Alright. I should stop telling you guys false promises because I never update on time, I'm sorry. Expect the next chapter within the next two weeks because I don't want to give you guys another broken promise. Hope you enjoy though!

WARNING: GORE, BLOOD AND CREEPY CHARACTERS IN THIS CHAPTER.

Chapter 3

Whatever was going on inside Amusement Mile, it must've been big if Batman and Robin were involved. Nico considered going back there another time, but he realised that he had already gotten there, and a shadow-travel trip back to his studio apartment would drain him of his energy really quickly, and he didn't want to waste the energy gained from eating the ambrosia just to go home when he could just quickly investigate the house that was near Amusement Mile, cleanse if before going home. That way, he would've gotten 2 out of 6 places within a night, which would also mean that he would probably finish this mission within a week or so and leave the damn school. He didn't understand why his father had said the mission would last for 5 months; after all, the mission itself did not seem that hard.

Swiftly and quietly, Nico quickly slipped his map out of his pockets, checking the street and counting the number of blocks the house/area that was marked from Amusement Mile, Nico stepped deeper into the trees' shadows. He bent down low and raced behind the cop cars, careful not to be seen as he then ran down to the next street. By the time the son of Hades had reached the street of that was marked, it had already been five past eleven. Tall apartment buildings loomed over him on both sides, and Nico figured that this was not a nice neighbourhood as he noticed the dirty streets and the constantly flickering streetlamps, meaning that it probably required maintenance, but no one could be bothered to fix the lights.

Checking over his shoulder a few times, Nico secured the hood on his head, before closely examining any apartment building that stuck out. It was a difficult task, as all the buildings looked exactly the same: tall, with mould-covered concrete walls and the occasional boarded/taped window. The lights from within a few floors up were still on, but Nico smiled to himself is satisfaction when he noticed that there was one building that stuck out: there were no lights on at all, not even for the entrance. He approached the front door to the bottom of the apartment, and when he reached for the handle, Nico noticed that where the door handle should've been, a splintered hole replaced its spot. He decided not to investigate as he warily and quietly slipped open the door, and winced when the door hinges made a loud groan. Staying very alert, Nico started to go upstairs, and reached the first door.

A large, rusted and worn sign with a single word was nailed onto the door: Evicted. The door was boarded shut, so the son of Hades proceeded to go to the second floor. The stairs creaked beneath him and he was grateful that he was used to moving around in the dark, for there was no light in the whole building. Any sane person his age would've been scared out of their wits to go to that apartment building in this darkness, as the only lighting was the glow from the Moon (More like Artemis' chariot). Nico crept to the second door, and his senses started tingling as he reached the front door. This was the one, he knew it. He could feel the necromancy and dark magic radiating from the room. When he reached for the door handle, the same hole was in its place, just like the one on the door to this building. So, taking a deep breath, Nico drew two knives from his belts, and pushed the door open, preparing himself for whatever gruesome sight that would be behind the door.

"Bats?" said the thirteen-year-old Boy Wonder into his com link quietly as he wondered around Amusement Mile.

Several Gotham City police officers wondered about as well, taking pictures and collecting anything that looked like plausible evidence for the current mystery that was going on.

"Yes?" came the Dark Knight's gruff tone into Robin's ear.

"Found anything yet?"

"No. But check the ticket booth, because that was where he worked most of the time."

Doing exactly what his mentor told him, Robin approached the central ticket booth, sliding out his lock pick from his utility belt as he picked the lock. Within seconds, the lock slid open, and the teen unhooked the padlock and threw it aside. He then pushed up the roll-up door that kept intruders from accessing the insides of the booth and stepped into the small, cramped space.

A box sat on the corner of the desk, as well as a roll of tear-and-go tickets. Below the small desk-like space were a couple of drawers. The top held a stamp and a walkie-talkie that was turned off, but the bottom draw held a silver watch, a small card and bronze ring. Robin wondered why the person would leave such things in this place, but came to a conclusion that it was probably safer to put the items here, rather than wherever a low-income amusement park worker could live in a city like Gotham. The Boy Wonder gathered the items carefully, putting them in evidence bags before slipping them into his utility belt.

"I've got something." He said to his mentor through the com.

"Okay. I have something as well. Have you gathered everything you could?"

"Yeah."

"Alright. Meet me at the Batmobile, I just have some things to clear up with Gordon."

Robin nodded, but realised that Batman couldn't see him, so he simply complied and headed back to his bike and the Batmobile.

The door creaked as Nico stepped into the run-down apartment, and the first thing that came to his line of vision and his sense of smell was Blood.

A lot of it.

The apartment reeked of decomposed meat and blood as he then pulled up his shirt to his nose, and thinking that he'd probably lost his appetite for the next month. Blood was everywhere, smudged all over the walls and ground. While a torn up piece if paper sat in the corner, its ripped remains lay all over the wooden ground. There was no furniture in the apartment, and Nico noticed that amidst the blood were globs of a white, hardened substance. He stepped towards the torn paper first, noticed that there weren't broken Latin or Hebrew letters on the pieces. Instead, there were thick lines, as it was once a picture.

The pieces were relatively big, and there was only five in total. Thus, Nico began to put them back together as quick as possible, and needless to say, it didn't take long for a full picture to form. It was a star, with a circle around it, and the Son of Hades recognised the symbol immediately. It was used for an ancient ritual to communicate with the spirits, known as Séance. In mortal beliefs, the ritual required the symbol to be drawn on the ground, and five candles must sit on the points of the star, while whoever was attempting it would have to chant an ancient verse. But Nico knew better, and that this was another attempt to raise/communicate with the dead using forced necromancy. In fact, the 'ancient' chant wasn't actually a chant, it was more like a useless poem about Hades' eternal boredom ruling the Underworld (and Nico knew this because his father himself was the one who wrote it), but it wasn't like anyone could or actually was bothered to translate all five-hundred pages of the 'original' chant (Being immortal gave Hades a lot of time to himself). The thirteen year old supressed a smirk as he realised the poor attempt from whomever had tried to perform the Séance. It had obviously not worked, and they had obviously tried to draw the symbol in someone's blood, and Nico suspected that it was probably the same blood from the owner of the amputated hand that was in the grave at Gotham Cathedral. The white globs were melted wax from the candles.

