Chapter 60
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 60
Chapter Title: Apollo and Artemis
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In Greece, anyone born and revering the gods could not help but gaze up in awe at the great mountain of Olympus.
Atop its peaks that soared beyond the heavens themselves stood the city of the mighty gods.
Beginning with the grand temples of Zeus and Hera on the highest summit, there was Hermes' temple of the herald, ceaselessly bustling with herald birds, papyrus scrolls, messengers, and the gods of wind.
Athena's grand library oversaw Olympus's garments, tactics, knowledge, and arts.
Demeter's barley temple was forever filled with the fragrant scent of fresh bread and the hearty aroma of barley.
Aphrodite's rose temple, eternally beautiful with swans and roses, and more besides.
Temples as splendid and beautiful as the divine works of each god themselves, impossible to rank in splendor, always looked down upon the residents of Olympus and the faithful of Greece.
And if one had to pick the most dazzling among them, it would surely be the Sun Temple, forever gleaming radiantly on the eastern side of Olympus.
Ascending the stairs of pure white marble, the first to greet visitors were the blue laurel trees planted in memory of the temple's master's sorrowful love.
As devotees passed them, recalling the heart-wrenching love between the god and the nymph they enshrined, they were welcomed by a temple with pillars and roof of gold and silver, adorned with emeralds and diamonds.
The carvings etched into those pillars meticulously recorded the trials the great master of the temple endured from birth, his triumph over them to slay the giant serpent Python, and the divine task of forever driving the eternal sun chariot.
Passing these, the pilgrims scattered to offer their individual prayers.
Those seeking the god of healing to banish their illnesses would offer white crows before the mournful laurel and pray.
Poets come to beseech the god of music for inspiration would play the instruments they brought under the warm sunlight.
Devotees there to praise and exalt the sun god would kneel before the statue meticulously sculpted in his image, beyond the relief depicting Python's death, and offer their adoration.
And as those praising the sun god looked up in reverence at the statue...
Beyond it could be seen the god's abode, forever filled with brilliant sunlight.
Yet lately, the god's abode beyond the statue had long hidden itself behind closed doors.
The doors that once stood wide open to warmly welcome the sick and poets who came seeking him now remained firmly shut, rejecting visitors. The nymphs and goddesses who frequented the temple just to catch a glimpse of the sun god—the most handsome man in the world—could only heave wistful sighs for their vanished idol.
And so, under the warm sunlight, a somber air lingered in the Sun Temple when a rowdy visitor arrived who belonged to none of the usual sorts.
-Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
The golden doors carved with the image of the beautiful god driving his sun chariot.
No one in the temple dared even touch them, deeming it sacrilege, yet the visitor pounded them violently and bellowed at the top of her lungs.
"Brother! Brother!!"
Under normal circumstances, enraged devotees and nymphs would have driven out the brute together, but at this moment, no guardian of the temple dared to even think of stopping her.
"Open! The! Door! Right! Now!!"
-Bang!
Her fiercely flashing beautiful eyes, her silken black hair tied up to avoid getting in the way.
The hunting garb woven by her mother, the goddess of motherhood Leto, from moonlight threads, and the silver bow—masterwork of Hephaestus—proclaimed who she was.
"Ah, Lady Artemis has come...!"
"Nymphs! Evacuate, quickly!"
"Oh dear~ what's all this commotion!"
The devotees quietly devoted to their god's will scattered in panic at the sudden visit from the moon goddess.
She came to the temple nearly every day to see her brother holed up inside, but today, her mood seemed particularly foul.
The moon huntress, unpredictable even among Olympus's gods, was infamous for her harshness toward outsiders—especially men and married women—who were not her devotees.
Particularly, her ruthless banishment of the pitiful Callisto, who had been forcibly stripped of her purity by Zeus, and her indifference to the curse from Queen Hera that turned her into a bear, was enough to instill fear even in Olympus's residents.
Especially when Artemis was raging like that, head to toe in fury—anyone even slightly in her way might as well be dead.
The sun god's devotees, quietly guarding the doors, could only pray for their secluded god's well-being and flee.
"Won't open the door?!"
With the devotees scattered, Artemis alone before the massive doors ground her teeth in fury.
But there was something the hastily fleeing devotees had failed to notice.
The bright red handprint etched on her otherwise pure and beautiful face, reminiscent of the moon in the sky.
Her pristine white hunting garb, dirtied and disheveled as if she'd been rolling on the ground.
Her silver bow and arrows dangling broken in two from her quiver.
If her huntresses or other residents had seen her state, they would have been aghast.
Her eyes, streaming with tears of rage and humiliation, would have torn at anyone's heart.
But that proud huntress surely would not have forgiven any who glimpsed her disgrace.
The swift response and flight of Olympus's residents could only be called wise.
"Ugh... Broooother...! Doooor...!!"
Artemis, desperately seeking her brother and whatever had happened to her, was on the verge of bursting into sobs.
As if hearing her cries, the massive golden doors silently swung open, and accompanied by warm sunlight, the brother she'd so longed for rushed out to greet her.
"Artemis! My sister!"
