"But how did you recognise me in the first place?"

My voice tore out between ragged breaths, each syllable dragging itself past the iron weight in my chest. Muramasa still hissed in my hand, black lightning crawling like a restless beast, its hunger only barely contained. The plaza reeked of charred blood and molten stone, and the corpse of the Minotaur—Ares's avatar—still smoked like an altar left abandoned after a sacrificial rite.

Artemis didn't answer right away. She stared at me with those emerald eyes that could cut marble in half, eyes that had seen mortals beg, kings kneel, and beasts whimper under her bow. But in that instant, her pupils trembled, ever so slightly.

"You… truly don't know," she whispered, as if the words disgusted her for daring to exist.

I tightened my grip on the blade, ignoring the bite of its curse gnawing into my veins. "Then enlighten me. Don't leave me hanging after dropping something like that."

"I was… Sister Lilith."

The name dropped from her lips like an arrow loosed from the bow, sharp and sudden, carrying weight I hadn't expected. Artemis's jaw tightened, her voice both steel and trembling strings. "She saved me once at the lowest stage of my life."

My heart skipped. Lilith. My mother.

The goddess's gaze drifted away from me for the first time since this confrontation began. Her tone became distant, laced with something I couldn't pin down—resentment, memory, and something else buried deeper, rawer.

"When my mother was pregnant with me and my brother Apollo, Queen Hera, in one of her infamous fits of jealousy, forbade the land itself to shelter her. No earth, no isle, no stone would yield to her swollen belly. Hera's cruelty knew no bounds—she even sent Python, that loathsome serpent, to hound her day and night, to torment her with venom and fear while she carried us."

Her voice sharpened suddenly, bitter as frostbite. "I felt that torment. Do you know what it means to be strangled before your lungs ever taste air? To feel your mother's womb shake with terror, her heart quiver with despair? Even unborn, Apollo and I drowned in Hera's malice. Our very birth was cursed."

The silver light around Artemis flared, briefly shuddering as if her composure fractured. But then she caught herself, drew in a breath, and her bow arm steadied again.

"Leto was suffering, hunted, abandoned by the very earth that birthed her. Hera delayed her labor, stretching her pain into an endless twilight. Days bled into nights with no mercy. My mother begged. She wept. She called to the heavens, to the Titans, to the primordial beings themselves—but none would shelter her."

Her gaze snapped back to me, emeralds now burning like a forest fire reflected in glass. "Except her."

I stiffened. "Lilith."

"Yes," Artemis said, her voice lowering into a timbre both reverent and raw. "The primordial sin, the daughter of Lucifer, the rebel who spat in the face of Adam and God alike. She came to my mother—not out of compassion, no, but because she despised Hera's tyranny as much as she despised the order that birthed her. She cloaked Leto, hid her from the serpent Python, and wove a sanctuary in shadows where no Olympian eye could pry. It was Lilith who gave my mother the strength to endure, to birth us upon the floating isle of Delos, where Hera's curse could not root itself."

My pulse thundered in my ears. The image of my mother—distant, untouchable, lost to her demon slumber—flickered in my mind. And here, in front of me, stood a goddess who spoke of her not with disdain, but… something dangerously close to reverence.

"You owe her," I muttered, half statement, half question.

Artemis's lips curled into something like a snarl, but her voice cracked just enough to betray the storm beneath. "I hate debts. I loathe them. But yes—I owe her. My first breath, my first cry, my first heartbeat in this world… they exist because of Lilith. Without her interference, I would have been strangled by Hera's envy before I ever touched this soil."

She stepped closer, and I felt her aura shift—no longer the cold executioner's edge it had been, but something heavier, messier. "That is why I knew you. The moment you drew that cursed blade, the moment your spiritual whatever flared and carved through Ares's avatar, I smelled her in you. That same defiance. That same hatred of chains. You are Lilith's son. The son of the woman who once sheltered me in darkness when even Olympus turned its face away."

Her words should have been condemnation, venom. Instead, they sounded like confession.

But then her eyes narrowed again, emerald cutting through hesitation. "And that is why you disgust me. Because you remind me of a weakness I cannot bear to acknowledge."

I barked a laugh, tasting blood as it dripped down my lips. "So let me get this straight—you hate me because my mother once saved your life? That's rich. Classic goddess logic."

Her glare sharpened, but for the briefest flicker, her cheeks colored. Not rage, not entirely. Something else. Something that made my stomach twist with unease.

"You don't understand." Artemis's voice dropped low, nearly a growl. "You carry her blood, her defiance, her scent. And yet—you wield it recklessly, shamelessly, like fire thrown into dry grass. You think it makes you untouchable. You think it makes you strong."

I smirked despite the ache in my ribs. "And what if it does?"

For a heartbeat, silence stretched. The goddess's bow arm trembled—not from weakness, but from tension, from an emotion I couldn't quite pin down. Her lips parted, then shut again, as if words warred with vows inside her throat.

Finally, she hissed, "Something is wrong with you. Wrong with me. Wrong with this entire farce. Lilith's son should not exist here, now, before me—and yet you do. And I…" She cut herself short, her aura flaring again as if to smother the crack in her composure. "I should end you where you stand."

But she didn't loose the arrow.

Her fingers flexed on the bowstring, silver light humming so bright it stung my eyes—yet the shot never came.

