Chapter 5 ~ The Spreading Lights in the Dark​

So I have made a decision

I'm incorporating a break day for myself, as constant training 24/7 wasn't doing good things to me, as I mentally got tired and a lot more frustrated in many ways.

So I had a not-yet-invented Sunday

Though that was yesterday, so he was back to training his next set of failures as he attempted to hastily adapt to the stupidly fast, ever-shifting time ratio.

On the side note, my inner dimension simply doesn't work right now for whatever reason

Letting out a "tired" sigh, I made my way over to where his siblings were currently resting. Demeter apparently was either in a good mood or she was incredibly bored, as she was helping Hera with her hair braiding, while Hestia was just softly speaking to them, all of them surrounding the usual lit up fireplace.

…you know? I never did mention this, but it was strange just how old each of us were but how we looked was different, we very much didn't look the age order.

Hestia was the eldest here, but if an outsider were to somehow get in here, while somehow ignoring our beauty, they would assume either Hestia or Hera was the youngest.

And despite the fact that I was literally the youngest, I was already starting to grow facial hair. It was a little prick for now, but that is still a beard with a body that was forced to age up faster to survive and give me the appearance as if I was the oldest one!

Which reminds me, I need to somehow get the beard trimmed, I wasn't much of a fan of facial hairs if I were to be honest.

I sat down in a cross legged fashion when I was thinking on this, although as the thought passed, I had gained a small frown on my face as I once again remembered today's failures.

Hera turned to him and said, "Shall I assume that nothing, once again, was yet accomplished?" She asked her only brother curiously, the question was basically worded that if I had a short temper and had no understanding on how she insults, I would've exploded from that.

If she wasn't aware of this habit of hers, I might need to talk to her about this, as I really don't want the youngest of my sisters to bring trouble to herself.

Though my frown did deepen, "there is nothing to say on progress, Father's domain keeps disrupting my gateway, and I have yet to find any meaningful pattern to follow," I say glumly, a bit upset at the obvious bullshittery going on, as I glared at the sickly green stomach acid to my right, I right passed Hestia.

Demeter let out a sigh, "It is to be expected, I suppose, that he is not the King of the Universe and the Titans for no absolute reason," Demeter sadly stated as she continued to work on Hera's braid.

Despite the sudden growth of irritation in me, I couldn't deny the truth the words rang out of her mouth,…although there was something about that sentence that got my attention…and this wasn't for the first time.

"…have you three thought about how exactly we know things such as mountains and the sky? As well as the fact we seemingly know how the hierarchy of the titans works?" I posed out my question, as I looked at my sisters, one after another in curiosity.

All my sisters did was blink at me, Demeter taking a pause at braiding Hera's hair before continuing her halfway done work.

"Hmm, I never really gave thought of this till now, it always seemed…natural, in an instinctual way, to always know such things" Hestia started, as she slowly looked at her hands, as small embers gently flew around her fingers. "To comprehend what words are, to understand who are the rulers of the world, and to know all things that can be found out there in the world…".

Hearing this, I actually felt a little interested in that, "really now? And how far does that road go? Can you tell the events of the outside world by sitting here?" I asked him curiously, in a light tone, despite having suspicions about how much she knows.

Hera shook her head, though in the minuscule amount as to not disturb her currently very helpful sister Demeter, "not particularly, from what I can understand, I can tell what my essence is of, one of which is beauty, I can also understand that…fa-father, is the king of the titans, but I do not know why or why he had decided that he wanted to devour us one by one…" she finished her explanation with his head tilted forward, to the point I couldn't see her eyes.

'…it seems like I have severely downed the mood', I reflected, a little guilty now as I looked around and saw my sisters looking a little defeated.

Ok, now how does one go about bringing the mood back up? and perhaps somehow bring it higher than it previously was.

"…when we get out of here, what will be the first thing you do?" I asked the first thing that came to mind, although inwardly I cringed at the awkward question as that was basically on the level slightly above "how's the weather today?".

And as I guessed, what came right after was an awkward silence, for a minute all three of the goddess simply looked at me, before looking at each other with uncertainty in their eyes.

"How…How can you be sure…that we would ever be able to get out of…here?" Hestia stated as she stared at the fire in front of her, her shoulders slightly trembling in the corner of my eye.

