After a day in the underworld shirou and athena had to leave or zeus would grow suspicious, he took athena to his temple where she would live until her temple was built.
Shirou: welcome to my home, make yourself comfortable.
Athena: thank you not just for welcoming me to your home but for saving my mother, if you ever need anything, you can simply ask.
Shirou: you shouldn't be thankful, we are family and you are my sister, it is my job as an older brother to take care of you.
Athena: but other gods and goddesses don't care about those things.
Shirou: true, but I do, listen athena many will try to use you due to your position as an olympian, I am not saying that you shouldn't trust anyone but you should find true friends and allies to depend on.
Athena: I don't need any friends and nobody can trick me I am the goddess of wisdom afterall.
With pride in her voice.
Shirou: really? You are also the goddess of war, does that mean you can't lose?
Athena: indeed.
Shirou: (got to knock down her ego, don't want another gilgamesh ). Fine, how about you and I spar ?
Athena: why?
Shirou: I just want to prove something to you, what's the matter, is the big strong goddess of war and wisdom afraid to lose to a mere blacksmith.
A bit mockingly.
Athena: fine, we will spar and I will show you that my wisdom never fails.
Shirou: we will see, now let us take you to your room and put your things there, then I will take you to tour olympus then we can spar.
After putting athena's things in her room, the two walked beside each other holding hands much to athena's embaressment.
Athena: why must we hold hands ?
Shirou: so that you don't wonder off and get lost.
Athena: but I won't get lost, I am too smart for that.
Shirou: (she is acting like illya when she doesn't get what she wants). Fine don't blame me if you do get lost.
Athena: you will see.
Shirou let go of her hand and both walked side by side, he took her to the gardens of olympus to enjoy the view, he also showed her the temples of the most important gods and goddesses, the library of olympus which almost nobody uses much to her horor. Finally he took her out to eat in a restaurent which served ambriosa.
Shirou: (hmm, I wonder if I can add ambriosa to my cooking, maybe a cake or perhaps ambriosa cookies).
Athena: olympus is really great.
Shirou: it has it's charms, hey athena can I ask you something?
Athena: what is it?
Shirou: what do you want to do as a goddess ?
Athena: I want to have a city that worships me and spread and collect knowledge, I want to know everything in existence.
Shirou: first let me talk about the city, tell me athena, what will you do to the mortals who live in your city.
Athena: what do you mean? They will build temples for me and worship me, why would I give mortals anything? It's their duty to grovel before me
Shirou: and how do you expect them to respect you?
Athena: I am a goddess, ofcourse they will respect me or they will suffer my wrath.
Shirou: they will respect you out of fear not love, is that that what you want, to be a goddess that only holds the loyalty of it's followers due to fear, or do you want to be loved and adored and praised for your kindness?
Athena thought for a second before replying.
Athena: the second, but what if they don't worship and love me?
Shirou: then you should give them a reason to worship and love you, loyalty coming from fear is a fragile thing like glass that can break anytime, while loyalty out of love and respect is as strong a steal.
Athena: I will think about it.
Shirou: as for your second wish I am afraid nobody can know everything.
Athena openned her mouth to object but shirou shot her a look making her shut up.
Shirou: nobody can know everything, the world is a place that is filled with infinite secrets, some lost, some hidden waiting to be found, even kronos didn't know everything.
Athena shuddered hearing the name of the titan of time.
Athena: what do you mean?
Shirou: even if you hate him, you must admit kronos was a very smart titan, but he did not know his actions would trigger the prophecy that would dethrone him, if he raised his children and had them swear an oath on their divinity that they would not betray him, he would still be a king.
Athena: but I am the goddess of wisdom.
Shirou: then can you tell me what is my favorite meal?
Athena:
no..
Shirou: my favorite color?
Athena: no
Shirou: see even you do not know everything which is fine, nobody would think less of you, besides it would be boring to know everything, life would become hollow and dull.
Athena: I guess you are right. Can you give me a minute, I need to think a bit.
Shirou: don't go too far
Athena: I won't
Athena got up and began to walk away thinking of what shirou said and what kind of goddess she wished to be.
5 minutes later
Athena had not stopped walking and thinking about what hephaestus said, was he right? She began to think and found herself agreeing with what he said, the problem with her is that she didn't think of it first. She sighed and chose to go back to shirou and talk more about it.
She looked around and did not recognize where she was, she had gotten lost.
Athena: hephaestus will never let me live this down.
Athena began to walk in a certain direction until she bumped into 2 gods, both children of ares who resembled their father, they were phobos and deimos.
Phobos: look brother, if it isn't a beautiful goddess.
Athena: I am athena, goddess of wisdom and war and the newest olympian, can you point me to hephaestus.
Deimos: that bastard who put our dad in the hospital, that weakling.
Athena: your father would logically be a bigger weakling.
Phobos: it would seem the little goddess doesn't know who she is messing with, we better teach her a lesson.
Athena quickly summoned her spear and began planning her attacks, but an aura of fear sent by both gods paralyzed her making her unable to think clearly.
