On a Godless Planet:Volume3A Chapter 9
Chapter 9: Doom[edit]
–Strength has arrived.
●
The Greek sea god had arrived.
Facing him came down to Seito.
…This is not who I wanted to see.
The only ones here were her and those stationed here for defense. Technically speaking, her superior Touto was here, but she wasn’t the combat type.
She had no backup.
There were a lot of gods outside, cautiously watching what happened in here, but none of them dared come in.
After all, Poseidon had stopped after entering the courtyard through the entrance.
Those outside would have to walk right past him to come in.
Which meant Seito and the guards were facing him with no backup.
It wasn’t a good position. Also…
“Touto, how strong is Poseidon?”
“There is one surefire way to find out.”
“You had better not tell me to try fighting him.”
“Why ask the question if you don’t want the best answer?”
Next to Touto, the manga clubroom door opened.
“Um, Senpai, I was hoping you could check over my storyboard.”
“Oh, done already? But, Souko-san, now is not a good time.”
“Eh?” said a first year from the manga club. Seito was pretty sure her last name was something like Raptor. She had once seen the girl really focused on the crane game at the arcade.
When the girl noticed Seito, she bowed and hurried back into the clubroom.
“Do you have the underclassmen closed up in there? Aren’t you pushing them a little hard?”
“She’s my candidate for the next club head.”
“What, so is she a creator god?”
“Something like that.”
“I see,” said Seito. That meant that girl would have to attend the later meeting of the gods. Seito had guard duty there, so they would see each other.
But right now she had to focus on Poseidon.
He was trouble. Because…
“You must be the Greek Poseidon! Explain your purpose here!”
But her question went unanswered.
“–––––”
Without a word, he took a step forward.
He was fully inside the courtyard now.
●
I asked a question in the entranceway to the school building, which looked a lot like a floating temple right now.
“What does she mean Poseidon’s here?”
“I don’t know either. Omokane-san must know something, but she ended the divine transmission and made sure we couldn’t find her.”
“Sounds rough.”
“You help me close up the library!”
With that, we made our way there with umbrellas. The school building and club building were still jacked up from the water and some boats were carrying in stone or other building materials. However…
“Poseidon, huh? Haven’t seen him in a while.”
“Is he a friend of yours?”
“Their lead god once came to us and made some ridiculous demands. And then a lot happened with their gods.”
“So you don’t get along?”
“…”
“W-what is that silence supposed to mean, Kuwajiri-san!?”
Then I realized something.
“Wait, where’s Sumeragi-kun?”
“He shouted ‘Woo-hoo! A dangerous event!’ and ran off for the club building with his umbrella.”
“Hmmm!? I have a bad feeling about this!”
●
Seito wanted to resolve this peacefully.
But a main member of Olympus mythology had entered their territory without permission. He was free to go where he liked in the Tachikawa city area, but…
…The school is a designated area.
There were no teachers here. She had called the school on her Revelation Board earlier and she had gotten an answer from the academic affairs office, but…
“Hello, this is the academic affairs office.”
“…”
“Um, did you need something?”
“Oh, uh, no, I’m good. Sorry.”
“Wh-why do you sound like you drew a bad card!?”
Why did he have to be so perceptive?
“Well, um, I just think some things aren’t possible.”
“Wait, wait, wait. Just tell me what it is! Is a water pipe clogged? I’m great at clearing clogs!”
Was he more a janitor god than a sea god?
But all the same…
…I can’t tell him the god who changed his myths is here.
Poseidon had to be far stronger based on that.
And if she couldn’t reach any useful teachers, she and the other guards would just have to do this themselves. That was their duty. She looked to TJ, and…
“–––––”
TJ waved forward, to say go on. So…
“…!”
Seito sprang forward. Her power was defensive in nature. It was especially effective in a home. Several gods who knew her lived in this club building, so it could act as a home. So she poured strength into her body.
[Image:godless_beset.png|50px]]
“Prepare yourself.”
She sent out a right palm strike.
She went straight in in order to give him the option to evade.
Poseidon was also a war god. If, right after he entered an unfamiliar building in an unfamiliar land, he evaded the opponent coming straight toward him, it would mean he had set foot in an unknown place.
Anyone with experience in these things would know she was “guiding” him.
