“So, can we finally have a proper conversation now?” Duke said.
“W-Who… who exactly… are you?” Logan struggled to straighten up.
That last impact had practically thrown his lower back out.
Victor had it even worse.
His pelvis had cracked—more specifically, the sitting bone in his backside.
“Cough… cough… Damn you.”
“The truth is, we’re the same kind of people. We’re all mutants,” Duke began, launching into his grand deception.
“What?” Victor blinked.
“Mutants?” Logan echoed.
“What? You didn’t know? Then what do you call yourselves?”
“Monsters,” the two brothers answered in unison.
“Monsters?” Duke chuckled.
“Actually… we’re gods.”
“Huh?”
“A very, very long time ago—so long ago that no precise records remain—the first Celestials descended upon Earth and altered some of the lifeforms that existed then. Those altered beings became the ancestors of today’s mutants.”
Duke deliberately avoided calling them the “Celestial Host.” The term always sounded awkward to him, so he simply shortened it to Celestials.
Logan and Victor slowly opened their mouths in shock.
That was a lot to take in.
“Personally,” Duke continued, “I prefer to call us Awakened Ones. Although ordinary people see us as mutants, and in time we’ll naturally come to be known as mutants, our abilities all originate from the X-Gene—a genetic sequence ordinary humans don’t possess. It lies dormant within the core of our DNA. Unless it awakens, modern technology can’t detect it.”
“Our powers emerge when the X-Gene awakens—through extreme trauma, life-and-death situations… things like that.”
“Wait.” Logan suddenly realized something.
“If this all started so long ago… then after generations of descendants intermarrying and spreading across the world…”
“…Doesn’t that mean almost everyone on Earth could potentially carry the X-Gene?”
“You could say that,” Duke nodded.
“But not everyone. I call people who merely carry the dormant X-Gene Zeta-Class. They have the potential to become mutants, but having the gene doesn’t guarantee it will ever awaken.”
Logan fell silent.
For years, he’d believed he was a monster.
Yet now he was being told he was descended from beings created by cosmic gods.
Well…
“descended” wasn’t exactly the right word.
More accurately, they were descendants of the Celestials’ experimental subjects.
But by that logic, mutants were practically attendants to the Celestials themselves.
Calling them “gods” didn’t seem entirely unreasonable.
Victor was equally stunned.
So they weren’t monsters after all.
Damn…
For the first time in years, he felt proud of who he was.
“Well,” he finally said, “I guess we really did become friends after beating each other up.”
He might be reckless, but he wasn’t stupid.
Duke genuinely hadn’t intended to kill them.
Sure, their healing factors made them hard to kill, and maybe Duke couldn’t kill them anyway…
But making their lives a living hell?
That, he definitely could do.
Sometimes, having regenerative abilities was a curse. New chapters come out on g.com first.
“So…” Logan asked curiously, “you really came to recruit us for some great cause?”
“What cause?”
“Godslaying.”
“…What?”
“Cough… cough…”
They had only just learned they were descendants of beings created by gods…
And now they were being asked to go kill one?
Besides, gods weren’t exactly something you could casually eliminate.
“Shouldn’t…” Victor asked innocently, “…we technically be on the same side?”
“There are many kinds of gods,” Duke replied.
“Some came from beyond Earth. Some were born naturally from Earth itself. Others are true descendants of gods.”
“And even the Celestials who created our ancestors would never consider us one of their own.”
“We’d be lucky if they regarded us as more than dogs.”
“But that’s a story for another day.”
“The one we’re going to kill…”
“…is Ares, the God of War.”
“So the Greek myths are real,” Logan muttered in realization.
“This war wasn’t started by him,” Duke said, “but he certainly pushed it forward.”
“That damn Ares!” Victor roared furiously.
“Millions have died because of this war! It’s a living hell! If we’re really going to kill him, count me in!”
Duke glanced at him.
At least for now, Victor still possessed a conscience.
The endless killing hadn’t completely devoured his humanity yet.
“Ares…” Logan was far calmer.
“He’s still a god. Can we really kill him? Isn’t he Zeus’s son? Shouldn’t Zeus clean up his own family?”
“I’m afraid that’s impossible.”
“The Greek gods are almost all dead.”
“What?!” Logan froze in disbelief.
“W-What the hell happened?” Even the battle-hardened Victor was stammering now.
“Ragnarok.”
“Zeus led the Olympian gods against Ares.”
“But Ares slaughtered them one after another.”
“In the end, only Zeus remained.”
“Using every last ounce of his strength, Zeus managed to gravely wound Ares and drive him away.”
“Before dying, he forged a weapon capable of killing Ares.”
“So…” Logan asked carefully.
“You have that weapon?”
Holy hell…
One god had wiped out the entire Greek pantheon.
How were the few of them supposed to defeat someone like that?
“No.”
“The weapon is with Zeus’s daughter.”
“My companion.”
“Nani?” Victor blurted out in shock.
Logan stared blankly.
“…is his own sister?”
“And we’re just clearing away the cannon fodder for her?”
“You could put it that way.”
Logan nodded.
If it were just the two of them going after Ares, he’d refuse without hesitation.
But if Zeus’s daughter was the main force…
Then maybe it was worth seeing through.
After all…
They were talking about killing a god.
That was enough to make anyone’s blood boil.
“Alright!” Victor shouted.
“It’s settled!”
“I’m in!”
“I want to see what that damned so-called God of War actually looks like!”
Nearly a century of living had filled Victor with hatred toward war.
How could they have lived ninety years without making friends?
Friends whose hometowns had been destroyed.
Comrades whose bodies couldn’t even be recovered intact from the battlefield.
Before today, he hadn’t known who was responsible.
Now that he knew Ares had played a part…
That bastard had to die.
Besides…
Who wouldn’t want to spend the rest of their life bragging about killing a god?
That alone was worth it.
Duke turned toward Logan.
Logan nodded.
“I want to see for myself just how powerful this God of War really is.”
“Excellent.”
“Tomorrow morning.”
“Six o’clock.”
“Meet me outside the Old Barrel Inn.”
With that, Duke turned and walked toward the mouth of the alley.
“This is the only chance to slay a god you’ll get in the next hundred years.”
“If you decide to back out…”
“…that’s your choice.”
“Back out?” Victor barked.
“Not a chance!”
“I’m doing this no matter what!”
Logan remained silent.
“Oh, one more thing,” Duke added without turning around.
“Keep Zeus’s daughter a secret.”
“She doesn’t know who she really is yet.”
“…Ah.”
“Got it.”