Thou Art the Harvest that Reaps the Stars (I)

... ...

...The birds are chirping merrily again today.

They sing the praises of Olympus. They sing of how happy they are to be here amongst its glorious skies, bountiful harvests, and beautiful vistas.

Ahh, and yet...

My heart sits ill at ease...

Sounds like you've got it rough too, hon.

You're the queen, right? In my world's version of Greek mythology, I remember Zeus falling in love with a human queen at one point...

But they say you fused with Zeus's first wife, Hera?

Doesn't that feel like sharing a body with your mother-in-law? How can you stand it?

And on top of that, you're even acting as his priestess.

...I guess Zeus must be really attached to you.

By the way, just out of curiosity, how does this Lostbelt feel about women's rights?

During the Olympia Machia, Lady Hera suffered a grave wound, and her original mechanical body was destroyed.

But Zeus was reluctant to lose his beloved queen forever.

By fusing her remnants with me, a Heroic Spirit from Proper Human History, he was able to prolong both of our lives.

Such is the depth of his love for us.

...I see.

Thank you for worrying about me, Pepe.

Now, um... If you wouldn't mind...

...I was hoping to ask you about the Chaldeans.

How could I say no to that? Especially after you've so kindly been putting me up in your lovely palaceer, shrine.

Oh, what's this? Are you two having a nice chat?

Any friend of Kirschtaria Wodime's is a friend of Zeus's. Please, make yourself at home.

Why thank you. Don't mind if I do then.

I must applaud your initiative, Queen Europa.

Lady Demeter.

I would never have thought to do something so dreadful as gathering information on Chaldea and Proper Human History.

What's this all about? No, wait, let me guess.

... ...

Is it because you feel responsible for letting them get away yesterday?

...Yes, that's right. I feel terrible about not being able to fulfill Lord Zeus's revelation.

Oh, you poor thing. You really are quite the worrywart, aren't you?

But you don't have to worry about things like this. Just let myself and the other gods take care of it.

You may have assimilated with Lady Hera, but you're still only a demigod. Zeus would never want you pushing yourself beyond your limits.

All you need to do is sit and smile by the flowers, like any young maiden your age.

Have you met my daughter Persephone yet? I would just love to see you two become friends!

...Lady Demeter, I'm afraid Persephone is

A Servant, was it?

Heroes who were inscribed in humanity upon their death, and now materialize as Heroic Spirits?

What a truly awful procedure. I can scarcely think of anything more dreadful.

Everyone knows humans should only be born from their mothers.

Say, I have a wonderful idea, Europa. You should think of me as your mother now.

I...

It's quite all right, Europa. There's no need to be polite.

I'm the goddess of the land, and the land has always been mother to all things.

Mother of the land, huh. That sounds like Gaia.

In the Greek mythology I know, she was the mother of the Earth, the gods, and everything else under the sun. She was also married to Uranus, the first god of the heavens.

First, there was Chaos. Then Gaia, the land, came forth and gave birth to everything.

The land has always been a mother. That's how it's supposed to be.

And the sea...

The sea was...also a mother. Or at least, it was supposed to be...

... ...

The sea?

Hmm. I didn't sense any sort of femininity from the late god of the sea in Atlantis...

Maybe that refers to the Oceanids the daughters of the sea?

Teehee. Oh, Pepe, human sage. That isn't what I mean.

Hmm... I suppose it might be difficult for you to understand.

But, all the same...

...I'm certain the sea was also once a mother.

A magical energy signal is making its way towards the ship!

It's kind of faint...but I'd recognize this pattern anywhere!

It's a Servant!

Dammit, now what do we do!? We don't have anyone here who can fight right now!

C-c-c-c-calm down, Manual! Have you tried a more thorough scan yet!?

It's Meunière! What, now you can't even remember the food theme anymore!?

But anyway, good idea! I'll run a thorough scan right now!

Easy there, guys. Just keep it together.

I already scanned this Servant myself, and there's nothing to worry about.

Leonardo!

Technical Advisor! What are you thinking!? You're supposed to be in recovery!

Hey, what's the big idea? You know I prefer to be called Da Vinci.

Anyway, don't worry about me. My recovery's still coming along fine.

Holmes was nice enough to set things up for me so I could connect my consciousness to the Border's core from the recovery pod.

That said, the most I can do right now is activate the systems that don't need the Magical Reactors to be rebooted.

Hmm. So you're not overexerting yourself then?

Of course not. I'm still making my health my first priority. Isn't that what your family's homunculus used to do, too?

...Yes, it is. Ruthlessly so, in fact.

But never mind that now. What did the scan tell us!?

Oh, right, the magical energy signal. Well, like I said, there's nothing to worry about.

Their Spirit Origin is super high quality, but I can also tell from their low magical energy levels that they're in pretty bad shape.

So it looks like a really high-end Heroic Spiritone with a Spirit Origin that's on par with a Divine Spirit...

...has drifted here, probably from Atlantis.

Drifted...?

So, what? You're saying they got sucked into the Great Pit's whirlpool...

...and they've been sort of floating around this area ever since instead of falling straight down?

They've probably got some kind of passive ability that lets them move around like this even when they're adrift.

... ...

...Then we need to make a calm, levelheaded decision.

So we have a powerful, Divine Spirit-level Servant... Drifting about in a weakened state...

From Atlantis...

...Hmmm.

N-now what is it!?

Relax, old man. That was just our new message sound! Looks like we've got a bunch of data from the Wandering Sea!

Huh, the README's a video file. I'll put it up on the main monitor.

Firstly, I want to congratulate all of you on making it to Olympus.

Now that you have made it this far, I wish you success in cutting down the Tree of Emptiness.

I have been going over all the data you sent me, and it has proven extremely useful.

Thanks to what you learned by going up against the machine gods Artemis and Poseidon...

...we now know we can expect that the other gods of Olympus are similarly powerful mechanical beings with combat abilities beyond human ken.

And above all...

We have gained information from the ultimate weapon that Hephaestus designed and forged out of Achilles's Divine Construct armor:

The longbow Orion used to shoot down Artemis.

That piece of data turned out to be the final key.

The final key...

This is the key that will give humans the means to bring down gods...

The last hope we have of fighting back against these literal deus ex machina.