True to his declaration that he would keep Cairens with him, Seianes took him along everywhere.
In the process, there was no room at all for Abrisius to squeeze in.
He felt an invisible gap between them and himself. Somehow feeling excluded, his dissatisfaction only piled up as the days went by.
‘Damn it…’
Today as well, Cairens and Seianes headed outside, chatting away together.
The contaminated land. He couldn’t understand what was so special about that land that the two of them kept going out together alone.
‘If I say I’ll go with them, every single day it’s the same—no, no… They just keep saying no.’
Seianes always gave the same reason, thoroughly excluding Abrisius from this matter.
The reason was that it was dangerous because the power of darkness had seeped deeply into the land due to Ircadeon’s rule over it in the past.
‘I’m from the Dark Divine Race to begin with.’
It was absurd to say that land imbued with the power of darkness was dangerous to someone from the Dark Divine Race.
But he couldn’t bring himself to object to Seianes’s words and could only brood over his feelings of exclusion while watching.
“Caw, cawww—!”
—You look like you’re in a bad mood. Are you okay?
Lily appeared and spoke to him, but he didn’t even have the energy to converse like usual.
—I told you. Just pounce on him. Then Seianes won’t be able to help but look at you.
“…Say something that makes sense.”
Ignoring her absurd suggestion, he closed his eyes.
How many minutes had passed? From behind where Abrisius lay, the voices of Cairens and Seianes could be heard. When he whipped his head around, the sight of the two in harmonious spirits entered his vision, and immediately Abrisius’s brow furrowed.
“You’re following what I taught you better than I expected.”
“You flatter me.”
It had only been about four days since Cairens came to this place.
Seianes was teaching Cairens how to control the Power of the Earth. So that Cairens could handle the power of these four elements—earth, water, land, and fire—just like in the original story. The Power of the Earth that Seianes possessed was the first of these.
Even though he knew it was natural for Cairens to learn this power, he worried that things might proceed according to the flow of the original story.
“You two are just getting back now?”
Pretending to be nonchalant, Abrisius greeted the two.
Only then noticing Abrisius, Seianes smiled brightly.
“Were you waiting, my baby?”
Seianes, who rushed to Abrisius in one bound, hugged him tightly. In Seianes’s warm embrace, Abrisius rubbed his head.
“Mm… A lot. Listen. Today in the Greenhouse Garden, a new flower…”
“Wait a moment, Abrisius. Let’s talk more later.”
But that was only for a moment. Seianes gently separated Abrisius, who had been nestled in his arms.
“Why…?”
“I have something serious to do with Cairens. It seems I’ll need to stay in the contaminated area with him for a while.”
“What?”
At this thunderbolt of news, Abrisius’s expression, which had finally softened, crumpled again.
“What do you mean? Why are you staying with him?”
“For Cairens to build and learn his power, he needs more time and effort. I’m going to stay there for a while and teach Cairens so he can restore the area.”
“…How long will you be there?”
“It’s my duty to help him cultivate his divine power, which is only half-formed, and to help that power grow even greater. To straighten out the flow within Cairens’s body will take at least over a hundred days.”
“That long?”
The thought that those two would have to spend together for longer than expected… He recalled Cairens, whose face had turned slightly red beside Seianes not long ago. And their relationship, which had grown noticeably closer recently… It might just be needless worry, but perhaps Cairens already harbored feelings for Seianes.
‘That can’t happen.’
If that’s the case, it would be better to confess to Seianes from this side instead. Of course, there was no way Seianes would easily accept just because he confessed.
Having directly raised him with his own hands for such a long time, Seianes still treated Abrisius like a child. Of course, recently it seemed he was strangely becoming aware that Abrisius had grown, but that still wasn’t enough.
There was also no guarantee that Seianes clearly saw him as a romantic prospect.
‘But I also hate just sitting around doing nothing like this.’
He hated being treated like a child forever and not being seen as a romantic prospect by Seianes. He had to find it. An opportunity to overcome this situation.
* * *
Inside the contaminated zone.
As he had explained to Abrisius, Seianes thoroughly educated Cairens.
For the match against Ircadeon, Cairens needed much power. The Power of the Earth that Seianes possessed was one of them.
Only by teaching Cairens to master that power could they purify this land together, which bore Ircadeon’s energy.
“You, whom Father chose, must acquire the powers of all four of us siblings, including me. I’ll help you draw out the divine power you possess even more, so do your best.”
Divine power.
The unique power that gods possess.
Demigods naturally had less of that power than gods. However, if it was Cairens, who was born with Henelion’s bloodline and carried the destiny of a hero, the story was different.
Thanks to Henelion’s bloodline, he could master the important powers of water, earth, fire, and sky that constitute the Surface. His lacking skills would naturally be resolved once he completed the tasks that would be presented to him in the future.
And thus, in the end, he would achieve victory in the war against Ircadeon.
Even if he didn’t like Cairens, Seianes intended to do his best for Cairens until that day came.
“The power of Henelion that you possess. That is the source of me and my siblings. Even if it’s only half, because you have Father’s power, you can learn and use the powers of me and my siblings. Thanks to the existence of light, you’ll be able to properly wield the powers of me and my siblings.”
As Seianes said, the siblings were born with the power of light as their foundation.
Because there was light, there could be fire; because there was light, the sky could shine, the earth could sprout life, and water could embrace light.
Those four powers were the children of Henelion, his close associates, and at the same time the most powerful force that could stop Ircadeon.
“Once you awaken everything within and become a true hero, you’ll be able to discard your human flesh and finally be reborn as a true god.”
Earth and sky, fire and sea. The moment he mastered all the powers possessed by these four gods and completed all the tasks they presented.
Cairens would shed the human body his mother bequeathed him and become a complete god.
Something no demigod had ever been able to do until now. Cairens alone would cross the boundary between human and god that no other demigod had been able to surpass.
“What did you say?”
But Cairens, who had never once thought about becoming a god, was rather flustered.
The divine power he had been struggling to gather became greatly scattered due to his agitation. Because of that, the land that had been recovering returned to its contaminated state again, but Cairens was still dazed.
Did I hear that correctly just now? Doubting his ears, he stared blankly at Seianes.
“What are you doing? Hurry up and concentrate.”
“What do you mean I can become a god?”
“Exactly what I said. You, who will seize victory in the war against Ircadeon, will become a god.”
Seianes spoke lightly as if hearing something completely unremarkable. But the expression on Cairens’s face as he heard those words was heavy.
“What would be good about being reborn as a true god?”
Being able to become a god.
That meant overcoming the limitations of being human.
It would be a glorious thing that an ordinary human couldn’t even presume. It might sound attractive to others, but to Cairens, who had denied and hated gods all this time, it was a rather unwelcome proposal.
“I don’t want to become a god.”
In the end, before the God of Earth, Cairens dared to rudely reject that proposal head-on.
That’s supposed to be glorious? What a joke.
To say so casually that he would have to discard this body, the only legacy his mother gave him. He could feel how much he looked down on humans.
That’s why it was even more repulsive.
“Even though my roots come from divine blood, human blood is also included within. And I have never been ashamed of the fact that half of me is human.”
