Chapter 27: I get a free tattoo


[David's Pov]

My initial reaction was to say: "No, this is not your shrine."

Look. As crazy of an adventure it was, I'm still new to this entire 'Greek Myths being real' ordeal. Even if I saw Chiron the centaur pretending to be a guy in a wheelchair, it did nothing to prepare me against an old guy claiming to be Cadmus when he was in desperate need of a walking stick than anything else.

Thankfully I managed to hold my tongue back. The old man hobbled over to the altar with his fiancé. He raised his eyebrow at the golden lion fur lying on it before passing it, and they sat down next to the brazier.

"Who are they?" I whispered to Zoë.

Zoë furrowed her brow.

"I don't know. Not anyone normal, by any means, but…"

She ended her sentence in a small gasp, her eyes widening in shock. I turned around just in time to witness the miracle myself; the old couple was glowing in faint golden gleams, and as I watched their features started to morph.

The entire length of the body expanded as well as the mass, the bipedal figures cramping over to a quadrupedal formation, and a pair of bat-shaped wings spread out to either side, wide enough to cover up the shrine itself.

When the transformation ended and the golden glow died out, two 30 feet long mythical reptilian creatures towered over my head.

Did I ever mention that I was a huge fan of reptiles in general? I think I did; back at the other Starbucks.

"Oh my god." My voice was squeaker than a mouse. "It's a dragon."

"Drakons, not dragons. It is a small difference, but that'll make all the difference in combat." The old man—old dragon said. Even with all the grace and calmness of an undisturbed lake, his voice made the ground beneath us tremble. He stretched out his neck to meet me eye to eye, and his eyelids cranked up into a smile.

"I'd suppose we could bypass the introductions?" The old man dragon said.

"I'm Cadmus, and this is my wife Harmonia."

The other dragon—old woman dragon? I had no idea how to address her, but then she nodded with a gentle smile.

Despite the terrifying attributes of a huge jaw and elongated fangs, her smile emanated a calm aura; up to the point where forest critters, and to my surprise, a few nymphs emerged from their respective places to huddle around and climb up the back, or nestled between the wings.

One nymph—a Naiad, judging by her cerulean dress—sent a small wink in my direction. Zoë made a sound that was either a nasty snarl or a very poor imitation of a cat with a bad case of a hairball. I'd guess that the nymph only stuck her tongue out at her before whispering something in Harmonia's…ears. I'm not familiar with Drakon biology.

"Naiads," Zoë grumbled with much distaste, it dragged me out from my initial hyped-up mood.

I wondered what she had against Naiads of all things; they're mostly kind beings, aside from the fact they liked to drag you down into their ponds, and they also tended to forget that humans can't breathe underwater.

Alright, maybe they were not kind. But something told me that Zoë had a much more personal grip on them. I would've asked her about it, but Cadmus addressed me before I could.

"I'd like a more private conversation. If you're willing."

Then he flapped his wings a few times, indicating with his tail that he was suggesting to give me a ride on his back.

"Am I ever?" I shouted out, this just became the best day of my entire life!

I barely noticed Zoë's groan from my back as I clambered onto the back of Cadmus; a small bit of myself wondered if this was technically disrespectful, but I shook that idea out of my head as soon as it came.

"Can Zoë come with, or…"

Cadmus shook his head.

"As I said, I'd prefer a private conversation."

I looked down at Zoë.

"I'll be back soon…I think."

Zoë merely scoffed as an answer. I could feel her frustration poking at my skin; did that nymph really tick her off that much?

HOWEVER before I could point that out, Cadmus flapped his wings once more, this time with much more force embedded within, and with a gigantic blast of wind, we took off into the air.

I would've shouted something aligned with: "This is awesome!" or "Wohoooo!" or whatever people say when they go high. In altitude, by the way; not…mentally. You know what I mean.

Unfortunately, being at semi-airplane height without the comfort of being inside of an airplane (not that I knew what those would be), I quickly regretted leaving the lion coat behind as we sailed through the clouds.

"A-a-re w-we g-g-oi-ng f-f-f-ar?" I managed to ask through chattering teeth.

"Don't worry. We only need to reach the mountainside."

Cadmus nudged ahead to a series of snowy mountain ranges obscured by clouds and mists. I wanted to complain that it looked quite far away, but we arrived in less than a minute after; bet no airplane can beat that record. Ha!

The ground was far too steep for me to land on without slipping at least a thousand feet down, most likely straight to the Underworld. Cadmus climbed around the vertiginous cliffs, partially taking short glides across the mountain tops, sending a small cascade of snow down the hillside.

