Chapter 806: “The Script’s” Influence
Hades had really been putting in the effort to become stronger lately.
That said, it wasn’t particularly difficult for Hades to ascend to the superior stage, given that he already possessed several Monarch Rank Authorities besides his primary ones, Darkness and Death.
He was a god who had lived for over 200,000 years, and in that time, he’d had more than enough opportunities to achieve all sorts of things. Every now and then, he would simply decide to pick up a law and push his comprehension of it to the Monarch Rank.
The end result was a man with over five Monarch Rank Authorities.
Which brings us to the current moment, with Arthur now questioning his father and asking why he was suddenly in such a hurry to grow stronger.
After all, like already mentioned, Hades was incredibly old, yet after reaching a certain level of power, he had long since stopped focusing on increasing his existence realm.
Instead, he had spent his time handling matters within the universe, specifically his duties as the King of the Underworld, the ruler of the largest galaxy cluster in the entire Olympus Universe, and the one responsible for overseeing the Olympus Universe’s afterlife.
And he wasn’t alone in this at all.
The stronger a being became, the harder it was to grow even the slightest bit stronger. Because of that, once most individuals reached an existence realm that was considered top-tier for their universe, they typically stepped back from actively chasing power and instead turned their focus to other aspects of life.
As a result, they often remained in the same existence realm for tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of years, but that didn’t bother them much. They already possessed enough strength to deal with virtually anything that could threaten them within their domain or anywhere nearby.
At most, they would pursue weapons and artifacts to augment the power they already had, and then maybe, just once in a while, they would decide to start thinking about comprehending a new law or pushing their existence realm a little further, and then after doing that, they’d go right back to not caring too much and returning their focus to everything else life had to offer.
After all, becoming stronger involves processes that most didn’t exactly find enjoyable or interesting. Comprehending laws, for example, was something that the majority of people found boring, and constantly engaging in battle to increase one’s strength came with the ever-present risk of death, which most individuals would honestly prefer to avoid, unless they happened to fall within that particular demographic of battle junkies, those who genuinely loved the thrill that came with being on the verge of death, and those who actively sought out that feeling in order to, "feel alive."
Hades was part of the group that preferred a slow life, and if he were the protagonist of his own story, it would definitely fall into the slice-of-life genre rather than anything remotely close to action-adventure.
Yet that same man was now actively pursuing power not just for himself but also for his subordinates, urging them to empower themselves as well, which could only mean that there had to be a reason behind this sudden shift in behaviour.
"So, what’s the reason?" Arthur asked, floating in mid-air in a lotus position, his elbow resting on his lap and his chin propped up by his palm.
He was also upside down, for some reason.
Hades, who was still subtly exerting pressure on the surrounding cosmic energy, which Arthur was actively countering with Cosmic Domination, replied, "Zeus is probably up to something shady, and whatever it is, it’s definitely going to affect me. So I’d very much like to have enough power to slap whatever he sends my way right back at him, twice as hard."
Arthur blinked in mild surprise at that, then chuckled and said, "Yeah, Zeus is always up to something. What did he do this time?"
"I don’t have any solid information yet, but I know he’s trying to pull something and rope his allies into it. Problem is, they’re not responding the way he wants. He’s gotten into multiple fights, and just when I thought he’d already pissed off three of his allies, it turns out he actually pissed off four.
I just didn’t know about the first one at the time.
Odin, Jupiter, and two others. Whatever happened with Odin was bad enough that he almost ended up fighting Thor."
Hearing that, Arthur’s brows rose as he asked,
"Odin, Jupiter, Zeus? Who are the other two he’s gotten into fights with?"
"He only fought with Jupiter. The others were just disagreements. Right now, it’s Asgard’s Odin, Romersk’s Jupiter, Erin’s Lugh, and Humenia’s Vuxohr."
The names Hades listed made Arthur fall silent, his expression turning thoughtful for a moment before he asked,
"Hey Dad, do you know if Alkosh is involved in whatever Zeus is doing? If not, can you find out?"
The instant Arthur said that, Hades narrowed his eyes and asked, "Why exactly do you want to know that?"
That reaction told Arthur everything he needed to confirm his suspicion.
"So he is involved, huh? I see... Alkosh, Zeus, Odin, and Lugh... I see, I see," Arthur muttered all this to himself while Hades stared at him in confusion.
