Prometheus had been waiting for Rovi.
Waiting for him to climb this highest, most remote peak.
And he had always believed Rovi would come.
After all—
"—My clay tablet. Time to return it to its rightful owner!"
Rovi extended a hand, without ceremony. Though he had never met the Fire-Thief before, the fragments he'd heard from Heracles were enough to sketch the Titan's temperament.
His purpose here was simple.
Recover that black history—for his honor!
"Clay tablet? Which one are you referring to? The one I gave Heracles? Or the ones I handed out to other heroes? For example—"
Rovi: "…"
Keeping someone's embarrassing past was one thing. Passing it around was another.
Who did this guy think he was—Goldie?
"Bwahahaha! Just kidding. Something that stores wisdom like that deserves to be treasured properly. How could I possibly hand it out at random?" Prometheus's laughter rolled across the mountain, shaking stone from the cliffs. "Even you don't get it back!"
"And besides—you didn't come just for that, did you?"
No, I absolutely did.
Rovi cast him a sidelong look—then laughed as well.
Retrieving the tablet was indeed one of his goals. Just not the most important one.
Prometheus shifted, the chains binding his colossal body clanking thunderously.
"You've come to end the God-King's rule."
He knew very well.
After the founding of the new city outsiders called "Rovi City," Rovi had remained within it. As the furious Zeus had already learned, kings and nobles from across the lands traveled there to seek wisdom.
But that wasn't all.
The gods themselves had begun to gather there.
Athena, Artemis, Hestia—who had appeared during the city's construction—were obvious enough. Later came Apollo, Hephaestus, Queen Hera, Poseidon, and more.
They too sought wisdom.
The one who had once built civilization to glory, driven back the gods, and crushed Cronus and Tartarus by sheer might—when a being like that declared he would bestow the original canon of wisdom upon the world, even gods could not remain indifferent.
And so Rovi City became a second "holy ground" for the Olympians.
"You used that to divide the gods from one another."
"Whoever entered your city, you formed a pledge with them. The gods loosened their restraints upon humanity. Mortals gained deeper wisdom, greater strength—an even more fervent faith."
"But what the gods failed to notice was this: within that faith, there was no place for the King of the Gods."
"No Zeus."
"Bwahahaha… As expected of the Sage. Schemes within schemes, thinking ten steps ahead. You're damned good at this!"
Prometheus laid out Rovi's actions one by one.
And Rovi had never spoken of these measures to anyone.
Not to En. Not even to Gilgamesh.
Of course, Prometheus had still misjudged one thing. He assumed Rovi's primary goal was to enrage Zeus completely—so that Zeus would kill him.
But even discerning this much marked him as a true seer.
"So this is the foresight you command?" Rovi asked thoughtfully.
"I was once a computational reserve unit of the Atlantean Titan Fleet," Prometheus replied. "My frame is long gone, but that essence remains in my mind. The concept of human evolutionary progress became what I now wield—[Foresight]. It allows me to perceive the currents of change in this world."
His eyes shimmered with torrents of information.
He had not seen through Rovi.
He had simply seen the world—its patterns, its transformations.
That was why he still willingly bound himself here.
This was Greece's highest mountain. Still part of the mortal world, yet high enough to survey its every corner. So long as he remained here, what he saw would exceed even what Zeus, seated above, could perceive.
Thus he had refused Heracles's rescue.
Refused freedom decades ago.
Perhaps that refusal was why Heracles had never obtained the Golden Apple.
And so the chain of myths had shifted.
"So," Rovi said dryly, "are you returning my tablet or not?"
"… "
Prometheus faltered, words rising and dying in his throat.
After all that explanation, you're still hung up on the tablet?
Then Rovi smiled again.
"I think I understand now. The true nature of your foresight."
"You were the 'Head Unit' of the Atlantean reserve fleet, weren't you?"
"Yes—the 'Head Unit.'" Prometheus grinned, confidence blazing. "If you wish to oppose Zeus, you will need me. You, who seized my grandfather's frame—the God of Ten Thousand Machines."
Rovi did not answer at once.
He stood upon the summit, gazing at the thunder roaring across the horizon—the faint silhouette of Zeus gradually emerging.
From here, Greece lay fully exposed.
Athens. Sparta. Troy. Rovi City.
When Rovi had departed, divine radiance had filled his city. Now the gods had dispersed.
