14. Underworld Demolitionist

My Kyuubi clone was still destroying anything and everything around it as it held off the veritable army of monsters and security forces that was now up against it as we made our way to Hades' palace. I wondered how long it would take for Hades himself to come out and deal with the supposed creature. Considering the ongoing battle between the clone and the forces of the Underworld was now reaching the hour mark, I was kind of surprised he hadn't yet. Of course, the only way I knew that was because the strongest feeling of power was still in the palace, a power that was similar to what I had felt from Ares back in Detroit.

As we came within half a mile of the palace, I paused for a moment and calmly collected the needed natural energy for sage mode. As my pupils became bar shaped and red pigment surrounded my eyes, I verified that the strongest presence in the area we were in was in the palace and not fighting my clone. I gained a grim smile on my face when I picked up my mom's presence right next to said god. It seemed that Hades was expecting me.

Still grinning, I said "It looks like Hades is waiting for us. Let's not keeping him waiting. But first, Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Sixteen clones came in existence surrounding us in a diamond formation of four teams of four, all already in sage mode, startling Annabeth and Grover as they jumped from their sudden appearance. Honor Guard in place, we continued moving towards the palace. As we got closer, more details of the palace began becoming visible.

The parapets nearly reached the ceiling of the underworld and had numerous bolt holes where someone could shoot anything from a long bow to a RPG out of. The outer walls of the fortress glittered black, and the two story-tall bronze gates stood wide open. Up close, I saw that the engravings on the gates were scenes of death. Some were from modern times-an atomic bomb exploding over a city, a trench filled with gas mask-wearing soldiers, a line of African famine victims waiting with empty bowls-but all of them looked as if they'd been etched into the bronze thousands of years ago. It made me wonder if they were prophecies that had come true.

Inside the courtyard was the strangest garden I'd ever seen. Multicolored mushrooms, poisonous shrubs, and weird luminous plants grew without sunlight. Precious jewels made up for the lack of flowers, piles of rubies as big as my fist, clumps of raw diamonds. Standing here and there like frozen party guests were garden statues of children, satyrs, and centaurs, all of which were smiling grotesquely. I frowned at the sight of them, recalling one obscure legend which said that Hades had once bought some of the people who Medusa had turned into statues in order to decorate his garden for Persephone. Looked like it wasn't just a legend after all.

In the center of the garden was an orchard of pomegranate trees, their orange blooms neon bright in the dark. "The garden of Persephone, keep walking." Annabeth said.

I understood why she wanted to move on. The tart smell of those pomegranates was almost overwhelming, especially with my advanced sense of smell that seemed to have carried over from my previous life. I had a sudden desire to eat them, but I remembered the story of Persephone. One bite of Underworld food, and we would never be able to leave. I pulled Grover to my side when he gave a particularly big and juicy looking one a hungry look.

We walked up the steps of the palace, between black columns, through a black marble portico, and into the house of Hades. The entry hall had a polished bronze floor, which seemed to boil in the reflected torchlight. There was no ceiling, just the cavern roof, far above. I guess they never had to worry about rain down here.

Every side doorway was guarded by a skeleton in military gear. Some wore Greek armor, some British redcoat uniforms, some camouflage with tattered American flags on the shoulders. They carried spears or muskets or M-16s, depending on their time period. None of them bothered us, but their hollow eye sockets followed us as we walked down the hall, toward the big set of doors at the opposite end. Two U.S. Marine skeletons guarded the doors. They grinned down at us, rocket-propelled grenade launchers held across their chests.

"You know," Grover mumbled, "I bet Hades doesn't have trouble with door-to-door salesmen."

Me and my clones all snorted at that before I turned my head towards the skeleton on the right since it's rank markings on the shoulder of its uniform was higher than his partner and said "I request an immediate audience with Hades."

A hot wind blew down the corridor, and the doors swung open. The guards stepped aside and we walked into a vast throne room that continued the theme of the palace with black marble walls and bronze floors. The throne was made out of human bones and sitting on it was Hades himself. Next to his throne was my mother, covered in a cloud of energy that all of us currently in sage mode could tell was Hades power keeping her in stasis.

Hades might have been the third god I'd met, but he was the first to actually strike me as godlike with just his presence alone. Ares and Dionysus gave off a sense of power without trying, but Dionysus had had to really ramp it up for that sense of power to be considered that of a god in my book since I had been in the presence of Kami and she had had to ramp it WAY DOWN for me to even be in her divine presence. I could tell that Hades on the other hand, wasn't even trying. He was currently at least ten feet tall, for one thing, and dressed in black silk robes and a crown of braided gold. Said silk robes had shadowy faces in the folds of them, faces of torment, as if the garment were stitched of trapped souls from the Fields of Punishment, trying to get out. His skin was albino white, his hair shoulder-length and jet black. He wasn't bulked up like Ares, but the sense of power he radiated without a thought of it was easily five times stronger than Dionysus' when me and the wine god had our stare down of doom three days ago. He was currently lounging on his throne of fused human bones, looking lithe, graceful, and dangerous as a panther.

