronos's reactions were incredibly sluggish at this moment.

This was not only due to the effects of the Divine Wine Metis had spent a hundred years brewing, but also because of the Goddess of Time, Rhea.

Long before today's operation began, Zeus had discussed everything with Rhea. Rhea, who remained in a nearby temple, had been watching closely. Once Kronos began drinking, she quietly used her divine power to blur the flow of time atop Mount Olympus.

Without any perception of time, Kronos had no idea how long he had been drinking.

The King of Gods was wholly immersed in his thoughts and failed to notice this subtle change. He only knew that he had drunk a little too much today, but not exactly how much.

The matter with Theron had repressed this King of Gods for centuries. He was too cautious, so cautious that he found every method unsatisfactory and repeatedly discarded them.

After going back and forth like this, his emotions had never been relieved and remained suppressed. The accumulation of those emotions caused him to overlook many abnormalities.

He did not even know he was vomiting from drinking too much. All his senses had been blurred.

The first to be vomited out was Ocean and Earth-Shaker, Poseidon, whom he had swallowed most recently.

He was the embodiment of the ocean and earthquakes. Almost the instant he appeared, the scent of ocean tides followed, and even the earth trembled.

Then came darkness. A figure symbolizing gloom emerged from the chaos, with eyes as black and deep as the abyss. It was Hades, the God of Gloom.

The third to emerge was an exceptionally beautiful goddess. She possessed snow-white arms, bright eyes, pearly teeth, and peerless beauty.

She was the beautiful Hera.

The fourth was Demeter, the great goddess symbolizing agriculture and harvest.

Almost the instant this goddess was born, lush green grass covered the earth, and abundant fruit swayed in the wind, as though the entire world were welcoming her arrival.

The last was the Source of Fire, swallowed first of all—Hestia, the warm goddess who symbolized the hearth and light.

Thus, all the gods previously swallowed by Kronos returned to this world.

The laws Kronos had inherited from them also vanished from him and were reborn alongside these gods.

Before Kronos even knew what had happened, his divine power had already dropped by nearly half. The feeling of having his laws stripped away caused him pain, and his consciousness, numbed by the Divine Wine, slowly began to return.

Seeing this, Zeus immediately addressed his blood relatives and decisively said, "Go!"

That unquestionable voice rang in every god's ears, exploding like thunder.

Now was not the right time for them to fight.

The King of Gods had certainly weakened, but they were not much stronger themselves.

Poseidon and the others were all in terrible condition, like gods who had just been born. Their power was nowhere near its peak, not even half of it.

With Kronos's strength, if they did not leave now, they would not be able to escape later.

These five gods had finally seen the light of day again. Though they still did not understand what had happened, they did not hesitate in the slightest at Zeus's command and immediately followed him away.

Zeus had not forgotten the Queen of Gods, Rhea. Before Kronos regained consciousness, he led his siblings and mother god out of Mount Olympus in haste.

Almost the instant they left Mount Olympus, the deafening roar of Kronos, the King of Gods, rang out from the mountain. Anyone could hear his fury in that voice, and the entire Mount Olympus trembled with it.

The whole world heard that roar and the deafening sound of collapse from Mount Olympus. All the gods turned their attention toward it, not knowing what had happened.

"Great King of Gods, I never thought you would have a day like this!"

"When you feared being overthrown by your own descendants and chose to swallow your children, did you ever imagine this day would come?"

Zeus burst into laughter, his voice likewise resounding across the world. In this manner, he forcefully announced his arrival and made everyone aware of his existence.

"Kronos, son of Uranus and King of Gods, cherish the days you still sit upon the throne of the King of Gods. You do not have many left."

With that, he left without hesitation, leading everyone straight beyond the world and into the vast, boundless universe.

By the time Kronos chased after them, not even a shadow remained.

Fury, shock, disbelief—every sort of emotion enveloped him. The emptiness and pain within his body, caused by the loss of divine power and the stripping away of laws, made him nearly doubt whether he had yet to wake from sleep.

Thousands of years of effort, divine power painstakingly gathered at last, and nearly half of it had been lost after just one drinking session!

Everything had happened too quickly, so quickly that Kronos could not accept such a loss at all!

He wanted to immediately catch up and kill all those traitors, but he could not find any trace of them. Utter rage ignited his reason, and in his anger, he directly shattered Mount Olympus!

Countless boulders crashed down upon the earth with deafening booms. The entire world shook, forced to bear the King of Gods' wrath.

Yet beneath that extreme rage lay a fear he could not speak of.

The curse he had nearly forgotten for a thousand years crazily wound around him once more. He had believed he had found the correct method and completely broken this curse, but only now did he realize how horribly wrong he had been.

The curse had never been lifted!

How laughable that he had thought he had accomplished something even Uranus could not, and had been so pleased with himself.

But at this moment, he realized that he had made exactly the same mistake as Uranus: always believing he could defy fate and control everything.

At that very moment, he suddenly remembered what Theron had said centuries ago.

Back then, that white-robed youth had looked at him with pity and said with a light laugh that his father had once been just as naive as him.

And what followed was:

"So your father's ending was not very good."

Did that mean his ending would not be good either?

But how could that be?!

He no longer pursued the traitors who were certainly impossible to find. Instead, he turned and charged into The Void. He wanted to find Theron and ask what his fate truly was.

But he was stopped.

He was stopped by the barrier he had set himself.

Back then, gripped by extreme fear, he had declared that no god was permitted to enter or leave. That "no god" included himself as well, though he had not realized it at the time.

Because when his strength was great enough, he could ignore his own command.

But now that his power had greatly declined, he could no longer pass through the prison he had created at his peak. He was barred outside.

As long as Theron refused to see him, he would never be able to see Theron again—unless he could swallow those five children again and recover his former strength.

Finally realizing that he had been wrong, horribly wrong, Kronos finally tasted regret.

But... it was already too late.

The Complete Seal

Unwilling to give up, Kronos, unable to find Theron, used the authority of the King of Gods to sense the entire world, yet failed to discover the whereabouts of those traitors.

Thus, he knew that they had fled beyond the world.

Without hesitation, he tore open space and arrived in that endless universe as well.

But he was not there to find those traitors, because he knew they would never let him find them. The ones he had come to find were the two powerful Titan gods in the universe.

Crius, Framework of the Universe, who symbolized vitality and expansion, whose children were the endless stars.

And Hyperion, father of the gods of light and the sun, who governed the skies and the movements of celestial bodies.

Kronos had initially regained his composure. Knowing that what had happened could no longer be changed, he began considering how to salvage the situation.

"Hyperion, Crius, my elder brothers, I am sure you already know what has happened. Traitors seek to overthrow the great rule of us Titan gods!"

"And now they hide in the depths of the universe. I ask you to find them, so that I may crush them with my own hands!"

The commotion on Mount Olympus had been too great not long ago, and all the Titan gods already knew what had happened. Crius and Hyperion were no exception, yet they fell silent before the King of Gods' request.

As rulers of this universe, they could naturally sense Zeus and the others hiding deep among the stars, but they had no desire to tell Kronos.

In their view, this was the King of Gods' family affair. They should not, and did not wish to, interfere too deeply.