"O...old friend, thank you..."
Having narrowly escaped with his life, Sisyphus leaned against the stone wall, patting his chest with lingering fear, and offered his genuine gratitude to the companion beside him.
Even though this fellow seemed perpetually full of schemes and forever on the verge of selling him out.
But at every critical moment, he had turned out to be unexpectedly reliable, pulling him back from the edge of disaster more than once.
Whether that counted as a debt of enmity or a debt of gratitude, to be honest, Sisyphus could not say.
At this moment Lorne had no time to spare for Sisyphus's complicated feelings.
Instead, he looked across at the figure standing motionless in the center of the cave, a flicker of surprise passing through his eyes.
Medusa?
No. That was not right.
Quickly, Lorne observed more carefully and shook his head, dismissing the thought.
The half-human, half-serpent female spirit in the cavern did not share Medusa's facial structure or bearing, matching her at most by thirty percent.
Well... Medusa was simply an epitome of beauty.
Hm, it couldn't be said that she wasn't as beautiful as Medusa…
More specifically, her scale coverage was far more extensive, her ears tapered to sharp points, her skin was marked with spots, and she retained far more serpentine features.
Rather than a god, she was closer in nature to a divine monster in an incomplete state, and her presence carried a distinctly cold and sinister quality.
More critically, she was not a living being.
She was nothing more than a drifting ghost.
Lorne raised his eyes to the bleached, half-human, half-serpent skeleton lying in the corner of the cavern, and combined with the legends surrounding the land of Arima, arrived at a rough guess as to the identity of the soul before him.
"Cerberus, you foolish child. I told you not to come back. It will kill you."
Accompanied by a long, quiet sigh, the half-serpent ghost's eyes filled with a helpless, exasperated look.
The three-headed hellhound rumbled low in its throat and drooped all three of its heads, like a child who knew it had done something wrong, wearing an expression of profound dejection.
"Do not blame Cerberus. It came because it was worried about your safety. A child's attachment to its mother is not something that should be scolded so harshly."
Lorne gave the middle head of the hellhound a gentle pat, stepped forward, and offered this with a warm smile.
"Mm. It is a good child. I have never doubted that."
The half-serpent ghost gave a small nod, then turned to look carefully at the unfamiliar visitors, wariness threading into her gaze.
"But you. Why do you carry the aura of my three daughters?"
"Well, about that..."
Lorne did not answer directly; instead, he turned to look in a meaningful direction behind him.
Sisyphus, huddled in the corner, jolted at once and immediately pleaded with a long-suffering expression.
"Old friend, I understand the rules.
You two never hold back, so this time can I just do it myself?"
As he spoke, he decisively snatched a rock off the ground, and with a speed that left no time to react, knocked the unsuspecting Adonis unconscious beside him.
Then, miming a motion toward his own head, he made his solemn assurance.
"Do not worry, we guarantee we heard nothing, not a single word..."
"Thud!"
Before he could finish, Sisyphus gave a muffled grunt and toppled straight over.
Thetis withdrew her arm from behind him, then with practiced ease tossed out seventeen or eighteen suppression, unconsciousness, and binding spells in rapid succession and spoke with perfect composure.
"I was worried he would pretend."
"Beautifully done."
Lorne raised his thumb in approval, then gestured toward Adonis lying nearby.
"Remember to give him a few extras as well."
Thetis accepted Lorne's suggestion without objection and applied the same thorough treatment to the already unconscious Adonis.
With the potential complications around them dealt with, Lorne finally turned his head back to the half-serpent ghost in the cavern and offered her a warm, gentle smile.
"You don't need to worry about them.
All three of them are doing well.
They have also ascended to the rank of gods."
As he spoke, Lorne held out the bronze elephant token bearing traces of the Gorgons' divine nature as proof.
The half-serpent ghost took a moment to sense it carefully, then finally exhaled a long breath of relief, the hostility in her eyes toward Lorne and the others gradually fading, replaced by a rueful sigh.
"Among all my children, those three always had the most troublesome natures. They must have caused you no small amount of grief."
