Zane Williams and The Gods of Olympus

by thesuperone342

Ever felt like Jason Grace is a complete disappointment and a failure to what a son of Zeus should be? Ever feel like Thalia was a waste and was thrown away too quickly? Well, this is the fanfiction for you. Join Zane Williams on his quest to be the strongest. Current Arc: The Last Olympian. Yaoi. (Anime Elements/AU) [Bad First Chapter, Needs Rewrite]

54. The Final Battle: Part Two

Okay, y'all, it's finally here. The true final battle. This fic has been over two years in the making so far, although I really should at least be halfway through HoO by now. I'm so far behind lmao. I keep making false promises, which is something I've been doing a lot the past year or so of my life. I'm trying to turn everything around, so the least I could do is actually have a legitimate schedule for this story, so I'm going to at least attempt to go back to weekly uploads like how I was when I first started (DIDN'T HAPPEN LMAO). Anyway, let's finally get into the final showdown, but first, some reviews.

Mr. Reader: "I'm not going to lie. This chapter had me at the edge of my metaphorical seat. Zane defeated Luke and then you leave us with a massive cliff-hanger. I'm under the assumption Zane is going to survive this, but maybe he won't. 10/10. Excellent work, mate."

Response: Thanks for the review, bro. Don't worry about the cliffhanger, it didn't take three months for this chapter to come out this time lmao. On whether Zane survives or not, well, you'll have to see. Hope you enjoy the chapter.

Echoxenvy: "Pretty good chapter man. Good start to the epic final battle between Zane and Luke. Some standout moments were definitely Thalia and Typhon. Thalia getting her Thunder Form and reassuring Zane was a great scene. Shes really the most underrated character in the fic. Zane vs Typhon was awesome becuase it scared Luke lol

Cant wait for Part Two!"

Response: Thanks for the review, man. The final battle is just beginning, and this one is going to blow everything in the previous chapter out of the water. Thalia is going to come back as one of the main characters in the later arcs, so we had to buff her up a bit. Plus, it was a long time coming anyway. Typhon was originally supposed to be a much longer fight, but honestly, I like what I wrote instead. Anyway, hope you enjoy the chapter, man. Can't wait for the next crossover.

Shadowhunter2077: "Glad to hear you're back man, It's really good.
And about the story, it seems that Zane is done with everything like the guy is just waiting for someone to piss him off.
I liked the battle, it shows just how strong Zane has become hell Typhon barely reacted against Zane, it's insane how strong he is now, are you going with GoW power levels to Zeus, if it is yes then it makes sense to how powerful he is in this story.
And I have to give this to Luke: the guy is a persistent bastard, he doesn't know when to quit and just die.
And about Drew is because she always talked about Silena being a traitor but since she redeemed herself she couldn't say more, but now Zane made it clear to everyone that she was a traitor, and no one will be able to tell Drew to quit because it is true."

Response: Yeah man, I'm back, hopefully for good this time lmao. Zane is definitely done by now, but he's going to be even more done with what's coming in this chapter. And honestly, I scale GoW way higher than this fic, which will be much more explored down the line probably in a couple years or so lol. Zane is absurdly strong now, but Luke's even stronger with his finished fusion. Luke hasn't stayed down for the entire story, but now you'll see if he even goes down in the end at all. Lol, Drew is gonna be funny af to write if that's the case lol. Anyway, hope you enjoy the chapter, only one more of TLO after this.

ReaperKurosaki: "This was a pretty good beginning to the final battle. I really liked Thalia overall in this chapter and the Typhon scene. The only thing that feels lacking is the old villains coming back. Pretty much just so Zane's friends have something to do, which is fine, but it would've been cool to have more dialogue with Zane and them. Especially Prometheus, considering Zane somewhat respects him, I was expecting internal dialogue about the two seeing each other again, but Zane just treats him like the same old mustache twirling villain he thought he was before the end of book four. Kinda disappointing, but overall, pretty good chapter."

Response: Thanks for the review, bro. Thalia is back in full force from now on, as she said she was going to leave the Hunt after the war is over. And yeah I'll be for real, the villains were only really there to show off Luke's abilities and give Zane's friends some opponents to fight. And I get you on the disappointment with Prometheus and the villains as a whole, maybe I might go back a change that part, but at the time there was a lot happening in the previous chapter so I felt like it would just bloat the chapter unnecessarily. But I get it. Zane mostly just treated him like he was nothing because he was nothing to him, at least in terms of power. Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter more.

Guest: "I gotta be brutally honest here. As much as I love this story, I think the writing quality is going downhill, especially with the fights. They used to be pretty creative and good, with real weight behind them, but now, it just feels repetitive and bland, and even though the stakes are so much higher, and the fight is between the MC and the main villain, it just doesn't feel like the final battle, nor even worthy of being in the top ten. Like now, every single paragraph is dedicated to describing how each sneeze between the two combatants can destroy the multiverse, or how with one step, they move picoseconds or femtoseconds or whatever, instead of including good choreography and neat ways to find weakness in the opponent. Zane these days feels less like a character and more like some OC a teen decided to create just because he wants them to be able to beat Goku or Superman. It's getting old how much Zane's strength is being shoved in our faces. Like, we get it. He's strong.

I honestly think that this should be the very last arc of the fic. I know you've said you have future plans, but honestly man, with how crazy these power levels are getting, it's not going to make much sense for Zane to be challenged by Gaea or the Giants, or to introduce the HOO characters, considering they'll be leagues weaker than even Nico. Idk it just seems like it's beginning to overstay its welcome man, that's all. I really hope you prove me wrong if you continue though, because I have liked this story for a while, and still do. I just wish the old charm was still around instead of the new VsBattle Tiering system box check lists we're getting."

Response: Alright, I'll be for real, I probably needed to be told this. I've even noticed this myself somewhat, like how all the fights have mostly just become descriptions of destruction and the ever present words 'massive shockwave' are seen over and over. This is honestly mostly because I got really heavy into the power scaling community during this last arc and just wanted things to be consistent with the character's level of power, rather than have a Kratos situation where Kratos struggles to cut down a tree but is like Multiversal in power. I'll definitely start changing this in the future, as honestly I missed the older style fights myself. You'll probably like the next chapter then, as most of that is gone in the real final fight. And I will still definitely be continuing after TLO, but a whole lot is going to be changed for HoO and beyond. Hell I might just say 'fuck you' to HoO and start just writing original stuff after this, but we'll see. But I understand all your criticisms, as honestly I share some of them myself. Anyway, hope this chapter fixes everything for you.

P.S: Superman one shots Zane lmao

FabulousOutlaw58: "Dope chapter man, I can't wait to see the rest of the final battle. The villains coming back was like the Flash Finale only way better.
My only complaint is that Thalia getting her thunder form was really glossed over. Hope that gets more focus in the future. Other than that, 9/10 for sure."

Response: Thanks for the review, bro. I haven't actually seen the Flash finale, the villains coming back was just kind of a spur in the moment thing, but I'm glad you liked it. And don't worry, Thalia's new form will definitely get way more focus in the future, you'll see. Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter.

Jolene0330: "I absolutely love this story I can't wait for the next chapter"

Response: Thanks lol, here you go.

Enough with reviews. Let's blow this pop-stand.

(DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything portrayed here (Except the OCs). If the fact that this is on a Fanfiction site didn't tip you off, you're fucking stupid.)

(000)

Even in Heavenly Thunder Form, I barely had any time to react to what Luke did next.

I briefly saw Luke's multi-colored aura flash, it's power so great it shook the entire universe. I only felt it for a brief moment, yet it affected me immensely. I tried to scramble to my feet, as Luke's power had completely floored me, but I wasn't quick enough. Luke's form blurred with more speed than I'd ever seen in my life, causing me to almost completely miss what Luke did next.

Luke spun around, swinging Aposynthesi in a diagonal arc as he did so. The Heavenly Diamond scythe was coated in a shroud of multi-colored chaotic energy, more power flowing through it than ever before. Before I could even blink, my entire frame was completely covered in a burst of Luke's energy, coating my entire vision an odd, dark blue-black sickly orange hue that nearly blinded me. I tried to strengthen my aura around me, maybe form some kind of shield with my own energy and possibly absorb Luke's power like before.

But it was useless. My little aura guard shattered, causing my aura to temporarily break into a million pieces, but it saved my life. The force of Luke's aura enhanced swing sent me flying, blasting me into the sky and out of orbit within picoseconds. My immense forced movement instantly caused half the atmosphere to evaporate, likely creating some kind of massive hole to space. I tried to stop myself with my telekinetic flight with every single ounce of strength I had with the ability, just barely being able to do so in time to not fly out of the solar system.

I coughed, spitting up several clods of saliva, completely not expecting how powerful Luke's slash was. My vision was blurry, and my entire body ached for a little bit, before soon being mended by my healing factor. I breathed in and out a little heavily, even though I didn't need to as I didn't actually have to breathe. That all happened in the blink of an eye, having been blasted from Earth to orbit in a near instant in my point of view.

Finally recovered, I glanced back at Earth and immediately wished I hadn't. The entire planet was sliced in two and using my aura sense, I could tell every mortal on the planet was dead. On the side of the planet I had been blasted from, the planet was mostly intact, with only my enhanced demigod vision being able to tell it had actually been separated from itself. However, the other side of the planet looked completely destroyed, with Luke's multi-colored aura permeating around the rip. It looked like somehow had punched the planet, but their force only took effect on the other side, causing it to burst like a watermelon.

My eyes immediately widened to the size of dinner plates, looking at the half-destroyed planet I called my home in absolute shock and dread. What…happened? Was that all from Luke's slash? Did he not care about the world he was trying to conquer!? Why did he basically destroy it!? I quickly charged my chaotic aura right back around me, reforming the aura cage that had broken before from Luke's attack. I blasted off back towards where the battlefield was, my immense speed creating a shockwave in space.

I appeared in the skyline where the Battle of Manhattan had taken place, the sky being littered with thousands of rainbow-colored cracks in reality that didn't heal or fade away. My jaw dropped as I saw what was left of the cracked and destroyed battlefield, which was nothing at all. The entire island of Manhattan was completely erased, with a slash in the landscape splitting the earth in half for miles in width. The slash went as far as I could see to the horizon, being deep enough for magma to ooze out the sides of the cut deep in the Earth.

Luke had cut the entire planet in half with a single swing, with the slash's energy starting from here. The entire battlefield was gone, including the Empire State Building and our citadel, completely erased from existence. Everyone…was gone. I couldn't feel the aura of a single person, only Luke's. His multi-colored energy permeated literally everywhere, creating a cloud of orange miasma everywhere in sight, as well as almost obscuring my aura sense all across the world.

D-Did Luke kill all my friends? My entire army was nowhere to be seen, as there was no longer a battlefield to actually be seen on. I looked around in complete panic, unsure of what I would even do if everyone I'd ever known was instantly ripped away from me. The sky above no longer had an atmosphere, giving a clear view to the energy constellations created by me, Hyperion and Percy.

However, I was immediately torn from my thoughts by an immense force constricting around my neck. Quicker than I could even blink, I was immediately slammed into the right-side wall where the planet was split in two, immediately creating a crater in the side and forming cracks as far as the eye could see. The movement felt like an insanely fast rollercoaster, yet the impact didn't hurt in the slightest. When the now decimated world stopped spinning, I saw the one holding me against the wall.

Luke. He had his now massive hand wrapped around my throat, effortlessly pinning me to the wall. Aposynthesi was in his other hand, being loosely gripped as if Luke didn't even think he needed it. I growled at the development, before my sapphire aura exploded around me. The side of the land left from the slash immediately evaporated from the pressure of my aura's power, destroying dozens of miles of the empty rocky hellscape that was once New York City.

Luke's grip didn't even budge a nanometer, prompting me to smash my aura encased gauntleted fists into the side of his armored arm and wrists. Luke's arm once again didn't even move, my punches doing literally nothing to him. I roared at the lack of effect, immediately drawing Thymos and channeling as much controlled destructive power into it as I could. The Heavenly Diamond Morningstar lit up like a Christmas tree, being surrounded in sapphire aura and lightning.

Luke immediately let go of my throat and his right hand gripped around Aposynthesi tightly, finally allowing me the ability to move. I lunged towards Luke at full speed, moving hundreds of tredecillions times faster than light, swinging Thymos directly at Luke's jaw. Luke, faster than I could even follow, smashed the tip of Aposynthesi against Thymos, creating a monumental impact. The shockwave was powerful, so powerful that many universes would probably be affected by the force.

