Machaon opened his mouth to speak, but the goddess never gave him a chance.

A wave of force crashed into him from seemingly nowhere, slamming him against the nearest wall with enough power to shatter his arm and several ribs. The invisible attack knocked the air out of his lungs, causing him to vomit it out along with a mouthful of blood.

Athena wasn’t done, however.

Before Machaon even managed to fall out of the human-shaped impression on the cracked wall, another blow struck from above with the weight of a carriage, peeling him right out of the hole. It sent him face-first onto the ground, crushing his nose and knocking out several teeth.

Suffice to say, finding himself at the deity’s mercy was quite a humiliating experience for Machaon. At the very least, he couldn’t recall the last time he’d been treated like this. Perhaps, one of his seniors might have tried to discipline him in his youth, thousands of years ago, but never this brutally. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do but shield his body with his domain and try to minimize the damage to his internal organs.

It wasn’t until several minutes later that Athena decided to stop.

Machaon’s whole body hurt. Even an expert healer would need days to fix everything. Weeks, maybe, due to his higher grade, though his stronger physique hadn’t helped much during the beatdown.

Unable to stand on his broken legs, Machaon propped himself up with his willpower, staring back at the goddess defiantly. As much as he despised being in a position of weakness, in a strange way, experiencing first-hand the power of the Concept realm had only reinforced his opinion that everything he’d done had been worth it.

Machaon wanted this – more than anything. Even though his previous plan to reach godhood had failed spectacularly, he’d rather get reduced to a pile of mincemeat than resign himself to a mortal’s fate.

“I… want t-to… speak to… your… mother,” he said with difficulty, his voice coming out broken and weak as his body trembled under the effort.

Athena clicked her tongue. “Again with the demands? Do you think that you’re in any position to get your way? You’re lucky you’d die if I pushed you further.”

Machaon chuckled – or tried to – though only a choked gurgle came out. “That’s right… you… need me alive… don’t you? …That’s exactly why… Phoebe’s going to… want to… hear me out.”

The goddess sighed, saying nothing else. She lifted her hand to the side, a river of thick, crimson mana gushing out of her palm. It landed on a spot a few metres away from the Starry Princess, spinning into a small cyclone about as tall and twice as wide as a person. The mana rotated faster and faster as Athena added more, eventually turning into the figure of a woman.

Machaon had never met the titaness in person, though he’d seen statues and illustrations of her more times than he could count, so he recognized her immediately. Her temporary form was ultimately just a blob of mind mana supplied by her daughter – whom Phoebe resembled greatly – yet that did very little to detract from her otherworldly beauty. He had to remind himself that the young-looking women – both of them – were hundreds of times older than even he was.

“I see that Athena has failed to control her temper,” Phoebe said upon regarding his injuries. “I suppose that it’s understandable, given the fact that she’s had to bottle her anger up for months… as have I. I would apologize on her behalf but, frankly, I fully condone her actions. If anything, you got off easy.”

“I… don’t care… what you think,” Machaon grunted before breaking into a coughing fit.

Hearing him struggle to form a coherent sentence, Phoebe gave her daughter a slight nod, prompting her to toss him a few gemstone vials. Machaon examined the green fluid swirling inside the expensive containers with his Mana Sense, noting that the potions were of the Green grade.

The irony of being offered the resources that had only been made possible by his greatest enemy wasn’t lost on Machaon, but he didn’t hesitate. Uncorking all six of the small bottles, he gulped down the healing potions one after the other. A wave of vitality rushed out of his stomach to flood the rest of his body.

Separated by a whopping three grades, there was only so much that a handful of doses could do, but he guessed that it would be enough to mend some of the damage to his throat and let him speak more easily. Clearly, this was also Phoebe’s intention.

“For the record, I don’t regret anything,” Machaon said as soon as he was able to. “It’s easy for you to judge me. You’re both Green-borns – you don’t know what it’s like to be cursed without a path to divinity.”

“Cry me a river,” Athena said, jumping back into the conversation. “I might feel bad for any other mortal saying that, but I don’t have a shred of empathy towards you. Do you honestly think that the ambitions of a single person could ever justify the level of destruction you were about to unleash onto our world?”

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Machaon shrugged. “Had there been a way for me to help every Yellow-born on Remior reach the Clear grade, I would have chosen that. But there wasn’t. There was only enough royal jelly for me, so I took it. That’s all there is to it. I just wish I had delayed stealing the egg by a few more decades, since the emergence of the Aurora Dew would have changed everything.”

“You’re beyond fixing, Machaon,” Phoebe said with a shake of her head. “What do you want? I hadn’t expected my daughter’s illusion to fool you forever, but you should have just played along and enjoyed the few years you have left.”

Machaon spat another mouthful of blood and phlegm next to his foot. “Fuck that.”

His response caused Phoebe to raise an eyebrow. Athena looked like she was about to start torturing him again, but the titaness lifted her hand to stop her. Ignoring the divine duo, Machaon continued.

