Five days later

Percy POV

I would have kept hunting down hell-hounds for the rest of the week but my supply of nectar ran out by the time I killed my seventh pack, frankly I did not know what to do now, I was probably going to have to take a break in between every one of the fights to replenish my energy and that was going to be pretty annoying. I took a look into my backpack to find a few more dried fruit bars, and some ambrosia squares. Sadly, the ambrosia did not provide as much energy as the nectar, it was mostly used for healing and with reftate protecting me, it was going to be pretty useless.

I took a deep breath and looked around me. I focused on my newly acquired hell-hound senses and smelled four mortals a few hundred meters away. At first I thought they were probably regular hunters but one of them smelled a bit like Ares. I figured my hell-hound abilities included the ability to smell demigods but this man was no demigod. His scent was very weak and if it weren't for the fact I have the combined ability of over a hundred hell-hounds I would have never identified him this far away. At this distance, no monster would have ever realized he was a legacy.

My curiosity got the best of me and I decided to follow them. I packed everything on my backpack and started walking towards them. I was still really tired from my previous fights and thought it was going to be a while before I caught up to them. I walked for a about two minutes when they stopped walking. I slowly got closer, my new hell-hound abilities proving essential as they allowed me to walk silently towards the group of mortals.

"We know you're there," said one of the mortals. I stopped to sense if there was anyone else nearby they could have found out, anyone else besides me, but alas it was just me with them.

I got a close look at the group of hunters and they were all wearing mortal standard hunting gear. It was clear two of them were hardened veterans since they were calm and carried medium sized game hunting rifles. The other two were obviously their trainees, they looked shaken up and carried newer versions of the Remington rifles.

"You are very skilled but stalking fellow hunters is not very nice." This was the same guy that spoke before. It was clear he was the leader as he did not pull out his rifle or made any rash moves, the other veteran hunter and the two trainees loaded their weapons.

I could not help but to be impressed with the mortals. How the leader knew that I was here was beyond me but I knew his hunter skills probably rivaled that of Artemis's hunters'. He was blonde, looked in his late thirties and had a scar on his left cheek. He was definitely a legacy of Ares as he radiated the aura of a true warrior.

His partner was also blonde but a bit taller, he was also less built than the leader and looked a few years younger. He had the same confidence and looked battle hardened, as if he had seen the cruelties of war. I took a look at the two trainees and could not help to notice that they were very young and inexperienced by comparison. One had jet black hair and looked about thirteen, the other had nasty blonde hair and looked about sixteen.

"What are you four doing here?" The leader heard my voice and turned around only to see me in my eight year old body. He raised an eyebrow and looked confused for a second before laughing out loud.

"So the expert hunter that we thought was following us was just a seven year old boy?" He turned to look at his partner who just shrugged his shoulders and at his trainees.

"See that boys? If this seven year old can do that at his age, both of you should have no problem learning to do that in the next year." The boys nodded at their mentor and looked back at me curiously with some mixed envy. The smiling leader just looked back at me and came a few feet closer.

"You should not brought along such young hunters into such dangerous place," the man just kept smiling as if he knew something I didn't. "Specially when you carry that scent…" The smile of the man instantly vanished and he looked at me in an alert manner. He backed away slowly, pulled out his loaded rifle.

"Who are you? Why are you here, how do you know about my scent?" The man seemed to have lost his cool and looked a bit frightened. The other hunters immediately pulled aimed their mortal weapons at me and aimed for my chest.

I raised my hands in mock surrender and asked the leader a question. "How much do you know and how much do they know." The man seemed to know what I was referring to and determined that I was not a threat so he put his gun away.

"We are monster hunters and know about the Greek world. I am Mike, that over there is Tom, our two apprentices are Steven and Josh, Josh being the youngest." I looked over at the rest of the members and gave them a half friendly smile.

"I am Percy Jackson, I am a demigod son of Poseidon." The two kids looked in awe while Mike and Tom narrowed their eyes at me.

