Gaia's body was covered in cracks, her abdomen swollen as twelve masses of essence pressed against one another inside it. Divine blood still slowly seeped from the old wound in her abdomen; whenever the wound was about to heal, the pressure within forced a narrow split open again.
Her wretched state brought a look of pity even to the God of Darkness, who spent years asleep and felt little emotion.
He was the embodiment of darkness, the prelude to death and the echo of the Abyss. To him, emotion was something unnecessary, something that even interfered with his duties. But at this moment, he truly felt pity.
It came from their bond as family. He and Gaia were both children of Chaos, born together in the chaos, sensing the contours of the world together. Only later had they each gone in different directions.
But those earliest memories of their shared origin had always lain in the deepest reaches of his essence.
Nyx's gaze left Gaia and settled on the Bottle of Life beside her.
The Bottle of Life was one of the Earth Mother's innate divine artifacts. It could heal all things, but the earth itself was the one thing it could not heal.
Nyx sighed silently and looked down at her chest.
This avatar was a strand of will she had separated from her true body, and it contained her essence of night. She tapped her chest, separating out a wisp of that essence.
Night was a time for all things to rest and recuperate. All weary living beings found respite in the night, and all wounds slowly healed in the shadows. That was the gentlest aspect of night's authority.
If the Night Divinity had not been bound by fate, Nyx could have healed Gaia directly.
But now her true body was locked within the Night Divine Domain, and she could not even wield her divinity from afar. All she could do was infuse this wisp of essence into her avatar, then pass it on through the avatar.
The wisp of night essence flowed around her fingertip. Then, with a gentle flick, she turned it into a long, slender purple thread that slipped into Gaia's Earth Divinity.
Gaia's body trembled slightly. Her essence relaxed somewhat at the touch of that wisp of night essence, and the wounds to her body and soul slowly began to heal.
But the edges of Nyx's avatar began to turn transparent. After parting with a wisp of essence, this body was dissipating irreversibly. Nyx's face grew indistinct, and she looked at Erebus behind her.
"Watch over her."
Erebus said nothing, merely nodding silently, and Nyx's avatar dissipated completely.
Beside the campfire at the foot of Mount Proeon, Nairmis's fingers were still gliding over the strings. He had played all night.
Sustained by the divine power of a third-class god, he would not have to stop from exhausting his divine power as he had before, but he was indeed somewhat mentally weary.
What warranted more attention, however, was his Emotion Divinity. After converting emotions for an entire night, he felt that his Emotion Divinity had reached a critical point. It was one step away from becoming a third-class divinity, but it was stuck.
Nairmis's fingers continued moving over the strings, but he had already begun considering other questions. The Emotion Divinity was his innate divinity, the foundation of all his other divinities.
If he wanted to become a first-class god or reach an even higher rank in the future, his innate divinity had to advance. It was not something he could discard or replace. It had to grow alongside him.
The good news was that the Emotion Divinity had that potential. The bad news was that as his divinity advanced, he needed not just quantity, but also more abundant and more intense sources of emotion.
His gaze passed through the campfire and settled on the God King. Uranus still had his eyes closed. Nairmis had to admit that every one of his recent rapid advancements had come with the assistance of His Majesty the God King.
The major events the God King had caused had provided sufficient torrents of emotion, allowing him to draw from them the power he needed to break through.
But this method had its limits. The further he advanced, the greater his needs would become. He could not, and should not, expect every advancement to be built on the suffering of others.
He needed more abundant sources of emotion. He could not count on those gods who knew only pleasure and felt little emotion. The beings with the most abundant emotions should be humans.
Humans were the beings richest in emotion. They loved, hated, feared, and yearned. They wept bitterly over insignificant reasons and risked their lives for a fleeting moment of warmth.
Human emotions were beyond comparison with those of any god. Because they were weak, they felt more deeply. Because their lives were brief, they burned more fiercely.
He tried hard to recall when humans had appeared in Greek mythology. There was still a long time before humanity would be born. He would have to wait.
While thoughts still churned in Nairmis's mind, night began to recede, and day arrived.
Uranus opened his eyes and sat upright on the rock. He glanced at the extinguished campfire, then at the lyre in Nairmis's hands, and stood up.
Nairmis stopped playing. His wrists ached slightly, but he set the lyre down and rose. I worked hard playing all night without a single complaint and maintained my standard throughout. Surely Uranus will at least offer a word of praise, something like "not bad"?
He had already prepared a modest response and some accompanying flattery in his mind. He raised his head, ready to speak.
But Uranus did not look at Nairmis. His body began to rise, and he took several steps upward through empty air, each step leaving a ring of golden ripples. Then his figure vanished into the distant sky.
From beginning to end, he had not spared Nairmis a single glance.
At the foot of the mountain, Nairmis stood rooted to the spot, dumbfounded, the corner of his mouth twitching.
"What a... rude fellow."
He grumbled inwardly and swallowed the carefully prepared words of flattery.
With the God King's departure, the invisible pressure shrouding the area finally vanished completely.
The entire forest came alive at the same instant. Then five nymphs rushed out from deep within the woods, stumbling up to Nairmis and questioning him with great concern.
Surrounded by them, Nairmis found himself somewhat overwhelmed for a moment, answering them one by one.
Still uneasy, the nymphs circled him another three times. Only after confirming that he had no injuries anywhere on his body did they finally let out long breaths of relief.
After reassuring them, Nairmis felt a wave of fatigue wash over him.
"Go back and rest. I need some rest too."
He walked into the shade of a large tree and sat down against its thick trunk, setting the lyre beside his knees as he prepared to rest.
But at the very last moment before he fell asleep, a thought flashed through his mind: Hemera.
That Goddess of Day had been secretly watching him. He was certain of that, but he did not know whether she was still nearby today.
The Emotion Divinity could sense emotions and locate them, but Hemera was a second-class god, one rank above Nairmis. He could not try to sense her without harming himself.
That meant she might still be behind some nearby tree, continuing to watch him in secret. Nairmis frowned. Troublesome.
Just then, a bird flew overhead, and the sound of its beating wings made him instinctively look up. He watched it pass above the treetops and fly toward the sky.
The sky, a bird in flight, being seen.
Inspiration struck. Since his Emotion Divinity could not advance quickly for the time being, and his perception could not encompass gods stronger than himself, he could use another method to prevent prying eyes: a physical barrier.
Build a house. No, something grander than a house. Build a palace.
The more Nairmis thought about it, the more feasible it seemed. He was the God of Crafts, after all. His Craft Divinity would come in handy.
With that concern resolved, drowsiness overtook him. He closed his eyes, telling himself at the very last moment before falling asleep that he would begin work when he woke.
Within the Earth Divine Domain, Gaia opened her eyes.
She was somewhat dazed. She looked down at her abdomen. The wound had already healed. Her awareness gradually cleared, and her memories began to return.