Finally, Cadmus made his way to a small icy cave. It was nestled in between a crevasse that stretched down so far deep, that I couldn't see the bottom.

As we got closer, I found myself clinging to the scale harder than ever. Something about the endless pit was vastly unsettling. It was as if the darkness had a mind of its own, and it was more than eager to knock us out of the air and devour us whole.

I shivered at the idea. The more I thought about it, it seemed more realistic; I could hear voices of beings unknown to mankind whispering, cackling, and taunting for me to jump into the abyss. Tempt my own fate. Laugh in the face of the gods.

I blinked, and there were hundreds of eyes looking upwards. Each in different sizes and colors. Some were paired, some were singular, some had three, and some had too many; counting them dimed my brain.

I blinked again. This time, thousands of mouths were saturated all over the place. Beyond the pits. It covered the side of the cliffs. It had taken over the sky. Or maybe, I was already falling?

Each lip said different things in language, which most of them I couldn't decipher to save my life. Every voice was hushed as if they were scared of getting caught, but at the same time, they had a sense of mockery. Deriding the fools who can't foresee their return.

Jump down, young hero. The voice chanted. Jump down, and be free with us. Where no string of the Fates, or lack thereof, will bother you.

I found myself swaying to the sound of the voices. It was a tempting offer.

"Steady. We're almost there." Cadmus's voice was an anchor. A calm voice amid a swirling whirlpool of messy visions and sounds the pit provided. But it was too far away. Out of reach.

"The—the pit, they are—"

The entire earth swam beneath my feet. Or maybe, I was moving like a wave. I couldn't tell. The pit was climbing up from both sides, ready to snatch and drag me down into the darkness as well.

And then, Cadmus swooped into a cave.

He skidded against the icy floor, his claws scraping on the ice before drifting to a halt. I was never on something faster than a bus in my entire life, and as much as I enjoyed the ride here, my stomach didn't take too kindly to the rough landing.

If I had eaten anything at the café, it would've climbed its way back out by my throat. Thankfully, all I had inside my abdomen was a sip of espresso. Un-thankfully, that sip of espresso mixed with gastric juice was a pain to regurgitate. All the while, out of the corner of my eyes I saw Cadmus turning back into a human. The golden light was substantially less bright here, and this time, instead of a wise old man he was a warrior in his mid-40s.

He wore a classic lightweight Greek battle armor suitable for both long-distant travels and an emergency battle, two javelins of different lengths, one for throwing and the other for hand-to-hand combat, a 3 and a half foot long double-edged celestial bronze sword, and an arm's length width shield padded with lion skin.

How did I just dissect all that? It's a child of Ares thing. It's amazing.

Thinking about weaponry calmed down my nerves a bit. As I tried my best to gather myself, Cadmus calmly lit the small hearth with a fireplace poker and went further inside the cave saying something about getting fresh honey for me to drink.

I had no idea how he was going to get fresh honey in a middle of a freezing mountain, but I was too tired and shaken up to argue. Also, I still had that thin slab of dignity left to not outright beg for him to not leave.

I looked at the cave entrance. It looked, and felt like the most dangerous place; it probably was too—wherever the pit led to, it was disturbing to think that I was living on the same planet with it.

As my jumpy mindset settled down, a peculiar scent caught my nose. A faint, yet delightful aroma of wildlife. Fruits and flowers that I would probably never remember the name of were slowly flowing out from the back of the cave.

I was almost tempted to venture forth, curiosity stoking on my sense of adventure, but before I scooped myself up on my feet, Cadmus returned with two cups carved out of wood in each of his hands. He handed one to me.

It indeed contained warm honey water. It had just the amount of sweetness and warmth that made my shoulders relaxed and reminded me of all the good things in life.

Like my ma.

And Zoë…for some reason. Thinking about her, the earlobe that the dove picked on earlier felt hot again. I pressed it against the cold cave wall to cool it down.

"Sorry about all that," Cadmus said with a small grunt of disapproval.

"But it was a necessary procedure to take you here. And this is the only place where we can talk without getting eavesdropped on."

"You're…different," I said. What I meant to say was that Cadmus was acting with an entirely different persona to when he was an old man, but my head wasn't working too well at moment with thoughts about the pit and Zoë (strangely) orbiting around it.

Cadmus barked out in laughter and sat down on a nearby stool. The laughter echoed against the wall, and the murky shadows of the pit retreated.

"Ah yes, I tend to act more cautious, well-mannered when I'm 'outside'. It makes monsters hard to detect me, or my wife," he took a swig from his jug that suspiciously smelled like root beer. "Lord Zeus gets all agitated when old-timers like us attract monsters. Says it restrains the future generations of heroes from growing, bah!"

