However, once his brief embarrassed annoyance passed, Thanatos quickly regained his composure.
Whose daughter Aergia actually was did not matter that much.
What had truly sparked his desire to recruit her was not the blood relationship he had misunderstood, but the maiden goddess's almost incredible comprehension of the rules.
If she were merely Hypnos's daughter, he would have looked after her a bit more at most.
However, a deity who could discover a brand-new rule within the domain of death—and even condense a godhead through it—was well worth striving for in earnest.
Except...
Thanatos suddenly remembered another name Aergia had mentioned just now—Nyx.
The young God of Death's expression instantly grew solemn.
“Wait, did you just say it was the Mother Goddess who personally handed you over to Hypnos?”
Aergia nodded.
“Yes.”
Thanatos's brows instantly knitted together.
Things seemed to have gotten a bit troublesome now.
If it were merely Hypnos's own arrangement, he could have discussed it directly with his twin brother. After all, there was nothing that could not be said between them, and if worse came to worst, he could simply trade a bit of his authority over death in exchange.
However, if this matter involved the Mother Goddess Nyx, the situation was entirely different.
The Goddess of the Night rarely interfered directly in the affairs of her children.
Even gods who were closest to her, like Hypnos and Thanatos, seldom received direct arrangements from their Mother Goddess.
Since she had personally delivered Aergia to the Temple of Sleep, it meant there had to be a special reason for it.
And although Thanatos had a short temper on ordinary days and was never particularly polite to his twin brother, he held profound respect for the Mother Goddess Nyx.
He would not go so far as to presumptuously violate a decision the Mother Goddess had made just to recruit a subordinate deity.
The young God of Death ruffled his short hair in frustration.
The bright prospect he had envisioned in his mind suddenly gained an insurmountable obstacle.
Standing to the side, Aergia watched his shifting expression, feeling her mind relax instead.
Since it involved Nyx, Thanatos probably would not keep pestering her, right?
However, she had clearly underestimated this God of Death's persistence.
Thanatos pondered with a frown for a moment before suddenly raising his head.
“Let's set that aside for now.”
“Hmm?”
“Anyway, today isn't over yet. Keep following me to continue patrolling the earth.”
Aergia froze slightly.
“Your Highness, haven't you already...”
“Who said I gave up?” Thanatos glared at her, then quickly added as if remembering something, “I'll ask the Mother Goddess in person. But before that, I need to confirm one thing first.”
“What thing?”
The young God of Death slowly unfurled the dark wings behind his back.
“Just how much you can perceive from death.”
The patrol that followed was far more fulfilling for Aergia than she had initially expected.
Thanatos was clearly a deity of intense action. Once he decided on something, he rarely hesitated further.
What was more, death blanketed the entire earth. Every living creature had an end of its own, and those lives drawing to a close continuously sent out calls to the God of Death that only he could perceive.
The two continued forward between the mountain ranges and forests.
Sometimes it was a giant beast too old to walk any further, sometimes a bird that had exhausted its remaining vitality in a rock crevice, and sometimes creatures that had sustained incurable wounds during long struggles, ultimately collapsing alone deep in the wilderness.
Whenever the moment of death truly arrived, Thanatos appeared right on time.
Unlike the youth who constantly frowned and complained on ordinary days, the God of Death was always extraordinarily calm when executing his divine portfolio.
He would not act perfunctorily just because a life was weak, nor would he extend extra leniency just because the target possessed divinity.
So long as death was destined, he would complete the reaping in accordance with the established rules.
Aergia quietly followed along the entire time.
At first, she could only rely on her own divine perception to barely discern the connection between life and the soul.
It was not a thread in the literal sense, but a special rule that maintained the physical body and consciousness.
As long as life had not reached its end, this connection remained stable; even if the physical body suffered severe trauma, it would not easily break.
And when death truly arrived, the connection would gradually loosen.
What Thanatos needed to do was completely sever that connection at the precise moment, freeing the soul from the body's shackles.
“Did you see it clearly?”
After one reaping concluded, Thanatos suddenly asked.
Aergia nodded, then hesitantly shook her head.
