Hey guys! UltimoFear here with another chapter for this awesome story! As you all may have noticed, the poll is closed, and the winner is... (drum rolls)
HESTIA!
So yeah, Percy/Hestia shall be the pairing for this story! How awesome is that? I think it's quite a nice change, Artemis was looking quite strong until the last few days, where everyone suddenly voted for Hestia, now, all of you that are dissapointed with this pairing, I'm sorry, my next story will probably be Pertemis (all FanFic writers seem to write atleast one Pertemis story, that includes me, probably.), but first I'll continue working on my current stories! Anyway, let's get on with the story!
WARNING! - THE END OF THIS CHAPTER IS ONE OF THE DARKER THINGS I'VE WRITTEN, NOT FOR THE WEAK! (I am sure you can all easily handle it, but just to be sure :P)
Percy POV
As Gaea released her energy beam at me, and I beat my wings and sent out my own power beam, our beams clashed and I could see the raw power that was being released was eroding the age-old temple. Pillars were starting to dissolve in the stream of power-filled molecules until they looked like those rocks at the beach, that are curved and smooth, and look unnatural. The stream of molecules was like a stream of water, only then the eroding force was multiplied many many times. Even the demigods seemed to be having a hard time hanging on, it looked they were making an effort just to survive the onslaught, I couldn't allow any of my friends to get hurt, none. Gaea looked enraged, and I imagine I looked much the same, I felt enraged atleast. Nico and Thalia were at the front of the demigod line, trying to shield the others from danger.
"Nico, Thalia! Bring the other demigods away, you can't stay here!" I yelled at the top of my lungs, I was already tiring from keeping Gaea's power at bay for so long. If I failed, the demigods would be safe atleast, I just had to stop Gaea long enough for the Olympians to gather up their power and finish her, because I may be powerful, but I can't face Gaea alone for long, I'm no fool. Gaea heard this and laughed, a cold, fatigued sound.
"Ah, how touching, but I think I won't let any of you get away!" She snarled at the demigods. She suddenly released a huge amount of power at me, knocking me out of the sky and caused me to crash into an already unstable pillar, collapsing it. I watched with horror as her hands once again glowed green and she pointed them towards my friends. I was to weak to do anything about it, but luckily, the beam was intercepted by none other than the Big Three, who had awoken earlier than the other Olympians, probably because they were more powerful. Together, the three brothers created a shield which disintegrated the beam as soon as it touched the shield. I saw Nico and Thalia grab the remaining demigods and dragging them out of the temple, they were safe for the time being, I hope. I tried standing up, but my legs wouldn't obey me, my arms felt numb from the impact with the pillar, and all my muscles were on fire, nevertheless, I managed to get on hands and knees and crawled towards the place where Riptide was wedged in the dirt, I hadn't even noticed it had flew out of my hand until I saw the familiar bronze blade half embedded in the soil. I wrapped my right hand around the leather grip and tried to pull it out of the ground, but it wouldn't budge. All the while I could hear the sounds of an enormous battle raging close to me, but my eyesight was fuzzy and I couldn't make out individual Gods. However, judging by the amount of smudges in my field of vision I realized that the entire Olympian Council had regrouped, and were giving the Earth Goddess a hard time, since I vaguely saw flashes of light all the time. I blinked my eyes and tried to focus on one particular object near me, it kind of worked, I could make out that I was crawling over cracked marble with grass and tree saplings peeking through the cracks. But my eyesight, and muscles for that matter, wouldn't help much in a fight with a Primordial Goddess of Earth. Suddenly, small hands grabbed my shoulders, alarming me. I tried to pull Riptide out of the ground, but it still didn't budge, it would return to my pocket soon, but if the person grabbing me by my shoulders wasn't as friendly as I hoped, it would do no good that Riptide would return to me in a few seconds, I needed it now. I was flipped onto my back with a grunt, I squinted against the harsh sunlight, and saw a stray energy ball fly over and exploding against a wall, completely oblitherating it. Luckily that the temple roof had long since collapsed, or it would do just that on top of our heads. I tried focusing on the face of the person who's hands were still on my shoulder, and I realized with a start that it was Hestia, Goddess of Hearth and Home, I didn't need Riptide after all, I thought, smiling vaguely. Hestia looked at me critically.
