Driven by the faint sense that she had finally brushed against a corner of the truth, Loki suddenly became all fired up.
Loki still urgently pushed the god beside her to hurry up and find their target, where the wine was stored.
"Sniff sniff…"
Soma's current appearance was… not something anyone would praise. Well… let's just say that people who make their hobbies their profession tend to be a bit unrestrained and carefree.
After all, Soma simply didn't care about his image at all.
As for Loki, she had no energy to talk to a guy acting like a dog.
Following after Soma, the two of them swaggered in openly, not thinking about hiding themselves in the slightest, and climbed over the wall behind the building.
No, "climbed" was more accurate. Either way… anyone watching would definitely not think they looked like decent gods.
With behavior like this, forget the top Familia like the Loki Familia or Freya Familia, even in ordinary small Familia, they would be spotted immediately by the members responsible for monitoring the area and then captured, punished harshly by the Guild Headquarters, and fined.
But the current base of the Dionysus Familia clearly no longer had such watchers.
Therefore, their actions were extremely bold, and combined with their anxiety, they acted without any restraint at all.
The two of them climbed over the stone wall covered in grapevines and entered the back garden.
Guided by the god Soma, who was twitching his nose as he sniffed, they infiltrated the building in single file, and, unsurprisingly, found a dark staircase leading down to the basement.
"That guy Dionysus follows some mysterious aesthetic, but does he really need to make his base this dark? Candles and torches for lighting? Isn't this way too old-fashioned?"
"Maybe he just likes the atmosphere? It feels… more mysterious, or something."
"…" Loki rolled her eyes at Soma, silently thinking: A god who hides in dark corners all year… as if he'd like magic-stone lanterns, yeah right.
Creak…
They pushed open a heavy wooden door, and in the weak ventilation light from the basement, the vision of the two gods gradually cleared.
"This is-"
What spread out before them were rows upon rows of oak shelves lining the walls, filled with uncountable bottles of wine.
No words were needed. The sight alone explained everything.
This was a wine cellar Dionysus had set up specifically to store fine wine.
Everywhere they looked, the shelves were packed.
Countless vintage wines were stored here, bottles and shelves covered in unexpected layers of dust, clearly long neglected.
That was normal, and also indirectly proved that everything stored here was premium stock, not some cheap stuff.
This scene, enough to crit any wine-lover, would normally have made Loki go wild with excitement.
The cool, even slightly cold air made her breath tremble, but that didn't stop her from striding forward.
She quickly moved down the narrow stone passageway toward the deeper storage area.
Finally, walking in line, Soma, still twitching his nose, suddenly stopped before a certain shelf's corner.
No words were needed. As though guided by Soma's unwavering stare, Loki turned her head and unhesitatingly grabbed one bottle, pulling it free from the shelf.
Suppressing her agitated heart and her trembling fingers, Loki viciously yanked the cork out.
And in the next moment, a rich, melting, almost tender aroma spread out, instantly filling the entire wine cellar.
"…There's no mistake. This is divine wine. And it's a completely different type of wine from the ones I make."
Soma took a deep breath. He didn't even need to taste it. Just from the fullness of the aroma alone, he could judge and confirm it with his divine sense.
Holding the bottle, Loki involuntarily drew in a sharp breath when she heard Soma's firm conclusion.
Unfortunately, Soma didn't notice the change in her expression at all, his full attention was focused solely on this bottle of divine wine.
His excited expression showed exactly how deeply it fascinated him. Then, drawing on his professional expertise, he rambled on:
"Compared to the ones I brew, this divine wine pursues the extreme, the absolute extreme… you understand what I mean, right? That kind of feeling."
As he spoke, Soma used gestures to help Loki understand.
But Loki had no mood to listen to his "nonsense." In her mind, only one word remained: extreme.
Soma's statement hit her like a bucket of enlightenment, illuminating a path through the fog covering the truth. She couldn't help widening her eyes.
To surpass Soma, the god of wine, who had no equal in wine brewing? Well, only in terms of a very specific type of extreme specialization.
But actually, "surpass" wasn't even quite accurate.
Compared to this bottle, Soma's divine wine pursued the principle of a wooden barrel, no weak points, fullness and balance.
But this wine? It focused on one single trait pushed to the absolute extreme.
Their styles were completely different, so comparing them was meaningless.
Of course, only insiders understood this sort of thing. To Loki, who was simply a drunkard, all she understood was this:
Whoever brewed this wine had surpassed Soma in brewing wine. That was enough.
And this realization shocked Loki to her core.
"Absolutely unbelievable."
A wine that could make the wine-obsessed Soma speak like this, what on earth could it be?
As though cutting off her spiraling thoughts, Soma said his next line:
"If it's this divine wine, then with how extreme it is… even we gods should be able to get completely drunk with ease."
"…"
These words.
The meaning.
A flash of lightning ran through Loki's mind. She felt she had finally grasped the key point.
Dionysus, controlled like a puppet behind the scenes. Dionysus, turned into a "joker."
Drunk. Drunk. Drunk, completely drunk?
Dionysus was drunk? That's why he smelled like wine?
If, if he was being force-fed this divine wine regularly?
If he unknowingly drank divine wine every day, remaining perpetually drunk and unclear-headed, turned into a marionette?
Then based on that hypothesis, with Dionysus in a permanently drunken state, completely unaware, he would attract the attention of Loki, Hermes, and even antagonize Ouranos?
Scene after scene replayed rapidly in Loki's mind, turning her face pale and horrified.