Within the world, Heaven, Earth, and Ocean formed a trinity. Now unencumbered by scruple, he struck directly at Ocean and Earth, encroaching on their core authorities.
Pontos, the incarnate embodiment of the sea, was the inland sea; Oceanus was the encircling great current. Each governed different conceptual laws of water.
Now Kronos intercepted part of the encircling current's conversion—where the void turned to substance—and he created an outer sea that upheld the earth, drawing the authority over water into his own hands.
This move not only openly contested the domains of Pontos and Oceanus, it was also a warning to Pontos and a slap at Oceanus, with whom his relations had long been cool (near-hostile).
As for earthquakes, this further constrained the Mother of All, Gaia.
He slapped at Oceanus because Oceanus had married his own daughter, Clymene, to the God-King's staunch ally, Iapetus the Weaver of Death—something that displeased Kronos.
He slapped at Pontos because Pontos had directly married off his eldest daughter, Eurybia, to Crius, the cosmic framework.
Eurybia, begotten by Pontos together with the Earth, was a powerful Titaness, Pontos's firstborn, the distilled essence of earth and the inland sea, representing vast strength within the world.
Her power was exceedingly formidable, no lesser than that of the primordial Titans; otherwise, Crius would never have accepted the match.
At the time, with centralization not yet complete, Kronos had nothing to say about this marriage—everyone was acting aboveboard, and he had no grounds to interfere.
Pontos did it for self-preservation, seeking allies amid the strife of the gods.
The twelve Titans each had marriages; as an "outer god," Pontos had trod gingerly within the new order.
Especially as Kronos grew ever more greedy and cruel, Pontos grew more fearful, and so actively sought marriages with the Titan great-gods to find protection.
As the inland sea, he was not a violent type by nature; his temperament was relatively mild. But when the tree longs to be still, the wind will not cease—in the face of the greedy God-King, he could not keep himself untouched.
To possess the great authority of the sea—in the God-King's eyes—was original sin.
After Kronos's one-stone-many-birds maneuver, Pontos dared not voice any objection; yet fear and anger already flooded his heart.
Only that much, however—rebellion was absolutely out of the question.
For the moment Kronos went no further. Though he had grown more brutal, he remained rational; his methods grew more seasoned. He did not press Pontos to destruction; he measured his steps just so, maintaining a delicate balance.
Pontos could at best protect himself. He did not wish, for such a small matter, to offend Crius; that would hardly be worth it.
The gods too truly had no way to deal with Kronos—his sense for "just the right amount" was indeed very good.
But more and more Titans left Mount Othrys, and seldom returned for feasts and gatherings.
And now the Mother of Earth, the Mother Goddess Gaia, was truly beside herself with rage; anger shrouded her heart.
All those earlier things she had endured—only to be met with ever further overreach, god-bullying carried too far!
Encroaching on the authority of earth—she had stomached it; after all, Gaia's essence is the source of all things, matter itself.
But to conjure up a quake-wielding authority—what was he playing at?
Greedy Kronos! Exactly like his father!
It filled her with bone-deep chill and fury.
Equally unable to bear it was Queen Rhea.
After Kronos once again swallowed "the ocean," the Mother Goddess Rhea, pushed beyond endurance, could no longer tolerate Kronos's greed and cruelty.
No mother can endure having all her children swallowed, one after another.
And such a thing would know no end—never-ending!
So she went to seek out the Mother Goddess Gaia—and in their shared anger and hope, the two aligned at once.
Afterward the Mother Goddess Gaia went to find the Night Goddess Nyx.
The three great Mother Goddesses together settled on a plot that would shake the cosmos.
Having gained Gaia's and Nyx's shelter, Rhea—in the God-King's next engendering of a law—did not this time yield everything to Kronos's weaving. With all things seemingly as usual, she added her own will.
With her great authority she stole the control over one of Kronos's own laws within the pattern he was weaving, merged in her own law, and at last engendered her final child—the god who bore hope and the future.
To protect this secret, the Mother Goddess Gaia carefully fashioned a seemingly ordinary little island.
On a certain dark night, the Lady of Night, Nyx, poured out her divine power, veiling all searching gazes in the cosmos, turning that region into absolute darkness and secrecy.
In a hidden cave on that little island, Rhea, weeping, secretly bore this child.
Then she took the great earth law entrusted to her by the Mother—abundance, luxuriance—and condensed that mighty law into a stone. She presented this stone as her newly engendered child to Kronos.
Kronos felt it was not quite what he had envisioned, for this time the law he wished to encroach upon and engender was the Sky.
That symbol of the supreme authority—this was now the only thing he lacked.
For the ever-lofty Heaven that looks down on all—the great Sky-Father Uranus—Kronos had always been filled with yearning and awe for that supreme authority.
His desire to possess it had never slackened, and as time passed, as he grew stronger and more centralized, he only desired it more.
He envied far too much the father's absolute power that stood above all!
He ached to take one more step!
Even so, though he failed now, he did not suspect Rhea. After all, the engendering of laws contained great randomness; one cannot simply have whatever one wishes.
And how mighty a domain the firmament was—success would hardly come so easily. Reasonable enough!
So the God-King thought, self-satisfied.
Besides, with centralization at this level, he had nothing to fear; he considered himself already invincible.
These two laws, in his view, were also extremely powerful and very well suited to himself; he was well pleased and greedily drew them into himself.
Once more he swallowed the newly engendered laws without hesitation—for him, this had become routine.
Watching Kronos still swallowing without pause, the goddess Rhea felt her heart go dead. This time there was no ripple left within her—only endless despair and calm.
This man she had once loved and revered as a great hero—after gaining power, over the long ages—was now a God-King exactly like his father: just as greedy and cruel, pitiless and venomous.
He no longer allowed anyone to defy him, nor would he hear any voice of kindness.
He had learned to do as he pleased—greedy to the extreme, without the least bottom line.
As time passed, the hidden infant on Crete had already grown.
God above gods, King of the gods, Father of all beings, Lord of the cosmos, Lord of Thunder, Supreme Sky-Father, Lord of the Sky, Eternal Heaven-Lord, Sovereign of the Everlasting Kingdom, Holy Savior of living beings, Protector of all creatures, Savior of all existence, Great Liberator, Source of wisdom, Source of power, Creator of life, Giver of wealth, Guardian of order, Master of storm, cloud, and rain, the Most High, Lord of Hosts, the Great Father of fate, the self-existent and ever-existent Time, the one and only omniscient and omnipotent God—Zeus!
His destined, mighty journey of fate—
The curtain rises!
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