Frondier left Poseidon and flew back toward the capital.
As he went, Frondier muttered.
"Does the Golden Apple really exist...."
"[What exactly is that Golden Apple? Where did you get that information?]"
The crow beside him asked.
Frondier gave a wry smile, having no way to explain.
"I heard it in a dream."
So he tried an absurd excuse.
"[Indeed. That’s common enough.]"
Gregory believed it far too easily.
"Common?"
"[You mean a prophetic dream. I’ve heard that gods sometimes relay them to humans.]"
In a world where gods exist, prophetic dreams aren’t all that surprising.
Frondier scratched his cheek.
There was one belief that had been ordinary thinking in his previous world, but in this world it had changed into a kind of personal creed.
—I don’t believe in gods.
—Because I don’t believe in fate.
In his previous world, most people believed neither in gods nor fate.
By contrast, here events kept happening that fundamentally shook Frondier’s disbelief.
"...Fate, huh."
Frondier murmured quietly.
The crow flying alongside him spoke.
"[I heard it from that finicky warden. Marco said the goddess of fate was on his side.]"
"So you’re saying that’s what this is about."
The story of the Golden Apple that had stopped midway.
It was now beginning again.
If so, then the Trojan War that would rise on top of it would burst forth in a similar fashion.
"[Well, Frondier? When it’s gotten this far, even if you hate it you can’t help but believe in fate, can you? It plainly exists.]"
"This isn’t fate; it’s the gods forcing things to turn out that way."
As Frondier saw it, the gods were nothing but cowardly.
No matter what ‘fate’ might be, gods who do their utmost to make events follow that fate?
"But when people believe something exists, it usually ends up existing."
"[What kind of delusional talk is that?]"
"Like stocks. A stock that everyone believes will rise—rises."
"[That’s because they buy it, not because they predicted it would rise. You’ve got cause and effect backward.]"
"Either way, it rises. Whatever the cause."
"[...That’s true.]"
In this way, setting aside whether something like fate truly exists or not—
If everyone moves believing that fate exists, then as a result events will proceed according to fate.
'Come to think of it, this thing is completely dead now.'
Frondier glanced at his smartwatch, whose existence he was nearly forgetting.
He still wore it, but it had been unresponsive for quite a while.
After he met Satan its notifications had sharply dwindled; after the Manggot war it stopped functioning altogether, and on the first day aboard the ship bound for Agoris it only left a single message—saying a World Quest had begun—before falling silent again.
He didn’t know whether the event that had erupted in the capital Palma was connected to the original game.
But apart from that, the smartwatch was now strangely quiet.
'Well, it was a device whose true nature I never knew in the first place. It was odd that it had been notifying me of ‘quests’ at all.'
Thanks to this smartwatch, Frondier had been able to gauge the directional flow of this world. Of course he already knew much from having played, but things like when something would begin, whether it had begun now, and the detailed contents of events—he had learned those through the smartwatch.
Halt.
Just then, Frondier suddenly stopped.
The crow flying beside him went far ahead, then circled back.
"[What is it, what’s wrong, Frondier?]"
Frondier didn’t answer.
He was seized by a question so obvious he’d never thought to ask it.
He stared quietly at the smartwatch that still didn’t so much as twitch.
'...What is a “Main Quest,” to begin with?'
Frondier might constantly chant “trash game, trash game” as a habit, but from his perspective this place was no longer a game. There were remarkably few elements that would make him think of it as a game.
What made him think of this as a game were only two things: that he had played a game in his previous world with the exact same setting and worldbuilding, and the occasional quest notifications that appeared on this smartwatch. Now even those quests no longer popped up.
'I’ve taken it for granted that because this is a game, quest notifications appear.'
But think about it the other way.
If this isn’t a game.
If, just like the world he used to live in, this is reality itself.
'Back in my previous world, if a Main Quest popped up, how would I have thought about it?'
You go to school, get a job, marry, have a kid.
If, within such a life, a Main Quest suddenly appeared—
And if the event described in that quest would inevitably come to pass—
Halt.
Frondier stopped in his tracks.
"[...You look deep in thought, Frondier. Is there something you’re worried ab—]"
"That’s fate."
***
Poseidon quietly watched the woman who spread her arms wide to greet him.
He had nothing to say to that air of someone who either understood the mood—or didn’t understand it at all.
"[Human, what is your name?]"
When Poseidon asked, the woman let out a soft “Ah,” and bowed gracefully at the waist.
"I am Cybel Forte."
"[Do you know who I am?]"
"I do not."
Cybel answered without hesitation.
Unlike Gregory, she knew nothing of Frondier’s circumstances.
Cybel had not heard from Malia, and coming to this continent had been her own unilateral choice.
However, Cybel smiled faintly.
"But I can infer it."
"[Ho.]"
"Standing proudly upon this vast sea, with a colossal majesty no human can help but look up to, that overwhelming pressure, that unfathomable class."
Cybel listed her guesses—phrasing closer to praise than deduction.
"You must be Lord Poseidon. I judge there is no other being who would possess such dignity."
"[...Excellent.]"
Poseidon was impressed. Were he some other god, those very words might have been an insult—but she had said them with no hesitation.
