Jason's nightmare began like many of his nights: with the hazy, distorted memories of his earliest childhood. He found himself standing in a shadowy forest, the towering pines looming over him like silent, disapproving giants. The air was thick with fog, and the scent of damp earth clung to his small, trembling frame.
He was just a boy—no more than three years old—but he felt the weight of the world pressing down on his tiny shoulders. His heart pounded in his chest as he stumbled after a woman who moved through the mist like a ghost. She was tall, her hair dark and wild, and her face… her face was blurry, like a half-remembered dream.
"Mommy! Mommy, don't leave!" Jason's small voice called out, desperate and fearful. His legs struggled to keep up, each step a battle against the thick, oppressive fog that seemed to clutch at his ankles.
But the woman didn't stop. She didn't even turn around. Her pace quickened as if she was running from something—no, as if she was running from him.
"Thalia!" Jason's voice broke as he screamed his sister's name. "Thalia, where are you?"
Jason's small hands reached out, grasping at the empty air. He stumbled, falling to his knees, the cold, damp ground seeping through his clothes. His mother continued to walk away, her figure becoming more and more distant, until she was nothing more than a shadow.
"Mommy, please!" His voice cracked, tears streaming down his chubby cheeks.
Suddenly, the mist parted, and Jason found himself surrounded by a pack of wolves. Their eyes glowed with a predatory light, their fur bristling as they circled him. He could feel their hot breath on his skin, smell the stench of their hunger.
"Mommy!" he cried again, his voice trembling with terror.
The wolves snarled, baring their teeth, inching closer. Jason scrambled back, his heart hammering in his chest. He was too small, too weak to fight them off. He had never felt so helpless.
"Thalia…" he whimpered one last time, his voice a broken plea.
The wolves sensed weakness. They lunged, their teeth snapping, and Jason closed his eyes, bracing for the pain.
But instead of the bite of fangs, he was suddenly in a different place.
He found himself in the dim, flickering light of a crumbling stone room. The air was thick with the acrid stench of poison and the distant, relentless roar of monsters just beyond the walls. It was a place of despair and death, a place he had tried so hard to forget.
In the center of the room was a little girl no older than seven. Her blonde hair was matted with sweat, her skin pale and clammy, and her breaths came in shallow, ragged gasps. Her eyes, once bright and full of life, were now glazed over with pain and fear.
Jason knelt beside her, his heart pounding with helplessness and sorrow. His hand trembled as he reached out to take hers, the small, fragile fingers barely able to curl around his.
"Jason... it hurts," the girl whimpered, her voice weak and quivering. Tears welled up in her eyes, slipping down her cheeks as she looked up at him, pleading for relief he couldn't give.
"I know," Jason whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "I'm here. I won't leave you, I promise."
He tried to keep his voice steady, tried to hold back the tears that threatened to fall, but the sight of her suffering tore at him. The poison from the monster's attack was coursing through her veins, burning her from the inside out, and there was nothing—nothing—he could do to stop it.
He could feel her grip loosening, her strength fading away with each passing moment. Panic surged through him, but he forced himself to stay calm, to be there for her, even as every part of him screamed to fight, to do something—anything—to save her.
"I'm scared," the girl whispered, her eyes fluttering as her breaths grew more shallow, more labored.
Jason leaned in closer, his forehead resting gently against hers.
"Jason…" she whispered, her voice trembling. "It's not fair."
Jason's heart clenched. "I know," he murmured, stroking her hair gently. "It's not fair at all. But you're going to be okay. Just hold on a little longer, okay?"
The girl shook her head weakly, tears slipping from the corners of her eyes. "You don't understand," she rasped, her voice barely audible. "My mother… she sent the monster."
Jason froze, his breath catching in his throat. "What… what do you mean?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper, not wanting to believe what she was saying.
"Athena," she gasped, her small body wracked with pain. "She's my mother. She sent the monster to kill me… because I'm too weak. She said I wasn't… worthy."