He drained the cup down to the very drop and tossed the wood jug into the hearth. The flames ignited fierce for a second or two before dying down to their normal pace.

"I don't…get it?"

Cadmus waved my question away. I noticed that something was etched on his palm. Maybe a tattoo?

"You don't have to. Pray that you never will. The reason why we're here is that this is one of the seldom places where even the Olympians don't dare come near."

"Because of the pit." I guessed. My body tensed up from just mentioning it. I took another sip of honey water.

Cadmus nodded. "A highway straight down to Tartarus. And that pit is one of the oldest ones out there; the pathway Typhon took when he first emerged from Gaia."

That didn't sound good at all. No wonder it was saturated with…whatever it was saturated with. Evil spirits? Maybe some ancient magic or monsters that may not even be written in the myths.

The idea was so unsettling…and yet, a very small part of me wondered, what kind of evil would be lurking inside.

"So, this is where you live?" I pointed around the cave.

"Sadly, yes. I live here and guard the gateway of Typhon in case any of the forces down decides to climb their way up and wreak havoc."

"I thought you went to Elysium."

"I wish I did. Sadly, Lord Zeus is reluctant on letting useful heroes rest." Cadmus sighed.

I was not sure what surprised me more: the fact that Cadmus was kept on the earth for thousands of years or the fact that even with him guarding the literal entryway to hell for eons, he didn't have an ounce of sarcasm or distaste when mentioning Zeus.

"You really are Cadmus," I muttered.

Cadmus raised his eyebrow.

"Were you assuming that I was lying?"

"No, but…you're just like you in the myth."

Now that I've said it out loud, it sounded mundane. Of course, they'd be identical; they were the same person. But at the same time, I couldn't help myself from being impressed that after all those years, Cadmus stayed who he was at his core. Even if he acted a little irritated.

Cadmus stroked his beard with a faint smile tracing his lips. His eyes stared far off, most likely back to the past.

"Ah, the stories; yes, they are nice to listen to from time to time. You seemed to remember them by heart, don't you?"

"Every one of them! Aside from being great feats, they are really inspiring and noble and…"

I was about to go on, but Cadmus waved both of his hands with a chuckle.

"Enough, enough. I don't do well with flattery."

"I'm not flattering, though."

Cadmus shrugged, still looking quite pleased nonetheless.

"Either way, I didn't bring you here just to get myself praised. I brought you here because you have the potential of becoming a great hero."

"I do?"

He looked down at me with an expectant smile. I hoped I could say that I returned it with a confident and excited grin of my own. But to be honest, I didn't feel the same energy. I'm not even 2 weeks into this whole world; and as exciting of an idea it was, I couldn't picture myself as a great hero.

"You don't believe me, do you?" Cadmus said.

I shook my head.

"I don't think I have it in me. I'm new to this entire world. And I don't…I'm not special. Anyone could do what I've done, and maybe not repeat my mistakes in the process."

My thoughts lingered over Rose and Luna—both of them lost, in different ways. Maybe if I had done things differently, things may have changed for the better.

Cadmus stared at me with deep eyes. His grin had faded away, leaving a much more somber expression.

"Mistakes." He grunted. "Mistakes are what makes us drive to become heroes. Look at me for example:

I started my journey to find my sister. I failed to do that.

I made a promise to lead my trusted soldiers to a new land. They all died.

Perhaps I could lead my new kingdom to glory? But, oh wait! I had an everlasting curse bestowed upon me that brought the worst luck to everyone."

I found myself shrinking under Cadmus's tale; aided by the fact that the one who cast the spell on him in the first place was Ares, who also happened to be my father.

Cadmus managed a genuine smile. "Don't worry, lad. I'm not good at shifting the blame on other people. It's not in my nature, as my wife put it."

That reminded me of what I told Zoë.

"Don't take responsibilities from Artemis; take responsibility from yourself!"

That's one of the rare principles I stood by on my own accords.

Most of the others, like don't use violence as a first resort, or try and think in other's point of view, and many others were driven from ma; she'd tell me bedtime stories from her home country with specific precepts because I was a troubled kid way back when we used to live together.

But not taking the blame, or neglecting what was mine, was something that came to me naturally. It's not even a difficult concept; whatever wrongdoings you might've walked across, you don't take any less or more blame than you're responsible for.

Maybe that was why Cadmus was my favorite hero.

"Anyone can be a great hero," Cadmus said. "But only some of them have a gentle heart, and even less of them have a gentle heart for themselves as well. That's why I choose you as my successor."

My eyes widened. Successor? Me?

"I don't think I deserve—"

"Lad, we both know that it's not about if you deserve it. It's about will you live up to it, or not."

