79th Year Anno Domini, Mons Vesuvius, Naples.
The final assault, led by a faceless sorcerer on the heights of the hold of the mage gods of old was one of legends. The attackers were led by a man with his face cowled and cast into shadow, leading them into a battle soon to be forgotten under a cloud of liquid fire and grey sand falling from above. Ten-thousand wizards climbed the mountain, assembled from across the empire, as far north as Britannia, as far west as Mauritania Tingitana, as far south as Berenice and as far east as Larissa on the Persian Gulf.
At the head of this formidable force was a skilled and powerful wizard, who called himself with some amusement 'figulus' in the tongue of the Romans. Potter, for he moulded the field of battle about him, wielding a sword and spiked round shield of the same strange wavy-patterned dark metal as the tip of the short spear held behind his shield, the same metal as his plate and ringmail.
On a plateau below the peak of the volcano, Mars the Bringer of War sounded his horn, bringing forth ten score of legions of thralls, leading them into the battle. The Potter threw aside men like rag dolls, his spells fell and deadly. He punched holes through plate as thick as a man's palm front to back, cast from the spear, for it was truly a staff, wielded by the most powerful sorcerers.
Fire thundered through the unflinching ranks of the enslaved, and they fell unflinchingly. The earth shook and the sky darkened under battle magic that could bring about the end of all. What could not be seen was the dark and seductive taint of mage-craft that twisted the mind and destroyed the consciousness of men. Fallen thralls stood once more, eyes unseeing as they joined the assault on the gods upon the mountain.
A lesser god, wielding a forge-hammer and a staff of twisted bronze moved to engage the sorcerer. It was over in moments, a stroke from the hammer fell upon the shield of the sorcerer, then the bronze staff countered a spell, only for that sword of dark patterns, molten metal frozen in the form of a blade, to find its target in his heart.
"Deos cadent!"
"DEOS CADENT!"
The roar of the attacking wizards echoed down to the sea, where beneath the waves, the first of the greater god mages lay slain, for self-proclaimed gods could truly fall. Neptune would never depart the great ocean and ascend the heights of the earthen forge to where Vulcan worked his metals.
Ten-thousand wizards formed a wall of shields as a hail of spells fell upon them, where one fell another came forward to form an impenetrable shell of enchanted metal. Out in the open surrounded by his risen dead, the Potter was attacked by two gods. In one smooth movement, he butchered the first of the brothers Pales by driving the spiked shield into him, impaling him there, before splitting asunder his leather helmet and skull with one terrible blow.
The third god to fall was the second of the brothers Pales, cut down after a brief exchange of spells. Two spells splashed upon his shield, before the Potter sent a shield-crusher to shatter the shield spell wielded by the second brother Pales. He charged forward, catching a sickle-sword on his vambrace before striking aside the crook that formed his staff, moving smoothly into a cut which disembowelled the second shepherd god.
"Deos cadent!"
"DEOS CADENT!"
The roar was silenced by the thrum of hooves as two riders charged their lines in chariots, one a woman in full plate, her chariot drawn by four horses which she whipped until they frothed at the mouth and bled at the haunches. The second rode a flaming chariot, the horses not of flesh but of fire. He struck down wizard after wizard with a bow until he was confronted by the sorcerer.
The ground reared up in front of his chariot, the fiery horses extinguished beneath earth and rock and the chariot's burning frame bent and broken. Walking forwards, the wizard sidestepped the charging goddess and struck her down from her chariot with a single thrust of his spear-headed staff before plunging his sword into the fallen Apollo. Flames enwreathed the blade, drawn forth from the heart of the sun god, as he struck left and right, cutting down the legions of thralls they had led into battle.
By the end of the day, the sorcerer's robe was still black, but on his cloak was his insignia, a scroll wrapped around a sword, bearing the words 'Deus Praevaricator'. And the last mage god, Jupiter, had died bleeding on his shattered throne in his shattered halls, but in one last act of defiance, had broken the spells binding the heat of the great forge beneath and Mons Vesuvius broke, heralding the end of the Roman God Wars.
1066 Anno Domini
Arrows hissed back and forth as the Norman cavalry broke the lines of the Huscarls. One man, black-robed amidst the armoured nobility struck down a Huscarl with a flaming sword before charging the king. To place your sword in the breast of one who claimed godhood was to take their immortality and make it your own.
The breaking of the gods on Vesuvius had slaughtered a hundred gods, many killed by multiple blows from many men. The abuse of what they took began immediately, and even if they were slain, the power corrupted the slayer all too soon. Struck with arrows, Harold Godwinson raised his godsword, taken from the cooling corpse of the slayer of Janus' killer. He charged on foot, his horse peppered with shafts. Then he fell, his helmet and head split by a blow from the black-robed horseman.
It was a hunt that would last centuries, killing off any who claimed the immortality of the god mages. And take it himself, until he could finally take his own life and go to his rest. But until then, the man once known as Harry Potter would hunt.
A/N: Maybe an Avengers crossover, kill off the members of the Norse pantheon whenever they descend to the same plane of existence as planet earth. As for how Harry came to be in 79 AD, I genuinely have little idea, work that out and leave it in a review. Maybe some more candidates for a sudden and violent death at the hands of the God Breaker? Hessian Horseman from Sleepy Hollow just sprang to mind randomly.