"We told you who we are and what we're doing here. What are you doing all the way over here in Idaho all alone kid? A quest?" I was not sure if I should lie to this people. They are basically doing the same as me, hunting down monsters and I would not want them to lie to me so I said most of the truth.

"I'm hunting down monsters. I am the champion of Nemesis, goddess of revenge, balance and retribution." To prove my point I used my blessing to see if they had any yearning for revenge and sure enough all of them wanted revenge or justice.

"They have taken so many of my friends and many other innocent people from their friends and families. They took your father Mike, they took your daughter Tom, I can feel both of you want revenge… we all want the same thing." Mike and Tom looked at each other and Mike nodded at me.

For some reason I was starting to feel attached to these mortals, like if we were long lost friends. I assumed the mark of Himeros was working its magic to develop my feelings of friendship towards the guys. My assumption was proven right the Mike decided to open up to me.

"My father spent his youth on the demigod camp before rejoining the mortal world to marry my mother. When I turned 10 he took me on a camping trip for my birthday. That day I was attacked by what I thought was bear but my father jumped in with a baseball bat just in time defend me from his killing blow." Mike took out a necklace that carried a small picture of a man that looked very much like Mike with a small boy hugging each other happily. Then he took out a Swiss army knife, he opened it and a celestial bronze sword sprung to life.

"After a few seconds I figured out it was a hell-hound and my dad was using this sword to battle it. The hell-hound bit my father's right arm when he saved me so he struggled to fight it. My father turned it to dust but at the end of the fight he was very badly injured, the scar on my face was nothing compared to what the beast did to him." Mike leaned on a tree and smiled.

"I rushed over to him and I saw him smiling. He looked at me said 'You're safe now Mikey, daddy kept you safe' I saw my father coughing blood and started to cry. He handed me his sword and cleared my tears.'Why are you crying Mikey?' I told him I was crying because he was going to die. He chuckled and told me 'Wipe those tears away Mikey, you should be smiling. Today was the day your father showed you how much he really loves you.' He pressed his sword on my hand and then he was gone."

I never realized things like this went on with mortals. I kind of always thought it was just us demigods who suffered, then this guy comes along and tells me what he had to go through. It reminded me of Clarisse's death, how it should have been me that died that day, not her. I could not help but to feel my eyes get watery and I noticed Mike was holding back a few tears himself.

I looked over at Tom who was outright crying. I could already kind of imagine what happened to him but I awaited for his story nonetheless. I waited for Tom to calm down and after a few minutes he finally spoke.

"Aphrodite gave me a beautiful daughter who we named Linda about fifteen years ago. One day when she was only twelve we went to the park to play on the swings. She asked me for money for some ice cream and I could not say no, she was my princess. I went sit down on a bench but when I turned I sew her getting attacked by a pack of hell-hounds. I rushed over to her but I was late. My little Linda… she died in my arms!" At this point Tom broke down in tears again.

I could only imagine what it must have like for Tom. He raised a beautiful daughter for twelve years then to have her die in his arms. He must be devastated, Mike's father gave up his life saving his son. He probably feels he should have done the same, I know I do.

"And I'll be damned if I let anymore of my children die before me." He looked at the trainees and wiped his tears. "I promise both of you, as long as I'm alive none of you are dying." The teary eyed boys nodded in acknowledgement and dried their eyes as well. They clearly had never seen this softer side of their instructors and looked at them in a new light. We must have all looked pretty pathetic, if anyone saw us they would have thought we were all a bunch of sentimental girls but who cares.

Mike looked at me expectantly and I willed myself to my regular 18 year old age. The guys looked surprised but didn't interrupt me when I opened up to them. "Her name was Clarisse, she was one month pregnant with my son and we were very happy. The camp was attacked by a rally of monsters, nothing we could not handle but then Ares came. Your grandfather never liked me and opposed my relationship with Clarisse." I pulled out Riptide , uncapped it and immediately felt even worse.

