Confession time: even though I had been hesitant about speeding up time for a singular person, after some practice with some weeds and cows, I sped up Paul's recovery process so that he was fully healed and functional within four days of his surgery.

"The doctors are not going to like this," Raina had told me, making sure that the door was locked and that the blinds were closed, preventing anyone else from seeing in. "They'll turn him into a guinea pig for the rest of his life. Most people don't wake up for at least a week, and when they do, they don't function like this."

"The Mist," I said, keeping my voice low as Paul groaned in his bed, waking up from a nap. "Make it seem like he's still here for a few days, just until he's cleared to leave."

Raina reached into the pocket of her scrubs, pulling out three silver beads no bigger than a thimble. "You're so lucky I study the obscure stuff," she said as she positioned the beads on the bed. "Now go. I think Percy would like to get his stepfather back."

"Stay safe."

Then, before Paul was fully aware of what was happening, I shadow-traveled us back to Sally's apartment, abruptly landing on top of the couch in the living room. It didn't help matters that I cushioned Paul's fall, meaning that I got all the air knocked out of me. After Paul stood up, I got up to my feet, clutching my chest as I tried to breathe normally again.

Needless to say, both Percy and Sally were overjoyed at the sight of Paul, surprised to see him to in perfect health. I'd have to tell them of what I did eventually, but not right now.

Anyhow, after hanging out with the Blofis' and Percy for a little bit, I caught the train back to school, completely drained from all the shadow-traveling I'd done this past week. Seriously, not even the unicorn draught I had was enough to make me feel well-rested, every muscle aching like I'd just sprinted a marathon.

And, of course, my return to school was marked by all my friends continuing their begging for me to train them, to which my answer was still no.

"If you want to learn how to fight," I'd told them that night, my eyelids drooping with exhaustion as I forced myself to read the next chapter in our biology textbook, "go take a karate class or something."

Unsurprisingly, Pete reminded me that fighting bare handed wouldn't do any of them much good if they couldn't kill the monsters. I don't know how many times I had to tell them that as long as they didn't go searching, monsters would leave them alone for the most part. Even then, if things really got bad, just run in the other direction. It's not that complicated.

This begging lasted for weeks, and around mid-April, I finally caved, tired of having to avoid my friends because they wouldn't stop pestering me otherwise. Do you know how annoying it is to have a twenty-two-year old man asking, "Please?" repeatedly anytime he was in your presence?

If it wasn't for the fact that I'd built up a tolerance to that kind of thing between the orphanage and camp, I promise you, I would've decked Pete in the face weeks ago.

"Meet me at Garden's Park at 10," I told them one night, watching the looks of shock on their faces, unable to believe what I was saying.

"But it's already 9:40," Patrick said with a frown, holding up his phone to show everyone else the time.

"Then consider this your first lesson: always be on time." I smiled, remembering that Salina had done the same thing to me one day. Clearly, the fear of discipline worked wonders on students. "I'll see you in twenty."

True to my word, I was waiting by the playground at 10, beginning to warm up while I waited for my friends to show up. They finally arrived five minutes later, the four out of the five of them completely out of breath from sprinting to make it here. Andy, on the other hand, was fine, having done CrossFit ever since he was in high school and running marathons every other month.

"Oh, God," Patrick muttered, his knuckles white as he clutched onto one of the ladders that led up to the slide. "I think I need my inhaler."

Leah fished it out of her pockets, and even though she was still red in the face, her breathing had straightened out enough for her to be able to hand Patrick his inhaler without wheezing too loudly.

"Just so we're clear," Pete said, still hunched over. "I haven't run that fast since I played soccer, and I quit freshman year of high school."

"Hopefully I'll help change that," I said, bending down as I stretched to one side. "We're not going to do anything too strenuous tonight, just some cardio. Sound good?"

"I thought you said you were going to train us?" Pete whined, his bottom lip out in a pout as he straightened up.

"I said I would, and you know I'm always true to my word. But I can't teach you anything if we don't start building up your endurance. So, with that being said, take five laps around the playground."

"Seriously?" Joe asked. "More running?"

"Running has saved my life more times than I'd like to admit, so get to it."

"Oh, stop complaining, you two," Leah said, grabbing Joe and Pete by the wrist and taking off with them while they screamed in protest.

Andy paused to make sure Patrick was okay before starting his own laps. I also checked on Patrick, telling him that he didn't need to sprint the five laps, only needing to complete them.

"There's a reason I opted out of PE," he grumbled. Then he sighed and began running, ignoring how Joe and Pete were screaming, "You can't catch us, Andy!" while circling the playground.

