At the same time.
The War God Mountain.
A furtive figure appeared before the great temple, poking its head out every now and then to peer inside.
Athena, sitting beneath a glowstone lamp and flipping through scrolls, looked up and glanced at the familiar figure in the darkness, letting out a helpless sigh.
"Aunt, if you have something to say just come inside. No one is stopping you."
Hestia outside the door, hearing this, slipped into the spacious great temple with a sheepish grin, and after a moment of hesitation, spoke haltingly.
"Athena, could I make a small suggestion?"
"What?"
"Don't go so hard on him every time. Can't you be a little gentler with him?"
Athena put down the scroll in her hands and looked at the hearthfire goddess before her with a smile that wasn't quite a smile.
"What's this. Getting soft-hearted?"
"He's my attendant god after all.
He hasn't committed any unforgivable crime. A small reprimand would be enough. But every time you find an opportunity, you beat him so badly he can't get out of bed.
I'm starting to wonder if you're deliberately targeting him."
"That's correct. I am deliberately targeting him."
Athena pushed the scroll to one side and gave an unabashed nod.
Hestia couldn't help showing a look of bewilderment on her face.
"Why?"
"If he were just an ordinary demigod, becoming an ordinary attendant god, only seeking to live quietly under the protection of you and me, naturally
I wouldn't go out of my way to do any of this."
Athena spoke calmly, her pair of deep violet eyes flickering quietly in the lamplight.
"Unfortunately, he is not..."
"I don't quite understand what you mean."
Hestia, lost in a fog, scratched her head with a completely blank expression.
Athena gave her own aunt a sidelong glance and let out an impatient hum.
"You don't actually believe he's just some minor branch bloodline of Ares, do you?"
"Isn't he?"
"Could an ordinary branch bloodline effortlessly accommodate the divine avatar of Crete?
Could an ordinary branch bloodline single-handedly defeat two Gorgon demonesses who had absorbed the divinity of Old Sea God Pontos?
Could an ordinary branch bloodline withstand a hundred of my strikes without being defeated?
That level of ability is beyond even Ares himself.
How could it possibly be talent that an ordinary demigod could possess?"
Hearing that meaningful reminder, Hestia suddenly grasped a certain possibility, her mouth going dry as she murmured.
"Are you saying... god King bloodline!"
"What else?"
Athena gave a sidelong glance at her slow-to-catch-on aunt, letting out a scoffing laugh and shaking her head.
"His little tricks are probably only capable of running circles around you."
Being teased by her niece in such a way, Hestia felt a surge of annoyance. "Something like this, why have you never said anything?"
"Because he doesn't want it said."
Athena spread her hands innocently, her face perfectly calm.
"Since he has reservations about his own origins, why should I go to the unnecessary trouble?
Some things are better seen through without speaking through."
Then a deeply hidden scheming look flowed through the Goddess of Wisdom's violet eyes, and she smiled with playful mockery.
"Besides, watching him rack his brains every day, coming up with all sorts of reasons to fob me off. Isn't that rather entertaining?"
"...."
Looking at her niece's face in the glow of the glowstone lamp, carrying that faint trace of cunning and wicked amusement,
Hestia immediately felt a chill run down her spine, and couldn't help asking with careful caution.
"Then when did you discover all of this?"
"Roughly after the defensive battle of Crete, I suppose."
Athena yawned, answering with casual indifference.
"His performance and talent were far too outstanding, far exceeding an ordinary demigod.
His brilliance was impossible to conceal. He didn't know the first thing about hiding his abilities. And there was always a familiar feeling about him that I couldn't quite place..."
Hestia blinked at this.
"A familiar feeling?"
"Ahem, more or less. Perhaps it's a resonance between god King bloodlines."
Athena gave a vague, non-committal reply, her violet eyes flickering slightly.
If before the Battle of Crete she had only harbored suspicion and a feeling, then after the Battle of Crete, the great sacrifice involving the [Bull], the visit of the great witch Circe of Aeaea Island, and the ambiguous relationship between the Underworld Moon Goddess Hecate and that little rascal, had all but confirmed in her mind a certain little scoundrel's true identity.
However, these matters involved too much.
It was not convenient to explain them clearly to Aunt Hestia.
And hearing Athena's evasive answer, Hestia was not satisfied.
"Even if he does carry god King bloodline, Zeus has left behind plenty of descendants. You don't need to specifically target him, do you?"
"I have quite a few brothers and sisters, yes. But ones who scheme all the way up to that god king and the Olympian gods?
Those are rather rare!"
"?"
Hestia was taken aback.
Athena gave a sidelong glance at her aunt who still hadn't caught on, and let out a meaningful cold hum.
"Just because I haven't said certain things doesn't mean he hasn't done them. And it doesn't mean I'm unaware of the little tricks he's been pulling behind the scenes."
"In the last battle, I lost Crete. Poseidon lost Atlantis. And yet not only did he establish his own cult on my territory and successfully ascend to divinity, he also consolidated two divine avatars carrying oceanic divinity and earth divinity."
"In one hunting expedition in Arcadia, Hermes lost his son."
"Entrusted with looking after the nine Muses for Apollo, he somehow looked after them all the way into the beds of the War God Mountain."
"Running an errand for Asclepius, the three Charites under Aphrodite changed hands."
"Even the reclusive Goddess of Memory and Goddess of Justice came to Athens on his account and publicly backed him."
"Every single one of these matters, every single event that had him involved, ended with everyone else suffering heavy losses while he profited enormously.
Once might be a coincidence.
But every single time?"
Listening to Athena's quiet, deliberate recounting, Hestia thought it through carefully and felt a faint sweat break out on her forehead.
