You notice that I have not updated anything in awhile, no? Well I could lie, or I could give you the real reasons... I don't get enough feedback to continue that story, for now... but that has no place here...
Chapter 1: Dawn
The rivers still flowed red with blood, the trees still regrowing from seedlings, and the sky was still clouded with smoke, dust and ash. But atop the highest peak, down beneath the lowest depression, and within the largest ocean, three brothers took there place in rule. Their sisters took their own places, at the King's side, by the edge of the hearth, and in the fallow fields, already yielding a new crop. Their children set about refilling a world devoid of peace and normality with just that. But as they wept for the lost, they knew that the gods themselves would not be enough next time, they needed a medium between themselves and humankind if the new peace was to be maintained. It was the dawn of a new age... an age that would last for millenniums for sure, but how many?
10,000 years later...............
Circa 2000 BCE
Olympia, Greece: Mid-summer, Early morning...
The red hues playing off the bottom of the lowest clouds indicated the soon-to-be sunrise, and rumble of thunder in the distance did not bode well for the Olympic games that were to be held later that day. In fact, although only Zeus knew it, it did not bode well for a certain attender of the sacred celebration. Thanasis was an experiment that Zeus had grudgingly approved of at first, but had come to regret. He now wanted the "failure" terminated, and in the most dramatic, unarguably significant way possible. However, he was not the only divine being concerned with Thanasis' fate...
Although dark clouds hung dangerously low over the track where the chariot races were to be held (naked), not a soul seemed to be concerned. Today was the final competition between two rivals: the widely celebrated, for his many achievements, Serafeim, and the rising contender, who was participating for the first time, Thanasis. They had both competed in four events thus, the footrace (naked), archery (naked), wrestling (naked), and sword fighting (naked), with Serafeim triumphing in wrestling in a final showdown thriller and in the footrace, where Thanasis was hopelessly outmatched. On the other end, though, Thanasis had, to the surprise of the onlookers, destroyed all of his competition in sword fighting, and as expected, took the archery event too. Now it came down to the wire, a sudden death tiebreaker, that is, assuming one of them won...
The race began and Thanasis burst out to an early lead, while Serafeim's experience told him to pace his steeds. As they raced around the track Serafeim slowly regained position moving up from last place to ninth, then eighth, seventh, sixth, fifth, all the way to second with only two laps left. But, it seemed that Thanasis' horses would not tire, and the gap had kept growing. He was a quarter mile in front of the second place racer, which happened to be Serafeim, in the eighth lap out of ten. Just as he was about to begin his tenth lap around the half-mile track an unexpected twist came into play. The clouds opened up and it began to rain in sheets. As the dirt track quickly turned to mud Thanasis' well trained horses ended up with an even greater lead, and it looked as if even Serafeim would finish more than a lap behind him.
A few hundred meters short of the finish line Lord Zeus made his statement, firing a bolt of white hot lightning at Thanasis, killing him instantly and causing the chariot to burst into flame. Then, at the Son of Kronos' command Zephyrus mustered his west wind to send the chariot, burning occupant and all, into the unoccupied midfield, slamming top-first into a 250 year old willow tree. As the chariot burned and Thanasis' soul departed to the underworld, Serafeim finished the race well ahead of the others, completely unnoticed by all...
Mount Olympus, Greece
Throne Room, Hades and Zeus
"How could you just kill my son, he is working out just fine!" Hades shouted, skipping anger and going straight to furious.
"...First of all, brother, you will not speak to me with disrespect-"
"I'll speak to you however I like!" The dark lord of death cut in.
"And, to answer you question, yes he was a masterful sword fighter and was a champion archer, but, other than training his horses, the undead monsters they are, all he did was practice and he had no intellect or any skills to be a go-between for us and humankind, he was a failure!"
"It's bad enough that you killed him, you don't need to talk as if he denounced us, or just you, or as though he died a century ago, he hasn't even crossed the Styx yet!" With that explosion of anger Hades disappeared into the shadows, presumably to conduct Thanasis to his palace immediately.
I know this seems vague, but I should have another chapter up tonight, or maybe tomorrow, (Who knows?) This really is a long chapter for having almost no plot, but they will be longer!