To this day, I still have no idea which one of us they were talking to.

It didn't take me long to catch up with Leah, the two of us falling into an easy conversation while we did our laps. And even though we weren't the first to finish (I don't like sprinting if I don't have to), alongside Andy, we were the least out of breath, which would be helpful for what I had planned next.

I hope they liked jump roping.

And so began our training, which would usually last two hours every night that we could spare, lasting until the end of the school year. Like Salina had done with me, I made my friends practice with almost every type of weapon under the sun, not stopping until I knew they'd found their perfect fit.

Leah ended up with a bow, Pete with a sword, Joe with an axe, Andy with dual-wielding daggers, and Patrick, sweet, innocent Patrick, ended up with a spear that had barbed wire coating on the end of it.

By the way, I feel like I need to mention that I did not steal these weapons from the Camp Half-Blood or Camp Jupiter armory, instead finding them in the Fields of Asphodel. I don't know how those weapons ended up there – the metal detectors were usually pretty good about confiscating Celestial bronze and Imperial gold at the entrance – but they weren't going to be used by anyone, so I gave them to my friends instead.

I hope Hades doesn't mind.

"Remember," I told them the last night of our training, "these weapons won't hurt other mortals, but it can hurt monsters and demigods. Please, don't use them unless absolutely necessary."

"Does that mean we can't kill a Cyclops if we see them in the street?"

I rolled my eyes. "No, Pete, you can't just go around stabbing Cyclopes if you see them."

"Party pooper."

We huddled together in a group hug, ignoring the fact that we all reeked and were coated in sweat from that night's exercises.

"Stay safe, you guys," I told them. "And please, for the love of Olympus, stay out of New York this August. Don't come back until September."

"What, why?" Leah asked. She redid her ponytail, pulling her hair into a messy bun so that none of her hair was touching the back of her neck. "You can't tell us to stay safe and then say to not come back to New York. What about school?"

"School starts in September," Joe said, "after Andy said it would be safe to come back."

"But don't you want to know why we shouldn't be here during the summer?"

"It's only August, though, the hottest month of the year."

Leah scoffed. "You boys need to come to Florida sometime. That'll show you some real heat." She turned to me, her dark brown eyes staring into my soul. "Spill."

"I can't," I said miserably, turning away from her and the rest of my friends. "Just know something evil is coming, and I don't want you guys caught in the middle of this mess."

"That gives us more of a reason to stay," Patrick said, pressing a button on the end of his spear, gasping as it collapsed into a wrist watch and landed on the floor. He bent down and put it on. "If things are as dire as it sounds, don't you need more help to fight?"

"No, this isn't your fight," I insisted. "And you haven't had enough training. Please, don't be here this summer. I can't bear to lose any of you, not after…"

Images of Cleo's death slammed into the forefront of my mind at full force, the smell and feeling of her blood invading all my senses. I still remembered her startlingly sky blue eyes, a perfect match to Apollo's, usually so full of life and joy dull and lifeless as I pressed a hand over the gaping hole in her chest, praying that someone would save her.

"No," I told myself, gripping my hair tightly in an attempt to steady myself. "This isn't real. You're safe."

But I could hear her screams, hear Michael's cry of anguish as he watched two of his siblings die in tandem, hear my own voice as I killed those dracaenae with a vengeance I didn't think was humanly possible.

And Cleo was a demigod, training ever since she was five to fight monsters, but she still died anyways. If someone with eleven years of training died, imagine how someone who'd only had two months would fare.

After judo-flipping Pete – he'd put a hand on my shoulder, and I'd instinctively reacted to it as a threat – I snapped out of my flashback, watching as Pete held his hands up in surrender as my hand was already preparing to knock him out.

I caught myself mid-punch and quickly scrambled off of Pete, hoping that I wasn't as visibly shaken up as I felt.

"You're not fighting in this war," I told them again in a steely voice, so unlike the panic I was dealing with at the moment. "I need you guys to stay alive, you hear me? You want to give sacrifices to the gods to help strengthen them? Fine, that's fine, but I don't want any of you in New York when the final battle begins."

"Can you at least tell us who's wanting to cause the apocalypse?" Joe asked, groaning as he slowly got onto the ground and flopped onto his back, still breathing heavily.

"My father," I spat venomously before turning on my heel and walking away before any more questions could be asked.

I left for Los Angeles the day after school ended, actually taking a plane like a normal person instead of jumping through shadows or riding a pegasus like I'd usually do.

