Khaos Rising - Chapter 6

ALL CHARACTERS ARE 18+__________________________________________

The laptop screen went dark.

Percy Jackson stared at the black reflection showing her own wide-eyed face, her brain still trying to catch up with what her eyes had just witnessed. The glow that had painted the Zeus cabin's walls in flickering blue light for the past thirty or so minutes vanished, plunging the room back into shadows. The sudden silence almost felt wrong - too quiet after the wet sounds of tearing flesh and the screaming chaos of monsters dying by the dozens.

Her mouth hung open. She blinked once. Twice. Licked her dry lips.

"Holy. Shit."

Beside her, Thalia Grace didn't move. The daughter of Zeus sat frozen on her side of the lumpy camp bed, one hand still hovering over the laptop's touchpad, her dark-lined eyes fixed on the screen like she could will the stream back to life through sheer force of disbelief. Small sparks of electricity crackled across her knuckles, unconscious manifestations of her godly power that made Percy's arm hairs stand on end.

"That just…" Thalia's voice, normally a low, husky drawl, came out hoarse and quiet, barely even above a whisper. "That just fucking happened."

"That JUST happened," Percy agreed unnecessarily, nodding so hard her brown ponytail whipped against her shoulders. She scrambled to her knees, leaning forward like getting closer to the dead screen would somehow bring the stream back to life. "Did you see when he- with the crows? And then the sword turned into a WHIP? And the shotgun with the green fire and black smoke and-"

"-I fucking saw it, Jackson."

"But like, you saw it saw it though, right? Because I'm not sure I believe what I saw even though I definitely saw it too."

Her heart hammered against her ribs, adrenaline still flooding her system from watching the massacre unfold in real-time. She'd fought monsters before, killed plenty of them herself with Riptide, but this? This was different. The red-haired guy on DJ Shriek’s stream had moved through that club like a fucking hurricane, all brutal efficiency and creative violence that made her own combat skills look like a kid's karate class. His actual sword-work was rough, his skill with the blade seemingly restricted to brute force and overwhelming offense, but he made it work. No- combined with his other abilities?

He made it dominate.

‘That Akira slide thing on the motorcycle,’ she thought, replaying the image in her mind. ‘While disemboweling a Hellhound with the sword-whip-thing. That was the coolest shit I've ever seen.’

But also possibly the most horrifying. There’d been so much blood, so much viscera and guts and-... shit, man. Percy had seen monster blood before, seen it dissolve into golden dust that then dissolved into nothingness, but these kills had been… messy. Ruthless. The stream's camera had caught everything in brutal high-definition: intestines spilling across dance floors, heads rolling through puddles of mixed monster fluids, that Cyclops literally getting bisected lengthwise. The mysterious Demi-God wasn’t a trained swordsman, but he definitely knew how to fight. 

More then that, he knew how to kill. He was really freaking good at killing monsters.

So good, in fact, that he made it into a viral performance.

Her stomach should've turned. She knew that objectively. But instead, Percy had been riveted, unable to look away, her competitive combat instincts analyzing every move while her sleep-deprived ‘seaweed’ brain just went ‘wow, that's so cool!’

"The teleportation," Thalia suddenly spoke up into the tense silence, her voice still tight. She finally moved, lowering her hand from the laptop to clench it into a fist against her thigh. More sparks danced across the sleeve of her tattered black crop top, blue arcs fading away when they reached her wrist. "Did you catch that? The dude was just… swapping places. With monsters. With his own weapon. With those fuckin’ birds. Just clapped his hands and-"

"-SWAPPED! Yeah!" Percy bounced slightly on her knees, the bed creaking under her enthusiasm. "That was INSANE! How does that even work? Is that like, a Hades thing? Can Hades do that?"

Thalia's electric blue eyes snapped to Percy's face. "Hades."

"Well, yeah, dude. I mean…" She gestured vaguely at the laptop, her overstimulated brain struggling to work through the logic. "That black and purple shotgun? Which was ridiculously cool, by the way. That was definitely giving underworld vibes. All shadowy and stuff. And the teleportation could be Shadow Travel, right? Plus the whole 'absorbing the essence of monsters into his weapon' thing seemed pretty death-god-adjacent."

For a long moment, Thalia just stared at her, electric blue eyes half-lidded and deadpan with bemusement. 

This late at night - or, rather early morning, the bags under her eyes were pronounced, made even more extreme by the dark black eyeshadow she hadn’t bothered washing off just yet because apparently they were pulling an impromptu all-nighter. Her soft, full lips were painted the exact same color, matching the short, spiky mess of silky-soft hair on her head. Combined with her pale white skin, dark-colored clothing, and utter refusal to wear the bright orange Camp Half-Blood t-shirt she’d been given by the Harpies after the Fleece pulled her from the tree, there was no denying how striking the punk-goth-rocker aesthetic made her look and stand out amongst the other Campers. 

Not that Percy thought she was hot or anything. Even though she was hot. Like, objectively hot. And fit. And funny. She just wasn’t, like, hot hot. Butterflies in the stomach hot.

Like Annabeth.

Annabeth was the one who gave her butterflies. Who fussed at her whenever she did stupid stuff, who always had her back when times got rough. Annabeth was her best friend, her closest confidante besides Grover. But she was also still super torn up about Luke, her behavior had become all weird and cagey ever since Thalia was revived a couple weeks ago, and their whole… friendship was starting to grow kind of awkward and strained. Plus, Percy didn’t even know if Annabeth liked girls-

Man. 

Now was totally not the time.

"Death-god-adjacent,” Thalia repeated dully, her dry voice forcibly ripping Percy out of her thoughts before she could start spiralling into teenaged lesbian angst. 

The punk girl’s lips twitched up into a smirk in spite of herself.

Percy flushed.

"You know what I mean!"

"I really don't." 

But Thalia's expression had shifted from shocked paralysis to something more intense, active, and unfathomably curious. She unclenched her fist, flexing her fingers like she was physically grasping at the problem, before turning her whole body to face Percy’s on the bed. "Okay. Okay, let's think about this. Shotgun, check. Teleportation, maybe Shadow Travel like Hades, check. Even the whole storage thing- he kept pulling shit outta his own shadow, remember? Doubly fucking checked. But the crows?"

Percy frowned, her eyebrows scrunching together. "Crows are like… death birds?"

"Crows are scavengers, Perce. They eat dead things. That's not the same as-" Thalia cut herself off, shaking her head hard enough that her choppy black hair whipped across her face. "Fuck, I don't know. Maybe? But that sword…"

The sword. Percy had felt something when that weapon appeared on screen - a cold wariness in her gut that she couldn't quite name, as if there was something about it that made her soul scared of ever being in its path. The blade had been massive, easily seven feet of dark metal that seemed to drink in the light of the dance floor rather than reflect it. Whenever he used it to kill a monster, there was no counterattacks or vengeful fury like when he blasted them with his shotgun - just a scream of agony, a look of complete and utter fear, and then poof.

Dusted.

So much golden dust.

She’d seen a few of the viewers reference it in DJ Shriek’s chat, actually. The name they’d use, it was-

"Stygian Iron," Percy said quietly.

Thalia's head snapped toward her. "What?"

"The sword. It was Stygian Iron. Saw it come up in the chat.” She wished she had better memory, but honestly, just reading the chat with her dyslexia when it was moving as fast as it was had already been an exercise in futility. The fact that she’d even caught ‘Stygian Iron’ in that blur of headache-inducing letters was a miracle in and of itself. “It clearly wasn’t Celestial Bronze, right? And if everything else is already screaming Hades…”

“It sounds like something you’d find in the Underworld,” Thalia admitted, tapping her finger thoughtfully against her bottom lip. “Stygian Iron. River Styx. Shit, Jackson, you may be onto something. He could be a Son of Hades.”

"I mean, probably?" Percy tilted her head, trying to puzzle through the implications despite her severe lack of insider knowledge on Greek Mythology politics. "But like, isn't that super illegal? The whole Big Three oath thing?"

Thalia's jaw tightened, her eyes flickering up to the ceiling for just a split second before the blue laser-beams focused entirely back on Percy. "Yeah. Super fucking illegal. Just like your dad breaking the oath to have you, or my dad breaking it to have me. The Gods don’t actually give a shit about their own rules, Jackson. Not until the repercussions are staring them in their own fuckin’ faces."

“Yeah, but…”

Percy trailed off, unsure of what to say in the face of her new friend’s obvious distaste for their fathers.

She’d known intellectually that she and Thalia were both products of forbidden godly hookups - that the Big Three weren't supposed to have demigod children after World War II because they were ‘too powerful’ and ‘caused too many problems’. Hell, it was a big reason as to why she’d been labelled the Lightning Thief last year and had to deal with so much of the bullshit that had come with it. But knowing it and connecting it to her own experiences and thinking about what it meant for this mysterious red-haired Demi-God were two entirely different things.

If he really was a son of Hades, and if the gods found out…

"Chiron needs to know about this," Percy breathed, the words spilling out before she'd even fully formed the thought.

"No shit," Thalia agreed immediately. She reached out to close the laptop with a decisive snap, the click echoing through the dark, empty cabin like a gunshot. "We need to tell him right now. This is- this is huge. Like, ‘potential war between the Big Three’ huge."

