The rhythmic tolling of the clock tower rippled through the morning mist, a resonant heartbeat that signaled the awakening of Orario.
It had been two days since the Ganesha Familia's exuberant celebration of the gods, and the city was already vibrating with a renewed, frantic energy.
Draco's eyes snapped open.
His pupils, slit like those of a predator, dilated as the first shards of golden sunlight pierced the heavy velvet curtains and struck his face.
It was barely past six in the morning, a time when most of the world remained swaddled in dreams, yet the city was never truly silent.
The distant rumble of carts and the faint calls of merchants echoed from the streets below, a low-frequency hum that signaled the start of another day of ambition and peril.
With a heavy, lung-expanding yawn that threatened to unhinge his jaw, Draco stretched.
His muscles, dense and coiled like steel cables, popped and groaned as he shook off the lethargy of sleep.
He shifted his gaze to the side, where his goddess remained deeply entrenched in her slumber. Bahamut was a picture of serenity, her face pressed firmly into the plush pillow, yet her physical state told a different story.
At some point during the night, her arms locked around Draco's left limb in a subconscious vice grip.
Her petite frame masked a strength that had nearly dislocated his shoulder in her sleep.
He looked at his arm, noting the faint bruise of the skin where she had clung to him.
If anyone less resilient had been in his place, they would have been reduced to a pulverized mess by dawn.
Shaking the macabre image of "meat toothpaste" from his mind, Draco leaned over.
He pressed a soft, lingering kiss to the crown of her head, careful not to stir her from her peaceful oblivion.
It had been around six days since his return to the city.
While the respite had been necessary to resettle, the itch of productivity was beginning to gnaw at him.
It was time to cease his idling and return to working.
He was a creator as much as a warrior, and the half-finished grimoires in his study were calling to him.
However, the morning demanded a sequence of errands.
His first priority was a visit to Rose at the Guild.
It was a task he had neglected for two days, distracted by the simple pleasure of Bahamut's company.
Following that, his itinerary led to the Ganesha Familia's estate.
Today marked the commencement of Monsterphilia, the grand festival of taming and spectacle. He had promised to accompany Bahamut and Aasterinian to the stadium around noon to witness the opening ceremonies.
The evening held its own weight.
He intended to seek out Tsubaki and Hephaestus, perhaps to finally make use of the one-eyed black dragon scales.
Only after those obligations were met would he allow himself to dive back into the complex, soul-tiring work of the grimoire he had begun two nights ago.
As for the Dungeon, it remained a distant thought.
As the only member of the Bahamut Familia currently on the surface, a solo dive was impractical.
The rest of the familia's members were still deep within the earth on a protracted expedition.
To gain any meaningful excelia…..the amount required to push his status and break the threshold to Level 8....he would need to descend into the Deep Floors.
Such a journey would take weeks of isolation and constant combat.
So he decided to wait for his comrades to return before launching his own solo campaign into the abyss.
Draco quietly exited the goddess's chambers and entered his own.
He stripped and stepped into a cold shower, the freezing needles of water finalising the transition from rest to readiness.
Once dressed in clean, functional attire.....he descended to the ground floor.
The manor was already filled with the mouth-watering scent of sizzling fat and toasted grains. Aasterinian had already taken command of the kitchen, her movements fluid as she prepared breakfast in portions that could feed a small army.
Draco ate quickly but appreciatively, the fuel settling well in his stomach.
With a nod to the goddess, he made his way to the front gate.
His departure was momentarily halted.
Standing just beyond the wrought-iron gates was a figure Draco didn't recognize.
The man was dressed in high-quality livery, though his posture was stiff, radiating a sense of unease.
"Hey there," Draco called out, his voice a low, melodic rumble.
The messenger flinched, his eyes wide as if he were staring down an apex predator.
He took a stuttering breath, composed himself with visible effort, and thrust an arm through the gaps in the gate.
