CHAPTER 2

The rest of that morning was spent getting the equipment for the quest ahead. He ran straight for the Fourth Cohort's barracks, which was Kurt's cohort, to tell his friends about the quest he was inviting them on. Their names were Brady, Phil, Sandy and Paul, and they were all children of Bellona, the war goddess, which was why he chose them – they were great in a fight. He'd also been friends with them since he'd arrived, which was another reason why he chose them – they were his best friends and fighting companions. He brought them up to speed on what was happening, and they all reacted well; they appeared to be excited for the upcoming fight. Kurt sent them off to grab some food to go and to armour up – they would eat on the road, since they were to get going for Mount Tam as soon as they possibly could, because they weren't sure how long Atlas would stay there – if he was even still there, which seemed unlikely. If he wasn't, they had to look for clues, and a decent wind could take most clues away, so they had to hurry.

As soon as the others had left, he headed up to Temple Hill, and entered Jupiter's temple. Being a son of Jupiter, he was somewhat a celebrity at the camp, since sons of Jupiter were rare, and usually very powerful. Kurt was no exception, but he liked to use melee combat whenever he could. The last son of Jupiter was Jason Grace, also a former praetor, but had formally given his praetorship up to give Frank Zhang a battlefield promotion so he could command a dead Roman legion to save them and the rest of their party – something else about the big quest that he had missed. Jason now resided at Camp Half Blood with his Greek demigod girlfriend. Nobody really minded that a Roman was now living with Greeks, because the millennia-long feud between the two sides had ended when Reyna made peace between both camps by delivering the Athena Parthenos to the Camp Half Blood. The Athena Parthenos was stolen in ancient times by Romans and taken back to Rome, where it sat for centuries until a Greek demigod and daughter of Athena called Annabeth found it and rescued it – she was part of Jason Grace's group, and is another part of the big quest that he had missed.

He kneeled in front of Jupiter's statue, a gigantic model of Jupiter in a toga holding a lightning bolt, standing on a marble floor that was etched with fancy mosaics and Latin inscriptions, under a glittering gold ceiling sixty feet above. He looked up at the only image of his father that he had – he's a god so of course he wasn't going to visit him in person, he was much too busy and much too important - and he began to pray to his father. He asked for strength in the coming battles, and hoped he would be able to best Atlas for long enough as to get him back under the weight of the sky. He prayed for his companions, and he asked Jupiter to protect them, as well as him.

When he was had some remote thought that his father might have heard him, which he thought was unlikely, and even less likely would be the fact that he would grant Kurt's prayer, he stood up, stretched, and left for the armoury, but on his way out, he was pretty sure he could hear thunder, even though the skies were clear. He smiled, and hoped it was a good sign.

Walking down the hill, he went through battle scenarios in his head, thinking about what kind of attack his team could pull off, and trying to gauge how the Titan would react. He did this alot before fights, and it gave him a good idea of how to win and by doing exactly this, he usually did. But, he reasoned, this would be more or less impossible because he didn't know how many monsters were with Atlas, and he couldn't plan for every single scenario. So he shrugged, and decided to plan once he had a line of sight on the opposition.

Entering the armoury, he headed straight for his armour that he kept in a locked chest under the armoursmith's workbench. He opened the lock with the key he had around his neck, flipped the lid open, and pulled out his layer of padding. The armour wasn't like normal Roman armour – it was special, and it was hard and it had some sharp edges and corners, so he had to wear a layer of padding when he wore the armour, to make sure it didn't hurt him – or worse. He took his trousers and top off, and slid the padded all-in-one suit on. He then pulled the chestplate on over his head. This plate was special – it wasn't like any other armour. It consisted of a plate to protect his chest, but not his stomach, as he had another piece to do that. There was another plate that protected his right shoulder, and a smaller one for the left. He pulled on the pauldrons next, the leg armour that was embedded with multiple spikes on the knees and feet, so any kick or knee attack would do extra damage, and it also prevented any giant monster taking a bite out of him, as the spikes would impale themselves on the inside of its mouth, hopefully rendering the monster in immediate pain. The spikes were sometimes poisoned if he was looking for a stealthy kill in a hard fight. He had coated the spikes in poison the last time he fought a drakon – and was possibly one of the best ideas he had ever had, since the drakon tried to bite him in half. The poisoned spikes obviously stopped this from happening, and the drakon was dead a minute later, so he always carried a vial of the poison around with him when he wore his armour so he had it readily available to use if the same kind of thing ever happened again.

The next piece he pulled on was the left gauntlet. It was one solid plate that ran from his wrist to the elbow, longer on the underside where it protected the elbow, and it came to a sharp point at the end, as well as having several spikes on the forearm. He fitted the metal cestus for his left hand, finished with some metal spikes on the knuckles, and sharp, almost taloned fingers. He then pulled on the righty armguard, which consisted of a plate to protect the upper arm and a plate to protect the forearm. There was an extra plate on this arm because it was his main sword arm, so he reckoned it needed more protection than the other, because he could wield his greatsword with just his right hand, but he couldn't wield it effectively with the left hand. The forearm plate was done in the same fashion as the left, as was the metal cestus he then pulled onto his right hand. He then clamped his metal sheathe over his stomach, which held his daggers and gladius on the front and had a metal combat sheathe for his greatsword on the back. The entire thing, sheathes included, was made of metal so it could protect his stomach, and was also fitted with a few spikes, in case a monster decided to get too friendly. The final piece of armour he put on was his helmet, which was almost the standard plumed helmet that all the other Roman demigods wore, apart from the spikes on the forehead and at the back of the head.

Every piece of his armour was designed solely for brutally fighting for his life, and it enabled him to use almost every piece as a weapon. Every piece of his armour was made from celestial bronze, because that metal could kill monsters, whereas mortal metals, like steel and iron, could not. As you would expect, when he was wearing his armour, he was a deadly, unstoppable force on the battlefield.

When he had strapped all his armour in place and put his weapons into their sheathes, he left for the exit to the camp where he would meet his friends and secure their transport.

He found his friends waiting for him, armoured and ready, next to the main gate with a black SUV. He knew that the camp owned some mortal cars for fast transport, as they were useful for going over land, but he'd never been in one himself. If he hadn't been in plenty of life or death situations, he'd almost be excited. He waved to them as he approached, and they walked over to him.

"I've always admired that armour" Sandy said with a wry smile, patting him on the shoulder, careful not to touch the spikes.

"Sorry Sand, it's one of a kind," Kurt said with a smile and a wink, and got into the passenger side of the SUV.

"So who's driving?" he asked out of the window. They all piled into the SUV, Brady in the driver's seat. Brady was 17 and was the only one of them that had a mortal driver's license, so it made sense for him to be driving.

"So where to, boss?" Brady asked, winking in the rear-view mirror.

"Mount Tam" Kurt replied, straight-faced. That killed the mood in the car. Kurt figured that they were psyching themselves up for the coming battle.

"Alright, let's go!" Brady cheered, before stamping on the accelerator, sending them shooting out of the camp.

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