Percy groaned in frustration, running a hand over her face even as she moved to stand up. Her legs had gone stiff from sitting cross-legged for so long, and she had to grab Thalia’s bedpost to steady herself. “I’m kinda tired of it, to be honest. Why can’t they just… get along? Take a chill pill? Maybe if they were nicer to their kids they wouldn’t go and start World Wars.”

“Perce, if literally any of the Gods were that empathetic we wouldn’t be staying in these drafty ass cabins at a summer camp for protection.”

Which was…

Fair.

Ugh.

"Do you think Mr. D will care? Or will he just-"

"-make a stupid pun with our names and tell us to fuck off?" Thalia finished, pushing herself off the bed with more force than necessary. "Probably. Screw that guy. But Chiron will listen."

The two of them stood there for a moment in the darkness of the Zeus cabin, the only light coming from the faint glow of stars and moonlight streaming through the tall windows. Thalia was taller than Percy, only by an inch or two - something about being a Child of the Big Three clearly substituted for her not eating her wheaties as a kid, because Thalia was 5’9”, Percy was 5’7”, and the despite only having been training during the summers at Camp Half-Blood for about a year now, Percy was actually rocking washboard abs and enough muscle definition in her arms to form an actual bicep.

Still, this whole thing felt surreal. She'd just watched a guy their age - because he'd definitely looked like a teenager, maybe seventeen at the most - brutally slaughter nearly forty monsters in less than twenty minutes, and now she was standing in her friend's cabin trying to figure out how to explain it to their centaur mentor without sounding completely insane.

Also, a small, traitorous voice in the back of Percy's brain whispered, he was really hot. Like, butterfly hot.

She immediately shoved that thought down into the mental equivalent of a locked box and threw away the key. Not the time. Definitely not the time. She had literally just watched him turn a Dracaena inside-out with a whip-sword. This was not the moment to notice that his long red hair had looked really cool whipping around during the crow transformation, or that the Akira slide had no business looking as sexy as it did, or that the way he swung his sword around like an oversized hockey stick was actually kind of cute in a caveman wa-

"Jackson."

Percy jerked her attention back to Thalia, who was watching her with narrowed eyes and a knowing smirk that made Percy's face heat up. "What?"

"You're thinking about how hot he was."

"I am NOT-"

"You one hundred percent are." Thalia grabbed her leather jacket from where it hung on the bedpost and shrugged it on, various different pins and trinkets glinting on its breast and collar. "Gotta work on your poker face, girl. I can practically smell your kitty purring from here. It’s gross.”

Percy's face went from warm to actively burning. "Okay, first of all - suuuper out of line. Second of all, you're one to talk! You were staring at the screen just as hard as I was!"

"Yeah, because he was fucking impressive." Thalia's smirk widened into something sharper and more dangerous, flashing a glimpse of frustratingly white and straight teeth. "That's allowed. Dude just proved he could take on a whole club full of monsters and WIN. That's objectively impressive."

"Exactly! So I'm allowed to think it was cool too!"

"Cool. Sure. That's definitely the word for what you were thinking."

"Oh my God, I hate you."

"No you don't." 

Thalia was already moving toward the cabin door, her combat boots hitting the floor with heavy thuds. But she paused with her hand on the handle, glancing back over her shoulder. The teasing edge in her expression had faded, replaced by something more serious. "For the record though? I was thinking the same thing. Hot and impressive. That’s a dangerous combination."

Percy blinked. "Wait, really?"

"The guy could turn into a hundred crows and teleport by clapping. Plus, he pulled a fucking motorcycle out of his own shadow and played chicken with a giant Hellhound. Like, c’mon dude. Duh. That's sexy as Hell."

Percy couldn’t even deny it. 

But she would never admit it.

“Uh-huh,” she muttered noncommittally, only slightly awkward. “It is sexy. Motorcycles, y’know? I always wanted one of those.”

They stared at each other for a moment before Thalia snorted, shook her head, and yanked the door open. "Whatever. Come on, Jackson. Let's go tell Chiron we just watched a suspected illegal son of Hades commit mass monster murder on an underground Harpy VTuber’s livestream."

Thank God.

"When you put it like that, it sounds really weird."

"It is really weird."

Percy followed Thalia out into the cool night air, pulling the cabin door shut behind them. The temperature had dropped significantly since they'd snuck in there hours ago to watch the stream, and goosebumps immediately broke out across Percy's bare arms. She'd gone to bed in just her Camp Half-Blood t-shirt and pajama shorts, not expecting to be dragged out of sleep by Thalia pounding on her cabin door at two in the morning with a laptop and a manic grin.

"You HAVE to see this," Thalia had said, practically vibrating with excitement. "There's this streaming platform - monsters and freaks only, hidden from normies - and there's a HARPY DJing for a monster nightclub and some demigod just showed up and started absolutely destroying everyone and-"

Percy had followed mostly because enthusiasm like that from the ‘super cool and badass punk-goth Thalia’ was both uber rare and infectious, and she'd been curious what could get the daughter of Zeus that hyped up. She'd expected maybe some cool monster fights. Underground combat tournament. Nothing prepared her for watching a red-haired teenager in a Sex Bob-Omb shirt (Scott Pilgrim was peak fiction) systematically dismantle an entire nightclub full of monsters like it was a freaking global leaderboard speed-run in a video game.

Now, walking across the central green of Camp Half-Blood toward the Big House, Percy's brain kept replaying specific moments. The way he'd used that teleportation ability to swap positions with a Hellhound mid-leap, sending the monster flying into a group of Dracaenae. The casual efficiency of his shotgun blasts, each one calculated or charged up for maximum carnage. The moment he'd ridden another Hellhound like a mechanical bull while his sword-whip-thing was literally embedded in its spine, literally draining the life out of the dying monster until it turned into nothing but so much dust on the dance floor.

‘He moved like he'd been fighting his whole life,’ Percy thought. ‘Like it was natural. Like he was enjoying it.’

That last part should've bothered her. It didn't. If anything, it made the whole thing more… Impressive? Percy fought monsters because she had to. Because they attacked her and her friends, because prophecies demanded it, because it was her responsibility as a daughter of Poseidon and a Hero. But this guy? He'd fought like it was fun. Like the violence was just another form of expression for him, or stress relief. 

Which was crazy, because as far as she was aware, teenage boys usually handled stress relief in a very different way than slaughtering monsters and risking their lives.

"You're doing it again," Thalia declared without looking back, both hands shoved into the pockets of her leather jacket.

Percy blinked away her thoughts.

"Doing what?"

"Thinking too hard. I can hear your brain creaking from here."

"My brain does not creak!"

"Jackson, your brain sounds like a rusty door hinge trying to open."

"Yeah? Like you’re much better!”

But Percy found herself grinning despite the insult, falling into step beside her ‘cousin’ as they crossed the green. The grass was damp with dew, making her bare feet cold and slightly slippery, but she didn't care. There was something almost companionable about walking through Camp in the middle of the night with Thalia, sharing this weird secret knowledge about a powerful Demi-God they'd never met but who'd already managed to impress the hell out of both of them.

They'd only known each other for two weeks - since the Golden Fleece had healed Thalia's tree and brought her back from the magical stasis that had kept her frozen at thirteen for seven whole years. Percy had been wary at first, unsure how to interact with this aggressive, punk-rock daughter of Zeus who'd been her predecessor as the ‘most powerful demigod at Camp’. Since Zeus was the King God and she was his daughter, everyone naturally saw her as the leader, the strongest, and she wore the responsibility well.

At first, Percy had been jealous. 

It had been an adjustment period, no longer being the ‘special’ one at Camp - which was messed up to think in the first place, because it wasn’t like she was more important than any one Demi-Gods from the other cabins. It had taken her a couple days to curb her pride and stop pouting, but Thalia had won her over pretty quickly with her brutal honesty, dark humor, and their shared love of breaking minor rules.

Like stealing the wifi password from the Stoll brothers so Thalia could catch up on everything she'd missed while tree-ified.

‘Which is how we ended up watching an illegal monster streaming platform at three in the morning,’ Percy thought. ‘So… thanks, Stoll brothers? I guess?’

The Big House loomed ahead of them, its blue paint looking gray in the starlight. Lights were on in Chiron's office on the first floor, which wasn't surprising. The centaur mentor rarely slept, always working on some Camp project or prophecy interpretation or paperwork for the gods.

Percy took a breath, steeling herself even as they drew closer. "Okay. So. How do we explain this without sounding completely insane?"

Thalia stopped at the bottom of the porch steps, one boot on the first riser. She tilted her head, considering. "We tell the truth. We were watching an underground monster streaming platform-"

"-which we technically shouldn't have access to-"

"-minor detail-“

"-and we saw a demigod massacre nearly forty monsters in a nightclub-“

"-in Miami, based on the location tags-"

"-using abilities we've never seen before-"

"-and Stygian Iron weapons-"

"-which strongly suggests he's a son of Hades-“

"-which is massively illegal-"

"-and also incredibly dangerous for everyone in North America. Especially us."

They looked at each other. 

Thalia's expression was grim. "Yeah. We sound completely insane."

"Totally insane."

"But also correct."

"Totally correct," Percy agreed.

Thalia nodded once, sharp and decisive, then took the porch steps two at a time. Percy followed after her at a slightly less sure pace, her heart rate picking up again. This was the kind of information that could start wars between Gods. If Hades had broken the oath, if Zeus and her dad found out…

‘Don't think about it,’ Percy told herself firmly. ‘Just tell Chiron. Let him figure out the divine politics crap.’

