Chapter 20: Adventure Prep

When we had returned to the villa I'd been worried that the sleeping arrangements would get complicated, given that we suddenly had to find a bed for Athena, but in the end it was much easier than expected. I simply slept in Alisha's room, spooning with her, while Athena took my room.

Of course, Alisha had still been moon-drunk at the time so I'd had to satisfy her one last time before she let me go to sleep, not that that was something I had an issue with.

The next morning my little elf was back to her normal self and was already making breakfast by the time I got up. I walked past my room on the way down the stairs and saw Athena sitting on my bed, staring at the decorations I'd hung up, mostly trophies from my travels. The look on her face was... odd. She seemed... sad? Or maybe regretful was the better word for it.

Yeah, that made sense. She was clearly upset that I had gotten as far as I had even though neither her nor any other gods had chosen me.

I could have just walked past the room but something made me pause and ask: “See anything you like?”

She startled, so deep in thought that she hadn't even noticed me. “I...” She paused. “Yes. It's just... we tend to forget that there's more to quests than just results. There's also fights and danger and glory.”

“You better remember it," I said. “We're going to need your assistance if we're to have any chance of surviving this quest.”

“Of course," she said. “You can count on me, as I will count on you.”

I nodded. “Come downstairs, Alisha is making breakfast.”

She nodded and got up.

**

Breakfast here at home was a far cry from what we got while out adventuring. While Alisha was an incredible cook and could whip up a wonderful breakfast even on the move she of course did way better when she actually had a proper kitchen to work in and didn't have to ration quite so much.

And considering that we'd be leaving on an adventure tomorrow Alisha had created a small feast for breakfast. Scrambled eggs, smoked Tiphereth meat, sausages, bread fresh from the bakery two blocks away, some grilled tomatoes and, of course, two plates full of sliced fruit. There had to be two of those because Alisha would polish off one of them on her own.

As Athena and I made our way down the stairs I saw Alisha giving me a sly smile as her gaze flicked back and forth between the goddess and me.

In response I raised an eyebrow, unsure what she was on about.

I had expected Athena to object when Alisha dedicated the breakfast to Brigid but she didn't say a word about it.

As always, Alisha waited just a bit too long after finishing her prayer, just to get everyone nice and hungry, before she said: “Dig in!”

“Thank you for the food," Athena said softly as she began loading up her plate with some of everything.

“You don't have to pretend to like it," I said. “I know we don't serve ambrosia here.”

“Fuck you, Tailor," she hissed before she started to eat. Even that seemed to be a deliberate insult as she picked out a sausage and carved into it while staring me dead in the eyes.

“So how exactly will this work?" Selene asked. “Can you just travel to these Elysian Fields like it's a normal place?”

I was once again reminded that, aside from maybe Anna, I was the only one of our little group with knowledge of how the Olympians worked. “As I understand it the underworld is mostly just a normal place, just, you know, underground. Hades rules over three parts. One is named after him and that's where normal people who died will go. The second is called Tartarus. That's the place where the Titans are locked up and where he tortures particularly heinous dead people. And then there's the Elysian Fields, a little paradise for those who died as Heroes.” I looked over at Athena. “Or at least that's what I was taught.”

“It's accurate enough," the goddess said. “There are no clear divisions between the living and the dead in the underworld but the dead do try to keep to themselves. Only those on the Elysian Fields," she paused and looked over at Alisha, Selene and Yume, “or those in equivalent afterlives, can interact normally with both the living and the dead. The normal shades of Hades can barely even touch the living so they have little reason to mingle with them.”

“But those who have earned a place in an afterlife for Heroes can?" Alisha asked.

“Yes," Athena said. “There are faiths that worship their forebears as minor deities and in many ways that is a correct assessment. The Heroes on the Elysian Fields are closer in nature to gods than humans. Some of them even become gods, like Hercules. If they are killed they just reappear in the place that sustains them, they get stronger as they are worshiped and they can interact with both the living and the dead. That's what makes them such a tremendously powerful force.”

“Then why aren't people constantly asking them for help?" Alisha asked.