"No serious injuries, but you look quite shaken up, I saw you fly into that pillar, didn't look pretty, Perseus." She said, clearly not amused by my failed attempt to fly.
"Ugh, I don't think it was that bad." I managed to croak out, she cracked a small smile.
"Sure, always you being the hero, isn't that right Perseus?" She said, more to herself, I didn't feel like answering anyway, my teeth hurt like crazy. Her hands suddenly glowed with a warm, cosy orange light and she put them on my cheeks, I immediately felt warm inside, like when I ate some ambrosia, only then ten times better. My various cuts and scrapes healed, I felt several broken bones mending, and my muscles felt cool and relaxed again. In other words, I felt better than I had all day. With my eyesight no longer a fuzzy collection of smudges, I could clearly see that Hestia was not in her usual eight year old form, she looked in her twenties and looked seriously beautiful. She had long brown hair that just passed her shoulders, her body was slim and petite and her eyes glowed with a fiery glint that looked terrifying and calming at the same time. did I mention already that she looked beautiful? I may have blushed a little bit when she smiled a dazzling smile at me, hey, sue me, a beautiful goddess gives you a huge smile, what would you do? She also had some good looking armor on that was shaped like flames. All in all she looked formidable and very, VERY pretty at the same time. Then I realized that she had a falming sword in her hand, woah, Hestia fighting with a sword? That's impossible, she was the always loving, kind, passive Goddess of the Hearth, she wouldn't harm anyone, and I had the urge to laugh and run at the same time when I saw her looking at me with determination in her eyes and a sword in her hand.
"Uh, Hestia, are you fighting too?" I asked incredulously, she laughed and the sound was music to my ears, wait what? This is just getting weirder and weirder.
"I have Annabeth already!" I told myself, little did I know, Annabeth had died in the fighting, but no-one had told me that yet, which made it even harder to deal with.
"Contrary to popular belief, I am decent with a sword, I was forced to learn in the First Titan War, after that, I promised myself to never fight again. But alas, Gaea is too big a threat to sit around and do nothing, so I joined my family in war, and it just so happens that I came across you crawling around like an infant." She said amused at the last part, my face was burning.
"Well, I did just, you know, fall, or more like, uhhhh, drop on the pillar, no not drop, I meant, Argh!" I was fumbling for words and stuttering my way through the sentence, nobody made me feel like this, yet here I was, trying to explain something to a Goddess, and failing miserably. She looked close to bursting out laughing, but composed herself.
"I understand Perseus, but we can talk later, first, we must finish this battle once and for all." She said, turning her fiery gaze toward a certain Primordial Goddess exchanging blows with the Olympian Council. I felt Riptide reappearing in my pocket, so I grabbed it and uncapped the pen, letting it grow into a bronze sword with a wickedly sharp edge.