Thousands of reality cracks appeared around us, all of them in a small, condensed space rather than spaced out like before. I did my best to contain the force with my telekinetic barriers, trying to save what was left of Earth, but the shockwave was immense. My telekinesis failed, allowing the shockwave to travel all over the planet only somewhat mitigated. The force likely leveled everything left on the surface for miles, definitely killing anything that might have survived Luke's earlier slash.

I was sent flying back thousands of meters from the epicenter of the clash, grunting at the sheer speed of the forced movement. I ended up in the skyline once more, overlooking the destruction of what was once the greatest city on Earth. The ground had been even more decimated by the swing, almost completely shaving off what was left of the crust. Magma poured from almost everywhere in sight, only leaving small islands of rock and brimstone. The landscape literally looked like Hell.

Luke appeared before me almost ten meters away, allowing me to get another look at him. Like I stated before, Luke was easily over ten feet tall now. He wore the same armor he'd been wearing since Atlas' Mountain, only it was an orange bronze color rather than a normal one. He wore a dark orange cloak around his neck and shoulders that fell onto his heels, one similar to his previous dark brown one. His hood was pulled down, allowing me to see his now completely non-cracked face.

It was jarring, seeing his no longer monstrous and evil look. Luke had been with the cracked skin and bright yellow eyed look for nearly two years, over two years if counting we he first fused with Kronos. He looked like a literal monster, his face looking like it was flaking off and his yellow eyes filled with unnatural power. Seeing Luke's face now back to normal, almost human looking if you didn't count the bright yellow eyes he still had, would have brought back some memories.

However, none of that was anywhere close to on my mind at the moment. The immense destruction of the battlefield plus the damage to the planet and lack of my friend's auras had me in the most frantic state I'd ever been in. Luke couldn't have just killed all of my friends, all of the gods and everyone on the entire planet in a single attack. I couldn't believe it, no, I refused to believe it.

Luke likely saw the panic and dreadful desperation all over my face, as he let out a deep chuckle. "So, you survived. I intended to kill all living beings on the planet with that attack, but of course you of all people would be left." Luke glared at me, the smirk leaving his face for the first time, like I had insulted him or something. "You're like a cockroach. No matter what I seem to do, you always find a way to prevail, to keep going." Luke's brow furrowed and his right hand gripped his scythe. "That ends…now."

I felt myself go cold at Luke's words. Luke…killed everyone. Not only had I seen the aftermath of the attack and felt the lack of life on the planet after it, but Luke also confirmed that doing so was his intention just now. Everyone was gone. All of my friends were dead. All of the gods were dead. Everyone on the entire planet was dead, too. I failed literally everyone. I froze, not comprehending anything except for that fact.

Almost immediately, I only felt rage. Not the kind of anger one feels after losing a board game, or even losing a loved one. No, this anger was pure hatred. It was the feeling of absolute fury, the feeling of someone who's lost literally everything in one fell swoop. My brow furrowed in complete fury, as well as my teeth grinding together in rage. I could feel my heart beating out of my chest, as well as my breathing became unstable from the anger.

Finally, I exploded. With a planet shaking roar, my sapphire aura exploded to life around me, dark blue lightning surging all throughout the several dozen meter diameter aura. I drew even more power from Thymos, pushing myself beyond my normal Heavenly Thunder Form. My muscles bulked up a frame or two and the veins around my face, arms and neck became visible, the blood vessels burning a deep dark sapphire blue. The entire color of my aura darkened a shade and the black particles associated with Heavenly Diamond energy increased all throughout my energy cone. Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form, my full power, had erupted.

I already felt the slight strain on both my stamina and my body, the raw power and amount of chaotic energy burning throughout my body almost too much for me to handle. The gap between mine and Luke's strength narrowed, with the new Titan of Time furrowing his brow at the development. Luke was still a lot stronger than me, but this power should even the odds enough for me to maybe get a surprise hit on him somehow.

My already massive dark sapphire aura expanded even more, now reaching hundreds of meters in diameter. "LUKE!" My rage hit a peak, almost reaching the same level of anger I had when Taylor died. Reality buckled at my power, with the destroyed wasteland around us getting even more distorted. The lava mostly overflowing what was left of Earth's surface started to make odd images, with repeating, reality breaking patterns being able to be seen all over the hellish landscape.

Dark sapphire lightning danced around me light a supercharged tesla coil on steroids, being present every few inches in my giant aura. Power seeped out of me, so much power that it could have blinked away Luke and his entire army when they arrived on the shore earlier, including Typhon. I wouldn't have even needed to attack them if I went all out from the beginning. I could have breathed to destroy them. And because I held back, everyone I knew was dead.

I growled at the thought, my aura bursting with even more life and power. My muscles started to strain at the amount of raw I was emitting, as if it wasn't strong enough to withstand its own power. I wasn't in any danger of it damaging my body, but I was certainly not used to this heighted Heavenly Thunder Form just yet. The form's power was immense, yet I could already feel the stamina drain. I had maybe fifteen minutes in this form, much more time than the previous time I used it.

Luke looked at my immensely powerful display with a serious expression. Luke could effortlessly take me out while I was only in regular Heavenly Thunder Form, but drawing even more power from Thymos would remedy that. I pointed Thymos at the traitorous Titan, aura and lightning surging from the Heavenly Diamond weapon. "YOU ARE GOING TO PAY FOR WHAT YOU-!"

My vengeful words were interrupted by one of the most immense forces I'd ever felt slam into the side of my left temple, completely shutting me up in a near instant. Faster than I could even perceive, I was sent blasting down to the hellscape below. I slammed onto the surface of one of the few islands in the lava hellscape of the ruined planet, creating a crater and sending cracks throughout the entire isle of brimstone.

All that power, the power that could destroy the entire Titan army with just its presence, vanished in an attosecond. Whatever the hell hit me struck me so hard that it caused me to completely lose concentration and control over Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form, causing it to dissipate immediately. The form was gone before I even hit the ground, the force having knocked me out of it in a near instant.

My vision was blurry, and my ears were ringing, causing me to only see a shroud of dark orange fog created by Luke's energy miasma in the atmosphere. My head pounded; my entire consciousness completely rattled by the immense blow. I tried to push myself up on my armored elbows, only for an immeasurable pressure to slam into my spine.

"RAAAAHHHH!" I roared in complete agony, feeling my entire skeletal structure from my chest downturn into dust. The most horrible crunching sound erupted from my body, sounding like a wet glowstick being torn apart a million times at once. My armor was still intact, but the metal unfortunately didn't stop the force of the blow from traveling through and destroying my entire body.

I had landed face down but was quickly spun around onto my shattered and destroyed back almost as soon as the force crushed my body. My healing factor tried to take effect, slowly but surely knitting my bones back together. But it didn't matter. To heal the insane number of broken bones I now had, it would have taken minutes to fully heal. But whatever could knock me out of my full powered state in a single hit didn't need that much time to kill me.

As my vision came back, I saw the sight of Luke standing above me, his smirk now firmly back on his face. "You are beneath me now, Zane." Luke's smirk turned into a full-on grin, and he let out a cackle of insane laughter. "HAHAHAHAHAHA! YOU ARE NOTHING, ZANE! I FINALLY WIN! HAHAHAHAHA!" Luke completely lost it; his face filled with complete sadistic glee. "There's nothing you can do. Nothing can save you this time!" My pounding brain, through the throbbing pain of the temple strike, pieced together that Luke likely stopped time and hit me full force, beating me in a single blow.

You would think that seeing your archnemesis standing over you, having you completely overpowered and defeated would be terrifying, but honestly, it just made me see how pathetic Luke truly was now. He completely had a full on come apart about finally being able to truly defeat me, as if doing so brought him the greatest ecstasy. He looked so proud of himself, as if destroying the planet all to defeat a teenager who embarrassed him was actually a great accomplishment. It was sad, almost.

I didn't voice any of these thoughts, as my lungs were currently slowly having the shattered bone pieces piercing it pulled out of it as I healed. Luke continued to gloat like he was talking to himself in the mirror. "I've taken nearly everything away from you, Zane. Taylor, all your friends, your planet and even your dignity. Seriously, you look so pathetic right now." Luke motioned down at me in disgust, seeing my broken and slowly healing state.

Luke spit on me and then smirked like a sadistic maniac. "Now…to take the only thing you have left..." Luke turned his gaze from my defeated form and up to the orange miasma filled skyline. Energy quickly erupted around Aposynthesi, creating a coat of dark blue, black and sickly orange aura around the Heavenly Diamond Scythe.

Luke turned around faster than I could even perceive, now back in my much slower, now heavily injured and slowly healing base form. Luke swung the scythe twice in an 'x' formation, creating two slashes of energy that almost instantly shredded through the sky. The now atmosphere free skyline shimmered for a brief moment, before shattering with a sound that sounded like a trillion beer bottles breaking. The pocket dimension or dimensional veil that Olympus resided in or under broke completely open.

Olympus could be sent clear as day above the burning, horrific firescape that used to be New York City, the dimensional wall broken open like a window in the sky. The fabric of reality around the slash vibrated constantly, swirling with cosmic energies that seeped from the now broken dimension that kept Olympus hidden. Luke looked at the tear through reality in the sky with a grin, before looking back at me. "…your father."

It was only then I realized that my father was still alive. I honestly thought he had been killed by Luke's slash as well, as he was already horrifically weakened by Luke's earlier disembowelment of him almost two weeks ago. Guess Olympus does exist in some kind of pocket dimension space that overlooked New York. I used my aura sense, barely able to focus due to the pounding pain from Luke's early hit to my temple and searched for my father.

Olympus was currently a shitshow. The front gates and a large portion of the massive divine city were completed erased from existence, annihilated by Luke's energy slashes he used to cut away the dimensional barrier. The remaining minor gods and goddesses who were not erased by Aposynthesi's power were running around like chickens with their head cut off, in complete panic due to the devastation.

However, I finally felt the aura of my father, close to the peak of the massive city, barely alive in the main Olympian palace. It was weak, weaker than even an average minor god. The corroding and eradicating effect of Heavenly Diamond poisoning him and slowly killing him. I wasn't sure how long he had left, but honestly, it probably didn't matter anymore, especially if Luke had anything to say about it.

Luke grinned when he saw the realization of his words on my face, the dread starting to imprint on me. Luke really was about to take away literally everything I've ever cared about. He'd already taken my friends, my world and even the love of my life. Now he was about to take away my father. "Now you see what I mean. For the embarrassment you've brought to me and standing in my way for so long, I'm going to take everything from you, Zane. The only thing you'll have left will be your own suffering."

Luke grabbed me by the breastplate of my armor, pulling me a couple feet off the ground. My entire body was still mostly broken, the reconstructing process of my healing factor still not finished, so I couldn't do anything. Not like it would have mattered, since Luke beat me at my strongest in a single blow. "Then, and only then, will you be allowed to die. Although…I could kill you so easily right now. You're completely defeated and helpless. But killing you so simply like this after everything we've been through, all the battles and fights we've had, just feels so…boring." Luke's expression fell after he said the words, almost looking annoyed.

The patented 'evil Luke grin' made its way back onto the new Titan of Time's face. "So, as cliché as you might think it is, I'm leaving you alive. Well, only long enough for me to kill your father. Then, I'm erasing you from existence, too." Luke threw my battered and broken body back to the brimstone of the cracked island. "You can heal up and come to Olympus to watch me kill your father, or I can just find you after he's gone if you're too weak to watch. You die afterwards regardless, so there's no point in running."

Luke's immensely powerful, multi-colored aura flared around his ten-foot-tall form, his grin deepening further. "I'll see you soon, Zane." Luke looked back at the shattered dimensional veil of the pocket dimension, cracking his neck with his open hand. "I've been waiting for this for years…" Luke blasted off into the sky towards the heavily damaged divine city faster than I could even think, immediately vanishing from view with a shockwave that rattled my downed and broken form.

Immediately after Luke vanished, the panicked and terrorized screams of what was left of the denizens of Olympus rung out through the burning hellscape, giving me a solid picture of what Tartarus must feel like. Bright, multi-colored flashes of aura erupted from the dimensional rip, silencing a good portion of the screams. No doubt it was Luke, ripping apart and eradicating the minor gods like animals, taking his sweet ass time, too. He aura blasts and flares were immensely held back, likely so Luke could kill them all slowly. This just made me feel even worse, which right now, was saying something, believe me.

I…failed. That was something I never thought I'd have to realize, something I'd have to swallow. Everyone was gone. Taylor, Percy, Thalia, Arthur, Annabeth, Nico, Young Matt, everybody. All the gods, all my men, everyone on Earth, and now the last ones to go would be my father and the remnant of the minor gods on Olympus, which by now was completely decimated. Luke had won.

