Asclepius, stiff as plaster, also looked straight ahead. Persephone, who regained her senses first, shook him frantically.

“Uh, I didn’t try to attract attention, why? What’s approaching now? Do you know anything?”

“…Uh, huh? Of course I don’t know!”

“Shall I try to win?”

“What nonsense are you spouting!”

“Alright, I’ll try to hold on!”

Persephone, who decided to respect the elder this time, pulled out her shovel.

She fixed the shovel to the ground and grabbed Asclepius by the scruff of the neck, sending him behind her.

Just as Persephone’s grip adjusted on the handle.

The ‘something’ approaching them reached them at a speed far faster than their senses.

It was only for a moment that the hair that had been violently fluttering in the strong wind settled down.

【Persephone?】

Soon after, a familiar voice echoed through the dark sky.

When Persephone, who had been squeezing her eyes shut, raised her head, the familiar gray eyes and white face were positioned in the center of the sky.

Except for the size…

“…Thanatos?”

It was different from the usual by about a hundred times.

Persephone looked up at ‘Thanatos’ with a dazed expression.

‘Is it really Thanatos?’

Because of the size, it seemed like it might be one of his siblings rather than the Thanatos she always met in the Underworld.

Unlike him who always called her ‘sprout’, the god before her eyes now called her by her real name…

Persephone tugged at Thanatos’s hair that was stretched out like a long river.

“Is it really you, Lord Thanatos?”

As she asked the question, ‘Thanatos’ blinked his white eyelids, and soon scattered into a dark gray shadow.

【Yes.】

He appeared again from the smoke, reducing his size and embedding himself in the ground of Tartarus.

It looked as if he was a fairy half-emerged from a lake to observe humans.

Even though he had reduced his size, Persephone still had to crane her neck to look up, but that was because of his original size.

Thanatos asked.

【Did you have some business?】

“Ah, did you hear?”

【A little.】

Thanatos’s white eyelashes fluttered like a fan, revealing gray irises.

His pupils, unlike human ones and more like a sea urchin’s, landed on the unconscious Asclepius right behind Persephone.

【You’re looking for my mother and brother. Why?】

Persephone quickly explained their situation.

【…Ah, insomnia.】

“Is treatment perhaps unnecessary?”

【…】

Thanatos lowered his eyes with a thoughtful look, calming his expression. After thinking for a while, he lowered his eyes.

【Was there any sign that he didn’t want to sleep?】

It was then that Thanatos posed the question.

“What? What do you mean?”

【…I’ve spent a long time with Hades in the Underworld. I knew that child didn’t receive the blessings of my brother and nephew.】

“And?”

【…Have you thought about why I, knowing this, didn’t try to cure Hades’s insomnia?】

“…”

【…】

Silence piled up thickly like a stack of straw.

Persephone met the somewhat detached gray gaze.

‘Come to think of it, I don’t know Hades’s circumstances.’

When she first discovered Hades’s lit office, she should have asked why he was only working and not sleeping.

But night was no longer a time when she could be as carefree as she used to be.

Or more precisely, even if she could act like her usual mischievous self in front of others…

“…I don’t feel bad.”

Persephone remembered the floating sensation from that day.

That’s why even seeing that man working at night, she didn’t feel like sticking to the window cheerfully saying, ‘You’re working hard!’

Well, if she had the will, she could become like a leech.

“Ah, I should have asked during the day…”

【Why did you suddenly become quiet? It’s not like you.】

“I was just regretting a bit.”

Persephone waved her hand to brush off the stray thoughts and grinned.

“More importantly, Hades’s inability to sleep might just be a habit.”

【A habit?】

Usually, people who don’t like to sleep fall into one of three categories. They have nightmares, sleepwalk, or experience something terrible only while sleeping.

‘But he couldn’t eat for a long time, and now he’s just starting to.’

Maybe sleep was similar.

“Even if he didn’t like sleeping in the past, now it feels like the ‘dislike’ emotion is gone and only the behavior remains.”

【…Hmm.】

“Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Thanatos tilted his head slowly like a river with a large flow. After twitching his eyes a few times, he grabbed Asclepius with his shadow.

Placing him on his palm, Thanatos flicked his fingertip.

【Climb onto my palm. I’ll take you to my mother and brother’s nest.】

Persephone’s expression brightened like spring sunshine.

* * *

“Wow!”