"Well then, what are we waiting for, Lady Hestia?" I asked, smirking. She smiled and together we ran towards the fray, joining the Olympians in the epic struggle against the earth itself. The first thing that happened was Gaea noticing me and hurling a large boulder at my face, I raised my hand and shot some energy at it, reducing the boulder to dust. I saw Apollo next to me, firing flaming arrows at Gaea with amazing speed, only matched by his sister Artemis, standing at the far side of the temple, perched on a crumbling pillar, shooting arrows and bursts of silver Godly power at Gaea. Hermes' caduceus had gone into laser mode and he was firing beams of pure heat and power at Gaea's face, Gaea however conjured up a wall of earth and blocked all the lasers and arrows fired by Artemis and Hermes. She then thrust her hands towards Athena, who was standing on top of some sort of sacrificial pedestal. Athena didn't see this coming and was blasted straight through one of the temple walls, even for a Goddess, that was a hard blow, I saw a trail of Ichor, indicating where Athena had flown to, but I couldn't help right now, I was trying to survive myself. Zeus however was positively wrathful when he saw his precious daughter get hit by so much power. He raised his Master Bolt and hurled it towards Gaea, she tried to block it with another wall of earth, but the bolt broke straight through her defensive dirt wall and slammed into her chest, sending her reeling backwards. She hit the floor with a thud and was immediately pelted with projectiles that ranged from flaming arrows to what seemed to be bullets radiating godly power, courtesy of Hephaestus who had set up some sort of turret firing balls of Godly force in a corner of the room. All this energy made Gaea slide backwards at high speed, crashing into another unstable pillar and causing it to collapse right next to her, unfortunately, she was nowhere near defeated yet, she quickly got to her feet and started throwing more energy beams around, a stray beam hit Artemis who was still perched atop a pillar and she fell off and hit the ground with a thud, I could see Ichor dribbling out of a few small wounds and Apollo rushed towards her, his hands already glowing golden with healing power. My attention was snapped back to Gaea when I suddenly saw another large boulder right infront of me. I did the only logical thing with a boulder this close to crushing you, I put my arms in front of my face in the form of an X, and, without me noticing, created a force field against which the boulder smashed and crumbled. I wasn't even surprised, my new powers were actually quite extensive, even my new wings didn't feel unnatural anymore, one glance behind me and it was confirmed my shadow was still a bloodthirsty, red eyed dragon that looked amazing and terrifying at the same time. To be honest, I didn't even know what powers I possesed, but I felt like I was a dragon, breathing fire and incinerating all my foes, but that was probably just me. Before I could muse more about me new cool ablilities and feelings. I remembered that I was in the middle of a huge fight that decided the fate of the entire world and all its inhabitants, plenty reason to concentrate. I looked up and saw Poseidon and Hades stand next to each other, their hands raised and in front of them they were shaping an enormous black and blue energy sphere that swirled around. They were chanting something in Ancient Greek that I couldn't understand in the least. But it was clear to me that they were pooling their collective power into this sphere, maybe it would be enough to stop Gaea? I didn't know. They finally finished chanting and fired their ball of black and blue destruction, Gaea turned around, but it was already too late, the sphere hit Gaea full on and she was blasted backwards, she came to a stop halfway across the plateau that was Mount Olympus' summit. She was bleeding Ichor from many small wounds, but the energy sphere had made a good sized burn mark on her upper chest. She looked dazed and was literally smoking, but she still wasn't dead, although she had difficulty standing up now, I thought that with all the Olympians here, most still fairly strong, we would be able to defeat Gaea. And that was when it all went wrong. It began when Zeus walked up to Gaea and attempted to finish her off with his Master Bolt, but she was faster, she grabbed her sword that had fallen out of her hand, and swung it in a downward arc at Zeus, who had no time to block the powerful strike. He was struck in the chest and staggered back with a huge cut in his chest that bled Ichor like crazy, then Gaea kicked him in the chest and he crashed into a lone tree, slumping down and making no indication that he was conscious. Artemis, who had been healed by Apollo, saw this and charged at Gaea with her hunting knives, followed closely by Hephaestus, who wielded a huge hammer that was on fire and blowing steam. Gaea blocked all of Artemis' striked with either her sword or shield, and ducked under Hephaestus' hammer swing. Gaea's fist glowed green and she smashed Hephaestus in his stomach, he shot backwards like he was fired from a giant cannon and landed on the ground and rolled a few feet before coming to a halt on the ground, he also wasn't getting up yet. Meanwhile the rest of the Olympians charged, seeing how Artemis could use some help as she was locked in one on one combat with a Primordial Goddess. Before any of the Oympians could reach her, Artemis put a little too much power into an overhead strike with both hunting knives, she was probably hoping to catch Gaea off guard and finish her off, but it didn't work that way. Gaea saw he chance and took it, she brought up her shield and bashed Artemis' hands while she had them above her head, causing her to drop her knives. Gaea then swung her sword at Artemis, who got a good sized cut on her cheeck which immediately started bleeding Ichor, and she then received a very powerful roundhouse kick to the head and slumped to the ground.
