On the throne of the Underworld, time seemed frozen.
The regular sound of Hades's fingers tapping the armrest was the only rhythm in this deathly silence.
His will, like the finest net, combed through the deep connection with Metis again and again.
Having ruled out all external interference, the answer, however unbelievable, seemed to point only inward.
He focused on the essence of the 'eccentric' force within Metis's consciousness—the sweet intonation, the distorted symbols of love, the thought patterns bordering on blasphemy against the origin of wisdom.
At its core, it was indeed a strong or distorted power of 'Eros'.
And that was the limit of Eros's authority.
But the paradox was that his investigation of Eros was beyond doubt.
Although the little love goddess was stubborn, she had suffered an injustice in this matter, and her tears and grievances were real.
Her divine energy core showed no signs of activation against Metis, and there was no corresponding fragment in her memory.
Could it be... that someone had bypassed Eros herself and directly invoked or even simulated her authority?
This almost touched upon the mystery of the nature of divinity, and the probability was minuscule.
Or was it some kind of higher-level disguise that even he could not recognize?
Just as Hades found himself in a logical dead end, a figure, hesitant and guilty, quietly peeked out from the door of the main hall.
"Um... Your Majesty, Your Majesty?"
Hades's gaze, like two cold rays, instantly locked onto the shadow.
The shadow writhed for a while, as if extremely reluctant, and then Hecate slowly emerged from behind it.
Her usually cold and confident face was full of embarrassment, apology, and a slight worry that 'maybe I'm in trouble'.
"Hecate?" Hades's voice betrayed no emotion, but that very calmness made Hecate's scalp tingle even more.
She stepped out of the shadow, her hands nervously twisting the corners of her robe, her eyes darting away, not daring to look directly at Hades:
"Your Majesty... Regarding Her Majesty's recent... um... 'condition', I... might, perhaps, probably... know a little bit of the reason..."
Hades did not press; he simply looked at her in silence, and the pressure of his gaze made Hecate almost want to retreat into the shadow immediately and never come out.
She took a deep breath, as if heading to the execution ground, and began to explain:
"Well... here's the thing. You know that little Eros used her newly acquired golden bow and silver arrows to tease Thanatos and Hypnos, causing an uproar in the Underworld, right?"
Hades nodded slightly; he remembered that, and finally Catia stepped in to stop it and confiscated the weapon.
"At that time, in the chaos, there was an arrow... shot at Catia. She reacted quickly and dodged. But the arrow... unexpectedly... ended up hitting me."
Hecate's voice grew lower and lower.
A flash of clarity appeared in Hades's eyes, but he still waited for what came next.
Just being hit wasn't enough to explain Metis's problem.
"I... I immediately sensed it was Eros's divine power of 'eros', and the effect was extremely strong and... troublesome." Hecate's cheeks reddened slightly.
"Naturally, I didn't want to be affected by this power, so I tried to dispel or resist it at first. But, you know, Eros's authority is very special; it's very hard to directly refute, especially once it has already taken effect."
She paused, secretly glancing at Hades, and seeing that he was still emotionless, she had to brace herself and continue:
"Well... so I chose... a clever method. I used transfer magic to try to transfer the effect of this arrow elsewhere. But this magic has a limit... You can't choose the target at will; you can only transfer it to... the nearest, most suitable divine power fluctuation, or... the most 'troublesome' god, just to get rid of it."
At this point, Hecate's voice was almost as soft as a mosquito's, and her head hung even lower.
"At that time... Eros had already been driven away, Catia clearly refused to 'accept' it, and Thanatos and Hypnos were already in chaos... I... I couldn't find a suitable partner for the transfer for a long time..."
She took a deep breath, as if mustering all her strength, and uttered the most important sentence:
"And then... then I thought of Her Majesty the Queen of Hades, and you..."
Hecate's voice was tearful: "I thought... you and Her Majesty of the Underworld have such a good relationship, inseparable all day, wisdom and the King of Hades... the perfect match! Transferring the power of eros would just be... icing on the cake, right? It... it shouldn't be a big problem... right?"
At the time, she had a lazy notion of it being 'natural' and even a bit of a 'becoming a god's matchmaker'.
Thanks to the magical goddess's exquisite control over energy trajectories and the momentary gap before the arrow's effect fully exploded, she successfully directed the troublesome divine power of Eros onto Metis, who was in the depths of the Underworld.
"I thought... you two are together all day anyway, so a little push wouldn't hurt, right? Maybe... you could even... enhance your feelings?" The more Hecate spoke, the guiltier she felt, and finally she was almost muttering to herself.
After doing all this, she quietly slipped away, thinking the matter was over and, at worst, it would just add a bit more 'spark' to the royal couple of Hades.
She never imagined that this would be due to the strong eros of Eros, acting on Metis, the essence of wisdom, to cause such... a strange and prolonged 'chemical reaction'. Nor did she expect that Hades would trawl almost the entire world to find her.
A long, suffocating silence fell over the throne room.
Hades understood everything.
Not a foreign enemy, not a conspiracy, not even a direct prank by Eros.
It was an accident—a chain reaction caused by Hecate's 'convenient handling'.
Hecate's transfer magic was so clever that even he couldn't trace it directly back to the source at the beginning, and could only perceive the essence of Eros's power.
And Eros herself actually knew nothing about it, because the effect of the arrow she shot had been 'transferred' by Hecate.
The root of everything turned out to be a ridiculous blunder.
Hades looked at Hecate, who wanted to shrink into the cracks in the ground, and for a while didn't know how to react.
Was he angry at her carelessness? Or helpless at this absurd coincidence?
Or... a little speechless that he and Metis had caused such a stir in the world over such a small thing?
He slowly closed his eyes and rubbed his brow.
The cold, even sound of his fingers tapping finally stopped.
"Hecate," he spoke, his voice betraying neither joy nor anger.
"Yes! Your Majesty!" Hecate was startled and quickly responded.
"Undo it."
"...Huh?" Hecate was stunned.
"Your transfer magic, the effect it caused." Hades opened his eyes, his gaze calm but undeniable.
"You figure out how to undo it."
Hecate's face instantly crumbled, her voice tearful:
"Your Majesty... This... this is a bit complicated... This power has long been intertwined with Her Majesty's consciousness, and you know the divine characteristics of Eros—like an ulcer attached to the bone... Forcibly removing it could cause... unpredictable effects on Her Majesty's consciousness..."
The more she spoke, the quieter she became, because Hades's eyes were growing colder.
"So?" Hades asked only two words.
Hecate broke out in a cold sweat, her mind racing for a solution.
She knew that this time she had really screwed up, and if she couldn't solve it properly, she would probably have to 'atone' in the most boring archives of the Underworld for hundreds of years.
Hades's anger, even if just a cold glare, was far beyond what she could bear.
She had to find a way to get this damned 'Eros' effect out of Her Majesty... to 'ask' it to leave safely.