And so it begins. I thought to myself, amusedly, while we were teleporting into the dungeon. For a moment I was jealous of my followers, as for them it no doubt felt like only an instant was passing between the moment we were teleported and the moment we'd arrive. But I wasn't like them, I was more sensitive to the passing of time and I could feel the milliseconds we were taking to be teleported.
Before my eyes, the scenery shifted, taking several moments. I went from standing in the middle of a mostly clean area, I went from being in the middle of the clean, outdoor area, to standing in the middle of a gallery. I studied my surroundings with a curious gaze once the shifting was over.
My followers and I found ourselves standing at one end of a gigantic gallery, perhaps a quarter of a kilometer wide. I took a step forward and felt my senses adjust as my tremor-sense gave me a keener understanding of the place I found myself in than my eyes alone could. I glanced upwards and saw that any roof that this place possessed was incredibly high up, high enough that it was beyond the range of my vision.
Behind me, my tremor-sense and my sense of touch alerted me to the presence of walls. When I turned around to look at the walls I saw massive things made of some sort of red rocks piled high and adhesively brought together by a thin, sticky looking red slime, as if meant to be camouflaged. In front of me and my followers, who were themselves wearily studying our surroundings were countless works of art.
Before studying the works of art that filled the gallery I studied the place itself. The place was a gigantic area, with an ivory-colored floor. In front of me, I could see over a dozen statues and at least twice as many paintings. The paintings hung in the air, suspended by magic. Thanks to my new ability to see magic I could see a faint aura of alteration magic around the paintings, presumably what suspended them.
The paintings and statues were primarily of two figures. The majority of them depicted a tall woman holding a spear, who had an owl on her shoulder, in various poses. The other primary figure depicted in the artwork on display was a handsome human-looking male, often semi-nude or clad in strange robes the sorts of which I had never seen before. In some artwork a young male human or a figure who was half-human, half-serpent was locked away in a tiny box and a trio of women stood around it, preparing to open it.
At that moment I heard the voice of the dungeon begin to speak again.
[Welcome to the Parthenon. You are in the first of several rooms, a gallery of sorts. Here you will find artwork depicting the goddess Athena and her adopted child.] The dungeon told me. I looked over to my comrades and asked them a question.
"Can you all also hear the dungeon?" I asked, curious as to if the voice had made itself audible to them as well. They nodded at me, and I smiled. "Good, that means I won't have to tell you everything it tells me." I said, relaxing a bit.
I walked forward, in the direction of one of the statues. I didn't quite walk up to it, mostly because I didn't want too but also because it was cordoned off by a square of magically suspended ropes to prevent anyone from touching it.
The statue I was walking towards depicted who I assumed was Athena. It was made of marble and depicted a tall woman dressed in armor-like robes. The woman in the statue had a beautiful face, one that was painstakingly detailed and wore a strange helm that looked protective but also noble and as if it itself imparted some sort of authority onto whoever wore it. That was when I received another message from the dungeon.
[Athena had distinctive equipment, divine relics that were unique in the world of her birth. She wore a helmet known as the "Cap of Invisibility", something originally forged for her uncle, a god of death, for usage in a war against other gods a group known collectively as the Titans. The Titans were, in most cases, parents of the Olympian gods but some of them were abusive parents. She also had a shield that had the head of the first medusa in their world on it, something which enabled her to turn her enemies to stone. She began using spears in battle after an inter-deity battle in which she wounded one of her siblings, a bellicose god of war named Aries who was opposing her using a spear.] The dungeon explained.
"This goddess seems pretty interesting." I said to my followers, after learning about the long-deceased goddess' distinctive equipment. They nodded, themselves studying other works of art around us. Only a few of them, the imps and Hagitha, studied artwork depicting the male figure. The rest of us looked at various pieces of art that centered around Athena.
[Athena's adopted child was a human named Erichthonius. That child is the male figure depicted in most of the artwork. In the mythology imposed by the humans who worshiped Athena, this child was the spawn of another god, a god of blacksmithing and metalwork named Hephaestus, though in actuality Erichthonius was just a regular human. Erichthonius became the king of the emerging empire of the Athenians, Athena-worshipers who sought to spread her wisdom throughout the world.] The dungeon informed us, revealing the identity of the male in some of the art. But it wasn't done just yet.