That was something I once thought was impossible, even back when he first began his fusion with Kronos. I thought he was just a deluded teenager, tempted by power and the thought of revenge from the Titans. I was only ever concerned with him right after he forged Aposynthesi during my little adventure with Matt, but even then, we still forced him to retreat. This was the first time we had been soundly beaten, and likely the last time, too.

It was all my fault. Literally. I'm not going off on some depressed, self-pitying rant trying to take in all the blame for what happened. No, it truly was all my fault. I could have killed Luke in a single blow before he completed his fusion, even in my regular Thunder Form. Luke and his entire army, including Typhon, were a non-issue. I didn't even need the Grand Army of Olympus there, or even the gods or my friends. I could have beaten them alone. I had them completely overpowered and could have killed all of them with a blink at my full strength.

But I didn't. I was arrogant, cocky and stupid. I played with them, making the final battle more of a spectacle than anything. I embarrassed Luke, wanting him to feel the full scope of my power and his weakness before I erased him. I wanted to break him down completely, take everything away from him and show him true suffering and pain before I ended it. Ironically, it was the same thing that Luke was doing right now, showing that Luke was right all along after all these years. When it came down to it, me and him really weren't that different.

Luke had just been a regular demigod at one point, one who was enraged at the injustice of the gods. It was understandable, because until recently they had been almost completely uncaring and aloof with their children, enough to where it was a regular occurrence for many demigods to be unclaimed by their divine parent. Despite not being part of that group, I still related to them. At the time, I had felt unloved and unwanted by my father as well. If it had been me that Kronos chose to tempt from the beginning instead, I wouldn't have been sure what my answer would have been. Hell, the existence of Sinister Zane out in the multiverse proved that I wasn't infallible in that regard. Honestly, my behavior in the Sea of Monsters was proof enough of this fact.

I felt my healing factor finally knit my shattered bones and obliterated muscles back together, but I made no effort to stand up. I simply laid there, utterly defeated. For the first time in…well, ever, I couldn't do anything. I was helpless, even at my full power. Luke would simply stop time and kill me in a single hit and there wasn't a damn thing I could do to stop him. I wouldn't even bother to go up to Olympus to watch Luke destroy the last thing I cared about, that being my father. I was just going to wait here to be erased.

The sound of nearby lava sloshing around broke me from my thoughts, prompting me to prop myself up on my armored elbows. "Hm?" I grunted in confusion at the movement of the lava, knowing that there couldn't be anything left alive on the planet at this point. But to my immense shock, two humanoid forms emerged from the lava with a burst of energy. "What!?" I shouted in shock, quickly standing to my feet.

As the lava fell away from their forms, I saw both Percy and Nico, actually alive. "Percy!? Nico!? You two are alive!?" I exclaimed in utter confusion; completely sure I felt no auras on the entire planet when I returned after being knocked into orbit. Percy was visibly injured, which considering he had the Curse of Achilles, was shocking. He was covered in cuts and visible bruises and had to be held up on Nico's shoulder to walk.

Surprisingly, Nico was completely fine, not a single scratch on him. Well, he still had the wounds that he took from his earlier battle with Prometheus but had no injuries from Luke's planet destroying attack. Percy was leaning on his shoulder, barely conscious but still alive. "Barely." Nico got out, before coughing up a bit of lava. "Ugh." Nico groaned a bit and wiped his mouth, before laying Percy on the cracked, rocky brimstone close to me. "But he won't be soon enough." Nico said, motioning towards Percy.

I looked at the son of Poseidon in confusion, although I quickly understood once I used my aura sense on him. Whatever he and Nico did to mask their auras was gone now, allowing me to sense Percy's energy clearly. It was heavily weakened and not just from the injuries themselves. I felt chaotic energy, specifically Luke's, imbued into his wounds. Ah, so that's how Percy was hurt.

A small, almost non-existent sliver of hope came to me. The feeling of utter desolation and defeat faded somewhat, now that I knew Percy and Nico were alive. "His injuries have chaotic energy all throughout them." My bright blue aura flared to life around my form, along with my signature lightning cage as I entered my regular Thunder Form. I completely controlled the force of the transformation with my telekinesis, careful not to cause any more destruction than there already was. "I'll heal him."

Luckily, Percy hadn't been hit directly by a Heavenly Diamond weapon, as healing that was impossible, even for gods. The energy itself, while still immensely powerful and capable of erasing things from existence, wasn't as potent as the weapon itself, allowing for healing from things like ambrosia to be possible. I held out an open hand over Percy's downed form, imbuing the son of Poseidon with a small amount of my own aura, which in my Thunder Form was easily enough to fully heal Percy's weakened base form.

The chaotic energy from Percy's wounds dissipated in the form of dark blue-black orange energy fading out of the injuries, as well as said injuries fully healing within seconds afterwards. Percy's aura returned to full strength, and I dropped my Thunder Form, not wanting to possibly alert Luke and have him come right back down from Olympus to kill my only surviving friends. "There." Percy sat up after my singular word, a completely blank expression on his face. "Percy? You good?"

The son of Poseidon didn't say a single word or even look in my direction, but not out of anger or spite like he would have hours prior. No, his face was completely catatonic, not a single expression etched on his face. My own expression became downcast. He probably knew what happened. I turned my head to Nico, "How did you two survive? Luke's attack erased everyone and practically destroyed the entire planet. Hell, it nearly even killed me."

Nico, his expression somber like mine, shook his head. "I'm not even sure. It all happened before I could even blink. One second Luke was laughing like a maniac, the next everything was gone." He looked at Percy, who still was completely silent and staring at the lava covered hellscape. "I think he saved me somehow, but I haven't been able to get a single word out of him. Him being injured from whatever Luke did didn't really help that fact."

Nico looked like he was in a daze but was forcing himself to stay tethered to what was currently happening. "I…" Nico shook his head, obviously lost in his thoughts. "I brought him to the realm that I use for shadow traveling, you know, that swirling darkness one, so that we could hide from Luke after he…destroyed everything." Nico's bottom lip quivered as he finished his sentence, and I could tell he was doing everything he could to not break down crying.

I honestly couldn't blame him, as he was still a child just like I was. I was too defeated to even shed a tear, but that didn't seem to apply to Nico. I wanted nothing more than to bring him into a tight hug and reassure him that everything would be okay but…it wouldn't be. Everything was gone, everybody was dead, and Luke was practically unstoppable at this point.

A tear slid down the son of Hades' cheek and he sniffed but kept talking. "After I felt your aura surge a few minutes ago, I brought me and Percy out of my shadow travel realm, but we were completely submerged in lava. And…well, you can probably guess the rest." Nico was silent after he finished his explanation. A few moments went by, with all three of us not saying a single word.

After only seven seconds, Nico's composure completely broke. He immediately broke down and collapsed to his knees, sobbing his eyes out. It should have been jarring, as I'd never seen the son of Hades cry like this before, but…I was completely numb. That tiny sliver of hope that had come up earlier immediately died and the desolation increased tenfold. I collapsed to my own knees; however, I was completely stone faced, just like Percy was.

We sat there for a couple minutes, the only sounds able to be heard being Nico's crying and the sloshing of the lava covered wasteland. I…didn't know what to do. Even all together, if we all teamed up to fight Luke all at once, he'd slaughter us. I was immensely more powerful than both Percy and Nico combined, so they would basically just be cannon fodder in a fight against the new Titan of Time. Despite all my reality breaking strength, I've never felt more powerless than I do right now.

Eventually, as Nico's cries started to subside into a similar catatonic state both me and Percy were in, said son of Poseidon spoke for the very first time. "I watched her die…" Percy's voice was no more than a whisper, but both me and Nico heard him clearly. "I…tried to save her. A-Annabeth…" Percy looked like he was in physical pain saying her name. "I tried to…m-make a barrier with my energy. It didn't work." Percy looked down at the cracked brimstone, and he started shaking all over.

Nico wiped his eyes and let out a loud sniff, looking at Percy's shaking form with an expression of depressed realization on his face. "I was right behind him before everything happened. Guess that's how I survived." Nico must have only survived due to Percy tanking the force of the blow with the Curse, as well as being hit with the chaotic energy that would have erased Nico. The son of Hades looked at Percy's shaking form, looking concerned as he shook more violently. "Percy…?"

For a second, I thought the son of Poseidon was crying just like Nico had been, but a quick glance at his emotions with my telepathy told me otherwise. I flinched and grunted a bit at Percy's emotions, feeling complete utter rage. More rage than I'd ever felt from anyone other than myself, and that included people like Matt, whose whole shtick was that he had anger issues.

Percy raised his gaze from the ground and up to the shattered dimensional veil of Olympus, an expression of utter fury etched on his face. "Zane…" Percy's utterance of my name made me raise an eyebrow in confusion, also making me worry a little bit. I didn't want to pry further into his mind to know whether he blamed me for all this or not. "…I'm sorry." Percy grounded out, his voice becoming higher than a whisper.

My eyes widened at the completely unforeseen development. What the hell was Percy apologizing for!? It was completely my fault that all of this happened! If I had just gone one hundred percent from the beginning and one shot the entire Titan army, none of this would have ever happened. "What the hell are you apologizing for? All of this is my fault. I should have just killed them all from the beginning!" Anger at myself creeped into my tone.

Percy shook his head, growling in complete rage. "No…it's all Luke's!" Percy nearly shouted, his aura exploding to life around him with a sea-green hue. The force nearly floored Nico and the entire hellscape that used to be Manhattan shook. "If it wasn't for him…none of this would have ever happened!" Percy fingers shifted back and forth between their regular state and pure water, gripped into tight fist. "But…that's not what I was talking about."

I looked at Percy in confusion for what seemed like the umpteenth time today. The son of Poseidon continued to speak, his tone still enraged and his frame still shaking from sheer fury. "Yesterday…I judged you for killing Silena for what she did. For betraying us and getting Taylor killed." My brow furrowed at the reminder, the rage of the event starting to return. "I didn't understand in the slightest in how you could do that."

Percy transformed into his Earthshaker Form, growling as he did so. More cracks appeared all along the hellscape as far as the eye could see, breaking apart the fractured planet even more and sloshing around the lava to the point that massive tidal waves formed. Nico was immediately floored, and I was forced bring up my armored arms in front of my face, the wind pressure from Percy's enraged transformation almost sharp enough to cut my skin.

Percy looked at me, his entire skin now swirling water except for his arms and legs from the elbow and knee down. "…I understand now." Percy balled his right hand into a rocky fist and stared hatefully at it. "Annabeth was erased from existence right before my eyes…and I couldn't do a single fucking thing ABOUT IT!" Percy's shout created a shockwave that reverberated across the entire hellscape. "Everyone was…" Percy whispered to himself.

Percy turned his gaze to me, his aura flaring all around him. "I'm sorry." Percy's voice returned to his normal, less shouty but more enraged tone. "I…was a terrible friend. I didn't know what you were going through in the slightest. I turned on you in your darkest moment." Percy looked out onto the chaotic, lava covered sloshing hellscape. "Well, darkest moment before all this…" Percy motioned to what was once New York City, now replaced by the literal mirror of Hell.

I shook my head at Percy's apology, honestly completely surprised he gave me one at all when I was the one who should have before. "Percy, you don't have a single damn thing to apologize for. Your reaction was completely justified, especially considering I killed one of your best friends." I sighed, the feeling of utter defeat returning. "None of it matters now, though. It's over. We've lost and Luke has won." Percy's enraged eyes widened in shock, particularly to the last three words.

"What!? You're giving up?!" Percy shouted at me, his expression one of complete disbelief. I turned my gaze from him, unable to look the son of Poseidon in the eyes. "You can't be serious! Luke killed everyone we know right in front of us, and we couldn't do a single thing about it!" Percy shoved me in the cuirass of my armor, causing me to smash into the brimstone covered ground on my back. "You, of all people, should be pissed! You shook the entire universe when Taylor died! Where's all that rage now!?"

I pushed myself up on my elbows and sat in a crossed stance on the hellish rock. "Believe me…" My bright blue aura exploded around me in an energy cone that expanded for dozens of meters, completely filled to the brim with my signature bright blue lightning. "It's still here."

The force of my transformation into Thunder Form created a massive shockwave, sending Percy skidding back on the rocky brimstone. Luckily, Nico had already been on the ground and managed to tether himself to it with his shadows, otherwise he would have been sent straight to space. The entire hellscape shook with my power, with the lava being launched into the air and creating massive tidal waves. The entire fractured planet shook for several seconds, the broken pieces of the planet likely being sent hurdling through deep space.