The front door of the Big House was unlocked like it always was, considering the amount of medical emergencies that happened at Camp Half-Blood. Thalia pushed it open without knocking, and they both stepped into the familiar entry hall - polished wooden walls covered in grapevines, old but well-maintained furniture draped over with leopard-printed decorations, and a generally tacky aesthetic that leaned more towards ‘grape wine distillery’ than anything actually fashionable. The interior was warm compared to the outside, heated by a roaring enchanted fireplace in the main common area that had never gone out for as long as Percy had been coming to camp. 

She could hear voices from upstairs - Chiron's patient rumble and Mr. D's irritated, nasally tones.

"They're both up there," Thalia muttered, already heading for the stairs. "Good. Let’s get this over with all at once."

Percy followed, her wet feet leaving faint prints on the hardwood. As they climbed, she could start to make out actual words from the conversation happening above them.

"-absolutely ridiculous, Chiron. A Satyr calls in the middle of the night claiming he's found another Big Three child? Really?"

Mr. D's voice dripped with sarcasm and irritation, as if he was genuinely upset at being woken up at such a late hour. Which was entirely reasonable, to be honest - a rarity for Dionysus. Percy and Thalia traded glances at the mention of ‘another Big Three child’, their steps slowing down drastically in the interest of shameless eavesdropping. No words even needed to be exchanged.

"Marcus Wheeler is a reliable Seeker, Dionysus,” Chiron’s voice rebutted, sounding just as tired, if not significantly less irritated than the divine Camp Director. The centaur’s patience was legendary. “If he says he found a Demi-God of such strength, I’m beholden to belie-"

Thalia froze mid-step, her eyes growing wide. Electric blue bore into Percy's sea-green as she grabbed the slightly shorter girl by the bicep and yanked her to an abrupt halt. "Marcus Wheeler. That's… fuck. That's the Satyr assigned to Florida, right? Miami area? Grover mentioned him the other day, didn’t he?"

"I think so?" Percy's brain was spinning its rusty hinges again, trying to connect dots. "We had to go through Florida to bring the Golden Fleece back to Camp; he only remembered after we got back that ‘Marcus Wheeler’ had some kinda pimped out monster-proof van that we could’ve used instead of-... Wait. If Marcus called about a Big Three kid. In Miami. And we just saw a Demi-God in Miami who we think is a son of Hades…"

Thalia’s mouth fell open.

"Holy shit."

It all made sense.

"Holy SHIT."

They stared at each other for a heartbeat, simultaneously stunned into silence by the implications- but then Thalia was moving, taking the rest of the stairs at a near-run, and it took all she had for Percy to scramble after her and not trip over her own feet in her haste. Thalia didn't bother knocking on Chiron's office door. She just shoved it open hard enough that it banged against the interior wall, skidding to a stop the instant she made it past the wooden threshold.

"We need to talk to you about-"

She hesitated. 

Percy slammed into her back, nearly taking the both of them out right then and there, before peering around Thalia's shoulder to see what had caused the freeze.

Chiron sat in his wheelchair form behind his massive oak desk, looking every inch the patient mentor in his cardigan and reading glasses. His expression was calm but concerned, brown eyes flickering between the two girls with that particular brand of centaur wisdom and intensity that made Percy feel like he could see straight through her skull.

Mr. D - Dionysus, the God of wine and Camp Director - lounged in a chair across from Chiron, looking deeply put-out by existence in general. He wore his usual tacky Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts, his pudgy face set in a permanent scowl. A can of Diet Coke sat on the desk in front of him, because Zeus had forbidden him from drinking his beloved wine as punishment for some ancient transgression. And because Diet Coke at damn near 4 in the morning was apparently his drink of choice instead of, like, coffee or water or something.

Both of them were clearly in the middle of a serious discussion. Both of them turned to look at Percy and Thalia with varying degrees of annoyance (Mr. D) and curiosity (Chiron).

"Thalia Grace and Perry Johnson," Mr. D intoned flatly, as if he and Chiron hadn’t just been discussing a Demi-God that could spark a brand new war between the Gods. "How delightful. Breaking curfew again, I see."

"It's Percy," Percy corrected automatically. "Percy Jackson. And we-"

"-need to tell you about a son of Hades who just killed a nightclub full of Monsters in Miami," Thalia finished in a rush, her voice sharp and urgent.

…

A tense, overwhelming silence fell upon the room

Mr. D's can of Diet Coke froze halfway to his mouth. 

Chiron's entire body went very, very still. His eyes behind the reading glasses had gone as sharp as arrow tips.

"I beg your pardon?" the centaur asked, and there was something foreboding about the quiet tone of his voice. 

Percy swallowed and let Thalia take the lead. She was good at that.

"Miami. Just now. Well, like twenty minutes ago, but still." Thalia stepped fully into the room, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Static electricity was building again, making the air smell like ozone and thunderstorms, but if the Daughter of Zeus felt her godly powers surfacing she didn’t outwardly acknowledge it. "There's this underground streaming platform that we found online, and a Harpy named DJ Shriek runs it like an illegal… fight club… thing. Mixed with a DJ set, I guess. We were watching because…"

She trailed off, clearly realizing she was about to admit to stealing wifi and accessing illegal digital content.

Percy squared her shoulders and stepped forward.

She knew what to do.

"We were watching because Thalia wanted to catch up on modern stuff and the Stoll brothers gave us the wifi password.”

Snitches got stitches, but at least with stitches she’d get to live to see another day.

Mr. D's eye twitched, and his can of Diet Coke crumpled lightly in his large, pudgy hand. "Of course they did. Damned idiots. Oh, give the Counselors access to the Mist-powered wi-fi router, Mr. D. They’re Counselors for a reason. They won’t abuse our trust. What a load of malarkey. I told you we should have-“

"Continue girls," Chiron interrupted the irate Director before he could properly get worked up. His deep  voice was deceptively calm. "This streaming platform. You saw… what, exactly?"

"A guy," Percy stated quickly, feeling very much out-of-place and underdressed now that the warm glow of Chiron’s desk lamp exposed her bare, dirty feet and baby blue pajama shorts to the world. Her heart was hammering again, but she forced herself to speak clearly in spite of the nervousness turning her stomach to mush. "He had long red hair, tan skin- he was probably sixteen? He showed up at this monster-run nightclub called Club Ravenous and just… destroyed everyone. Thirty-eight monsters. We counted, the DJ counted, the chat counted- Chiron, this dude killed them all. Well, not all all, there was this spider lady that-“

"Not important, Perce,” Thalia cut in, lightly digging an elbow into her side.

“Hey-“

“The guy had a big ass claymore made from what the other chatters were claiming to be ‘Stygian Iron’. It also turned into a whip… sword. When he wanted it to. A, uh, whipsword," she barreled on without hesitation, chewing nervously at her bottom lip. "And he also had this shotgun that fired these weird black bullets that exploded into green fire, as well as all these crazy abilities- he turned into a swarm of crows at one point, swapped himself or other monsters with different monsters and objects by clapping his hand-"

Percy hurriedly nodded her head. "Shadow travel, we think. Or something like it. The whole place was pretty… shadow-y, so I guess it’s hard to say-"

"-but he also absorbed monster essence into his weapon,” Thalia picked back up. “We saw the so-called ‘Stygian Iron’ glowing all creepy and white every time he killed something with it. Like he was draining the monster’s freakin’ soul-”

"-so we're pretty sure he's a son of Hades,” Percy finished, equal amounts proud of their deductive reasoning and nervous because of what it all implied. Also confused because she wasn’t sure if she was supposed to know what ‘essence’ was, but fuck it. “It was really giving death-God-adjacent - y’know, the underworld weapon and the shadow powers and the whole ‘super evil but not really’ vibe.”

"’Giving death-god-adjacent’," Mr. D repeated drolly, his voice absolutely dripping with disdain as he slowly turned his head to regard Thalia instead. "Did your slightly less impressive cousin actually just say ’death-god-adjacent’? Are the two of you mentally ill? Hades isn’t even a God of Dea-"

"Enough, Dionysus. Please." 

Chiron's gaze hadn't left Percy and Thalia, but something in his expression had shifted. It wasn’t quite shock - Percy wasn’t sure if Chiron could ever actually be shocked anymore after all the crazy things he’d done, the things he’d seen, and the heroes he’d trained - but there was definitely a deep concern there. Concern mixed with… recognition? 

She wasn’t all that good at reading centuries-old centaurs.

"This Demi-God. Did he give a name during this supposed ‘livestream’?"

"No," Thalia shook her head, brow furrowing with annoyance and disappointment. "DJ Shriek asked him on stream and he told her to ‘fuck off’."

"Which was kind of badass," Percy quipped unnecessarily.

Mr. D glared at her in annoyance.

Chiron's fingers drummed once against the desk - a nervous tic Percy had never seen from him before. His eyes flicked to Mr. D, who glared back with a look that spoke of complete and utter exhaustion and irritation. Some kind of silent communication passed between them and in the end, Mr. D was the one who relented, leaning back in his chair and letting out a disgusted huff of air. Chiron, meanwhile, took a slow breath and removed his reading glasses, setting them down with deliberate care.

"Red hair," he said slowly, sounding less surprised by the second. "Fifteen years old. Stygian Iron blade. Shadow manipulation, crow transformation, and some peculiar form of… teleportation that could very well be linked to the aforementioned shadow manipulation."

