Eventually, he managed to sneak a few words of his own out. "Then... if you all already knew other universes existed, why does being here matter so much?"
Hestia’s expression flattened.
"Because knowing sothing exists is very different from being able to touch it."
She folded her hands in front of her chest, squeezing her breasts together, then continued. "For all our knowledge, for all the ages the gods have observed the great patterns of creation, one truth remained absolute."
Her golden eyes narrowed.
"The divide between universes could not be traversed."
Rohan swallowed hard. Now that just sounded contradictory with everything she had just said. How could he be there if it was supposed to be impossible, even for Gods?
"No god has done it, no matter how much they have tried. No mortal has done it. Nothing, no will of any realm has ever successfully crossed from one universe to another and remained intact, to my knowledge."
Her gaze swept over him again, from head to toe.
"Until you ca along."
The whole temple fell into silence. Rohan stood there, arms slowly lowering back to his sides, and felt a strange mix of emotions hit him all at once.
Confusion, obviously. Disbelief too. Bust most of all — a fair amount of dread.
A literally god had just told him that he shouldn’t exist in this place, and with such a serious tone at that. Rohan dreaded to know what Hestia would do now that she’d figured him out.
’Will I beco her own personal test subject now that she’s figured out the truth...?’
Hestia suddenly let out a mild smile. "Do you find it terrifying?"
Rohan gave her a look. Despite how well the conversation seed to be going so far, it had been completely overturned by this new revelation.
"I found it terrifying before I even knew what was going on." He answered dryly. "Now I just have a better reason for it."
But he quickly switched the focus to sothing he considered infinitely more important.
"If I’m in your universe now... how can I go back to my own."
Of all things, Rohan wanted to see Hestia’s reaction to this question. Not just her answer, but he wanted to witness her expression, her emotions before she gave him an answer.
If she acted like it was no big deal, then he would know then and there that he’d never be going back to his own universe. Not just because of everything Hestia had talked about either — if she lied about him being able to go back, then it was a dead certainty that she had no intention of letting him do so.
However, if she admitted the nigh impossibility of him being able to do so... his situation wasn’t exactly better, but Hestia might not be a conniving goddess.
His question drew a real smile from her, though it was only a small one.
Whether Hestia had figured out his thoughts — or even worse, as he still held so suspicions about her being able to read his mind — he didn’t know.
It vanished quickly regardless, however, as he thoughts turned to the bigger matter.
"We believed the universes were entirely sealed from one another." She spoke. "The boundaries at the edge of our universe was simply impossible to cross, no matter the amount of strength one held. Even knowledge of the other universes ca only through long observation and divine deduction, not through any physical proof."
She turned slightly, walking a few slow paces to the side. "So, how high do you think the chances are that you can do sothing even the gods consider impossible?" Hestia looked in his direction.
Rohan sighed. Although it wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear, it was along the lines that didn’t pin Hestia as soone who’d do him harm because of his unique status.
"I’ve done it once, so it’s no longer impossible." He eventually responded.
That’s right. Despite the big ga Hestia had just talked, he did feel it prudent to remind her that he was living, physical proof that this so called ’boundary’ between universes she’d been on about the whole ti was no longer impossible to cross.
Of course, it might as well be, as the sample size of successful crossings was only 1, but it wasn’t absolute anymore — that is what is most important.
Hestia chuckled. "I suppose you have beat in this case."
Rohan wasn’t in the mood for any lighthearted banter anymore. He quickly switched the mood and topic. "So what am I supposed to do now?"
If it were any other person, he wouldn’t even bother to ask. In a situation like this, where he had to achieve sothing literally nobody in history had achieved, again, then he was better off going at it alone than seeking the advice of soone else.
But Hestia wasn’t just ’so other person.’
She was a Goddess, and one of quite high stature from what Rohan could gather. She spoke of other gods existing out there in this universe, yet she never ntioned any of them in the creation of the Great System that gave everyone an equal opportunity to gain power.
If Rohan had to guess, Hestia might be one of the most powerful, higher level Gods, perhaps even the strongest of all.
She might just be the exception to his idea of nobody being able to provide him any help.
"Why don’t we start off with you retracing your steps from now to when you last recall being in your own universe. Perhaps we can reverse engineer the thod you used to enter my universe by going over this." Hestia suggested, and Rohan was already ahead of her. He planned to do this before she even brought it up.
But having Hestia by his side to help might provide so useful insights that he might not have even considered if she weren’t there.
***
Rohan spent the next half an hour going over everything he rembered from the past half a day — from his first encounter with the dungeon, to his final encounter with the hidden cave that eventually led him to this place.
He made sure to even include the thoughts that had been plaguing him at those tis — such as his surprise and suspicion upon discovering the dungeon, having never heard of such things existing in the Origin Realm at the ti.
Now, of course, he knew that the Dungeon was likely not sothing the Origin Realm had made at all, or perhaps even knew existed.
It was this fact that seed to pique Hestia’s interest the most.
"I believe I understand what happened to you now." She revealed.
But her face quickly fell back into her most serious expression.
"Dungeons are a common thing in my universe, I should know best, as I was one of the main architects of them. Everything you’ve described to about your experiences in the dungeon is extrely familiar to . The fact that one showed up in your universe can only an one thing." She revealed.
"The boundaries separating our universes has overlapped, which caused this phenonon. I’ve never heard of sothing like this happening before, so I’m sure you can imagine how rare it is, but it is the only possible explanation."
Hestia didn’t ntion it outright, but the most striking piece of evidence for her hypothesis was Rohan’s presence here himself. If it were just that one dungeon showing up in the Origin Realm bearing similarities to the ones commonly strewn across her entire universe, then it might be nothing but a coincidence.
It was Rohan actually being transported across the boundaries and into Hestia’s realm after reaching the end of the dungeon that made her certain this was no coincidence.
Rohan took a long breath and let out out slowly through his nose.
Now that Hestia had actually put words to it, the whole thing almost sounded sensible.
It definitely wasn’t sothing he could explain to another person without them thinking he’d spent too long huffing blood fus inside the dungeon, but it was rational enough that he could at least follow the sa line of thought as her.
Rohan rubbed his temples to ease his rising stress. ’My cortisol levels are off the charts right now...’
The strange extra information the dungeon had been feeding him. The treasure chest, the title, the second status. The whole ti he’d been thinking the Origin Realm had so kind of switch up, yet now Rohan understood that it wasn’t the Origin Realm doing that at all, but Hestia’s Great System.
A thought occurred to him.
"If this overlap can happen once," he said carefully, "does that an it can happen again?"
Hestia gave him a knowing look.
"That’s the golden question." She answered. "But I wouldn’t lose all hope just yet. While sothing like this hasn’t happened before, I do know that the boundaries of our universes move at extrely slow speeds — I’m talking minuscule amounts of distance over thousands of years — so this overlapping point you entered through might not just still be open, but open for a very long ti at that."
Rohan’s hope spiked.
"You’ve found the entry point from your side of the overlap, so all we’d have to do is find it from my side now."
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