— — — — — —
Arcadia HQ
The sofas in the conference room were packed with everyone who currently held decision-making authority, plus one Asura who had wandered in by accident.
Ryo sat squarely in the center, as he should. To his left, Kurousagi sat on the sofa, repeatedly nudging his shoe with her leg under the table, kick after kick, expressing a rabbit's cheap but persistent dissatisfaction.
Across from Ryo, Athena attended the meeting in the form of an energy avatar. She calmly held a cup of black tea, clearly enjoying the show.
Click.
The door opened, and Leticia walked in. She clapped her hands lightly and looked at Ryo.
"As you instructed, I've already locked the two of them up. For the foreseeable future, we probably won't need to waste manpower guarding those two gods."
"Eh?" Kurousagi jumped in shock and blurted out, "Our Community has a Gift that can actually hold a god-level existence?"
Leticia's expression turned subtle.
"Well, it's not exactly a very practical Gift. To put it simply, it's the kind that says, 'Break the seal and get eternal humiliation.' It's more about deterrence, making them afraid to act rashly."
Athena, who had just poured Ryo a cup of tea and casually taken a biscuit from in front of him, asked with mild surprise, "Arcadia has a Gift of that level?"
Without lifting his head, Ryo replied, "She's probably talking about 'Croix Romance Theater.'"
"It's a stage-type Gift venue. Inside are scripts similar to fairy tales. Once a participant tries to break out of the game, the stage play is forcibly triggered, blurring their mental perception of gender."
Hearing this, Leticia added. "I put Hermes in the role of Sleeping Beauty."
"If Ares doesn't want to kiss Hermes awake and accept the fact that he's fallen in love with a man, then I think he won't dare try anything."
Croix Romance Theater was considered a top-tier Gift. It could screw over four-digit existences, allowed any gender for the male and female leads, and even reversed perceptions of romantic orientation. Men fell for men, women fell for women, and sometimes people fell for rocks or dirt or other non-human things.
Because of that, even during Arcadia's hardest times, this thing never sold. But no one ever used it either. It was completely useless.
Who knew what Baron La Croix, that lolicon freak, had been thinking when he made this thing.
"A very interesting idea," Athena said, biting into her biscuit and clapping lightly, smiling faintly. "I'm quite curious about this former member named Baron La Croix."
What kind of brain came up with a game like that? Athena found the idea of dissecting such a brain rather intriguing.
"In any case, there's no immediate risk of these two escaping. And with the defeat clauses in place, even if they did escape, they wouldn't get far."
After saying that, Leticia raised her head. Her ruby-like eyes fixed on Ryo.
"Now it's your turn to explain, our dear Leader."
She glanced at Asura sitting to Ryo's right, who was calmly eating biscuits.
"?!" Asura looked up, met Leticia's gaze, and tilted her head in confusion.
They stared at each other for a second or two. Then she quietly finished her biscuit and reached for another.
Seeing this, Leticia sighed. "Why is the enemy's leading general getting along with you in such a cheerful way? Why did Ares of Greece join forces with Hermes and storm the game venue to attack you?"
"Considering that Lady Shiroyasha can only appear as the award presenter after the Gift Game ends, I suggest you come up with a proper explanation quickly. Otherwise, if we clash with the Greek gods, we'll be in a very awkward position as their enemy."
"Well…" Ryo scratched his head and thought for a moment. "When I was about to fight Asura, Ares barged in and fought me. When he was about to lose, Hermes rushed in and tried to sneak-attack me. Then Asura, who couldn't stand watching anymore, formed an alliance with me, and we defeated them. That's basically it."
Hearing this, Asura snapped her head up and shook it vigorously. "I didn't do anything. I was just watching from the side. I didn't lift a finger."
After saying that, she turned her head and shot Ryo a meaningful stare.
'Why are you glaring at me…' Ryo froze for a moment, then suddenly remembered that Asura didn't want to start a conflict with the Greek gods.
After thinking it over, Ryo spread his hands. "Alright, I lied. Actually, even working together, Ares and Hermes still couldn't beat me. I suppressed them myself."
The moment those words fell, the room went dead silent.
Noticing the shift in atmosphere, Ryo raised an eyebrow and said irritably, "Hey, what's with that reaction? Am I really supposed to lose to those two?"
Leticia's lips curved slightly before the smile quickly faded. "You knew about Ares's ambush in advance, didn't you?"
"Thinking back, you had us set up defenses outside against a supposed Ouroboros raid, exaggerating how the headquarters might be attacked. You already knew back then, didn't you?"
"Ouroboros?" Asura chewing on a biscuit suddenly looked up, glanced around, realized they weren't talking about her, and lowered her head again.
Beside her, Ryo had no way to refute that.
After receiving news from Mata that Ares had gone missing, he really had intended to keep it from Kurousagi and Leticia. Now that it was exposed, he had no face to argue back.
With that in mind, Ryo raised both hands. "Fine, I admit it. I just wanted to see what it felt like to go all out."
"And then you went all out and brought home two massive headaches?" Kurousagi kicked him again and rolled her eyes. "Do you have any idea what it means to capture two of the Twelve Gods?"
"That's provocation. A straight-up provocation against the Greek Pantheon," she complained. "You might as well have killed them and brought back the spoils. At least Greece wouldn't lose face that badly."
Everyone turned to look at their cute bunny in unison.
"Eek!" Kurousagi shrieked, shrinking her neck and covering her ears. "Why are you all staring at me?"
"It's nothing," Ryo said with a sigh. "We just didn't expect you to say something like that."
For a moment, he wasn't sure whether to feel sad or proud.
The rabbit who once didn't even dare kill a chicken, now talked about killing people without batting an eye.
Life really was strange.
"Ah…" Leticia sighed and said to Ryo, "Before the Heavenly Army arrives, explain your thinking. What exactly was your purpose in bringing those two back?"
Hearing that, Ryo's lips curled slightly. "Intimidation, and ransom."
"With the achievement of defeating two chief gods, my debut battle isn't finished yet, but it's already close to perfect. At the very least, Ouroboros won't dare act rashly anymore."
Beside him, Asura, a senior executive of Ouroboros, nodded in agreement. Down in the lower layers, killing a Freak was genuinely troublesome. Until they figured out Ryo's true depth, Ouroboros wouldn't move lightly.
Noticing Asura's reaction, Ryo gave her a subtle look, then continued.
"As for the ransom…"
At that point, Ryo's smile deepened slightly, "Zeus should already know by now."
.
.
.