I didn't answer for a bit,…before shrugging, "well either way, I will somehow figure out a way to stabilize the portal through trial and error…or we will have to grow strong enough to brute force our way out…in other words?-".

I looked up to them, one by one, from Hera to Demeter to Hestia, before looking down at my shaking, hard clenched fist, "…we WILL get out of here, mark my words,".

All was silent, I didn't lift my head back up, so I wasn't even sure what expressions they had on their faces.

Silence once again filled the room, for a second there I believed I failed to encourage my siblings, …until they spoke up.

"To speak honestly? While thoughts of finding beautiful flowers, gemstones, and maybe finding a man to be with is nice and all…but the thing I actually want to do is find a particular soft grass to lay on and fall asleep under the warmth of the sun," said hera, as she had a distant look.

…can't say I expected that from her, but I can't lie and say that isn't a bad desire, hell, I want that, although there was a peculiar part of her sentence.

A smirk already appeared on my face, "my my~, thinking of marriage already? But we only got a small lead on our escape at the moment," I teased a little, as I did actually see this as a little funny.

All Hera did was turn her head away and lifted her nose up, and said with a scowl "that is not of your concern of what I think about, especially whom I fancy".

All that did was widen the corner of my smirk, "oh~, but I disagree, this is an excellent time waster!, so what exactly is your taste? Is he tall? Broad shouldered as well, does he have dazzling blond hair alongside sparkling blue eyes? Perhaps another divine being with a powerful domain as his own, who keeps doting on you non-stop?" as I bombarded her with questions on the topic.

It was honestly not my business, but to my delight the desired effect came to be, as her ears and a small part of her cheeks turned more golden, basically divine blushing, "N-no!…Silence yourself!" She denied as her frown deepened.

All Demeter did was roll her eyes, as she was finishing up on Hera's braid, while all Hestia did was let out a small smile as she watched us.

Demeter spoke up after tying the final braid, "honestly,…I don't think I'm the type for marriage, don't particularly like the idea I would be stuck to someone permanently, I like more the idea that I remain freely on my own," after her eyes gazed passed us for a moment she nodded to herself.

I nodded while having one of my hands under my chin while the other held the former's elbow, "respectful, very respectful decision…a bit more on the lonely side, but respectful," Demeter's eye twitched, annoyed at me for my comment on her opinion.

Which then I turned to Hestia, "and what of you? Any plans on getting together with someone outside here?" As I threw out the last of my teasings.

What I didn't expect was that that was a massive landmine I just stepped on.

Immediately, my eldest sibling seemingly froze, and after a few minutes her smile shrunk more and more until it wasn't there anymore, as her eyes glazed over, filled with depression.

…What the Tartarus

Immediately my eyes widened as I sat up straight in my cross leg position, as I didn't see that expression coming, I can also feel surprise and concern from my other two sisters as they both tensed up with worried looks.

It was once again silent, …but I was gonna wait for her to answer, this was clearly a delicate situation I stumbled myself into, and she needed the time to collect herself.

It only got worse…

"...I-I, …I don't…I-I don't believe I can bring myself to…to ever-" her shoulders were trembling, she slowly raised her shaking hands from her lap as she hugged herself, her eyes beginning to gather tears, "I don't think…I can ever bring myself to…commit myself to someone…like that…" as she slowly spoke, stuttering a few words, she was having a hard time keeping herself composed, her words more and more quieter.

Her eyes were still glazed over, as if she was imagining something…or remembering something.

I was once more resting my elbows on my legs, with my hands holding and covering the lower side of my face.

I opened my mouth, as I cautiously asked my question, "and why is that…" I kept my voice low, my tone was soft and smooth, I didn't want to force it out of her, in the end if she couldn't say it I would not ask her again.

This time, water from her eyes did fall, "...because…when I-I ever begin to imagine such…imagine such a-a thing…all I can think about…is mom's scream…I-I just can't think about anything else…can't…cant't help but imagine… if…if that would be me instead in the future,"

I froze at the middle of her admission, and at the end my hands clenched hard on themselves, …to the point, part of me was worried I might break something in them.