"He wanted revenge for when I beat him 6 years ago, he said I took everything from him. He overpowered me, broke my sword and was about to kill me when Clarisse decided to intervene. She got distracted for a second and was taken down by hell-hounds before our very eyes. Ares in anger unleashed his true form and killed all monster on the spot. As her dying wish she told us to get along." The guys nodded in understatement but seemed confused about when the revenge part came.

"A few days later I was visited by Nemesis after a burst of anger on my part after someone blamed me for their deaths. She sensed my desire for revenge and made me aware of it. She made me her champion and promised I could make every single monster pay for what they done. She promised I would have my revenge." It seemed like my story was not as sentimental as theirs since their faces turned fierce. It was probably a secondary power of Nemesis to bring up feelings of vengeance, she probably did that to me when we talked that day now that I think about it.

"What about them? They are not motivated in the same way that we are, they want to fight monsters to serve justice but don't exactly want revenge against them." I looked over over over trainees and Mike nodded.

"Steven is the son of my friends from the army rangers. I promised him I would look after his son as his dying wish. Josh over there is just a trigger happy knucklehead. His dad is an elite hunter like me but he's over at headquarters. Want to come along? It's right over at Boise for our convenience of course." I was pretty intrigued with the idea of going to the establishment of this so called mortal hunters but I was not sure if I should go. Boise is the capital and I am bound to come across some mortal women there. Even if we don't meet any on the way there, there will probably be some at their headquarters and I could not take any chances of my eight year old body succumbing to godly lust. That would definitely be awkward.

"Sorry Mike, I have to keep moving. Maybe we will meet some other time whenever I'm in Idaho." I turned into my eight year old form and waved them off. I sensed around for the nearest pack of hell-hounds and walked towards them. The hunters were good people and I would have liked to stay with them, but alas I am destined to spend my journey alone while I find out how to beat this cursed mark.

Once the hunters were out of my sight I mist traveled near the pack to close most of the hundred mile distance. I was surprised to find out I arrived at a parking lot. From the looks of it, it belonged to a hospital. I could sense the hell-hounds just a few meters away, they moved like they were chasing something and I smelled the scent of a demigod. I could tell it was a daughter of Aphrodite and that she was about fourteen since her scent was feminine and strong. I cursed myself, being near a pretty teen girl was the least thing I wanted but I knew I could not leave her on her own, not after I could see a looming threat of monsters.

I summoned my escrima sticks and prepared for battle as I got closer. The hell-hounds became aware of me as my scent was stronger than the girls and started running in my direction. I got ready and to my surprise they were really fast, much faster than the ones I fought back in the forest. Maybe I was too worn out and my perception was off but they seemed to be moving at insane speeds.

I quickly tried to use the same strategy I used versus the previous packs but they were starting to get the upper-hand as their attacks were fast and vicious. I was getting pushed back and realized I was not going to win. I used the very last pint of my power left and tried another technique I never tried before. I focused on all the water inside them and instantly forced it to boil. The hell-hounds started whimpering and fell to the floor shaking in pain.

I was drained and fell to floor of the parking lot as well. I barely managed to reach over to my backpack and pulled out an ambrosia square. Once I ate it I regained a tiny bit of my strength and my soreness went away. With renewed power I stood up and started to stick escrima sticks though the bodies of the injured hell-hounds but that required a lot of force as their skin was thick and strong. At the cost of another bit of my energy I willed the escrima sticks to expand abruptly and the hell-hounds blew up into dust.

I felt the life force of the hell-hounds and the power of Nemesis reach my body and the sat down as the surplus of energy did very little for my tattered and used to the limit body. I knew that I was on the verge of fainting due to exhaustion but I had to reach her. I focused on the little bit of energy I just got from killing the monsters and used it to mist travel next to the girl. As soon as I reached my destination I passed out in front of her, landing right in her arms.