Would he counterattack or defend?
Hopefully, she would simply hit him, but even if he struck back, her right palm strike would reach him.
That was the sort of exchange she had demanded he “prepare himself” for. So…
“…”
Her strike was going to hit. Poseidon simply watched her with a blank expression. But…
“You’re miiiiiine!”
All of a sudden, she heard her partner’s voice.
Coming from behind Poseidon.
●
“What!?”
The question escaped her mouth.
Her partner Beisu was charging toward Poseidon through the pathway leading into the courtyard. It was a thoughtless charge that didn’t consider the possible consequences.
She had thought he was still on guard behind her, so when had he gotten there?
…You idiot!
Beisu had been off his game lately. It had something to do with her, but he wasn’t currently powerful enough to charge this kind of enemy. Which may have been why he decided to sneak in from behind.
At any rate, in the moment before Beisu hit Poseidon with a tackle…
“…I see.”
With a quiet comment, sounding like he had realized something, the sea god moved.
“–––––”
He pulled back.
Swapping places with Beisu as he charged in from behind.
The movement was so much like a receding wave. He appeared to be stepping forward and, the very next moment, he had Beisu had swapped places.
He hadn’t circled around Beisu.
It had looked to Seito like they had simply changed coordinates.
…He’s on another level entirely!
A moment after that thought, the result arrived.
Beisu was right in front of her, mid-tackle.
“Ah!”
●
“Oh, pinball.”
Is DECO’s Time Machine back in the arcade? I wondered while the ball bounced around with some weirdly lively noises.
Beisu had taken Beset’s right palm strike counterattack, sending him ricocheting around.
Seito wasn’t the type to go easy against Poseidon.
Beisu’s eyes instantly rolled back in his head, but…
[Image:godless_beisu_awate.png|50px]]
“Nfh!”
That he didn’t go “gweh” or “gyah” suggested he was truly in agony as he flew right on back down the pathway he had arrived through.
“…”
“Beisu! What are you doing!?”
Oh, so that’s her first thought here.
●
That had been a solid hit. Seito had felt it in her wrist.
…Wait, that’s not the point!
But he had flown toward the flooded schoolyard. If he fell in, he would end up soaked, but he could swim back.
When he did, they needed to have a talk.
Then someone entered the pathway Beisu was flying down.
“Hooray! Is something exciting happening in here!?”
Beisu collided with the idiot.
●
In the harbor connecting the school building with the club building, the gods watching to see what became of Poseidon’s attack instead witnessed some pinball.
The guard god who flew out of the club building’s entrance happened to collide with the human who wanted to watch the dangerous situation. The human was knocked away toward the school building, a truck carrying supplies to the school hit him and knocked him away at a right angle, so he flew toward the schoolyard.
The human fell into the water covering the schoolyard, but ether light soon rose into the sky from where he landed in the water.
He had rolled back.
●
Touto tried not to think about it too much. Be like a chicken. Yes, a birdbrain.
Then some loud voices and a group of gods arrived at the entrance.
“Heyyyyyyyy! Why did Sumeragi-kun just roll back!? Who’s responsible for this!?
“Eh!? What happens to the culprit!?”
“You don’t know!? Anyone who enrages the lifespan goddess has their lifespan obliterated, so they turn into a dried husk and crumble away!”
“Eh? Hold on! But who was at fault here!? Me!?”
“What did you do exactly?”
“Senpai-chaaan, that is a terrifying smile.”
“No, it isn’t,” said Senpai-san while Seito instructed the other guards to fall back. Then she sat down, placed a hand on her forehead, and spoke.
“I sent Beisu flying and he hit the human.”
“Hit him?”
“Yes. That knocked the human away and It seems a freight truck hit him.”
“A freight truck?”
“Oh, I just got a witness account from the driver. He’s a local god.”
“What did he say?”
“He said a figure suddenly flew in from the side, so he went ‘An evil spirit!? I must hit it with my truck to purify it!’ and then he slammed on the gas.”
“…”
“Oh, and the direct cause of the rollback was belly flopping too hard into the water.”
“…”
“Um…”
Senpai-san thought for a bit. She bent her fingers down one by one to work out some kind of logic, raised the fingers again to check her result, and…
“Seito-san?”
“Oh, yes!? What is it!?”