But that wasn't the point…

She remembered…or at least she remembered the scream, the same wail I heard as KRONOS, as he threw me into his belly.

My sisters looked horrified and at a loss at what to say, …and really, what can you say when you don't remember any of mom's grief-filled wailing.

However

"...so you remember as well," is all I said, as that wording implied a lot about me as well.

Suddenly Hestia stood up straight with wide eyes as she glanced at me with tearful eyes, "you…you remember?" she asked, hesitant and full of sadness.

"...I never forgot anything, …I can still remember her rich brown hair, her green eyes, and her smile as she named me, …" as I spoke I can practically feel the jealousy from the other two silent sisters as they listened to me, so I continued, "I can also still hear her loud cry as HE ripped me from her grasp, as well as HIS golden hate-filled eyes before he threw me into his stomach".

It was amazing just how fast the two's jealousy seemed to vanish out of existence, …although it is quite understandable why they were so upset, as they couldn't remember Rhea.

"I can remember the fear, …I can recall the despair, …but I can never once forget my sheer hate for him, though it did get blurry for a while as my body kept rebuilding from father's attempt to devour me".

The goddesses all flinched, as if someone hit them when I reminded them of my infancy, now more horrified now knowing I fully remembered such an experience, Hestia taking it the hardest with her sorrow look.

All I did was give them a dry look, "we already gone over this, …you already explained to me that when I had arrived here, the acid had gotten so much worse to the point it was actually killing you, which according to our so called instinctual knowledge that that is supposed to be impossible".

Indeed when the first week had passed, they did inform me that Hestia attempted to retrieve me from the acid, but because kronos was literally devouring my flesh that is DEATH, and that he made himself absolutely enormous as a titan, finding me simply wasn't an option in the massive ocean of acid.

This time Demeter looked guilty, "but…if we didn't hesitate and helped to get to you…then yo-"

"-would've been in the same situation," I flatly spoke to her as I interrupted her ranting from the beginning, as I waved my hand dismissively "the only difference there would I've been is that I would've arrived on this fleshy platform with less or maybe no sisters at all, …you told me that Hestia was already getting eaten alive by the acid when she was in there for a minute, and that was when I was barely getting in there, it would've been suicide to go again, …and besides,…it worked out in the end,…I had to adapt quickly as I worked on abilities that would've otherwise taken decades to even discover, my pain tolerance became stupidly high, and my body was forced to grow up faster given it better qualities where I can do-".

"STOP!"

I flinched at the loud yell that came from hestia, she looked back at me with now angry tears, I can see her teeth as she gritted on them, as she had a snarl on her face as he glared at me as her clenched hand shook.

"SILENCE YOURSELF, DO NOT SPEAK AS IF YOU GETTING CONTINUOUSLY HURT IS A GOOD THING, I couldn't even begin to care less about the fact that your ability to help us escape was shortened when your trying to justify your pain," she panted as she breathed in deep breath as she glared at me.

…And to be honest, …this was the loudest she has ever been, as even the other two were quite startled with wide eyes with this occurrence.

All I did was blink twice, before I gave a chuckle, asI gave an easy going smirk, "forgive me, I didn't believe it would upset you this much, …however, there is one thing you got wrong, I never once justified my suffering, in fact, I didn't even attempt to do such a thing, it is because of that pain, that I have myself a goal after we escape, and it's something I don't care that I will or will not have to die for,"

I grabbed Hestia by her shoulder on the opposite side of me with one arm, and with my other arm I grabbed both Demeter and Hera, and I gave them both a tight hug, although they shrieked in surprise at the sudden action, and as I did this, I told them of my ambition.

"Kronos has given us, alongside any new future family members in the future, suffering beyond mercy and forgiveness, once we get out of here, I will dedicate myself for however long I need to,…to bring him as well anything he has personally built, all down to Tartarus!" as I gave out a blood thirsty, all-teeth-showing, wide grin as my Irises began to glow in my black sclera eyes up the ceiling of the stomach.

AN:

…i would like to believe I wrote a decent hestia trauma talk…good enough to the point that I made myself cry a little as I wrote this 😭.

I decided that this chapter would mostly be about character development, can't promise I can always keep up with it, but at least I can keep trying whenever I remember to do them