Hello, good to see you all again so soon... or not... my bad. I need to make a schedule for this so I'm not just uploading at random ass times... and so I hold myself accountable for publishing on time instead of having massive gaps like this. With all that being said I want to get a few things out of the way. 1, I am finally back in the mood to write so I will be trying to set a schedule and stick to it. 2, on top of having my writers drive back I also have most of my energy back in general after the really shitty time I was having. 3, the reason for the massive gap this time had to do with me being in a car crash with my family (everyone is fine, we just ended up being hit and the car was totalled) then a few weeks later the new car we bought was stolen, so I was out of it for a bit curing whatever god thought that this was a fun way to have my life go. lastly, I've been trying to pump out 5000 words for each chapter, I'm going to cut that back a bit to 4000 and maybe 3500 just until I really get into the groove with this story. that's all and thank you to everyone who has reached out and offered their support and kind words.
Last time
Cole walked up to Israfil and told him something.
"Back when I was at camp when someone was terrible at archery, Chiron would tell them they were worse than a son of Poseidon. He may be a big three kid." Cole said before walking off.
Israfil looked at me and Smirked, "I guess it's time to see if you're a big three kid."
Now
Percy POV
Israfil and led me past a see-through tarp to where the big three tests were. The Poseidon test was the one I saw earlier with multiple cups of water. "These tests have never had anyone try them so, we have no idea if they work," Israfil admitted to me.
"Alright, I'll give it a shot. What do you want me to do," I asked?
"I want you to try and move the water from this glass to another glass, obviously by trying to use your mind, not just using your hands," he said.
I nodded, then walked closer to the cup. I focused on it and tried to move the water just slightly to start. Nothing happened, so I tried to put more force into the small movement. Again nothing happened.
Israfil noticed my struggles and calmed me down. "these have never been tested, it may be our fault you can't do this right now not yours. Don't put too much pressure on yourself." He said with a kind smile.
I nodded my head and took a deep breath. I Made my thoughts as clear in my head as I could. 'Move the water up, right, then down. That's all you have to do'. I held my hands out next to the cup of water and closed my eyes. I felt my fingers tense as I tried to feel the water and move it. I moved my hands in the exact motion of my thoughts, then opened my eyes. The first cup was still full and the second one was empty.
"do you want to try again or do you want to try a different test" I heard Israfil's voice ring over my shoulder.
"I'll go to another one, I can't feel anything while I'm trying to do this," I said. Israfil turned around and then I follow suit smacking over the cup as I did so to get rid of a bit of frustration from all the failed tests. With Israfil's and my back turned neither of us noticed that the water didn't flow out of the cup for a second like it had been held in place. The Hades test consisted of a similarly ridiculous-sounding task. Either I was to try and feel the dead in the ground and let them rise or I was supposed to cause a crack in the ground. Safe to say all I succeeded in was looking like an idiot. Zeus's test had a similar outcome. We had taken a staircase that led outside and I had been asked to control the wind. At this point, I couldn't tell if these were actual tests or just something Israfil made up to watch me act like an idiot.
Either way, Israfil was stumped. "Perce, I'm gonna go talk to Cole about this see if he can figure something out that I missed. Follow me to his office then stand outside the door while we talk alright" he told me.
"lead the ways Isra" I responded
"Isra" he questioned?
"your name is not easy to make nicknames for, alright," I said jokingly annoyed.
"Better than calling me Issy," he said with a smile.
"Yeah that's definitely worse," I said we walked in silence the rest of the way to the office and when we got to the door I stood outside while Isra went inside. What they didn't realize was I had good hearing and at this close, I could hear everything they were saying.
"All the big three tests were fails as well," Israfil said after barging into the office.
"Thanks for knocking. But that is interesting we haven't had a clear-sighted mortal find this place before. do you think he could be just a weaker demigod of someone from an earlier test," asked Cole?
"The two tests he did the best in were the Hephaestus and the Apollo test. Obviously, everybody heard him sing which was incredible but with his level in archery, there's no way," Israfil Explained.
"And the Hephaestus test," asked Cole?
"That one was weird. He made bullets which is a pretty complex design especially considering the shell of the bullet and the gunpowder and everything had to go together. But when he used the machines it was awkward and slow and I could see him studying the machines beforehand not just feeling his way through it like other kids of Hephaestus would," Israfil finished exasperated.
"Hmm, this is definitely an interesting one. There was no other test he was alright in" Cole questioned again.
