After only a few minutes, everyone was already bruised all over their bodies while some of them even had fractured bones. However, since they were not yet seriously injured, the dummies kept on attacking and chasing them despite their cries.
After a few more minutes had passed, the first one to make a fatal mistake was Ruruko as she dodged in the wrong spot and got her left eye pierced by the wooden sword, "AAHHHHH!!!"
Her wail of pain attracted everyone's attention and they were horrified when they saw her busted eye as Ruruko tried to cover it with both of her hands, "RURUKO!!!", shouted Saji in desperation as he attempted to go over to her side.
At that point, they had already forgotten that Kisuke's reminder that the dummies would only stop moving for them if they were seriously or fatally injured, as they tried to help their precious comrade.
But even after seeing this, Kisuke didn't remind them again and saw the dummies slash at their wide open backs, leaving them open for even more attacks, "AHHH!!!" "KYAHH!!!" "AHHH!!!!!!" Intermittent cries of pain rang across the group as each one of them fell victim to the dummies' attacks, leaving them with a few broken limbs and fractured ribs. If not for their Devil Physiques, they would have already died.
Kisuke sighed and approached Ruruko who was rolling on the ground in pain. He then carefully picked her up while stopping her movements and slowly dipped her body in the Hotspring, "I'm going to put your head under the water, so don't scream or you'll drown."
Despite the pain, Ruruko heard him properly and did her best to stop her screams and sobbing.
After a few seconds of treatment, the pain in Ruruko's left eye slowly subsided and she was able to straighten out her thinking, "Continue doing this until your eye regenerates. After you've fully recovered, those dummies will detect it and will start attacking you again."
Ruruko shuddered after hearing that but didn't say anything and just silently sobbed to herself.
Kisuke knew that this would be a crucial part for her and left her alone to think, "I already said it before. There are only two results from this training. Either you get stronger or you will never be able to fight again."
Kisuke then faced the rest of Sona's Peerage, "I said that as long as one is only seriously injured, your dummies won't stop. If you don't take this in mind, this will only happen each time one of you gets seriously injured. And down the road, you guys won't be lucky when you're all downed while one of you is fatally injured with no one to help if either Serafall or I am not watching."
"Go in the Hotspring on your own. I still need to attend something. It'll be a few more hours before Serafall arrives, so do your best to survive since you already agreed to take this training while knowing the risks."
"And if you think this is too much, then I agree with you. But this is the only way for you to get stronger fast without relying on external help or tools. And just so you know, Sona, including Koneko and Aika, already went through something similar, so this is not some unfair training."
After setting up the vending machine for their nourishment liquid, Kisuke left them alone with the dummies. Even after walking far away from them, he could still hear their screams.
Soon he met with the two cloaked figures and asked them to follow him. Once they reached and entered the room, Kisuke immediately sat down and said, "Please sit down."
Athena and Nyx removed their hoods and sat down in front of Kisuke, "Thank you," Athena replied, "I'm sorry if I'm meddling, but even Ares' soldiers don't get that kind of brutal training and they are known as one of the best armies in the Supernatural world. If this training were to be integrated into his army, I don't think even a tenth of them would remain, and you're giving such a thing to youngsters. This is technically torturing them."
However, Kisuke only smiled at her, "I wouldn't give them something like this if I knew they couldn't pass it. In fact, I'm around 90% sure that they'll overcome this."
Athena and Nyx's eyes widened in surprise, "What makes them special?" asked Athena curiously.
"It's because they are not soldiers," answered Kisuke.
Visible confusion appeared on Athena and Nyx's faces, however, Kisuke just brushed it off and changed the topic, "Enough of that. You didn't come here to talk about that, right?"
With a big grin, Kisuke directly asked, "So, how are we going to storm Olympus?"
While Nyx shuddered, Athena smiled, "As expected of you. You already knew what I had on my mind."
"Well, it's an obvious conclusion. Considering Zeus' position and the situation within Olympus, sneaking into your father's place would be next to impossible." Kisuke shrugged his shoulders, "Besides, they gave me such a wonderful title~ It would be a shame if I didn't put it to good use~"
Athena couldn't help but smile wryly, "I really am glad that I'm absolutely not your enemy..."
