The Hero Returns

* * *

Bang, ka-boom—!

Cruuuunch, whoosh—

Su-hyeun no longer fought long range. He instead actively closed in and ceaselessly pressured Ares.

If the latter raised the shield to block, Su-hyeun would mercilessly pound on it, and when an opening presented itself, his hand shot out to grab Ares' arm before throwing the God of War and Destruction around like a rag doll.

Slam—!

"Kuh," Ares could only grunt softly after he crashed to the floor.

It felt like every bone in his body was screaming in pain. Even then, he wasn't given time to stew in his stupefaction.

Crouuuuk—!

Su-hyeun's sword roughly scratched the floor, and Ares urgently rolled his body to the side to get out of the way. However, right at the last second, fierce flames exploded from below.

Ka-boom—!

Hiss, sizzle, crackle—

Ares' figure became airborne; after rolling on the ground, he kicked the floor beneath him to quickly jump up.

"Rain down!" Almost at the same time, countless spears suddenly floated in the air above the Temple of War Declaration. They were the same type of spears that Ares used to throw around.

He then assumed the spear-throwing posture despite not wielding any spear, and when he finished getting ready...

Fwhooooooosh—!

All those countless spears spread out in the sky above rapidly descended to the ground.

Stab, staaab, bang—!

Stab, puk, bang—

However, the tens of thousands of spears that rained down were easily blocked off by pure-white clouds.

"Dammit—!"

Ares' fluster didn't last for long.

Whooooosh—!

Storm winds blowing up from below threw Ares off balance, causing him to stagger greatly in the air.

Swhoooosh—

Ares' figure spun around as he continued to be pushed up farther in the air. Powerful and razor-sharp wind pressure nicked and wounded him all over, but he still tried to minimize the damage to him by getting into a fetal position.

Pazzzzzzik—

Su-hyeun watched all this unfold and then generated a Thunderbolt that boasted a far greater destructive power than any others that came before.

"With this, it's over," eyes gleaming sharply, he assumed the spear-throwing posture.

FLASH—!

And so, just as a streak of lightning spear left his hand while flashing blindingly...

RUMBLE—!

A similar type of light accompanied by a thunderous roar flashed powerfully from a completely different direction.

Rumble, kurururururu...

The Thunderbolt was disintegrated in the middle of its flight.

In the meantime, Ares, being helplessly buffeted around by the winds, was wielding a massive spear that reached at least four meters in length. However, he wasn't moving an inch.

More correctly, he couldn't even if he wanted to. The same thing applied to Su-hyeun as well.

"Let's end this battle here, shall we?"

"Oh," Ares lowered the hand that held that huge spear and mouthed a word with some difficulty, "Father?"

"If it's Ares' father, then…" Su-hyeun thought as his gaze quickly shifted over to an old man with radiant golden locks who had suddenly appeared in the air over the Temple. "Zeus?"

He ended up inadvertently blurting that name out aloud.

Zeus's gaze landed on Su-hyeun next upon hearing his voice. The latter was jolted awake from surprise and then, while clamping his mouth shut in a fluster, bowed his head slightly.

Zeus, the head god of Olympus and one of the strongest gods in existence, the father of all the gods as well as mortals below, the god of the skies—these were among the many flashy and majestic titles that best described what kind of god he was. However, the ranks of gods including Su-hyeun knew of another title to refer to him as, a more awe-inspiring title.

Zeus was none other than the god among the Five Godly Sages—one of the five strongest and mightiest gods in all of the realms out there.

"My apologies, but our greetings will have to be delayed for a little while," Zeus smiled rather warmly. His smile was quite blinding, despite him not even emitting any light.

Ares hurriedly went down on his knees and deeply bowed his head in Zeus's direction, "Father, what brings you to this—?"

"I have to say, I've been treated to quite an entertaining spectacle, a first in a long while," Zeus replied as he locked his gaze on Ares below. "You have lost this one, Ares."

