The day all gods and mortals feared had come. Ragnarok, the end for everything, had begun, Asgard had fallen and now under the control of Hel while her brother Fenrir had been killing the gods that tried to stop them. As the gods fell, so did mortals. Hel's shadow army, along with the frost giants, were now killing all mortals they came across.
All those dead people, all those souls…they belonged to the King of the Underworld, Hades.
Hades sat on his brother's throne, more than amused how things had gone for his benefits. Not only was Zeus killed and trapped in his realm, Tartarus (with the help of Hel and Ao Kuang), but he was also able trick all gods, making them believe it was Anubis and Loki who had killed his egoistic brother. Ares was even more useful than he had ever expected: not only did the bloodthirsty idiot kill several gods like Chaac, Anhur, He Bo and Anubis (no more judge of the dead for the Egyptians, easier to get their souls for himself) but he had also released the demon, Izanami, and there was nothing to stop her from killing all the people in Japan.
He was disappointed in Athena though. Even though she did find out that something was not right and even convinced some gods like Ra and Neith, she never realized he was behind all of this. In a way this did satisfy him: fooling the goddess of wisdom, quite of an achievement, even for him.
However, he couldn't let Athena roam freely anymore. As happy as he was to fool her, she was still a potential threat to him as she was one of the few gods capable of coming up with ways to stop him and his plan. He ordered Ares to chain his own sister into the dungeons of Olympus, in exchange of letting him being the commander of his army in his new world. Ares did not hesitate to obey the king of Olympus.
Now he only had to wait. Let Ragnarok consume the world with all those souls coming to him. Soon he would be powerful enough to forge a new world – his own world…
Athena had never felt this miserable in her entire existence as she did now. Olympus, her own home, was now her own prison, chained to the walls while her spear and shield had been taken away from her by Ares. Defeated, she was cursing herself under her breath.
How stupid she had been? How could she not see this in time? Even with all the warnings from Nox, Neith, hell even Loki, who they thought was the one killing his father, she could not see the truth behind all this. Had she been blinded by vengeance so much that she had ignored all logical reasons?
She felt embarrassed and even ashamed of herself. She had let down everyone: the Asgardians, the Egyptian gods, her soldiers and most importantly, her father. That one probably hurt her the most. She rather stayed chained up for all eternity just to avoid facing Zeus' disappointment in her.
"Wow, such a goddess of wisdom you are" said a voice in the distance. Athena lifted her head and looked around, trying to find out the source. When she found nothing, she frowned. Had she been here so long that she was starting to hallucinate? "I guess even that war-maniac brother of yours is smarter than you" the voice called once again, now in a teasing manner.
Athena felt her blood boiling, her eyes narrowing. She might have been fooled, but she was NOT an idiot like Ares. Annoyed, she finally spoke up "And who dares to call me stupid? Least show your face if you talk in such manner."
The voice sighed as if it was bored. "Some ego you have here. You gods are seriously boring, almost making want to sleep instead of enjoying this chaos"
Realization dawned on Athena's face, now recognising the person behind the voice. "Eris"
A pixie-like woman in purple tunic with golden stripes came out of the shadows (Athena wondered how she could not see her before, but she rather not think on it too much). The young woman herself wore a rather bored expression, being unamused. "Please, that name is so lame, Discordia sounds so much better and actually fits me. But yes, it's me in the flesh. Geez, I thought you would have found this out way sooner."
"What are you doing here? Enjoying my suffering?" Athena asked, ignoring her previous insult.
Discordia sighed again, getting quite irritated. "Normally I would, but you make it so clichéd I would rather listen to my sister babbling about vengeance and justice. Even that is better." Before Athena could speak, Discordia continued, "Anyway, I'm here to help you get out of this place."
When she saw the confusion on Athena's face, she rolled her eyes. "What? Just because I'm the goddess of discord, does not mean I'm evil."
"What about the whole Trojan war then?" Athena asked, not really believing her. She didn't hate the young goddess, but she would not call her a friend, not even refer to her as an ally after what she had caused.
Discordia just shrugged, as if she didn't care. "Your fault for not inviting me to that party. Besides, I only threw that apple between you. Everything else was caused by that man accepting Aphrodite's offer so she could get the apple."
Still not convinced and quite unsatisfied with the seemingly uncaring behaviour of Discordia, Athena simply went back to the original topic. "Why do you want to help? I would expect you out of anyone to enjoy this the most."
"Big bad guy taking over the world, causing thousands of people to die and nobody able to fight against him. Blah-blah-blah. BORING! Would only work as a bed time story, least it makes me sleepy really fast" As the last word left her mouth she fell asleep, floating in the air. She woke up almost immediately. "See? Just by talking about it makes me fall asleep. What I want is something exciting, actual chaos, strife between all gods, allies betraying each other and enemies join forces. I want to see an actual war between all gods!" As she kept talking, her grin got wider and wider, as if she was just fantasizing about the best thing in her life. "And for that I need you"
Me? Athena thought. In what world would I be needed for such thing. Normally she would understand most people (even gods) but Discordia was a different case. The goddess of discord might not be totally evil, but it didn't mean she was one to understand easily. "What do you mean by that? Are you telling me that I should fight against Hades?"
"BINGO!" Discordia shouted, applauding her. "The goddess of wisdom can be taught" she said with quite a sarcastic tone, making the elder goddess slightly irritated again, before pushing back these feelings. "Basically yes but of course not all alone. That would be super unfair and not even entertaining. You need allies to even think about stopping this whole 'evil taking over the world' situation." She got closer to Athena, a small dark orb appearing in her hands. Dark energy flew from it and consuming the chains and breaking them as it started to vanish. The orb disappeared as well. "Now get out and start finding allies or at least avoid making more enemies than necessary. Pretty sure you wouldn't like that zombie guy being on you with his minions all the time. Blegh!" She looked like she was about to throw up just for mentioning that god.
Athena finally stood up, now being unchained and free to move. She was about to thank Discordia for that (never in her life she thought she would do that) but before she could say anything, the pixie-like goddess had disappeared, as if she was never there. Something else caught Athena's eyes though: the glimpse of her shield and spear. Confused how those got there, she lifted them, making sure that they were real.
"Gift from my mother. Apparently she isn't too happy about this whole world ending thing and to be honest, neither am I. What fun would I have if the world wouldn't exist anymore?" She heard Discordia's voice again from the distance, just like she did the first time. ". Oh and I count on you make this war quite entertaining for me to watch."
Athena ignored the last sentence of the discord goddess. She had much bigger problems than to try to satisfy such a brat like Discordia. She needed to come up with something to get out without being noticed, and very fast. With every second Hades got more and more powerful and the world fell even further to chaos.
A plan formed in her mind. Hades might have conquered Olympus, but it was still her home. She knew this place as the back of her hands and she knew exactly where she could get out. For the first time after getting captured, a confident smile spread across her face, as she walked out of the dungeon and ready to leave Olympus once again.
In the far distance, Discordia's voice was heard for one last time. "Oh, and if you see my brother somewhere here, I would try to get away from him as fast as possible. He might not be able to take a god's life, but he's more than capable of injuring you pretty badly with his scythe. Bye-bye!"