"There are two halves of the sea. The unbroken calm; this side of the sea is helpful, serene, and favorable. This side carries adventurers and explorers to their destination. The other side, is the raging storm. Crushing and demolishing all who believe they can master the vast waters. Nothing can contain the sea."
Well that was unexpected.
The two demigods walked hand-in-hand through the new Japanese mythological art museum that recently opened in New York. One of which was obviously more interested than the other. "Come on Percy, these are really interesting. They could use more context sure, but otherwise they're pretty good. Like that one." Annabeth finished pointing at a series of paintings depicting two women in conflict, on a cliff overlooking a raging sea.
"I don't get it though. We're kids of Greek gods, and you want to look at Japanese story-art."
"The word you're looking for is mythology, seaweed brain."
"My point still stands though. Why?"
Annabeth contemplated voicing her suspicions, if the Greek and Roman Gods are real, what about the other pantheons? "Think about it Percy, what about all the other pantheons? The Norse? Egyptian? Japanese?"
Percy thought for a minute, that would help explain his encounter with Carter Kane. But wouldn't they have already noticed? "I suppose that would make sense, but wouldn't we have noticed them?"
"Not necessarily, the mist is a very powerful thing. No one, not even Hecate knows all of its capabilities. And on top of that, I have my suspicions of my cousin Magnus. There's something different about him than your average mortal, but he certainly isn't like us."
"So… you're looking for evidence for other pantheons? And weren't you going to talk about that with your cousin soon?"
"In a way I suppose. With any luck he'll provide answers." Annabeth smiled at her boyfriend, "Enough of that, we were also here for fun. The start of it anyways."
"Oh, there's more? I thought you were going to be merciful today." Percy replied cheekily. To which Annabeth smiled and whispered something into his ear that made him blush, effectively shutting him up."
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The Japanese born girl was extremely miffed. Which was not an unnatural event in itself, her being extremely temperamental. But today the storming blue-eyed, short and lithe girl would forever resent. Her mother and step-father threw her out of the house for the day for her kid twin sisters 7th birthday. She despised her stepfather, but she absolutely adored her kid sisters. They were the complete opposite of her, in physical appearance and personality. They had thick blonde curls, she has short, straight, dark hair. They have green eyes; she has storming blue eyes. They have naturally tannish skin, she has pale skin. She sighed as her anger faded while she thought of her kid sisters, they might've been different from her, but they were intelligent enough to understand their dad was trying to alienate her; and they made it their mission to be great little sisters. Even though Herald (her stepfather) won over her mom in his mission to forget about the little girl she already had.
She just sighed and accepted her fate, perhaps one day she can meet her father and proceed to shove her shoe, small shoe, up his ass. That'll help with all these years she's stuck with her stepfather. Taking a sip of her Pepsi she proceeded down the newly constructed exhibit, half paying attention to the mostly uninteresting to her art. 'Why did I even bother coming here? I'm not an artist.' She scoffed thinking back on why she was here. This morning she found a brochure on her windowsill for the place, originally she threw it in the trash and thought nothing of it. But then her mom and stepdad 'asked' her if she could hang out around town and be back tonight. So she remembered the brochure and thought, 'Why the hell not?'
She was lost in her thoughts when essentially her worst fear came true when she first thought of coming here, getting approached by overly cheerful tour guides. "Excuse me young lady, but would you like to hear the story to this painting?" The graying haired woman asked. Graying hair wasn't the only thing hinting other woman to be elderly, bad crow's feet, wrinkles so deep they were like canyons etched onto her skin, her skin was ashen, and her eyes had a light film over them; except they had an odd glint in them, her teeth were a bit long, and her hair was a bit too rough to be the common among elderly, but hey, she wasn't here to judge.
Not wanting to be rude, Amy smiled politely and accepted the elderly woman's invitation. So she followed the woman and tried to pay attention to the woman's explanation, but they were dreadfully boring. But one did catch her attention, the one the guide skipped over. "Uh, hey miss? What about that one?" she pointed to one of a man cutting off the heads of an eight headed dragon. The guide frowned, but complied. "That one? That's the Storm God Susanoo, slaying the great dragon Yamata-no-Orochi. But over here- "
"But… why did he?" Amy interrupted the guide, the painting obviously caught her attention.
The guide frowned deeply, but complied, "To understand why he done it, you would have to know why he was there. The story starts with his older sister Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. You see, she was loved by all, adored by all. She overshadowed him and other sister the moon goddess, and she had a great field of grain. He destroyed the field in jealousy, and greatly upset his sister. In fact, because of his final act, killing one of her cows and throwing it through the roof of her sewing room, she fled into a cave avoiding all the other gods. During which Susanoo's merriments terrorized all the humans, disturbed the seas, and shook the mountains. So, he was banished from the heavens, and in his rage, the mountains themselves shook in terror. In his banishment, he met a crying couple holding their daughter, so he approached them, curious of their misery. 'What causes your misery?' the storm god asked. The man calmed down enough to answer, 'every so many years, a great 8-heaed serpent eats one of our daughters, and this is our last.' The storm god made them a deal, he would slay the great serpent, if they allowed him to marry their daughter, they agreed. He told them to place eight great pots, filled with sake in front of their doors. When the serpent came, he could not resist the drink, and so the storm god drew his great sword and cut off its eight heads, slaying the mighty serpent. As he was readying to leave with his new bride, he noticed a bulge in its tail, so he cut the tail, and sprang from it the greatest sword in existence, the Ama-Murakumo-Tsurugi." Listening to the oddly engrossing story, Amy lost track of time, and it was 10:30 she rushed to the door, but the guide stopped her. "oh, I'm sorry dear, but you can't leave." Amy stared in shock at was once a friendly old woman, but now… not so much. Her skin got even more ashen, she also grew horns, and her teeth elongated into small knives. The young girl stumbled back in fear, "What the hell!" she continued scrambling back looking around for something to defend herself with, 'why didn't I try an artifact museum? Ah what the hell.' She thought grabbing a painting and thwacking the advancing demon, causing her to screech and slash furiously, when an arrow flew into her eye causing her to drop and turn into black dust. "What the hell?"
"Hitting an Oni with a painting? Not bad." A shadowed voice startled Amy, which is saying something, because she was already pretty damn scared. A figure stepped out of the shadows, a taller girl with a bow held out her hand to help the smaller girl up. Taking the other girls hand, she stood up and took a closer look at her timely rescuer. She couldn't have been much older than herself, though she was taller. She had blonde hair, tightly held up in a bun, and she had soft features not uncommon in North America.
"A… a what?"
"An Oni. Common Japanese demon, this one was rather crafty. Oh! Where are my manners? My name is Kylie. You are?"
"Amy."