"Father! But that—"

"I'm sure you want to say that you haven't lost yet. You still have your Giant Spear, after all."

Ares maintained his silence as he faltered from Zeus's scrutiny.

From the sound of it, Zeus must have been watching the battle for a long while.

"If you two continued, then one of you would have died today, and that would have been you, Ares." Zeus turned his head and asked the seemingly empty air, "Isn't that right, son?"

"Yes, most likely so."

Ruuumble—

That was when Apollo revealed himself between Su-hyeun and Ares. He had been getting ready to intervene just in case the battle reached its climax.

His eyes were peering into a future not too far ahead. His Insight was acknowledged to be not any worse than the Five Godly Sages. Rather, his was actually better than theirs at this point.

He might have been the God of Fire, but he was also known as the God of Prophecies.

"Did I really lose, father?" Ares asked, and Zeus nodded without hesitation. The God of War and Destruction pondered this for a moment and then also began nodding, "I see."

His boiling excitement instantly cooled down. Ares calmly analyzed his situation from earlier and then stored the huge spear in his hand away.

He then walked over to Su-hyeun and extended his hand, "That was fun."

"I also learned a thing or two from you today," Su-hyeun held that offered hand and shook it.

After they shook hands, Ares patted Su-hyeun on the shoulder, "If it's possible, let's have another round before you depart from Olympus. The thing is, calling it a finished business with my defeat leaves a rather sour taste in my mouth."

"Well, that..." Su-hyeun briefly faltered but simply nodded after seeing Ares' expression, "Very well. Understood."

"As I thought, you're a cool dude," Ares grinned in contentment and then turned around to leave. Accompanied by the four gods working as his underlings, he soon left the Temple of War Declaration.

And so, only Su-hyeun, Zeus, Apollo, and Hades remained.

"Now that I think about it, this is my first time meeting my son's benefactor, isn't it?" With the situation now having calmed down a bit, Zeus finally began greeting Su-hyeun properly, "Nice to meet you. I'm Zeus, father of Hercules."

He introduced himself and bowed his head in a dignified manner.

A god among the Five Godly Sages was actually lowering his head? Su-hyeun jumped in surprise and bowed his head even deeper to greet back.

He was genuinely getting flustered here. By a lot, too.

The "Zeus" from Su-hyeun's imagination was nothing like this. But that's because Zeus from the Greek myths was a bit of a libertine, so to speak. He was known to be a lustful playboy that went after any pretty woman and was as far from being dignified as humanly possible.

Of course, not all gods behaved in the same manner as described in various myths. Even then, the behavior of this Zeus was quite far removed from all the gods Su-hyeun had encountered so far.

"My name is Kim Su-hyeun."

"Yes, I'm aware. You may not know this, but I've been watching you for quite a while, benefactor."

"When you say you've been watching me—?"

"Aren't you the benefactor who saved my son, Hercules? I've always been grateful for your actions," Zeus replied and began chuckling affably all by himself.

It was almost as if he was a good-natured neighborhood grandpa. If said grandpa was a totally ripped and hulking dude with radiant golden locks, that was.

"Rather than being majestic as a god ranked as one of the Five Godly Sages, he was…friendly," he thought.

And that was why it felt so weird right now.

Zeus gave off a truly dangerous vibe.

"You don't need to be frightened, you know."

Shudder—

Su-hyeun's brows shot up when Zeus calmly said those words.

This feeling he was getting...It was rather similar to back when he first encountered the Bull Demon King.

"At the very least, I won't harm my son's benefactor."

"Understood," Su-hyeun replied with some difficulty and let out a long sigh.

He only belatedly realized how nervous and tense he was—nervous at this old man standing before his eyes with an affable expression.

"Now then, shall we change the venue?" Zeus grinned contentedly and turned around. His figure smoothly glided up in the air next. "Please allow me to guide you to the palace."

