Ch.390The Road to Mount Dikere (2)

Whoosh…

Lying quietly in the captain’s quarters with my hearing amplified, I can feel the vibrations of the Sky Warden transmitted perfectly.

Sometimes massive like waves, sometimes quiet as leaves, these vibrations never cease.

Just like humanity sometimes faces enormous adversity, and sometimes enjoys periods of peace where nothing happens.

“Damn. It’s starting again.”

Viktor rose from his seat and poured himself a glass of apple brandy to clear his mind.

If there’s one thing he dislikes about becoming a god, it’s that all his thoughts revolve around humanity as a species.

Even when eating something delicious, it doesn’t end at simply enjoying the taste—he finds himself wondering why poor people can’t eat such delicious food. When seeing beautiful scenery, he can only think about how much benefit humanity could gain if that landscape were developed… These are the only kinds of thoughts that come to mind.

It’s similar to how alcoholics constantly think about drinking. Though not exactly a one-to-one comparison, it was embarrassing that someone who was supposed to be humanity’s master was actually being controlled by humanity.

Of course, this was natural since he was the god of humanity, but having everything converge to a single theme like a hormone-driven teenager obsessed with sex was quite uncomfortable.

Not only was it inefficient… it inevitably felt like he didn’t have control over his own thoughts and mind.

Perhaps this is the fate of all gods. The Four Great Gods might suffer from a similar curse.

“Somehow it seems I’m only accumulating more curses. I don’t like it…”

The curse of infertility was already maddening enough, and now even his thoughts weren’t his own. It truly felt like becoming a terminal of the massive machine called humanity.

*breathe* *breathe*

“…”

Viktor gazed at Raisha, who was breathing quietly in his arms.

Having been burned by women many times in his youth, Viktor wasn’t particularly swayed by beauty. That’s not to say he couldn’t be tempted—just that he wouldn’t hastily develop affection based solely on someone’s appearance.

Most people in the world would consider this normal, but sadly, most people can’t distinguish between someone impressive and someone good. Just as they can’t distinguish between those they want to follow and those they should follow.

Looking at Raisha, her body was sensual, but she couldn’t compare to the beautiful models in magazines or celebrities on television.

He wasn’t sure how mortals perceived her. He only vaguely knew that to mortals, he himself was a being so powerful they could barely breathe in his presence.

Perhaps to mortals, she appeared as a beautiful saint radiating moonlight?

If so, that would be quite enviable. After all, Viktor himself couldn’t see that saintly appearance.

Sometimes, the vision of mortals might be broader than that of gods.

*

“Hmm. Somehow it feels colder than yesterday…”

“My apologies, my lord. The mountain terrain is treacherous. For safety, we had to increase altitude. The engineering department said they’ll turn on the heaters around lunchtime, so please bear with it a little longer.”

“Bear with it? What an amusing thing to say!”

Viktor burst into laughter as if it was truly hilarious. For someone who was the very source of light and heat, being told to bear with the cold?

Whether it was a lack of prejudice or simply a thought that hadn’t occurred to them, what mattered was that a mere mortal had managed to improve a god’s mood.

Viktor laughed like a child and placed his hand on the wall, warming the entire Sky Warden. Instantly, the mountain chill disappeared.

“My lord?”

“Is there really any need to turn on heaters? I am the embodiment of warmth itself.”

Everyone belonging to the Solar Army was spiritually connected to Viktor, so they immediately recognized the source of the sudden warmth.

Whether using divine power this way was trivial or practical was debatable, but at least it could be said he was using it more usefully than uprooting mountains to throw at enemies or scorching the ground with massive lasers.

“How much longer do we have…”

“About three days, my lord. Assuming we don’t encounter turbulence.”

“Come to think of it, the winds are strong around these mountains.”

“Can’t you control the wind as well, my lord?”

“Hmm… rather than control, it’s more like cutting through it. Besides, wind moves clouds, and clouds make rain. If the rain that should fall on the humans living nearby doesn’t fall, that would be quite troublesome.”

“Ah…”

While the sun creates weather and climate, controlling it at will is impossible. It’s like how parents give birth to children but can’t readily control them.

He can control light and heat themselves, but has no way to manage the natural phenomena that occur as a result of them.

For example… when snow melts and causes an avalanche, it’s unfortunate, but there’s nothing the sun can do about it. Yet the sun can’t simply choose not to rise either.

“By the way, these mountains. Is this the Dikere mountain range?”

“Geographically speaking, yes. They say the Dikere Mountains are even more treacherous than here.”

“Hmm…”

With his divine sight, he could see adventurers battling on the ridges and others gathering herbs. There would probably be similar adventurers on Mount Dikere as well.

“Come to think of it, herbs that grow in mountains all have strong medicinal properties. I wonder why that is?”

“Perhaps herbs with weaker properties were all ‘naturally selected’ out? Easily visible plants would be quickly consumed by wild animals. Only herbs that established themselves in treacherous places would stubbornly survive.”

“Hmm. That’s one way to look at it.”

It’s a reasonable argument. When other herbs that share nutrients disappear, the few surviving herbs can monopolize those nutrients. Naturally, their medicinal properties become stronger.

It’s like how wild ginseng is valued much more highly than cultivated ginseng.

“Do herbs grow on Mount Dikere as well?”

“Why wouldn’t they? Records occasionally mention herb gathering there. If they can adapt to the cold and pressure, small herbs don’t need much to grow, unlike large trees. Besides, they were a religious organization, so they might have developed herbs that could grow in harsh mountain conditions for their service work.”

“True… it was the Imperial era, so what couldn’t they do?”

As the Honor Guard Commander said, countless species went extinct during the Eclipse Era.

Beyond the grand scale of species we typically imagine, this included plants with genetically modified traits created by a seven-year-old child referencing only textbooks. While the scale of the “mass extinction” was smaller than one might think—since even plants or animals created as a pastime in someone’s room counted as species—it still had a significant impact.

Among the extinct species were plants and organisms being cultivated to halt aging or serve as ingredients for panaceas, so the damage to human civilization was quite severe.

As the example of the Orcran Swamp shows, humanity was still searching for ways to heal and strengthen themselves through nature.

“Speaking of which, didn’t ancient religions conduct rituals using drugs? Using hallucinogenic effects to achieve religious visions?”

“Did that actually work?”

“If it had worked, they wouldn’t have been forgotten. Without advanced civilization, it was just a case of crude knowledge gained through experience combined with an inadequate religion. In early human history, shamans and doctors were essentially synonymous.”

“I see…”

Well, ancient magical rituals contained many interesting elements.

Like records of creating berserkers who feared no death by mixing blood with water infused with hallucinogenic mushrooms.

There was an island nation that used drugs to deliberately create a vague comatose state, bewitching people into slaves for simple labor—that’s supposedly the origin of zombies, now classified under the broader category of undead in modern times.

Isn’t it amazing that such simple vocabulary has been passed down for over a million years with hardly any changes?

“It’s already this late. Let’s go eat.”

“Yes, my lord. Today’s menu is sausage and vegetable stir-fry with fried eggplant, pickled vegetables, chlorella bread, and seaweed stew.”

“Sounds delicious.”

Eat lunch, eat dinner, go to bed.

The Sky Warden advances along the extended ridgeline, crossing over increasingly higher mountain peaks.

And after three days, the Solar Army finally arrived at Mount Dikere.