"Yeah," Percy confirmed eagerly, taking a half-step forward. "That's him."

"And this happened in Miami. At a place called Club Ravenous."

"Yeah." Thalia was watching Chiron with narrowed eyes now, picking up on the same weird recognition that Percy had noticed. "Why? Do you… do you know something?"

Chiron and Mr. D exchanged another look, but this one lasted even shorter than before. The portly God waved one hand in a dismissive, 'go ahead' gesture, slouching even deeper into his chair like he couldn't be bothered to care.

The centaur cleared his throat.

"Approximately three hours ago," he began carefully, steepling fingers beneath his beared chin and fixing the two girls with a serious, no-nonsense stare, "I received a phone call from Marcus Wheeler - the Satyr Seeker who’d been assigned to the Miami-Fort Lauderdale region for the past school year."

Percy's stomach did a weird flip. 

"We heard you talking about that when we came in,” she admitted, trading side-glances with an intense-looking Thalia. “He came across another Big Three kid, right?”

"Yes." Chiron’s expression turned grave. "Marcus reported that he had encountered a newly awakened demigod. Fifteen years old, turning sixteen soon - within the week, if I remember correctly. Long red hair. Willful. Extremely powerful scent; he said it was comparable to you, Percy. The both of you, actually. A potent combination to be certain. And he was very, very certain."

…

Percy felt like the air had been sucked out of her lungs.

"Wait," she managed, licking her suddenly dry lips. Her brain struggled to draw proper correlation between the hurricane of crimson death she’d seen on the livestream and the boy, younger than Thalia no less, that Chiron was describing to her now "Newly awakened? As in-"

"As in his divine gifts manifested for the first time tonight."

"Bull. Shit."

The words exploded out of Thalia like a thunderclap - ironic, considering just who her father was. The punk-goth dropped her crossed arms, stalking forward and slamming her hands on Chiron’s desk with enough strength to shake the very sturdy, very heavy-looking piece of furniture. A small, decorative mug with ‘#1 Activities Director’ emblazoned over the front tipped over and rolled towards the edge, spilling a couple lead pencils. 

Chiron looked entirely unperturbed.

"That's impossible,” she declared hotly, and sure enough - she totally sounded jealous. And disbelieving. Which pretty much mirrored exactly what Percy was feeling at the moment. “We just watched that guy take down forty monsters. In, like, fifteen minutes. Using these crazy powerful ‘gifts’ that I've never even heard of. There is no freakin’ way that was his first night with god juice."

Mr. D. wrinkled his nose. “God… juice?”

"Thalia’s right," Percy butted in, her voice coming out higher than normal. She cleared her throat, tried to speak with something approaching composure, but it immediately cracked- … so she gave up. "That guy fought like… like a monster-slaying veteran. Like someone who'd been killing those creeps his whole life. His sword-fighting was, uh, crappy. He kinda just used it like a super big baseball bat. But- but everything else was stupid good. That couldn’t just be beginner's luck!"

"Nevertheless," Chiron sighed, shaking his head, "that is what Marcus reported. The boy's name is Andreas Ashcroft. He has been moving schools frequently - Marcus said he's attended thirteen different schools in the past few years; a story that isn’t too far away from your own, young Percy. After his prom night devolved into a tense battle with a Lamia who’d pretended to be his date, young Andreas slayed the monster, escaped the chaotic aftermath, and had a rather… eye-opening conversation with Marcus afterwards. This, as I said, happened all in one night. Before this ‘illegal livestream’ adventure, I’d reckon.”

Both girls went silent and looked at each other.

Thalia’s face was flustered. One of her eyes was twitching. She looked completely and utterly bewildered by the statements being made, and honestly, Percy couldn’t blame her. Percy could also tell that Thalia needed a second to compose herself lest she said something that got her turned into a newt by Dionysus, so she decided to take the plunge and react for the both of them.

"That's-" Percy's hands flew up, gesturing wildly as if flailing her arms would make her disbelief more poignant. "That's not possible! That doesn't make any SENSE! How would he even know how to use his abilities? How would he know about monsters? Who gave him that sick Stygian Claymore? Why does he-"

"Those are excellent questions," Chiron interrupted gently, "to which I do not have answers. Marcus attempted to bring Andreas here to Camp Half-Blood for safety and training, but the boy refused. He said he wanted to… explore and ‘gain power’ on his own terms. Marcus expressed that he seemed excited at the prospect of slaying monsters rather than intimidated by it."

"Typical," Mr. D muttered into his Diet Coke. "Children of the Big Three, if he is Lord Hades’ son, always think they know better than everyone else. Arrogant little Godlings."

"Hey!" Thalia snapped.

Mr. D just gave her a look that conveyed all that needed to be said.

But Percy's mind was still racing, unsatisfied by Chiron’s explanation. She was still trying to reconcile the fighter they'd watched on the livestream with the newly awakened demigod Chiron was describing. 

It didn't fit. 

It couldn’t fit. 

People didn't just wake up with powers and immediately start using them at expert-level proficiency. It took months of training at Camp to get combat skills like that, if not years. Days upon days of practice to develop the kind of tactical awareness she'd seen on that stream. Maybe not the sword-fighting, but the ease in which he chained-together his powers, his utter confidence in the face of death, the spatial awareness and strategy-

It just didn’t freaking make sense-

Unless…

"What if he's been training?" Percy asked suddenly, punching a sun-tanned fist into her palm. "Like, what if he knew he was a demigod before his powers awakened? What if someone's been teaching him how to fight this whole time?"

Chiron tilted his head, considering. "That's possible. Though Marcus made no mention of-"

"Or what if he's older than he looks?" Thalia cut in, her electric blue eyes bright with interest. "Age gets fucky-”

“Language, Thalia.”

“-when it comes to divine magic. I’m technically like, what, twenty now? But I look and feel fifteen. What if he's actually twenty-five but looks like a teenager?"

"Or," Mr. D drawled mockingly, setting down his Diet Coke with a sharp clunk, "what if he's simply a child of Hades with naturally prodigious combat abilities, and you're both overthinking this because you can't accept that someone might be more talented than you at slamming a sharp piece of metal into big, scary monsters? Get over yourselves. The world is a very, very big place, and you girls are very, very small bugs in the long scheme of things."

The room grew cold. 

Lightning struck the cloudless night sky with a loud, resounding CRACK. Percy felt the moisture in the air responding to her emotions, condensing into tiny droplets that ran, cool and wet, down the side of Chiron’s mug and Mr. D’s can of Dr. Pepper. But despite his annoying personality and mockery and constant rage-baiting, the portly, gaudy man was still a God, and threatening a God was the easiest way to suffer a fate worse than death. That was, like, ninety-six percent of Greek mythology.

So she swallowed her anger.

And her pride.

Because, in his defense, there was a lot of that going around too.

"Dionysus," Chiron sighed.

"What? I'm just saying what we're all thinking." Mr. D waved a dismissive hand. "The boy is powerful. More powerful than these two were when they first awakened their divine power, apparently. That doesn't mean there's some grand conspiracy to solve. Sometimes genetics just works out in interesting ways… especially when said genetics comes directly from a Greek God."

‘… He has a point,’ Percy realized reluctantly. She didn't like it, but he had a point. If Andreas really was a son of Hades - one of the Big Three - then his power level would be naturally higher than most demigods. Add in whatever skills he might have picked up before his awakening, and…

‘But still,’ her brain insisted stubbornly. ‘It’s his first night. This doesn't add up.’

"Tch. So what do we do?" Thalia clicked her teeth, eyes glaring at everything and nothing all at once. "If he's out there, just running free and throwing his weight around freely without knowing the full scope of the absolute shitshow he’s a part of, what’s our next move? How do we-"

"Ms. Thalia, we will do nothing."

The words sounded like they were spoken in a foreign language with how absolutely, mind-boggingly senseless they were. Percy's head snapped toward Chiron, sure she'd misheard. "What?"

"We do nothing," Chiron repeated patiently, not a single ounce of hesitation or doubt in his voice. He set his reading glasses down on the desk with deliberate care, the soft click of plastic frames against oak somehow louder than it should have been. "You girls have done enough by bringing this to our attention. And that will be all that you do. This situation is volatile, direly so, and the last thing Mr. Andreas needs is a mass panic in Olympus because the two of you got too excited to find out that you have another cousin. In these matters, less is more.”

Percy's mouth opened. Closed. Opened again.

‘He’s kidding. He has to be kidding.’

But Chiron's expression remained grave, patient, infuriatingly calm.

"Chiron," Thalia groaned, and with one glance Percy could tell immediately that the usual spirited girl was doing her utmost to stay respectful and calm and mature - like a good Daughter of Zeus. She ran a hand down her face, her short, spiky black hair practically standing on end as static electricity flickered across her pale skin in agitation, and began tapping her boot against the floor. “This ‘Andreas’ guy is in trouble. Deep trouble. Even if he isn’t Hades’ kid, there were fifty-thousand viewers in that Harpy chick’s livestream. Someone’s gonna rat. A clip’s gonna go viral. We need to get on top of this now-”

"Oh, please."

Mr. D's nasal drawl cut through Thalia’s protest like a knife through butter. The God of Wine lounged even deeper into his chair, his pudgy fingers drumming against his Diet Coke can. The tap-tap-tap rhythm grated on her already frayed nerves.