And as she spoke of the three Gorgon sisters, the phantom face covered in scales lost every trace of its cold, eerie cast.
In its place appeared something gentle and maternal.
Lorne shook his head lightly, his expression carrying warmth and familiarity. "Not at all, Lady Echidna. They have helped me greatly."
Echidna, the serpent mother, was one of the famous nymphs mentioned in Hesiod's Theogony.
She was a goddess, fierce and strong, half beautiful maiden of the glancing eyes and fair cheeks and half enormous serpent, terrible and great, spotted and flesh-eating.
In the hollow of a rock, far from the deathless gods and mortal men, she had her cave, kept there in Arima beneath the earth.
There the gods ordained a divine home for her to dwell and guard in the deep underground.
Yet compared to herself, the monstrous children she had borne with Typhon, the great monster-father, were far more widely known.
The hundred-headed dragon Ladon, guardian of the Garden of the Hesperides.
The fierce dragon of Colchis, guardian of the Golden Fleece.
The legendary twin serpents of Troy.
Cerberus, the three-headed hellhound standing watch at the gates of Hades.
The nine-headed Hydra, bane of countless heroes.
The Nemean Lion, slain by Heracles.
The Caucasian Eagle that gnawed at Prometheus's liver.
The Sphinx, who posed the famous riddle.
The Harpiai, those winged spirits of the sea.
And the three Gorgon sisters, once persecuted on the island of unseen, who through hardship and struggle had ascended to become attendant gods of Athena.
Every last one of these was a descendant of Typhon the monster-father and Echidna the serpent mother.
Yes.
The ghost standing before him was, in terms of blood, the mother of the three Gorgon sisters.
And by that measure, Lorne's mother-in-law in all but name.
As for why Cerberus was so affectionate and docile toward him, it was most likely because the aura of the three Gorgon sisters led it to recognize him as one of its own, and it wanted to bring him here to this cavern to see its mother Echidna.
But judging from the situation before them, this mother-in-law's circumstances appeared to be far from good.
"The Gorgon sisters rarely speak to me about family matters. If I may ask, what has happened to you?"
Lorne glanced at the half-human, half-serpent skeleton in the cavern corner and asked the question in a measured voice.
"It was the hundred-eyed giant Argos. He killed my body while I was in a state of deep sleep..." Echidna let out a sigh and spoke of what had been done to her without any attempt to conceal it.
"Because of the war against Typhon?" Lorne asked.
Echidna gave a slow nod and, in a tone edged with bitterness, recounted the past.
In those days, Zeus, in his desire for eternal sovereignty, swallowed his wife Metis to prevent the birth of an heir who might surpass him and commanded the gods of Olympus to unleash the Great Deluge, destroying the golden generation of humanity.
Time and again he violated the laws of life itself.
That unbroken string of transgressions finally drove the earth mother, Gaia, to fury.
She descended into the pit of Tartaros, drawing the powers of death and nothingness from that ancient abyss, combining them with her own power of creation, and brought forth Typhon, the father of all monsters, the embodiment of destruction.
When the time came, Typhon's true form broke free from the bonds of the abyss, rose to the surface of the earth, and, leading a vast host of monsters, stormed Olympos and waged war against the gods.
Zeus succeeded in defeating this enemy and sealed his remains and soul back into the depths of Tartaros.
But the god-king feared Typhon's power and feared even more that Typhon's descendants might one day become a threat to Olympos.
So Olympos dispatched the hundred-eyed giant Argos to kill Echidna in secret.
Of Typhon's children, some fled persecution and scattered across the world.
Others submitted, were branded, and were sent to serve the gods in various places.
The three Gorgon sisters who fled to the island of invisibility belonged to the former.
Cerberus, standing guard at the gates of Hades, belonged to the latter.
Yet in the midst of this misfortune, one small mercy remained.
Though Echidna's body had been destroyed, her soul had survived by some grace.
And sustained by the death energy of the underworld deep within the Arima cavern, her soul had gradually stabilized, preserving her original mind and awareness, sparing her from sinking into eternal sleep.
