Chapter 18
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 18
Chapter Title: Messenger of the Gods and Teacher of Heroes
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Chiron had personally brought him along, and Zeus and Apollo had stepped forward to issue an oracle. Dianes was that much of a person of interest right now.
Hermes had heard the rumors and grown curious, so he poked around here and there. Surprisingly, quite a few gods on Olympus held favorable views of Dianes.
"The island of Pasos where that child grew up has long worshipped not only Father but also Poseidon and Ares my brother."
The beautiful island of Pasos in the northern Aegean prayed to Poseidon for safe voyages for its fishermen and sailors.
And it offered prayers to Ares for the courage to fend off countless pirates and invasions from other kingdoms.
So Hermes had first asked those two if they knew of the child named Dianes from Pasos—and gotten some truly unexpected reactions.
"The first one I visited was Poseidon. When I casually asked if he knew about Pasos's Dianes, he went on and on praising him, saying there's no one else like that kid in the world... He was practically ready to adopt him as a son."
Poseidon, god of the vast oceans.
The master of the Aegean that enveloped Pasos—Hermes had made him his first investigative target, wondering if he knew something.
When Hermes casually brought up Pasos's Dianes, Poseidon couldn't stop raving about the boy's martial prowess and his reverent devotion to the gods.
"He often performs sword dances and spear dances by the seaside among the nymphs and dedicates them to Poseidon. And those dances are so graceful and beautiful that Poseidon even said he wants to invite him to his deep-sea palace someday and pour him wine himself.
Every time he offers a sword dance, Poseidon is so pleased that he sends gifts of fish or relics, and he's protected the Nereid nymph who's to be the boy's companion so no one dares harm her."
Even more, the boy dedicated all those fish and relics he'd received to Zeus's temple, so Zeus inwardly envied him for gaining such a promising and pious follower.
No need to say how proud the dark-bearded sea god must have felt.
"Hoo... Spear skills impressive enough to earn Poseidon's admiration..."
Chiron, who had personally crossed spears with him, nodded as if to say it was certainly deserving.
Spear techniques fluid as the wind itself. Dedicated to the god who wields the spear—how could that god not feel gratified?
And the boy hadn't hoarded the gifts from the god for himself but humbly offered them to the supreme god, expressing thanks to all the gods once more.
For the rough god of the seas, how gratifying and heartwarming must such a young, promising devotee be?
"And next was Ares my brother. Zeus help me, it was the first time I've seen that brother of mine so delighted over a human hero."
Ares, the god of war—rough and crude beyond all on Olympus.
With his fiery temper, he caused endless incidents even among the Olympians.
For him to be delighted?
"What happened?"
The image that naturally sprang to mind at the thought of battle-mad Ares being delighted was...
Dianes laughing atop piles of savage corpses.
Dianes dancing over bodies while wearing wolf and hyena pelts stained with blood.
And so on. For that Ares to be delighted—well, it was a natural assumption in a way, but fortunately Hermes shook his head firmly.
"He reportedly hunted fierce beasts like wild boars and bears in brutal solo fights and offered them unstintingly to my brother's temple.
Not only that, but he composed a poem praising my brother in person and placed it on the altar. Brother was so moved that, right in front of the other priests, he sent his sacred fire first to accept it.
He even carries that poem tucked in his bosom and shows it off. That Ares!"
Thankfully, it wasn't the blood-soaked mad scene Chiron had imagined.
A poem and offering moving even Ares—what must it have been like to earn such emotion from him?
Chiron suddenly felt curious.
"Hoo, does the boy have a talent for poetry as well?"
"Yes, it was a poem in an unusually unique style—concise yet rhythmically superb, with distinctive and outstanding expressions. Even Athena was quite envious."
Thanks to that, Ares had elevated his reputation from mere brute warmonger to a god of war versed in both letters and arms, and he even felt grateful to that young boy.
"Phew. That's a relief."
At the news that their new hero was accomplished in both letters and arms and beloved by the gods, Chiron felt both admiration and relief.
How many heroes had met tragic ends due to their own hubris earning the gods' ire?
Even Heracles was a constant worry with his arrogance and birth. But Dianes revered the gods without such flaws and honed himself diligently.
"And next... Surprisingly, Father thinks very highly of that boy Dianes too."
"Zeus... you mean?"
Even as he received the dream oracle and brought Dianes from the forest, Chiron had constantly worried that Zeus might not look kindly on the boy.
As the one who had granted the great hero of the prophesied Gigantomachia and the bud of a hero to rival him, what if he saw it as a thorn in his side?
Hermes's report left Chiron unable to hide his surprise.
"Exactly. After hearing from Poseidon and Ares my brother, I was wondering where to go next.
Then Father's eagle came and led me straight to him."
The highest peak of Olympus.
Gazing down upon all of Greece from there, Zeus spoke softly to Hermes, who had come at his summons, of Dianes—of the offerings and poem dedicated to him, precisely.