However, the shaking quickly stopped. With a sigh, I dropped my Thunder Form and returned to base, the chaotic hellscape quickly returning to normal. Percy dropped his rocky arms that were covering his face, having been forced to due to the pressure my power had exerted. "But…it doesn't matter. Luke is far too powerful now. He's killed all of our friends, all of the gods and everyone on the planet. And now he's about to kill my father." I pointed to the tear in the dimension veil in the sky.

Both Percy and Nico followed my point, seeing the now practically destroyed Olympus through the tear in the sky. "He's basically killed all the rest of the minor gods up there. The only one left is my father." I reached out with my aura sense, still feeling my father's incredibly weakened aura. He was still alive, although likely for not much longer. Luke's aura was close to his, almost right on top of him. "After that, he's going to erase the rest of us. Even if all three of us teamed up to fight him, he'd kill us easily. It's useless."

Percy turned his gaze from the sky back towards me, his expression one of disbelieving fury. "Luke, your worst enemy and the one responsible for all of this," Percy motioned to both the burning hellscape and the shattered dimensional veil in the sky. "…is up there right now, about to kill your father! You're fully healed, you have both of us to help you and you're just going to…" Percy paused for a second, literally unable to speak through his frustration." …let him die!?"

Rage poured through veins at Percy's words, making it's way on my face in the form of a scowl and a snarl. "I told you, it's USELESS!" I shouted, the force of the yell creating another massive shockwave, although this one was harmless. Percy jerked back in surprise as if he was smacked. I glared at the son of Poseidon, finally done with his shit. "I can't do anything to stop him! He beat me, while I was at full power, in a single fucking hit!"

Percy froze at my words, however, I didn't care and continued to lay into him. "If I could actually do anything, don't you fucking think I would have done it already!? He's so much more powerful than me that it's pathetic! He's stronger, faster and can stop time on top of that! That's not even mentioning his Heavenly Diamond scythe and all his other insane time abilities! I'm completely helpless against him!"

Percy was silent at my outburst looking at me in genuine shock and confusion. I'd never admitted that someone had me completely outclassed to such a degree, or at least I'd never been that frantic and vulnerable about it, to the son of Poseidon. His shock quickly morphed into steely determination, only having been briefly affected by my words.

Percy stared me dead in the eyes, a look of disappointment all over his watery face. "…You're a coward." Percy's words had my jaw on the floor and my eyes wider than dinner plates. Anger started to build up within me, as I was completely outraged at Percy's words. "So what if you can't do anything about it!? You would rather just sit here and lay down for Luke to erase you instead of going out fighting!? The Zane I know would be disgusted!"

Percy's words made me freeze. All the anger towards the son of Poseidon died and I processed his words. Was I being a coward? I knew I couldn't do anything against Luke, he was simply far too powerful. I scoffed and shook my head. "Then the Zane you knew died with Taylor, and everyone else in the world, too." I knew Percy was absolutely enraged right now, especially since Annabeth's death at the hands of Luke pretty much just happened, but he had to see sense. It would be useless to try and fight Luke now.

Instead of going silent and somber like I thought Percy would have, my words made an enraged snarl appear on his face. "If you give up right here and now, that makes Taylor's death for nothing!" Percy's words made me freeze, and anger towards the son of Poseidon quickly burned in my veins. My expression turned visibly angry, but Percy didn't care. "It makes everyone's death for nothing. All the pain and hardship we've been through will be completely meaningless if you just sit here and wait to die!"

I was silent at Percy's words, completely stunned and unable to say anything, seeing Nico to our left watching me and the son of Poseidon argue with a concerned expression on his face. Percy was…right. Everything I've fought for would be for nothing if I just completely give up. I sighed, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. Flashes of the faces of my friends appeared in my mind, as well as the faces of my mom and my father.

For over five years I've fought to gain more power, so I could protect the ones I love most with it. I've killed countless monsters, defeated over a dozen immortals, travelled to other universes, achieved power beyond the gods, almost enough power to be considered in the same realm of my father's power. Or at least beyond the level of most primordials. If I just gave up here and died with a whimper, then Percy was completely right, all of it would have been for nothing.

But what could I even do? Even using Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form, Luke was strong enough to defeat me in a single blow. He could kill me without a single shred of difficulty, and I was completely powerless. "You're…right, Percy. I shouldn't be just giving up, not after everything we've been through to get here." I sighed, letting my armored shoulders slump. "But what can I even do? Like I said, I don't stand a single chance in hell at beating Luke, even with you two."

Percy's angered expression faded somewhat at my agreement of his words, yet his stern look still remained. "It doesn't matter what we can do. We may be overpowered a trillion times over, but it's not the first time. Every single time things have looked bleak, against Atlas on his mountain and against Luke at camp, we've always prevailed. You have always prevailed." Percy looked at me with complete sincerity, an utterly serious expression on his features. "I have a feeling that we can do so again. We just need to try." Percy looked at the hellscape once more. "It's the only thing we can do."

A small fire lit within me at Percy words, bringing me back to all the times it seemed hopeless against an enemy. Atlas, with him being so far beyond our strength that he literally played with us the entire battle, only losing to his own arrogance. Luke, back when he was about to destroy camp after the Battle of The Labyrinth. Hyperion, on multiple different occasions. Right now, even though the stakes are much higher, is no different.

I nodded at Percy's words; an expression of steely determination etched upon my features, along with a smirk. "Heh, when did you end up being the smart one for once?" Percy didn't respond to my quip, with him simply looking at the torn dimensional veil in the sky. I didn't comment on Percy's lack of response, knowing his pain and rage was still fresh. "Right then, let's go erase that fucker from existence or die trying." I turned to Nico. "What do you say, Nico? Ready to go out in a blaze of glory?"

Nico, who had been silent for the entire duration of me and Percy's argument, looked a little uneasy. "I…don't know how much help I'll even be." Nico looked at his hands, his black aura slightly coming to life around them. "I'm not anywhere close to Percy's level, much less yours. I don't even think I'll be able to survive in the vicinity of the fight." Nico's desolate look intensified. "I've been training so hard the past couple of years, doing everything I could to catch up to you two." Nico looked back up to me and Percy. "And now…the gap is wider than ever."

I sighed at Nico's words, completely understanding how he was feeling. I've had feelings of my own very similar to his, in regards of needing Heavenly Thunder Form to even the odds against Luke. But now wasn't the time for that. "Nico," I put a gauntleted hand on the son of Hades' shoulder. "…if you don't want to help us, it's okay. Even with everything at stake, this fight is too much for you. Hell, it's too much for all of us. So, if you want to sit this one out, I won't judge you." To my left, Percy nodded at my words, conveying his agreement.

Nico looked hesitant, likely because both decisions were unfavorable. It was either 'come fight with your friends and probably die' or 'stay here and let your friends fight without you and still probably die.' Not the easiest choice in the world, but it was one that had to be made quickly. "I…" Nico started, seemingly unable to get the words out. "…I'll fight." Nico didn't look too sure of his answer, something I didn't blame him for. "Better to go out fighting than to sit here and have the same thing happen."

I nodded at his words, a somber expression making its way on my face. "Well, at least you didn't need a speech from your best friend to make that decision." I said, a sad smirk making its way on my face. No one reacted to the quip, not that I expected anyone to. I took my hand off Nico's shoulder and walked to the edge of the cracked brimstone isle, looking up at the dimensional tear to Olympus with a serious expression. "Let's do this."

At my words, the three of us blasted off into the sky towards the tear, our blastoff completely annihilating the brimstone isle. I reached out with my aura sense through the tear, finding Luke's aura at the highest point of the now destroyed city of the gods. 'He's at the main palace, in the throne room if I were to guess.' I sent both Nico and Percy a telepathic message as we flew through the dimensional veil, with Percy having to carry Nico by the arm due to his lack of telekinetic flight, unlike me and Percy.

Percy, who was beside me carrying Nico, nodded. 'Right.' Percy sent a telepathic message back of his own, keeping it short and simple. We flew to the palace at top speed, flying above the now completely destroyed Olympus. I glanced at the dilapidated city, seeing every single building either in complete shambles or missing entirely. For once, there were a complete lack of minor gods throughout the city, having been killed by Luke not even five minutes ago. Even the personal palaces of the Olympians had been destroyed, either having been completely erased or simply blown to pieces.

The sight was rather jarring, if I was being honest. Olympus, the legendary city of the gods, was completely decimated. I never, ever, in my wildest thoughts and imagination would I ever see such a sight, not with my father as king. But he had been defeated, crippled and heavily weakened, leading to this. Olympus had been such a symbol of strength and power, that even with all the power I had personally gained, I initially believed it to be untouchable. Seems that's not the case.

The only thing that was still standing was the main palace, the one with the Olympian throne room. Luke's aura burned with power clear as day from the last standing palace, with my father's heavily weakened one being right beside his. Luke hadn't killed him just yet, which was surprising. He must be waiting for me, probably so he could kill Zeus right before my eyes.

The three of us slammed down onto the already cracked and damaged marble flooring in front of the main doors for the palace, cracking and destroying it even more. Percy let go of Nico's arm and drew Riptide from his pocket, quickly shifting it from its pen form to the sword one, an expression of rage on his face. Nico drew his Stygian Iron blade from his sheath, looking really nervous. I pulled Thymos from its sheath as well, already charging the weapon with my aura and my lightning.

Before I pushed the massive doors open, I turned back to Percy and Nico. "Well…here we are. End of the line." An expression of complete sincerity appeared on my face as I stared at both Nico and Percy, looking at the two directly in the eye. "Whatever happens in here, whatever the outcome is, just know that I enjoyed every moment of the time we spent together. Both of you." My words brought a slight smile to Nico's face, yet Percy's didn't change. He was completely focused on his goal, which was no doubt to end Luke.

I turned my head back around and took a deep breath. This could be the last few minutes of my existence, the last thing I'll ever do. I was scared, hell, I was honestly terrified of what could happen the second I opened this door. But now wasn't the time to be a coward, it was the time to face my ultimate enemy. I waved my hand, blasting the two massive doors off their hinges and stepped inside.

Percy and Nico sauntered in behind me, anticipation in every single one of their steps. I scanned the throne room, noting that the seemingly ever-present light that illuminated the Throne Room was gone, creating a shroud of darkness throughout the room, all except in the middle. The thrones were all destroyed, every single one of them either being completely erased or reduced to piles of rock and metal. The Hearth, the fireplace that Hestia once tended to, was out, which was probably why it was dark. Even the constellation covered ceiling was dark, with the stars being gone.

Standing in the middle of the annihilated throne room was Luke, his immensely powerful black-blue, orange aura creating the only light source in the room. Luke held Aposynthesi in his right hand lazily, looked up at the final, undestroyed throne in the room. It was bright silver and gave off the feeling of authority and power. My father's throne.

Speaking of my father, he was on his knees and being gripped by the neck from Luke's open left hand. He was finally awake and conscious, no longer in a coma for some reason. Maybe Luke forced him out of it somehow? Zeus' torso was completely covered in bandages and not by his toga, which he was only wearing the skirt of. He held the Master Bolt in his hand, but the weapon seemed…dim. Dim and even weak. What the hell happened to it?

Luke smirked and turned around from my father's throne to look at the three of us, his sheer presence atomizing the doors that had been blasted in his direction. He still held my father in his left hand, said King of Olympus choking and gargling at the new Titan of Time's grip. "Ah, there you are! Was starting to think you were actually just going to wait for me to come back and erase you."

Luke's eyes moved to Percy and Nico, who walked behind me into the throne room. His eyes widened in confusion and slight shock at the sight of them. "Percy and the son of Hades? You two survived, too? Wow, and here I was thinking that my energy slash killed everyone but Zane. Guess I really need to work on being more thorough whenever I wipe out entire populations, huh?" Luke let out a chuckle at his own stupid joke. "Anyway, you boys finally come to die? To watch this old goat die, too?" Luke motioned to my weakened and injured father, who grunted at Luke's words.

I nearly growled in rage at Luke's words, but Percy beat me to it. The son of Poseidon snarled and growled like an animal at the New Titan of Time. "We're here to make you suffer, Luke!" Percy was already in his Earthshaker Form, as he never left it earlier, but now his aura exploded with even more power than before. I glanced at him with a raised eyebrow in surprise, noting he was almost on par with my Thunder Form again. Guess fighting Hyperion a second time really did wonders for Percy's power, thanks to the Achilles Curse.

