Myth: The Spiritual Dominator

midnight.

No. 29, Rhine Avenue, South City District.

Perhaps because of the history of the diversion, this era that should have been primitive and backward is now mixed with things that should not have appeared.

Just like this house number with a strong later flavor, such an arrangement would absolutely not have existed in the original ancient Greek city-state.

Under the cover of night, Ryan was dressed in black, but his face had changed at some point.

This is a universal divine spell of the Hell system, [Disguise] - the so-called universal divine spell is a divine spell that has no restrictions on the object of belief, and any clergyman who believes in the devil can obtain the right to use it through prayer.

For example, the most famous healing spells of the clergy, the first-level [Cure Minor Injuries], the third-level [Cure Moderate Injuries], etc., are general magics of the Order Department. As long as the object of your faith is not a chaotic monster or something like that, you can use this magic.

As for the effect of [Disguise], it is to be able to change the appearance of the recipient within half an hour, and the duration and extent of the change in appearance can be extended depending on the caster's skills and professional rank.

Therefore, in the eyes of outsiders, the figure walking in the shadows of South City at this moment is a middle-aged man with a face full of stories. He seems to be integrated with the shadows, and it is difficult for ordinary people to discover his whereabouts.

Tread-

The footsteps sounded around Ryan, but they did not reach the outside world. Shadows suppressed all the movement along the rows of single-family buildings, he climbed over the fence and entered the garden of No. 29.

The house in the distance was pitch black, with no sound of breathing. There were only some servants and guards cleaning around, and it looked like they had come to the wrong place.

'Very alert, but worse than nothing.'

Under spiritual vision, extraordinary powers will leave traces that will slowly dissipate over time, but fixed realm marks will not.

Like now, Ryan can clearly see that there should be a basement in the house, and there are magic traps set up at the entrance and exit.

And in the basement...

"…That's a little arbitrary, but there are some precautions. If a normal person looks directly at the statue from a supernatural perspective, I'm afraid the outcome will not be good."

After quickly correcting his judgment, Ryan also realized something.

In this era, although many extraordinary professions have various means of detecting mysterious fluctuations, most people do not dare to use them. Only high-level clergy dare to relax the standards.

After all, there are many things that may not cause any damage when left there, but that doesn’t mean you can just look at them randomly, such as statues of gods.

'Let's deal with these people who are in the way first.'

After identifying the wind direction and finding a position upwind, Ryan released the restrictions of the divine magic, and some sounds came out.

He searched through his distant memories for those beautiful tunes and notes, and finally he found a suitable option and hummed the tune of "The Goldberg Variations" with his voice.

Under the influence of the extraordinary power, the music not only did not arouse vigilance, but silently aroused the servants' sleepiness... After a while, feeling that the time was about right, Ryan pushed open the door and walked in openly.

The servants on duty on the floors had all fallen asleep, and they probably had no idea what their mistress did.

Following the direction guided by the magical light, Ryan easily found the entrance to the basement.

"It will take time to dismantle it... let's just use violence to solve it."

The best solution to this kind of magic trap is to let it trigger a few more times. Anyway, judging from the aura, the energy it contains is not that great.

boom--

boom--

boom--

……

There were three muffled sounds, but the sound was not violent. After all, this was a cult member's basement, and she probably didn't want the things she had set up to cause too much noise. After all, this thing couldn't handle any real pursuers. It was not used to guard against enemies, but to guard against thieves who accidentally broke in.

The fourth falling object landed smoothly with a sound, and seeing that the trap was not triggered again, Ryan rolled over and entered.

Going down the stairs...as expected, he saw a small prayer room decorated luxuriously.

Mrs. Summer, who had just been seen during the day, was fainting in the middle of the prayer room. As a first-level professional who tended to be more agile, she was hit without any surprise.

Ignoring her for the moment, Ryan strode forward and took a look at the statue in the center - an unfamiliar image, a faceless woman with a peacock pattern on her head.