Enkidu stood within the city modeled after Uruk, upon the highest palace steps.
In Athens, Athena stood within her temple. The Gorgon sisters watched in unease as the goddess of wisdom and war crowned herself with the diadem of the gods.
In Sparta, Apollo sighed, resigned, his divine light flaring despite himself.
Hera cast rainbow mists from the sky. Hephaestus dragged subterranean fire to the surface.
All the gods trembled beneath the God-King's fury.
Apollo and Hera now understood Rovi's "strategy." They feared it—yet had no recourse.
Zeus had always been obstinate.
Arrogant.
He cared nothing for the other gods.
If he deemed them traitors, then traitors they were.
And so they had no choice but to stand with Rovi.
With Uruk.
Against the wrath of the God-King.
In that instant, birds scattered.
In that instant, hearts quailed.
"The power of the King of the Gods has manifested," Prometheus said. "But he still resides in a dimension only he can reach—the primordial boundary. From there, he will cast thunder to destroy the world."
"So you need me."
"As the Titan 'Head Unit,' I can unify the power of the Greek gods—just as Zeus once unified them against the White Titan Sefar."
"Only then can you touch his essence."
"Only then can you drag him down into the mortal world."
Rovi withdrew his gaze from the storm and looked again at Prometheus.
The former Titan, bound upon stone, suppressed by Zeus's lingering divine power—yet not a trace of decay marred him.
On the contrary, he shone with vigor.
He was delighted.
For he knew he would die.
What he meant by "need" was simple: Rovi would shatter his very self, extract the core of the Titan, and embed it within the Machine God frame taken from Cronus.
Cronus had been a Titan Machine God—the flagship of an interstellar fleet.
But a fleet could not reach full capacity through brute strength alone.
A flagship commanded. Unified.
Yet such command required calculation.
It was the relationship between a KING—and his HERALD.
Only by combining Cronus's frame with Prometheus's computational support could Rovi patch the critical flaw in his Machine-God Form.
Only then could he reach Zeus.
Only then could he drag the God-King down from his lofty heaven and give him the thrashing he deserved.
And only then could Rovi seal his own death.
Rovi's path to self-destruction had always been grandiose and spectacular. Even now, that remained unchanged.
But before Rovi died, Prometheus would perish first.
"You will be utterly annihilated. Nothing of you will remain," Rovi said, robes whipping violently in the wind.
"But my name will endure," Prometheus replied, a fierce grin splitting his face. "Not as a mere thief of fire—but as Prometheus, who defied fate itself."
"I've never feared death. What terrifies me far more is being chained forever by destiny's coils. Sage of Uruk—"
"I believe you understand that far better than anyone. My companion. My guide!"
"Bwahahaha!"
Greek prophecy was absolute—a fate no one could alter or escape.
Just as Cronus had overthrown Uranus and claimed sovereignty over heaven.
Just as Zeus had toppled Cronus and imprisoned him in Tartarus.
After Athena's birth, Zeus's reign was destined to be eternal.
That, too, was fate.
For the future God-King had already been strangled in his cradle.
Yet Prometheus had never accepted this fate.
He was a Titan. He had witnessed a God-King's fall into depravity by destiny's decree. He had watched his Titan kin vanish into oblivion.
Yet still, he yearned to defy it.
Because in Rovi, he'd found inspiration and courage.
"Before hearing your story, I spent my entire life trembling before fate. But now—I want to rebel."
"You've already done it yourself."
"Sage of Uruk, my guiding star—will you not take me along…"
"To witness it once more?"
Atop the peak of the Caucasus, high above clouds swept by raging winds, the Titan roared his declaration.
Prometheus, the Titan who had persisted through millennia solely to defy fate, spoke his resolve to the world.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Thunder exploded overhead, lightning crackling layer upon layer.
Within that furious vortex, the God-King did not yet appear in person. He merely hurled down lightning spears from on high, threatening all creation.
The world trembled, gods recoiled in fear—but at this very moment, Rovi raised his hand.
He did not respond to Prometheus's fervent words.
Instead, a spark of light ignited in his open palm.
A solitary glow amid encroaching darkness.
Prometheus stared blankly, stunned. His gaze fixed upon Rovi, upon that radiant spark.
"You guessed some things correctly, and some wrongly."
Robes fluttering, Rovi turned aside, his features gently lit by the glow in his palm. A subtle smile played across his lips.
"I did come here to pull Zeus down into the mortal world. But not for your help."