He held a thick, cream-colored envelope sealed with heavy wax.
Draco took the missive, his brow furrowing as his fingers brushed the seal.
Before a single question could be uttered, the messenger turned on his heel and sprinted away, disappearing into the morning crowd with desperate haste.
Draco looked down at the wax seal.
His expression darkened.
It was the crest of the Freya Familia….
"What is that woman playing at now?" he mused silently.
He broke the seal and scanned the elegant, flowing script within.
A dry chuckle escaped his throat.
The letter wasn't addressed to him at all; it was an informal invitation for Bahamut, requesting her presence for morning tea with the Goddess of Beauty.
In the high-stakes political theater of the gods, "tea" was rarely just tea.
"Well, that's her headache, not mine," Draco muttered.
He resealed the envelope as best he could and returned to the kitchen.
He scribbled a quick note for Bahamut, explaining the delivery and its origin, and left both items on the counter where she couldn't miss them.
Stepping out into the crisp morning air, Draco straightened his collar.
The path to the Guild was already teeming with life, the city bracing itself for the chaos of the festival.
He blended into the flow of the crowd, moving toward the center of the world.
.........
Around the same time, in the Hephaestus Familia's main shop, a deeply irritated red-haired goddess was sitting behind a desk.
The rhythmic, almost imperceptible tap-tap-tap of her feather pen against parchment usually brought her a sense of calm, a hum of productivity.
Not today.
Today, the only thing humming was the furious buzz in her mind.
Hephaestus, dressed in her familia's practical yet elegant uniform, had enough.
Her frustration, a volcanic heat simmering just beneath her usually composed surface, threatened to erupt.
It poured into every syllable of her internal monologue, every furrow of her brow.
The source of her annoyance wasn't a faulty hammer or a tricky forge temperature, but a small, persistent lump on the other side of her desk…..a goddess on her hands and knees with her face pressed onto the floor.
It was none other than Hestia.
They were on the third floor of the Hephaestus Familia's main store, a grand stone edifice that jutted proudly from the northwestern main street, somewhat close to the Guild.
The store was not merely a shop; it was currently the gleaming, fire-forged heart of her familia's world-famous brand.
The ground floor bustled with customers and the clink of finely crafted wares, the second housed administrative offices and archives, but the third floor was devoted to management…..Hephaestus's personal domain.
Currently, it was packed, not with files or blueprints, but with an almost suffocating tension.
"You realize I'm a very busy person?" Hephaestus asked, her voice clipped, barely concealing the biting edge of her annoyance.
The words hung in the air, unanswered.
"..." Hestia remained a silent, unmoving bundle of blue and white fabric.
Her dark hair was splayed across the polished mahogany floorboards like a discarded shadow.
"You may be very quiet, but I can't concentrate on paperwork with you there. Don't you get it?" Hephaestus tried again, injecting a little more force into her tone, a desperate attempt to penetrate Hestia's self-imposed silence.
Yet, Hestia didn't budge, her posture unnervingly rigid in its supplication.
"Hestia?"
No response.
"… haa…" Hephaestus could only sigh, a long, drawn-out exhalation that did little to alleviate her stress.
She ran a hand through her vibrant red hair, a gesture of weariness.
The lump of a goddess on the floor, her friend, had not moved from that humiliating position. Not for an hour, not for a day, but for almost two days.
That's how long Hestia had kept her head down, plastered to the floorboards of Hephaestus's private office.
It was a spectacle of sheer will, or perhaps, utter madness.
The whole ordeal had begun on the night of the Celebration, hosted by the Ganesha familia.
Amidst the joyous din, Hestia had approached Hephaestus, her usual boisterous energy subdued by a rare earnestness.
She had asked Hephaestus to have her Familia make a weapon for one of her members. Hephaestus had listened, considered, her sharp mind weighing the implications, but ultimately dismissed the thought.
Even though she didn't brag about it…..it was simply an acknowledged fact...the smiths of the Hephaestus Familia were known as the best in the business.
