"S-scarlett?", Aoto muttered to himself, his body trembling uncontrollably. He felt a cold dread wash over him, but he fought to hold himself back with every bit of resolve he had.
Unlike Chiyoko, he had never met any goddess before being summoned. So when Scarlett proposed the idea of announcing herself as a goddess's incarnation and replacing the statues, he had no problem with it. He had thought, "What are they gonna do even if they find out about it? They can watch at best!"
But who could have thought that he would actually be summoned by them instead, without any prior notice?
He felt like he was absolutely, completely fucked right now.
"No... no, this is not over yet," he thought. "If they knew my and Scarlett's relationship fully, I would've already been dead by now. But how much do they know? What if they are just testing me?" Dozens of questions flooded his mind, but then he took a deep, shaky breath and forced himself to steady his racing heart.
"They can't be omniscient, so I still have a chance." Aoto motivated himself, trying to find a sliver of hope.
"Miss Scarlett? Is she not your incarnation?" Chiyoko asked, his face a mix of innocent confusion.
"This idiot! Don't just say anything without thinking!" Aoto sighed to himself, but there was nothing he could do now to stop him.
"Yes. Although I can understand why you and most of the people got tricked by her, so I will not pass any judgement on you two right now!" the goddess of beauty and battle, Aphrodite, said calmly.
"No punishment? So they definitely don't know everything?" Aoto immediately felt a huge wave of relief wash over him.
At that moment, the goddess of beauty, Aphrodite, turned to look at Aoto. "Before explaining the situation further, I would like to ask you something!" she said, her voice calm but commanding.
Without stopping, she added, "About Scarlett. Two of you were summoned at once. From what we know, she identified herself as your slave. But I certainly don't think you both had a relationship like that!"
"What are they gonna do if I tell them I'm her best friend?" Aoto joked to himself, trying to ease his own panic.
But then he looked at Aphrodite with a dim, sorrowful expression. "You saw right through me, my lady. We barely knew each other. At the time of the summoning, we just happened to be close, and she was pulled alongside with me," he added.
"But when I said she was my slave in order to save her and ended up resolving the situation, we became more friendly. Since it was a new world for us, we always stayed in contact and ended up becoming benefactors for each other!" he immediately told a fake story on the spot, one that even he was quite shocked he could come up with so quickly.
"Thank God I used Reality Warping to give my throat a 'Storyteller' skill!" he thought to himself, a bead of sweat rolling down his temple.
"Hmm..." Goddess Nikke hummed lightly, tapping a finger on her armrest. "This relationship and trust will surely come in handy. You did a good job!"
Aoto looked at Chiyoko, who seemed quite happy after what Aoto just said.
"What are you happy about? Didn't you see she already has three girlfriends?" He thought to himself in disappointment.
"So let me get to the point. You two are now given the job to kill Scarlett Nova, by any means possible!" Aphrodite said in a grim, cold voice.
"B-but, Miss Scarlett is not a bad person. She must have done it out of ignorance. Please give her a chance!" Chiyoko pleaded immediately, his voice desperate.
"It is still a crime for us. But since you are so sure, then make her announce that she faked being our incarnation and spread our name for the next one hundred years!" Nikke proposed, her tone business-like.
"This..." Chiyoko hesitated. Although he didn't know Scarlett as well as Aoto did, he still knew that she had a very prideful personality. She would never do something like this.
"I'll try!" he answered, his voice low and lacking any real motivation.
"I'll persuade her as well!" Aoto added immediately. His goal was to somehow get out of this mess right now, so he agreed without a second thought.
"Hmm... If she doesn't agree, you have to kill her. Of course, it won't be for free!" Aphrodite said with a mischievous smile, trying to motivate them with greed.
"You might have realized it by now that you can't go any further than level 100. But I can make an exception and lift the limit to level 1000!" she said. Her offer was surely enticing.
"How is it? Being powerful enough to crush continents like some of the powerful heroes of the past? Isn't that sound exciting? You might be able to grow as powerful as the demon king!" she added, her voice full of temptation.