The two gods walked towards her with sick smiles on their faces, phobos got a sword and prepared to slash athena, athena closed her eyes waiting for the blow praying for help
Athena: (hephaestus help...)
When she felt no pain, she dared to open her eyes and saw deimos trembling in fear and hephaestus infront of her, phobos on the other hand could not say anything, he had spears and swords sticking out of him, ichor was dripping from his wounds, it did not take much for him to vanish leaving golden dust behind to reform in tartarus. The swords then vanished by dissapearing into blue particales.
Shirou looked at deimos who almost shit himself.
Shirou: leave now.
The tone showed the consequences if he did not follow his orders
Deimos quickly ran but not before he shouted that his father would be told about this Shirou (gently): athena are you okay?
Athena: why did I freeze? I am the goddess of war, I should be able to take down a minor god.
Shirou: it is because you don't have battle experience, come with me.
Athena took shirou's hand and both teleported to his home and went to a trainning space.
Shirou get ready.
Athena summoned her armor and spear and took a perfect stance.
Shirou: make a strategy, take as long as you want, I will not attack you.
Then shirou traced a very deadly weapon that would force all those who were either raised or trainned by him to have a traumas for eternity, it was the bane of all those who live in fyuuki especially the yakuza group, it was used by taiga his teacher the daughter of a yakuza boss, it was the infamous Tora shinai.
athena: are you mocking me?
Shirou: trust me this is a very deadly weapon.
Athena trembled in anger, he was mocking her, fine she would show him, she attacked him with decent speed, but before she could land a hit, she saw the shinai give out a deadly dark aura, shirou raised it up and athena was not sure but she heard the roar of a tiger but that could be the pain she felt making her delerious. The blows continued until she could no longer take it and gave up.
Athena: ouch, that hurt.
Shirou: sorry, but I needed to make you understand.
Athena: that you are a sadist ?
Shirou: that you need experience, strategies won't always work, in fact no plan survives first contact, you can have knowledge on how to forge a sword, but nobody can make a perfect one on their first try. It takes work and you may fail many times before finally succeeding.
Athena: okay I get it.
Shirou: good now go shower while I make some food for you.
Athena got up without complaining, she did not want to feel that shinai hitting her again, she was sure it was somehow cursed.
Shirou meanwhile has been cooking her something delicious for her first day, he made her some burgers with fries and for desert he made some milkshakes.
Athena came down and after taking her first bite began to eat without any manners making shirou release some dark intent along with hanya masks.
Shirou (sweetly): athena you are a smart and good girl and good girls eat with manners or don't eat at all.
Athena scared nodded quickly in fear and began to eat slowly making the hanyas and dark feeling vanish.
Athena: what was that?
Shirou: what was what?
Athena: those masks.
Shirou: I have no idea what you are talking about, you must be too hungry and are imagining things.
Athena wanted to disagree but had no proof so she started eating again.
After that she went to sleep while shirou went to his room and closed his eyes and found himself in a room filled with door each having the image of a hero or heroine of the past or future, from karna to enkidu to lancelot to atlanta to scathach, every hero had his image drawn in a portal.
Shirou theorized that this is his connection to the throne of heroes and the way he can use the skills and powers of those heroes. He kept walking till he reached 7 portals that were blocked, no matter how hard he tried he could never use the powers of the people those portals belong to nor did he know who they were. The only thing that diffrentiated those portals from regular one is that on the top enscribed in gold is two words that made shirou wonder what they mean and their importance, the words were grand servant.
He then continued walking, the throne of heroes did not only have human heroes and demigods, but also gods as well. He walked infront of a portal that drew his attention and touched it and suddenly he gasped and fell to his knees as knowledge entered his brains.
Machine gods
Losbelts
Age of gods
Pan human history
Al
Betrayal
Zeus
Chaos
Finally a image was burned to his mind, the image of a machine broken and destroyed, it was an image that would haunt his dreams for some time.
Shirou slowly recovered and decided he needed to rest, he looked at the name above the portal, it read hephaestus and then vanished.
Shirou was now in his room thinking about what he saw and felt, it made him doubt a few things, was he and the others in this dimension really gods and divine beings, make no mistake they were powerful but the strength he saw in his visions made him feel like a child fighting a lion. He could no longer focus and decided to think about it tommorow, for now he needed to sleep.
The next day shirou took athena to a trip to the underworld where she met her mother, her mother was happy to meet her and asked her how time on olympus had been. Athena told her everything making metis send shirou a grateful look.
Metis: anyways I made you some food.
Athena: Well I am a bit hungry.
Metis: great hephaestus join us please.
Shirou nodded and went to a room where hades was also waiting with food on the table.
Metis: enjoy.
Athena and everyone began to eat and chat on different topics till the food all dissapeared.
Metis: so was it good?
Athena: yes....but hephaestus's is way better.
The sound of a broken heart and broken pride echoed through the room or perhaps it was only shirou's imagination, metis fell to her knees and began to cry while muttering about being beaten as a mother by a god and how her womanly pride was broken.
Shirou and the others watched her awkwardly not knowing what to do, finally deciding to leave her alone would be the best option.
The End
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