Peacock...Confirming his guess again, Ryan walked up to Mrs. Summer and stabbed her without hesitation.

"what--"

It was a simple and rough way of waking up. With a scream, Mrs. Summer was immediately awakened from her coma.

The pain in her arm made her want to struggle subconsciously, but the coldness on her neck froze her there. She opened her eyes and saw a middle-aged man in black looking at her coldly.

"Very good. You are mentally strong enough to not do anything irrational due to fear and accidents. This will at least allow you to live a little longer."

He nodded slightly and under the effect of a universal divine spell [Illusion Sound], the sound produced came from all directions, but Ryan himself did not speak at all.

This was originally a trick to divert attention, but it is quite appropriate to use it here.

"…What are you going to do—hiss…You'd better calm down. You probably don't even know who we are."

Despite the sudden change and the bleeding wound, Mrs. Summer quickly faced the reality.

She looked at the middle-aged man in front of her and tried her best to put on a charming smile.

Although due to the pain in his arm, this smile actually doesn't look good at all.

"You are not here to hunt us down, are you? Otherwise, you wouldn't give me a chance to speak. The Church of Knowledge has a way to dig out secrets from my memory. This is their unique skill... You can see that I am a servant of God. I mean, have we had any conflicts before?"

"If so, I can apologize to you and make compensation... If you come here purely for wealth, we can give you what you want, and we can even cooperate—"

"Cooperation, with whom?"

Interrupting Mrs. Summer's words, Ryan asked calmly.

"Of course it's with our Resurrection Sect. We are a sect protected by the true God, not those totem spirits."

The reaction was quick, but Mrs. Summer couldn't help cursing in her heart.

You've come to my door, why are you still asking such a question... But the next moment, the smile she was trying to maintain could no longer be maintained.

"Really? The Resurrection Sect." Ryan, standing opposite, nodded with a smile: "This is really strange."

"I thought the partner you were talking about was the Argos Kingdom that believed in the Queen of Heaven."

……

Argos, like Athens to Athena, is the earthly sanctuary of the Queen of Heaven. It is said that there are giants with a hundred eyes living there, which is why Ryan finds the whole thing very interesting.

The Queen of Olympus gave herself a vest of "Mother of Resurrection", and then the church under her was transformed into a cult within the sphere of influence of Athens.

Their target was not even someone else, but the Church of Knowledge that believed in Athena.

In comparison, the so-called ability of the 'Mother of Resurrection' to restore people's youth and reproduce seems so normal. The latter naturally comes from the [fertility] authority of the Queen Hera, and the former is not so strange. After all, in mythology, Hera would bathe in the spring of Karnassus every spring. This spring can wash away anxiety, fatigue and aging, and even make people return to virginity and restore youth...

"Tell me what you are here for, or what you have done."

Facing Mrs. Summer's horrified gaze, Ryan remained expressionless.

Unlike the two farmers before, the church members believed in gods, so it was difficult for them to read their memories directly, unless they were in the temple of another god.

So if possible, Ryan still hopes that the other party can confess something himself.

"Who are you? Even in the Church of Knowledge, only high-ranking priests and above know our identities!"

The irrelevant answer brought Mrs. Summer back to her senses.

She stared at the middle-aged man in front of her, as if she didn't care at all about her life or death at the moment.

"...So they are still enemies who know each other's identities. That's right. Since I can see the tendency of the traces of holy power, there is no reason why Athena can't see it..."

Her expression was calm, but Ryan could clearly see Mrs. Summer's pupils suddenly dilate.

Apparently, Ryan calling Athena by her first name horrified her.

Even if they are enemies, these believers will show respect to each other's gods. After all, strictly speaking, they are all members of the Olympian pantheon.

"The faithful are still troublesome. It seems I have to go to your lair... Don't look at me like that. You will show me the way."

Instead of answering the questions of a dying person, Ryan simply killed this beautiful believer and then crushed her soul into crystal.

Then in this prayer room, Ryan used Mrs. Summer's body as a medium and performed another simple divination.