It was weird, being confined inside a metal cylinder 30,000 feet in the air, but there was a TV and decent snacks, so I wasn't too miserable. I don't think the guy who'd sat next to me was my biggest fan, though. I guess he wasn't a fan of charm bracelets.

Once I left the airport, immediately engulfed with California's intense heat the second I walked out onto the sidewalk, I made my way to the DOA Recording Studios via taxi. The poor driver must've thought I was some kind of lunatic or criminal after I asked him to stop, claiming that he didn't understand why we were stopping in front of some abandoned warehouse. The Mist, no doubt.

But he quickly shut up after I slipped in another fifty bucks and sped off, leaving me with the promise that he'd keep his mouth shut.

"Welcome back, Miss I-serve-Olympus-and-have-more-respect-from-Hades-than-Charon-does," Charon said, tipping his sunglasses down just enough so I could see the bottomless pits that were his eyes. "How can I help you today, Princess?"

I flinched at the name, something that either Charon missed or decided to ignore.

"I would like passage to the Underworld," I said, planting three gold drachmas onto the ferryman's podium, daring him to deny me entry.

He picked up one of the drachmas, inspecting it, before placing them into the little box I knew he had underneath the podium. "You know," Charon said as he dusted something off his new Italian suit, "you're one of the only people I've ever met who want to go to the Underworld. Why don't you go spend more time on Olympus? I hear it's lovely this time of year."

"Already spent five years of my life on Olympus," I replied, shuffling past Charon as the elevator doors creaked open and spirits rushed to get inside. "Plus, I've got some friends on the other side."

"Oh, do we now?" Charon then whirled around, shoving a few souls out of the elevator, shouting, "No one better change my music!" as the doors squeaked shut. If it wasn't for the fact that I knew this was merely a transition from elevator to a boat on the Styx, I would've never taken this entrance, but I really wasn't in the mood to feel drained, so creepy entrance it is.

"Mention a pay raise to the boss, would ya?" Charon laughed as we reached the other side of the River Styx, the dead disembarking as they began to shuffle their way towards the E-Z Death lines.

"Sure, Charon. And for the love of God, stop threatening souls about your music. They've been listening to the same thing for thousands of years."

"Hey, none of 'em are complaining." He shrugged. "Plus, I don't care. See ya around, Princess!"

"Don't call me that," I muttered under my breath, shouldering my backpack as I skipped through the lines, the security guards having seen me around so much that they no longer bothered trying to stop me.

Though my intention had been to visit Nico, who hadn't come back to Camp Half-Blood ever since the end of last summer, and Hades, before I made it to the palace, I stopped in front of the endless field that was Asphodel. Somewhere amongst the spirits was Hazel Levesque, whom I hadn't seen in over a year by now.

Feeling guilty about not having visited my friend, I started my journey into Asphodel, eventually having to shove in my earbuds to ignore the sound of hissing spirits as they dissipated from being in close proximity to living flesh.

It took a good hour and a half and some magic before I found Hazel, who was still sitting by the same poplar tree where we'd met for the first time. She was picking at the red poppy flowers, the only splash of color that could be found outside of Elysium and Hades' Palace in the Underworld.

Hazel then looked up, a gentle smile resting easily on her face as she stood up, brushing back some of her curls out of her face. "Hello, Andy," she said. "It's nice to see you again."

I couldn't help but smile back at Hazel. "Sorry I haven't been back sooner. Things are getting more and more chaotic, you know?"

She nodded solemnly, gesturing for me to follow her to the poplar tree. "Something's definitely amiss. I can feel these souls getting restless." Hazel then carefully pried off a piece of bark from the tree, revealing a little hole in the trunk. She then pulled out two leather necklaces, numerous clay beads resting in the middle.

"I don't know how these got here," she said, dropping the necklaces into my hands, "but they looked like yours, so I held onto them for safekeeping."

"Oh, gods."

I twirled the beads between my fingers, seeing the same beads that were currently resting around my neck staring back up at me from two necklaces. And from the way that the beads that held a green trident, the summer that Percy had been claimed, were completely damaged and carved up, I knew exactly who they belonged to.

"Thank you, Hazel," I said, shoving the necklaces deep into my bag. "But I'm afraid this is proof of how bad things are getting. You haven't seen anyone suspicious around here, have you?"

Hazel bit her lip as she thought before finally saying, "I think I have. There's this boy that spends a lot of time down here, especially around the banks of the Styx."

I swore violently under my breath, which caused Hazel to blush. "What does this boy look like? Is he usually by himself?"