Later, Cerberus, as her child, sensed its mother's aura and began making its way into the depths of the Arima cavern from time to time to visit Echidna, easing her solitude.
With a child's company, the ghostly Echidna found enough comfort to continue dwelling in the depths of the cavern.
But peace did not last.
As time passed, signs of disturbance began to rise from far below.
Typhon, once hurled into the abyss by Zeus, seemed to be showing signs of awakening.
And the creature was ravenously hungry for life and nourishment.
Lorne thought of the grim scene in the passage earlier and furrowed his brow.
"So just now, it truly intended to kill Cerberus?"
At Lorne's confusion, Echidna gave a matter-of-fact, slightly contemptuous sound.
"There is no sentiment to spare in the wild. For most divine monsters, the weak are simply food.
Let alone the fact that these children carry Typhon's divine nature. It has only just begun to stir back to life and desperately needs power from the same source to restore itself..."
Listening to his mother-in-law's account, Lorne formed a rough picture of that so-called father-in-law's nature.
Echidna at least looked after the three Gorgon sisters and the other children of Typhon to some degree, fulfilling a mother's role and preserving a basic measure of warmth.
But that monster-father Typhon, born of destruction, was brutal and savage and only scattered his seed through domination for the sake of release and propagation.
He never understood or cared anything for the bonds between parent and child.
This explained why earlier, Echidna referred to Typhon by name throughout, rather than as a husband.
Clearly, like the mating of a dominant beast in the wild, there had never been anything resembling affection between them.
And thus, the serpent mother Echidna was dealt a thoroughly terrible hand, subjected by force to a fate she didn't have any say in, and then, because of the disaster Typhon left behind, drew the attention of the Olympian gods and lost her life along with everything else.
And now, that resurgent monster-king had set his sights on his own blood kin.
It's no wonder Echidna had nothing but contempt for Typhon.
"That would mean you yourself may also become its food?"
Lorne thought of the pit piled high with the bones of great beasts and that dragon head already beginning to take shape from below and felt a surge of genuine concern for the mother-in-law before him.
"I have already died once. I do not fear dying again." Echidna shook her head with a composed expression, then turned a gentle look on Cerberus and Lorne and patiently discouraged them. "As for all of you, the sooner you leave, the better. Do not come back after this. It is not safe here."
However, Lorne thought of the three Gorgon sisters waiting at home and spoke without hesitation.
"I can bring you with us."
"I understand your good intentions, but it would be useless." Echidna declined his offer once more and explained with a resigned tone. "After Argos killed me, he threw my bones into the underworld as a precaution.
Over all this time, my body and my soul alike have been completely saturated with the death energy of the underworld. There is no possibility of me leaving this place."
However, Lorne gave a mild smile, then brought out the Cornucopia from his robe, along with a small deep-red bottle bearing a label marked with the elixir of immortality, and spoke in an unhurried tone.
"What if I told you that I could use the life energy of all living things to scour every trace of death energy from your bones and your soul and restore your body with a divine elixir?"
"...!"
Echidna froze.
In the eyes that had looked as dead as ash, a small flame of hope was rekindled.
As long as hope exists, no one can refuse the chance to live.
She was no different.
Seeing that unmistakable flicker of temptation on his mother-in-law's face, Lorne felt the corners of his lips curl upward with quiet satisfaction.
In a later age, the Hungarian mythologist Karoly Kerenyi, drawing on the decoration of an ancient vase, theorized that Echidna may originally have been a patron deity of viticulture and the growing of grapes.
Which meant that his own divine nature as a god of wine and her divine nature as the serpent mother were in close alignment.
It seems like he did have a vacancy for one more attendant god.
More importantly, if he could draw this mother-in-law to his side, the children of Typhon scattered across the world might become the very leverage he needed to shake Olympos.
This was a force even Zeus feared.
It would be foolish not to claim it.
'So Typhon, is it?'
As these thoughts surged through him, Lorne thought back to the great monster-father who had just about made a snack of them in the passage, and smiled maliciously.
'Your wife is gone.'
(End of Chapter)