"Nope, he wasn't great at any of the others." Said Israfil
"Well, I'd say he can use a forge well enough. We can say he is a Hephaestus kid and then teach him how to make something a bit more useful than bullets. We'll train him only for forging if he is a mortal he won't be able to wield celestial bronze well so there's no point in wasting our time." Said Cole.
"I don't mean to be a waste of time but if I could waste just a bit more I'd like to try something," I said walking through the door.
"Ah, Percy... What do you mean waste a bit more time," Cole asked trying to direct the conversation away from its previous topic.
"I'd like to try the Poseidon test one more time," I said
"Perce, I said it before we have no idea if those tests work don't feel the need to try them again," Said Israfil
"I know they haven't been tested, But I ask both of you if you will follow me to the testing area I'd like to try one more time," I said Confidently.
"Very well Percy we will follow" Said Cole. We walked back down the hallways towards the testing area hopefully for the last time. We walked past the tarp covering the big three sections of the tests and over to the cups of water. I stood in front of the cups just as I had before and noticed the cup I had knocked over before. Something about that cup was bothering me, but it didn't matter right now. I held my hand next to the cup and instead of forcing the water to move I let it flow. I felt it flow up into the air and then I felt it flow around me in a circle before falling into the empty cup. I opened my eyes and this time the water had been moved to the other cup.
"Israfil I figured a few things out while you were talking with Cole. One I remembered something my mom used to say, about how my dad was lost at sea. I also realized that water doesn't move in a stiff motion. If it flows it can carve massive canyons and huge cliffs if it is given enough time or speed and flows past the surface. When I had tried to force it earlier I had done this" I said before knocking the cup over only for the water to stay in the cup just as calm as when it had been upright. Both of the men had their jaws open as they stared at the sight before them. Their thoughts were very similar.
'HOLY BALLS OF CERBERUS IT'S A GENUINE CHILD OF THE BIG THREE' was the gist of what ran through their minds.
Cole cleared his throat then spoke. "Israfil does he have any kind of combat ability" He Questioned?
"I'm not sure but I'm willing to teach him" He responded
"Israfil do you want to do the training with Percy as your partner," asked Cole?
Israfil looked at me for a second before nodding "yes, yes I do".
"Very well you will start your training tomorrow then," Richard told us "Israfil you're dismissed do as you please until tomorrow then meet me at my office at 9 am sharp. Percy, follow me." he finished turning and walking away from me. I trail after him not sure whether I should strike up a conversation with him or not as we walk the halls. Eventually, my curiosity gets the better of me
"Sir, where are you taking me," I asked?
"you are coming to meet the only other surviving member of the original 6, Layla, daughter of Hecate."
Time Skip
Still Percy pov
We made our way down a new set of halls, apparently heading towards the daughter of Hecate. The air in this section of the foundation felt stagnant and coarse. "sir are we close" I asked?
"we're here" he replied stopping suddenly. He knocked on the wall of the hallways and you could hear scampering from the other side. The sound of footsteps emanated through the wall 1... 2... 3... click. The wall opened up to reveal a very pretty woman. Despite the loud footsteps that could be heard the woman was actually quite petite. She couldn't be any taller than 5 foot 3 and had a skinny but curvy frame. Black glossy hair fell to her mid-back with amethyst purple eyes to top it off.
"Who's there... oh... oh hey, sorry hammer," she said with a playful glint in her eyes.
"Who's Hammer," I asked stepping out from behind cole. Her eyes locked onto me like a test subject. She scanned my body with her eyes documenting and cataloging everything about me. Then she looked me in the eye and I stepped back in slight fear.
"What extraordinary eyes!" she yelled giddily "Right sorry, hi, my name is Layla and Cole is Hammer, I'm not going to explain how he got that nickname though, you're too young for that story... physically at least. Anyways what's your name" she exclaimed like a hyperactive 8 year old.
"My name is Percy," I told her slightly startled by her attitude.
"Nice to meet you Perce, come in I'm sure you need to talk to me about something," she said stepping back and opening the door fully.
As the door opened a black mass took off out the door and lept for my face. The world around me went slightly darker, then I saw that the black thing that had lept at me had suddenly changed to what looked like the tongue of a massive dog. 'Mrs, O'Leary' I heard ring through my mind. The darkness faded and I was back in the hallway only I was kneeling, and the black thing which turned out to be a large wolf was sitting in front of me while I scratched its neck.
"How did you do that" questioned Layla?
"What did I do," I asked in return?