"I haven't seen much of him, but when I do, he's always alone. He's this scrawny thing, paler than a bleached poplar tree and in desperate need of a sandwich. He wears a lot of black, almost as much as Pluto, and has a sword dark as a nightmare."

My pulse soared almost instantaneously, my heartbeat pounding like a drum in my ears. She'd seen Nico! Had that happened before? Did this mean that Kyle hadn't bathed in the Styx yet?

Though Hazel was a spirit, therefore making it impossible for her to touch anything living, I somehow managed to clamp my hands around her wrists, shocking her and me both. Still, with urgency flooding my voice, I warned, "Listen to me, you can't tell anyone about what you've seen until I say so."

Hazel's gold eyes were wide with panic. "Is that boy evil? Does he work for your father?"

"No, far from it," I said, releasing Hazel's wrists and sighing exasperatedly. "He's a good friend of mine, one who I told to be careful about wandering around the Underworld by himself. He's too young to be surrounded by so much death," – I stopped, looking at Hazel – "just like you."

"Who is he?" Hazel asked, curiosity having replaced her fear. "How are the Furies not trying to tear him apart right now? Why hasn't Cerberus eaten him?"

Although I knew that Nico hadn't met Hazel until technically a couple months from now, I figured it wouldn't do the timeline any harm if I revealed this bit of information to Hazel. I mean, she'd be brought back to life within the next few months anyways.

"That boy is Nico di Angelo. He's a friend of mine and works very closely with Lord Pluto, so you'll see him running around the Underworld pretty frequently."

"Did the Olympians train him as well?" she asked curiously, seeming to relax now that she knew he wasn't a threat.

I winced. "Not exactly." Before I could answer anything else, an explosion shook Hades' palace, causing the both of us to cringe. Even from the middle of Asphodel, I could hear the screaming echo off the obsidian walls.

"I should probably go check that out," I said, watching as the three Furies zipped across the sky, entering the palace through the windows. "We'll see each other soon, Hazel." I waved goodbye and vanished into the shadows, landing in the middle of Persephone's garden.

Persephone's garden was nothing like the ones of the mortal world, filled with exotic flowers that would die immediately if so much as a ray of sun touched one of the petals. The goddess of spring also had her fair share of fruit trees, most notably the pomegranates, which were in full bloom despite their growing season not starting until October.

I found the couple standing in front of one of Persephone's fountains, which spewed precious gems instead of water. Though there was little light in the Underworld, there was still enough to make the gems shine like a disco ball, casting a glow of different colors onto the black-clad inhabitants of the Underworld.

"You know how I feel about that boy," Persephone said, absentmindedly picking at the petunias blooming on her dress. "He was asking for it."

Hades' eye twitched. "While I agree he was being much too demanding, was it really necessary to turn him into a dandelion?"

Persephone shrugged and bent down, her fingers gently caressing the white tufts on the head of the plant. "He's much better this way, don't you think?"

"Did you turn Nico into a dandelion again?" I asked, making my presence known to the two gods. Hades pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation while Persephone scowled, the rose in her hair wilting in response.

"Hello, Andy," Hades said, his voice tight. "I wasn't expecting a visit from you for a while."

"I sent you an Iris-message a week ago. Remember?"

"Right, yes, I completely remember."

Persephone rolled her eyes. "I'm lucky if he remembers when my mother shows up, let alone someone who comes and goes as she pleases." She stood up, careful to not hurt the dandelion by her foot. "But now that you're here, I assume you want something from us. That's how this is supposed to work, right?"

"Uh, not really," I replied, rubbing the back of my neck sheepishly. "I came to help with security. Word is that some spirits are growing restless, joining with forces much darker than our father, so if I can help keep them in check, it'll be better for all demigods in the long run."

"Darker forces?" Hades asked. "What could possibly be darker than…oh."

I grimaced. "Yeah, she's waking up. History tends to repeat itself and all that nonsense, you know?"

"Sadly, I do." The Lord of the Dead heaved a weary sigh, his eyes focused on the dandelion that had once been his son. "Go on, then," he said, waving me off. "I'll make sure Nico is human the next time you stop to visit."

"And be nicer to him," I said, giving Hades a pointed look. "I know you prefer Bianca, but she's doing her own things with the Hunters right now. At least try to have one good relationship between your children. Trust me, it'll help in the long run."

I then waved goodbye and marched out of the palace, heading to the Fields of Punishment to go deal with the malicious spirits that would sooner rather than later make their appearance in the mortal world.