303 Tour to the Edge of Heaven (1/2)
With a lot of convincing, Zero was finally allowed to visit Titan Cliff. Isis, Merlin, Buddha and Hades will accompany the young doctor to the edge of Titan Cliff. However, it was agreed with great reluctance from Hades' part. He had basically no say when Isis put her foot down and told them that Zero was going. The God of Death didn't know what Zero told the Goddess of Time but the teen had somehow managed to successfully convince the most stubborn goddesses that existed. Hades couldn't stop her even if he wanted to. With Isis' power over time, there wasn't much Hades could do against her.
Zero felt bad for the worried grim reaper but he assured Hades that he would be careful. Hades was uncertain but still decided to trust Zero and Isis. Titan Cliff was literally the edge of Heaven where the plane broke. It was not repaired due to the strong force that sucked everything that came close to the edge away into the void. Every day, the plane grows smaller as bits of it were lost to the void. The mana that Heaven could produce couldn't keep up with the amount of chaos energy that attacked it. As a result, the crack grew wider and the plane grew weaker.
Zero could feel the chaos energy's pressure as they stopped at the winged carriage station at the foot of Titan Cliff. There was still a good distance to cover before they arrived at the broken mountain but the pressure was so strong even if Zero was still far from his destination. The chaos energy's effects of making him drowsy could immediately be felt and the teen stumbled out of the winged carriage into Merlin's arms.
\”Zero! What's wrong?\”
The young doctor shook his head to get rid of the sleepiness and tried to keep his eyes open but he felt very dizzy. \”Sleepy...\”
Almost immediately, Buddha and Merlin started working on maintaining a mana and qi barrier around the small tour group. It still took a while before Zero was able to go back to normal. During that time when he was still zoning in and out of slumberland, Hades carried him on his back. Isis led the group and watched out for any potential threats, ready to freeze time and unwind it to get everyone to safety if the situation required.
Zero felt the blood rushing in his vessel and a strange thumping in his chest. Something else ran through his existence and hummed in resonance with the void. The pull was so great that Zero felt twitchy. It was hard trying not to run towards the edge of the cliff and throwing himself off it. Was this how others felt when they were near him? Zero knew that the Demon Lords were enticed towards his existence when he wasn't in his vessel. Baal said so.
The cliff was bigger than Zero thought it would be. According to Isis who was giving them a short history lesson about the cliff, Titan Cliff used to be where the Titans like Zeus, Athena, Poseiden and Eros resided in before the war with Hell happened.
\”Is Gaia also a Titan?\” Zero asked.
Zero looked at the tall cliff. \”Mount Olympia... were you sad when your home was destroyed?\”
Hades blinked. \”My home isn't on this mountain. My siblings, nieces and nephews all lived here but I was in Tartarus back then. It was the office that Kerberos was left in. Back then, Hell was still part of Heaven. I just happened to move out of the home to focus better on my work. It's often very noisy with so many people arguing every day.\”
For some reason, Zero couldn't find it in himself to be angry. He could imagine the level of chaos with gods who acted like immature children running around and causing destruction on a daily basis. Zeus' character was a very good guideline for what kind of chaos there would be in the Mount Olympia Titan household. If every single Titan was like him, Zero would have done the same thing Hades did.
As Hades told Zero stories about the old days, Merlin and Buddha were increasing the strength of their barrier. Isis never let down her guard and became more vigilant as they approached the peak. The wind was strong and cold nearing the edge of Heaven but Zero was wearing clothes with enchantments for temperature regulating so he didn't feel it. The others had their individual ways of coping with it too so nobody really mined it.
The cliff was a rocky edge and Zero was slightly disappointed that there were no ruins of the old civilisation of Titans for him to see at the top of the broken mountain.
\”Don't go too close to the edge, it isn't stable,\” Isis warned and Zero nodded.
Merlin held his student's hand and slowly led him closer to the edge so that they could witness the void. Hades grew serious and no longer spoke. He activated his power and altered the permissions for the first three barriers so that the two magicians can pass through.
As Zero leaned in to take a look at the void, the image that greeted him was nothing like he'd imagined it to be. In truth, Zero was expecting to see a big gaping hole that led into a pit of black that would suck the soul out of anyone who laid eyes on it. In reality, the crack reminded him of the Trigression Falls.
Although Mount Olympia was broken, it continued to rain debris into the strong pull of that vortex at the bottom. Stranger yet, there were countless threads from the broken mountain that tangled with each other and held strong even if they were getting pulled into the vortex of the void. There were dense clouds at the bottom that made it hard to see where the threads were leading to but Zero had an idea of what it was doing. The dense clouds collided with each other at the base of the broken cliff with a ferocity that created storms. The storms shook the cliff and caused more debris to fall into the void each time.