Athena nodded. “First of all, you need to get into the reaches of the underworld controlled by Hades, which means fighting your way through whatever trial he deems fitting, then you need to ask him for permission to let you visit the Elysian Fields and then, and this is the reason we aren't employing their help all the time, you need to actually convince them to help. They aren't some sort of mercenary company. They are the greatest Heroes this world has ever seen and all of them are proud personalities, all of them larger than life.”

“And I suppose convincing them to help will fall to us?" I asked.

Athena blushed. “Likely. Most of them have little respect for the gods left.”

“Gosh," I said. “I can't imagine why people who spent most of their lives being pushed around by the gods wouldn't want to keep doing the same in death.”

“Fuck y—" Athena began, then stopped herself and said: “You're not wrong. Anyway, what they do respect is other Heroes and, and it physically pains me to admit this, there are probably no greater heroes in this generation than the ones at this table.”

I grinned so wide it felt like it would split my face any moment but before I could say anything Athena preempted me:

“But that doesn't change the fact that you are an ass, Tailor.”

Just kiss already, Syr muttered in my head.

**

After that we started preparing for our trip to the underworld. A layman might assume that the underworld was similar to a big dungeon but that was utterly false and in truth it had nothing to do with a dungeon.

First of all, while both had entrances that led down into the earth, dungeons were either self-contained spaces that connected to nothing except their one dungeon entrance or they were true pocket dimensions that didn't actually occupy any space within the real world. The underworld, meanwhile, was very much a real place, located right beneath our feet.

Second of all, while dungeons had a modicum of safety thanks to their rest spots, campfire sites that warded off monsters and warned of others approaching with malicious intent, there was no such thing in the underworld. That meant sleeping in shifts and constantly being on our guard.

Third, while dungeons were full of things that wanted intruders dead, the underworld was more like the surface world, with both monsters and just normal people living normal lives. In fact, after going through the map together Athena and I determined that our journey would take us through a large village we would be able to rest in.

However, despite these differences there were also a few similarities between them, namely that monsters underground were rumored to be much tougher and much more lucrative than those above ground and the underworld held many materials that were considered rare and valuable up here, same as dungeons. As an example, the silver honey we'd bought in Shackled Hollow way back when was so expensive precisely because it was usually only available from the underworld. In fact, the ecosystem underneath Shackled Hollow likely was part of the underworld, laid bare by the unusual condition the floating village provided.

I had known about the underworld but I'd never had occasion to visit and I suddenly felt bad about it. Did they, too, suffer from Dark Lord attacks or was that something only us surface dwellers had to worry about?

I shook the thought off. We had a journey to prepare for.

The first thing we did was go buy supplies. And by 'we' I mean my women and me. Athena was still paranoid about people being after her so she stayed back at the villa. Personally I thought she was being a bit dramatic about it. If the Holy Maiden had overrun Olympus she probably had no forces to spare for any other operations, least of all catching a goddess she had no means of locating, but I couldn't bring myself to be too upset with Athena about that.

The army that had taken over Olympus had included goblins and I had a pretty good idea of what goblins would do to female prisoners. I fucking hated Athena but even so I didn't hate her enough to want some dirty goblins to turn her into their plaything. The same held true for the other goddesses too, of course. I shuddered at the thought of the virgin goddess Artemis being defiled by those little green shits.

I shook my head to clear it. The last thing I wanted was to start feeling sympathy for fucking Athena and her peers. This whole quest was messing with my head. I was forced to spend time with my old nemesis and I couldn't even lay into her properly because we were on the same team for once.

I decided to focus on our shopping to take my mind off it. We had quite a few things to procure, after all.

The first item on my list was a way to illuminate our surroundings. The glowstone the receptionist had used had been a good inspiration but given that of our party only two, possibly three if Athena deigned to help, people could use magic at all we needed something else. There was another type of glowstone that didn't require a mage to constantly channel mana into them and that would instead draw in ambient mana whenever it wasn't being used. They were much more expensive but the convenience that anyone could use them made the increased price more than worth it so I made sure to buy a dozen.

Despite popular belief the underworld wasn't entirely dark. In fact large parts of it were allegedly bright enough not to require any sort of light source, but the first leg of the journey, the descent into the underworld, went through a pitch black system of tunnels hewn into the earth, right alongside the river that sprang up to the surface at the site of the well.