"No! Sis!" Apollo cried and ran towards Gaea with a harsh glow in his eyes, he must be really mad. When he got to Gaea, however, she merely smirked and blocked his strikes, then, in her hand that was hidden behind her shield, she charged up and suddenly released a beam of energy that hit Apollo in the face, he screamed briefly but was silenced when Gaea punched him in the gut and kicked him down. Slowly, all the Olympians fell, Hades was disarmed and got blasted back to where Athena was slowly recovering from her own wounds. Aphrodite tried fighting with a dagger, but was clearly outmatched, she was slammed in the face with a shield and sent reeling by a burst of power, courtesy of Dirt Bitch. Ares, seeing his girlfriend fall, tried outmuscling Gaea, which didn't work out to well, he got a good cut on his right arm and got kicked in the shin and punched in the face while he was on one knee, he fell to the ground too. Poseidon shot loads of Godly energy at Gaea and then tried to impale her with his trident, but Gaea caught his jab between her sword and shield, and twisted the trident so that Poseidon was forced to drop it. After that it was no real contest, Poseidon tried to hold Gaea at bay with Godly energy, but was rewarded with a sword butt between his eyes and a kick in the stomach, and, as if that wasn't enough already, he also got his fair share of Primordial power beams in his face and was sent sprawling on his back, also not able to fight anymore. Demeter and Dionysus both started snaring Gaea in plants, but forgot she was the Earth Goddess, Gaea merely sent the plants back at the duo and they were trapped, Gaea slashed across Dionysus' belly, and he yelped and started bleeding profusely, then he was bashed by a shield and fell backwards. Demeter meanwhile had freed herself from the plants and had a staff in her hands. She twirled it around and ran at Gaea, who stopped the graceful movements of Demeter's staff quickly when she caught it in her hands and wrenched it from Demeter's grasp. Demeter shot Godly energy at Gaea, which missed by an inch when Gaea sidestepped. Then Demeter was slashed down by Gaea's sword and knocked on the head with her own staff, knocking her unconscious. Hera had a sword in her hand and she circled Gaea, but I could already see that Hera had next to no experience with a sword, her grip was completely wrong, and that was confirmed when Gaea knocked the sword out of Hera's grasp with the flick of her own sword. She then knocked Hera on the side of her face with the flat of her blade, she then charged power into her fist and slammed it into Hera's face, and that was all it took for the Queen of the Gods to go down. Suddenly there was a flash of movement and Hermes was engaged in a battle with Gaea, he swung his caduceus in quick and powerful arcs, but Gaea managed to block them all, eventually Hermes overextended on an uppercut and Gaea hit his caduceus mid-swing, bringing him off balance and he stumbled right at Gaea, who quickly slashed his hand, disarming him and kicking him in the face with a jump kick that sent Hermes into the ground face first, where he lay unmoving. Hestia was the last Goddess still standing, all the others were knocked down and bleeding, not able to stand up, much less fight at this stage. I was shocked, just then, it had been going quite good, we had managed to wound Gaea several times and had almost achieved victory, when suddenly the entire Olympian Council was incapacitated, I knew the only reason Gaea hadn't done worse yet, was because me and Hestia were still alive, we were the last remaining threats, and when were knocked out, she would most likely send us all to Tartarus once and for all. Hestia and Gaea were circling each other, and I tried to help, but suddenly earthen hands reached out of the ground and grabbed my feet, immobilizing me, I tried breaking out