At long last, he’d finally gotten rid of the “Fallen Angel” setting.
Inside a mountain cave, Steve Trevor was happily splashing around in a “bath.”
The water here was light blue and emitted a faint glow, making it quite unusual.
Even stranger still…
The water was actually flowing upward.
Just as Steve climbed out of the pool, a figure walked in through the cave entrance around the corner, startling him so badly that he instinctively tried to crouch down.
“…Fuck!”
The moment Duke walked in, the sight nearly burned his eyes.
Damn it, you’re actually just standing there without moving?
Showing off your assets to me, huh?
With a dark expression, Duke walked over, mimed pulling up a pair of pants, then pointed toward the cave entrance.
He couldn’t help it—he didn’t speak English.
He was only worried that Wonder Woman might come barging in and see something she shouldn’t.
Never had he imagined that this “stain” would end up attached to him instead.
If the situation had allowed it, he really wanted to chop that sausage of his off.
Steve knew the man before him, Duke, didn’t understand English, and he didn’t understand Chinese either.
Still, from Duke’s gestures, he got the message.
He hurriedly stepped out of the pool and tied on the “apron” around his waist.
Duke immediately called toward the outside,
“You can come in now.”
Diana entered.
On the way here, Duke had spent some time teaching her a few traditional Chinese ideas about the differences between men and women.
Things like: women shouldn’t casually take men to watch football, shouldn’t casually kiss men, shouldn’t casually hug or cuddle with them…
Diana might have been European, but she was practically a blank slate.
She knew absolutely nothing about relationships between men and women.
In fact, this was the very first time she had ever seen a creature with three legs—a man.
Oh, one thing I forgot to mention.
The first man Diana met was Duke, not Steve.
Because Duke had fallen closer to the shore, Diana swam to him first before rescuing Steve.
So Duke became the very first man Wonder Woman had ever laid eyes on.
Duke didn’t like Steve.
He knew perfectly well that Diana was a blank slate, ignorant of everything, and endlessly curious about the outside world.
After all, everything was new to her.
She wanted to try everything.
It was precisely because of that sense of novelty and curiosity that Steve ended up taking her first time.
The worst part was that after getting her first time, the guy ran off to get himself killed.
￣へ￣
What a ruthless bastard.
“Can I ask you a few questions?” Steve asked.
Wonder Woman nodded.
“Where am I?”
“Themyscira.”
“You’ve already told me that. What I mean is, where is this? What kind of place is this? Who are you? Why does the water look like this? And why do you speak English so well?”
Duke remembered this scene.
Although there were quite a few English words he didn’t understand, he could still make out bits and pieces.
“This is Heaven!”
“Heh.”
Wonder Woman smiled.
Of course she knew what “Heaven” meant.
“We are the bridge that promotes peaceful coexistence among mankind.”
“…Okay.”
Although he was still confused and hadn’t gotten the answers he wanted, Steve nodded anyway.
“Thank you for pulling me out of the water. Um… are you here to let me go?”
“I tried, but it’s not my decision. I even asked them to let me go with you—or any Amazon—but my mother wouldn’t allow it.”
“I can’t really blame her. I wouldn’t want someone I care about anywhere near a battlefield either.”
“Then why do you want to go back?”
“I don’t think anyone wants to go back to war.
But someone has to try.
“My father once told me, ‘If you see something wrong in this world, you can either do nothing or do something about it.’
“I’ve already done nothing once.”
Wonder Woman fell silent.
She turned and walked away, with Duke following at an unhurried pace.
“Hey! Thanks for crashing into my plane…”
“…It let me see a completely different world.”
Just as the two of them were about to leave the cave, Steve shouted toward Duke.
After Diana translated his words, Duke replied jokingly,
“Let’s just hope it wasn’t my ass that hit your propeller!”
“Hehe.”
Wonder Woman couldn’t help shaking her head with a laugh.
She didn’t bother translating that one, leaving Steve standing there utterly bewildered as the two departed.
Steve: (O_o)??
“???”
After leaving the cave, the two of them didn’t return to rest.
“So you’ve still decided to go to the battlefield?” Duke asked.
Diana didn’t answer directly.
Instead, she simply said,
“Protecting the peace of the world is the responsibility of the Amazons.”
“So… you’re going to retrieve your equipment now?”
“How did you know?” Diana asked in surprise.
“Your eyes are full of determination.”
Duke raised two fingers in a V shape and pointed toward her beautiful eyes.
“Aren’t you coming?”
“Going… where?
“The temple?
“You mean… the battlefield?”
Duke smiled, sat down on a large rock, then patted the space beside him, motioning for Diana to sit.
After she sat down next to him, close at his side, he continued.
“Do you know…
“I’m not from this world.”
Then he paused, waiting for Diana’s reaction.
After all, the whole “negative eighty years old” remark was bound to become a problem sooner or later.
Even if she didn’t ask now, she’d remember it eventually.
It was like a thorn lodged in the heart, or a tiny pebble in your shoe—something impossible to ignore.
Of course…
With a bit of embellishment.
To his surprise, however, there wasn’t the slightest trace of shock on Diana’s face.
“You’re not surprised?”
“Why should I be?”
“This world is merely one intersection within the Multiverse. Because of the ancient agreement, Odin of the Asgardian Gods left Earth to establish Asgard, ruling what are now known as the Nine Realms.”
She spoke as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
Deep down, she couldn’t help feeling a little regretful.
If the Olympian Gods had also left back then…
Would they have avoided declining into what they had become today?
Unfortunately…
Time could never flow backward.
Duke scratched his head.
So that’s how it is.
Well, that made sense.
Gods all came from different planets anyway, so someone like him wasn’t really that strange.
“My world is very peaceful.
“It also went through the First and Second World Wars.
“But there weren’t any gods like these.
“Well… maybe there were, but I didn’t know about them.
“After all, in my world I was just an ordinary person—even more ordinary than that spy.
“The moment I saw what the spy was wearing, I knew this was the time of World War I.
“Compared to my world…
“It’s exactly one hundred years in the past.”
Diana immediately understood.
“You’re twenty years old…
“So that’s why you said you were… negative eighty years old?”
“Mm.”
“Then how did you come here?”
She was genuinely curious about that.
“If you’re asking me, I don’t know either.
“In my world, I was just an ordinary college student who hadn’t even graduated yet.
“By accident, I dug up a book called Notes of the God of Magic in my family’s ancestral home.
“Then I got interested and tried copying what it described.
“Who would’ve thought…
“…I’d end up here.”
At that, Duke waved his hand.
“Don’t ask anymore.
“I really don’t know.
“One second I was practicing…
“…and the next, I was lying behind that huge rock on the beach.”
Diana fell silent.
“…To be honest,
“That was my first battle.
“And the first time I’d ever killed someone.”