"Let me see. Father recited it to me with endless admiration, insisting I read it too... Here it is!"
Hermes thrust his arm into the pouch at his waist, rummaged around, and pulled out a parchment inscribed with the poem, handing it to Chiron.
"I read it too, and whew. If this kid grows up, the Twelve Olympians will fight over who gets to bring him to their temple."
"That good?"
As Chiron carefully unrolled the parchment Hermes handed him, he marveled once at the fact that supreme god Zeus had admired it so, and twice at Hermes praising the poem so highly.
And the third time, upon reading the poem on the parchment in full. He marveled a third time.
"Heh... A masterpiece. And praising the lord god in this manner..."
Honestly, it was debatable whether to even call it a proper dedicatory poem.
It didn't follow the standard format of temple odes, and the rhythm was quite foreign.
Yet the content was perfectly suited to move Zeus's heart.
"Seated upon the lofty throne, yet you embrace the child abandoned by mother and forgotten by father.
Golden throne sullied by muddy feet, white divine robes stained by grubby hands—yet you but cherish and smile,
Thus becoming the eternal Father.
Receive our reverence, our Father.
Ruler over all, yet for your beloved consort, you merely smile at the insults of goddesses and false names.
You bless the illegitimate child as your own flesh and blood, love even her divine duty, and endure the mockery in her stead—
Thus becoming sacred love itself.
Receive our worship, love of all."
Hermes softly recited the poem as if from memory, and it must have surely moved Zeus's heart.
Zeus, slandered by Hera over Heracles and lacking dignity among the Greeks due to his philandering.
If an orphan from his own temple offered such a poem and gifts, he must have been deeply touched.
"Even Hera, upon receiving this, asked me.
Whether Father raising orphans in his temple and declaring them his children was for reasons like this."
Thanks to that, Zeus and Hera's marital temple—which he'd quietly checked after today's council—was truly peaceful for the first time in ages.
"I see. I hadn't thought deeply about it, but... Orphans born of affairs or illegitimacy are, in a way, those who negate Lady Hera's divine duty."
"For Father to embrace and protect all such orphans as his own children, even enduring the mockery—that profound love for his wife Hera!
Argh, how does such a young child think so deeply! Thanks to him, Iris and I—who were dying caught between those two—finally caught a breath."
Hermes hammed it up exaggeratedly, but his claim of catching a breath was probably sincere.
When Zeus and Hera clashed, it was always their messengers—Zeus's Hermes and Hera's Iris—who suffered in between.
Chiron had often listened to their complaints deep into the night on such occasions.
He understood their feelings all too well.
"In any case, overall, Olympus's opinion is largely very favorable toward our new hero."
Hermes concluded with a bright smile, and Chiron nodded back.
But the information he truly wanted hadn't emerged.
"...You couldn't find out about his origins?"
"Urgh... Shamefully, yes."
Hermes, who traversed the world in a day with no tale unknown to him.
Even he drew a blank on Dianes's birth, his face hardening.
"I visited everyone with a similar aura to the boy, plus gods, spirits, and even heteromorphs who'd been to Pasos in the last decade. They all shook their heads.
No one was lying."
"Th-that much effort... You must have had it rough."
"No, I was curious myself, so don't worry about it."
Hermes waved it off, but he truly seemed baffled by the utter lack of leads.
For him to react this way meant there were really no clues at all.
In that case... Perhaps?
"Uh, Lord Chiron?"
"Yes?"
Hermes, looking a bit awkward as he ran a hand through his hair in the air, gazed at him with concern.
"This might sound silly, but with Father paying such close attention.
The boy might be involved with even greater beings than we think."
"Greater beings?"
"Shh! Be careful. Those ones exist yet do not exist.
Even Father Zeus reveres and fears them."
Those whom supreme god Zeus feared and whom Hermes wouldn't name.
There was only one such group.
The primordial gods—the sky and earth, death and darkness incarnate.
Dianes related to them?
"No way... Surely not..."
Then Dianes was more than a mere human hero.
He hadn't manifested divinity or received a divine mantle yet, but if he truly was their child...
The whole world might turn upside down.
"It's just a guess for now... Please keep it as just a guess, Lord Chiron."
"A-ah, I understand."
"Who knows. Like the boy said, maybe he's from the Hyperboreans beyond Olympus."
To ease the frozen atmosphere, Hermes cracked a joke, and Chiron reluctantly played along with a nod.
"Well then... I'm off! Hades sent word that the Charon shore is packed again."
"Oh? Won't you see your sons before you go?"
"Haha, Father's been scolding me for visiting too much—'Aren't you busy?' So, farewell!"
-Hahaha!
Leaving only cheerful laughter behind, Hermes vanished in an instant far away.
"...Phew. What a mess."
Hermes gone like the wind, Chiron could only stroke his beard in complicated thoughts over the suspicions he'd left behind.