The words hit Jason like a punch to the gut, leaving him reeling. He stared at the girl, horror and disbelief coursing through him. "No… no, that can't be true," he insisted, shaking his head as if denying it could make it false. "Athena wouldn't… she couldn't…"
But the girl's eyes were pleading, desperate for him to understand. "She did," she whispered, her voice trembling. "She told me… she said I was a mistake… and that the world is no place for mistakes."
Jason's mind raced, struggling to comprehend the cruelty of what he was hearing. He had always known the gods could be distant, uncaring, but this… this was monstrous. How could a mother—how could any parent—do something so vile to their own child?
"I'm sorry," the girl continued, her voice barely more than a breath now. "I'm sorry I wasn't strong enough."
Jason's heart broke anew, the weight of her words crushing him. "No," he whispered fiercely, his voice thick with emotion. "Don't say that. You're strong. You're so strong…"
But it was too late.
Jason's heart shattered as he watched her slip away, her breaths slowing until, finally, they stopped altogether. Her hand went limp in his, the warmth of life leaving her small body.
Jason sat there, frozen in shock and despair, as the final vestiges of life left her body. The weight of her words bore down on him like a crushing tide, threatening to drown him in sorrow and rage.
He wanted to scream, to lash out at the injustice of it all, but all he could do was sit there, his heart shattered into a thousand pieces. The knowledge that a god—her own mother—had condemned this innocent child to die was more than he could bear.
As the nightmare began to dissolve into darkness, Jason felt an overwhelming sense of helplessness and fury. The image of the little girl's face—her final words—etched themselves into his soul, a burning reminder of the cruelty that even the gods were capable of.
It would fuel his anger, his determination to fight against the injustices of the world—even if it meant standing against the gods themselves.
Jason's dream shifted, plunging him into another memory—one that had haunted him many times before. He was standing in a dimly lit room, the air heavy with the scent of old wood and something more acrid, like burnt herbs. Luke Castellan stood before him, his expression a twisted mixture of bitterness and resolve. Jason remembered every detail vividly, as if it had happened yesterday.
Luke's eyes, usually sharp and calculating, were filled with a deep, smoldering anger that made Jason uneasy. It was the kind of anger that had been building for years, festering and poisoning his every thought. Luke leaned in closer, his voice low and venomous as he spoke.
"The gods cursed her, Jason. My mother—she was once brilliant, a powerful seer. But the gods, they twisted her gift, turned it into a curse. Apollo, the very god of prophecy, let her mind unravel. And why? Because she dared to reach too far. They drove her insane, Jason. She was nothing but a pawn in their games."
Luke's voice grew more intense, more persuasive. "You think they care about us? We're just tools to them, weapons they can use and discard when we're no longer useful. The Titans—they're offering something different, Jason. A chance to end this cycle of abuse, to break free from the gods' control. You don't have to be their puppet. You can choose to fight back."
Jason looked at Luke, searching his face for any sign of deceit, but all he saw was a man who had been pushed too far, who had lost too much. A man who had once been a hero, now turned into something darker by the very forces he had tried to serve.
"Join us, Jason," Luke urged, his voice almost pleading now. "Together, we can bring down Olympus. We can make sure that no one else has to suffer like we did. We can build a world where the gods can't hurt us anymore."
Jason's nightmare shifted, transporting him to another haunting memory—one that was etched deep into his soul.
Bodies of demigods—children like him—littered the ground, their lifeless eyes staring up at the sky. The scent of blood and smoke filled the air, and in the distance, he saw a massive figure—Kronos, the Titan King—towering over the wreckage, his scythe dripping with the blood of those who had fallen.
Jason looked down at his hands. They were no longer the small hands of a child, but the hands of a young warrior, stained with blood. He felt the weight of his sword in his grip, saw the bodies around him—people he had known, people he had sworn to protect.
"You did this," a voice hissed in his ear, cold and accusing. Jason turned, but there was no one there. Just the empty battlefield, echoing with the screams of the dying.
He looked up at Kronos, and the Titan's eyes were on him, full of malice and dark amusement. "You could have saved them, Jason," Kronos said, his voice booming across the field. "You let them die."