"The gods will find out precisely when they are meant to find out, Thelma Gray, and not a moment sooner. That is how divine politics work. You don't simply announce that Hades may have broken his sacred oath. You gather evidence. You consult oracles. You move carefully, deliberately, because one wrong word could spark another war that makes World War II look like a minor disagreement over lunch plans."

“It’s Thalia, Lord Grape Juice,” the Daughter of Zeus scowled, her hands clenching at her sides, “And you and I both know that that’s total bullshit. You’re seriously telling me that we’re just supposed to sit here and ignore a Demi-God who might be powerful enough to shift the balance of power between the Big Three? After everything that’s happened with-... with Luke? With Kronos? With the whole freaking ‘end of the Gods’ prophecy hanging over our heads?! C’mon.”

The Great Prophecy.

Just the mere mention of it made Percy’s stomach drop into the depths of her asshole. 

She didn’t know the exact details - Annabeth didn’t know either, and she was the one who told her about it in the first place - but neither did she need all the details, either. All anyone needed to know was that a child of the Big Three was gonna be a weapon to potentially decide the fate of Olympus once they turned eighteen, the ‘age of majority’ in most forward-thinking states. Percy personally thought that the Fates should’ve made it twenty-one, if only to match the legal drinking age in New York (and give her more time to try and not be the prophesied one), but nobody cared what she wanted. 

Definitely not those creepy old ladies.

And the worst part of it all? The prophecy didn't specify which child of the Big Three. It could be Percy herself - the daughter of Poseidon, already fifteen and looking at three more years until her eighteenth birthday. Or it could be Thalia - the daughter of Zeus, technically frozen at thirteen but now physically sixteen and climbing. Or, if this Andreas kid really was a son of Hades…

‘Another player in the game,’ Percy thought bleakly, as Thalia and Mr. D began trading thinly-veiled (and not so thinly-veiled) insults back and forth. ‘Another person who might be the Chosen One. Andreas Skywalker.’

Even more messed up was the fact that a part of her - a small, petty, deeply ashamed part - was almost relieved at the possibility of sharing that burden. Of not being the only teenager with the weight of Olympus resting on her shoulders. At first it was her. Then it was Thalia. And now, potentially, there was another. Andreas.

The other part of her, the part that had spent the last year as Camp Half-Blood's designated Big Deal and had a taste of what it felt like to be the Hero and the powerful one, bristled at the competition.

‘... Man, why can’t I just be normal?’

But Percy already knew the answer. She'd learned it last summer, fighting monsters and gods and her own father's brother. Power attracted power. Destiny called to destiny. And when you were a child of the Big Three, you didn't get to be ‘normal’. You got to be a chess piece in games played by beings who'd existed since before humans invented the concept of ‘mercy’ and ‘empathy’ and ‘mandatory therapy’.

There was nothing she could do about it now. At least, not yet.

Percy returned her attention to the discussion at hand before she could fully lose track of what was going on, leaving the generic ‘heroic brooding’ for later in the calendar.

"-but that's insane," Thalia was protesting, though it sounded like a lot of the aggressive fire had already leaked out of her voice. She was pacing now, in the small area in front of Chiron’s desk and just behind Mr. D’s chair, both hands clenching and unclenching at her sides. Her hair floated upwards like she was just discovering how to Go Even Further Beyond. "Why would they react so-... so explosively? Just because the kid exists doesn't mean Hades is planning some kind of coup. My dad had me and he's not building an army out of his children."

The look Mr. D gave Thalia could have curdled milk.

"Your father, Thalia Grace, is the King of the Gods,” he stated drily, taking a long, obnoxiously loud sip of his Diet Coke. As soon as the can was emptied, he touched his finger against the side of the aluminum, weighed it with one chubby hand, and sighed contentedly. “Mm. Anyways, Zeus doesn't need to build an army from his offspring because he already commands the loyalty of most of Olympus and has done so for millennia. Hades, on the other hand, rules a kingdom that most gods won't even visit, has been systematically excluded from Olympian politics despite being one of the eldest, and has more reason than most to harbor grudges against his younger brothers. You saw how quickly he was accused when the Master Bolt was stolen.”

Gods. 

Percy hated that he was right. And not even because he was right, but because he had to be such a smarmy prick about it.

Clearly Thalia was thinking the same thing, judging by how her shoulders slumped down dejectedly.

Chiron saw it too, because something softened in his weary, lined features. He sighed, reaching over to set his #1 Activities Director mug back upright, grab his eyeglasses, and set them gently on the bridge of his nose.

“Girls,” he began, his tone gentle yet stern, “I know this is frustrating. I know you want to help. But you must understand - approaching Andreas directly would accomplish nothing except potentially exposing him to the Olympian Council before we’re prepared to handle the consequences.”

"And what if he gets himself killed while you’re figuring out how best to break the news to our dads?" Percy challenged, but it sounded more like a quiet plea than anything else. "What if he picks a fight with something he can't handle? What if-"

"Then that is his choice to make."

The words were gentle but final, and Percy felt that finality like a haymaker to the freaking chest.

"Marcus offered him sanctuary," Chiron said quietly. "Offered him training, protection, and community. Andreas chose to refuse. That is his right as a free-willed individual. We cannot force him to accept our help, no matter how much we might wish to. We could use his help. His power, strength, and supposed skill. Fates know that we need as many able-bodied heroes as we can find to help prepare for the Titan Army. But we will never force anyone to join us. This is not a conscription, and Mr. Andreas has full autonomy to do as he pleases. Within reason, of course.”

"So we're just supposed to sit here and do nothing while he's out there fighting for his life?" Thalia's voice was raw with frustration. "That's not- we're supposed to help people, Chiron. That's what heroes do. You taught me that!"

"Sometimes," Chiron responded, and there was a profound sadness in his dark eyes that hurt to even look at,  "the most heroic thing we can do is respect someone else's freedom. Even when it terrifies us to do so."

Percy wanted to argue. Wanted to protest that this was different, that Andreas was special, that they had to do something. But the words stuck in her throat because underneath her concern, underneath her heroic instincts…

She knew Chiron was right.

If Andreas wanted to fight alone, wanted to test himself against the monsters of the world without Camp's safety net, who were they to drag him back kicking and screaming? Percy herself had resented Camp's restrictions sometimes, had chafed against the rules and regulations designed to keep young demigods alive. She understood the desire for freedom, for autonomy, for proving yourself on your own terms.

She just wished it didn't feel so much like abandoning someone who might need their help.

"So what can we do?" Percy asked quietly, seeing as Thalia had gone virtually silent - glaring a smoldering hole into the floor. "There has to be something. Some way to keep an eye on him without interfering directly, right?"

Chiron studied her for a long moment. Then he exchanged a look with Mr. D - another one of those silent god-and-mentor communications that Percy couldn't quite parse.

Finally, the centaur sighed.

"We can monitor the situation," he said carefully. "If Andreas continues to engage with the monster world as visibly as he did tonight, word will spread. Information will reach us through normal channels; Marcus's reports, other Satyrs in the cities he visits, perhaps even the oracle if his actions become significant enough to warrant the attention of the Fates. In the meantime, Dionysus and I will figure out how best to bring him to the attention of the Olympians without accusing, unsaid or otherwise, Hades of siring a Demi-God."

Thalia finally looked up, her smoky blue eyes narrowed in a suspicious squint. "That's it? Just… wait for reports?"

Chiron nodded. "That's all I can officially sanction, yes."

…

Wait a second.

Officially.

Percy's eyes narrowed. Chiron's word choice was always very specific. Very deliberate.

Officially he could only sanction monitoring through normal channels.

Which meant unofficially…

She glanced at Thalia and saw the same realization dawning on the punk girl's face.

"And unofficially?" the goth-punk asked, her tone carefully neutral.

Chiron's expression remained perfectly bland. "Unofficially, I cannot control what two teenage girls choose to do with illegally obtained wifi access in their free time. Particularly if they are careful, discreet, and don't do anything that could be traced back to Camp Half-Blood."

Percy felt a grin tugging at her lips despite the gravity of the situation.

"So if we happened to, say, keep watching DJ Shriek's stream…"

"I would have no knowledge of such activities," Chiron said firmly. "And I would expect that anyone engaging in such hypothetical activities would not share details with me that would force me to officially forbid their continuation."

‘Translation: Don't tell me what you're doing, and I can pretend I don't know you're doing it. Chiron, I could kiss you right now. But not. Because that’s gross.’

"Oh, for the love of-" Mr. D set his Diet Coke down with a sharp clunk, his red-splotched face growing even redder as he glared tiredly at Chiron. "You're encouraging them. You realize you're encouraging them to disobey direct orders."

"I'm doing no such thing," the Centaur replied innocently, sliding a stack of paperwork out from beneath a paper weight and uncapping a ballpoint pen. "I merely stated that I cannot control the private activities of Camp attendees during their personal time, provided those activities don't endanger other campers or bring monsters to our doorstep."

"You're encouraging them," Mr. D repeated flatly.

"I'm teaching them about the importance of plausible deniability in matters of divine politics."

Despite everything - the late hour, the stress, the world-ending implications of their conversation - Percy felt a laugh bubble up in her chest. It came out as more of a strangled giggle, but still. The image of Chiron essentially giving them permission to spy on Andreas while maintaining complete deniability was so perfectly Chiron that she couldn't help it. The old horse had always been the cool one.