Luke looked at Percy with a deadpan expression before immediately bursting into insane, maniacal laughter. "HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Luke literally held his stomach and nearly doubled over at Percy's words, something that just made the son of Poseidon even angrier, causing his aura to flare even more. Luke didn't even notice, or he didn't care. It was still paltry to Luke's new power. "You've always been one to crack jokes, Percy, but that was the funniest one you've ever said!"

Percy was legitimately about to charge Luke right there and then, but I held up a hand. "Wait!" Percy stopped almost immediately at my dire tone, looking at me in surprise. "If you just charge in completely blinded by anger, Luke will just kill you immediately." He'll probably kill us immediately anyway, but I left that unsaid. Percy growled at my words but kept himself contained, knowing I was right. "We need to play this smart if we're to have even a sliver of a chance."

Luke scoffed at my words and smirked at me. "'A sliver of a chance?' he says. Pfft." Luke's aura shifted from a calm, more controlled state to insanely powerful and chaotic in an instant, exploding all around him for dozens of meters. The sickly orange blue-black aura was completely filled with black, chaotic particles and was powerful to shake the universe. "You really, honestly think that you can stand up against this!? The only one who would even have a one percent chance would be Zeus at his full power!" Luke motioned towards my heavily weakened father, who was still in his grip, holding him in the air towards us. "And you can see he is now but a shell of himself!"

All three of us were immediately floored by Luke's aura surge, forcing me to transform into Thunder Form to even stay on my knees. Both Percy and Nico were completely on the ground, unable to even move a micrometer underneath Luke's aura pressure. My knees started to buckle at the pressure, the weight feeling like the combined mass of dozens of universes. I quickly placed my hand on Thymos, drawing chaotic power from it and transferring it into my aura.

My aura instantly shifted into a sapphire dark blue, along with the lightning and the color of my glowing eyes, fully transforming me into Heavenly Thunder Form. Suddenly, the pressure of Luke's power didn't seem so unbearable, but it was still there. I forced myself up to my feet, now able to stand with me being in Heavenly Thunder Form. I lifted my gaze from the ground, and looked back to Luke, but as Luke was holding out Zeus in front of him, I immediately locked eyes with my father.

Time seemed to slow to a crawl, almost becoming frozen in my perspective. 'Father.' I sent a telepathic message to the King of Olympus, knowing for a fact that he would hear me. Quickly, Zeus' groggy and unfocused expression shifted, focusing on me and changing into a sad smile. The image of Luke holding my weak and helpless father like he was nothing but a trophy enraged me, causing my aura to flare up with enraged strength. 'I failed you.'

Zeus immediately shook his head a little, unable to do much as Luke's inescapable death grip was still wrapped around his neck. 'No, son. The only one who failed here is me.' Zeus looked guilty, as if he was thinking about his greatest shame. 'Castellan only became this due to my own neglect. The Olympian's own neglect. Every death caused by him is of no one's fault but my own.'

I shook my own head, my attention completely off Luke and on my weakened father. 'No, Luke did all of this because he was a whiny, weak teenager who only wanted power and glory. Kronos chose him for a reason.' I pointed a thumb at my armored cuirass. 'I could have destroyed Luke and his entire army when he arrived on the shores of Manhattan, but I didn't. I held back and wanted to embarrass Luke. He wouldn't have completed his fusion if it weren't for me.'

Zeus smirked at my telepathic message, as if he was a teacher looking at a student get everything wrong about a question. 'If it wasn't for you, Castellan would have won this war a long time ago. Camp Half-Blood would have been destroyed and the Titans would have had dominion even earlier.' Zeus shook his head as much as he could in Luke's grasp. 'But enough about who is to blame, we don't have time for that.'

Zeus' expression quickly became serious, yet the smile remained regardless. 'Castellan is about to kill me.' Zeus' telepathic message made my eyes widen in shock. I quickly tightened my grip around Thymos and prepared to charge Luke, but Zeus' head quickly shook slightly again. 'There's nothing you can do to save me, Zane. Castellan is faster than you, almost as fast as me at my prime and he can stop time on top of that.'

I looked at my father with the most incredulous expression I've ever had in my life. 'What do you want me to do then!? Just sit here and let you die right in front of me!?' My thoughts were a far cry from what they were just a little while ago, where I was prepared to just lay down and die back on that brimstone isle, as well as let my father die. Now I was willing to do anything to save him.

Zeus' expression turned somber and even a little sad. 'Yes. Trust me, there is nothing you can do. Even if you teleported, Castellan is simply too swift. I am going to die to his hands, permanently.' My father's telepathic message made me look down at the floor, that same desolation feeling from earlier returning. 'Zane.' Zeus mentally spoke, prompting me to look up at him. 'Do not give up hope. No matter how bleak this situation looks, never lose hope. If anyone can overcome Castellan, it is you.'

I stared at my father in shock, unsure of what to make of his telepathic message. 'But…what am I supposed to do!? You said yourself that Luke was too fast, but he's also too powerful! I know you can read my mind, so you must have seen him defeating me in one attack at my full power!' My father's confidence in me confused me to no end. He's millions of years old and has probably been in countless battles. He's gotta know how this fight is going to go.

Zeus simply smiled at my thoughts. 'Remember the prophecy, Zane. It will guide you to victory, and if it doesn't, nothing will.' The prophecy? The one about a half-blood reaching sixteen? How the hell was that supposed to help!? Prophecies don't mean anything! I barely saw Luke's fingers around my father's throat twitch, causing my eyes to widen. Before I could warn my father or do a single thing, the scythe head of Aposynthesi tore through my father's chest.

The blood running through my veins instantly turned freezing cold at the sight, and my eyes widened to the size of dinner plates. No…no, no, no, no, no, no, no! I can't lose anyone else! Not again! Quickly placing my hand on Thymos, I drew even more chaotic energy from the Heavenly Diamond weapon, pushing myself past my normal chaotic form into Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form. My even darker sapphire aura exploded to life around me, along with the darker sapphire lightning cage.

Ichor exploded out of my father's mouth, trailing down his chin and splattering to the ruined marble floor below. Luke quickly pulled Aposynthesi out of Zeus' torso, rearing it back behind him in a swinging motion quicker than I could even blink. Blindly, I charged forwards at full speed, intent on saving my father's life and taking Luke's head off with a swing from Thymos. Dark sapphire lightning and aura flooded through the chaotic Morningstar, with the energy being as powerful as I could make it on short notice.

But it…didn't matter. Before I could even move two inches even moving at tredecillions of times faster than light, Luke swung. Faster than I could even track, the New Titan of Time swiped directly at my father's neck, immediately passing through and stopping in an outstretched position past my father. Zeus' face went slack, and his eyes became wide, nothing seeming to happen for what seemed to be a solid two seconds. Hell, the entire universe seemed to freeze.

It quickly unfroze, as Ichor exploded all from the King of Olympus' neck, all from a very clear and visible golden line from my father's throat. Zeus' hands shot up to the wound, as if he was trying to stop the ichor from spewing out of his neck, but his head quickly slid off his shoulders only a second after. Zeus' severed head hit the cracked marble floor with a squelching sound, joining the pool of ichor below his now headless body.

Zeus' wide eyes met mine, his telepathic presence still within my mind. '…Goodbye…Zane…' Those were the final telepathic thoughts my father had, right before fading away into golden dust. First his severed head faded, then his headless corpse, and finally, the pool of ichor where his head had lain. Zeus was completely gone almost without a trace, leaving behind only the Master Bolt, which laid at Luke's feet.

Zeus was gone. My father was dead, permanently.

Just like everyone else.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" My darker, sapphire aura exploded around me, dark lightning surging although the energy cone in a giant cage around me. Behind me, both Percy and Nico were sent flying, both of them smashing into the walls of the palace and being pinned there by the pressure of my power. The entire Olympian palace shook at my rage, the walls and floors becoming even more cracked and damaged by the second.

My eyes immediately focused on the object of my ungodly fury, the absolute bastard that was Luke. I growled in utter anger like a savage animal, even sending bits of spittle from my mouth. "LUKE!" The power of my aura increased even more, being amplified by my rage. Luke didn't seem to notice, as he still held that same fucking shit eating grin he always seemed to have, only it was wider than it had ever been.

Luke's nonchalance only served to make me angrier, making the urge to completely erase his existence increase a million-fold. "RAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH!" I was so enraged that I couldn't even formulate a sentence, so the only thing that escaped my lips was a guttural roar that created a shockwave that blew away the shattered Olympian Thrones, breaking them apart on the molecular level and leaving the Throne Room mostly empty.

I brought back Thymos into a swinging position, the Heavenly Diamond Morningstar already coated with as much power as I could put into it in a short notice. I charged Luke at full speed, once again moving hundreds of tredecillions of times faster than light, completely blinded by my anger. This attack was pumped with at least four times the power of the attack that clashed with Luke earlier, so it should at least give the new Titan of Time pause.

But even that was doomed to fail. As soon as I reached the former son of Hermes, the new Titan instantly sidestepped my swing, the force and universe-shaking aftereffects of the attack doing absolutely nothing to him. Luke quickly disappeared from my view so fast that it didn't matter if he even stopped time, I wouldn't even be able to tell the difference of the speed. My crazed eyes darted to everything in my line of sight. Where is he!?

Before I could even blink, a barrier of sickly orange, blue-black energy materialized around me. I turned around faster than I could even think, seeing Luke's massive hand outstretched and pointing towards me, containing me within an energy barrier. I slammed my gauntleted fist directly into the center of the barrier, growling when I realized that the strike did zero damage. My fists blurred in and out of sight, punching the energy barrier millions of times within the timeframe of a single Planck time, once again doing nothing.

Luke laughed at my attempts to escape, clicking his now perfect teeth together. "Hehehehe, someone's angry." I growled at the new Titan of Time's words, almost frothing at the mouth out of sheer anger. Luke reared back comically, as if someone had smacked him. "Whoa, I knew putting your weak pathetic father out of his misery would piss you off, but not this much." Luke grinned at me, using the same stupid expression I'd seen on his face for years now at this point.

I slammed Thymos into Luke's energy barrier, channeling as much aura and lightning as I could into the weapon, causing the shield to buckle slightly. Luke's grin faded and his brow narrowed at my progress, which prompted me to draw Thymos back once more. Channeling my rage and fury, I focused even more chaotic energy from my connection with the weapon into it. I drew back the Heavenly Diamond Morningstar, the weapon being coated in so much aura and power that reality around the weapon started to warp, distorting the very image of the weapon in my hand.

But Luke was ready for this. As soon as I slammed my further amped up swing into the energy barrier, the barrier seemed to strengthen tenfold out of nowhere. Luke's sickly orange, black-blue energy flowed from Aposynthesi into the barrier around me, making my own attack from Thymos useless. The Heavenly Diamond Morningstar slammed into Luke's energy barrier, the attack once again doing nothing.

My eyes literally twitched in sheer anger, as did my entire face. "RAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" I swung Thymos into Luke's barrier just as fast as my fists had earlier, again doing nothing. The anger boiling within me reached a new peak, but I couldn't even act upon it. Luke had me completely dead to rights, as I was utterly helpless inside his energy cage. I couldn't even teleport out, as any lightning that struck me would be negated by Luke's energy.

Luke laughed out loud at my visible uncontrollable anger, his entire giant form literally shaking. "HAHAHAHAHA! You're literally like a caged animal! HAHAHAHAHA!" Luke wiped a tear away from his eye as his insane laughter subsided, ending it with what was basically a content sigh. "I told you I'd take everything away from you, Zane. How does it feel?" I simply glared at the new Titan of Time, looking at him with as much hate as I could muster in a single gaze.

Luke almost frowned at my reaction. "Hm, expected you to be a broken, sad mess. Guess you're filled with too much rage for that." Luke's grin returned. "Ah well, no matter. I bet killing the last of your pathetic friends will change that." Luke's grinning gaze shifted from me to the door of the Throne Room, his insane smile widening. "Now about that…"

My gaze followed the new Titan of Time's, finding both Percy and Nico still floored from earlier. Well, Nico was. Percy was finally standing up, looking a little disoriented by no less enraged than he was before. My eyes widened and my immense rage was replaced by intense desperation. "No….don't you fucking touch them. DON'T FUCKING TOUCH THEM!" I slammed both of my armored fists into the barrier uselessly, still trying to escape.

Percy fully stood up and dropped into a fighting stance, not at all intimidated by Luke's disturbing stare. Percy's sea-green aura exploded around him and extended to his sword, Riptide, as the son of Poseidon pointed the weapon towards Luke. "You're going to pay for what you did to Annabeth!" Percy growled at the traitor; his anger was still almost as great as mine. Percy twirled his blade and held it above his head. "Come at me, motherfucker!"

