This story is dedicated to both Jon-Ur and AdmetoUltor14 – I hope you will come back one day to write more…

Mystic Center

Chapter 2

Argos

The very first thing anyone living in a modern world would have to get used to when dealing with the past times – especially with either ancient times or dark ages – is the smell. The putrid smell of dirty animals, organic wastes, decaying bodies, and unwashed bodies. Smells so repulsing, it would make any public toilet after a very busy night smell like flowers.

That's right. The past was smelly. It smelled worse than sewage. But a modern nose wouldn't be the one dealing with the temporary shock, oh no. The past times for any modern humans are so alien, so incomparable, that you might as well find yourself in a completely alien world.

Another thing you need to prepare is your eyes. Because what you are about to see will make any horrors look like a lullaby. Only in the past, you can see merchants offering many goods, right next to sick people throwing up, whores selling their own bodies (not always clean and healthy bodies, mind that), and denizens throwing their wastes out of their windows. A pure abstraction for anyone living today.

You might believe that such views were only a problem for slums and other poor districts, but here I am about to disappoint you. While the noble families and the rulers of cities indeed had better looks, pretty clothes, and expensive things – even though the Dark Ages of ancient Greece were pretty poor compared to others – it was still common to smell a suffocating odor of anything related to humans to be present even in the chambers of noblemen and noblewomen.

Let me help you imagine this correctly. Imagine a beautiful queen, with mysterious emerald eyes… or any other of eyes color of your imagination… Scratch that, just imagine your perfect woman, dressed up in a delicate, almost translucent dress exposing her goddess-like shapes, with jewelry that would make any woman jealous.

She looks astonishing, isn't she? Now, here is the kicker. Imagine that you can smell from her an odor of an unwashed body. And that from the hair you noticed a few dead chiggers just falling down.

Are you disgusted enough? Do you feel like being thankful for your own times? Well, let's just say that the description above was just a bit colorful. Even during the dark ages of ancient Greece, personal hygiene was pretty important and was practiced very often in Greece. Yes, some historians might even point out how even ancient Minoans had access to running water – even if it was through primitive ways.

Yes, that is all true, and even in the darkest days of ancient Greece, the public baths were a thing. That is all true - as long as you stayed in the city of Hellas. But go to any less urbanized region, or simply travel outside of Hellas, and you might find what has been described to you. Might find of course. We are not here to compare the ancient practices of hygiene. We are here to talk about a certain lonely warrior.

And yet, let me give you another warning, this time for your taste buds. While in our times we fancy adding many spices to our dishes, know that many of them weren't too accessible for our ancestors. After all, salt was the true gold of the past.

Now, let us go back to our warrior.

As he looked upon everything around him, he noticed the sudden change in the wind. It was as if the spirits of wind were calling upon him, urging him to venture to the Argos, one of the largest and oldest cities in the entire Peloponnese.

Before even entering the city, the lonely one could not help but wander around what seemed to be the endless fields of wheat and other signs of agriculture. It was almost weird to him that Argos was dedicated to the Goddess Hera, and not her older sister Demeter. Especially knowing that the entire economy of Argos was based around agriculture.

The ancient people were definitely weird ones.

As the lonely one ventured into the city, he quickly melted into the crowd. He didn't want to be noticed by anyone, especially by any priests, priestess or – fate forbid – a goddess. People like him had to be careful around any places sacred to gods. Anyone like him wasn't welcome within the sacred grounds of the gods.

On these ancient grounds, his kind was persecuted by almost anyone. Gods feared their powers, spirits of nature called them abominations, and some mortals – either old enough to remember the old stories or well acquainted with the dark secrets of the past - still blamed them for what happened with the civilization of mankind.

It was entirely possible that his kind will never be accepted by anyone associated with Greece ever again. Even if the gods had much worse sins occupying their souls.

But the lonely one did not care. He had other things to do than reopening old wounds. He was done dealing with past sins, he had enough of the past. For him, there was only one way – forward. And thus he moved.

Argos, just like any other large city of Hellas had a large crowd, especially in the suburban area. The entire city was busy with the ongoing market. All around him, people were yelling either about the high-quality of their goods, about cheap prices, or about who scammed whom. Nothing unusual for any market, even by your modern standards.

The lonely one was slowly clearing his own path between the crowd. His black cloak was tarnished by dirt and other kinds of stains, almost losing its dark night color. But the lonesome did not mind. Without those stains, people would never let him out of their sight, after all, the dark pigment was unusual for those times.

And yet, thanks to the stains on his cloak, he was able to blend into the crowds, posing as just another traveler marching towards the city's bonfire.

As he was marching, he could not help, but smirk underneath his disguise. How many future historians would kill for a picture, or at least his testimony of life in ancient times? And here he was, blending in with the crowd of ancient Argos, breathing the same air as the ancient Greeks.

