302 Meeting at the House of Great Gods (1/2)
The Goddesses offered all sorts of treats from tea to biscuit when they saw Zero. Standing beside the teen, Merlin suddenly felt very insignificant. Nobody gave him a glance in his direction and compared to the young doctor who was speaking to them casually, the God of Magic was no fool. He could never hope to achieve that level of intimacy with the Great Gods that Zero enjoyed.
\”It's good to see you again,\” Gaia smiled. \”Have you been doing well?\”
Freya gave Merlin a side glance and asked if Zero's training was tough. The Goddess of Beauty and War wasn't joking about her threat to Merlin. If he tried to do the same thing he did with Truen and overwhelmed Zero, she would smite Arabesque.
Zero laughed and assured them that he was doing very well. He took pity on Merlin who was as pale as a sheet. Once they were settled down, Zero brought the topic for the meeting up so that his teacher could breathe a little.
\”I came here today to ask for permission to access some restricted areas in Heaven.\”
Hades was silent and Freya sighed, Gaia and Isis already had their answers and smiled.
\”I cannot allow you to visit Valhalla yet,\” Freya told Zero. \”The Gorgons aren't ordinary people. If you don't have your grimoire yet and charm for protection against their eyes, you will be petrified upon sight. It's the same as the basilisks' curse where you get turned to stone.\”
Hades also rejected Zero's request.
\”Titan Cliff is too dangerous for you to visit. I suggest you have the grimoire ready before you head there.\”
Zero frowned. He could understand Freya's concerns and agreed that it should wait until he was better prepared to deal with the Gorgons. However, Titan Cliff was one place he had to see. Without knowing the extent of the damage, Zero didn't dare to proceed with his grimoire. After all, grimoires are bound for life. There is no upgrading of a grimoire once it has been created no matter how powerful Zero becomes in future.
\”I can understand Freya's concern however, I cannot accept Hades' terms. The reason why I need to visit Titan Cliff is to access the damage done to the plane and help Merlin create a design to repair the plane. However, there is a more major reason why the visit is important. I need to understand the powers of chaos magic and how they react before I create my grimoire.\”
Hades looked confused and Merlin chose to step in at this moment to help his student sound more convincing.
\”Zero intends to create his grimoire out of the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life to act as not only a weapon but a shield. While it is a weapon that can rival the power of creation, Zero needs a shield against chaos magic in the void. He had a run-in with the fragments of the Great One not too long ago after he gained his Parallel Minds after the Mind's Eye system's administrator was changed to him.\”
Zero took a look at Merlin and hesitated. There were some things he told Buddha but left out for Merlin because he didn't know if it would be wise to tell Merlin about Solo's intentions. Freya and Isis noticed the conflicted look and exchanged a glance.
Merlin was soon led away by Freya who demanded to know Zero's academic progress and if he had been ill-treated in Arabesque. At the same time, Merlin decided to talk about the array to seal the crack at Titan Cliff with Hades. Isis pulled Zero to the side so that they had some privacy to talk.
\”What's going on?\” she asked.
Zero frowned and told her everything from how he was made Mind's Eye's administrator back at Trigression Falls. He told Isis about how he added new assistants to help him out and the Parallel Mind assistant that the system created. Wii's hostage situation when Solo who was being rejected by Mind's Eye made Isis' lips thin. Zero explained how he had an argument of sorts with Solo and how Swift gave him a letter from Shittomi indicating that Solo might still be around.
\”I suspect that there will be a day when Solo and I will meet and have to fight it out. I cannot say what Solo wants to do but from the actions he has been taking against me, I am eighty percent confident that he wants to push me into destroying everything that he has created.\”
Isis didn't say anything. There was a great storm in her eyes and the Goddess of Time sighed heavily. \”Zero, what will you do if this meeting with Solo happens?\”
The young doctor grinned. \”I will find a way to win him over without harming him. The power of absorption permanently removes something from this cycle and keeps it in the part of the void that I control. I don't want to do that to Solo. However, Solo will try to seal me away again. The chaos energy is definitely something Solo created to use against me. Steve and Merlin tested it in small amounts the other day as I assisted them. I can be certain that this chaos energy is what kept me sleeping for so many years in the void. If Null did not come along and blast it away from me, I might never have woken up fully. To counter this, I will need a shield. The grimoire I create will be that shield and recreation magic will be used to counter Solo's power of creation.\”
The Goddess of Time looked troubled at the revelation. As the keeper of the restricted library, she knew some things that not even the other Great Gods were aware of. In another branch of the same timeline, Zero said that he would defeat Solo and assimilate together so that they would be one again. A different Zero said that they would not fight Solo and instead will find a way to return back in time to the point where they could stop Solo from committing those mistakes. There was even a few version of Zero who claimed that they would commit mutual suicide with Solo and end the entire cycle of existence. However, none of those versions of Zero said the thing that Zero was telling her right now.
Could this be the Zero that will succeed instead? All those times when time had to be rewound because of a bad ending made Isis rather jaded. Gaia, Sedna, Zeus and all the Gods fell in those timelines. Isis was always the last one standing with Nel by her side. They would rewind back time over and over again, trying different ways to find a different ending.