Luke chuckled at Percy's bravado, finding the son of Poseidon's attitude to be hilarious. "You always never gave up, Percy, even if it meant your death. Hell, you've literally died before and Prometheus told me you were determined down to your last moments." Luke appeared in front of Percy's form faster than I could even perceive, either moving with impossible speed or simply stopping time. Luke infused a massive amount of energy into his fist, causing a literal coat of multi-colored energy to form around his hand. "Let's see how you act this time you die."

Before any of us could blink, Luke slammed his aura covered fist into Percy's gut. Luke must have infused chaotic energy into his fist, because the Curse of Achilles did not protect Percy whatsoever. Luke's giant fist and arm tore through Percy's torso like a hot knife through butter, ripping through the front and tearing out through the back, blood exploding from the wound at the same time.

More blood spurted from Percy's mouth as his eyes widened in shock. The son of Poseidon tried to say something, but nothing escaped his lips except more blood. He tried to pry Luke's arm from the giant hole in his body, but Luke was immovable. Luke ripped his arm out of Percy's torso hole, prompting even more blood to spill from the hole and onto the marble floor. Percy's knees shook as he slowly took three steps back, his hands being completely coated red as he uselessly tried to stop the blood from pouring out.

Luke grinned at the red blood on his left arm, before atomizing the liquid with a flare of his aura. Luke's grinning expression fixated on Percy, whose eyes were wide and looking at Luke completely shocked. "I was expecting you to give me a look of defiance or at least spite in your last moments." Percy coughed up a glob of blood, looking at the massive blood splatter it made on the ground with even wider eyes. "I wasn't expecting…fear all over your face." Luke's grin was literally ear to ear now. "I'll make sure to remember that look forever."

Before Percy even could have the chance to say anything or even blink, Luke flipped his Heavenly Diamond scythe into a reverse grip, before slicing through Percy's entire body vertically. Percy froze for a second, his face slack and his body bobbing left to right slightly. Percy's grip around Riptide faded, and the sword dropped to the blood-stained marble floor with a clang.

Percy's body then separated into two, perfect halves and flopped to the floor, completely cut in half vertically. No blood or gore fell from Percy's corpse, the inside of his body having been instantly cauterized by Luke's Heavenly Diamond weapon. Percy's body stayed there for only a second, before completely fading into golden dust and vanishing, just like my father.

I completely froze at the sight, unable to even process what had just happened. Luke just…erased Percy from existence and made me watch. Percy, the guy who was basically my brother in all but blood, just ceased to existence before my very eyes. Rather than my intense anger becoming even greater, I just felt…numb. Even number than before when I thought literally everyone but me had been killed by Luke's planet destroying attack.

Luke looked down at where Percy's body used to be, his grin fading from his face. "Good riddance." Luke spit where Percy's blood once was, blood that faded away when Percy was erased. Luke turned his gaze to Nico, who had been lying on the ground on his stomach watching the entire display with terrified eyes. Nico's expression shifted to one of pure fear, and shadows formed from the ground around his form, showing that he was about to shadow travel away. I really didn't blame him.

Luke instantly appeared behind Nico, slamming his giant boot onto Nico's back. The shadowy tendrils around Nico's frame completely dispersed and Nico's back shattered with a crunch. "AAAAHHHHH!" Nico screamed out in pain, blood and spittle erupting from his mouth. He was quickly silenced by Luke's massive hand grasping around his throat, being lifted off the ground and into the air above the new Titan of Time. Nico's black aura erupted around his form and his eye color shifted from onyx to red, his Shadow Form exploding to life.

It didn't matter in the slightest. Nico's increase in strength was literally nothing to Luke's unfathomable power, Nico slammed his fists and legs into Luke's arm suspending him in the air, his blows literally doing nothing. Luke grinned at Nico's desperation, the son of Hades still futilely trying to escape. Luke reared back Aposynthesi, slowly as to bring out more fear from Nico. "N-No, wait! Don't erase me! Please!" Tears literally streaked down Nico's cheeks as Luke prepared to end him. No…no, not Nico! NO!

Luke's grin simply deepened at Nico's pleas. "Begging? Now that is more like it!" He brought Nico down to his eye level, which was still ten feet above the cracked marble floor. "You know, I normally would imbue my aura deep into your chest and slowly rip you apart from the inside with it, just like I did to a pathetic version of poor little Percy." Luke was referring to that version of Percy he brutally killed in front of me and Matt over seven months ago, causing Nico's already terrified and pale face to only get worse. Nico probably knew the story.

Luke shook his head, his insane grin still plastered on his face. "But you know what? I'll let you die quickly instead. I need to complete my revenge against Zane, and I can always go out and torture infinite different versions of you throughout the multiverse." Luke's grip around Aposynthesi tightened, and his brows furrowed at Nico's choking, begging form. "Goodbye, pathetic weakling."

Nico's eyes bulged out of his head in complete shock and terror, the inevitability of what was about to happen dawning on him fully. "NO! NO, NO, NO, NO, NO! PLEASE, WAI-!" That was all Nico could get out, as Luke swung his Heavenly Diamond scythe straight through Nico's hanging torso faster than either me or the son of Hades could even comprehend. Nico's terrified face froze, and nothing seemed to happen for a solid second.

Then, Nico's form separated into two different halves, his bottom half slumping to the floor almost unceremoniously. There was no red blood, the Heavenly Diamond having cauterized the wound just like Percy. Nico looked down in utter terror at his now separated legs down on the cracked marble beneath him. Nico's horrified eyes then shifted to my own horrified ones, before letting one final noise that was a mix between a gurgle and a grunt. Nico body, both separate halves, quickly faded away into nothing but golden dust, just like Percy and my father.

Everything was completely silent after the son of Hades' corpse faded away, neither me nor Luke speaking. I looked at the spot where Nico had been, completely silent and numb. Nico…was gone. Erased from existence. Just like Percy, just like the rest of my friends and just like the rest of life on the planet. It was all gone.

Luke…had taken everything away from me, just like how he said. No matter how hard I fought, no matter how much power I had gained in the past few months in anticipation of fighting him, I came up short. Luke had grown too powerful, something that was no one's fault but my own. Screw what my…father had said before he died, this was all on me.

Now, I felt true defeat and desolation. Not the feeling I felt earlier on that brimstone isle, but a completely new and utterly worse one in every way. At least back then I had some time before Luke actually completed what he said he was going to do, now I didn't even have that. The new Titan of Time had ripped everything away from me right before my eyes and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it the entire time.

Every single battle I've ever had, every single struggle, every single happy moment, every single memory I've ever lived through and experienced was now made pointless. They had never truly mattered, as we were only going to die in the end anyway, but it was made even worse now. Every other time I've been able to prevail no matter how bad the opposition became or how high the stakes rose, but not this time. This time, I was defeated.

'If you give up right here and now, that makes Taylor's death for nothing!' Percy's earlier words, the ones he spoke before we flew up to Olympus to convince me to continue fighting, rung through my mind for whatever reason. But Percy had been wrong. Taylor's death was for nothing regardless of whether I fought or stayed back down on that isle to die. It wouldn't have changed anything, likely only prolonging the rest of my pathetic, miserable existence.

It didn't matter, nothing mattered anymore. The entire universe was decimated, the entire Earth was as well, and that wasn't even counting all the friends Luke had erased. Luke had won and he would now be able to terrorize the rest of existence after he cleaned up whatever was left of this reality. Like I said before, it's over.

Even if I wanted to resist, to continue fighting the new Titan of Time after what he had done, it was pointless. I couldn't even do a single against Luke, as he had me completely overpowered, completely outmatched and completely overwhelmed. No ability, power or weapon I had at my disposal could deal with Luke. Either he was too powerful for them to work or was simply too fast for me to hit him. And even if none of this was the case, I had nothing left to fight for anymore. Everything was gone.

'That's not true.' A voice, not a memory, spoke through my mind as soon as those previous thoughts finished. What? My eyes quickly darted around the destroyed throne room, looking for the source of the sound. Luke's form seemed to be frozen, as I was still within my mind and he seemed to be taking his sweet as time, not moving at super speed. Who…was that? It sounded beyond familiar and brought feelings of safety and security to my soul. Did I imagine that?

'No, you didn't.' The voice rung out through my head again, almost causing me to jump inside Luke's energy dome. Wait, I wasn't imagining this? But everyone on the planet was dead. Hell, everyone in the universe was probably dead at this point, too. 'Who are you?' I asked back with a telepathic message of my own, not actually sensing another mind commune with mine.

'You already know.' Suddenly, memories of the past five years assaulted my consciousness. Memories of training in the Arena with Luke at camp, memories of the bonfire and looking up at the sky to observe the constellations, memories of my cabin and laying on the bed reading comic books, memories at the pavilion eating with my friends. Everything pleasant over the past five years played through my mind and they all had one constant in them. A red-haired son of Ares who I was in love with.

My eyes widened and even teared up somewhat. 'T-Taylor!?' I telepathically sent in complete shock, unable to even believe that he was speaking to me. 'Yes.' The son of Ares' voice rung throughout my mind once more, causing the tears to actually leak down both my cheeks. 'You're…actually speaking to me.' I closed my eyes and shook my eyes, trying to keep even more tears from spilling out. 'Taylor! I'm so sorry! I should have been able to save you!'

I tense in anticipation of Taylor's next message, terrified whether he would yell and scream at me for failing him or just not respond again whatsoever. But Taylor's next message surprised me. 'Zane, you have nothing to apologize for. My death wasn't your fault. But that is beside the point.' My focus was, seemingly against my will, shifted to Luke's seemingly frozen form. 'You can't give up against Luke, Zane. More than you could even imagine is depending on you.'

The warmth and security that Taylor's voice brought me faded somewhat as his frank words brought me back to reality and out of the little happy daze I went into for a little bit. 'I…can't win, Taylor. Even if I didn't give up and tried with absolutely everything I had, it would still end up the same way. I don't even think I could even summon up any rage no matter how angry I should be. I'm just…numb. I can't even break out of this fucking barrier!' Surprisingly, some anger built up within me at the thought of how useless I felt being stuck.

Taylor must have noticed, because he quickly pointed it out. '"Can't summon up any rage?" Then what was that?' I was silent at Taylor's message, unable to even formulate a beginning of a response. 'Zane…I know seeing everyone die around you and being unable to do anything about it has affected you. You can't even imagine how much it breaks my heart seeing you like this, broken and tired.' I looked down at the cracked marble floor at Taylor's telepathic message, ashamed of the way I was feeling.

Was I…scared? No, I couldn't be. I've stood up to plenty of people more powerful than myself in the past before, and Luke was one of the few who ranked within that number. Even outmatched before, I'd never given up against anyone before, even if I could do nothing. Why was now any different? Was it failing to save my friends? In all those previous times I mentioned, I managed to save the day by the end. Now, there wasn't anything left to save.

'No! Don't think like that!' Taylor's much more forceful tone of voice broke me from my depressive reverie, almost causing me to flinch. 'Zane…we may all be gone. Percy, Nico, Annabeth, Thalia, Arthur, Young Matt, everyone. But…do you really think we would want you to just give up and let yourself die because you suddenly think everything is pointless!? Zane, we all died FOR you, not because of you! If you died for any of us, would you just want us to sit down and cry about while waiting to be erased!?'

But…I…Taylor was right. Even after what Percy said before to inspire me to fight alongside him against Luke back on that isle, I fell right back into the same, self-pitying depressive mindset that would help literally nobody. 'But…what can I even do? Even if I fight, I'll lose regardless. Luke will erase me from existence and then go to the Underworld to do the same to you.'

Taylor's response was quick. 'Remember what your father said.' My father? Right before he died, he said to remember the prophecy. But I didn't know what he was talking about. Hell, the prophecy made absolutely no sense with what's already happened so far. 'The Ophiotaurus.' My eyes turned from Luke's seemingly frozen form to a large aquarium in the corner of the room, where said monster was being held.

The Ophiotaurus had been one of the more important parts of the whole Atlas quest, as Thorn had tried to get Thalia to sacrifice it and gain the power to defeat the gods. But it had been taken to Olympus by Grover and placed in an aquarium here in the throne room to keep it safe. 'Remember what we all told you that Thorn told Thalia back in San Francisco? You need to do the same thing Thorn tried to get Thalia to do before Percy killed him.'

I looked at the half cow, half serpent thing in surprise, honestly shocked Luke hadn't killed it yet. Maybe he thought it wasn't worth his time anymore, which was something I could capitalize on. 'I have to…sacrifice it? Then I'll gain the power to defeat the gods? But…I already have that power, and the gods are all dead. What good would killing it even do?' I telepathically sent to the dead son of Ares, unsure of what he thought would happen.