Their blades were legends, their armor, masterpieces.
She had a reputation to uphold, a standard of excellence forged in decades of sweat and fire. Run-of-the-mill adventurers and fledgling Familias simply didn't have the resources to buy her weapons.
To have her smiths, artisans whose time and skill were priceless, make a weapon just for a friend, without proper compensation, was out of the question.
To request her smiths' sweat and blood, their very essence poured into a creation, under those terms would be an abuse of power.
Completely taboo.
Hephaestus had told Hestia many times, and as directly as possible, to come back with some money if she wanted to make a custom order.
Yet, Hestia hadn't given up.
Instead, she had kept on asking, her voice growing softer, her head bowing lower and lower with each refusal.
She'd been persistent since the end of the Celebration, and Hephaestus was truly at her limit.
Hestia showed no signs of giving up, or of even raising her head.
Exasperated, Hephaestus had finally snapped, telling her to do whatever she wanted, then retreated to her Familia's home base, planning to ignore Hestia until she capitulated.
Hestia was bound to get hungry, thirsty, and ultimately, go home at some point.
That was two days ago.
Hestia was still pleading, not with words, but with a silent performance of absolute contrition and desperation.
'Why is she doing this…?' Hephaestus looked down on her with a questioning eye, her singular, vibrant red iris narrowed.
She couldn't understand what drove Hestia to keep that pose.
When she had woken up this morning, finding Hestia still there, still utterly motionless, it had been quite a shock.
Hestia had asked for many things before…..loans, favors, a place to crash….but something was different this time.
Hestia's strong will, her obsession, was shining through in a way Hephaestus hadn't seen in a very long time, if ever, directed at such a singular, seemingly self-sacrificing goal.
"Just what is that pose? You've been doing it since yesterday."
Hephaestus finally broke the silence again, her voice slightly softer, curiosity finally outweighing annoyance.
"… Dogeza."
The word was muffled, barely a whisper against the floorboards, but clear enough.
"Do-ge-what?" Hephaestus blinked, leaning forward slightly.
"Takei told me this pose has the power to make people forgive whatever you have done and grant any request."
"Takei…?" Hephaestus repeated, a new layer of dread beginning to form.
"Takemikazuchi…" Hestia clarified, her voice still pressed against the floor, but a hint of conviction now laced in it.
"Aaa…" said Hephaestus as the face of the god in question, with his earnest, slightly naive demeanor, floated into her mind.
She knew that if Hestia was taking his advice, this could be a real pain.
Takemikazuchi, for all his good intentions, had a penchant for… unconventional wisdom. Hephaestus could almost hear him now, earnestly explaining the 'ancient art of dogeza' with grave importance.
'I can't take this anymore…' Hephaestus sighed, a heavier, more resigned sound this time.
She absolutely couldn't focus on her paperwork.
The incessant, unspoken pressure from the prone goddess was a far greater distraction than any actual noise could be.
So, she set her feather pen carefully on the side of her desk and systematically piled up the papers that still needed her signature, creating a neat, accusatory stack.
Hephaestus glanced outside her window, the bustling street below a stark contrast to the quiet drama unfolding in her office.
She straightened her posture, taking a deep breath, and cast her gaze onto the back of Hestia's head.
This had gone on long enough.
"… Hestia, tell me. Why are you going this far?" Her finger lightly scratched the fabric of her eye patch, a habitual gesture when deep in thought or confronting something particularly perplexing.
"… Because I want to help him!"
Hestia didn't look up, but her voice, though still muffled, was suddenly loud enough to be clearly understood, imbued with a raw, unyielding passion.
The air in the room seemed to crackle with her sudden emotional outburst.
"He's changing, and quickly. He… Bell has a goal, and he's chosen the hardest path to follow. It's a dangerous path, that's why I want to help! I want to give him the strength he needs! A weapon that will clear a path for him!"