“Why did you send this Beisu-san person flying?”
“Um, wait, is this some kind of trial?”
“…? Senpai-san, are you a god with a right to judgment?”
“Huh!? Kuwajiri-san! Stop making fun of a weakling god like me! Of course I don’t have that kind of right!”
“Senpai-chan, could you calm down?”
“Anyway.” Kuwajiri turned toward Seito. “Don’t worry. This is not a trial. It is an emotion-driven vigilante killing by the strongest of all gods.”
“It doesn’t get much worse than that.”
“Hey,” said Seito, pointing toward the entrance and the man standing by the wall there. “Poseidon there was trying to barge in here, so I was trying to stop him! But he dodged and I hit Beisu instead, so long story short, it wasn’t my fault! It was Poseidon’s fault! For dodging!”
“That’s the worst possible excuse a guard could make.”
“I-I don’t care! I don’t want to go so far past mummification I’m nothing but dust!”
Yeah, probably not, thought Touto, but Senpai-san turned toward Poseidon.
“Do you have a moment?”
“…?”
He gave her an expressionless look of displeasure. He must have wanted to say something here, but…
“Hey, no fighting.”
The thunder god entered from the passageway. He handed Shifu a plastic bag containing a case of beer, but when Poseidon saw him…
““Tooru-chaaan!”
●
…Whelp, here it comes.
Here what comes? This. Poseidon ran over toward them, and…
“Really, now. Why didn’t you tell me you were here? Oh! And Shifu-chan’s here too? What a delight!”
“I’ve been standing here for a while now.”
“Sorry about that. I zoned out for a bit there!”
●
“Can you really zone out so much you don’t notice Harvest God-senpai?”
“Knowing Poseidon, it’s possible.”
“He switches pretty drastically between off and on. Maybe he would’ve switched on faster if I’d been in the front of the group.”
“Um,” said a voice.
“How do you know each other?”
●
“Oh,” replied Shifu. She ignored Poseidon who was yammering away about the bullet train’s dining car now that he had switched on.
“Well, you know how it is. When Zeus came picking a fight with us, a lot happened and Posei-chan here made friends with Tooru and me.”
“Oh…”
Senpai-chan nodded a few times as she more or less reached an understanding of the current mood, but the matter of her reputation remained. Poseidon had reacted to Tooru this time, so Shifu looked to Tooru. And he…
“Hey, Poseidon. Are you willing to bow your head to smooth things over here?”
“Eh? Smooth what things over?”
Oh, he came in here without even knowing what it meant, realized Shifu. So she glanced over at TJ who would know what was going on.
“Poseidon-san, you aren’t allowed in here without permission.”
“I’m not?”
“But,” he said.
“I’m an earth god, so it seems to me I should be allowed in anywhere there’s dry ground to stand on.”
●
“Eh? What does he mean he’s an earth god? Isn’t Poseidon a sea god?”
“Hey, gather up. We just got tonight’s dinner for everyone. ...So what’s up? A fight?”
“I am so sorry…”
“It wasn’t me! Why is everyone looking at me!? And I know some of you know what really happened!”
“Bil. You’re jumping the gun here. …So what happened?”
“Well, Human-senpai was in a multi-collision accident and rolled back, so we were trying to determine who was responsible, but then Poseidon said he is an earth god.”
“Poseidon?”
“Who’s that?”
“You’re just going to further confuse matters, so stay quiet. …Anyway, I thought Poseidon was a sea god? But he said he’s an earth god?”
“Correct.”
“So does this mean Mr. V had his position as a sea god rewritten by an earth god?”
●
“Here I am enjoying a late lunch when I get the feeling someone is badmouthing me.”
“C’mon, I worked hard to get this gyudon bento for us to share, so don’t let these trivial matters get you down, honey.”
“Nnnnn! Trivial!?”
●
I feel like they’re slandering Mr. V, thought Tenma, but Knowledge God-senpai raised her hand.
“It’s more complicated than this, but Poseidon was originally a god of the Pelasgians who lived on the Mediterranean coast and he was an earth god at that time. But that changed thanks to the influx of Greeks and other Greek-speaking people.”
“So Poseidon originally had a similar position to Mr. V?”
“This happened before the creation of the Olympus mythology and the changes came from syncretism and fusion rather than one mythology overwriting another.”