After a few minutes, the lonely one stopped for a minute, to gaze upon a small sanctuary. As of now, the building before him was nothing more than a small temple with a few tombs from the Late Bronze Age era. And yet, with his eyes, he could gaze upon the glory of what this place would become in the future. The legendary Heraion of Argos.

As he took a few seconds to gaze upon the sanctuary, he noticed a small presence in the air. He could feel someone's divine gaze upon the small and ancient Argos. It was the presence of mighty Hera, Queen of Olympus, and all Olympian gods. The lonely one concentrated on the presence. He could almost see the queen's smirk upon the city. She was more than pleased to possess a city for her own. But she did not detect him.

Yet.

The lonely one knew that Hera was always looking for any bastard her cheating husband would sire or any demigod appearing on her sacred lands. The queen's ire for demigod bastards was well known within the lands of Hellas.

The warrior could only sigh. Long ago he learned how to hide his presence, how to become invisible to the watchful eye of the seekers. And nowadays, people like him were forced to hide. Especially from gods and anything related to Hellas pantheon.

And thus, the lonely one started to walk again, towards the Argos Acropolis. The attack on Corinth Isthmus was something that piqued his curiosity. He heard the call, urging him to go there, and then he found an Ares's demigod and one of the commanding officers from this city. He was more than sure. It was the call. And people like him always obey and follow the calls. For that is the will that guides them through their life.

The ancient Acropolis of Argos was, to no one's surprise, a bit disappointing. The times of mythological greatness of this city were long past gone, erased by the fall of the Bronze Age, waiting for a renaissance in the classic age of ancient Greece. As of now, what awaited any traveler, was the transitional period of Argos, barely anything worth seeing.

As the lonely one climbed into the ancient Larisa, he noticed a large crowd of people tightly packed at the center of the hill, just right below a stone podium. On the said podium, there was a man, clothed in a traditional chiton. And just as the lonely one arrived, he started to speak with a loud and domineering voice.

"Hear me, oh people of Argos! And let all the gods of ours be my witness! For I speak with the authority of our king, the great Alexius, chosen of gods! Hear my message and know the word of the king! It is with this day, that our great Alexius, protector of Argos, has cursed the traitorous Myron and his men, alongside the Ares's bastard, Hesiod, who dared to raise their hand against our king! The king has spoken and promised drachmas upon drachmas for any brave enough to kill the traitor and his cursed bastards, hiding in the Isthmus of Corinth!"

As always, brave and stupid enough young males were screaming with every bit of oxygen they had in their lungs, trying to compete for the glory of killing traitors. As if killing a few people, already buried and forgotten in the sands of time was worth anything.

And yet, despise of the surrounding noise, the man on the podium continued.

"Let us recall the demerits of the cursed Myron! The one who dared to raise a hand against our protector. The one who dared to kidnap Argos's blessing from the Demeter herself! Our flower in the barren land! Our Beloved-"

Diantha.

Before the man on the podium could finish his sentence, the lonely one already heard a name. It was like a quiet, almost silent whisper. But he heard it. He felt the call. It was his destiny to find Diantha, whoever that girl was. Because his fate was already intertwined with hers.

Long ago the lonely one learned to never question the call. He wasn't like the gods of this land. He knew that one cannot escape destiny, the call of the universe. The cosmos always provides, but it always wants to pay the cost. The universe gives power, but for the price of being enslaved by fate. And anyone who would dare to run away from it will always find themselves on the universe short end of the chain.

That is the price of the power. One cannot hold the power without being a slave to it. One cannot touch the universe, without being enslaved by it. The more power a person gains, the more power the universe gains over a person. Because the universe always demands a balance. And generations upon generations of his kind knew this. And followed every call.

That was the secret rule of the mystic center.

And thus the lonely one turned away from the loud crowd, stepping down from the Larisa, he once again found himself in the ancient city. For a while, he contemplated. All the targets from Argos were killed. Soon any barely matured boy will march towards the isthmus only to find long dead and deteriorating bodies.

He could claim the victory, he had the evidence of his kill. But that would only bring unnecessary attention upon him. And the lonely one always preferred to be left alone. Besides, he had no need for any of the pleasures of this age. Greek Drachmas were worthless to him, he had no need for land, and the only woman he was interested in was beyond his reach.

As he was about to exit the city, he felt a small tug on his cloak. When he turned around, he noticed a small, malnourished boy. His clothes were torn apart, barely holding together. His second hand was reaching out to the lonely one as well, in the well-known gesture of begging for money.

The lonely one reached into the boy's mind, searching for any sign of lies or deceits. And yet the only thing he had found were the memories of his now-deceased father, his happy life before coming to Argos, and his poor life with his mother and sister after moving to the city.