Hestia kept talking with her face to the floor, never looking up, as if the sheer force of her will could push the words through the wood directly into Hephaestus's heart.
Hestia had to reveal her true intentions.
It was hard to hide anything between deities, especially when one was in such an extreme state of pleading.
She bared her entire being, her devotion, her guilt, in an attempt to persuade Hephaestus to change her mind.
"He is always helping me! I feel like I am living off his hard work! I'm his goddess, but I haven't done anything godlike for him!"
Hestia's whole body tensed, her knuckles whitening where they pressed against the floor, as she squeezed out her next words: "… I hate being useless…"
Her voice was weak at the very end, imbued with a vulnerability that Hephaestus rarely heard from her flighty friend.
But it was enough.
It was enough to reach Hephaestus's ears.
At that moment, the almost painful sincerity of her desire to empower her child, triggered a memory.
Hephaestus's mind drifted back in time, not to a request for a free item, but one where a similar earnestness had shone through.
She recalled a certain scene from the past, years ago, with Draco.
He had approached her with a request.
Hephaestus had, out of affection and recognition of his potential, offered to create something for free, a gift.
But Draco, had refused.
"My Lady," he had said, his voice deep and calm.
"I deeply appreciate the offer. But my strength, my achievements, must be my own. And the value of your craft is not something that should be taken lightly. I will earn the price. Only then will I truly wield what you forge for me with the respect it deserves."
She recalled, although the memory was not exactly accurate, and overly garnished due to her favorable impression of him.
However, the main fact was that he had insisted on paying the appropriate price, even if it meant months of grueling dungeon dives and dangerous expeditions.
He didn't want charity; he wanted to earn the right to wield her craft, to match his effort to theirs. Hephaestus had been taken aback by the act, but it was what made her like him more.
It was quite different from Hestia's current plight...Draco was asking to pay, Hestia was asking for a gift…..but his sincerity had come off similarly to the quiet resolve she now felt emanating from Hestia.
She had seen the truth in his heart, and had relented.
It hadn't been an abuse of power then; it had been an acknowledgement of respect, a recognition of a bond.
Now, looking at Hestia, an uncomfortable realization dawned.
This wasn't just Hestia being her usual selfish, entitled self.
This wasn't about her own comfort or indulgence.
This was a goddess, her friend, driven by an almost painful selflessness, willing to debase herself for her child.
The shame in her voice, the self-loathing at her perceived uselessness, was undeniably genuine. It was a mirror, in a strange way, to Draco's pride, both stemming from a deeply honorable intent, albeit expressed through vastly different means.
Hephaestus sighed again, this one softer, laced with a reluctant acceptance.
She saw not weakness, but a desperate strength in her friend's pose.
She saw a goddess truly struggling to be worthy of her child.
"… All right. A weapon shall be made for this… boy." She said, the words cutting through the tense silence like a chisel.
Hestia's eyes, which had been squeezed shut for what felt like an eternity, shot open as her head popped up, a sudden, almost comical movement.
Her expression was a mixture of disbelief and dawning, radiant hope.
Hephaestus shrugged, leaning back in her chair.
"If I didn't say yes, you'd never move. And frankly, my spine is starting to ache just watching you."
It was a half-truth, but a necessary one to preserve some semblance of her earlier resolve.
"… Yes. Thank you, Hephaestus!"
Hestia tried to jump to her feet, a burst of joyful energy, but after spending so long facedown on the floor, her limbs weren't ready.
They buckled beneath her.
She fell back to her knees with a soft thud, but her face was alight with an innocent, teary smile, a joy so pure it was almost blinding.
Hephaestus sighed yet again, but this time it was lighthearted, touched with an affection she would never openly admit.
She knew she was being too nice to Hestia.
But Hephaestus saw a different kind of change in Hestia…..not just persistence, but a transformation born of genuine devotion.
And in her world, such intent often carried more weight than gold.