Thalia was grinning too, sharp and fierce. "I think I understand completely."

"I'm sure you do. Now," Chiron adjusted the stack of papers again and began writing something at the very top of the first page - a clear and straightforward dismissal. "It's nearly four in the morning, and I’ve several letters to draft that will hopefully not end with our new ‘friend’ getting smote for committing the disastrous crime of existing. You should both return to your cabins and get some rest. I suspect tomorrow will be a long day of regular Camp activities, and you'll need your energy."

"Regular Camp activities," Percy repeated dubiously. "Right."

"Super regular," Thalia agreed, her grin widening. "Totally normal day ahead."

"Get out of my house before I turn you both into dolphins," Mr. D grumbled, already looking completely done with the situation.

"You can't turn me into a dolphin. My dad's Poseidon. I'd probably just swim away."

"Then I'll turn you into a land dolphin. With legs. Useless, floppy legs."

Percy scoffed. "That's not even a thing!"

"Come on, Jackson," Thalia grabbed her arm, tugging her back toward the door. "Before he actually does it."

Percy let herself be pulled out of the office, throwing one last look back at Chiron. The centaur met her gaze calmly, and she thought she saw the faintest hint of a smile beneath his beard before the door swung shut behind them, seemingly of its own accord.

Then they were out in the hallway, and Thalia was leading her down the stairs, and Percy felt like she could finally breathe again.

"Well," she breathed as they headed for the front door. "That was…"

"Completely insane?"

"Yeah."

They emerged into the cool night air, and Percy shivered as the temperature drop hit her bare arms and legs. The stars were incredibly bright tonight, scattered across the sky like diamonds, and somewhere in the distance, she could hear the faint, familiar sound of the ocean - Long Island Sound lapping against the shore of Camp's private beach.

Everything looked so peaceful. So normal.

But Percy's mind was still churning, processing everything they'd learned. Andreas Ashcroft. Fifteen years old. Possible son of Hades. Powerful enough to massacre a club full of monsters. Stubborn enough to refuse Camp's help. Out there right now, somewhere in the world, fighting alone.

Badass. He was a badass.

But damn if she wasn’t annoyed that he was putting off their inevitable meeting.

"So," Thalia said as they walked back toward the cabin area, her voice carefully casual. "We're definitely keeping tabs on him, right? Via the stream? Dunno if DJ Shriek’s gonna be following him around or if he’s gonna show up on other people’s shit, but I already have the site bookmarked…"

"Oh, absolutely," Percy confirmed without hesitation. "Chiron basically gave us permission. Well, unofficial permission. Which is still permission."

"Good." Thalia kicked at a loose pebble, sending it skittering across the path. Her head was tilted back to look up towards the sky, something wistful and oddly… peaceful glinting in the stormy blue depths of her eyes. "Because I want to see what he does next. If that really was his first night, and he's already that good… I need to know how much better he's going to get. It pisses me off, but, like- it also makes me feel eager y’know? Seeing his fight really made me realize just how much I’ve been slacking with my own training."

Percy glanced sideways at her cousin and caught the edge of something intense in Thalia's expression. It wasn’t quite jealousy, per se, but it was definitely competitive. The daughter of Zeus was used to being the strongest, the most powerful, the natural leader.

Andreas's existence challenged that.

And Percy understood that feeling completely because she was experiencing the exact same thing.

‘I want to fight him too,’ she realized with startling clarity. ‘I want to get stronger, get better control over my powers. And if-... no, when we meet, I want to test myself against him and see who's better.’

Which was probably not the healthiest response to learning about a potentially endangered demigod, but here they were.

"Do you think he's actually a son of Hades?" Percy suddenly asked, the thought having sat at the back of her mind since the start of the meeting. "Or could he be something else?"

Thalia was quiet for a moment, considering. They'd reached the cabin area now - a semicircle of twelve buildings, each dedicated to a different Olympian. The Zeus cabin stood tall and marble-white, imposing and empty except for Thalia. The Poseidon cabin sat lower and darker, made of sea-stone and shells, also empty except for Percy. Two lonely cabins for two lonely daughters of the Big Three.

Maybe three, soon, if Andreas ever changed his mind about Camp.

"Honestly?" Thalia stopped walking, turning to face Percy directly. The moonlight caught in her spiky black hair, making the choppy edges look almost silver. "I don't know. The Stygian Iron sword definitely points to Hades. The shadow stuff, the whole death-aesthetic thing with the black and purple. But the crow transformation? The hand-clapping teleportation? That felt different. Off-brand for what I’d assumed a typical Hades kid had in their arsenal."

"Maybe Hades has powers we don't know about," Percy suggested, only half-joking. "I mean, it's not like we have a handbook. 'So You're A Child Of The Underworld: A Guide To Your Death God Dad's Abilities.'"

“Not a Death God,” Thalia snorted, unable to hide her half-grin. “And even if that handbook existed, it would be the most depressing read ever.”

"Chapter One: Everyone You Love Will Eventually Die."

"Chapter Two: You Smell Like A Corpse To Monsters."

"Chapter Three: Your Dad Literally Lives In Hell."

They both giggled, the dark humor cutting through some of the tension that had hung around their shoulders since they’d first watched the livestream. But Percy's smile faded quickly as another thought occurred to her.

"Thalia… the Great Prophecy."

The punk girl's expression sobered immediately. "Yeah. I was thinking about that too."

"If Andreas is a son of Hades, and if he's as powerful as he seems…"

"Then he's another candidate for the prophecy. Another Big Three kid who might be the one to save or destroy Olympus… if he survives to adulthood."

The weight of it was oppressive, almost overwhelming. The Great Prophecy had been this looming shadow over Percy's life ever since Annabeth had reluctantly explained it. The idea that her eighteenth birthday might be the day she had to make some impossible choice that would determine the fate of the entire world was terrifying enough. But the idea that it might not even be her choice to make - that it could be Thalia's, or maybe even Andreas's - was somehow both relieving and deeply unsettling.

"You know what's messed up?" Percy whispered, running a sword-calloused hand through her long brown hair and pulling the scrunchy free of her ponytail. "Part of me hopes it is him. The prophecy kid, I mean. Because then it wouldn't be my problem anymore."

"That's not messed up," Thalia insisted, and there was an aggressive understanding in her voice. "That's just called being human. Or, well, half-human. Nobody actually wants to be the chosen one. We just deal with it because the alternative is letting the world go to shit."

"But you'd want it to be me instead of you, right?"

Thalia didn't answer immediately. She took a moment to chew on the idea, gaze flickering from Percy to the sky and then back to Percy.

"... I'd want it to be me instead of anyone," she finally admitted, her voice rough with emotion. "Not because I think I'm better, or because I want the responsibility, or some equally stupid shit like that. But because… I already lost so much. My mom’s dead - found that out a few days ago. Drunk driving, apparently, big whoop. I lost my childhood too; seven years of my life gone to that fucking tree. If the prophecy is going to take someone at eighteen, I'd rather it be me than watch someone else get taken. Not like I have a lot more for the Fates to take, right?”

Percy's throat felt tight. 

She reached out before she could over-think the decision and grabbed Thalia's slightly larger hand, squeezing it tightly between her own. The punk girl squeezed back, even as she abruptly turned her head away and wiped at her eyes with the leather sleeve of her left arm. For a moment, they just stood there in the moonlight between their lonely cabins - not speaking because there wasn’t really a need for talk. Percy didn’t think there’d been a moment in the past couple weeks since she’d met Thalia that she’d felt as close to the girl as she did in that moment.

And, annoyingly enough…

The butterflies appeared.

Fucking puberty.

“Y-you know you have me though, right?” she only slightly stammered, feeling the tips of her ears burn like no tomorrow. “And Annabeth. And Chiron. And Grover. You’re not-... you’re not alone, Thalia.”

“... Yeah,” Thalia muttered, and for her sake, Percy pretended not to hear how wet and hoarse her voice was. “Thanks, Perce.”

When she pulled her hand away and cleared her throat, Percy found herself simultaneously relieved and disappointed.

"Ahem. Anyways. We should probably not tell Annabeth about this."

Percy blinked at the subject change. "About Andreas?"

"About our plan to keep watching the streams," Thalia clarified, rolling her neck with a groan. Her eyes were a little reddish now, but Percy wasn’t sure if it was because of the time or the tears. "She'd probably try to talk us out of it. You know how she gets - all logical and strategic thinking and 'but what if the monsters trace your IP address' or whatever. I love her like a little sis, but she could be so lame sometimes."

Percy couldn't help but smile. Thalia's impression of Annabeth was startlingly accurate - the bunched eyebrows, the serious tone, the concerned frown. It was very much giving ‘Daughter of Athena’ vibes.

"Yeah, you're right,” she nodded, even though the thought made her slightly uncomfortable. Percy had never been very good at lying, or keeping secrets, or doing anything even remotely negative when it came to those she was loyal to. “Annabeth would definitely be the responsible one and shut us down."

"Exactly. So this stays between us. Deal?"

"Deal."

They stood there for another moment, neither quite ready to go to their respective cabins yet.

"... I guess he was kinda hot," Percy blurted out before she could stop herself. "Like, objectively. Not in a weird way, but- the red hair and the whole murder-smile thing during the Akira slide and-"

A conspirational, shit-eating grin forming on Thalia’s black-touched lips.