But the trust built over such a long time made her still unable to help but defend him awkwardly.
"Isn't he doing all of this for you?
For Athens?"
"Did you ask him to make the three Charites your attendant gods?
Did I ask him to lure two Titan goddesses and a whole heap of other people's attendant gods up the mountain?"
Athena glanced at her aunt who was still stubbornly shielding her own attendant god, and gave a light hum.
"Don't treat him like some harmless little rabbit. The things he does aren't purely for my sake either."
"Then where's your evidence?"
"I have none."
Hearing this, Hestia's spirits immediately lifted. "So after all that, these are all just your guesses and suspicions."
"That is enough!"
Athena cut off Hestia's rebuttal with a cold hum, her violet eyes deep as an abyss, flickering quietly.
"He has indeed hidden himself well enough not to give me anything concrete to catch him on.
But in the world of the gods, this little cleverness cannot protect him forever."
"Many things require no evidence.
The key is not whether he did them, or whether he left any traces.
The key is how the powerful side chooses to think about it."
"These are precisely the principles he once taught King Minos himself.
And yet he has forgotten them himself."
"A single moment of wariness was enough to send King Minos to his death and nearly bring the Minoan people to extinction."
"If that god king were to grow suspicious of him, if he turned his attention to this restless son of his, do you think he could have lived safely to this day?"
"Do you have any idea how much trouble his little schemes, along with all these gods gathering on the War God Mountain, have caused me?"
"If he weren't still operating under your banner, and if I weren't drawing the vast majority of attention on Olympus away from him, his fate might not be much better than Asclepius's!"
Listening to Athena's merciless litany, Hestia had initially felt some lingering fear.
But as the final words reached her ears, the hearthfire goddess immediately set her heart at ease, wrapped her arms around her niece's arm, and swayed with a giddy smile.
"So after saying all of that, you're clearly concerned about him!"
The goddess of wisdom, who had been keeping a straight face, paused, realizing she had inadvertently revealed her true thoughts.
But proud by nature as she was, she was still unwilling to back down and admit it.
She simply lifted her chin and gave a light hum.
"I simply don't want his self-important little cleverness to be noticed prematurely by my father, thereby ruining my grand plans!"
"But didn't you just say he had ulterior motives?" Hestia retorted with a grin.
"It doesn't matter. Since I've chosen to trust him, I'm not afraid of whatever little schemes he's hiding." Athena spoke openly. "Whatever he wants to do, he's welcome to try.
Even if he's bold enough to want to contend for the sovereignty of Olympus, I as his elder sister will give him that opportunity."
But then the Goddess of Wisdom's tone changed immediately, and she cracked her knuckles with a cold smile.
"However. If his everyday little schemes can't even get past my eyes. If his own strength can't even beat me. What right does he have to deceive the gods and challenge the supreme Sky Father of Olympus?"
"Without strength to back it up, no amount of scheming and plotting can amount to anything.
Relying solely on one's own cleverness, when a true crisis arrives, all one can do is be at the mercy of others."
Hestia listened, then nodded with a thoughtful expression.
"So you beating him up is for his own good?"
"Taking more losses at my hands, pulling in that self-important cleverness of his by a notch or two, is always better than being caught red-handed by someone else and dying without a burial place!"
Athena spoke with complete righteousness, but her hand couldn't help touching her own protruding knuckles.
Of course, there was also the matter of itchy hands...
At this moment, Hestia also couldn't help pumping her fist with righteous indignation, putting on an air of standing shoulder to shoulder with Athena.
"Exactly right! Beat him! He deserves it! Next time remember to call me along!"
However, hearing this, Athena turned a meaningful gaze on her own aunt.
"Is that all? He's hidden quite a few things from you."
"If even you don't mind, why should I? When he's ready to talk, he'll say it himself." Hestia gave a sweet, artless smile, then lifted her head to look toward Mount Olympus among the stars, her eyes filling with a clear and steadfast light.
"And besides, no matter what he's thinking or what he wants to do, I believe he will make this world a better place!"
Athena gave Hestia a deep look, and after a long while, sighed dejectedly, her lips moving silently.
'So that's where I lost before...'
This level of trust...rationality could never.
Hestia, who had been gazing up at the starry sky, seemed to faintly catch some kind of sound, and turned to look at her big niece beside her with surprise.
"What did you say?"
"Nothing."
Athena composed her expression and gave a light wave of her hand.
"Aunt, we've talked enough for tonight. If you don't have anything else, go back and rest first."
Hestia made no move to leave in a hurry.
Instead she carefully raised her hand.
"One more question. If he's never a match for you, won't he just keep getting pushed around and beaten by you forever?"
"If he doesn't want to be dealt with, then in the future he'd better not leave me anything to catch him on.
Or else win against me fair and square on the battlefield!"
"And after he wins?"
"After he wins... I... ahem, what comes after that, we'll talk about it then!"
Athena, in the middle of speaking, thought of something unknown and felt an inexplicable flush spreading across her tightly composed cheeks.
She pushed the want-to-get-to-the-bottom-of-things Hestia out of the great temple.
"Alright, alright. Go back for now. I still have to spend tonight working out all those ideas he brought up. Honestly.
Everything only given in rough outline, all the rest just dumped on me.
I genuinely don't know who is working for whom here."
As her niece's complaints disappeared behind the closed temple doors, Hestia, banished to the plaza, couldn't help but furrow her brow.
'Being on the receiving end all the time isn't a solution either. How about...'
The hearthfire goddess pondered for a while, and finally looked quietly down at the brilliant radiance with flame-like patterns that had emerged in her own palm under the moonlight.
(End of Chapter)