At the Heavenly Army Headquarters, by the window of one of the detached palaces, Athena looked at the silver-haired Star Spirit dressed in a purple kimono and let out a quiet sigh. "I thought the one who'd stop me would be the Queen. I didn't expect it to be you, Lady Shiroyasha."
"Why'd you think it'd be that Halloween nut?" Shiroyasha opened her black folding fan, hiding the lower half of her face while her amused eyes curved into a grin. "I'm Ryo's direct patron deity, you know. By all rights, shouldn'tI be the one holding you accountable for exposing his background without asking?"
"The timing," Athena replied simply. "I arranged everything according to when Ryo arrived in Little Garden, and I noticed something."
"Oh?" Shiroyasha leaned in, clearly interested.
"...Little Garden Central Core grants every being a Spirit Rank the moment they enter Little Garden. In other words, every lifeform is observed by the Center upon arrival and assigned an identity." As she spoke, Athena looked out the window at the streaks of divine light fading into the distance, traces left behind as the gods departed.
"If someone wanted to conceal a person's Spirit Rank, then no matter how powerful they were, not even the seventeen Two-Digit beings could do so until after the Center had assigned it. They'd have to follow the rules."
"And if they wanted to hide it perfectly... They would have to act at the exact same instant the Center bestowed that Spirit Rank."
"Oh..." Shiroyasha lightly tapped her palm with her fan. Now she understood where Athena was going.
Athena glanced at her before continuing, "That's right. I previously visited Mount Meru to ask the Buddha to trace Ryo's original Spirit Rank."
"The result was that nothing appeared abnormal."
"Every possibility I'd considered was already reflected in that original Spirit Rank. The Another Cosmology... the Fourth King of the Greek Gods I mentioned earlier... even traces of the power Ryo calls Cosmo."
"They were all present from the very beginning, if only in faint fragments."
"The Buddha remained perfectly calm about it. He seemed to have understood everything long ago... He probably assumed I was only trying to confirm whether Ryo really was my 'little brother.'"
Athena smiled faintly, "But I knew perfectly well he couldn't actually be the Fourth King..."
"I see. The fake was just too convincing. It fooled Shaka, but not you." Shiroyasha stuck out her tongue before narrowing her eyes with a playful smile. "So then... how much have you figured out?"
Athena slowly shook her head. "If someone wanted to disguise a Spirit Rank perfectly, there was only one way. They had to interfere at the exact moment it was born, acting simultaneously with Little Garden Central Core."
"Only nineteen people in Little Garden can accomplish that now. And before... there were only eighteen."
"Based on the timeline I've reconstructed, your first encounter with Ryo happened after Arcadia was destroyed. By then, he'd already been in Little Garden for several months. So you couldn't have been the one who concealed his Spirit Rank."
"According to Arcadia's members, Ryo was brought back by Canaria after she went out one day. Which means that, around that time, Canaria and one of the Two-Digit beings completed both Ryo's summoning and the disguise of his Spirit Rank."
"And among the beings closest to Canaria... or those comparable to a Two-Digit... There was only one. Queen Halloween ."
Athena sighed. "I don't know what role Canaria played in all this. But I'm certain Queen Halloween was the one who summoned Ryo to Little Garden. Only she could have disguised his Spirit Rank at the exact instant it was assigned."
"You clever people are terrifying..." Shiroyasha rubbed her forehead with her fan. "Even I only learned the truth because Boss tipped me off. I never imagined you'd piece it together yourself."
Athena narrowed her eyes, "What was the Queen trying to accomplish by summoning Ryo?"
"No idea," Shiroyasha answered without the slightest embarrassment. "As far as I'm concerned, all I had to do was steal what belonged to Halloween. I wasn't interested in anything else."
"Besides, she's sneaky as hell. Unless she tells you herself, who knows what she's actually planning?"
Athena sighed again.
She knew the Queen well enough. That capricious Star Spirit could do just about anything without surprising anyone.
"...Does Ryo know about the Queen?" Shiroyasha asked, sounding oddly hesitant.
Athena shook her head. "I don't think so. But I'll explain everything to him."
"You'd better not." Shiroyasha pointed toward a tiny blonde Gothic doll standing nearby.
