After Seducing and Abandoning Apollo [Greek Mythology] - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Apollo.

Hair like flowing gold, a silver bow that never misses its mark, and the power to heal wounds with a mere touch—he was every bit the god of legend.

He was, without a doubt, Apollo.

Awed by the divine presence pressing upon her at such close range, Daphne’s thoughts momentarily ground to a halt.

It was not her first time standing face-to-face with a deity of this world. After all, strictly speaking, Daphne’s mother was Gaia, the Mother Earth, and her father was the river god. The blood of divinity coursed through this temporary body of hers as well. Yet, aside from the tender sigh that echoed beside her ear at the moment of her birth, she had never met her ancient, exalted mother.

As for her father, Ladon, he could never muster an ounce of dignity before his twelve daughters with their vastly different personalities.

Instead, he was constantly driven to his wits’ end by their antics, looking no different from an overly doting mortal father.

Apollo, however, was different.

He was a deity of the new generation, residing atop the snow-capped peak of Mount Olympus.

Power, status, beauty, lineage, and wealth—he was born possessing everything that mortals and even other gods craved.

He was accustomed to looking down upon all living beings on the dark earth; staying high above the rest was second nature to him.

Except for his father Zeus, he had perhaps never bowed his head to anyone.

And right now, Apollo was staring at her intently, expressionless, with those deep blue eyes capable of peering into the depths of the future.

Daphne was not timid by nature, but the overwhelming pressure of an Olympian staring at her from such close proximity exceeded what reason could bear. It was the vast chasm between a god of the sky and a spirit of the waters; it was the sacred aura emanating from him, cut from the same cloth as ambrosia, so dense it triggered a primal instinct in her nymph body to submit. Furthermore, his eyes, his entire face, and his form were beautiful beyond comprehension.

Daphne wanted to turn her gaze away but couldn’t, a chill rising uncontrollably in her heart.

She felt like a moth that had carelessly drifted into Apollo’s field of vision, pinned in midair by his passing, indifferent glance—liable to be incinerated at any second by the deity’s radiant glow.

To get a second chance at life, I’m supposed to make this transcendent being fall in love with me?

And that’s not even enough—his love has to be so profound that it leaves him vulnerable to pain.

For the first time, Daphne felt the sheer weight of the daunting task Eros had thrust upon her.

Suddenly, Apollo reached out toward her.

The pad of his finger brushed against her cheek, picking up a stain of dark red—the blood of the basilisk.

Daphne shuddered softly, snapping out of her spellbound state as vexation over her ruined plan instantly took over.

She vaguely remembered a few vague impressions of Greek mythology from her past life, where romantic relationships in this world almost always began with lust at first sight. During the years she had spent living as the river god’s daughter, everything she heard and saw corroborated this without exception: beauty was seen as the outward reflection of inner nobility; this world favored the gorgeous and showed no mercy to the unsightly.

Therefore, if she wanted to carry out Eros’s commission, the first impression she made on Apollo mattered more than anything else.

This body possessed exceptional looks, and Daphne had painstakingly drafted several contingency plans, hoping to make full use of the environment and her own assets to make a breathtaking entrance in front of Apollo.

Yet, mocked by the Three Fates, this was how she had to meet him.

It couldn’t be worse.

Eros was truly an unreliable employer, telling her only to come to Delphi while neglecting to mention that the place was infested with monsters.

Although the current situation could technically pass for a damsel-in-distress rescue, classic tropes dictated that the saved beauty—even if trapped in a monster’s lair—should never lose an ounce of her captivating grace.

In short, she shouldn’t look like this: one second wildly swinging a dripping dagger in a desperate struggle for survival, and the next, lying humiliated at her target’s feet—hair disheveled, face smudged with dirt, and reeking of rank blood.

Apollo’s lips twitched slightly, as if he muttered something under his breath.

But Daphne couldn’t hear it clearly.

“Forgive me, my lord, did you just say something?”

He didn’t answer.

Brows furrowing at whatever unpleasant thought crossed his mind, he asked instead, “Who are you? Why are you here?”

His guarded tone made Daphne think of a lord interrogating a suspicious trespasser. The way he looked at her had also changed abruptly—far too abruptly.

That intense concentration, as if his pupils might devour her whole, vanished without a trace. In an instant, she was demoted from an eyesore of a moth; to him, looking at her was no different than looking down at a tree or a blade of wild grass.

Daphne could even feel that Apollo found her presence too close for comfort. Though he didn’t voice it, he clearly expected her to have the sense to step back behind a polite boundary line.

And yet he was the one who had walked over on his own accord just a moment ago.

What proved even more vexing was that she couldn’t actually throw an attitude at him.

Not yet, at least.