Quickly saying the chant to cleanse the place of dark magic, Nico then slipped back out the door, and left the building without making that much of a racket. He was barely half-way down the street when he heard a loud, angered groan from behind him. Pulling his hood up further, Nico quickened his pace to a shadowy spot to shadow-travel away as he heard the groan again. Footsteps could be heard, and a loud splat came from behind him.

Turning around slowly, the Son of Hades froze when he saw what was behind him: A large yet very skinny…person of sorts clumsily stumbled its way towards the demigod. Its movements matched the ones of a zombie, yet Nico knew that if it actually were a zombie, he would've been able to control it or destroy very easily. However, this was not the case. This thing was at least three metres tall. Its skin was made from raw Earth, and its feet were made of dripping wet mud. Three arms sprouted from each side, and Nico counted six arms in total. Its face was skeletal like, with two holes for eyes, and a rugged clump of mud for a mouth. It groaned and shuffled its way towards the demigod, and for a second, the teen could only stand and stare at the creature in confusion, wondering whether or not it was neutral or if it was going to harm.

His mind was made up suddenly, when it started gathering large balls of mud, and tossed it at the demigod's head. Nico ducked just in time, and the creature groaned in annoyance as its six arms began to fire mud balls at the Son of Hades.

What is that? He wondered as he drew his sword and, while dodging all of the mud, he swiftly lunged forth and cut down the Earth-born like creature.

Nico was about to leave, when he heard yet another groan, and turned to see that the Earthborn had already re-formed.

"What the…" he said to himself as the teen lunged and stabbed the creature yet again.

This time however, running quickly away so he would not have to deal with it again. He was utterly confused as he sprinted to the nearest alley, what in Hades was that? he thought to himself, but as soon as he shadow-travelled to his studio apartment, his head had gone heavy, and within moments he had collapsed onto his bed, still fully-clothed and drifted into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Dick sat in Italian class the next morning. It was thirty-five minutes pass eight, meaning that class had started five minutes ago, and yet, a certain teen that goes by the name Nico di Angelo had not shown up yet. He had already missed homeroom, and Dick was beginning to think that he was probably not going to show up all together when said teen stumbled into the room, his uniform messy, and shirt was crumpled and half untucked.

"Ah, I see our new student have finally decided to arrive." said Ms. Brown.

The students snickered as Nico shook his head slightly, and mumbled a small apology.

"Sorry? I didn't hear that." said the teacher.

"Sorry…" he muttered.

"Sorry for what? I didn't quite hear that, would you mind repeating that, Mr. di Angelo?"

"I'm sorry for being late to class, and I promise I will be here right on time next time." snapped Nico suddenly in a mocking manner.

Ms. Brown looked shocked at his slight outburst.

"Young man, that is no way to speak to a teacher. But since this is your first time in this class, I shall let you off for your little slip up." she said curtly.

However, all Nico did was narrow his eyes at her as he gave her a slight nod, before settling himself down next to Dick.

"Dude, you're nearly an hour late to school. Late night?" said Dick.

"You could say that." came Nico's muttered reply as he set his books down carelessly, his eyes still trained on Ms. Brown who was screeching to the class about obedience.

Ms. Brown was a grumpy old lady, with white hair and rounded glasses to match the look. Yet Nico still had his narrowed eyes trained on her.

"Would someone give us a recap of what you did last year?" she said to the class in a sickly-sweet voice.

"She wasn't here before?" whispered Nico.

"Nope. As far as I know, she was a replacement teacher for our original teacher who had to take long service leave." said Dick.

Nico's eyes narrowed even more as the teacher pointed her wrinkled finger at him.

"Perhaps, Mr. di Angelo, you would like to show us how to read the following passage. After all, I sure your father or a family member must've taught you Italian before you came to our wonderful school." she said.

Nico stiffened, as he felt his sword hand twitch.

"I'd rather not, Ms." he hissed as he glared at the teacher.

Ms. Brown merely smiled at him in a creepy way as she headed for his desk, and slammed a book down in front of him.

"But I insist." she snarled.

Nico curled his fists beneath his table until he knew there would be nail marks on his palm the next day, and he clenched his jaw as he darted his eyes from the still smiling Ms. Brown to the Italian text book in front of him.

"As you wish, teacher." he said through gritted teeth.

The class seemed to be in a daze as this happened, not realising the tense Nico, or the creepily smiling old teacher. Dick was the only one who noticed, but chose to keep silent as he watched the ordeal and he took in the teen's and the old hag's body language.

"There once was a beautiful queen who lived in Libya, and she had many children. One day, her children were taken away from her because of a jealous witch, just because she was far better than her." read Nico stiffly in fluent Italian.

"How does this story have anything to do with class?" he asked in a steel voice.

"Oh, nothing. Just a simply tragic tale of an old queen of Libya."

Dick was swayed by this tale, and he almost saw the evil gleam in Ms. Brown's eye as she headed back towards the front of the room, but he missed it as he began to pack his books. Nico's hard eyes didn't soften, but suddenly, the bell for next period rang loud and clear, snapping the other students out of their seemingly unnoticeable daze. Dick looked back at where Nico sat moments ago, but found that he was already out the door.

A/N Thanks for all the people who reviewed :D! And Thanks for Reading! :))))))