[This part of the gallery is devoted to Athena and Erichthonius. Further into the gallery, there is a section that is devoted to Athena's divine family, gods and even the titans of Olympus.] The dungeon told us, being quite helpful.
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We spent a few minutes on the outer edges of the gallery. When we were content with what we had seen and what little information we had learned about Athena from the dungeon, we began to walk deeper into the Parthenon.
In minutes we began to see a greater diversity of figures depicted in the artwork on display. We also began to see a greater display of artwork itself. New things like masterfully decorated tapestries and even pottery that had stunning artwork emblazoned on it also began to show up in the gallery's interior.
The first figure who wasn't Athena or Erichthonius to be depicted in artwork that I saw was a woman in an incredibly detailed and skilled painting. The first painting I saw her in was one where she was naked, long-blonde hair covering her breasts, as she stood atop a massive clamshell. Sea-foam was visible around her. Even in the painting, she was perhaps the most beautiful being I had ever seen, with long legs, a curvy body, nearly golden skin, and radiant golden hair.
Not far from it floated a vase that depicted the same woman, though the art style was very different and Athena on two of its sides. They were facing different directions and both had upset expressions on their stylized faces. Between them stood a small human, holding a golden apple and facing the beautiful goddess, and thus looking away from Athena.
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[The goddess you are looking at was the goddess of love, lust, beauty, sexuality, and fertility, as well as a minor goddess of other, less significant things. Her name was Aphrodite, though some who worshiped her called her Venus. There are contradictory accounts of her birth, in one she is a half-sister of Athena, and in the other, she arose miraculously as a sort of child of a titan. Athena and Aphrodite once competed to be awarded a golden apple in the buildup to a mythic war on Earth, the planet of their births.] The dungeon revealed.
Aphrodite. I thought, even myself feeling swayed by the beauty of the woman in the painting. But that's not all I thought.
So some domains are strong enough that even gods themselves can be affected by those who wield influence over them? Domains and subdomains like love, lust, and beauty must be serious deals to be so powerful... Now how can I gain control over them? I wondered, before realizing that lust was one of the aspects of the subdomain of corruption.
It's a good thing I already liked the idea of gaining power over lust. Now it seems doubly useful. I thought as I tore my gaze away from the painting and vase which depicted Aphrodite.
My followers were gazing at other paintings, statues, vases, and tapestries. I looked at the artwork in front of them with a curious expression on my face. And in doing so I got to see several other gods and goddesses, as well as monsters and even other higher-beings. As I studied the pieces of art I also received introductory messages about the gods, goddesses, monsters, heroes, and titans depicted within the art.
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[This strange painting is actually of a god and a goddess.] The dungeon explained to me. I was looking at a painting depicting Athena. She was standing in the middle of a strange thing, which seemed to be a headless body of a shirtless man. She was balancing herself on a thick neck, was wearing pristine robes, and had a spear in one hand.
[This painting depicts Athena who is clearly visible within it, but also Zeus. Zeus was the head of the Olympic Pantheon and a greater god. He was the father of Athena, who he fathered with a titan of the mind named Metis. In the painting, Athena is standing atop of Zeus.] The dungeon revealed to me, while I studied the painting.
[He received an ancient prophecy hinting that one of his children would overthrow him one day like Zeus had done to Kronos, his father and like Kronos had done to Uranus, who was his father. The prophecy frightened Zeus and so he ate Athena's mother. Athena was born anyway and began to make a racket in Zeus' mind. Eventually, he asked Hephaestus for help in removing the source of his headaches from his head. The god of metalworking numbed Zeus to pain using technology and then cracked his head open. Athena and her mother walked out of Zeus' head to their freedom.] Said the dungeon, into my mind.
[Whoa, these deities could survive having their heads split open?] I asked, unaware of the limits of their lifeforce, or of my own lifeforce for that matter. I continued to study the painting, aware that the titan mother of Athena wasn't depicted in it. The dungeon's response to my question didn't take long.
