"You seem to be enjoying yourself."
The woman had dark green hair that flowed elegantly down her shoulders, long enough to float against the water in the hot spring. Unlike Cera, who had wrapped herself in a towel this lady had no qualms exposing her completely nude body. She almost seemed to be pushing her busty chest towards Cera as if to say 'hey look at these'. This admittedly caused a slight flush of pink to appear quite visibly on Cera's cheeks before she managed to cut her eyes in the other direction.
The complete stranger broke the silence after Cera had spent several minutes settling in and basking in the hot spring. This woman had a mysterious air about her. Although she was quiet for a while, her apparent charming nature gave Cera the impression of an easy-going attractive sort of personality. That makes it much easier to talk to her without feeling nervous or on edge.
"Well, I've never been in a hot spring before, the water feels amazing on my skin!"
"Ahhhh, that explains it then!"
The stranger clapped her fist in her hand as if something had just dawned on her.
"Explains what?"
"I was wondering why you didn't wash yourself off by the bathing area first before getting in the spring, being your first time I'll let it slide. Don't let it happen again…or else."
The sudden threatening tone caught Cera off guard, she had no idea there was such a rule in the first place.
"Or else?"
At Cera's response the woman starting swimming over with an ominous smile spread on her face and laughing like "huhuhu".
This caused Cera to feel uneasy, almost triggering a fight or flight mode from within.
"Or….else…..THIS!"
Within the next moment Cera was attacked, but not in the usual way. Not in the usual way at all, in fact.
She felt the woman's gentle fingers slide past her defenses into a sensitive area. The most diabolical form of an attack. That's right, the most excruciating torture had begun to ensue as this total stranger tickled Cera's armpits.
At first it was funny, she laughed and laughed…and laughed, but it didn't take long before Cera was begging her to stop. She wiggled and squirmed and tried with all her might to escape this evil foe's grasp, but to no avail!
"So, have you learned your lesson or should we keep going?"
The woman wore a sadistic smile as Cera was nearly breaking out in tears.
"Y-yes! I won't do it again I swear!"
The strange woman had finally stopped and quickly moved away while giggling still with a "huhuhu", on the other hand Cera was leaning over while panting and sending the woman a look that could kill.
After a while of cooling down so to speak, the two had begun talking once again. Though, Cera wouldn't forget the treachery that she had just endured.
"So, what brings you to this neck of the woods? It's not very often that another person is allowed to stay in this house you know? It might be hard to believe, but Hades himself used to live here."
Taking this moment, Cera drew a long breath while searching for the words she was looking for that would explain exactly how she got here.
"I'm as lost as you are, one moment I was in Neodeka trying to catch up to my lil brother and then all of a sudden I was here along with this idiot who won't stop following me named Jericho.
Apparently, some muscle head named Jeshira thinks I hacked his 'gate' or whatever which maybe explains how I got here, but he kept going on about how he thinks I'm some candidate or something…then there was that weird group of cloaked guys that called themselves 'the looming shadow' and their leader brought me and that idiot Jericho here.
That basically covers everything that has happened in the past few hours, but there's still one thing I can't wrap my head around which is why there are pictures of my mom and dad sitting out there. This IS the underworld right? How are there pictures of my folks in the underworld? If we ever lived in the underworld I'd think I'd remember something like that but nope. As far as I remember we always lived on Eart-"
"HOLD IT WHAT WHAT WHATTT!????"
The stranger had cut Cera off from finishing her story, she wasn't sure at what part the woman became confused since it was obviously a lot to take in all at once.
"What's wrong?"
"Y-you just said that the people in the photos out there are of your parents? Are you absolutely sure about that?"
"I mean they look exactly the same, but maybe they're some kind of doppelgangers or evil twins or somethin' I dunno."
"Whats your dad's name?"
"Uhhh, Mark Shadows. I'm Cera Shadows by the way."
"Oh…my..God…"
The look on the woman's face was as if she had just found her long lost cousin or something.
"What? Do you know something, spit it out come on!"
"Well, I just never expected this…how do I put it? Hmmm…well, I guess to start off…if what you say is true then you should know that your dad is the king of the underworld. Though, he and your mom traveled to the human realm about 29 years ago and they never came back.
In their absence, another candidate has reincarnated into the god Anubis and he's trying to gain the throne to the underworld.
But, if you're a direct descendant of Hades…Hmmm, you might be crowned the ruler of the underworld instead of Jeshira…once you reincarnated that is."
"Okay, that's a lot of crazy to soak up…but, also I gotta say I really don't want any part in it."
"What!? Why not? Your bloodline makes you a candidate and not only that, you're also royalty on top of that!...I'm actually kinda jealous…
•́ ‿ ,•̀ "
"Yeah, well when I came here I was actually looking for my lil bro like I said…until I find him and know he's safe, I don't really care about this throne stuff you're talking about…but, now that we're on the subject I keep hearing the word 'candidate' getting thrown around. But what am I a candidate for?"
"Oh! You mean you don't know about that either? What's the best way to explain it…well, to start I guess since you heard about the looming Shadow and all that I'll give you a brief history of them. So, what you probably don't know is that they are a clan of sorcerers that was started a longggg long time ago. Somewhere along the line they found evidence of the existence of some untapped and limitless energy that at the time could only be described as magic…"
The woman was going over her lesson, Cera was nodding along but inside she was just hoping this lady would get to the point already.
"Magic? You mean like actual magic?"
"In a manner of speaking yes, but actually no."
"Well, now I'm lost again."
"Basically, what we are talking about as 'magic' was actually in fact the remnants of power that was left behind long ago by beings that we had thought to be completely extinct."
"*Gasp* you mean…aliens? (☉｡☉)!"
"What? No. Are you serious, no I'm talking about ancient GODS!"
"Ohhhhhh…that's cool too."
"This is going to be a while, for now let's go ahead and get out of this water. I'm turning into a raisin here."
"But wait, you know we've been talking all this time and you never gave me your name…that's a bit rude isn't it? I mean, I gave you MY name."
"Ohhh, that's right!...ahem…tremble before my awesomeness! Bow before my beauty! For I am the one! The only! Makayla Ashlyn, REINCARNATION OF APHRODITE!"
This woman Makayla struck a grandiose pose without any clothes on while dripping water from the hot spring. Cera was surprised to hear the 'reincarnation of Aphrodite' part, but aside from that the over the top introduction was so cringe that she had to face-palm after witnessing it.
The two ended up migrating into the living room where Makayla continued to educate Cera about Gods and stuff.