But at that moment, she stopped and rolled her eyes as if she remembered something.
"Ohh yes, you three defeated a demon king. Congrats!" she congratulated them flatly, with zero emotion. "Now that I think about it, we summoned you late. That moment might've been a great chance to kill her there as well!" she added, her thoughts sounding quite malicious compared to her holy look.
Aoto's lips twitched, but he didn't say anything. "Don't we deserve some kind of reward? What am I gonna do with an emotionless congratulation?" He thought to himself but dared not to say a word out loud.
But still, he certainly had one question that he wanted to ask the most.
He looked at both of them. Their mana was completely overwhelming. Besides, it couldn't be said to be fully mana; it had divinity in it. They were overflowing with it.
It was like thousands of years of accumulated divinity.
Aoto had looked at the Demon King Noir's mana. He had certainly a huge quantity of mana, way more than any other demon, but it was still short compared to these two.
"Umm... my lady, can I ask something?" Aoto asked with a dry, humorless chuckle.
"Say," Aphrodite said.
"I can sense both of your unfathomable power. Then how come you respond to summonings and summon heroes to set them on a journey to defeat the demon king?" he asked.
"Can't you just do it yourself? I can hardly imagine any demon king having as much power as you two!" He said with a touch of praise and respect in his tone, trying to be careful.
"That's what I wanted to ask as well," Chiyoko's eyes lit up slightly, as if Aoto had just predicted what he wanted to ask.
As for the goddesses, both of them looked at each other in silence. But then—
"Pftt...." both of them laughed at once, leaving Aoto and Chiyoko completely confused.
After a few seconds of laughing, Nikke took a deep breath. "I thought you two would have realized it by now. You both are quite dumb compared to the previous generations's top heroes," she chuckled once again.
"Yes. Although we aren't sure about the first and second demon kings, we could have easily defeated the rest of them in a single day!" she said with a proud smile.
But then her smile turned cold, and a dark grin spread across her face. "But then what? Who's going to worship us when all the demon kings were to be defeated?"
"Huh? But weren't you supposed to be with humanity's prosperity?" Chiyoko asked in surprise, their statements had shocked him to the core.
"Why would we? If demon kings are gone, they'll just fight to death between themselves!" Nikke said with a sneer, her voice dripping with disdain.
"Yes. It was already so hard for us to rise to high-ranking goddesses. Making sure that ancient humans don't perceive us as some kind of evil entity, showing small miracles, divine dreams to old kings, sometimes resurrecting some dead person back to life..." Aphrodite sighed, thinking of all the hard work they had gone through. Her beautiful face looked tired for a moment.
"Do you know how rare it is to become a goddess in your awakening? One wrong image in people's minds and you will end up like those mindless mutated monsters wandering in the universe!" Aphrodite said, shivering slightly as if the thought was too horrible to bear.
"That's why we don't descend to humanity or make any type of appearance. Since once we do, our mighty and holy image in their mind will surely grow a bit low," she explained. "People tend to feel less impacted by someone or something they can actually see. Instead of something they can't describe or comprehend, they end up making those beings an idle figure."
"A blind worshiper gives the purest divinity to us!" Nikke added with a smug smile.
Aphrodite sighed and waved her hand in frustration. "Indeed, and this is what we are. Idle goddesses. A pretty face, a charming body with golden hair, who can't even use abusive words despite how dark our thoughts are!"
Chiyoko, "....."
Aoto, "....."
Both of them were silent. Their lower faces hung loose slightly, their minds completely dazed by the horrifying truth they were hearing. Everything they believed in was a lie.
"Pftt, are you two thinking why we told all this to you?" Aphrodite chuckled, enjoying their shocked expressions.
"Well, what can you even do about it? It's your job to fight for us. Once you die, there will be more. Even if one of them ends up defeating a demon king, by the time they go for the next one, one more demon king will rise. Not to forget the increase in the quantity and quality of believers after a demon king gets defeated. It'll be a great benefit for us!" she said, her tone full of pride and ego.
"You are heroes only down there. For us, you are just one of the slaves who contributes to filling our need for divinity!"