"When he jumped at you your eyes changed from their normal impassive look into a look so kind and friendly it made me want to hug you for the rest of eternity" she explained.
"I don't know how I did it my mind went blank" I answered honestly.
"Layla that's the runt right," Cole asked her? Layla nodded her head. "since it seems to have grown attached to you despite it hating everyone it's met, would you like to train it as a pet and a weapon" he asked?
I quickly weighed the pros and cons.
Pro - he could be a great friend
Pro - If trained properly he could become a great weapon/asset
Pro - his fur is so soft
Con - if I'm not good enough at training him I might get my face eaten off
Hmmm "screw it ill train him," I said after a moment
"Alright we'll get that sorted later, for now, I need to talk to Layla and then I'm going to let you two talk for a bit" he explained to me.
I nodded my head in understanding and stayed there as the two of them walked away to go and talk. I sat and tried to talk with my new wolf friend for a bit before Cole walked back past me and pointed his head in Layla's direction telling me to go talk with her. I nodded to him and walked over to her. "you wanted to talk to me" Layla stated as she heard me walk over.
"Yeah, how did you know," I asked?
"Just a guess, anyways what do you want I've got tons of cool stuff in here if you want to be a test subject," she said smiling?
As she mentioned all the cool stuff around I finally took a good look at the room I was in. It was easily the size of a basketball court with two floors to it. It gave off an industrial vibe with the metal floors and stone walls. Giant containers filled with weird animals and strange gasses littered the middle of both floors while desks filled with test tubes, strange gems and metals, and stacks upon stacks of papers. I was definitely in a cliche mad scientist lab, but it was kinda cool. "I want to know if you have anything in here that can hide scars," I asked trying to keep my expression hard?
"Something to hide scars? Well yes, I have something but why do you need it are you worried about being scarred after training because if so you don't have to worry" she said rambling on.
"Layla I need to hide these scars," I said pulling off my shirt to reveal my scar tissue-covered torso. A resounding gasp was heard when Layla made eye contact with my body.
"Ok let me go get the medicine and eventually ill teach you to make it yourself ok," she asked?
"yeah that would be great" I responded smiling and putting my shirt back on.
She walked away and started sifting through vials on one of the desks. As she was looking she started talking to me "I gotta say kid talking to you doesn't feel like talking to a normal kid, you seem much older"
I snorted at the comment "as far as I know I've only been alive 6 years so I don't think I have wisdom bottled up inside me, then again they say trauma makes people more mature".
"Well put kid, ah here it is," she said pulling out a large wooden box. "In this box, there are 20 some-odd vials make sure you eat then drink a full one of these vials afterwards, after about 45 minutes you should notice around 80% of your scars are gone and the effects should last for a week. Sound good" she asked?
"Sounds great, thank you, Layla," I said smiling ear to ear.
"Oh don't thank me yet I expect you to let me do some tests on you as payback for those vials," She said grinning. A very sarcastic 'yaayyyy' played through my head as I then booked it out of the lab with my new wolf in tow.
No one POV
The rest of the day passed by quickly with Percy joining up with Israfil to eat, work on a training regiment, and figuring out what to name Percy's new wolf companion. Eventually, they decided to name the wolf πιστός or Pistos which means loyal. Night came around and Percy and Israfil went back to their room to sleep and Pistos curled up at Percy's feet. Percy woke up that morning from a large paw coming into contact with his stomach "Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" was the noise that emanated throughout the room. Percy sat up and wiped the tiredness from his eyes before noticing that Israfil was up and staring at him with an amused grin. "what time is it" Percy asked sleepily.
"About 8:15," Said Israfil after a glance at his watch. "enough time to grab some breakfast and wake up before seeing Cole".
"Sounds like a plan to me," Said Percy as he got up and strolled out of the room after getting dressed. After some breakfast and almost falling back asleep on his breakfast it was time to meet up with Cole. As Percy and Israfil walked down the hall Percy asked him a question "didn't Cole just ask for you to come at 9, not me".
"Yeah but if you're not needed then you can sit outside. Plus since this is about our training then I think it won't matter if you hear it now because you gonna hear it later anyways," said Israfil.