"Wah...! Broooother!!"
Whatever grudge gripped her so fiercely, Artemis threw herself into her brother's arms and burst into tears.
"Sister, what on earth happened? What's wrong with your face?!"
"Waaah! Broooother!!"
Unable to speak properly, sobbing uncontrollably in his arms, her face tore at Apollo's heart.
How dare anyone leave such wretched wounds on Zeus's daughter, his sister, one of the Twelve Olympians?
"Come inside first. Let's tend to your wounds right away."
"Hic..."
"Here, blow!"
"Hmph!"
Personally wiping her nose with his robe hem, Apollo led her to the treatment room in his abode and began examining her injuries.
"That must have hurt terribly. You should have come straight to me. Why scare the devotees out front?"
"B-but..."
He wiped her swollen face with golden ointment blended from ambrosia and herbs.
Apollo's special elixir that healed any wound with a mere swipe.
Yet even after applying it three times with utmost care, invoking even his healing powers...
The bright red mark on his sister's beautiful face showed no sign of fading.
At that sight, Apollo's face stiffened.
"No way, sister... Did you clash with Lady Hera?"
How many existed who could strike the moon goddess Artemis and even shatter her divine artifact?
"Eek!"
His guess hit the mark; the sniffling Artemis jolted and froze stiff.
"Sigh... Why did you do that..."
The queen, guardian of marriage and family, the mightiest goddess.
Former earth mother goddess and protector of ancient mysteries, she had yielded all those divine roles to Demeter and Hecate, yet remained a great witch commanding powerful ancient beasts. A goddess of immense divine power befitting the queen of the gods.
When Zeus's philandering peaked her fury into winter wrath, even Apollo driving the sun chariot needed thick furs against the biting cold that blanketed Greece.
Given the siblings' origins, they owed gratitude that Her Majesty even allowed them thrones on Olympus.
True, the two had suffered persecution from Hera alongside their mother Leto since birth.
But they were bastards born of Zeus disregarding the queen's domain, and Zeus's decision to elevate them to major gods in recognition of their feats had passed only by her mercy.
"What exactly happened?"
"It was... Waaah!!"
Apollo and Artemis had always taken care to avoid clashing with the queen who once persecuted them.
Apollo couldn't fathom what had driven Artemis to suffer such humiliation from her.
Sighing deeply at his sister breaking into tears again, Apollo hurried off somewhere, gathered various things, and personally tended to her.
"Calm down first and drink this, sister. It'll warm you up."
He personally brewed calming herbs into warm nectar and draped a blanket infused with gentle warmth over her shoulders.
Sipping the steaming nectar, Artemis stared at the ground for a long while with her puffy eyes.
Gazing patiently at her brother, she finally spoke.
"It was..."
A few hours earlier.
Her huntresses brought shocking news.
Atalanta, her most cherished huntress in the forest of heroes, had fallen in love, of all things.
For a devotee saved by her, who swore lifelong chastity in her name, to betray her and take a lover...
The forest nymphs said it happened passionately in front of everyone on a bright morning when brother Apollo began driving his chariot—with kisses, no less.
Rumors of Hera blessing them or personally adorning Atalanta were beneath her notice.
The betrayer deserved a punishment so cruel that death would seem merciful. The fact that her lover was that loathsome Dianes of Passos, who'd marked her shoulder, and that they were in Chiron's sanctuary—she'd forgotten it all in her rage.
"Artemis."
Just as her chariot neared Messenia by the forest of heroes.
From the peak of high Taygetus guarding Messenia's border, a noble voice called to her.
"Y-your Majesty?"
Hera sat on the mountaintop, a chilling smile like midwinter's north wind, beckoning her closer.
Of all people, the goddess she feared most had suddenly blocked her path.
"It's not even evening yet—what's this about? Bringing moonlight along, no less."
"..."
"My throat's parched. You don't intend to chat from your chariot, do you?"
Do you dare make me look up at you to talk?
Her low threat made it clear Hera wouldn't let her pass easily.
But Artemis had no time for this.
She needed to punish the traitor who betrayed her as quickly as possible—and the black-haired wretch who'd humiliated her and stolen her huntress to boot.
"I-I'm busy right now! I have to go!"
As she whipped the reins to flee...
"...When did Olympus's hierarchy become such a mess?"
At the queen's voice laced with quiet fury, just as Artemis tried to escape...
Vast power gathered above her head, striking her and her chariot with tremendous force.
-Boom!
"Kyaa?!"
Artemis plummeted chariot and all, stunned by the impact wracking her body.
Pinned screaming under the overturned chariot, before she could question what happened, a pale hand yanked her from the wreckage.
"Guh... Agh?!"
When she came to and opened her eyes...
The queen of the gods held her by the collar with one hand, dangling her in midair.
"Have you truly gone mad? Daring to look down at me from your chariot?"
Staring into her divine power-blazing eyes and bound by her immense might, Artemis's mind snapped alert.
She'd momentarily forgotten, roaming Greece's forests more than Olympus.
Why the queen was called queen.
Why Hera was the goddess of goddesses.