Persephone stuck her head out, not minding her hair whipping her cheeks.

“This is really fun!”

The feeling of being attached to a being dozens of times larger than herself was like fulfilling a childhood dream.

Top-notch ride! Five-star satisfaction! The best mode of transportation!

【It’s dangerous, stick close.】

Persephone wrapped her arms around Thanatos’s fingers as if hugging a horse’s mane and neck.

Even so, her gaze filled with strong curiosity didn’t stop darting around.

“How does it feel to have a place like this as home?”

【It’s not bad. I’m used to it. The Underworld before Hades came was mostly like this.】

Thanatos turned his gaze following Persephone’s head.

【Back then, there was no order or system. There was no bloodshed because my mother and I were kings.】

“…You were king? But now you seem like Hades’s subordinate?”

【When Hades came down to the Underworld after the lottery and expressed his intention to rule, the gods of the Underworld, including myself, first bowed our heads and adjusted our personalities. Not as elders or senior gods, but as servants.】

“…”

【We were bored, and we believed that child would govern the Underworld well, and he actually is, so it was an excellent choice.】

As Thanatos kindly added an explanation, Persephone blinked rapidly.

‘Come to think of it, he’s been calling Hades ‘that child’ all this time?’

The Thanatos she was seeing now must be from before his personality was adjusted, a bit more generous but seeing Hades as a junior or a child.

She understood why Hades had readily accepted the trip to Tartarus. It was all because Thanatos was here.

Persephone laughed out loud and exclaimed.

“To think you were a king, Thanatos looks cool for the first time today!”

【When did I not look cool?】

“The king is big so the king is cool!”

【…】

“Or is it cool because you were a king?”

A smile crept onto Thanatos’s lips.

Persephone secretly became serious. It seemed that regardless of personality, he still liked bad jokes.

How much time had passed?

From the surroundings that had only rocks and cliffs, a blue energy that looked like constellations had been pasted began to seep out, and soon a pitch-black cave appeared.

【Anyway, this is the entrance to the nest where my mother and brother are. You’ll be able to find them once you go in.】

Thanatos cautioned as he pressed the back of his hand to the ground.

【As I told you, my mother was a former Underworld king like me, so mind your manners.】

“Yes~ Lord Asclepius, wake up!”

“Hueok!”

Persephone, who had slapped Asclepius on the back, waved to Thanatos while carrying the staggering Asclepius on her back.

As the shadow disappeared, the god of medicine cleared his throat and straightened his clothes. He gestured for them to go in quickly.

As they entered, a cold light similar to moonlight wrapped around their shoulders, revealing a small hill clearing.

Colorful vegetation and soap bubbles reflecting humans’ dreams surrounded the nest like flower petals.

The hill, instead of lava rivers, had water flowing as if sliding out from under the rocks.

As Asclepius stepped on the grass—no sound was made—a silver-haired man rose from an ebony bed.

Unlike the recent Thanatos, this man was similar in size to humans, but the aura he exuded was no less powerful.

“Ah, are you perhaps Lord Hypnos!”

Asclepius bounded towards that god.

‘It’s almost like a beekeeper going to catch hornets.’

Suddenly, Persephone found herself in a position to watch the two from afar.

‘Is Lady Nyx not here?’

She looked around and moved a bit away from Asclepius and Hypnos.

Especially, the sparkling light a bit far from the nest was truly beautiful…

Persephone walked towards it as if enchanted.

Fixing her gaze on that light as if burying her nose in it, she finally realized it was similar to the vegetation surrounding the area.

“Wow, it’s beautiful…”

The sparkling thing swaying like reeds looked just like starlight reflected on the night sea.

She hadn’t seen such plants even in Elysium.

‘Should I take some?’

The deliberation didn’t take long.

As Persephone plucked a bunch of the ‘reeds’, a hole like white flesh was left wide open.

The joy of discovering a rare plant was short-lived.

【…Ugh.】

A truly enormous eye rose to the surface.

Yes, she made eye contact.

It was like a whale. A creature that, when it moves, makes everyone hold their breath, and its majesty makes everyone freeze.

Persephone realized like a bolt of lightning.

This whale was a ‘goddess’.

【…Who is it?】

And that she was the one who governs the night.

Persephone stared with unfocused eyes at the nearby hole, no, scalp.

She had gifted Nyx, the goddess of night, with circular baldness.

…She was screwed.