Speaking of, I also bought a new map, far better than the rather rudimentary one we'd used to plot out our route. I wasn't going to rely on whatever weird power Athena used to just know things.

The next item on my list was a couple fishing rods. As I said, the first leg of our journey down the well was going to lead us through dark tunnels running parallel to one of the tributaries of the Styx and since I didn't relish the idea of subsisting on whatever monsters we might run into in those tunnels I wanted a way to fish up some proper food. I was all but certain that whatever fish were to be found in one of the rivers of the underworld were going to look fucking horrifying but that didn't mean they wouldn't be edible. A lot of fish were like that. Monkfish for example looked like something that had come crawling out of Echidna's rancid cunt but they were delicious anyway.

After that came perhaps the most important part: Spending money. Not only were we likely going to find a ton of valuable and rare ingredients for dirt cheap down in the underworld, we also needed coin to pay the fare to reach Hades' part of the underworld. The only way to get there was to let Charon ferry us over the main body of the Styx and he was pretty strict about his price. Two mun per person. No more, no less. For those who worshiped the Olympians it was normal to place two mun over their eyes as part of the burial rites just to make sure they'd have the travel fare once they made it down there.

Next I bought another couple bottles of sleeping drops. As I said, we were going to have to sleep in shifts once more and sleeping drops made that much more convenient. They used to be too expensive to use frivolously but these days I was a lot more loaded and could afford a lot of minor conveniences I'd abstained from before. Not just because I no longer had to be a mun-pinching asshole but also because I had people I loved to care for.

**

Eventually we had everything we needed and came back to the villa to find Athena in the garden, channeling mana into the mystic fruit trees.

“What are you doing?" I asked from right behind her.

She damn near jumped out of her skin. When she had herself under control again she said: “You scared me.”

If it had been anyone else I would have apologized. Instead I just said: “I thought you were too scared to leave the house.”

She looked sheepish. “I was. But then I realized how useless I was being and so I decided to channel mana into the plants. The priestess and the witch won't really be able to once we leave.”

“They have names," I said flatly.

“Sorry," she said, surprising me. If I recalled correctly she'd never apologized to me for anything. “I'm really not used to referring to mortals by name," she admitted, then corrected: “Alisha and Yume won't be able to channel into these plants once we leave so I decided to do it for them since there wasn't anything else I could do.”

I nodded. “Thanks. I didn't really want them to exhaust themselves before we leave.”

She shrugged. “These are some very valuable plants. Where did you find them?”

I frowned. “In the Crystal Crown's dungeon. Don't you know that?”

Now it was her turn to frown. “How would I?”

“You're the one who warned me of something we encountered down there," I said.

She kept frowning, but then blinked. “Oh, so that's what that was? No, I saw a pivotal point in your future, of you almost dying thanks to tulip monsters. What was that about, anyway?”

And so I told her exactly what had happened in that fight. She seemed horrified by what we'd seen.

“Do you think they can put these grafts onto any living being?" she finally asked.

“I'm not..." I started but then realized what she was saying. “You're worried they'll try to do this to your kin, aren't you?”

“Yes," Athena said. “Just the thought of that happening to one of them... It's not just vile, we'd also be in deep trouble if they can corrupt the gods.”

“I don't think they can," I said.

“Why not?”

“They were able to turn mindless dungeon monsters but even corrupting a dungeon boss took them significant effort. We have reason to believe that the cultist they grafted onto the boss wasn't just a random flunky but someone actually powerful. And even he had a hard time subjugating the boss entirely. And that was just a dungeon boss. A thinking, feeling being would be even harder. And a god? I don't think that would work. Maybe they could corrupt a god's body, but even then I'm sure killing that god would get rid of the influence.” I paused. “Unless, of course, they let themselves be corrupted.”

“I don't think any of my kin would do something like that," Athena paused, then frowned. “Hopefully.”

I gave her a rueful smirk.

“So, who do you think is the traitor?" she asked.

“Yume hopes it's Ares," I hedged.

“Is that what you think?" she asked.

“It wouldn't make much sense," I said. “He was the one who sent a Chosen One against that Dark Lord of Shub-Niggurath, wasn't he?”

“That's a good point," she said.