using brute force and all the power I could muster, but it didn't work, not even my new power, which I shot out of my hands in generous amounts, could break the earthen hands restraining me. I was forced to watch as Hestia engaged Gaea in one on one combat. Hestia was the first to charge at Gaea, swinging her sword in a diagonal arc, Gaea brought up her shield and stopped Hestia's strike and thrust her own sword forward, trying to impale Hestia. Hestia sidestepped and swung her sword again, this time catching Gaea off-guard, however, Gaea ducked just in time to avoid geting beheaded and swung her sword in a powerful uppercut, Hestia jumped backwards and barely avoided the swing, Hestia shot fire at Gaea, who summoned another earthen wall and stopped the flames, she then hurled several boulders at Hestia, who ducked foward, avoiding them. Gaea, seeing Hestia dive forward, jabbed her sword, but Hestia was faster, the flat of her blade connected with the blade of Gaea, knocking it aside, and she thrust her own flaming sword forward, Gaea knocked her strike aside with her shield, and quick as lightning knocked the blade out of Hestia's grasp. All this time I was struggling against my bonds, but to no avail, I knew what would happen next, Gaea, Primordial Goddess of the Earth, was surely going to make Hestia, Goddess of Hearth and Home fade, and I couldn't allow that to happen, ever. I saw Gaea draw back and impale Hestia in her shoulder. Hestia cried out in pain, but was silenced when Gaea knocked her to the ground and putting her foot on Hestia's chest, preventing her from getting up, she then wrenched her blade painfully out of Hestia's shoulder, who screamed in anguish as the blade was violently ripped from her shoulder. Gaea then raised her sword high above her head, and got ready to finish off Hestia, and that was when I went into berserk mode, I just couldn't watch Hestia get killed, she was so kind and loving, and I felt a strange despair when I thought about her dieing. My eyes were probably terrifying, because Gaea visibly flinched when I looked at her, even Hestia looked a bit afraid of me, but I didn't care, I just knew I had to save her. I death glared at Gaea and smashed the earthen hands holding me back. I laughed a terrifying, mad laugh and felt the darkness take over my body. This was the cost of great power, my sane mind thought, while the rest was dark and screamed for Gaea's blood.
"You! You will regret the day you came into existence, you will regret your choice of harming Hestia for the rest of your miserable, immortal life! Come, face me, face The Dark One! FACE YOUR DEMISE!" My mouth was moving without my permission, I didn't know what The Dark One was, but apparently I was it. And even though I knew that this was not me, I couldn't help but agree, but then, with a start, the last of my sane mind was taken over by darkness, and I could no longer think rationally. Dark waves of power eminated from my very soul, Gaea looked downright paralyzed. But right then, all that I did was laugh uncontrollably. I slowly walked forward and shook Gaea out of her stupor. She began hurling everything she had at me, boulders, earth, energy beams, but I dodged them all, except the last energy beam, which nailed me in the chest, I was barely able to stand, later I realized that it was actually luck that I wasn't dead yet, because even though Chaos had given me great power, Gaea could still best me, I was almost on her power level, but not quite yet. But I knew it was enough to destroy her. Forever. I ran at her full speed and charged up my fist with dark energy, slamming it into her face as she had done to Hera. She flew backwards against a rock and slowly stood up again. She fired another five power beams at me, but I dodged four, and was barely able to block the last, nevertheless, I continued on my walk of destruction.