The doll was barely thirty centimeters tall and was holding up a sign with a single word written on it: WARNING
Athena looked at the doll.
She recognized it immediately as one of the maid dolls responsible for maintaining Queen Halloween's palace.
She frowned, "What exactly is she thinking?"
Shiroyasha shrugged. "Maybe she's waiting until Ryo is at his most wary of her... then she'll reveal that she's actually his 'real mom.'"
"Sounds exactly like the kind of twist she'd enjoy. You know how she is. The more she likes someone, the more she enjoys messing with them."
She tapped her chest with a smug grin, "I'm not like her. If I like someone, why would I hide it? That's why everyone knows Shiroyasha is a hundred times better than that Halloween bitch."
"..."
Athena fell silent.
In her opinion... Shiroyasha wasn't much better than the Queen. The two of them, together with Algol, were Little Garden's three problem children for a reason.
"You already know the outcome of today's meeting, don't you?" Athena asked.
"I was there." Shiroyasha rolled her eyes. "You really pulled a fast one. You solved the mystery behind Ryo's origins, explained away the abnormal speed of his growth, and scared Zeus so badly he nearly turned white."
"Now almost every god in Little Garden believes Ryo is Greece's Fourth King of the Gods."
"At this rate, it won't be long before that legend spreads throughout the countless universes outside."
Little Garden and all of its subordinate observation universes observed one another.
Changes in those lower universes could eventually affect Little Garden. Likewise, changes within Little Garden would ripple outward into every subordinate universe.
The relationship was wildly uneven.
There was only one Little Garden. But there were countless observation universes.
That was precisely why so many gods gathered in Little Garden and refused to leave. The rewards earned by establishing legends in Little Garden were on an entirely different level from doing the same in any lower universe.
Because every legend born in Little Garden would eventually spread across countless worlds. Just like this one.
The rumor that "Ryo Yagami is the Fourth King of the Greek Gods" was already circulating among the gods.
Soon enough, the same story would begin spreading throughout the subordinate universes.
And when enough people believed it... Even if Ryo wasn't the Fourth King... The Central Core would eventually grant him the corresponding Spirit Rank.
It was practically the same as turning fiction into reality.
That was the terrifying power of Little Garden's Poets, who were quietly acknowledged as the Fourth Strongest Species.
Except this time... it wasn't just one Poet rewriting reality.
An entire Pantheon Hall. Thousands of deities. Every last one of them had been thoroughly fooled into believing Ryo really was Greece's Fourth King.
"So that brat just got himself a Fourth King of the Gods Spirit Rank without lifting a finger." Shiroyasha clicked her tongue. "Once he advances to Three Digits, even if he ends up becoming one of the strongest Three-Digit beings just below the Rule-Breakers... no one will think it's strange."
She burst into laughter. "You've made him owe you one hell of a favor."
She knew Athena had once hoped to become the Fourth King of the Gods herself. Yet with one decision, she'd effectively handed that position to Ryo.
That made Shiroyasha wonder...
"You big maiden, don't tell me you've given up on becoming the Fourth King. Planning to settle for being the King's wife instead?"
"I never said I'd given up." Athena glanced at her calmly. "Besides... Knowing Ryo's personality... Do you really think he'd accept the title of Fourth King?"
"You trust him that much?" Shiroyasha looked at her meaningfully. "That's basically handing him a free chance to screw you over."
"..."
Athena was silent for a long while.
Then she admitted to herself that, considering Ryo's personality... there really was no guarantee.
Finally, she sighed, "This identity will only make him even more of a thorn in Zeus's side. He may not accept it at all."
"Besides... I don't actually want him escalating his conflict with Zeus. It was only a decoy. A distraction to draw Zeus's attention elsewhere."
Athena's eyes turned cold. "The one who severs Zeus's legend will be me. Pallas Athena."
"Hah. Parents and children trying to kill each other. The classic Greek family tradition." Shiroyasha laughed before waving her fan. "You explain all this to Ryo yourself. I'm staying out of it... My side's in a sensitive position right now. If Zeus starts making a scene, it'll put Boss in a difficult spot."
...
..
Arcadia, the pavilion overlooking the reservoir.
"...What?" Ryo blinked blankly at the message he'd just received, "I'm the Fourth King of the Greek Gods?"
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