He reached out with his left arm. I could see the tattoo on his palm, a sigil of two spears in a cross with a shield, whist two drakons flanked on either side. A small trivia passed through my head. Aside from boars, dragons and snakes were also the sacred animals of Ares.

"A symbol of peace between myself and your father," Cadmus said.

I looked down at the sigil and took his hand.

A sudden pain shot up through my hand. I held the grip tighter, and the pain died as quickly as it came. Cadmus released his grip, and when I looked down on his hand again, the sigil was gone.

It was etched on my left hand.

I clenched and unclenched the sigil. I didn't feel any different. No sudden surge of power, or some drastic boost in any of my functions. Somehow, that didn't surprise me.

Cadmus clapped his hands once.

"Now, the sigil will help you achieve more than usual. It'll grant you extra…strengths as you'd call it when you need any. But the source of it is all inside of you. The sigil is not giving you extra power—"

"—it only helps tap into what is mine." I finished the sentence. He smiled and nodded as confirmation.

"The true use of the sigil…would be a mirror." He added.

"Mirror?" I asked.

Cadmus leaned forward, his expression was once more clear of any smiles or reassurances.

"There will come a time, young hero, when you go against yourself. You become something who you're not. You…lose yourself." His tone suggested that this was not mere advice; he had been in a similar situation, perhaps even experienced it first-hand.

Cadmus gently poked my chest. "But even then, you'll find a part of yourself that is still you. The most fundamental core, an unchangeable factor of who you are. The sigil will remind you of that. It'll be a map of your sail. A rein to your chariot."

Something tingled at the back of my head. I've heard a similar phrase getting used somewhere…but I couldn't recall it at the moment.

I gave what I hoped was a confident nod. It must've been good enough because Cadmus barked a laugh and said that was all he had to say.

"Now, if you have any questions I'd be more than glad to answer."

"Um, about that…I actually have a small request."

Cadmus raised his eyebrow.

"I'm listening."

I told him my request.

When I was done, Cadmus looked down at me with an amused frown.

"Are you sure that's what you want?"

"Positive."

He shrugged, and soon enough we flew our way back to Cloudcroft.

This time, the pit didn't bother me at all. The sigil embedded in my left hand seemed to block out their tantalizing words.

[Line Break]

"What is with thee and autographs?" Zoë asked as we watched the two drakons flap away.

I held the Nemean Lion fur, now signed with unerasable soot.

May your future journeys be filled with greatness, young hero.

-by Cadmus, the hero.

I was proud of it to every degree possible, but Zoë rolled her eyes when I ran my finger over the writings. The only reason she approved of the idea was, that Heracles would hate the idea of someone else writing their name over his spoils of war, thereby claiming it as their own.

"I doubt that no one ever tried this before," I said as I put the fur around my shoulders, the embracing warmth made me shiver slightly.

"No hero ever managed to hunt down the Nemean Lion after him. It was up to us to hunt it down once it reformed. I made sure that no hunter would get greedy over it by sacrificing the pelt to Lady Artemis…"

Zoë trailed away, her lips pursing up tightly.

She had been talking to Harmonia by the time I've returned, and even as they left, the goddess of harmony gave her a knowing nod before taking off. A part of myself wanted to ask what did they talk about, but I kept silent. After all, I didn't tell her about my conversation with Cadmus.

I still couldn't fully believe that I just met my idol hero in real-time.

Truthfully, he was vastly different from what I expected. But unlike the first confrontation with Artemis, it wasn't a letdown either.

"So, how do we get out of here?" I asked.

It would've been nice if Cadmus gave us a lift, but he said they had interfered with our quest enough by getting rid of Echidna and the Chimera—those were the snake lady and her poodle at the train.

"It's simple."

Zoë pointed at the sign perched at the edge of the woods that read:

[DANGER! WILD BOAR RAMPAGING! ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK!]

"How good are thee at boar hunting?" the huntress said, a broad smile across her lips.


Ah, what's fanfic without a nice power-up scene.

Just kidding. As it was stated, the sigil of Cadmus(I'm calling it like that) is not a power boost like, say, Super Saiyan.

I'd treat it closer to 'Hysterical strength', you'll see how it works in due time when things get harder and harder.

It's also a shame I couldn't give Harmonia/Zoë more screen(?)time than I did, but currently, I'm under a bad case of C-Virus and the pills I took are making it hard to do normal tasks, like eating or walking 10 feet to the bathroom, so that's all I could muster up at the moment. Hopefully, I'd get it more fleshed out in the future.

Everyone, I hope you had fun reading, and take care.

Tata~