Chapter 584: The Passage Not Found
Boundless darkness, a scene beyond description.
It was as if he was floating between existence and non-existence, unable to distinguish between inside and outside.
In a hazy dream, Dionysus felt as if he had done many things and said many words.
In the illusory light and shadow, he saw the Sky fall and the earth tremble. Statues turned into human forms, replacing the glory of the old masters.
Starlight descended, rising from his own body.
A transaction, an exchange.
One descended to the underworld because of it, while the other ascended to the mountain peak.
That which was eternal lost its eternity, and light rose from the darkness. As if his chaotic thoughts were illuminated by that light, Dionysus finally found himself again.
Was this a dream, an endless mortal dream…
"…Wake up…"
"Wake up…"
"Wake up!"
"Hoo—"
In an unnamed valley, he was awakened by a calling voice.
Dionysus suddenly woke up, but the dazzling light made it hard for him to open his eyes.
In front of him, Heracles was looking at him with some worry.
Clearly, the Great Hero had not expected his companion to suddenly fall into such a deep sleep, almost to the point of not waking up.
"Wait, stop shouting, I'm already awake… Heracles, did I just suddenly fall asleep?"
He covered his forehead with his right hand and stopped the large hand shaking his body with his left.
Dionysus felt his head was a bit muddled, as if he hadn't been sleeping peacefully, but rather had been beaten up in a dream.
Ah… right, and Ender, he seemed to have dreamt of him.
In the dream, Ender asked him if he remembered the vow he had made to him, and Dionysusnaturally said he hadn't forgotten.
Although he was an immortal god, he had already acknowledged this friend. He would carry Ender's share and live on permanently in the Chaos World.
"…Dionysus, I don't know what exactly happened to you."
"When I finished answering the Sphinx's three questions, you were already unconscious here."
He breathed a slight sigh of relief. Seeing his companion finally wake up, the Great Hero reached out to help him up from the ground.
"What, were you ambushed just now?"
"Such a deep sleep doesn't look like it happened naturally."
"Perhaps… but it's over now."
Shaking his head slightly, Dionysus tried to release the heavy feeling in his mind, but it was in vain.
A strange sense of weakness came from the bottom of his heart. As a god without Divinity, though he was immortal, he was not immortal in the mortal sense.
Once his own traces were erased, he would fall into a deeper slumber than even a Star God, without even a chance to wake up.
After all, Star Gods at least had resilient Star Cores as anchors, and generally no god would necessarily grind those into dust, but he didn't have that kind of luck.
So Dionysus had always cherished every bit of his divine power in the past, even though Zeushad given him a lot of faith.
Only today, he felt that his divine power seemed to have been consumed by seventy to eighty percent for no reason.
"It's probably the Sphinx's power of rules… It's very likely that it conflicted with Father God's power."
"Whether it's royal authority or Law, they are similar to the Sphinx's rules. In fact, they all branched out from one of the most supreme and core parts of the present world, order."
"They either combine, with one submitting to the other, thereby achieving the other's strength, or they conflict with each other, making coexistence difficult."
"The ancient Titans left the God Court because of this, and the Sphinx's power might have affected me for the same reason… A fall into the pit, a gain in your wit. Next time, I can't be so careless."
Various thoughts flashed through his mind, and Dionysus rested for a while longer in place.
Finally, he indicated that he was fine and could continue on their journey.
The matter of Zeus's power, of course, could not be spoken directly.
So, Dionysus also chose to politely decline Prometheus's suggestion to check his physical condition.
"…Alright, since you're fine, let's head to the true ruins of Mount Othrys now."
Nodding, Heracles did not refuse.
Having obtained the Sphinx's legacy, he now felt a strange swelling sensation all over his body.
He really wanted to find something to fight, or light a fire to burn something down.
Although according to the records in the book of purgatory, the path under Mount Othrys that led to the fourth layer of the Spirit World was a 'dead end,' he still wanted to see it.
After all, he still remembered the words of the Athenian wise man, and his own intuition in the Ocean Eye. (See 3-347)
No matter what he did, no matter if he only wanted to go to the fourth layer of the Spirit World to fulfill the vow he had made to himself… it seemed that one day, he would definitely have to walk this 'correct' path.
—Starting from the base of the World Pillar in the present world, along the ridge of Mount Sinai, all the way to its end.
There, all doubts could be answered, and all difficulties would no longer exist.
Perhaps that day, he wouldn't need logic, but could personally verify the Sphinx's question.
Was the so-called 'omniscience and omnipotence' truly real?
······
Heading west, since leaving that unnamed valley, Heracles had traveled hundreds of thousands of miles.
Compared to when he arrived, he now had an additional Divine Artifact of the Goddess of Law.
He also wondered if the Goddess had won her bet with the Sphinx, since he had caused the Sphinx's Death?
"Speaking of which, it's a bit strange… Ender, have you ever considered a question?"
Speaking silently in his mind, with the help of Ender's ingenious psychic threads, the Great Herocould speak directly to him mentally.
"The Sphinx's domain rules state that whoever begins the Q&A with the Sphinx, if he fails to answer even one question, he will lose everything."
"Conversely, if he answers all three questions, then the Sphinx will in turn lose everything and fulfill the questioner's renown—that's correct, isn't it?"
"Yes," Ender replied, already knowing what Heracles was going to ask: "You mean, with such clear rules, Lady Themis, the Goddess of Justice, who presides over Justice and Law, must also be able to see it."
"So her bet with the Sphinx was meaningless from the start, because even if the opponent lost, a dead person couldn't fulfill the bet."
