Outside the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Da Hai ate skewered beef while reading a worn map he'd proliferated from a sailer. The coast of Anatolia was finally clear to him.

Sitting on one of its steps, he remained unnoticeable by the temple occupants. The trick was to blend into the rain. It was relatively simple for a cultivator of his calibre.

The rain was still heavy with no signs of slowing, so people were rare on the streets. All except for one runner holding a satchel.

He'd come by way of the harbour, face completely red. But he still made the effort to climb the steps, right past Da Hai, to deliver his message.

"Every resident here has some semblance of cultivation. Though it's not cultivated, but innate. The mortals here aren't like the Three Realms at all," Da Hai mused.

A normal man from the Three Realms could not cross the distance at once under heavy rain at such speed like that. He estimated that the mortals in this Chaos World would not be identified as mortals in his home world.

In fact, they were closer to the descendants of Earthly Divinities. Da Hai had observed them from Haotian's memories briefly. In a way, every man from the Hellenistic Chaos World was semi-divine.

The most powerful of them, the ones he observed commanding the soldiers, ruling the city state, or managing the temple though? They possessed golden blood.

Similar to Golden Core immortal cultivators, they held long lives and great physical power. Yet there was no other innate advantageous that were obvious. Perhaps if they embarked on a spiritual path, it'll show.

"That runner…could it be the emergency sacrifice?" Da Hai wondered aloud.

Ever since he began his short stay in Ephesus, he'd noticed the uneasy feeling its leaders had towards the rain. They feared that if it didn't light up, a flood may be inevitable.

A sacred bull had been brought in around the same time as Da Hai's own arrival. From what Da Hai heard on the streets, its testicles were to be offered to the city's patron, Artemis.

Da Hai didn't understand the correlation. But he was not one to judge queer customs.

Before long, he heard a huge disturbance within the temple. More runners were sent out, this time to other administrative and commercial areas of the city. More messengers were sent to deliver letters into people's homes.

Da Hai frowned, reaching forward to grab one message from a passing runner. He wasn't noticed, and he quickly shielded the paper from the rain.

"Prophecy?" He murmured after reading the first several sentences. "Grand prophecy issued from…the oracle of Delphi?"

It took a bit for him to completely translate across every word he'd read. Oddities in his understanding took even longer to comprehend.

But from common knowledge alone, the innate god understood Delphi to be among the most sacred places in this Chaos World. A city built upon a cave where fate touched the earth. It was said that all that was known, that could be, and that will be, flowed through Delphi.

If Mt Buzhou was the centre of the Primitive World, Delphi was the centre of the Hellenistic Chaos World.

"What was the saying on the road? The three absolutes in all existence? Atlus holds up the sky, Olympus rules the world, Delphi decides the law."

Da Hai beheld the message regarding the prophecy with interest. Clearly the sisters of fate was not letting things go. It had been battered, bruised, utterly humiliated to the nth degree by an existence that wasn't even a fellow Chaos World.

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It branded him a criminal who stole from fate. It portrayed him as a sea monster who erred from the righteous path. It urged heroes to defend their world from the incoming apocalypse who seeks to consume all things and eradicate all life.

Just from reading it alone, Da Hai found it numerous. Shenni would've been perfect for this role. The deceased Beast Emperor hated the Primitive World with enough of a burning passion to be exactly as described in this prophecy.

"What can a trio of blind bats do? This is just sending innocent heroes to their pointless deaths," Da Hai ended up scoffing. "Even my own disciple knew better then charting a suicide mission out of spite."

It was incomparable for a mere Heavenly Dao to measure up to a true ruler like Zulong had been. He brought the boy up with ethics, and he grew up magnificent. The selfish, heartless, prideful decision of the sisters was idiotic at best.

"Delphi huh. If I got my mythology correct, the cave beneath that city is a holy place for prophecy. Usefulness of divination aside, the knowledge there must be important." Da Hai dusted off the map he'd bought and cross referenced it with a sea chart in his possession.

'Yurlunggur said Zagreus traveled with Pangu, and Zagreus brought home knowledge. If the Primrodial's intelligences have all been assimilated by the Moirai, then even if I find his body it'll be useless.

'But the knowledge should still exist. If nothing else, Delphi seems like the place where I can access it. Now these sea charts.'

Da Hai reasoned that Delphi must be a database of some kind. Even if not, its connection to prophecy may allow him to track the sisters down. After all, it had essentially gone into hiding after being brutalized.

As for why Da Hai didn't consider immediately ascending Olympus? It wasn't as probable to him, that the ruling gods had this same information. If even the primordials were soulless puppets, how important could the Olympians be?

"I need a better map. This is all too vague." Da Hai tossed away the map of Anatolia and the sea chart after consulting them. Delphi was on mainland Greece, an entire ocean away. Good thing he was a good swimmer.

He strolled through the rain covered city, not disturbing the rising commotion from the prophecy's reveal. The common folk were very active despite the downpour. Their fears of a monster rampaging throughout the world was not without merit.

In the age before the Olympians, the ancestors of men passed down stories of monsters being a common site. The ancient titanomachy was needed to cull billions of bloodthirsty beasts. It was only after the birth of Artemis did it become considerably safe to travel between city states. Yet even then, the odd monster still prowled.

There were already talks of potential heroes rising up to slay the prophesied monster. Or perhaps the gods would be stirred into motion given that the fates themselves issued it.

In the Temple of Artemis, the sacrifice was held to not only stave off a potential flood, but also for luck regarding the prophecy.

The bloody testicles of the dead bull was brought before a statue of a regal woman wearing a headdress and armour.

Near the harbour, Da Hai paused his stride. There was a feeling of emptiness that passed over him. In his mind, he suddenly remembered the dying celestial bull who had fought him above the firmament.

They barely had any relation. No karma as a Buddhist monk would say. He'd never even learned its name.

He glanced back at the temple in Ephesus. The incense merit was rising towards mainland Greece. It tried to take on the appearance of a bull, but failed. Ultimately collapsing into a stream of silver.

"A Heavenly Dao entity that devours and assimilates. Ultimately taking command and growing. Intelligent and calculative, yet arrogant and inexperienced. It's the life cycle of a Chaos World, but staved off by an active intelligence," Da Hai felt his heart tighten as he concluded his thoughts.

The Heavenly Dao of the Three Realms. That being was also absorbing other Chaos Worlds actively. But from memory, even it had never ate great cultivators and enslaved them to its will.

The relationship Da Hai was used to was symbiotic, not parasitic. He simply did not understand what compelled the Sisters of Fate.

Without looking back, he stepped onto a small fishing boat. An appropriated item of course. Da Hai left a small pouch full of the local currency behind and enchanted it to be hidden to all but the owner.

Then he set off.

…

"Your excellency, we did not expect."

"Save it," Artemis shushed her high priestess' flattery.

Instead, the goddess carefully examined the coalescing faith energy rippling through her primary temple.

The aching pain Apollo had drawn to her attention was acting up again. Yet contrary to the previous her, she understood why this feeling was edging at her.

One of her domain had been pierced. Well, domain was not the most accurate term. More of an associated relationship that attached to her domain during her godly assignment.

The great bull signifying fertility had disappeared. Along with it, her seat in Ephesus also appeared diluted through her divine gaze.

'Could it be the titans' remnants? A suppression spell perhaps.'

Her reasoning was sound in her own mind. The introduction of the bull symbol had aided her family in squashing whatever loyalist Titans who'd gotten ideas in the aftermath of the Gigantomachy.

Hera took command of Zeus' empty seat to direct a bolt of tribulation lightning from the upper air. Such an act shattered their resolve instantly.

Artemis did not even consider the possibility that the bull had been damaged, or destroyed. It was part of the logic of fate, part of the sisters' grand design. That it could suffer an, 'incident', was entirely unfathomable.

"Continue the spread of the prophecy. Make sure no one is left unaware. Fate desires the hunt for heroes, gods and halfblood alike," Artemis said after gathering the faith energy herself.

"But…what of the rain? This one fears the harvest may…"

"The rain will settle on its own. It's just a little bad weather," Artemis scoffed. "The prophesied monster is the true concern."

Outside, her hunters were already marshalling. The prophecy had not been specific in weather a god or a mortal was destined to dispatch the threat. Hence everyone with a hint of pride thought themselves the chosen one.

Artemis as the goddess of the hunt, also considered it part of her domain.

…

The sky overhead rumbled with the sound of surging lightning.

In another place, far away from the busy commotion. A young silver haired male banged the back of his head against a pillar. The empty bottle in his hand never felt heavier.

His blue gaze appeared lifeless. His perfect muscular body sagged beneath an unseen weight. But even the dishevelness of his state did not deter from his attractiveness. To any mortal's eyes, he appeared perfect.

"Another destined road. Another road ahead. Another fate." His muttering sounded equally as empty.

"Just…give me a moment. I'll be on my way."

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