“Told you. He’s, like, ‘I would let him pin me against the wall and spit in my mouth’ levels of hot. You don't see that too often in guys our age."

Percy's face went nuclear. "Thalia! Fucking gross, dude!"

"What? I'm just being honest. You're the one who brought it up!"

"I didn't say anything about wall-pinning! Or- freaking saliva!"

"But you were thinking it."

"I was not!"

"Liar. Your face is like a tomato right now."

"It's dark! You can't even see my face properly!"

"I can see it well enough." Thalia’s grin turned absolutely wicked. The sight made it abundantly clear that she was finding a lot of amusement in Percy’s embarrassment, but getting teased by the older girl had become something of a recurring theme over the past couple weeks.

Percy wish she could get used to it already.

"So, what specifically did you find hot? The motorcycle? The sword? The part where he literally rode a Hellhound into the ground while it was dying from his sword after he ‘Akira-slid’ beneath it on his motorcycle?"

"I- that's- you can't just-"

Percy's brain had apparently short-circuited. Because yes, okay, all of those things had been attractive in a very confusing way. The confidence, the skill, the complete lack of fear.

And maybe, possibly, the fact that he looked really good covered in monster blood and golden dust.

Which was probably something Percy should examine with a therapist, but whatever.

"For me it was the crows," Thalia continued conversationally, as if they were discussing the weather instead of their mutual attraction to a mysterious demigod who'd just committed mass monster murder. "Something about turning into a hundred birds and then reforming like it was nothing. That's hot. Power is hot."

"You have issues."

"Says the girl who gets turned on by motorcycle stunts."

"I never said I was turned on!"

"You didn't have to. Your face is doing that thing where you get all flustered and try to convince yourself you’re not attracted to someone while being super obviously attracted to them," Thalia drawled. “It’s the same thing you do when Annabeth smiles at you.”

Percy groaned and covered her face with her hands. This was so embarrassing. 

And the worst part?

She was right.

Percy had been attracted to Andreas's display of power. In the same way she was attracted to Annabeth's brilliant strategic mind, or the way Thalia's confidence and aggression made Percy feel safe and protected and maybe-sorta gave her little butterflies(though she would never admit it). Not to mention it was apparently super obvious that she had a crush on Annabeth, which was even more humiliating and daunting because Annabeth was smarter than Thalia and a lot more perceptive, which meant… If Thalia knew, Annabeth knew. And if Annabeth knew, then the whole Athena cabin probably knew.

And if Andreas ever came to Camp and he turned out to actually be cool and funny in addition to hot and powerful…

‘Maybe I just have a thing for badasses,’ she thought miserably. ‘Is that a thing? Is that a normal thing to have?’

“Don’t worry,” Thalia snorted, shoving her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket. “You’re as subtle as a brick through a window, but I’m not gonna tell anyone. Your gay panic is safe with me.”

"It's not- I'm not-" Percy sputtered, her face burning hot enough to melt snow. "I don't even know if I'm gay! I might be bi! Or pan! Or just really confused!"

"Yeah, well, welcome to the club." Thalia shrugged, as laidback and irreverent as ever. "Sexuality is a spectrum, Jackson. You don't have to have it all figured out right now. Just… you know. Don't beat yourself up for thinking the murder boy was hot. That's allowed. So’s having a crush on Annabeth. No one’s gonna judge you for liking both tits and di-"

“I GET IT, THALIA.”

…

SNORT.

Laughing about it made things a bit less humiliating, at least.

"We should probably actually try to get some sleep," Thalia snickered, looking every bit as exhausted and manic as Percy felt at that moment. "Before the harpies find us and try to eat us for being out past curfew."

"Good point." 

Percy glanced toward the Poseidon cabin, then back at Thalia. "Thanks. For tonight. For watching the stream with me and for… you know. Not making me feel like a freak about the whole thing."

"Anytime, Jackson." She bumped her shoulder against Percy's, a small, genuine smile curling her lips. "We're in this together, right? Whatever happens with Andreas, with the prophecy, with all of it. You and me."

"You and me," Percy agreed.

And there was something solid about that promise, something that made her feel like things would actually be alright for once. She wasn't alone in this. She had her mom, had Thalia, had Annabeth (even if they weren't telling her about the stream-watching plan), had Grover and the rest of Camp.

And maybe, eventually, they'd have Andreas too.

If he survived long enough for them to meet him.

‘He will,’ Percy thought fiercely as she headed toward her cabin. ‘He has to.’

Because the alternative - that Andreas would burn bright and fast and be gone before they ever got the chance to know him - was just straight up unacceptable.

But hey-

If he truly was a Son of Hades…

Maybe his dad could bring him back to life so that they could spar?

Percy felt like there was a thing or two she could teach him about sword-fighting, at the very least.

_______________________________________________________

[Sun Breathing]. Elite Trait.

 [Old Blood]. Legendary Trait.

[Harem King]. Rare Trait.

[Explosive Sweat]. Rare Ability.

[Prophetic Compass]. Rare Ability.

The cards floated in my vision like holographic game interfaces - five glowing rectangles that only I could see, each one pulsing at the edges with reality-warping chaos energy that hurt my eyes to directly stare at. I lay sprawled across Isabella and her sisters’ massive, heart-shaped bed, my bare back sinking into silky-soft, red satin sheets that would've been tacky as hell under normal circumstances but somehow fit the whole ‘monster nightclub VIP room’ aesthetic perfectly. The mattress was obscenely plush, the kind of luxury that made my injuries scream a little less when I shifted my weight.

‘Five pulls for five Drachma,’ I thought, tilting my head as I glanced over the admittedly badass Perks. The golden one was brighter than the other, almost pulsating, and it pounded my brain just to even think about staring at it. ‘Not bad, Ashcroft. Not fucking bad at all…’

The flatscreen TV mounted on the opposite wall had gone dark after DJ Shriek's stream cut out - probably busy salvaging her destroyed equipment after I'd turned her club into a slaughterhouse. I could still hear faint sounds from beyond the room: distant, discordant music, the buzzing of voices, and the ambient noise of Club Ravenous recovering from the massacre. But in here, it was just me, the Gacha, and the muffled giggles drifting from the attached bathroom where Isabella and her three sisters were ‘getting ready’.

It’s been five minutes since I’d rolled my perks, washed my face, and made my way to ‘Private Room Velvet’ for my just reward. The Harpy Bouncer had simply pushed the door open for me, letting me into the seemingly empty room with instructions to take off my shoes and lie on the bed. It’d been obvious what was going on the instant I heard the sound of water running and quiet, muffled voices and giggling. I didn’t think my pants could get any tighter than what they already were.

Of course, the rest of my body disagreed with the sentiment. 

Every breath sent sharp pain lancing through my ribs - two, maybe three cracked from various impacts during the fight, the most flagrant offender being Taureen the Minotaur Molester. My left shoulder throbbed where it had been wrenched partially out of socket by a dracaena's tail slam, and there were so many cuts and bruises peppering my skin that I’d already gone and ditched my leather jacket and Sex Bob-Omb shirt in my Shadow Inventory, what with how fucking torn and bloodied both of them were. Lying on the bed in nothing but my torn up jeans and black Nike socks, I felt like one big, oozing bruise.

‘But I won. And I got paid.’

And now, all I needed to do was officially cash ‘em in and reap my rewards.

I focused on the first card, this one glowing a warm green, and willed it to expand before me.

[Prophetic Compass]

|Rare Ability|

Allows you to conjure a phantasmal compass in your hands that points towards your target, as long as you are aware of the target you are looking for and have something related to it on your body, you can use the compass to track it down.

The card's surface shimmered like emerald, breaking apart into motes of gleaming light that surged into my arm, and suddenly I knew how the Ability worked with the same certainty I knew how to breathe. With it, I could conjure a phantasmal compass in my hands, a ghostly navigation tool that would point toward whatever target I specified, as long as I possessed something connected to that target. A piece of their clothing, a drop of their blood, a photograph - anything that established a tangential link. The perfect tool for tracking down prey, with the main ‘limitation’ being that I needed something physical to go off of.

“Not bad…”

My mind immediately started cataloging applications. Finding people obviously, but also objects. Lost weapons. Hidden treasures. If I had something from Camp Half-Blood - a business card with the address, maybe - I could find it anytime I wanted to. If I had something from Kali, I could track her in New York…

Though she'd probably sense me coming and teleport away just to fuck with me.

But hunting down monsters was also an obvious application of the Ability. Old trophies, hair, fur, fangs, claws - literally anything could be used to track those motherfuckers down, and if, in my adventures, I came across something that needed a bit more detective work, all I needed was one piece of evidence to find where the (monstrous) culprit went. Or God. Or clear-sighted mortal.

Mint shit.

The ability slotted itself into my consciousness like a puzzle piece clicking into place, Προφητικὴ Πυξίς branding itself across my rune-covered arm. I didn’t replace any of my existing abilities with it. Not yet. But it was there, present, for whenever I needed it.

I focused on the next. 

[Explosive Sweat]

|Rare Ability|

MHA - You can sweat a very explosive compound on demand that you can detonate at any time, allowing you to unleash powerful explosions.