"This 'Head Unit' you speak of—"
"I already have one."
Prometheus froze.
He realized then it was not just Rovi's hand glowing. Throughout the shadowed world beneath Zeus's stormy rage, along the storm-tossed Aegean, countless faint lights began to emerge.
Not a single flame.
But countless sparks.
That's...the people?
Even Prometheus, for all his foresight, stared in disbelief.
From this lofty height, he saw clearly each tiny spark igniting—the lights of humanity.
In Athens, an elderly philosopher grasped a parchment scroll copied painstakingly from Rovi's city, wisdom's cradle. His aged figure radiated softly.
Outside Sparta, a grim-faced general silently commanded his soldiers into perfect formation, movements learned in Rovi's academy. They marched not with divine aid, but through pure discipline and ingenuity.
His body, too, glowed faintly.
In the fields, old farmers gazed proudly at turning waterwheels; craftsmen smiled with satisfaction at intricate mechanical creations they had crafted.
They, too, shone with light.
But they were mere mortals.
How could mortals shine?
Though faint, almost negligible individually, when gathered together, those sparks formed an astonishing galaxy of brilliance.
"The strength of one is never enough. One man's wisdom alone is unreliable."
"How could your single 'Head Unit' ever match the brilliance of these countless minds?"
Rovi smiled broadly.
From the start, he had come to this peak merely because from here he could survey all of Greece—and witness clearly the hearts and flames ignited by the city he had built.
Prometheus stood frozen.
His former fervor forgotten, he stared dumbfounded at that resplendent sea of light.
Could humans truly possess such power?
Had he, a God of Foresight and Evolution, never even considered this possibility?
I…
"You've done your part for a thousand years," Rovi said quietly, stepping forward. Wind surged as he approached, slicing effortlessly through the chains that bound the Titan thief of fire, shattering them link by link.
He placed a gentle hand on Prometheus's weathered shoulder.
"Prometheus, you embody humanity's emergence. You are the fire-stealer, the enlightener of Greece's civilization."
"You're humanity's father-figure."
"You've done enough."
"But from now on—it's our turn. Our responsibility."
Ours—as humans.
Humanity's responsibility.
Prometheus, now freed, did not move. He stared ahead in silent awe, glimpsing civilization's earliest days, watching humans struggle onward, step by halting step, toward a brighter future.
My children… have truly grown up.
Prometheus laughed, tears streaming freely down his face.
At that same moment, Rovi moved calmly toward the cliff's edge. Facing the vast, turbulent world, he watched the waves roll unceasingly in the Aegean Sea below.
He spoke.
"PEOPLE OF THE WORLD: DO YOU WISH TO DIE POINTLESSLY, SIMPLY BECAUSE YOU REFUSED TO BOW TO THIS GOD? DO YOU WISH TO LIVE BLINDLY, FOREVER AS HIS LIVESTOCK?"
"I AWAKENED YOUR WISDOM. I TAUGHT YOU HOW TO WALK. NOW—TELL ME YOUR ANSWER."
"IS THIS THE LIFE AND DEATH YOU DESIRE?"
In Athens, the philosopher snapped his quill in half.
In Sparta, the general hurled his spear skyward, silently but firmly demonstrating his resolve.
The farmer spat bitterly on the grass. The craftsman tapped his hammer disdainfully, a confident smirk crossing his face.
Would they accept such a fate?
Never.
Who would wish for death? Who would choose blind obedience?
No one.
"THEN—LEND ME YOUR WISDOM~!"
Rovi laughed.
He laughed openly, boldly, unrestrainedly.
His laughter built and built, roaring until it became an engine of molten brilliance.
From above descended the Colossal Machine God, crimson storms billowing from its iron wings. Rovi's Machine-God Form rocketed skyward borne on thousands upon thousands of human sparks.
He charged straight toward the lightning spears raining down.
He charged alone.
Yet carried by all humanity's flames.
Because at this moment—
"All these sparks—I am all of them!"
"Come, Zeus!"
Fist raised high, Rovi ascended, bearing humanity's countless lights toward the heavens!
---
T/N: yeah no excuse this time :sob: WAIT NO I WAS STARTING NEW TLS SO HA! yeah sorrrey heres the 4 chapters!
bonus chaps
100 stones -> 1 chapter
200 stones -> 2 chapters
300 stones -> 3 chapters
and so on
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