* * *

The Palace of Olympus was the place where numerous gods gathered. However, not just any god could freely waltz in as they pleased. Only those who directly inherited Zeus's blood or had some mixed blood in their veins were allowed to enter here.

Su-hyeun parted ways with Hades and Apollo because Zeus wished to speak to Su-hyeun privately.

Since one of the purposes of visiting Olympus was to have an audience with Zeus, Su-hyeun had no problem agreeing to that offer.

"Hercules is doing well. After that day's event had come and gone, he's still doing his best to stop the Giants. His impatience has vanished now, and he has taken another step closer to becoming a complete god," Zeus continued to speak, but most of what he talked about were stuff related to Hercules. "Although things were awkward for a while, his family has grown close again. Even my grandchildren have both grown up a lot now. They already reached the age of..."

He went on about the topics related to Hercules for a while but then suddenly stopped himself and made a slightly sheepish face, "Did I sound too much like an idiot father just now?"

"N—no, not at all," Su-hyeun ended up inadvertently smiling faintly. He actually preferred this, a lot more so than a god trying to put on some airs and looking dignified.

While chatting away, they finally reached the Palace of Olympus.

"It's really huge," said Su-hyeun.

The Palace was as big as a small city. The tallest part of the structure reached the heavens, while its garden was basically a dense forest.

Su-hyeun was sure he had never witnessed a palace as big or as beautiful as this one before in his life.

"You see, the beings called gods hate the idea of doing things in small quantities. They want to make it bigger and then make it even bigger than before."

"Did the gods come together to build this palace?"

"No, but I heard that gods far more ancient than myself have constructed it. Even I'm not privy to all the details, but..."

Was he not keen on speaking the truth, or did he really not know?

Su-hyeun became ever so slightly curious but decided not to pry. It wasn't a topic that he simply had to get to the bottom of, anyway.

Zeus continued, "I heard that you wished to acquire Hephaestus' hammer."

"Yes. That's why we had that wager."

"And that's why you fought Ares earlier. Since you achieved victory, I shall inform Hephaestus. Also..." As the two walked down the corridor of the impressive palace, a grin appeared on Zeus's face, "I'd like to give you a small gift in my personal capacity."

"A gift?"

"Yes. It's a token of my gratitude for saving Hercules. Please, do not be troubled and accept it."

There was a reason why Zeus brought Su-hyeun to the palace, but to think that reason was about a gift...

"I guess I should be happy about this," Su-hyeun thought.

First, Hephaestus' hammer and then a gift from Zeus himself.

Su-hyeun couldn't even guess what kind of gift it would be, but there was no way it would be something simple or plain. For instance, the glove he wore over his left hand was an item that contained Zeus's power.

He quietly followed after Zeus into the palace while mulling over such things.

The interior of the palace was as complicated as a maze. The ceiling was tall, and countless rooms and chambered existed inside; doors leading deeper inside automatically opened whenever Zeus got close to one.

They walked for a while like that, and when they finally arrived at the central part of the palace...

Creeeeak—

The biggest golden door they had run into opened up automatically with a heavy noise.

"Isn't that a well?" Su-hyeun muttered softly while taking in the sight beyond the doorway.

It happened to be a huge space.

Unlike a normal room, though, not a single piece of furniture could be seen inside. The only thing in it was a massive well at least dozens of meters in diameter smack bang in the middle of the chamber.

As for the water found inside, it was surprisingly clean and pristine, especially considering it was an unmoving body of water indoors. He peeked his head past the edges and looked at his own reflection; it was as if he was staring at a massive mirror.

"The Hero and Taoist God," a couple of familiar terms came out of Zeus's lips next. "You possess the 'power' called titles, yes?"

In response, Su-hyeun tore his gaze away from the well's water and looked back at Zeus.

What he said just now made one thing certain: Zeus knew about the existence of the system, as expected.

"In that case, have you heard about the God Title as well?"