“Let’s skip the nonsense, shall we? We all know why you’ve kept me alive. You just want to turn me into your boy’s latest punching bag – a step-up after Deimos.”

“So what?” Phoebe asked. “Do you think you get a vote?”

He smirked. “Don’t I? I doubt that I’ll make for much of a challenge if I just sit back and let Percy kill me.”

The titaness creased her brow. “Are you seriously threatening to commit suicide… to blackmail me into sparing your life?”

A pang of laughter escaped Machaon’s lips. It was just as ridiculous as it sounded, but this was the only path to salvation that he’d managed to come up with after pondering over the issue for the past couple of years. Everyone on Remior wanted him dead, but he was still valuable as a suitable opponent for Phoebe’s prodigy to fight against.

“All I want is a chance,” he clarified. “Pardon my crimes and promise not to send anyone from the Order or take direct action against me. We both know that Percy will come after me anyway, and I’m sure that you’re confident in his victory, so it shouldn’t make a difference to you. Either way, I’ll die.”

“You clearly think otherwise,” Phoebe pointed out.

“That’s my business. More importantly, I’ll make for a better challenge if I’m fighting towards something – otherwise, why would I even bother to resist? Just to get executed by you on the off chance I win?”

Phoebe remained silent for a few seconds, seemingly considering his request.

“Have it your way. I won’t stop you from attacking Percy or even his House, but you’re not allowed to get anyone with the Clone bloodline killed,” the titaness eventually replied. “I’m not planning to pressure Percy into having children anytime soon, but his relatives with the bloodline are now priceless assets.”

Machaon raised an eyebrow.

“His grandfather is a two-cored Violet with a rare affinity, a powerful bloodline and – if rumours are to be believed – the same boosting spell that allows the boy to fight above his grade. That makes him almost as strong as me. How am I supposed to even get

to Percy if I’m not allowed to kill Archibald?”

“That’s your problem. Find a way around it,” Phoebe replied, not leaving any room for debate. “I’ve already given you infinitely more than you deserve. If it hadn’t been for Percy, I would have killed you years ago.”

‘If it wasn’t for him, you would have never learned about the Starry Princess,’ Machaon thought, but kept that to himself.

Phoebe left without saying anything else, her avatar scattering into a swarm of fading motes. Athena didn’t seem to have any interest in talking to him either, though she stayed in the room. Her instructions were clearly to remain with the oversized bug, to ensure its wellbeing – and maybe to give Percy’s latest minion a chance to grow by having the hive to herself.

Machaon found the deity’s blind obedience to Phoebe amusing. As a goddess, Athena was powerful enough to do whatever she wanted, yet she was willing to spend years babysitting a beast inside a dark cave, just because her mother wished to pit a couple of mortals against one another.

‘Pathetic,’ he thought, limping out of the room. Every step hurt, but a bright grin still spread over his face – or well… a rather patchy one, due to all the missing teeth.

This hadn’t been a pleasant encounter in the slightest, but Machaon had succeeded!

Sure, the titaness might have lied about her willingness to spare him, but his only option was to trust her. It wasn’t like he was new to gambling. His original plan to reach the Clear grade via royal jelly hadn’t exactly been guaranteed to work either.

Even if Phoebe intended to honour her word, there was one final obstacle threatening Machaon’s survival: Percival Avalon.

As strong as the Red-born was, Machaon knew that he held the advantage for now. In theory, he could go after Percy whenever he wanted, crushing him like a bug before he had the chance to grow more powerful.

The problem was that the boy was protected. Machaon might have managed to steal a royal egg from the hive, but sneaking past the wasps had been much easier than it would be to fight his way through the army of Blue beasts to get to their ruler. Not to mention that every mage in the Alchemists’ Guild would also jump to Percy’s aid.

Another option was to try to get to the crow while it was still separated from its master. At least that way, Machaon would greatly weaken his opponent. For now, Machaon was still probably stronger than Archibald – strong enough to win without killing him – and House Asclepius would easily crush House Avalon.

Unfortunately, there was a good chance that several smaller families would get involved, and Machaon couldn’t fight the whole planet by himself. Especially if House Etna also stood against him.

‘I need to prepare,’ he reminded himself, having already given this part of the plan a lot of thought.

Machaon needed power and allies. Ideally, it would be nice if he could also find a way to disentangle the hive’s future from Percy’s survival, so that the other nobles wouldn’t be as eager to help the boy. Fortunately, Machaon had a pretty good idea how to get his hands on each of those things.

However, he also needed to hurry the hell up. At the rate his opponent was growing, Machaon’s window to act was shrinking by the day.

‘Ten years,’ he decided. ‘I’ll have everything ready by then. It’ll probably be several times longer than that before he’s strong enough to be beyond reach, but it’s best not to cut it too close.’

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep