Having traversed countless realms, can you possibly be as clever as me?

The king of Mycenae became a young man named Agamemnon. It is said that Hercules returned to Mycenae after that, but no one ever saw him.

After years of wandering at sea, Medea finally met Orpheus, who then guided her to the city of Ephela.

This little-known town is not famous in Greece; it has not produced any great heroes, nor does it have any moving stories. But this town also has its own unique characteristics—

This is the entrance to the underworld from the mortal realm; only through this gate can mortal life enter the underworld. Orpheus entered the underworld through this very place.

"Brother, I've wandered in the underworld for so long, and finally, we're reunited here." Medea excitedly grasped Tsugumi's hand, and then—

A dagger suddenly pierced Dongjiang's back, as if it had been there long ago, transcending time.

"I will never let you leave again, brother. You will stay in this moment forever."

Medea looked at Tsugumi, frozen in time, and revealed a satisfied, yandere smile.

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753. The Titan of Time, Grandfather?

Golden sand slowly dripped from the hollow part of the dagger through the hourglass.

Medea stared in disbelief at the Dagger of Time piercing Tsugumi's body, taking two steps back. Looking at Tsugumi, who seemed frozen in time, she revealed an expression of ecstatic joy.

She did it! She really did it!

Following Orpheus's guidance, she used the Dagger of Time, which contained the power of time, to pierce her brother's body!

Death? No, it's not that simple.

This dagger, imbued with the power of the First Cause, possesses a formidable strength that even the gods cannot resist.

That golden sand of time is a product of time itself. It is a power that existed before creation, before Chaos!

Time is the first cause, older than all things and more ancient than destiny.

The person stabbed by this dagger will neither move forward nor backward.

His time will freeze at this moment, trapped in an eternal space-time, never to die again, and fate will be unable to interfere with him!

In other words, even if the Fates wanted to weave his final chapters again, they could not.

"Forgive me, brother, this is the only way, the only way for you to continue existing instead of wandering aimlessly forever..."

Medea reached out to touch her brother, but his handsome face, trapped in the Sands of Time, remained untouched. She lowered her hand, gazing at Tsugumi frozen in time, and murmured...

"Rest assured, I will always be with you at this secluded crossroads. Gods, Titans, no one will find us, no one..."

Click!

A sound like something being peeled away and shattered suddenly rang out in this tranquil space, and Medea's expression froze instantly.

The next second, Tsurugi slowly stretched out her hands from the Sands of Time, followed by her legs—moving as slowly as an elderly person, but she was definitely moving!

"Ah—ah—ah—recovered...recovered...it really is...I knew I wasn't wrong..."

Tsugumi's voice gradually returned to normal from its cassette-like quality. He slowly walked out of the Sands of Time, looked at Medea, and sighed.

"You really did betray me... This is not unexpected. More than the matter itself, I am curious about how you did it."

He took out the Time Dagger that was supposed to be pierced into his back, and played with it for a while. Although the Sands of Time inside had all been lost, the power of time contained within it was undeniable.

"Where did you get this thing...?" he asked playfully.

"Brother, I didn't do it." Medea's pretty face turned pale, and she struggled to breathe as she tried to explain.

"Please don't talk to me with the 'I love my super handsome, super manly, and super great brother, but because he was destined to leave, I did whatever it took to turn him into a living specimen, completely disregarding his wishes, but I did it out of love' kind of foolish whitewashing."

Tsugumi interrupted Medea, summarizing her rambling with a concise summary.

"I'm only asking you where you got this thing from?"

Time—this power also holds a revered position in Greek mythology.

Or rather, in any mythological world with a concept related to time, this aspect of power cannot be weak!

Time, strictly speaking, is an abstract concept—humans cannot define time in a straightforward and pure way.

For example, if the Big Bang shaped the universe, and then the world began to develop—did time exist before or after the world?

Such unobservable and unanswerable questions are like asking which came first, the chicken or the egg; rational thinking is completely unable to provide an answer.

But in the world of Greek mythology, the answer does exist—time existed before the world.

This world was born from Chaos, who chose to become the world because Eros pushed him, but before that, the 'first cause' that drove everything was time.

Or rather, it should be called Chronos.

Actually, this is a relatively late mythological existence. It originated from the poetry of the Orphic sect and was nearly two centuries later than the mythological beliefs of Zeus and others. However, it was later listed as one of the three primordial gods by Philosophers of Syrus in his theory of cosmology around the 6th century BC.

He is considered one of the earliest beings in the universe, the "Father of Chaos." He does not exist in human form, but is formless or serpentine, and together with his consort Ananke, the embodiment of destiny, he encircles the primordial world egg, creating an ordered universe.

This power of time was also the greatest element that later formed Zeus, the 'omniscient and omnipotent' heavenly father in esoteric Buddhism.

The esoteric Zeus achieved this by returning to the primordial state, simultaneously absorbing the three elements of Chronos, Ananke, and Eros, ultimately unifying them into the primordial Phanes and swallowing them whole. He incorporated their power and wisdom into himself, achieving a state where "all things are mixed and intertwined within Zeus's belly," thereby gaining omniscience (encompassing the past and future) and omnipotence (the power of creation/destruction).

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In other words—this is the fusion material for an omniscient, omnipotent, and unique God!

However, this is ultimately a product of the esoteric Buddhist system, which is closer to philosophical concepts than mythology. Moreover, even according to the original setting, Chronos should not appear in the normal Greek mythological world in a strict sense.

After all, if the esoteric mythological world of Chronos existed, Zeus would necessarily be the omniscient and omnipotent being who transcends fate and all concepts, and Chronos would have been merged into Phanes from the moment of his birth.

unless......

Tsurugi suddenly felt a chill down his spine, followed by the ticking of a clock in his ear.

"You are very smart, child."

A male voice, a mixture of arrogance and reserve, sounded behind him.

"You actually know the First Cause and the ancient secrets before creation? I really doubt whether you are the son of my cowardly child Hades?"

Dongjiang slowly turned around, and behind him stood a tall Titan.

His entire body gleamed with the luster and color of obsidian, but from his chest to his arms, one could see broken and pieced-together gold marks. He wore a gold watchband engraved with Roman numerals from one to twelve on his collarbone, and held a golden scepter shaped like a sickle in his hand.

Six stone slabs, resembling wings, floated behind him, adorned with black and gold patterns, matching his attire and decorations. He had white hair, eyes that shone with the same white light, and a face somewhat resembling Zeus's.

But these are not the most important things.

The sands of time floating around his wings and body revealed his identity; the dagger that had frozen Dongjiang in time was his creation.

"What? Do you have something to say to your grandfather?"

The echoing sound seemed to emanate from the depths of time. Tsurugi remained silent for a moment, gazing at the proud Titan, and said softly...

"...Are you from Egypt?"

Kronos: ......

"You'll never get rid of this foul mouth, you son of a bitch." Kronos's expression hardened, and he snorted coldly.

"Who's your grandson? I'm your grandpa!" Facing this Titan who was trying to take advantage of her, Tsurugi gave him the middle finger without any hesitation.

However, he really didn't expect that a Cronus would suddenly appear.

When exactly did the second-generation Titan King become the God of Time?

As a backdrop to Zeus in mythology, Cronus, whether appearing in the pantheon or elsewhere, is a stepping stone without even a specific divine role.

Later, after Zeus reconciled with him and allowed him to govern Elysium, he gave him the position of Saturn, which is the origin of the famous painting "Saturn Eats His Child". In fact, if we really want to talk about it, his wife Rhea is the real goddess of time - although she has no real role to play except for the title.

However, many later creations of Cronus have merged him with the original Cronus, endowing him with authority over time. For example, in Saint Seiya, he is the god-king who controls space and time; in the Marvel series, he is the embodiment of the concept of cosmic time; and in Percy Jackson's works, he often appears as the god of time.

However, it's not actually a modern work. Ancient people often added the characteristic of time to him, especially after the emergence of the Tantric system, which endowed the image of Cronus with many time-related elements.

In a sense, this can also be considered a result element of secondary creation feeding back to the original work - devouring one's own child is seen as a metaphor for the cruel side of time. Time is like a merciless god that will "swallow" everything, including his own descendants. As the ruler of the Golden Age, in that eternal era of mankind, he is also seen as a symbol of his eternal rule over everything with time.

"Are you wondering why I'm here?" Kronos asked quietly, as if he could read Tsurugi's mind.

"But all your thoughts are meaningless. No matter how you perceive it, the past, present, and future me are all time itself!"

He raised the scepter in his hand, and in an instant, everything in the world froze in mid-air.

But Tsurugi was unaffected, or rather, this portion of the time force was not enough to stop him.

"Alright—regardless of when I joined your family, you didn't come out of Tartarus alive just to start a family chat, did you?"

Tsugumi looked at the Time Titan before her, which was scattered with the sands of time, and squinted.

“Of course, I’m here to invite you,” Kronos said, extending his hand to him in a seductive voice.

"Olympus is now in decline!"

Accompanied by booming thunder, he revealed a picture of time.

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What was shown in that scene was an enormous, terrifying shadow, as if it were blotting out the sky, moving toward the towering and magnificent Mount Olympus.

It marched toward the mountain that was almost level with it, roaring more deafeningly than thunder, its movements shaking the very earth, crashing down upon this sacred mountain.

The gods on the mountain are fighting against a terrifying monster. The blade of the god of war is tearing his body apart, the spear of Athena is piercing his shell, and Hephaestus's countless weapons are completely covering the body of the monstrous creature.

But all the attacks failed to defeat this terrifying monster. Instead, countless twisted and deformed monsters sprang forth from its torn and splattered flesh.

"I have released Typhon from beneath Mount Etna!" Cronus declared proudly, pointing to the scene.

"I took it back to the very beginning of time, to that most powerful moment, so that with Gaia's blessing, he could attack Olympus!"

"Not only that, I also freed all the Titans and primordial gods, from Tartarus, from the forgotten ends of time!"

The panorama of time unfolds further.

Dongjiang saw it: from the edge of the ocean, a colossal shadow riding countless sea monsters dragged the sunken Atlantis from the seabed, and then endless monsters surged toward Olympus.

That was the union of Oceanus and Phorcys, the world's oceans awakened from their forgotten slumber, and the father of sea monsters joining forces to attack Poseidon's territory.

In the sky, dazzling stars began to gather continuously; these were the brothers Crios and Coeus, who symbolized the stars of the universe, and they were ravaging all the constellations that the gods had raised to the sky.

Theia, the embodiment of light, and Hyperion, the resurrected primordial sun, attempt to seize the Sun of Hope, the embodiment of the thrush. Mnemosyne, the creator of mankind, and his son, the Titan Prometheus, the seer, together incite mortals on earth to join their legions!

Many Titans and primordial gods ravaged the land, some released from Tartarus, others returning from the depths of oblivion.