Ethan Nakamura was a hundred-per-cent-maginified-a-thousand-times sure he had died. At least by common sense, after being stabbed in the stomach by a ricocheted knife blade he momentarily knew was too deep to even pull out.
He was too stunned when he realized he found opening his eyes was difficult, and was too stunned even when he found himself in a spacious cave where one of its four openings poured orange light. Evening sunlight, he recognized. If he was in the Underworld: a) he should NOT be alone – there were tonnes of other ghosts; b) no place was spacious – everything was traffic, traffic, traffic; c) unless he was abducted, there was no such cave in the Underworld to be presented for any dead demigod, much less a human, and; d) light do not exist in the Underworld. The only source of light was tinder burning on posts.
Unless he was in Elysium.
Elysium?
The gods must've gone crazy if they let him fall to Elysium – on top of that, without his conscience.
After a blurry sensing of "long time", Ethan was slowly starting to accept the conclusion he was in Elysium. Where else, would you be dead and yet wake up lying in a very comfortable bed? Isles of Blest – yeah right, he'd eat his grandmother's best Sunday hat.
He was about to lull back to sleep when a girl's voice, clear and refreshing, spoke: "Oh, so soon to sleep again?"
His eyes snapped awake and found a girl peeking into him. She was beautiful.
Surprised at the beauty, he instinctively leapt from the bed. Or at least tried to do so. Instead his back went "CRACK!" and he fell back onto the bed again. He groaned while rolling around, trying his best to ease the abnormal pain in his back. He realized then his whole body ached seriously.
"Oh, don't move so fast, hero," the girl said alarmed, her hands at his back massaging it, "You are not healed completely. Moving too fast would destroy you."
His back to her and his front on the bed, Ethan took a pain glimpse to see the stranger clearer. She was petite, for her age he predicted – sixteen? Or maybe fifteen? – but she had an intelligent feature. Not a daughter of Athena; she showed none of the pompous traits or tongue. Perhaps a daughter of Aphrodite; but she didn't flirt. After some debating Ethan came to a disheartening conclusion she wasn't a demigod. Nevertheless she was still mystical: caramel-coloured hair that fell down naturally, a small smile that too seemed natural to be on her face. A natural feature. She wore a white Greek dress: the type that often was only of robes and showed a girl's shoulders, back and cleavage – whoa. Disgrace to you, Ethan Nakamura. Shut up and concentrate on your back pain like a menace.
Ethan felt a whoosh of relief for not successfully "leaping out" of bed and hit her face in the rough process.
He noticed she was singing magic, and he knew it was magic because: a) it was Greek, and; b) he felt his pain dissolving away. He soon relaxed and was about to slumber again. She chuckle.
"You really must be tired to sleep again, hero," she said, "Rest and heal. No harm will come to you here. I am Calypso."