“Personally I wouldn't be shocked if it was Demeter," I said.

“She is unhinged enough," Athena agreed, “but I don't think she'd be willing to bow to another fertility goddess.”

“That's true," I said. “I suppose we'll find out when we make it there.”

“When, not if?" Athena asked. “I never took you for an optimist.”

“After everything we've overcome during our stay in the Crystal Crown's dungeon I am pretty confident we'll make it through the underworld. It's what comes after that worries me.”

“If everything goes to plan we'll have back-up for that part," Athena reminded me.

“It's not the army that worries me," I said. “It's who else might be there. We have no idea how powerful the Holy Maiden is but considering she's powerful enough to empower a Dark Lord she has to be pretty strong. Then there's whatever god is working with her, Wilhelm, and who knows what else.”

“If you put it that way it's beginning to sound like a fool's errand," she said worriedly.

“It's not all bad," I said. “The only way I see this working is if we manage to sneak our way into the realm. Every god we manage to free is another huge ally we can use against them.”

“I... hadn't considered that," she said. “It's like I can barely keep my thoughts straight since this happened.”

“I don't blame you for being out of it," I said. “This is completely beyond the pale. Nobody could have expected that.” The moment I'd said it I wanted to kick myself. Here I was, having sympathy for Athena of all people.

“Y-yeah," she said, clearly as shocked at what I'd said as I was. “Th-thank you.”

I averted my gaze and saw Alisha standing on the terrace, grinning at me as she waggled her eyebrows. What was up with those reactions of hers lately?

**

Dinner was an even bigger feast than what we'd had the night before, Alisha desperate to use as many perishable goods as she could before we had to leave once more. In the end we still had to leave a note for Anna's maid, telling her to take the meat from the ice box for herself before it went bad.

After dinner I made it quite clear to Athena that we were going to enjoy our last night in our own bed for quite some time and she didn't comment on it, but at least when we went upstairs she stayed on the ground floor, reading by candlelight.

We made the best of the night, knowing that we wouldn't be back here for at least a few weeks and also knowing that what lay ahead of us would be the hardest challenge we'd ever had. I made sure to give each of the girls as much as I could and we all ended up using sleeping drops so we would have to spend less time sleeping to feel rested.

The next morning I knew we'd been quite loud because Athena couldn't even look at us without blushing but I couldn't make myself care. Although I had to admit that I was getting kind of used to seeing my nemesis blushing, as weird as it was.

After breakfast we finally began our journey. We ended up using the caravan network to travel straight east, which was another awkward leg of the journey as we were forced to spend most of a week cramped into a caravan wagon with one of the Olympians, but at least the route included three inns we were able to stay at and bathe in, which kept us from getting too rank on the trip.

The trip in the caravan had been rather uneventful. At this point we were all strong enough that most normal dangers barely even registered as a threat so when the caravan got waylaid by a group of bandits it took Alisha no more than two waves of her hand to make them all fall unconscious by pulling the air out of their lungs. The rest of us hadn't even bothered to leave the wagon. Well, except for Athena who had been worried about Alisha but had then stared at the little elven cleric in awe once she'd seen her in action.

Finally, after a week on the road, we made it to the village of Tenarus. It had apparently once been a rather quaint village that had just happened to be built next to a well leading down to the underworld, except with all the riches that adventurers and merchants dragged up from the underworld Tenarus had become a huge hub of trade and travel. Anything we'd bought last week to help us travel through the underworld could be found here as well, though at a significant mark-up. Despite this I was surprised to find that there weren't many people braving the descent into the underworld. Apparently some of the people who had gone down there had neither returned nor arrived at their destination. It immediately made me suspicious, but realistically speaking it was very unlikely that this was connected to our current situation.

Even if the Holy Maiden knew that Athena had escaped and had found people to help her take back Olympus and even if she had the manpower to go looking for her there was no way she could have predicted that Athena would want to ask help from the Heroes of Elysium and stationed her troops there weeks before we showed up. So I took it as a coincidence but decided to be extra cautious once we descended into the underworld.

We spent one last night in Tenarus, renting rooms at the cheapest inn in town, which was still asking absolutely extortionate prices, before we finally decided to enter the cave entrance that would lead us down into the underworld.