“I am Daphne, daughter of Gaia and the river god Ladon. Hearing that a sweet, divine spring lay near here, I came seeking its waters. But before I could find the spring, I was unfortunately attacked by the basilisk,” Daphne stepped back two paces, her voice dripping with pious respect.

“Thank you for saving me. Forgive my bold assumption, but I believe you must be the glorious son of the goddess Leto.”

“I am indeed Apollo, son of Zeus and Leto.”

His demeanor remained somewhat blatantly cold.

Unconcernedly slinging his silver bow back over his shoulder without looking at her, he threw another interrogation-style question her way: “The river guarded by the river god Ladon lies in Arcadia, a great distance from here. Why have you journeyed so far alone?”

To meet you.

Though not in such an unromantic fashion.

Daphne’s mind raced, searching for a suitable excuse. Just then, Apollo turned his gaze back to her. The color of his eyes was astonishingly deep—his irises lacked the pale, thread-like veins typical of blue eyes, resembling instead the pure, deep azure that only synthetic pigments of later eras could match.

When he stared at her like that, it gave the illusion of looking into a cold, flawless gemstone.

It felt as though no lie could escape undetected before his eyes.

A thrill of alarm struck her heart. Abandoning the idea of weaving a grand tall tale, she let hesitation settle over her face, waiting a good while before answering: “Unlike my sisters, ever since birth I have found it… difficult to draw power from the waters and rivers, and I cannot cast divine magic as they do.”

Saying this, Daphne looked down at her palms, lowering her eyes with a touch of self-derision.

“Father said that a blessed divine spring should be able to nourish a deity’s power, yet all the springs nourished by my father within Arcadia proved useless to me. Thus, I left Arcadia, searching all along the way for unowned divine springs to absorb their power…”

She had not revealed the full truth, but neither had she lied.

Daphne truly could not command the power of rivers as freely as her sisters could. She couldn’t manipulate water currents at will, needed to surface for air after staying underwater for too long, and walking on the water’s surface was the absolute limit of her abilities.

She simply knew the reason why.

Eros had made it explicitly clear: the true origin of this body was green flora. Plants required water, but at the end of the day, she was nothing like the true daughters of the river god, who were born capable of transforming into swimming fish and waterbirds. The God of Love’s disguise methods were remarkably clever; at the very least, Ladon had failed to spot anything amiss, merely assuming his youngest daughter had inherited more of Gaia’s terrestrial blood and thus lacked the natural affinity for river and marsh magic.

Daphne had also used the pretext of seeking a remedy for her physical shortcoming when she departed Arcadia alone. Even if Apollo were somehow bored enough to cross-check her claim with Ladon, he would find absolutely nothing out of order.

Apollo, however, seemed to lack interest in her entirely. Upon hearing her explanation, he merely gave a curt nod, accepting her words.

“What on earth was that giant serpent…?”

Apollo’s response remained exceedingly brief: “Its name was Python. It has ravaged this land for far too long.”

“I had no idea it was here…” Daphne murmured softly, once again offering her warmest regards to the unreliable Eros in her heart.

Now that the monstrous Python was dead and their conversation had reached a lull, the pleasant, gurgling sound of running water deep within the dense forest grew noticeably clear.

True to her character persona of someone desperate to find a divine spring, Daphne cast a quick glance in the direction of the sound.

Seeing this, Apollo immediately spoke up: “The pond into which that spring flows resembles the shape of a dolphin, and thus it is named Delphi. I shall build my temple of prophecy here, and mortals from all over shall come to seek oracles.”

In other words: Don’t even think about claiming this spring.

His territorial awareness was strong. Should I proactively offer to serve in Apollo’s temple at Delphi? The daring thought flickered through her mind for a fleeting moment before Daphne instantly dismissed it.

Apollo clearly harbored a fair amount of vigilance toward her; acting overly eager would only make her appear all the more suspicious.

So, biting her lower lip as if striving to suppress a look of disappointment, Daphne turned to smile at him instead, yielding with complete grace and understanding: “It was you who slew the monstrous serpent plaguing this place, so naturally your will takes precedence. Besides, to supply water for your divine temple is the ultimate honor for that spring.”

Making a gesture as if about to depart, she added, “I shall never forget the favor of your life-saving grace, radiant Apollo. Pray permit me to return another day with gifts to offer at your temple.”

With her love-at-first-sight strategy ruined by circumstance, she decided to take a indirect route instead. With today’s disheveled and filthy first impression setting the baseline, making a stunning appearance later after dressing up meticulously would offer a contrast that was, in itself, a clever move.

Apollo offered no reaction.

Taking his silence as tacit permission, Daphne took a few respectful steps backward before turning around.

Whether in her past life or the present, she was never one to dwell for long on setbacks.