“I can sense the presence of the connection, but I still can't clearly see where death actually begins.”
“That's because you don't possess authority over death.”
Thanatos answered as if it were obvious.
Then, he raised his hand, an extremely faint ray of grey divine light emerging from his fingertips.
“Don't resist.”
Before Aergia could ask, that divine light had already sunk into her body.
An extremely special rule-based vision expanded as a result, and the originally blurry connections of life suddenly became crystal clear.
She could see the life aura that had yet to dissipate within the physical body, as well as the power deep within the soul that sustained its existence.
More importantly, she finally saw the exact place where the authority over death took effect.
It did not simply destroy life.
Instead, when a life could no longer continue, it rendered the final judgment for that life that had reached its end.
Aergia was almost instinctively immersed in it.
This was a rule entirely different from sleep.
Sleep could recur. A living creature could sleep today and awaken again tomorrow.
Death, however, was not like that. At least within the currently established world order, death signified the true end of a life. The soul could continue to exist in the Underworld, but that did not negate the fact that physical life had run its course.
And that power which severed the soul from the body was precisely Thanatos's most core authority.
The longer Aergia observed, the more she realized its complexity.
The timing of death, the strength of the life connection, the power a soul could withstand, and the resistance of different creatures to their end—all of these influenced the final reaping process.
Thanatos did not simply swing his short sword.
On the contrary, in the vast majority of cases, he had to control his divine power with extreme precision to avoid causing extra damage to an otherwise intact soul while severing the connection.
This earned the young God of Death a few more degrees of genuine respect from Aergia.
It turned out his work was not as simple as it looked.
Of course, Thanatos seemed quite proud of this.
“Now you know how troublesome death is, don't you?”
“It is indeed more complex than I imagined.”
“That's why I said you should follow me.”
He naturally steered the topic back to his initial invitation.
Aergia wisely refrained from responding.
During the subsequent patrol, she continued to observe the rules with the help of that temporarily shared thread of death divine power. Details that were previously difficult to comprehend gradually became clear, yet even so, she did not rashly attempt to create a new concept.
The emergence of Rest was already an exceptionally rare harvest in itself.
She did not think that merely accompanying Thanatos on a few more trips would allow her to condense a new godhead as casually as picking up stones scattered on the ground.
Laws were not conjured out of thin air.
Only when the world itself possessed an as-yet incompletely defined phenomenon, and her divine portfolio happened to touch upon those rules, could a new concept possibly be born in her hands.
Thus, most of the time she merely observed and recorded, continuously organizing those scattered, complex patterns deep within her consciousness.
Until, in a desolate valley, they encountered a mountain beast whose life was drawing to a close.
It was a massive ancient creature. Its grayish-brown fur had long lost its luster, and the two curved horns atop its head were covered in fine lines left by the passage of time. It lay quietly beneath a rock face, a few half-eaten stalks of grass scattered beside it. Its chest slowly rose and fell with its breath, each inhalation appearing extraordinarily laboured.
Thanatos needed only a glance to know that this mountain beast was extremely old, its internal life origin constantly withering. Though it had not yet reached the absolute end, the power sustaining its life was nearly exhausted; even without any external influence, it would be hard-pressed to survive more than a few days and nights.
Unlike the creatures earlier that struggled desperately in the face of death, this mountain beast seemed extraordinarily peaceful. Sensing the arrival of the two deities, it merely raised its eyelids sluggishly before lowering its head once more, without the slightest intention of even standing up.
“Another old fellow about to die.”
Thanatos glanced at the mountain beast, his tone flat, clearly long accustomed to such sights.
Aergia's gaze lingered on the mountain beast. Utilizing that strand of the authority over death Thanatos had granted her earlier, she carefully observed the shifting rules within its body.
Its life was fading.
This in itself was not unusual.
During their earlier patrol, she had already seen many similar situations. Some creatures died from severe injuries, while others naturally exhausted their life origins. Whatever the cause, when death truly arrived, Thanatos could accurately perceive it through his own authority and complete the final reaping of the soul.
However, this mountain beast before her brought another detail to Aergia's attention.
Rate on N.U.
