"Gift of the Stars?"
The same question was asked by Percher on the other side.
After Kudō Asuka's victory, she was accompanied by Kasukabe Yō for a medical examination and to get accustomed to her newfound power.
As for the remaining member, Saigō Homura, he had been preparing to study the anatomy of the Bull of Heaven.
But halfway through his research, he received a message from Kuro Usagi, summoning him to a testing ground deep within the strata of the Saint Cross Group.
Though it was called a testing ground, it had never actually been opened.
was in the heart of Tokyo, its most important facilities being its skyscrapers and massive industrial park.
Only a select few knew that the true core of the Saint Cross Group was not the industrial park, but the Saint Cross Welfare Institute at its very center.
And among the staff of the Saint Cross Welfare Institute, only a tiny fraction knew that the institute above ground was not the real heart of the facility.
The true core of the Saint Cross Welfare Institute was, in fact, underground.
This subterranean base housed all of Saigō Homura's research achievements and projects. The BDAs and A-devices he developed—all data and samples—were protected and sealed away in the underground labs.
Yet even among the personnel who worked in these labs, including Saigō Homura himself, none had ever ventured this deep.
The elevator descended, and they soon reached a depth of over three hundred meters, the only sound being the grinding of rails.
If the underground labs still carried the air of modern civilization, a sense of security wrapped in human progress despite the lack of light, then this deeper level was utterly devoid of any modern trace, save for the transport rail itself.
It felt more like the deep sea, or perhaps an alien world, exuding an ancient and boundless aura.
Stepping out of the elevator, they were met with a wall of lightless darkness. It was so thick that it seemed to swallow even the light from the elevator entrance.
In the faint illumination, Saigō Homura noticed the ground beneath his feet wasn't soil or gravel, but an ancient material like the stone slabs that paved the central roads of the Roman era.
Shining his handheld flashlight around, he could even make out some very old walls and sculptures of owls.
"Is this... an ancient castle or palace?"
Saigō Homura recognized the style of the structures. Though his knowledge of history wasn't extensive, it was clearly a design from around the beginning of the common era, far too ancient for the present day.
"A good eye."
Black Rabbit nodded, then told Saigō Homura to turn off his flashlight.
"The goddess we are here to visit is an ancient Earth Mother deity. She holds authority over darkness and the underworld, so she may not be fond of the sun or bright lights. To avoid offending her, it's best to turn off the light!"
"The... the underworld?"
Hearing this, Percher couldn't help but shiver. Feeling a chill in the air, she hugged herself, a little frightened.
"Kuro Usagi, we've come down so deep... we haven't actually arrived in the underworld or hell, have we? Aren't we the Master's maids? Even if we died, shouldn't we go to heaven?"
In the eyes of someone from the Middle Ages, hell and the underworld lay deep within the earth.
She had wanted to believe in science, but with Kuro Usagi herself talking about visiting a goddess, she couldn't help but worry.
Faced with this concern, Kuro Usagi scratched her head and said uncertainly,
"If Lady Athena hasn't deployed her divine realm, it probably isn't the underworld!" Her words made even Saigō Homura flinch and tremble slightly.
Didn't that mean if this lady did deploy her divine realm, they would be in the underworld right now, dead as doornails?
Realizing this, he immediately moved to press the switch on his flashlight.
If this goddess had a temper like Queen Halloween's, and his flashlight happened to offend her, he might really end up dead.
As a pure researcher, he had always been a pragmatist.
Anyone raised by a god could not possibly disbelieve in their divine might.
Just then, a soft rustling sound echoed through the chamber. An owl had appeared before the three of them, its orange, serpentine eyes faintly illuminating the ground.
"There is no need to extinguish the light. While I possess the divinity of the underworld and darkness, the master I serve is a Lord of Light. As a fellow servant of our master, I naturally hold no aversion to the sun or its brilliance."
The owl spoke with the majestic and calm voice of a goddess.