'Not all the gods are dead. In fact, the last remaining one besides the primordials is right in front of you.' My eyes shifted back to Luke, wide at Taylor's implications. If I could somehow get to the Ophiotaurus and sacrifice it…could that give me the power to actually defeat Luke once and for all? It…couldn't, could it? Luke's power was almost on par with my fathers at his peak, nothing could defeat him.

'The power of the Ophiotaurus could. There was a reason all the gods wanted it dead.' I looked back at the aquarium, seriously considering Taylor's words. I mean…I don't have anything left to lose anymore, right? All of my friends were gone and the two people I loved the most were gone, too. 'Okay, Taylor…I'll try. Only thing I have left to lose is myself at this point.' The world seemed to resume at normal speed, and I opened my eyes, the color of deep glowing sapphire shining through the dark destroyed throne room.

With a slight roar, I expanded my aura all around me, trying to blow straight through Luke's multi-colored energy barrier. Luke's expression changed from a sadistic grin and morphed into a serious stare as he turned his gaze from where Nico's body had been to me. "Trying to escape again? I put enough power into that barrier that you'd need more than ten times your own full power to even crack it." I didn't listen at all to the new Titan of Time, charging my aura around myself even more.

The dark sapphire lightning completely surged throughout the small energy barrier, likely completely obscuring my frame from Luke's vision. The dark sapphire, black particle filled aura of mine intensified once more as I tried to escape the barrier with every single inch of power that Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form gave me. My roaring got louder as I gave it everything I had, more power than I've ever wielded before running through me.

Luke glared at my powering up form, his brows furrowing at my escape attempt. "I told you, it's useless! You'd need a thousand years of the most intense training imaginable to come even close to escaping my power! You haven't even shaken the barrier! GIVE IT UP!" Luke roared at the top of his lungs, his voice so loud it shook the entire damaged palace and created another shockwave. I roared at the top of my own lungs, the chaotic power surging through me starting to strain my own body.

My muscles popped and tore, blood vessels in both my arms and in my head ruptured, my bones screamed in pain, and I even felt my teeth were about to shatter from all the pressure of my own power. One of my eyes even felt like it was about to pop. Despite all of this, pushing my body beyond anything I'd ever pushed it before, Luke's energy barrier hadn't even been affected in the slightest. I was doing nothing but killing myself.

All of the energy and power faded away in the blink of an eye, the dark sapphire lightning and aura returning to their normal sizes as I collapsed to my knees. I breathed in and out heavily, every single cell in my entire body in horrific pain. Luke laughed at my utter failure. "HAHAHAHAHA! I told you! I told you that you could never escape, but unsurprisingly you didn't listen. Now stay right there, I'll end this hilarious display soon." Luke started to slowly walk towards me, no doubt taking his sweet time to prolong my suffering. "Not like you could even go anywhere."

I slammed my gauntleted fist against Luke's barrier, uselessly. This was absolutely beyond humiliating. "God fucking dammit!" I growled in anger, completely embarrassed and pissed that I couldn't escape Luke's basic fucking barrier. 'Taylor…I'm sorry. I can't even get out of this…this…this pathetic SHIT!' Taylor's response was immediate, which surprised me. I had guessed his spirit went back to Elysium, but that was the case. 'Yes, you can! You can't give up! No matter what happens! Keep fighting!' I breathed in and out heavily while listening to Taylor's words, which lit a fire within me.

I closed my eyes, my breathing becoming even heavier in preparation for what I was about to do. I reached deep into my connection with my Heavenly Diamond Morningstar, perfectly visualizing the infinite strands of immeasurable power all connected to a single source of boundless energy. I locked onto one of the strands, drawing more power than I ever had before, not counting the Super Heavenly Judgement I used against Hyperion. This little move right here…could be the end of my very existence.

In an almost infinitesimal percentage of an attosecond, I felt it. Power. More power than I've ever held before rushed through my body, darkening my aura even more than Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form did. The color of my aura and lightning cage shifted to an almost navy-blue color, being several shades darker than ever before. The signature black particles of chaotic energy were almost innumerable, with the particles almost looking like thousands of tiny flies surging throughout my aura cone.

My muscles bulked up even further, dwarfing that of even a professional bodybuilder at this point, making me appear as if I was over three hundred pounds of pure, painfully bulging muscle. The strength of my aura exploded, almost reaching the level of power that Luke was at, prompting the New Titan of Time's eyes to widen in shock. My new, painfully bulging massive muscles convulsed and shook violently, with dark, navy blue glowing veins popping up and creating an easily visible web all across my skin, only being hidden by my armor.

I created a new variation of Heavenly Thunder Form…again. The desperation situation, combined with my complete disregard for my own existence and body, allowed me to spontaneously create another evolution of my most powerful state. The strain created by the regular Power Stressed Heavenly Thunder Form was absolutely nothing to the strain caused by this new state, as every single atom in my body felt like it had the weight of a million realties pressed upon them. My muscles shook and quivered, hardly able to keep up with the power as if it was holding an immeasurable weight.

My aura cone's power intensified exponentially, only barely being contained by Luke's energy barrier. The multi-colored energy sphere around me buckled and cracked, allowing some of my now dark navy-blue aura to seep through. Reality cracks appeared throughout the room, immediately illuminating the previously mostly dark room more than the sun ever could and basking everything in shining, rainbow colored light. Any rubble left on the floor rose in the air, forcibly being levitated as an aftereffect of my strength and the already cracked and damaged walls of the palace started to crumble apart, allowing small bits of light from the hellscape below to peak in.

Luke's eyes grew to the size of dinner plates, his jaw wide open and agape at my sudden massive increase in power and the weakening of his barrier. "W-What!?" Luke was completely stunned by the development, his slow walking immediately ceasing. His brows furrowed and his expression shifted into one of pure rage. "No…no, no, no, no, no, NO! NOT AGAIN! THIS ENDS….RIGHT NOW!" Luke immediately switched his Heavenly Diamond Scythe in a reverse grip and pulled the weapon back in preparation to swing. Luke's multi-colored aura built up around the scythe, the power of the weapon literally warping reality around Luke's arm, creating odd repeating, impossible images and colors around the weapon.

Just from the flare of his aura and the position of his stance, I could tell Luke was about to stop time and cleave me into trillions of pieces with a barrage of aura slashes, as he's tried to do before with the exact same maneuver countless times. However, unlike with any of Luke's moves after he completed his fusion, I could actually perceive his movements due to the new heightened 'Super' state of Heavenly Thunder form I was in. Luke's aura exploded around him, now only slightly stronger than mine.

Luke roared in anger, spittle practically flying from his maw. "DIE!" Luke screamed like a complete madman, desperation and fury etched all over his expression. Luke swung quintillions of times in a fraction of a microsecond, sending quintillions of condensed energy slashes rapid fire directly at my form, which was still behind the barrier. Even if I could perceive the slashes, they were still frighteningly fast, as they were practically on top of me in the blink of an eye.

Time seemed to slow down in my perspective, the energy slashes seeming almost frozen to me. 'Shit.' I had to get out of this barrier right now, or Luke was going to kill me, new form or not. I looked at my gauntleted hands, seeing the dark navy-blue aura all around me, as well as the almost uncountable number of black particles that were signature of chaotic energy. 'Alright…I have the power…now I need the rage.' I closed my glowing, dark navy-blue eyes, allowing memories of all of my friends to flow through my mind. Memories of all the friends Luke killed.

All the memories I shared with Taylor, every conversation, every little moment I cherished and even every little thought I had about the son of Ares flashed through my mind. All these memories, feelings of love…would only exist as memories, at least for now. I could get Taylor back, and I would. But…all of my other friends were gone permanently, curtesy of Heavenly Diamond. I would never see any of them ever again, never make any more memories with them and would always be reminded of my failure to even save a single one of them. As that one final thought shot through my mind, something within me snapped.

Rage, more rage than I've ever felt in my entire life, flooded every pore in my body, prompting me to audibly growl as my already massive power grew even more. The navy-blue color of my aura and lightning darkened even more, practically looking black with just a smidge of blue within. My lightning cage intensified immensely, almost completely obscuring my entire form with a cloud of dark electricity, far more powerful than ever before. My aura exploded in strength once more, shooting me past Luke's power level and even beyond the full power of my father. With this new state and new level of anger, I had officially become the strongest being in our entire pantheon, at least to my knowledge.

But right now, I didn't care in the slightest. My one and only thought was making Luke beg for death and I didn't have long to make that thought a reality. With this much chaotic energy running through me, I probably had less than thirty seconds to be in this state. I let out a universe shaking roar, literally feeling everything left in our broken and shattered universe quake with my aura sense. My power reached a new peak, now substantially more powerful than Luke's new power. As I unleashed my momentous roar, a massive wave of condensed aura and lightning erupted from my form as I expanded my aura all around me. Luke's energy barrier immediately shattered as if it was made of glass, finally freeing me.

My aura continued to expand outwards with all of Luke's energy slashes being instantly dispersed, completely overtaken by my aura. The entire palace practically shattered at my unleashed rage, with the entire ceiling and most of the walls instantly being erased from existence with just a slight burst of my energy. Luke was blown back dozens of feet, almost being sent away from the now annihilated palace itself, before catching himself with his own telekinetic flight. Luke was forced to bring up his arms to shield his face from the wind pressure my sheer power intensified, anger and disbelief clear all over his face.

Luke was practically frothing at the mouth at my escape, his demonic glowing yellow eyes shining in pure fury. "How….?" Luke whispered to himself, his voice riddled with sheer disbelief and absolute rage. Luke's multi-colored aura erupted all around him, finally weaker than mine both in intensity and power. Luke roared at the top of his lungs as his power shot out of him, with the blue-black, sickly orange energy cone clashing with my own. Our aura cones smashed into each other, with rainbow-colored reality cracks ripping into reality with a thundercrack all around us thousands of meters in the dark storm covered sky, an aftereffect of my power up.

Luke snarled and tightened his grip around his Heavenly Diamond scythe. "I…AM SICK OF YOU!" Luke's shout shook the entire decimated planet, the yell creating a massive shockwave that caused the landscape that used to be Manhattan below the ruined Olympus to shift. Luke put his scythe into a sheath on his back before summoning even more power from the weapon. Luke's aura intensified, both in size and in power, his strength increasing even further. "Every time I seem to finally pull ahead of you, finally surpass your power, you always bounce back!"

The multi-colored, chaotic energy riddled energy of Luke's built up even more several meters around him, another maneuver of Luke's I've seen before. The New Titan of Time was charging a singular, immensely powerful aura blast and was intent on erasing me from existence with it. "But not this time! This time, I am fucking done with you, Zane!" Luke put out both hands in front of him, quickly creating a ball of energy in front of him, very reminiscent of Matt's Red Beam Cannon. "This time, I-!"

Before Luke could utter another syllable, I appeared in front of Luke at full speed, faster than both him and even my father could move. I quickly drew back my fist, infusing every single ounce of power and aura I could into my arm. The navy-blue aura of this new Heavenly Thunder Form state shrunk from dozens of meters in diameter down to only coating my right arm, completely obscuring my armored right arm from view, as well as causing bursts of navy-blue lighting to spark from my arm. I felt my stamina almost completely drain just due to the simple movement of my arm, meaning the stamina costs of this new state were insane. I was going to need to put literally everything into this punch, every bit of physical strength, all the power of this new state, and even every single bit of telekinetic might into the strike, all to make the most of it.

"SHUT UP!" I roared, slamming my aura covered fist directly into Luke's torso, instantly shutting up his insane rambling. All the power Luke had been summoning into his aura blast instantly evaporated, completely disappearing along with Luke's aura cage. Luke's eyes slowly trailed down to my aura coated fist in his stomach, his eyes wider than dinner plates, with time seeming to freeze in both of our perspectives for a brief moment.

Eventually, the strike finally took effect, and the effect was momentous. Firstly, my all or nothing punch immediately shattered Luke's torso armor in a million shards and creating a massive indent on his torso, creating an extremely satisfying cracking and crunching sound. Ichor exploded from Luke's mouth, and he was immediately about to be sent flying away faster than I could even follow, the sound of his forced movement likely akin to that of a trillion sonic booms.

However, that wasn't the only aftereffect of my ultra powerful strike. The storm I had created when powering up into this new Heavenly Thunder Form state was instantly dispersed by the strike, with the force of the punch almost breaking reality, as millions of tiny reality cracks materializing around me as far as the eye could see, even appearing in the hole in the atmosphere leading to space. Another massive shockwave was produced due to the punch, once again shaking the entire ruined planet below.