"Wait, exactly what are you saying that ’you see’?"
Hades asked this while reaching out to grab Arthur and spin him 180 degrees so they were now eye-to-eye.
In response, Arthur took a deep breath and said, "Give me a second, Dad. I need to go vent."
Before Hades could ask what he meant, Arthur teleported away, left the planet entirely, travelled to a distant region of space with no life or habitable worlds, descended onto a random planet’s moon, obliterated it with a frustrated punch, then returned to Lucifer’s domain and resumed the exact same lotus position, casually brushing the moon dust off his fists.
"What did you just do?" Hades asked.
Arthur, after brushing the dust off his fists, replied, "I went to vent my anger. No one really enjoys having the events of their life dictated by someone else, even if that someone is themselves."
The words made little sense to Hades, and Arthur had no intention of elaborating.
"Anyway, listen, Dad. Just know to stay away from Alkosh. And tell everyone you care about to stay away from him in any way they can."
Hearing that, Hades’s gaze turned suspicious as he asked, "And why exactly are you telling me this?"
"Because I think Alkosh is—"
Arthur froze mid-sentence, his eyes widening in shock before he clicked his tongue and said, "I’m afraid I can’t tell you why."
Of course, Hades wasn’t about to just sit back and accept such an answer.
"What do you mean you can’t tell me? You were literally just about to say it."
"Yeah, exactly, that’s the problem," Arthur responded. "I was about to say it, and the moment I tried, I could feel Time trying to erase my memories of what I was about to tell you.
If I tried telling you, I’d lose all memory of it. And I don’t think I can talk faster than I can forget."
At that, Hades fell silent, his expression conflicted, while Arthur simply sighed and said, "You know what, here’s the takeaway—Alkosh is bad news. Stay the fuck away from him."
That was the most Arthur could manage without risking the loss of the fragments of information about "the script" left in his mind, because, as it turned out, he wasn’t the only one who had set traps with time.
His future self had also set a trap for him.
’You fucking bastard, just what the hell are you planning?’
Arthur cursed his future self in his thoughts, shaking his head with a sigh before saying aloud, "So, this means I won’t be able to cast the Ancestral Regression spell this time again, huh?"
That was the real part that bothered him.
Ancestral Regression—a spell that allowed one to awaken the traits and powers of the ancestors whose blood ran in their veins. Ever since Arthur had discovered the existence of the spell through Lewis, his quarter-giant subordinate, he had wanted to cast it on himself, either to awaken more traits or to gain raw power.
The spell required the blood of an ancestor, with the bare minimum requirement being a grandparent. Arthur had initially planned to use Diablo’s blood for it, but after further research, he found out the spell could only be cast once.
If he used it with blood from his maternal side, that was it. He wouldn’t be able to do it again with blood from his paternal side.
So, he decided to use both at once. Diablo’s and Kronos’.
But then came the complication. Kronos was sealed in Tartarus, within the Olympus universe. And due to the nature of the seal, not a single part of Kronos’ existence could leave that prison.
Even if Hades were to go in and slice up Kronos’ arm to draw blood, that blood would boil and evaporate the moment it crossed the boundary out of Tartarus.
Which meant, if Arthur wanted to use Kronos’ blood, he would have to enter Tartarus himself, and Hades wasn’t about to let Arthur come to Olympus while Zeus was doing fishy things.
So, the spell kept getting delayed, postponed time and again, until now, when Arthur was already 31 years old and still hadn’t cast it.
A decade ago, after coming across Lucifer’s Vestige, which was now the current Lucifer, and learning that Diablo had apparently preserved the last fragment of the original Lucifer’s energy core in temporal stasis, complete with the blood still on it, Arthur had decided to take things a step further.
Since the Ancestral Regression spell was more effective the further up the ancestral line one went, he figured—why not aim for his great-grandfather’s blood instead?
But then came another complication.
Arthur’s paternal great-grandparents weren’t exactly in accessible conditions. His paternal great-grandfather had, quite literally, been diffused into the spatial fabric of the Olympus universe, and his paternal great-grandmother was sealed.
Arthur had, at one point, brought up the idea of using his great-grandmother’s blood, and Hades’ reaction back then had been unsurprisingly bad, just as bad as it was now, as the man could already tell exactly what Arthur was thinking.