“Shinto mythology came about from the syncretism of local gods, so it’s a common way for mythologies to form.”
“B-but why did he turn from an earth god to a sea god?”
●
“Well,” replied Kido, while considering heading outside after securing a stock of snacks in the cafeteria. She didn’t know Izumi’s tastes, but she knew wagashi would be a safe bet for Douhai-san.
“For example, Mr. V was a god of water sources, right? And water sources are closely related to the earth.”
The emergency meant she only had to sign her name at the register. She walked outside without an umbrella and the rain automatically avoided her. The club building was to the southeast. She saw a figure obscured by the rain a bit to the right.
She started walking. And…
“Poseidon was an earth god, but his primary trait was being ‘the earth shaker’.”
“The earth shaker?”
“In other words, the causer of earthquakes. As far as earth gods go, that makes him more like a god of calamity, but that is also why he was later made the brother of thunder god Zeus.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” said Douhai-san. And…
“So he isn’t a sea god?”
“There are other reasons, but you can link earthquakes to a sea god.”
How did you do that?
“On the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea, an earthquake almost always caused a tsunami.”
●
“Really?”
<Kido is correct. The continents forming the surface of the Earth are positioned atop continental plates, which are positioned such that they surround that inland sea.>
Balancer displayed a map on a Revelation Board. The map showed the Mediterranean Sea in the center.
<Approximately 200 million years ago, diastrophism split Europe from Africa. The gap this created is geographically known as the Tethys Ocean, but it was eventually split between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. It dried out for a time, but after the Strait of Gibraltar split 5.33 million years ago, it filled with water, forming the Mediterranean Sea.>
“When it was dry, that must have been some valley.”
<Yes. That is why fossils of ancient surface creatures can be salvaged from the bottom of the Mediterranean.>
“The Seto Inland Sea was actually formed in a similar way. I didn’t expect the Divine States-World Correspondence to include a similarity like that.”
<Well, their depths are entirely different. The largest continental plate split by diastrophism gave the Mediterranean an average depth of 1500m. Its deepest point is more than 5200m deep. When it was dry, all of that was a natural valley where you could reach a depth of 5000m. You could say a literal “abyss” existed over a vast area of land.>
“…”
“Um, how many Mount Fujis is that?”
“Just under one and a half.”
“Terrain like that existed in extreme ancient times. And speaking of the continental plates, let’s look at the divide between the Eurasian Plate and the African Plate. On the west, it starts at the Balkan Peninsula where Greece is. On the east, it starts at the Anatolia Peninsula south of the Black Sea. That is where the African Plate digs in below the Eurasian Plate in what is known as the Aegean Sea Plate. So most any earthquakes that occur in the Mediterranean will happen here.”
●
Kido listened to Douhai-san as she walked in the rain.
“I always thought Europe didn’t have many earthquakes.”
“The areas away from the Mediterranean plate – modern day Italy, France, Spain, and the southern coast of Africa – have no plates digging into each other, giving them a solid bedrock, so you are right about them. But to the east, in the Greek region, they have a lot of volcanic activity and frequent earthquakes.”
<Yes. The border between plates is found in southern Greece and earthquakes caused by this will occur in northern Greece, so they have a lot of them. For example, in the 1900s up through the 90s, they had ten earthquakes of magnitude six or greater. Each time, dozens or hundreds were killed.>
“That means they have a major earthquake about once a decade.”
And…
“When each one causes a tsunami, there is a lot more damage than just the direct earthquake damage. The earth shaker title is directly linked to the ocean overflowing.”
●
Kido thought about how she was a god of seas and rivers to the Scythians who were primarily based on the north side of the Black Sea, but…
“Earthquakes are not a part of me.”
<The south end of the Black Sea is the northern border of the Aegean Sea Plate, but the north end is on the Eurasian Plate, meaning very few earthquakes. Any earthquakes on the Anatolia Peninsula would only be strong enough to shake the Black Sea’s water level a bit. In fact, the area from Europe to Russia has the fewest earthquakes in the world.>
“And then an area with plenty of them is right nearby? I can see why the ancient people assumed something must live there.”
“I was thinking that explained all the different gods in Greece, but then I realized our mythology has the occasional earthquake in it too.”
