117. Starting Today, Day One?
117. Starting Today, Day One?
"Uh....."
His head felt blank.
"....Huh?"
No, it felt refreshing?
A strange sense of liberation washed over him.
A sensation like his brain was giving up on thinking.
Perhaps he had truly given up on 'thinking.'
And what appeared before his eyes was
[Trait: Country-Toppling Beauty activated]
[Target: Chrono's Intelligence decreased by 1/2.]
"Ah shit"
Nothing less than a signal that his intelligence had been halved.
No wonder his head felt light— it was literally because he had given up thinking.
He slowly turned his head toward Athena.
"What are you thinking?"
A question.
To this, Athena answered.
[Defeat the Queen Siren and save everyone.]
"Are you serious?"
[You need not think about anything else at all.]
"No....."
Was that supposed to make sense right now?
The moment he tried to say something to Athena, she vanished from the spot.
The limit of the Advent's duration.
What remained in that place was just a single withered olive tree.
"Ha......"
How Greek god-like, indeed.
Did he trust her?
Especially the part about throwing out crap and telling him to handle it himself— that was precisely a Greek god.
"The idiot was me for trusting her."
Well, the worst had been averted at least.
Then what remained was simply to execute.
He racked his brain as much as possible to find a way to resolve this situation—
"....Fuck?"
—His brain, it just wouldn't work.
"No hold on...no, nooooo....?"
His thoughts wouldn't connect.
His thinking couldn't reach deep places.
A sensation as if his field of vision had narrowed from 3 dimensions to 2, to 1.
'This isn't good...'
This wasn't good.
This was not good.
...But, why was it not good?
"Wow....."
He finally realized it properly then.
How a person changed when their intelligence was halved.
He felt like he was experiencing the mental state of someone wasted on alcohol and drugs right away.
'My thoughts keep getting cut off midway.'
He couldn't continue thinking beyond a certain depth.
Couldn't formulate a plan.
Couldn't organize the situation.
Even trying his hardest to grasp the tail end of them, the thoughts eventually scattered like smoke and dispersed.
And in the midst of that, the emotions lingering in his thoughts remained in his heart, making it even harder to continue thinking.
"Waaaa....."
At the end of it, as he sat down in a daze, Minerva approached him and asked.
"Chrono....Lady Athena said it was something only Chrono could do."
".........."
What a bitch of a goddess.
But if he didn't do something here, he'd probably die, right?
'I don't want to die, though.'
But....but, hmm, what was he trying to think about again?
"Chrono, can you do it?"
".....Hold on."
Can you overcome it?
If the question was can you do it, if you can do it——if you don't, you die, right?
He didn't want to die, so he had to do it.
'But how do I do it?'
Well.
There was nothing he couldn't do, right?
He had plenty of cards in hand right now.
There was a reason they had been so hard to use...
"......?"
Why had he found them hard to use?
Thinking about it, it was strange.
"Hmmmm...."
Strange.
So very strange.
"It's my power anyway."
There was no reason not to use it.
'But.....'
But what?
He shouldn't become an NTR villain?
No, whether he was a villain or whatever, did that matter?
"If you don't want to die right now, you have to survive."
What? The original story? When the original story was ruined this far, what original story was he babbling about?
The happiness of other heroines? So right now when things were all fucked up, what happiness was he babbling about?
"By staying still, you can't save anyone."
Then what should he do?
"If I become a villain, I can save everyone."
Of course, the responsibility and handling the aftermath would be disgustingly difficult, but
"Is there anything I can't do?"
If it comes down to it, just doing it was enough.
'What about the final boss?'
"That's....."
Going on like this, he might end up clashing with Uranus later too...
"...That's a problem for later me to deal with!"
Future him would figure it out!
'But....'
But what?
Cronus? If Cronus was the problem, this was also simple.
"Cronus."
[Main God—Cronus: You finally call me, my ap—]
"I want a deal, Cronus!"
[Main God—Cronus:.....??]
If he couldn't trust Cronus,
"Swear on the River Styx. That you will never again take back the power you have given me."
[Main God—Cronus:...........]
He just had to make a 'contract' with Cronus.
Not as god and apostle,
But as Cronus and Chrono.
"If you're pissed off, then just die."
[Main God—Cronus:....But there is a condition.]
"If you put a weird condition on it, I'll bite my tongue and die right now, you know?"
[Main God—Cronus:.............]
"Should I try a class change into a fishmonger?"
[Main God—Cronus: Athena...what on earth have you done?]
A small sigh.
Soon after, a window appeared behind it.
[Emergency Mission]
[Contract with Cronus]
-This is an emergency mission issued by Cronus.
1. Accept the following terms before the River Styx. (0/1)
[Cronus shall not revoke any Divine Authorities or Blessings granted to Chrono henceforth. In exchange, Chrono shall offer five minutes of each day to Cronus.]
Reward: Execution of the Contract.
"OK! Thank you!"
He accepted it immediately.
[Main God—Cronus:....Should I have made it ten minutes?]
"No take-backs! Thank you!"
With this, there was no threat of being backstabbed right away.
For the first time in a long while, he pulled out that cold, heavy 'thing.'
─Woooooong....!
"Heh....you were happy to see me too, huh!"