"The Sphinx's rules are so powerful that even if the gods enter its domain and willingly begin the Q&A, they cannot escape the rules' sanctions after failure, precisely because this power harms both the enemy and itself; it cannot even restrain the Sphinx itself…"
"So in this situation, the Goddess shouldn't have done such a foolish thing, right?"
"…More or less."
Agreeing with this, the Great Hero was indeed a bit puzzled.
The Sphinx told him before its Death that its Life and Death were also a riddle, and the answer was already before Heracles's eyes.
However, perhaps the first three questions had consumed too much of the Great Hero's energy, and he couldn't immediately figure out the reason.
"Well… I'm not sure if what I'm saying is correct, I can only offer you a guess."
Changing his posture in the pocket of his clothes, the puppet said with a smile: "You should also know that the Goddess of Law is not only the Goddess of Justice, but also the goddess of Fairness."
"So when she does things, she shouldn't simply favor one side."
"However, from the moment she constrained the Sphinx to stay in the valley, and even set up the 'Equivalent Balance' at the valley entrance, exchanging divine power for the questioner's Life, these actions, although all done with the Sphinx's consent and paid for by herself as fair measures, upon closer examination, still show some bias towards humans."
"But you must know, Heracles, the Goddess of Law Themis has never been human; she is an ancient Titan, the daughter of Sky and Earth Mother, the legislator who eradicates tumors for the present world."
"In her eyes, demons or humans, even giants, sea monsters, and even the ants underfoot, are actually no different; they are all just ordinary living beings."
"In the entire world, perhaps only inherently chaotic evil creatures would disgust her… Besides that, what's so special about humans?"
"So if you think carefully, you'll find that the Sphinx actually received the same treatment as humans."
"It was confined in the valley, which seems like a cage… But if you look at it over a longer period of time, if it had continued to run rampant in the human world, the gods might not have been able to do anything to it, but one day, when Oedipus, who was manipulated by the gods and bore the mandate of heaven, came before it, could it truly have been as 'lucky' as it is now, escaping a calamity and ultimately awaiting your arrival?"
"It lost its freedom, but in return gained hundreds of years of Life… And if you look at the stone balance in front of the valley from this perspective, you might get a different result."
"You mean…" His mind stirred, and Heracles felt as if he understood something: "The reason the Goddess left a glimmer of hope for the humans who came to answer questions here wasn't because she particularly pitied these questioners who came for wealth, status, fame, and ultimately for their own greed."
"But because she had already shown mercy to their opponent first, so she gave them an equal opportunity?"
"The Goddess first made a bet with the Sphinx using a Divine Artifact, and only then was this valley created… Just as first pledging freedom to the Goddess, the divine power crystals obtained in return could save them from being obliterated by the rules."
"The questioners pledge their freedom to her, in exchange for divine power to preserve their lives, the price being to fight for the cause of Justice for the rest of their lives after failure… The Sphinxput its freedom on the gambling table, in exchange for the Divine Artifact golden balance, the price being to serve the Goddess eternally after failure…"
"So the reason I was able to pick up this Divine Artifact as a wager was not because of the Goddess's favor, but because of her Fairness."
"Just as the divine power crystals used by those who failed the questions to exchange for Lifeultimately became the Sphinx's sustenance, the Divine Artifact golden balance is also my rightful spoils of war."
His heart trembled. At this moment, the distant and long gaze of the ancient god shocked Heracles, but her absolute fairness in her actions was equally so.
Her existence seemed to be the interpretation of this Divinity, the proof of the word Fairness… Looking down at the golden balance at his waist, the Great Hero knew that this Divine Artifact would probably not belong to him forever.
The divine power crystals were permanently paid to the Sphinx because those who failed the questions ultimately left unscathed.
But even if the Sphinx escaped Death in some way, everything it once possessed was fulfilled by Heracles.
Even the Great Hero could not guarantee what form this escaped Life would take.
"Stone statue… or undead?"
Looking back, at this moment, Heracles had to admit that perhaps some gods' actions seemed so ridiculous, so uninspiring of respect.
But in the Chaos World, those truly enduring ancient gods who lasted more than one era were by no means as shallow as mortals imagined.
Indeed, weakness and ignorance are not obstacles to survival; only arrogance is.
······
Time flew by, and in the passage of time, Heracles had already circled Mount Othrys several times.
Collapsed ruins, dried-up rivers; burnt-out trees, stubbornly growing plants.
In this ten-thousand-year-old ruin, the Great Hero saw what appeared to be remnants of the Golden Age, and a few inscriptions recorded in some form of hieroglyphs.
With the aid of the book of purgatory, the group followed the notes inscribed on the stone tablets and found an independent building said to be very close to the former gathering area of the Golden Humans.
However, with the passage of time, especially the cataclysm during the war with Typhon at the end of the second epoch, the earth's crust shifted and plates overlapped.
Although Heracles found the building, he still could not find the remains of the Golden Age's main city.
Holding up the stone tablet that had guided them all the way towards the sun, the Great Heroonce again examined the relief carvings on it, which complemented the text.
In the Sky, the clouds looked as if they had been burned by fire.
At the peak of the towering World Pillar, several abstract figures as tall as the Sky overlooked the human world.
Some were indifferent, some majestic, some noble, some full of disgust.
Humans on the earth were prostrating themselves, praising the greatness of the gods… And between the two, a crimson meteor was falling from the Sky, plummeting to the mortal realm.
"This record…"
"Sky… falls… fire, surely… disaster… arises…?"
With a difficult and awkward tone, Heracles read out the words on the stone tablet.
"It seems to record a warning from the gods to humans at that time… But what good is it?"
Shaking his head slightly, the Great Hero looked around, feeling a bit helpless.
He had found this place, the base of this ancient sacred mountain left in the world.
But the problem was, the so-called 'correct' path to the Spirit World did not seem to be open to him.