Nyx also nodded nervously on her words.
"Though it doesn't seem like you regret what you did to Medusa."
Despite the fear within her, Athena stood her ground, "Even after our fight, I still believe that what I did was the right thing, so I won't ever apologize." But soon after, she shook her head, "Though I've already taken my hands off her and won't bother her ever again since you already took her under your wing."
Kisuke sighed, "Well, I guess that's a lot better than you apologizing without any sincerity. Besides, I can also understand where you're coming from. It's just that we have differences in ideals. As they say, 'justice' is subjective."
"Thank you for your understanding," Athena then took out two golden orbs from her personal space and handed it over to Kisuke, "Since I won't be antagonizing Medusa anymore, please take these."
Kisuke silently received and inspected the golden orbs before muttering in surprise, "These are remnants of Divine Cores?"
"More specifically, remnants of Stheno and Euryale, Medusa's older sisters' Divine Core. I knew that they'd been helping Medusa survive through the eons and I planned to use them for something. Since I don't need them anymore, I'm giving them to you, their caretaker," explained Athena.
"Thanks~ This will be helpful."
"You're welcome. There are still some things related to Medusa and her sisters in my private quarters. I can give them to you after you've healed my father." Athena's expression then became serious and took out a map, "Now that we're on the topic, here's the map of Olympus."
Pointing towards the northern part of the map, Athena continued, "Over here is my father's abode. The plan is simple. You'll create a big ruckus once you've entered Olympus to gather most of their forces towards you, which will weaken the security around my father. Once you've done enough, you'll use your body double spell to go through this path where it'll be harder for you to be detected to reach me near the place of our goal."
Athena then looked in his eyes and added, "Though you probably don't trust me enough to point you to a certain path, so I'll leave you the decision of where you want to go before meeting up with me."
Athena then proceeded to explain each and every place on the map to Kisuke, reminding him of what to watch out for. Ever since Apollo revealed himself, he hadn't been in Olympus for a long time so there was only a slim chance for Kisuke to meet him.
"Alright," Kisuke nodded, "I'm fine with this since there's a lot of freedom to move around. If there's nothing else, let's move out."
"Please wait. There are a few things I'd like to request first," Athena stopped Kisuke.
"Go on..."
"For my first request, please don't kill anyone."
"Oh, Goddess... That's a tall order."
Athena gritted her teeth, "I know... But most of those inside Olympus are just innocent people! Of course, there are many scums among them, but I can't let those good people suffer any further than they already are! Even if you have a way to detect those poisons, we're not even sure if everyone who doesn't have it is from Apollo's side."
"This is also the reason why I gave you the information regarding Olympus! Just so you know, this information was only available for high-ranking Gods! By giving this to someone like you, I'm essentially giving away Olympus' future in your hands! But for a chance to reform it and save the victims, I'm willing to be the eternal sinner and traitor of our faction!"
Kisuke didn't answer immediately and just stared at her resolute face while thinking, 'Indeed... I can easily tell that this is confidential information and thanks to this, I would be able to improve what I planned on doing there. And although Apollo hasn't been there, I'm pretty sure that he'll come back once he has appropriate control over Olympus. Once that happens, my 'investments' will bloom.'
'I know that she's still hiding a few things, but that's normal. It's already a big risk to give this to me.'
After a few more minutes of silence, Kisuke sighed, "Fine... But I would require your full cooperation in the future as well." Even though Kisuke held her life in his hands, it would still be a lot better if she voluntarily accepted his requests, 'Holding the whole of Olympus hostage instead of just her life should do the trick.'
Athena smiled happily, "As long as you don't treat the citizens of Olympus badly!"
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Editors:
28th00: I still fear what Ophis is building while unsupervised, the last time that happened she built a terrorist super organisation that tried to kill her(even if it was pretty much a joke in the end). Getting your eye exploded is pretty painful, especially considering this is the 'normal girl' Ruruko. Ruruko is the only known reincarnated devil who was a former human who had absolutely no relation to the supernatural world or any knowledge of it or any special abilities of note before being reincarnated as a devil. I wonder if Sona being Awol for so many volumes has made it so she can get Saji instead of giving up on him like in canon?