After hearing Saint Raphael's request, Akuto calmly looked toward where the "Boar" was.
"Saint Raphael-dono, you don't need to worry. The one who can deal with it has already arrived."
"You mean…" Erica found it hard to believe.
"I mean, this time, even if I don't lift a finger, the incident will still be resolved." Akuto looked toward a stretch of empty ruins.
Hm? What do you mean, 'even if you don't act, it'll be resolved'? Then why did you demand my loyalty on the condition of 'calming the chaos caused by the Boar' just now? Erica finally spotted the blind spot.
So that was it. Holy Child-sama's plan was to freeload off her for free?!
Given how things were going, if Saint Raphael hadn't appeared, wouldn't she have already been completely taken for a ride by Holy Child-sama?
With a "barely survived" sort of relief, Erica followed the direction Akuto was looking—yet she couldn't see anything at all.
"Holy Child-sama, is there really something there?"
"There is." Akuto's tone was firm. "There is wind."
The moment Akuto finished speaking, a sudden gale tore across the previously empty ruins!
Light gathered along the currents. A boy in a white robe gradually took shape, wearing a faintly subtle smile—his aura distinct, inexplicable.
"He's the one I meant. The one who can solve the problem."
The instant Akuto said it—
"Boom—!"
The next second, the violent wind surged!
A purging tempest swept the land, easily piercing the Boar's divine protection and slamming straight into its true body!
"BOOM!!—"
The Boar's massive body—along with countless chunks of rubble—was hurled into the sky.
In an instant, the world cleared.
Only a gentle breeze remained, brushing softly over the ground, as if the disaster had never happened.
If not for the broken walls and shattered stone still standing, no one would believe this place had just suffered the ravages of a Heretic God.
"Uh..."
A cold bead of sweat slid down Erica's temple. Solved? Just like that? It was solved like that?! She hadn't even seen what happened!
As her mind reeled in shock, the strong wind cut off abruptly.
Within the fading gale, the figure was no longer visible.
But the boy's eyes looked vaguely lost.
Noticing Akuto and the others, the white-robed boy cast them a puzzled look.
"Holy Child-sama… what exactly is—" Erica instinctively turned to Akuto for an explanation.
"Didn't I tell you? He's the one who can solve the problem. Look—problem solved." Akuto spread his hands.
He had seen it clearly.
The white-robed boy invoked the incarnation of Strong Wind, and while he struck the Boar with the storm, he also casually drove a golden sword into the Boar's body.
"Thou… art a guest from afar?" the white-robed boy spoke, his tone carrying an uncanny ancient cadence.
"For this small island in the Mediterranean… thou truly art an honored guest indeed—"
"Ah, I'm just here to take a look around. And you? You look like you're repeating your own myth?" Akuto replied with a smile.
Repeating his own myth.
Defeating Bahram—also known as the Persian war god Verethragna—in myth, he manifested many forms across his wandering journey, becoming a guardian of the sun and the people.
And now, his incarnations had been scattered. He was traveling as he recovered them, so calling it a reenactment of his myth was not wrong.
Because he had only regained part of himself, the white-robed boy currently carried only a faint trace of Heretic presence.
As he subdued and reclaimed the rest of his incarnations, that presence would gradually deepen—until, at last, he would no longer be the slightly bewildered youth before them…
…but would become that victory-flower which knows fate and seeks triumph.
Right now, he bore three incarnations: Strong Wind, Boy, and Warrior Who Wields the Golden Sword. Later, he would also reclaim—his original incarnations.
…
The moment Akuto saw him, he understood something.
This was the novel timeline, not the anime timeline.
The difference was that in the novel timeline, Kusanagi Godou became friends with Verethragna before the war god's frenzy fully erupted.
And when reclaiming the White Horse incarnation, Kusanagi Godou "stole the kill" from Verethragna and used an antique book—an old volume once owned by a collector—to subdue the White Horse incarnation.
In the anime timeline, Verethragna simply felt that Kusanagi Godou possessed the qualities of a warrior, so he let the White Horse incarnation—who was interested in following—go with him.
He merely treated Kusanagi Godou as seasoning for battle, as someone who had a faint possibility of defeating him.
Without question, compared to the anime's "picked up for free" White Horse incarnation, the novel version—where Kusanagi Godou earned it through his own efforts, defeating a god—was far more likely to win Verethragna's recognition.
Compared with the novel timeline, the anime timeline felt overly rough, almost as if anyone could casually do what Kusanagi Godou did and become a godslayer.
…
Verethragna showed no particular reaction to Akuto's line, "You're repeating your own myth," and repeated himself again.
"Thou… art a guest from afar?"