Of course, that did nothing to take away from the rather pissed off look he had on his face as he stared straight at me while my clones shifted formations to allow Grover and Annabeth to stand in front with me a few steps ahead of them while they formed two lines of eight behind us. "You are brave to come here before me, Son of Poseidon," He said in an oily voice. "After what you have done to me and my realm, very brave indeed. Or perhaps you are simply very foolish."

I snorted before I sent a cold glare at the god and said "What I have done? I would never have come here if you hadn't kidnapped my mother. Everything I have done while down here was in retaliation for what YOU did first! You steal someone who is under MY protection and expect no consequences for your actions?" My chakra flared as my Killing Intent suddenly skyrocketed, my form shifting to that of my century old one as I said "I am a Shinobi of the Elemental Nations Hades! And I do not take people attacking me and mine lightly!"

Hades looked startled as my form shifted for the briefest moments before he snarled as he lurched to lean over the edge of his throne and exerted his own version of Killing Intent as he growled out "I wouldn't have kidnapped her if you hadn't stolen from me!"

I blinked even as I kept my Intent up and said "What in the name of the Shinigami's old wrinkled balls are you talking about? Before you stole my mother, I had absolutely nothing to do with you."

"Don't lie!" Hades roared and the throne room shook with a tremor so strong, they probably felt it upstairs in Los Angeles. Debris fell from the cavern ceiling as doors burst open all along the walls, and skeletal warriors marched in, hundreds of them, from every time period and nation in Western civilization. My clones immediately formed a protective ring around Grover and Annabeth with me outside of their protection, not that I needed it, as they lined the perimeter of the room.

Hades continued yelling as he said "You were the thief on the winter solstice. Your father thought to keep you his little secret. He directed you into the throne room on Olympus. You took both Zeus' Master Bolt and MY Helm of Darkness. And now you have the nerve to come here into my domain, you unleash that monster on my land, and now you stand here before me threatening me?! I ought to kill you where you stand boy! Instead I'll give you an ultimatum, return my helm or I'll completely stop death."

My killing intent flared even higher as I shouted "I don't know what Zeus and your problem is, but for the hundredth time, I did not steal no stinking bolt and I sure as Log didn't steal your stinking helm! Now give me back my mother or I will flood the Underworld with the ocean that is above us, that is MY ULTIMATUM!" Behind me, Annabeth and Grover shook with fear as our two Intents battled for dominance. Each of my clones raised their hands in front of them in preparation of performing jutsu as the soldier skeletons around us shifted, taking one step forward making their weapons ready.

Hades rose from his throne, towering to the height of a football goalpost as he shouted "You dare to continue this charade of innocence?! You have the Master Bolt with you right now! I sensed it upon your arrival into my domain!"

I snorted and said "I find that highly unlikely considering the fact that I would have noticed having a bomb that could eliminate entire countries somewhere on my person."

"Oh really, well if you are so certain, then open your back pack." Hades said coldly as he sank back to his previous form and sat back down on his throne.

"I'll do one better, and let you open it." I said before I shrugged the pack off and tossed it at Hades. Hades caught the pack with a sneer before he looked down and opened the bag. His eyes widened when he saw that the only thing in it was the thousand dollars and map showing the location of the entrance to his domain. Snapping his head up while throwing the pack on the floor in anger, he shouted "Where is it?!" His arm began reaching for my mother as he said "If you don't give me the Bolt and my helm in thirty seconds, I will kill your mother! Do you understand me Percy Jackson, where are they?!"

I took one step forward as my Killing Intent reached new heights and I coldly said "As I have said before, I never stole Zeus' Master Bolt, and I certainly didn't steal your helm. Which means that you kidnapped my mother for no reason, and are now threatening her with death for even less. And unluckily for you, I am not just some random half blood from off the street. I am a reincarnated former Jinchuuriki of Kurama, the Nine Tailed Fox, the Sixth Hokage of Konohagakure, and the oldest shinobi to have lived of my generation. In short Hades, in the infamous words of Lucio Baldomero, YOU DONE FUCKED WITH THE WRONG NINJA!"

As I shouted the last part, the clone directly behind me replaced himself with mom's frozen form and slammed the two Rasenshuriken he now had in both hands into Hades' form blasting said Death God through his throne and into the back wall of the throne room screaming in pain as the two orbs expanded slicing into him on the microscopic level. The skeleton army immediately reacted to the attack on their lord, and fired their weapons at us, only for all of the bullets, spears, and arrows to get blown away by the massive collaborative Wind Shield Jutsu that sprung up around my clones and were shredded to dust by my Shredding Cyclone Jutsu. My clones retaliated with Wind Senbon jutsu that turned each skeleton into dust as they shredded the room, leaving it looking like Swiss cheese afterwards.

