Hey guys, I'm a new writer to fanfiction . net, but I'm not new to the world of fanfiction nor am I new to writing it. This is my first official Percy Jackson fanfic, and I have one of my friends providing ideas and another one may be beta. Anyway, hope you like it!
"Concentrate Perseus!" Tartarus yelled again as I collapsed to the floor out of exhaustion.
"I'm trying, Tartarus," I yelled back as I pushed myself up on to my feet, swaying at first but soon regained my footing.
"You're the Titan of Creation and destruction, you need to learn to concentrate on your powers," He explained as he walked over to me.
"I don't see why Gaea banished me down here when I can barely destroy a simple boulder." I growled as I glanced from the Boulder to Tartarus.
"She banished you down here because she was afraid, she was afraid that you were going to overthrow her in the future." I scowled and shook my head, closing my black eyes for a moment as to not show Tartarus my frustration.
"Why didn't Uranus stop her then, he's my father! He could've stopped Gaea before she threw me down here!" I screamed angrily, attracting the attention of some of the nearby monsters.
Tartarus sighed and ran a hand through his jet black hair, which almost seemed to suck the light out of the area. He looked like he had heard this rant millions of times, and he had. I had been stuck down here in Tartarus for the past two millennia since my mother Gaea banished me here. Not even a three days after I had been born she threw me down here because apparently I was 'too powerful'. Of course, I survived the fall. A Titans body when they are three days old appears to be a teenager, but being immortal may have also played a part in it. That's when Tartarus found me, but everything after that is a different story. How Gaea knew I was too powerful though when I was only three days old will never cease to amaze me. Maybe it had something to do with the Fates, and the message they gave her the day I was born.
"Let's move on to weapons combat, maybe after doing that for a bit you may be able to concentrate better." Tartarqus suddenly said with a bit of sarcasm in his voice. His sudden change of subject pulled me out of my stupor. Instead of saying anything, I just nodded and reached behind me, grabbing my bow as it materialised on my back.
It was made of a black oak and had intricate details of red and white, while the string was a woven combination of black, red and white. My quiver also appeared on my back, filled with an infinite amount of arrows. Every arrow was either red, white or black and was either made up of either mortal steel or silver. Red arrows explode 3 seconds after impact, black arrows created a hole in the ground and white arrows were normal. Just below where my hand goes to grip the bow was a small, barely noticeable to the untrained eye, button. One press of that button and a small blade would appear on either end of the bow and was handy for close range fighting.
Attached to my hip was my dagger, the hilt of which was black leather. The dagger itself was about four inches in length and was made up of a mixture of the metals steel, silver and stygian. This meant it had the ability to kill not only both mortals and monsters, but gods as well.
Yes, I know about the gods. I know about my younger siblings and how Kronos overthrew my father because of my mothers wishes. I know about how Zeus, Kronos' youngest son, did the exact same thing to Kronos, and how his remnants are somewhere down here. Tartarus knows exactly where, and he's the reason I know all this, but he won't tell me anything more.
"Alright, let's begin." Tartarus said, pulling the shadows to form a dome the size of two football fields around us. Once he had done that, he manipulated the shadows again to form around twenty or so monsters, ranging from hellhounds to dracaena, even cyclops. I pulled a white arrow out and notched it, waiting for the monsters to make the first move.
An empousa moved towards me and I waited until it was at least a metre and a half away from me before I fired the arrow, watching it hit the empousa directly between the eyes. The monster became shadows again, snaking itself towards Tartarus before it seemed to be absorbed by him. The rest of the monsters charged at me after that, and I ran towards them as well. Lowering my bow, I reached down and grabbed my dagger, bringing it up. As I did so, I managed to slice open the stomach of the cyclops beside me. I didn't wait to watch as it too turned to shadows, instead I turned around to face a shadow giant. Noticing that it's legs were open, I ran forward before dropping down and sliding between them, my bow horizontal with the hidden blades exposed. This cut small slits on the inside of both of the giants calves. I used this distraction to my advantage, turning around and stabbing my dagger into it, just beside the bottom of its spine. Knowing I would have to kill it sooner or later, I grabbed my bow and a red arrow, notching and firing it straight at the giants brain. I quickly ran away, counting down from three as I did so. "Three, two, one." I whispered under my breath right as the arrow exploded, killing not only the giant but about half a dozen other monsters.
It didn't take me much longer to kill the remaining monsters and soon I stood in front Tartarus, not even slightly breathless as he looked at me with a critical gaze. "How was that?" I asked him, raising an eyebrow as I waited for his critique. I seemed to always do something wrong when in weapons combat, whether it be I let my defence slip for half a second or I exposed my weak point to the monster for just a small moment. There was always something, and every time I had to analyse my fight repeatedly to see if I could pick up where I went wrong as well and try to fix it. For a minute Tartarus said nothing, he just looked at me with this hard gaze.
Eventually he finally spoke, his voice stiff and stern. "You're ready." Was all he said to me, which was confusing.
"Ready for what?" I asked, puzzled.
"Ready to go to the surface." He elaborated, and as soon as he said that I could feel something in my chest, something that almost felt like relief. I didn't let that relief show on my face though, instead I just stared at Tartarus. "At least you will be, once you past my test." He further explained, crossing his arms loosely over his broad chest.
"What test?" I finally asked, though somehow I knew I was going to regret asking that question.
"You have to compete in the Arena of Tartarus."