[Yep! These gods and their titan parents had such immensely powerful and persistent lifeforce that they could survive being utterly annihilated physically. One of them, Kronos, survived the destruction of his physical body and had his spirit thrown into an eerie divine realm named Tartarus which was designed by a god of the underworld. We don't know if the titans were destroyed during the same event that destroyed Athena.] The dungeon informed me, causing my eyes to widen.
So it's possible other higher-beings might still exist somewhere in the multiverse? I speculated, for a second. No... I don't think so. I don't doubt that such beings would have made themselves known somehow in the countless years since the end of the mythic age. Unless they were in some absolutely inescapable prison. Which... they might be? I need to continue to research this. I realized. Right before I made a tactical decision, inspired in equal parts by caution and curiosity.
[Hey M.A., or the system, can one of you send me a species notification on titans?] I asked, curious as to one if existed. I got my answer a few seconds later.
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[System alert:
Titans were gods. They were a specific set of gods, a pantheon that was older than the pantheon of the Olympians, which was the pantheon of Zeus, Hephaestus, Athena, Aphrodite, and other gods and goddesses. Asking the faith and knowledge domains for permission to provide you with information on specific pantheons...
Request granted on two conditions:
Condition 1: In order to ask about a pantheon you have to find a holy site of a deity who was in some way related to that pantheon. Not necessarily a member of the pantheon, but someone with a legitimate relationship to it. As of right now, you can ask for information on the Olympian gods and the Titans because Athena's mother was a Titaness named Metis and because she herself was an Olympian.
Condition 2: Gaining information about the pantheon itself is limited. Until you gain more influence over the knowledge domain you cannot learn much if any actionable knowledge, as in any significant knowledge more specific than the names and domains of the gods and goddesses who comprised the various pantheons that once existed.]
[New Two-Part Pantheon Notification: The Titans & The Olympians
The Titans were a group of gods who lorded over a region of Earth in the unimaginably ancient past, long before the apocalyptic event which destroyed all known higher beings.
Titans were themselves fathered by an abusive higher-being known as Uranus and freed from that horrifically evil creature's tyranny by the actions of Kronos who rallied his siblings, not all of whom were titans, and overthrew Uranus. Not long after he overthrew Uranus, Kronos began to perpetuate evils on his own children. Though not all Titans behaved as cruelly as he did, and not all Titans fought against the Olympians in the Titanomachy, the conflict between the Olympians and the Titans.
The era of titan-rulership over the part of Earth that would one day become a nation known as Greece was an era of communion with nature. Not many humans lived in Greece during this period, and thus that did were nearly universally male resulting in Greece's human population was one in steady decline. Kronos took his older sister Rhea as a wife and their children became six of the twelve most widely worshiped Olympian gods.
Kronos imprisoned many of his children within himself, devouring them moments after their birth, and they were only freed by the courage and heroism of their youngest sibling, the Olympian of nobility named Zeus. Once Zeus's siblings were freed the Titanomachy began and ended after a decade of constant warfare throughout the land now known as Greece.
Other titans of note were Metis, Prometheus, Hyperion, and Hecate. Those titans were the titans of minds, trickery, light, and magic respectively.
The Olympians were a pantheon made up primarily but not entirely of the children of Kronos and Rhea. Several of the other members of this particular pantheon were the children of Rhea's children.
These gods lorded over the population of Greece for thousands of years. Their era of dominion over Greece's population was one of culture, sophistication, and growth for their worshipers, especially but not just humans.
Zeus, Athena, Aries, Hephestus, and Aphrodite were all members of the Olympian pantheon. Zeus was the Olympian of leadership, power, and nobility. You already know what Athena was the Olympian of. Aries was the Olmpyian of war and combat. Hephestus was the Olympian of metalworking and a minor Olympian of technology. And like Athena you know what Aphrodite was the Olympian of.]
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Whoa... that's a lot of knowledge to gain all at once. I thought, staggered by the knowledge that just seeped into my mind, curtesy of the system. But before I willed away the notifications, I reread them.
And then I continued my trek through the gallery, taking in more of the ornate artwork before me, as my followers did the same.