After the War of the New and Old Gods, the Greek World—long held under the ancient Titans and slowly stagnating—began to flourish again.
Olympus, now the center of divine authority, cast its radiance across sky, earth, sea, and abyss, growing stronger by the day.
Fertility worship, common across mythic traditions, was how the gods displayed their power and continued their bloodlines.
As the third-generation God King, Zeus set out to expand his family and secure his rule—joining with goddesses again and again to beget new children and fill the Greek World's power vacuum.
Over several decades, Zeus took six wives: Metis, Goddess of Wisdom; Eurynome, Goddess of the Sea; Demeter, Goddess of Fertility; Mnemosyne, Goddess of Memory; Leto, Goddess of Nurturing; and Hera, Queen of the Gods.
With the sea goddess he begot the famed Three Graces; with his elder sister Demeter, he fathered Persephone, Queen of the Underworld; and with Mnemosyne he sired the nine Muses, patrons of the arts.
More importantly, with Leto he had Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt, and Apollo, god of prophecy and light; with Hera he had Ares, god of war, and Hephaestus, god of fire; and after an affair, he fathered Hermes, messenger of the gods, with the daughter of Atlas, the sky-bearing Titan.
These five outstanding children filled out the ranks of the Twelve Olympians, and the pantheon advanced by leaps and bounds.
As for Zeus's first wife, Metis, an ancient Titan curse caused her to merge with the God King himself, becoming his very thought and wisdom.
Since she left no offspring, her name became taboo among the gods—unspoken, and gradually forgotten.
Following their ruler's example, Zeus's boundless vigor and procreative drive set quite the precedent.
Thus, throughout Olympus—save for a few like Hestia, the chaste goddess of the hearth, and Artemis, the huntress—a potent atmosphere of desire pervaded.
Beyond sex and asexual creation, a new wave of making also rose: birds, fish, beasts, and insects were fashioned one after another.
The Greek World's species grew richer and more varied, its ecological chains more complete; the once-chaotic mass settled into shape, its borders ever clearer.
Facing Olympus's expanding family power, the elder Titans, one after another, wisely kept their divinities yet chose to retire and transfer authority peacefully. Those who resisted were forced to lie low and help maintain appearances.
Such scenes were nothing new in Greek changes of divine rule.
It's said that even Pontus, the old sea god among the four primordial deities, was beaten down during the Titans' seizure of power—his divinity shattered until he faded from sight.
Otherwise, how would Oceanus, Titan of rivers and currents, have produced 6,000 river and ocean offspring?
In a sense, those descendants inherited fragments of Pontus's broken divinity.
Legend has it that two of Zeus's wives—Metis, Goddess of Wisdom, and Eurynome, the sea goddess—received the two largest fragments of Pontus's divinity.
...
While Olympus prospered, the mist-veiled Cilician Marshes remained tranquil and deep, as if refusing all clamor and strife.
At dawn, slivers of sunlight filtered through the gauzy fog and the gaps in the leaves, scattering across the forest.
A tawny stag, coat glossy and crowned with sharp, branch-like antlers, scanned its surroundings. Finding no danger, it lowered its head to graze on the tender moss clinging to the rocks.
Whoosh!
Thunk!
A sudden, piercing sound came from behind the hidden shrubs. An arrow split the air and struck straight through the stag's neck.
Moments later, leaves whispered as the centaur sage Chiron, longbow in hand, approached at a measured pace. He knelt beside the prey, whose struggle grew weaker by the moment.
Hit in a vital spot, the stag lay upon leaves already soaked with blood. Its eyes dimmed, crimson foam bubbling at its lips in obvious pain.
Chiron gently stroked the creature's head, leaned close to its ear, and murmured softly to soothe it.
As it eased just a little, the centaur sage clasped its neck with both hands and gave a swift, decisive twist.
Snap!
A crisp sound echoed as the stag, its neck vertebrae snapped, thrashed its limbs a final few times before its convulsions ceased, its life completely extinguished.
"Alright, everyone come over to dissect this stag. Observe the inner workings of the gods' creation—its internal life structure. Later, we'll practice tracking and herbal identification."
Chiron murmured as he turned, and amid a rustling sound, the students—who had maintained Presence Concealment the entire time—approached cautiously. Each controlled the Ether within their bodies, maintaining a form no taller than a person, some taking the shape of mythical beasts, others human.
Among them, two figures flanking him on either side were the most striking.
The silver-haired goddess on the left, spears strapped to her back, stood as still as an elegant, profound ocean yet moved with the fury and majesty of thunder. She embodied two starkly contrasting qualities, her stride confident and spirited.
The purple-haired fairy on the right bore a crimson serpentine divine mark upon her forehead. Her form was curvaceous and graceful, her vertical pupils deep and shadowy. Her movements carried a cold, bewitching allure, radiating a poisonous mystery that beckoned exploration.
Walking side by side, their auras both instinctively clashed and yet strangely harmonized. Clearly, the figures appearing in the Cilician Marshes were the grown Athena and Medusa.
Behind them, due to study group assignments, corresponding teams had formed. The harpies, Sphinxes, Hydras, Caucasian eagles, and Nemean lions stood by Athena's side, awaiting instructions. On Medusa's side stood Cerberus, the hundred-headed dragon Ladon, the Colchian Dragon, the chimera, and the other two Gorgon sisters.
Bringing up the rear, Samael walked with hands clasped behind his back, leaning them against his neck. He strolled leisurely alongside the serene, veiled goddess, chatting cheerfully as they covered the flanks.
By the time the two arrived, the groups of students ahead had already crouched on either side of the stag. Using its spine as the central axis, they split the prey in two, each selecting a half to dissect.
After placing their halves on clean grass, Athena drew her Bronze Age dagger, skillfully stripping away membranes and separating muscles. The Goddess of Wisdom explained to her teammates how the creature's blood flowed, the functions of each organ, and the effects of piercing them.
The Typhon offspring, who hunted by instinct, listened to the descriptions and watched the captain's practical feedback after the Destruction of each organ. Their vague sense of life's structure grew slightly clearer.
As for the topic left as homework—the storage of ether within the body—she invited the participants to explore it together.
Similarly, Ana's other group launched into fervent discussions. Inspired by the gods' transformation of the world, they even began enthusiastically debating what kind of creations they themselves would fashion.
Amidst the heated atmosphere, Samael's gaze softened with satisfaction, as if he were glimpsing through time and space the future scenes of passionate debates at Plato's Academy in ancient Greece.