"Furthermore, the flashlight you use is a type of Astra, is it not? That is not simulated sunlight, but a boon from the earth—one of my own domains. I naturally do not mind it."
As she spoke, as if on command, a faint starlight illuminated the entire underground space, brightening the once pitch-black palace.
Percher could finally see the full view of the underground space. It was just as Saigō Homura had guessed: a vast and ancient palace.
The palace was adorned with carvings of cows, owls, and snakes. If Percher had the relevant knowledge, she would have recognized the carving style as Mediterranean, bearing the marks of an early, primitive religion.
"Astra?"
Saigō Homura's focus was entirely different from Percher's.
He knew the flashlight in his hand was a type of A-device built with the Third Stellar Particle, but he hadn't known it had this alias.
In Latin, Astra meant "star" or "nova." In Sanskrit, it meant "weapon." The release incantation for Black Rabbit's Vajra of Indra even contained the "Astra" suffix.
He just never thought it would be connected to his A-devices.
Since this was their first meeting and he hadn't yet gauged the goddess's temperament, Saigō Homura kept this question to himself.
By now, Kuro Usagi was already speaking with the goddess with a slight familiarity, explaining the purpose of their visit.
"Lord Su Mo sent us here to request the Gift of the Stars from you," Kuro Usagi said.
"Gift of the Stars? What's that?" Percher asked, subconsciously confused.
Only now did she understand the reason for their trip.
"Requesting a gift from a goddess?"
Saigō Homura's point of surprise was completely different from Percher's.
Hearing his exclamation, Percher belatedly realized the problem.
"That's right! Didn't Lord Su Mo say that gods and buddhas can't interfere in the Trial of the Savior? Why would he have us ask a goddess for a gift? Kuro Usagi, did you get something wrong?"
If she didn't know Kuro Usagi was a terrible liar, she would have thought this was a trap.
Back when they faced the Bull of Heaven, Kuro Usagi had made it crystal clear that they absolutely could not borrow the power of gods to deal with Humanity's Final Trial; they had to overcome it themselves.
It was because of this restriction that their previous battle had been so grueling, barely managing to defeat a single Bull of Heaven.
If they could have used divine power from the start, it wouldn't have been nearly so much trouble.
They wouldn't even have needed to ask for help from others; Kuro Usagi alone would have been enough to sweep away a hundred Bulls of Heaven.
So what was this now? Was she deliberately trying to lead them into making a mistake?
Kuro Usagi, however, knew the answer to this question.
"I didn't get it wrong!"
She shook her head and looked at the owl avatar before them.
"Lady Athena is a goddess, but she is not just a goddess!"
"Athena, the Goddess of Victory, is not just a goddess?"
Saigō Homura looked at the owl avatar in confusion.
This extremely popular deity had another identity?
"Correct."
The owl nodded calmly.
"With my master's help, I, as the Triple-Goddess Earth Mother Athena, returned to ancient mythology and ascended to become the Earth Mother Gaia. Now, I have also become the Stellar Spirit that symbolizes the planet Earth."
"The power of gods cannot easily interfere in the key processes of humanity. But the Stellar Spirit of Earth is different. Human history is, in itself, a part of the Planetary Chronicle."
"As for interference, my very existence here, my activities, already determine humanity's fate until they leave their mother star."
"Therefore, as long as I manifest my aspect as a Stellar Spirit, I can, as the planet itself, interfere in the development of human history... such as now."
This was why she had not performed a Domain Expansion.
Right now, she was not the Goddess of Victory Athena, not the Triple-Goddess Athena, nor the Earth Mother Gaia, but purely and simply Athena, the Stellar Spirit of Earth.
Whether one was a human-side Origin Candidate or a divine-side Origin Candidate, the ultimate goal was to rewrite the Planetary Chronicle... and both of those things happened to fall under the cosmology and authority of a Stellar Spirit.