But unlike before, this time the divination seemed to be disturbed by something, and only pointed out a general direction. Ryan silently took note, then picked up the statue in the center of the prayer room and turned to leave the basement.

'Tomorrow the people here will find out that their master is missing, but they probably won't find this place right away. After all, from a normal angle, this place is well hidden.'

'But it's getting more and more interesting. Hera's followers came to Athena's territory to cause trouble, and Athena's high-ranking clergy even knew about it. Athens and Argos have always had trade relations, and there is no trace of hostility at all... Haha, as expected, war is inevitable. It is just the result of the accumulation of contradictions under the guidance of interests, but it does not mean that there was no conflict before the war came, it was just hidden underwater. '

'Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It was like this in the past, it is like this now, and it will be like this in the future.'

After walking out of this room, Ryan determined the direction. The result of the divination just now pointed to the North City District, which was indeed more suitable for an organization that acted in secret to develop its power.

I just don't know what's going on there, or to be more precise, if it's just an open or secret fight between two sects of gods, then why would the paladins get involved?

"No matter what, I am now a member of the Resurrection Sect, and a subordinate of Madam Summer."

After rubbing his face and changing his expression again, Ryan looked at the statue in his hand.

"It's a cult, how can it work without an evil god?"

"Hera obviously won't start a cult. The name 'Mother of Resurrection' doesn't sound good. I think it would be better to change her name to 'Great Mother of Reproduction'."

With a strange look in his eyes, Ryan's figure disappeared into the shadows again. This night is still very long.

······

Olympus, Golden Palace.

Thousands of years later, there are no traces of the battle left. The original ruins have long disappeared, leaving only the magnificent buildings.

Modeled after the ruins in Asgard, the king of gods Zeus built another "Golden Palace" on this sacred mountain that supports the sky.

This building, which combines the artistic styles of two divine systems, is indeed solemn and magnificent, so much so that many gods often stay here temporarily.

But at this moment, in the Queen's bedroom, Hera's expression was not very good.

"Hebe, my daughter... Tell me, what did the king of Athens do?"

With a bit of gnashing of teeth, Hera looked at her daughter, Hebe, the goddess of youth and cupbearer of the gods.

Now that the boy that Zeus loved the most had not been born yet, there was naturally no chance for him to replace her. The goddess of youth, who was born at the same time as the god of aging in the underworld, was still holding a golden cup and pouring wine for the gods. Of course, she would occasionally play the role of a maid to her mother goddess.

Yes, as a new god with weak power, her status is almost at the bottom among the gods. In the original trajectory, she would be married by Zeus to his famous mortal son, and this would be one of her rare highlights as a god.

"…It's like this, Mother Goddess. Half a month ago, the King of Athens went to the sea, defeated the incarnation of the sea god Nereus, and then led his army to clear the waterway to the south. His reason was that he was missing…"

"enough!"

Interrupting, Hera took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling violently.

She didn't care about the reason. She just knew that this human being whom she disliked had done something big again, and she had no way to deal with him.

"If it had been a thousand, no, two thousand years ago, I would have hung his body on Mount Olympus and let his soul suffer the same punishment as Tantalus!"

"…Mother Goddess, Tantalus deceived the gods and even made the goddess of agriculture eat the flesh and blood of the descendants of the God King, but Athens belongs to the goddess of wisdom…"

"Whose daughter are you?!"

Hera shouted angrily and looked at Hebe who had quieted down, but she knew that what the other party said was right.

Even if we don't consider the restrictions on the gods in the human world today, she couldn't openly kill the king of Athens, after all, that was Athena's territory. And although she didn't want to admit it, she couldn't beat Athena at all.

Of course, now she was even less able to defeat the King of Athens—she had not tried it herself, but she had let others try more than once.

"Huh...but at least there is good news."

Glancing at her useless daughter and thinking of her useless son, Hera realized that she still had to rely on herself.

And the accusation made by the King of Athens was actually quite correct.