"Fair enough" Percy replied. The two continued walking until they got to Cole's office and entered. Once they entered Cole talked to them about the sections of their training. Firstly they were given some basic exercises to do while training in the first step which was sharpening their mental prowess. this meant they would train their instincts, their battle strategy formulation, their ability to lie/think on the spot, and some basic school smarts. In the second part of the training, they would train their bodies. The purpose of this training was to maximize your body's potential, for example, if you were a smaller person you might train your speed and reflexes more than brute strength and vice versa. Step 3 of the training was weapons training. You trained in 3 subsections, close range, mid-range, and long-range. You started with the section you were the worst at and did the section you were best at last. The fourth section was for survival things such as cooking and setting up tents, this was considered the relaxation period before the final test. Step 5 the final test wasn't told to them saying that it would be cheating if they knew. The two of them left the room and started walking back to their room to take a break and prepare mentally for the training that was about to come. As they walked Percy got curious "hey, what's our training regiment for while we do the mental training" he asked.
"oh yeah, let's check," Israfil said reaching into his pocket to pull out the sheet of paper that was given to them by cole. Israfil looked at the sheet for a second then stopped walking "... you're fucking kidding me".
"language," Percy said getting a 'really' look for Israfil "sorry my mom didn't like swearing".
"Oh... Perce I'm sorry I shoulda asked this before but, do you wanna go back and live with your mom," Israfil asked.
"No... she wouldn't want me anymore," Percy said sadly.
"oh, well, anyways look at this training regiment," Israfil said handing Percy the list. It read
Training regime - Percy, Israfil
5-kilometre run
100 pull-ups
100 burpees
100 squats
50 one-legged squats(25 per leg)
100 walking lunges(50 per leg)
100 step-ups (50 per leg)
50 tricep dips
50 alternating staggered pushups
10-minute plank
100 m legless rope climb
under 3.5 minute 1k run
50 pistol squats(25 per leg)
100 dragonfly's
100 Russian twits
50 dragon flags
100 mountain climbers
*repeat 5 times (2 min break in between sets)*
5 km run to end
Good luck
"yeah this constitutes swearing, what monster would actually be able to complete this," said Percy?
"I think we should just start off doing as much as we can and work our way up, sound good," asked Israfil. Percy nodded in response.
time skip 8 months
Percy POV
Starting off for our training had been utterly brutal. We had been informed we would have classes starting at 8Am and going until 5Pm with a one hour break for lunch from 12-1, for the first few months we learned basic school knowledge but skipped out on a lot of the really useless things like early grades of science and other languages. The amount of knowledge we had to jam in our brains in that roughly 5 months timeframe was ungodly, I mean we learned in 5 months what most kids learn in 12 years. How we had successfully done it was beyond me, but it was done. After those months we learned from a different teacher who taught us more about battle strategy, how to read a person body language, the weakest points of the body and how to exploit them, how to speak in different styles like very posh or proper and then very relaxed and with lots of slang and a whole wack of other things. after our 8 hours of lesson we would do our workout routine which started off very slow in those first few months. Doing 8 hours of incredibly condensed school and then doing a brutal bodyweight workout was not fun, to say the least. In the beginning, we couldn't get through the first set. Israfil did a bit better than I did seeing as he is older and more fit than I am but that was to be expected. We became very close he was my goal the thing I was always striving to be as good as. he always made sure to do a bit better than me in the tests and to last a bit longer than me while working out, he was very much becoming my older brother. In turn, I was his little brother who enjoyed the same things as him, chased after him, and who would fight with him from time to time. We were becoming very close and I felt like I had gotten a new family member. we had trudged through the days and while they were incredibly hard a comfortable monotony fell over us. After a month the schedule was as follows school 8-12, lunch 12-1, school 1-5, break from 5-5:30, workout from 5:30-7, eat dinner from 7-8, train Pistos from 7-8, a study from 8-9:30, relax from 9:30-11:30, and finally go to bed at 11:30.
Finally, we had finished that though and we were on to the fitness training which had me wondering how hard this would be after the training we had been doing during our mental training. It was hard to imagine something much harder. Then again we had only done bodyweight workouts so they could have lots of new workouts with weights... why did we ever agree to this. We woke up after a few days of break from the intelligence training we had a note attached to the door to our room that we were to report to a room near the northwestern end of the foundation for our physical training for 9 pm. And so some of the most brutal training imaginable was probably about to start.
Ok again this chapter is slightly shorter than the last few being 4000 words instead of 5000 but this has made writing this chapter far more enjoyable because I don't feel like I'm bulshitting you by stretching out this chapter and I can follow my chapter plan to keep everything in this story moving the way I want it to.
Signing off, Have a lovely day, a pleasant evening, and a beautiful night.
See ya next time.