The Scythe of Cronus.
...No.
[Fragment of Squite][Rank: B]
-A scythe imbued with the Divinity of Cronus.
-Time is relative, but it never disappears.
-An independent fragment separated from its main body. It never parts from its master.
-Trait: Indestructibility (Infinite durability).
-Trait: Transformation (Can change its form).
-Trait: Traces of Time (Can manipulate the 'time' of the target struck).
"Squite!"
─Woooooong!!!
Was it happy to be outside after so long?
Squite shook its body with all its might, radiating joy with its entire being.
'I'm glad to see you too, you bastard.'
He hadn't been using it for fear of being betrayed again, but now the story was different.
He raised Squite just like that and pulled the trigger toward Siren across the way.
"[Double Excel]."
For the first time in a while, he used time itself to accelerate the bullet's speed.
─Baaaaaang!!!
"Kyah.....!"
If earlier it only ended with the bullet lodging in,
Now the bullet outright blew Siren's head apart.
Overwhelming destructive power!
Penetration beyond imagination!
And in addition, recoil that made his wrist throb with every single shot!
"Fucking great!"
Why had he stubbornly refused to use this good thing until now?
He immediately turned his eyes towards the Queen Siren up ahead.
"Y-You utterly despicable underlings of the gods!"
The Queen Siren screamed, shedding tears of blood.
"Ooh, yaaaa....."
".....?"
"Me, actually, maybe doable?"
Was it because his intelligence had dropped?
The sight of the Queen shedding tears and screaming seemed quite 'doable.'
"Big Brother."
"Huh? Why did you call—Heueung!"
Even so, she couldn't compare to Mai!
"...Human, will you indulge me?"
"Huh? Uhhh....woo, yaaaa...."
But it wasn't like a Queen was lacking either...
"Big Brother. Mai must not be forgotten."
".........."
Still, he couldn't give up Mai either—Mm, glb...
"Gwoooeeeek....!!"
The continuous mental attacks made his stomach turn inside out.
A combined assault of Mai's 'Country-Toppling Beauty' and the Queen Siren's 'Charm.'
It seemed like it was meant to make him hold onto his sanity through a kind of 'fighting poison with poison' effect, but
"Urrgh....guuuuugh.....!"
With his already precarious intelligence thrown into total dizziness, there was only one way to solve this.
"Minerva, strike up the band!"
"Ehhh...??"
"Play!"
"Ah, yes!"
Minerva plays!
Hearing his words, she began fervently shredding her electric guitar.
"It was Chrono... right? Would you by any chance have no intention of becoming my husband?"
"Heueut....!"
"Big Brother... you promised you'd embrace Mai when Mai gets bigger!"
"Heueung!—What the fuck is this!"
But for all her fervent shredding, the performance's buff was way too weak.
Why? How come? Earlier Athena had appeared and reinforced it——as if that would happen.
"Come to think of it, I haven't even opened all her exclusive events yet...."
"Chrono?"
He walked toward Minerva.
'The prerequisite was wrong from the start.'
The condition to unlock Minerva's events.
How could he aim for some awakening event without doing the most important one?
He stood in front of Minerva and grabbed her shoulders.
And then.
──Zzkyuuuuuuuung!!!
"Eeep....?!!"
A head-on collision of the lips.
To Minerva, who had dropped the pick in her hand in shock, he declared.
"It's Day 1 starting today?"
"......Hyaaaaa?!!"
Minerva's face flushed bright red.
A brilliant light leaked out from her body.
"Eeeeeeeeeeeek?!!!"
Confession.
Kiss.
Awakening Event.
'Highly successful.'
****************
The Temple of Athena.
Athena gazed upon the human realm beyond the lake and smiled.
[OK! Thank you!]
"It seems it went well."
The sight of him giving up on thinking any further.
Actions driven solely by emotion and intuition, pushing forward.
In Athena's eyes, his figure appeared an exceedingly 'wise' one.
"Chrono, you truly are remarkable. Brave, courageous, capable, and also outstanding."
Wisdom.
The wisdom of the gods.
Because 'wisdom' viewed through divine eyes never meant 'intelligence.'
"But─ you, you think far too much."
One who thinks too much.
One who worries, agonizes, and finally acts at the end of it all is certainly 'wise' in 'human eyes'─ but in truth, to her eyes, it was an utterly ridiculous behavior.
"They say 'look before you leap'... but"
That is only necessary for 'frail people' who fall into danger if they fall into the water, after all.
"One who has no need for a stone bridge need not bother to cross a stone bridge."
That was precisely Greek-style wisdom.
Just as those words said.
In Athena's eyes, Chrono already possessed ample ability to overcome.
He merely couldn't move forward because he thought too much, worried too much, and agonized too much.
But to tell him to advance bravely, to worship blindly— he was already a soul who had been abandoned once.
Ultimately, he could be neither brave through faith, nor ignorant through worship.
So Ultimately, only one path remained.
"Make him unable to think at all."
As a result, Chrono cast aside 'intelligence' and obtained 'wisdom.'
Now all that remained was to watch over the outcome.
And so, what the intelligence-discarded Chrono committed was──
[──Zzkyuuuuuuuung!!!]
"Oh my?"
He was having a lip-crash with her child.