<Because Mesopotamia is on the border between the Arabian Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is also near the Somali Plate that supports the northeast end of the African Plate, so it is a fairly unstable region. Iran and Iraq have major earthquakes from time to time and while Dubai in the UAE is going through a lot of development, its skyscrapers are all designed to resist earthquakes of Magnitude 7 or greater.>
“On that note, do you know where Japan ranks on the list of countries with the most earthquakes?”
“Are we not #1?”
“No,” said Kuwajiri-san.
“Japan is #4. #1 is China, #2 is Indonesia, and if you can believe it, #3 is Iraq in the Middle East.”
“Wow, so we’re #3.”
“Probably not the best place for a tower.”
“Tooruuu. That’s a video game.”
<Anyway,> said Balancer. <Volcanic regions also tend to be on a plate border, so a mythology where cataclysms tend to come from the earth probably came about on a plate border or in a region bordering one.>
“So thanks to earthquakes and volcanic activity, continental plate movement and its side effects have led to the creation of quite a few gods.”
This flooding and rain were probably similar in that regard. Weather could now be explained using things like atmospheric pressure and air currents, but humanity tended to attribute it to gods.
However…
“So with all this talk of an ‘earth shaker’, should I assume Izumi is currently going on about it being the ‘earth jiggler’ in his big boobs worship?”
●
Tenma saw everyone freeze when Kido’s comment arrived over their Revelation Boards.
Eventually, Harvest God-senpai whispered to everyone except Poseidon who was smiling happily for some reason.
“So Kido-chan said ‘Izumi would love some snacks if we’re going to be playing games, wouldn’t he?’ and went to the cafeteria earlier, so…does she not know Sumeragi-chan rolled back?”
“Shifu-san, your Kido-san impression is spot on.”
“Yeah, that is not the point here.”
“Oh, s-sorry. I was trying to not think about it! Um, and in my defense, if we do have some kind of communication system set up, I’m not a part of it.”
“I received a request to complete the rollback procedure, but it came from the Shinto Representative, not you.”
“Yes,” said Tenma. “The terraforming lead is in charge of the terraforming, so she wouldn’t be in charge of that. The human’s management system is primarily managed by my boss. His mother was involved in his creation, but she has not been involved since and I doubt she was notified of the recent rollback.”
So…
“I believe we can blame this on my boss.”
●
They aren’t responding, I noted in the cafeteria shortly before I finally heard Douhai-san’s voice again.
“Um, Kido-san? Can I tell you something?”
“Yes? What is it?”
“Sumeragi-kun kinda, sorta rolled back.”
I broke the Revelation Board with a chop and began running.
●
Raidou was chatting with Poseidon.
They were similar-ish gods, although mostly in that they were war gods, but when Poseidon was “on”, he turned into a real motormouth. Raidou was a fairly good listener, so he listened while ignoring about half of it.
Poseidon rambled from topic to topic. Currently, he was talking about when he first gained his real manifestation here and Demeter dragged him to an okonomiyaki place.
“It was the best. I had no idea what she was even talking about!”
●
“The thing is, Poseidon, there are some rules you must follow while here.”
Demeter used a flat metal device to point at the food cooking on the grill.
“This here is the soul food of this region.”
“Eh!? What do you mean!? Other than the few veggies it’s got in it, it’s all made from flour, isn’t it!?”
“Just listen.”
Athena looked apologetically toward the grill, but you know how she is.
Anyway, I listened.
“These are made differently to the west and east of the area we live in. If you get the two confused and order a Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki in the west, you could start a war.”
“A war!? Really!? Over this!?”
“Not ‘this’ – ‘okonimiyaki’. Do not forget that name.”
I had no idea what she was talking about, but apparently that metal tool was called a “hera” in the west and a “kote” in the east. I remember that much.
●
After hearing Poseidon tell that story, Raidou saw Shifu and Senpai-san end a whispered conversation and quickly turn his way.
“”E-excuse me! This was supposed to be a Shinto trial, but, Poseidon-san? You should really run away now!”
“Eh? What? What’s happened now?”
“Hurryyyyy!”
What is this about? wondered Raidou.
Just then, a figure burst in through the courtyard’s entrance, hair trailing behind her.
“Where is the ruffian who killed my Izumi!?”
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