Hades roared in pain and rage as he stood up from where he had collapsed against the rubble that was the remains of the back wall. A massive tremor formed in response to his anger and I knew that up above us the people in Los Angeles were not going to be having a good day. Growing back to his massive size from before, Hades glared down at us and said "You dare to attack me?! You shall endure the most horrible torments in the Fields of Punishment for eternity for your actions!" A veritable hoard of lethal wind jutsu was the response and Hades shouted in pain as seventeen A and S ranked jutsu slammed into him, hurling him through the rubble of the back wall and through the next three walls behind that.

As Hades fell to the ground with another, much smaller tremor, I turned my head towards the ring of clones and shouted "Someone tell your brother to poke a few holes in the roof!" Turning back forward, I blitzed through hand signs and shouted "Wind Style: Grand Wind Dragon Horde Jutsu!" The air above us howled as seven Grand Wind Dragons came into existence. Hades began stumbling back to his feet, massive wounds bleeding golden ichor, but looked up when all seven dragons roared their might to the heavens before they launched themselves at the god, slamming into him one after another drawing a further roar of pain as each successive hit threw him back even more, destroying even more walls before the last one threw him through the last wall of the Palace and out into the surrounding area.

As he struggled to get to his feet, we all heard my Kyuubi clone shout out "Wind Style: Wind Senbon Jutsu!" I looked up in time to see Ten Wind Senbon longer than four double decker buses put together slam into the ceiling of the Underworld and continue upwards as they burrowed up all the way to the ocean above us. There was a distinct popping sound as my clone dispelled, having used all of his chakra in that last attack, and I flinched as the memories of fighting off Hades' army for an hour assaulted me.

I was drawn out of the potential migraine that caused by Hades' voice as he shouted "What have you done?!"

There was a large rumbling in the area as I shouted back "Exactly what I said I would since you wouldn't return my mother!" Immediately following my statement, water poured out of the ten holes above us, each new waterfall slamming down with the force of hundreds of combined fire hydrants. The closest one slammed down on the outside wall of the palace and began turning said palace into even more rubble as it tore the walls apart.

As the water burst through into the throne room, it circled around my clones as they manipulated it to form an air bubble around them. As the water came towards me, I shifted back into my Percy Jackson form as I took a running dive into it and began manipulating it as I swam against the raging current, the clone who had hit Hades with the two Rasenshurikens joining me and helping me drag the air bubble the other clones had made with us as we moved towards the downpour of water. I heard Hades give another bellow of rage through the water before we reached the waterfall. Moving into the center of it, I manipulated the water underneath us to shoot us up the fall like an elevator at a good fifty miles per hour while my clone kept the bottom of the air bubble solid.

We briefly passed through the rock that had once kept the water of the Pacific Ocean out of the Underworld before we came out in open ocean, still rising. We shot towards the surface of the ocean that was glittering with sunlight and within five minutes we were within two hundred feet of the surface. Once there, I slowed our speed down from fifty miles an hour down to five and our progress became a crawl.

Then we breached the water, the air pocket surrounding Grover and Annabeth looking like a giant bubble in a sheet of bubble wrap before it popped sending water out revealing Grover and Annabeth being held on top of the water by two of my clones who were water walking and had the two riding piggy back style. Grover and Annabeth were staring at me in shock as Annabeth stuttered out "Y-you actually flooded the Underworld. Do you have any idea what Hades is going to do to you?"

I snorted and said "I did tell him I was going to do that if he didn't return mom. I believe I told you on the flight here that the amount of damage done to the Underworld was completely up to if Hades cooperated or not."

I turned my attention to where another clone held my mother in a bridal carry and I was quick to walk over to it. Seeing that she was still frozen and covered in a golden shell, I frowned and said "I had been hoping that all that damage Hades took would have broken whatever kind of magic he had put on her." Placing my hand over her heart, I muttered "I hope this works." I then pushed some of the natural energy out of my body and into the barrier disrupting its integrity. The shell flared for a moment before there was the sound of shattering glass as it burst apart into golden dust.

Sally's eyes snapped open and she gasped in a large amount of air. She turned her head in a panic before she gained a confused look when she took in the sight of me and my clones standing on the surface of an ocean keeping her, Grover, and a girl she did not know above it. Turning her head to look back at me, who she correctly assumed was the original, she flinched at the sight of my sage mode eyes even as she said "Percy? What's going on? The last thing I remember was us being at Camp Half Blood."

I had a relieved smile on my face as I said "You were kidnapped mom. But don't worry, the one who did it is currently dealing with his realm being flooded. I'll explain more later, but for right now, we need to get back to shore."