Instead, Artemis's jaw worked, clenched so tightly I swore I heard enamel grind. Her breath hitched, shallow, ragged, nothing like the aloof predator-mask she'd worn since the moment she stepped into this plaza.

"I should…" she muttered again, though her voice wavered, thin cracks spider-webbing through marble.

I tilted my head, bloody grin curling across my face. "But you won't."

Her eyes snapped to mine. The fury there should have pinned me to the stone, but it didn't—because behind it, beneath it, something far stranger pulsed.

Confusion. Frustration. And… heat?

Artemis blinked once, twice, then looked away—her bow dipping an inch before she jerked it back up, as though ashamed of her own hesitation. "Silence," she spat, though the command lacked its usual venom. "You dare presume to know the will of a goddess?"

I coughed, spat iron into the dirt, and chuckled low. "I don't need to presume. You're shaking."

Her nostrils flared. "I am not."

"You are." As I pushed Muramasa into System Inventory. I pushed with my Conqueror's Will, flared at the bare minimum output.

Her breath stuttered. Just enough.

The silver aura around her flared—violent, searing—but it was a cover-up, the kind of overcompensation you only saw when someone's mask slipped.

"Shut up," Artemis hissed, her words trembling with more than fury. Her fingers dug into the bowstring hard enough that faint cracks formed across the conjured silver light. "Do not mistake this… for weakness."

I tilted my head, the grin widening despite the taste of copper in my mouth. "Then what should I mistake it for?"

Her eyes widened a fraction. "Silence!" The shout cracked sharply, but her voice betrayed her. Not wrath. Not authority. Something closer to… desperation.

The Conqueror's Will stirred inside me, low, steady—just enough pressure to remind her I wasn't prey. And she felt it. Her pupils dilated, emerald darkening like a storm brewing over forests. She took a half step forward, then froze, her lips parting as though words clawed at her throat but refused to come out.

"You… infuriating—" she started, then stopped, face twisting, colour blooming faintly at her cheeks. Her bow trembled again, but not from doubt this time. From something hotter. Something I wasn't supposed to see in this goddess of chastity.

I let a low chuckle escape, soft but sharp. "Something's wrong with you, Artemis."

Her jaw clenched, teeth flashing. "No. Something is wrong with you." She snapped the bowstring back, light gathering into a arrow again—but her hand wavered, her aura spiked, and for a fraction of a heartbeat, she bit her lip. Hard.

And that was when it clicked.

Oh. Oh no.

A masochist tsundere goddess?

Her glare locked onto me, emeralds blazing, but the blush that betrayed her fury burned hotter than moonlight.

And finally she... collapsed.

Riiiight... must fight, now that I think about it. My body is screaming at me to rest.

As Artemis's knees buckled before she could protest, the silver aura guttered like a candle left in the wind. I caught her by the arm before she hit the ground, her body trembling beneath the chill glow that still clung to her like frost.

The moment my hand brushed her skin, she jolted. Not from fear—no, that would have made sense—but from something else. Her pupils dilated, breath hitching as if the contact had burned.

"Unhand me," she whispered, though her voice lacked its usual steel.

I raised a brow, steadying her as best I could despite my own body screaming in protest. "You're about two seconds from kissing the pavement. Don't think your pride's going to keep you upright."

Her glare shot at me, emerald fire, but her cheeks betrayed her again with the faintest dusting of pink. "I… am Artemis. I do not fall before mortals."

I smirked, leaning closer so she couldn't ignore me. "Yeah? Because right now you're doing a pretty convincing impression."

Her lips parted, then snapped shut. Her shoulders trembled, whether from exhaustion or something else, I couldn't tell. But the divine bow she had been holding dissipated, the light unravelling into sparks.

The barrier around the plaza flickered with it, silver threads straining like glass under pressure.

"Take it down," I said again, softer this time, my grip steady on her arm.

Her eyes searched mine for a long moment—anger, pride, confusion, and something rawer twisting together. Then, finally, she exhaled through clenched teeth, the faintest shiver running through her.

The barrier shattered.

"And you uneducated swine, it's called Curtain. It creates a separate dimension without affecting the real world," she muttered through gritted teeth, still trembling, but the authority in her tone was returning, slowly knitting itself back into place.

I let out a low whistle, dragging a hand down my face. "Cute. Very 'goddess having a meltdown behind a perfect mask' cute."

Her glare burned hotter than ever, but I saw it, fleeting, that sharp flicker of vulnerability beneath the armor. The blush on her cheeks hadn't gone; if anything, it deepened when her eyes flicked down briefly, only to snap back to mine in defiance.

"You… you insolent, arrogant—" she began, then her words stumbled over themselves, the fury wrestling with something far stranger. Her bow, which had been mere sparks a heartbeat ago, now floated by her side, silver light weaving around it like a coiled serpent. She flexed her fingers as if restraining herself from doing something reckless.

I smirked, leaning slightly closer. "Hey, goddess? Don't fight it. You're exhausted. You've been holding back your pride, your anger… hell, even your little blushes, for centuries. Just—let it out. For once."

Her lips twitched, half a sneer, half a shiver, as she blinked rapidly. "You… you are a fool," she hissed, voice trembling with a mixture of scorn and something darker—desire, or perhaps recognition of danger far beyond mere mortal recklessness. "I… will kill you where you stand."

"Hahahahahaha! I would like to see you try~"

***

Stone me, I can take it!

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