If anything, her mood was quite light now.

At least she had established a connection with Apollo—the first step had been taken, a cause for celebration indeed.

Apollo stood frozen in place.

He had expected the nymph to look back, but she didn’t.

Instead, he found himself inexplicably bothered, his gaze taking on a mind of its own as it pursued her figure relentlessly.

You’re completely right—a few words were cut off at the very beginning of that paragraph in the previous output.

Here is the fully restored and complete opening for that section:

The maiden’s hair braid had come undone, letting her golden-brown hair spill down to her waist in a wild, tousled mass. Strands stained with serpent blood clumped together in places, yet as a whole, it still resembled a lush, unfurling bundle of sea kelp. The wavy tips swayed gently with her light steps, her beautifully sculpted neck and slender arms peeking in and out among the flowing golden strands.

She really had terrible luck—she had even lost her shoes, leaving her no choice but to walk barefoot across the forest soil. Yet she seemed untroubled by it. When her foot accidentally brushed against fallen twigs, she did no more than give a faint hunch of her shoulders. When the sharp edge of a pebble poked the sole of her foot, she merely hopped on one leg several times like a dancer, as if doing so could ward off the pain.

Thus, her filthy skirt flapped upward with her movements, the fabric bunching above the backs of her knees. While her delicate feet and toes were caked with dried blood and mud, the maiden’s ankle bones and curved lower legs gleamed stark white, as if emitting a soft glow. It felt like something one was not supposed to see, making it all the more breath-taking.

It was at that exact moment that the hallucination of foresight struck him again.

Whenever Apollo sensed a momentous event concerning his own fate or that of the Olympian gods, precognition would break directly into scene fragments, brutally forcing its way into his vision and taking over his consciousness. However, because his authority over prophecy was not yet complete, he could not trace the finer details of these precognitive visions; he could only grasp the raw images.

Even earlier, when he had just saved her, a flash of spiritual fire had flickered briefly in the deep recesses of his sea of consciousness.

And now, that vague premonition expanded into a full scene. For the second time, he witnessed the exact same sight: in a future—perhaps distant, perhaps near—he was sprinting desperately, pursuing someone across the dark earth.

He did not know whom he was chasing. He could not make out the figure of his target, catching only the plain-colored skirt fluttering with every stride and the fleeting ghost of an ankle ahead. The mere sight of that small corner of her dress, white as a dove’s feather, was like a spark striking dry bushland in the summer heat—igniting a roaring blaze in an instant, leaving him burning and trembling from head to toe with overwhelming emotion.

He heard the triumphant, smug chuckle of an onlooker—the voice of Eros. But Apollo had no time for the detestable God of Love; desire swallowed reason, and panic flattened all composure. He knew only that he had to catch up before it was entirely too late.

In the next breath, Apollo snapped back to reality. He pinched the bridge of his nose, his expression turning slightly stiff.

The emotions in that vision were completely alien to anything he would ever feel. Even experiencing this precognitive hallucination for the second time, he still could not believe that such a day would ever come for him. He would never permit himself to become so pathetic—never. The patterns woven by the threads of fate were not set in stone; even if the Three Fates turned a blind eye to Eros’s petty revenge and wished for him to taste the bitterness of love, he could find a way to evade it.

Besides, the owner of that skirt corner might not even be her.

She was merely a weak nymph whose arrival was far too coincidental—weak, yet suspicious. Though she put on a meek and respectful front in his presence, that was clearly not her true nature.

When Apollo had arrived at the monster’s lair, he had immediately spotted the figure trapped by the giant black serpent.

He had never seen a maiden act so savagely—her wild, frantic swings with the dagger were bordering on madness. Serpent blood was splattered everywhere, yet because she lacked strength, she couldn’t inflict a fatal blow. Her desperate struggle for survival lacked any of the clean, one-shot lethality his sister Artemis displayed when hunting.

An edged weapon was most dangerous in the hands of a child. And a dagger like hers was even sharper, brimming with aggression. When she raised her head and met his gaze, he had almost thought her eyes were on fire—he could only blame it on her irises being too pale in color. Moreover, those were restless, dishonest eyes.

In short, this nymph was by no means the type Apollo could ever see himself liking. If Eros intended to set a trap of desire for him, he should have at least picked someone who was her absolute polar opposite.

And yet, she walked lightly and swiftly, never once looking back. It seemed she truly wanted nothing more from him.

That unlingering, unregretful silhouette inexplicably vexed Apollo. He prided himself on being benevolent and generous; he was hardly low enough to force a maiden who had just escaped mortal danger to trek barefoot.

And so, Apollo took a step forward in pursuit, calling out that name for the very first time:

“Daphne.”