As Luke began to be blown away by the force of my ultimate punch and the energy of my new Heavenly Thunder Form state being released all around me at once, prominent cracks appeared at the point of impact on my gauntleted hand. The cracks deepened considerably, with more forming all up my arm armor and spreading all throughout the entire Universe Titanium set. As more power flushed from my form and burst all around me from the punch, my entire Universal Titanium armor exploded off my frame, reduced to millions of broken pieces and being scattered away by the force of the strike.

Another effect of the punch was dozens of multiversal portals to the in-between realm of the multiverse ripped open, all created by the immense amount of chaotic energy unleashed by the strike, allowing the infinite-colored kaleidoscopes of energy to showcase the infinite realms of the multiverse on the other side of the portal's tunnels. Luke flew into the larger portal that formed directly behind him, the portal larger in size than an elephant, completely disappearing off into the multiverse and out of sight.

All of this happened before Luke could finish his words, and after he was sent off into the multiverse, the only sound that remained was the deafening sound of the final aftereffects of my punch, creating sounds almost incomprehensible to hear and impossible to describe. The immeasurable, atom crushing pressure of the 'limit broken' state I had entered completely vanished, leaving me only in my base form, completely exhausted and beat. I finally landed a hit on the bastard.

I immediately collapsed to my knees as soon as the power faded, grunting in pain as every molecule in my body felt as if it had been stretched a million light years. I breathed heavily, almost to the point of hyperventilating, trying to regain my bearings and get back to my feet. I looked at my right arm, my eyes widening in shock when I noticed all of my armor was completely gone, leaving me in nothing except for athletic black tights. I punched so hard…that my own armor broke, leaving behind only my weapon sheaths on my side and back. Not even Ouranos was able to get through my armor before. I quickly looked at my left wrist, finding that the only thing that remained of my armor was Taylor's shield, which now resembled a silver metal wristband on my arm in its closed form. I breath out a small sigh of relief, thankful that I still had that piece of Taylor to remember him.

The multiversal portals in front of me numbered in the dozens around the completely annihilated Olympian palace, not closing by themselves unfortunately. That meant whenever Luke recovered, he would be back very quickly, likely right back through the portal he had been punched through. I had to get to the Ophiotaurus, if it was still around after my ridiculously destructive display and sacrifice it. I needed whatever the hell power it was going to grant me to defeat Luke, as the new 'limit breaker' state I unlocked only lasted long enough for one punch. Luke likely wasn't permanently affected by the chaotic energy of my blow, as he had his own chaotic aura around his body when I punched him, meaning Luke would likely heal himself with his time powers. That punch probably just pissed him off more than it was going to actually hurt him.

Quickly summoning a small burst of lighting around my body, still in my tired base form. I looked at the lightning, a plan coming to mind. I had learned how to teleport earlier this week via dematerializing myself with my own lightning, although it came with the drawback of having to summon the lightning to teleport me from above with a storm. But what if I could use any bit of my lightning to teleport? I allowed some of the sparking lightning tracing down my shoulders to make contact with my skin, feeling the same 'electrifying' feeling I felt when teleporting normally.

I instantly teleported in front of the Ophiotaurus' aquarium with a thundering sound, materializing with a burst of sparks instead of a lightning strike from above. I had no time to ponder or congratulate myself on spontaneously improving my teleportation technique, as my mind was completely focused on what I had to do. I quickly glanced at the Ophiotaurus, noting the aquarium had somehow barely survived all the destruction caused by my power up and punch. The glass of the aquarium was cracked and had some water leaking out on the cracked floor of the ruined palace, but the Ophiotaurus was surprisingly unaffected. Guess my father put some sort of protection enchantment on the aquarium.

The Ophiotaurus simply stared at me expectantly, as if it was waiting for me to do something. 'Uh…what do I do now…?' I reached out with my telepathy and sent a telepathic message in every direction around me, hoping Taylor was still listening and would help me. Thankfully, he was, as his presence quickly returned to my mind. 'Build an altar.' Taylor's voice resonated throughout my mind, his tone that of determination.

I quickly reached out with my telekinesis, building an altar made from parts of the cracked marble below in less than a nanosecond, with the white altar seemingly appearing from out of the ground. 'Now what?' I quickly asked the dead son of Ares in my mind, looking between the Ophiotaurus and the multiversal portals that churned with primordial energy as they remained open. I needed to hurry this up, or Luke would effortlessly kill me when he returns.

'Kill it and place it's intestines on the altar.' I looked at the Ophiotaurus with serious eyes, finally realizing what it had been seemingly waiting for. Its nonchalant and non-fearful attitude confused me, prompting me to reach out into the creature's mind with my telepathy. The creature wasn't intelligent enough to form thoughts, but I could feel its emotions. It was completely okay with me killing it, which was astounding. Why was it just okay with dying? Did it know that it's death would save the multiverse?

Off to my left and back towards the multiversal portals, the biggest portal I had punched Luke through had a massive aura appear inside the tunnel, letting me know Luke was likely seconds from slamming right back through that portal and instantly killing me. 'Right.' I quickly withdrew Prometheus' sword and stabbed right through the aquarium quintillions of times faster than light, immediately disemboweling the Ophiotaurus and spewing out its intestines as the water erupted from the now broken aquarium.

The water turned red, all the blood spewing from the Ophiotaurus' wound and staining the formally white cracked marble floor red. The Ophiotaurus' corpse quickly splattered across the blood and water covered ground, taking its last breath and slumping to the floor unmoving. I didn't even have time to appreciate the creature's sacrifice, as Luke's aura was now clearly emanating from the portal. I grabbed a handful of the Ophiotaurus' entrails, quickly throwing them on the altar and turning towards the portal.

As soon as I turned, Luke's giant form smashed into the ground after seemingly appearing out of the portal, creating a massive crater with his impact that produced a shockwave that forced me to bring up my left arm in front of my face. Luke stood from his crouched landing position, completely healed with rage all over his face. My messages to Taylor became frantic. 'Now what!?'

Taylor immediately understood the danger, his presence very strong in my head. 'Light the intestines on fire, now! QUICKLY!' Taylor's tone was just as frantic as mine, if not more. I quickly stabbed Prometheus' sword into the pile of entrails on the altar, about to press one of the many buttons on the handle of the massive blade to coat the entire weapon in fire, therefore lighting the intestines on fire as well.

Before I could press the button, I was immediately knocked on my back and pinned to the cracked marble ground by an immeasurable force. I saw triple, my vision completely blurry from the force of whatever was pinning me down. Once my vision recovered, I quickly saw that the immeasurable pressure was in the form of Luke, with the new Titan of Time pinning his absolutely giant foot on my now unarmored chest.

Luke stared down at me, sheer unadulterated rage etched all over his face. "ENOUGH!" Luke grabbed me by the throat faster than I could even perceive, bringing me closer to his face while still pinning me. "I AM FUCKING DONE WITH ALL YOUR SHIT, ZANE! I HAVE LET YOU BE A NUISANCE FOR FAR TOO LONG!" Luke raised Aposynthesi above his head, his multi-colored aura erupting around it. "I'M FINISHED WITH YOU, THE OLYMPIANS AND THIS ENTIRE UNIVERSE!" Luke's aura increased to apocalyptic levels, becoming even more powerful. Luke glared directly down upon me, his rage calming a bit. "This one's going to feel good."

I glared right back at the New Titan of Time, defiance and determination written all over my face. "Not as good as this is going to feel." Luke's face quickly became confused at my words, prompting me to quickly raise my open right hand towards the handle of Prometheus' sword. I reached out with my telekinesis, pressing the fire button on the sword handle with my mind. The button jutted inwards, lighting the entire blade on fire.

Luke's eyes widened at the development, with him quickly putting the pieces of the situation together and realizing what just happened. "NO!" The fire on the blade quickly lit the entrails of the Ophiotaurus on fire, quacking burning them to ash and filling the air with the smell of burning meat. Luke's eyes widened further, and he even gasped, which led to him literally jumping away from me in fear as if even being in contact with me would kill him. Luke looked between me and the burning altar, fear riddling his face.

However…nothing seemed to happen. No power increase like the prophecy and other said, no new form, no new anything. Silence fell between me and Luke, almost becoming painfully awkward after nothing continued to happen for several seconds. A minute nearly passed with both of us sitting there anticipating whatever should be happening, with everything continuing to stay the same. Luke finally smirked, the fear and worry leaving his expression as fear began to well up within me.

"Heheheheheh…" Luke started softly chuckling to himself as he stared at the burning altar, his laughter slowly getting louder. "HehehehehaHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Luke let out a completely insane, full belly laugh as if he had just heard the most ironic joke in the entire world. "After all this time, all the prophecy and fear surrounding that stupid cow, all the worry on how it can destroy the gods…and it does nothing." Luke started laughing again, having to wipe tears from his eyes halfway through. "NOTHING! HAHAHAHA!" Luke looked back down at me, his grip around his Heavenly Diamond scythe tightening. "Now, Zane…where were w-?"

Before Luke could finish his rhetorical question, power beyond absolutely anything I'd ever felt before flowed through my body suddenly exploded from my form, completely blasting Luke dozens of meters back just like before, sending the New Titan of time sprawling through the cracked marble ground. Luke barely stopped himself after a couple of seconds, before taking flight in the air and looking at my aura coated form in shock. "W-WHAT!?"

Instead of my normal bright blue aura or even my sapphire blue aura of Heavenly Thunder Form, my energy had shifted into that of bright gold color. Throughout the entire golden aura around me were rainbow particles, particles almost perfectly the opposite of the black particles of chaotic energy and behaving the exact same way. The aura all around me started to rip apart everything around me, with the entire mountain Olympus once stood on being instantly annihilated after several seconds of my aura blazing.

I floated in the air where I had been laying, the spot where Luke had me pinned, and finally opened my eyes to show off their now golden color in the irises, with the rainbow particles being visible inside the optical organs as well. I held my arms out to the side as bursts of golden lightning sparked up and down my body before disappearing, intently looking at the golden energy coating my limbs and getting my first true feel of its power.

I looked at my arms in amazement, feeling just how powerful this second new state made me. I was even more powerful than I was in that 'limit broken' Heavenly Thunder Form state, further surpassing Luke and my father at their full powers. Yet unlike with every massive jump in power I had gone through so far, this state had absolutely zero strain and I felt as if I held perfect control over the strength I now wielded.

That wasn't the only thing that was different, as everything around me looked different, as if a golden hue overtook everything within my vision. My brain felt like it was on a 'maximum overdrive' setting, with me being able to think and comprehend things far faster than before, as well as new bits of knowledge I should have had no way of knowing sprouting up in my mind. I closed my eyes, allowing the golden rainbow particle infused energy around me to intensify even more.

The air around my golden aura coated form seemed to thicken and shift, their sheer power of my aura alone warping and messing with reality. Even more tiny reality cracks started to appear, with the very fabric of everything around both me and Luke starting to fail and buckle at the sheer might of this new power that the Ophiotaurus' sacrifice granted. The entire universe threatened to fall apart simply from the very presence of my charging aura, which Luke forced to create an energy barrier around himself to even stay within one hundred meters of me and my charging power.

Unlike every other power up I have had so far, I felt completely calm and focused as I unleashed all the energy around me, not roaring in effort or exertion like I would be doing if I was in any other form. This new 'Prophecy Power' seemed to be infinitely easier to wield and use than anything else. I closed my glowing, gold colored eyes and commanded my golden, rainbow particle infused aura to calm and return to a small cone around two meters in diameter around my frame in a the blink of an eye.

I opened my eyes, my vision quickly darting towards Luke. The New Titan of Time finally was able to drop his energy barrier, doing so with a sigh of relief before quickly looking at me in complete fear. I allowed a smirk to form on my face, despite feeling completely calm and collected, as if this new form eliminates emotion. "Now, Luke…" My voice rung out from my throat, sounding as if three different versions of me were speaking in a amplified, echoey version of my voice. "…where were we?"

(000)

And that's chapter forty-nine, y'all. I ain't got no excuse for how long this one took, as I've been in and out of the mental hospital several times since the last chapter. Finally got this down and (once again) I'm hoping to start uploading against how I used to, but don't hold me to that lmao. I've been doing much better recently, even started going back to the gym semi-regularly, so I'm going to devote as much time as I have to this.

Hoping people enjoy this one more than the previous, and that everyone likes Zane's new form. This chapter was supposed to be the second last of TLO but it ended up being over 40k words, so I decided to split it into two chapter. I have half the next chapter already written, so this for real shouldn't take as long.

Now I gotta go read book 6 of SOH, see y'all later.