I am Thalos, Odin's older brother

Chapter 506: Destined Destruction

"Impossible—" Zeus blanched in shock.

In his view, the \\[Space] office, which could cross physical bounds, was already outrageous.

He simply couldn't imagine Thalos could overlay his own space atop Zeus's space.

Didn't that mean Thalos's spatial ability surpassed Zeus's?

The discovery made Zeus's very soul tremble.

In many things, gods and men are no different—both cannot do what lies beyond the limits of their imagination.

In an ultimate duel with an entire world as the stake, such a realization crushed morale even harder. If not for the pride of a God-Emperor and the knowledge that Thalos would never spare him, Zeus might have already lost the courage to attack.

"Impossible! Absolutely impossible!"

Zeus drove the "Thousand-Armed Giant" in a futile charge at Thalos.

At a pace of one step per second—each step three hundred meters—this was, to mortals, no different than a mountain slamming into their faces, the oppressive force of that extreme violence unmatched.

Very soon, Zeus discovered bitterly that no matter how he charged or unleashed thunder, he couldn't touch Thalos in the slightest—he couldn't even brush his divine shield.

Seemingly within reach, actually worlds away!

Under the chain impacts of multiple World-Swords, that unattainable distance made Zeus's heart sink like a stone.

"How… how can this be?"

As if that weren't enough, as he drove forward, Zeus suddenly found his body heavy.

It felt as if the entire Olympus range had turned into a gluey mire, clamping his giant's legs fast.

Slowed?

Sluggish?

No—why would I be caught by such low-grade, petty arts?

Zeus quickly perceived that not only were the blades and swords in all those little arms across the giant's chest and belly slowing, not only those hundreds of ferocious heads, but even the eyeballs in his own divine body were tracking more slowly.

In that moment, Zeus finally realized this wasn't some third-rate trick—it was the exceedingly rare \\[Time] office.

"You… how… do… you… have… \\[Time]?"

As Zeus's movements and voice were stretched at will by \\[Time] in that local space, his words sounded ridiculous, like a stammer.

That absurd sight of Zeus fell into the eyes of the goddesses in Asgard's Golden Palace. For no reason, a blush rose on Artemis's face. Unluckily for her, one hand on her slightly rounded belly, she remembered the moment she had been subdued by Thalos:

the proud huntress goddess reduced to prey, not only slain and reversed upon, but to bear a descendant for the conqueror. What humiliation… that's how Olympus's historians would likely write it.

Now, though, as long as you weren't blind, you could see the outcome was decided.

History is always written by the victors.

If it were an Aesir historian, of course it would read, "The pure virgin goddess Artemis was moved by His Majesty God-Emperor Thalos's greatness, willingly offered herself, and bore His Majesty a divine son."

Who the victor is—matters immensely!

"No! No! No—" Zeus's divine roar reverberated again and again within that bounded theater of war.

Every head of the Thousand-Armed Giant he controlled howled; every pair of arms thrashed.

He stoked chaotic energy, using chaos to scramble order—his only viable response left.

Pushing chaos beyond its limits even gave some of the giant's heads power comparable to subordinate gods.

Another god would likely have been disrupted by so many arms brimming with chaos might.

Too bad for him, his foe was Thalos Borson—the greatest, most powerful deity among the Aesir and in this entire chaotic cosmos.

"Sigh!" Thalos's soft breath carried into Zeus's heart—and over the World Tree's root curtain, into the ears of every deity locked in battle: "Zeus, I must tell you a fact: from the moment your Olympian pantheon was set as the final foe, you had no hope of victory."

"Why?" Zeus blurted.

"Your might and your arts hold no secrets from me. You know nothing of mine." Thalos's words were the final judgment pronounced on Zeus: "You and your Olympian pantheon—no matter how many times you begin again—your end will always be… annihilation!"

Fate?

Isn't fate supposed to be a phantasm?

Zeus's first instinct was disbelief.

After all, his own Three Fates had said nothing of his end.

The Three Fates—children of Zeus and the goddess of justice Themis—bore the charge of governing the destinies of all things. Even a god-king dreaded the power of the trio—Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos.

The only thing the three had ever said was, "Outer gods lie beyond our sight of fate."

But why?

Before Zeus could react, Thalos projected to him—and to every Olympian still fighting—their destiny.

In truth, Thalos was swapping concepts, casting images of ruins from the modern Hellenic Republic on Earth.

In the seas of spirit of the gods, they felt the clips vividly: toppled gates and broken walls everywhere, temples reduced to rubble, throngs of mortals who clearly weren't ancient Greeks pointing and laughing loudly atop sanctuaries that should have been sacred and solemn. Any temple would forbid mortals from such "desecration." And yet there was not a flicker of divine power left in those halls, confirming their dread—the future locked by fate had the Olympian pantheon already extinct!

The Olympians longed to curse, to stand and debate Thalos for seven days and nights to prove Olympus had not been destroyed.

They did not!

They dared not!

Simple: this was the Aesir God-Emperor Thalos displaying "the future," "prophecy," and \\[Fate]!

If they were people of the Celestial Empire—staunch materialists—they could of course scoff at such images.

The pity was, they were true gods; there was no one more "prophet" than they.

If \\[Fate] decreed that the Olympians must perish, what right had they—already at an absolute disadvantage—to defy fate?!

Even the three goddesses and Apollo, who had already yielded to Thalos, felt a twinge of luck—thank goodness they'd bowed early, or wouldn't they be falling with the rest?

They had dodged a calamity, but those still within the "tribulation" felt wretched.

"No! I don't want to fall! I—I surrender!" In their various isolated pockets, some Olympians, unable to bear the terror of a fate set in stone, began to fold.

Only for their weakness to draw merciless mockery and refusal from the Aesir opposite: "Apologies! In the name of the former Dagon god-king Amma, I must refuse your surrender!"

______

(≧◡≦) ♡ Support me and read 20 chapters ahead – patreon.com/Mutter

For every 50 Power Stones, one extra chapter will be released on Saturday.