The lonely one kneeled in front of the boy and reached out to one of his pockets. He took out the sigil of Argos, the very same one he found while searching the bodies of the bandits from the isthmus of Corinth. He placed it in the boy's hand and then squeezed it tightly.

"Look at me boy. Look at me and listen closely, because I will not tell it twice." The boy's attention was now fully focused on the lonely one. "Go to Larisa Hill, you will see many important people there. Then yell from the top of your lungs those words: I carry the message of the one whose name is carried in the dark. The traitors of Argos are dead. Tell them that they must give you and your family the full reward for this bounty. And if they won't, tell them that they will meet something in their ways. Tell them that I promised it to the Styx herself. Tell that and show them what you have just received from me."

For a second the boy hesitated, but one look from the lonely one persuaded the small boy to obey the words. And as soon as the boy moved towards the hill, the lonely one heard something similar to distant thunder. Alongside a whisper of the oldest Oceanid.

"That is an oath I shall remember, oh nameless one…"

The lonely one only scolded himself. He knew better than to make any pledge to any of the mystical ones, and yet he just broke one of his own secret rules, just because he felt sad for someone's fate. He already knew that the consequences of this small action will haunt him for all the years to come.

But for now, all that was left for him was to move on.

After many hours, when the sun was just about to set, the lonely one found himself on another hill, far away from the city. From that place, he could gaze upon the city of Argos, now appearing as nothing more than a far-away miniature. He gazed upon it, with a bit of sentiment. Argos, now small, barely a point on someone's map, in the future will become one of the major polis of the classical age of ancient Greece. One day this city will become a jewel worthy of a goddess - someone like Hera.

One day, the civilization of man will rise up again from the ashes, unburden by the bronze age collapse, ready to move forward and never look back. The lonely one could almost feel all the future civilization leaving their imprint in the history, dozens of signs screaming – we were here!

Humanity will never regress to this state. It will become something, not even their bronze age ancestors could dream about. And not even the so-called mighty gods will be able to stop them. Never again.

But for that humanity will have to wait. A few centuries will have to pass for that to happen.

And then, as if by the temptation of fate, the lonely one heard another whisper. Soon one whisper turned into an entire choir of whispers, barely heard in the wind. And as the lonely one turned around, he noticed a giant supercell cloud, foreshadowing an incoming massive storm. But it was not a normal storm. Neither was it another tantrum of the king of Greek gods. No, it was something much worse.

It was as if the storm was a manifestation of the ancient fight, the conflict between the light and the dark. The lonely one could feel massive quantities of unleashed power. Something that he had never felt since his own coming. And something he was more than sure that some of the gods will notice as well. The massive shift in power.

He could feel it. It was another call. It was his time to once again bear the responsibilities of his past. For his fallen brothers and sisters have entered the realm he called home. And he was more than sure that most of them will not come with peaceful intentions.

And thus once again, his kind will become feared and hated. Once again the gods will strike against his kind, this time burying any hopes for humanity to reach the next level.

The lonely one understood. It was his call. Now everything became clear to him. His purpose. He was sent here to stop his fallen brothers and sisters. He had to make sure that the gods will not notice the sudden shift in power. His mission was to ensure humanity's rightful destiny. And somehow, Demeter's daughter was inside all of this fight. Somehow her string of fate intertwined with everything that was supposed to happen.

The lonely one gazed at the incoming storm one last time. He could feel the turmoil – both inside him and in the outside world. The universe hated it, it demanded the balance be restored. And it was his duty, as the last of his kind remaining faithful to the creed, to restore the balance.

And thus it would seem that the lonely one still had a long path before him. It will take some time before he will reach home. He still had much to do.

With the last sigh, the lonely turned around and whispered to himself.
"And so, it begins."

And then, he vanished, leaving only incoming wind and a pair of footprints as the only testament of him ever being there…

Well, I hope that you liked this chapter. I know that it is a short one again, but I promise that the future one will be longer.

As of now, let's look at your comments.

Guest – Thank you! Well, I hope that you will find this protagonist interesting as well.

Guest160 – Well, the whole purpose here is to create a mysterious character that does not entirely fit in the times he's in. And I hope you will find the protagonist of this story interesting as well. As for the more modern take… Well, for now, I will make the protagonist rather stay in shadow and make sure that no one knows for sure who or what he is… Like an ancient urban legend.

Well, that is it for now. If you want to know more about all my projects here, just visit my discord: discord . gg/ pghekDe

DISCLAIMER: Due to recent problems with discord users having their accounts hacked and used to spread Malware, I was forced to make a rule to ban all hacked accounts. If you noticed that you are no longer on my server, just contact me either here through fanfiction private message or through Discord DMs - it is possible I had to ban you because you were hacked.

Anyway, that's it for now. See ya in the next chapter!