"No!" Jason shouted, his voice raw with denial. "I didn't want this! I was trying to save them!"
But the battlefield didn't care. The bodies remained, the blood continued to pool at his feet.
Jason fell to his knees, clutching his head as the world spun around him, the horrors of his past and the weight of his choices crushing him from all sides.
The earth trembled violently, jolting Jason from the grip of his nightmare. The ground beneath him heaved as if trying to shake off an unseen burden. His breath came in ragged gasps as he stared up at the sky, where the stars flickered like anxious eyes. The night air was thick with an unnatural stillness, the wind holding its breath in eerie anticipation. Jason could feel it—something monumental was on the horizon, something that would shatter the fragile peace that clung to the camp like a fading dream.
A distant, bone-chilling scream pierced the silence, followed by a chorus of inhuman wails that echoed through the forest. Jason's heart leaped into action even before his body did. He sprang to his feet, his hand instinctively reaching for IVLIVS, the coin that transformed into his trusted weapon. With a practiced flip, the coin turned into a double-edged, imperial gold gladius, its blade gleaming ominously in the dim light.
He sprinted into the forest, each step guided by an unspoken urgency. The trees, usually vibrant with life, now loomed like silent sentinels, their branches clawing at the sky. As Jason weaved through the undergrowth, he felt the forest's emptiness, a void that seemed to devour all sound except the pounding of his heart.
Then he saw it.
In the heart of the forest, a monstrous figure towered over seven feet tall, its muscular frame cloaked in coarse, dark fur that rippled with every movement. The creature's head was that of a bull, its sharp, curved horns gleaming like the edges of death itself. Hoofed feet crushed the earth beneath them, leaving deep impressions in the soil as it closed in on its prey.
A boy, no older than twelve and a few years younger than Jason, stood cornered by the beast. His shoulders slumped with exhaustion, but there was a fierce determination in his hollow, sea-green eyes. His raven-black hair clung damply to his forehead, and in his hand, he gripped a glowing bronze sword, its light flickering like a dying ember.
Jason didn't hesitate. He summoned the lightning, feeling the raw power course through his veins. His eyes narrowed in concentration as he called the storm to him. The sky answered with a blinding flash, a jagged bolt of lightning tearing through the heavens and crashing down onto the massive beast.
But the minotaur was unfazed.
With a roar that shook the trees, it grabbed the boy by the neck, lifting him effortlessly into the air. The boy struggled, his feet kicking helplessly as the beast's grip tightened. Jason pushed forward, forcing the wind to propel him faster, but he could feel the ground quaking beneath him, the very earth protesting against the violence unfolding.
Cracks spider-webbed through the soil, and the trees swayed violently as if caught in a tempest. The groan of the earth being wrenched from its slumber filled the air, a sound so primal it made Jason's blood run cold. And then, with an agonizing scream, the ground erupted.
The minotaur, once a symbol of raw strength and indomitable will, was now at the mercy of the earth's fury. The ground buckled beneath its hooves, throwing the massive creature off balance and forcing it to drop the boy. The boy, with a swift, fluid movement, sidestepped the creature's deadly horns and swung his sword in a wide arc.
The blade cut through the air with deadly precision, striking deep into the minotaur's hide. The beast let out a final, guttural roar, but instead of collapsing in defeat, its form began to shimmer. The wound glowed with an intense, radiant gold, and the creature's body started to dissolve, disintegrating into fine, golden particles that drifted away on the night breeze.
Jason hovered above the fissures, watching as the last remnants of the minotaur vanished. Below, the boy's adrenaline was ebbing, leaving behind a wave of overwhelming exhaustion. As his legs buckled, Jason swooped down, catching him just before he hit the ground.
In the dim light, Jason noticed a faint, ethereal glow hovering above the boy's head. It took shape, solidifying into a familiar symbol—a trident.
"A trident," Jason whispered, the realization dawning on him like the break of dawn. "Poseidon. Earthshaker, Stormbringer, god of the sea."