Of course, from Cybel’s point of view—
'I could tell from the trident alone, mister.'
—she had conveniently omitted the most important hint.
"[What business does a human child have coming this far? No—more importantly, how did you arrive at all? On ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ that tiny boat.]"
He was curious why she’d come, but far more distracting to his eyes was how she had come here on that minuscule boat.
Could that craft even change direction?
Cybel smiled brightly.
"By advancing with faith, I arrived."
Words straight out of scripture.
"It must be the will of God."
Poseidon narrowed his eyes and studied Cybel.
But even to his sight, it didn’t seem she had some strange method for crossing this sea.
If she could fly like Frondier, she’d have flown from the start; if the boat had special mechanisms, Poseidon would have seen them. Above all, if that were the case she could have come on a big ship.
His ultimate conclusion—
"[...You are lucky, child. You will not have such fortune again.]"
In a way, it was no different from having spoken the correct answer.
"[Commendable that you came this far, but beyond this point is forbidden.]"
Poseidon returned to his original stance—as when he had first barred Frondier.
"Excuse me? Why is that?"
"[Do not ask why. I do not permit anyone to pass this point.]"
Cybel blinked at those words.
Clicking her tongue softly, she pressed her temples, then looked up at Poseidon again.
"Then, perhaps—do you know Frondier? Did Frondier also fail to pass here and turn back?"
"[...What is your relation to Frondier?]"
Poseidon had half expected this.
An appearance this peculiar, a presence without reason—this child certainly had some connection to Frondier.
In answer to Poseidon’s question, Cybel, heh-heh, touched her fingertip to the hollow above her collarbone as if proudly.
"I’m Frondier’s girlfriend."
"[...Girlfriend?]"
Poseidon recalled the first time he’d met Frondier.
A stranger was holding Mjölnir, so to question the circumstances he had lifted the entire ship.
Frondier had taken to the air, and there had been a mage who slowed the falling ship’s descent. The construction and speed of that magic had been astonishing even to Poseidon’s eyes.
Girlfriend?
"[...Wasn’t it that child?]"
Crack.
When Poseidon carelessly uttered that, there was a sound of something colliding.
It shouldn’t have been possible for him to hear it.
'Hm? The force of the waves seems to have changed.'
What?
The sea was growing rough.
And within Poseidon’s own domain.
"Heh, hehe. Elodie is a friend Frondier trusts—and a comrade-in-arms. But! The girlfriend, the lover—that would be me."
While Cybel spoke, the sea grew more and more violent.
"[...I see. Very well.]"
Sensing a bad premonition, Poseidon chose to agree for now.
So the mage’s name had been Elodie.
From the moment he met her, Cybel had possessed a strange presence, and just now it had peaked.
Was she truly human?
"Which is why I have to meet Frondier. If he passed through, then please let me pass as well."
That was beyond unreasonable.
Frondier had set out on a pilgrim’s road, while this woman had simply followed after him. Whether girlfriend or whatever else, it wasn’t Poseidon’s concern.
And yet, for some reason—
Poseidon felt he must not bar Cybel’s way.
She must not be handled carelessly.
Even if someone were to touch her, it must not be something that happened near him.
This did not mean Cybel’s power exceeded Poseidon’s; he was not frightened of such things.
"[...In that case, I shall give you a test.]"
Shaking off the foreboding he himself could not identify, Poseidon spoke.
"[Have you ever seen something called a ‘waterspout’?]"
"...I’ve seen something similar."
A waterspout—water whirling upward into the sky.
It is observed only very rarely at sea.
Elodie’s original “Jujak Rise” was a spell modeled after this very waterspout.
"[From now on, a waterspout will strike you.]"
Poseidon waved his hand lightly.
Swoooooo...!
With just that slight movement of his vast hand, the sea’s waves began to rotate at once.
"[If you survive, I’ll let you pass.]"
Poseidon intended to let Cybel pass anyway.
But he was curious about the source of her power.
How had she come this far on that tiny boat? What was that persistent foreboding that kept pricking his senses?
The waterspouts he conjured were large in scale and powerful, but if it were Frondier or Elodie as he had seen them, they could handle it without much trouble.
Then how would this Cybel deal with it?
"J-just a moment! Uwah!"
Without delay, Poseidon formed the waterspout and sent it at Cybel—power that could rightly be called a god’s authority.
KRRAAAASH!!
Flustered, Cybel watched the waterspout surge toward her.
With the tiny boat she rode, breaking through or evading it was impossible.
'Well then, what is this girl hiding?'
Just as Poseidon’s gaze sharpened—
Cybel’s expression settled; she gripped the boat with both hands.
Immediately after—
Swoooong~
Cybel was swallowed by the waterspout and shot upward together with the boat.
"[Hm?]"
Thus Cybel, with her boat, went up and up without end—
She soared above the sky until she was beyond even Poseidon’s sight.
"Mommy~~!" Her voice droned in echo and then slowly faded away.
Someday, somewhere, she would fall.
"[...Well, now.]"
Could it be—had he just killed a person?
And Frondier’s girlfriend at that?
Poseidon fell into one of the rare, profound agonies of his life.