Warning - Gets pretty dark from here! (But you can easily read on, once again, just a little warning to be sure :D)
"You petty little Earth Goddess, you will be screaming, flailing, begging for death when I'm through with you. I will tear you open, bit by bit, and relish every scream. This is the price you pay for your choices, Gaea, you chose to attack Olympus, and now I am here, to make sure you will never be able to do that again. I will rip your legs off so you cant walk, I'll take your hands so you can't fight, I'll take your tongue and feed it to you so you will never talk!" I screamed at her, my voice was twisted and sick, but I didn't even notice then. I ran at Gaea and drew Riptide, she blocked my first strike, and the next. But I had years of sword fighting experience, so I prevented her from going on the offensive. I pushed her backwards, slowly gaining ground on her. She suddenly lunged at me in a desperate attempt to bring me off balance, but I tripped her as she flung herself at me. She fell and I twirled around, but she was up already. She jumped at me and our swords met mid-swing. Both our swords stopped dead in their tracks as we were trying to push each other off balance. Eventually I managed to push her back and tried for a diagonal slash, aimed at her head. She brought her shield up however and blocked my strike. She then went on the offensive and I had a hard time blocking her strikes. I didn't realize I was laughing all the time, a creepy, twisted laugh that would haunt me for nights to come. Then Gaea overextended on one of her jabs, and I hit her sword with the butt of mine, knocking it out of her hands. She instinctively raised her shield, but I kicked her shin and she dropped to one knee, hissing in pain. I then relieved her of her shield with a solid roundhouse kick and smirked at her, she was on one knee, weaponless.
"So, this is how it ends for you, my dear, dear Primordial Goddess. I will enjoy this." I said, licking my lips. I then gave her a knee to the face, and she fell on her back. I swung Riptide and cut off one of her legs, simple as that. I was surprised, but then again, Riptide was glowing with this strange and immensely powerful dark glow, so I guess that had something to do with it. But right then, I was just enjoying mutilating my enemy, Gaea. She screamed when her leg was severed, but was silenced when I slammed my entire fist into her mouth choking her, I looked over at Hestia, and she seemed to have fallen unconscious, good, better she not see what was about to happen. I looked back at Gaea to see her still gurgling and trying to force me away, I chuckled.
"What's the hurry, Gaea? I'm having quite alot of fun, so don't mind me." I said, smiling sweetly at her. She looked terrified, no, that didn't even describe how she looked, and that made me laugh even more. I balled my other fist and channeled my energy towards it, and slammed it into Gaea's chest, literally making a gaping hole in her chest, she would've screamed if it weren't for my fist suffocating her. I leaned towards her face and looked deep into her wild eyes. I then grabbed Riptide again and wedged it into her stomach, twisting and turning it. I then wrenched it out painfully and started slashing her arms and her remaining leg, laughing all the time, I smelled all the Ichor dribbling into the fabric of my shirt, and I loved it, I was even darker than I thought, only later I realized I needed to cure myself, fast. But then I leaned even closer.
"Goodnight Gaea, I'll give you a goodnight kiss, sleep tight." I said, and kissed her forehead softly and ran my tongue around her forehead, before channeling even more power to the fist that was wedged in her throat, I had charged it up with so much power that the power exploded outwards, literally blowing up Gaea's head from the inside, blood, gore, bits of brain and bone and other stuff I couldn't quite place flew around me, and I smiled. So much for being immortal, I could inflict as much pain as wanted, but I could feel myself losing consciousness after this display of power, the darkness was taking over completely and I let out a strangled scream, my soul and mind were at war with themselves, light and darkness fighting for dominance, with the last of my power, I banished Gaea deep into Tartarus, while she was already not able to rise in so many millenia, I made it even harder for her. Then, the war with myself became too much and I fell into a deep, peaceful sleep, still smiling faintly.
Ok guys, this is the first real dark thing I've written, I though it was quite gory and dark. So, tell me what you think, and I'll see you soon, hopefully! Anyways, this is probably one of the darkest parts of the story, there will most likely be a few more scenes like this, but not too many I think. Review please, and I'll see you guys soon. Did I mention to review? I love all the support everyone keeps showing me, that's why I already updated today! Keep the support up and I'll be as happy as can be, and happiness translates into chapters for you guys!
UltimoFear Out!