Indeed. If he had reacted to Akuto's words, that would mean he had almost fully restored his Heretic divinity.
Facing the boy's question, Akuto smiled and shook his head.
"Compared to me, you're the one who's a guest from afar. And that isn't the important part."
That was right. To Sardinia, Verethragna was unquestionably a guest from afar.
"Yes. I come from afar… yet… why I came… even I do not know the answer…" Verethragna murmured softly.
"If I told you that you came in obedience to fate, would you believe it?" Akuto kept smiling, speaking with pointed implication.
Of course Akuto knew why he had come—he had come in pursuit of defeat, in pursuit of battle with the god-king Melqart.
It was only that, in the god-king's battle, his body was scattered, and to reopen the heavens he became incarnations.
Akuto knew that Verethragna still lacked a broad self-recognition that he was a Heretic God.
But not being fully restored had a benefit.
So long as he remained incomplete, he could avoid the influence of frenzy and Heretic divinity, and speak rationally like he was now.
It was precisely under such conditions that, in the original timeline, he could become Kusanagi Godou's friend and rival.
And it was also precisely under such conditions that he could calmly talk with Akuto here. Otherwise, if he had fully restored his Heretic divinity, the moment he saw Akuto, he would likely have attacked in a frenzy.
"I came in obedience to fate?" Verethragna nodded.
Fate—this world truly did have fate.
But he nodded not because he sensed fate. He nodded because, in his hazy memories, he found a deep, instinctive disgust toward it.
In the next second, driven by that "disgust," Verethragna spoke almost reflexively.
"Is that so? Thy words may not be wrong. Many things are decided by that damned fate."
After saying it, even he froze.
Who was "fate"? Why had he suddenly spoken that name?
Wait.
Was "fate" the name of an existence? Fate should be fate—shouldn't it?
…
Hearing that, Akuto smiled and shook his head.
"Ah. You're right. Those women who govern fate truly are awful."
He knew exactly who Verethragna meant—the goddesses of fate.
In this world, the goddesses of fate did exist.
In the late stages of the original story, after Kusanagi Godou slew the goddesses of fate, he obtained the Authority of the Warrior Who Defies Fate.
Through that Authority, he severed the fate-line of Princess Alice's frailty, and he also severed—and inherited—the fate of the Last King.
But due to the influence of the Warrior Who Defies Fate within him, he could choose whether or not to carry out the Last King's duty, thereby escaping the Last King's destiny.
Just as Akuto and Verethragna finished mocking the goddesses of fate together, the system's prompt sounded in Akuto's mind.
[Ding!]
[Congratulations, Host, you have triggered the main-story quest: Verethragna Who Becomes Fully Heretic.]
[Quest Description: The boy war god has appeared as in the original plot and defeated the Boar. However, for you, simply defeating a Heretic God no longer has much meaning.]
[Compared to defeating a mere Heretic form, you are more interested in the god's true body.]
[A Heretic God can generally provide Authorities and divine power around peak Super Demon King / God-class / low-tier Chief God. But if it is the god's true body, you can obtain peak Chief God or even quasi-Dragon God level Authorities and divine power from them.]
[Therefore, you must first research a method to pull a god's true body out of myth.]
[A "fully heretic" state is the closest state to the mythic true body, and it is also the weakest point in history.]
[Only by leveraging a Heretic God after "fully becoming heretic" can you drag their true body down from myth.]
...
[Verethragna, the Eastern war god born for battle and mad for battle, is among the easiest gods to "fully become heretic."]
[Quest Rank: Red.]
[Quest Requirement: After making Verethragna lose in wholehearted conviction, reveal his true identity and make him "fully become heretic," to usher in your true duel.]
[Note: This quest is special. After completion, in addition to the system's original reward, you will also obtain the method to pull a Heretic God's true body down from myth.]
...
After reading the newly triggered system quest, Akuto raised an eyebrow.
Fully becoming heretic, huh…
Akuto knew that the evolution of a Heretic God depended mainly on two factors.
First, their combat power and divinity rank in myth. Normally, a god-king or war god was stronger than an ordinary functional deity like a god of wine or flowers.
Second, their self-recognition.
The firmer a Heretic God's self-recognition, the more power they could unleash. At that point, even an obscure weak god could erupt with strength comparable to the top-tier Heretic Gods.
For example, in the original plot, the agrarian god Saturnus.
Saturnus was originally the Roman agrarian deity who brought harvests to the people, and also the celebratory god tied to the origins of Christmas festivities.
By all logic, such a Saturnus should have been rather average in battle.
But after entering the state of "fully becoming heretic," Saturnus erupted with power comparable to the strongest Heretic Gods.
(End of Chapter)
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