The card dissolved into red-orange sparks that sank into my skin everywhere - my chest, my arms, my face, everywhere I had pores. For a second, everything was numb, and then, out of nowhere, it was like I necked down a whole fucking pack of pop-rock candy. My entire body tingled, static electricity surging through the inside of my flesh as if trying to escape through my pores, and I knew, intrinsically, that my sweat glands were rewiring themselves on a molecular level.

I could feel it. The potential. Just like Katsuki fucking Bakugo, with just one pull of the infinite Chaos Gacha, I could now sweat nitroglycerin on command and detonate it with a thought. I didn’t hesitate to slide it into Murder Swarm’s slot - at least, for now.

“Wooh, eat your fuckin’ heart out Al-Qaeda,” I breathed, raising my hand over my face and pushing at the sweat glands that I could now feel all over my body like a sixth sense. The scent of burnt sugar and caramel wafted past my nostrils as a clear-colored, viscous-looking liquid beaded from the tips of my fingers, gleaming slightly in the dim, overhead lights of the Lamia Sisters’ VIP room.

One snap of my finger, one mental command, and suddenly it was like I’d just popped a fucking miniature firework in my face. Which, thinking back on it, wasn’t the smartest decision I could’ve made.

POP!

It was only my ‘Demi-God’ reflexes that kept me from actually blinding myself.

My forearm slammed itself across my eyes just as those crimson-orange sparks clawed their way outward, loud and violent and way too fucking close, the air cracking like it had just been smacked by an angry God. Heat washed over my skin in a blunt, concussive wave, not too hot or even painful, but noteworthy enough to let me know that, no, I didn’t have an instant, all-encompassing immunity to my own explosions.

Even from what little I remembered of watching My Hero Academia - which, honestly, was just the occasional edits on Tik Tok, even Bakugo was still capable of being hurt by his own powers. He’d just been training with his fucking Quirk since he’d been in diapers, so his innate resistance was souped up to the point where it didn’t even matter unless he was dropping a nuke on a whole city block or some equally insane attack like that.

But I wasn’t Bakugo. And I sure as hell hadn’t been adapting to my own nitroglycerin-sweat explosions since I was a toddler.

I hissed through my teeth and shook my hand out on instinct, fingers twitching as residual heat bled away into the air. The viscous residue of nitroglycerin sweat was gone now, vaporized in that single violent release, but I could still feel it - or rather, feel the absence of it, like peeling hot super glue off of your finger tips. The pads of my fingers were slightly raw but overall seemed… fine. Which was good, because I would really be needing my fingers soon.

“…Yeah,” I breathed to the empty room, lowering my arm and rolling my shoulder deeper into the silky-soft mattress. “That’s definitely gonna get me killed one day.”

Not today, though. And that was all that mattered. 

The applications were fucking endless. Explosive punches by sweating on my knuckles. Explosive kicks. Coat my weapons. Create bombs by sweating into containers. Propel myself through the air like a rocket. Mix it with Boogie Woogie for explosive teleportation combos. The grin spreading across my face probably looked unhinged.

Ἐκρηκτικὴ Ἱδρώς burned itself into my arm beside the compass, characters glowing molten-orange before cooling to purple-black.

Third card.

[Old Blood]

|Legendary Trait|

Bloodborne - You have the blood of the Great Ones running through your veins. You have greater vitality and energy thanks to the old blood, empowering your existence. Your energy is also more potent, making it so that you need to spend less energy to invoke abilities or spells. The concentrated mystery in your blood also gives you greater insight into magical and esoteric arts. Finally, your blood has healing properties that scale with your vitality, but those who ingest too much may be affected by your corruptive presence. If you want, you can exert greater influence over those who consume your blood.

Legendary. My first ever Legendary.

The golden card pulsed once. Twice.

Then-

It detonated.

Liquid gold exploded from the card and slammed into my chest like a divine shotgun blast. My back arched off the bed, every muscle seizing as the Old Blood rewrote my biology from the cellular level up. It felt like my veins were filling with molten silver, like my bones were being dipped in cosmic fire and reforged stronger, denser, and more.

My heart stuttered. Then my heart stopped.

‘Fuck-’

And then it roared back to life, beating so hard and fast that I could feel it in my fucking teeth. The Old Blood surged through me in waves, transforming everything it touched, and in that moment there was nothing I could possibly do but lay back and take it like a good little Demi-Primordial. My cracked ribs knitted themselves back together with audible pops, bone fragments fusing, cartilage regenerating. My dislocated shoulder wrenched itself back into socket with a meaty clunk that would've made me groan if I could even draw in enough air to breathe.

But I couldn't breathe.

I couldn’t breathe because the Old Blood was in my lungs now, filling the organ with an eldritch power that made my chest concave inwards and blow back out like balloons being deflated and filled. My muscles densified, fibers compacting and multiplying - not growing stronger, per se, but tougher. Harder to tear. My essence reserves - that internal well of power I'd been running on fumes with - suddenly flooded, refilling like someone had opened a tap directly to Grandma K’s primordial soup itself.

The cuts and bruises covering my skin sealed up like zippers closing, scabs forming and falling away in seconds to reveal fresh pink tissue that rapidly darkened back to my natural tan.

The transformation lasted maybe fifteen seconds. To me, it fucking felt like hours.

When it finished, I collapsed back into the mattress, gasping, naked but fully healed torso drenched in sweat that was thankfully not explosive. My entire body thrummed with power, and I felt good. Better than good, actually. I felt like I could run a marathon, fight another hundred monsters, and still have energy left over to-

The giggling from the bathroom spiked in volume.

Right. 

That.

With this Perk, I was practically specc’d into a sort of spellblade build now, if I wanted to go more nerdy and compare my life to some kinda fantasy RPG. My Essence was damn near overflowing from my soul, my skin gleaming and my body thrumming with vitality, and I knew, intrinsically, that if I were to study any sort of magical bullshit I’d be a fucking prodigy. I didn’t know if this world had an alternate, divine version of Hogwarts, but maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to do some research? The Mist was probably considered ‘esoteric arts’, and apparently you could do a fuck ton with it. 

Club Ravenous was just one of many examples.

Then there was the whole ‘corruptive blood’ thing.

‘Interesting. Guess I’ll get an opportunity to test it soon…’

I dragged my attention to the fourth card, though my hands were shaking slightly from the Old Blood.

[Harem King]

|Rare Trait|

You are a harem king to be, your preferred partners are more attracted to you and society as a whole does not see a problem with you having a harem. In addition, your partners do not mind you dating others either, and while they might still have their own jealousy and rivalries, it will never grow to be malicious, hurtful, and/or violent.

Don’t fucking judge me.

This one was a lot more gentle than the last. Pink-gold light drifted from the card like flower petals, settling over me like a warm blanket, and all of a sudden the idea of having multiple partners didn’t seem like some sort of crazy, anime gooner weaboo fantasy. 

It felt normal. Not transgressive. Not something to hide or feel guilty about. Just another relationship structure, as valid as monogamy. And more than that - I could feel the subtle shift in how the universe would perceive me from now on. People would be more attracted to me, yeah, but it was deeper than that. My partners wouldn't compete in toxic ways. They'd accept each other… eventually. Build something together.

I wasn't sure how I felt about a perk literally altering how people perceived relationships, but fuck it - I wasn't exactly planning to be monogamous anyway, and what hot-blooded teenager didn’t want a harem of beautiful and powerful women. There was no way I wasn’t taking this Perk - not with Kali waiting in New York, Isabella bound to me by Styx Oath, and apparently some yandere chick obsessing over me thanks to that curse. 

Βασιλέως Χαρέμ etched itself delicately into my skin, and I turned my attention to the last card.

[Sun Breathing]

|Elite Skill|

Demon Slayer - Sun Breathing is a specialized swordsmanship style and breathing technique created by the legendary swordsman Yoriichi Tsugikuni that mimics the sun and replicates it with the user's movements, techniques, and abilities. All techniques and forms are extremely varied and have no set pattern, making them the most versatile and effective against enemies. With magical power, solar flames that are effective against unholy can be manifested.

It burned.

That wasn’t just metaphorical bullshit, either. The card actually caught fire, radiant white-gold flames sprouting around the edges in a conflagration and slowly consuming it from the outside-in. When I reached forward like a dumbass to touch it, the fire didn't hurt - instead, it felt like what I’d imagined drinking the sun would be. Like pure, concentrated daylight pouring into my chest and spreading through every nerve, every muscle, every cell. The fire moved quicker and quicker, consuming the card completely before compacting itself into a single, baseball-sized ball of solar flames and surging down into my chest.

This time, the warmth consumed me.

Knowledge flooded my mind. Not just techniques - though I suddenly knew thirteen distinct Forms and how to flow between them - but the fundamental principles of Sun Breathing itself.

Total Concentration Breathing. 

The foundation.

‘Maintain a constant state of maximum lung capacity by controlling breathing rhythm,’ my brain rattled off, even as my eyes flickered left and right beneath my lids as I struggled to subsume what was effectively years of supernatural swordsmanship training in the span of seconds. ‘Increase blood oxygen levels. Enhance physical abilities and mental clarity. Stabilize body temperature. Accelerate healing. Enter a meditative combat state where the body moves faster than thought.’

But it went even deeper than that, didn’t it.

I hadn’t watched Demon Slayer, but the Perk itself ingrained the truth within my soul - Sun Breathing was a spiritual discipline disguised as a combat technique. The breathing pattern aligned chakra flow - or essence, in my case - with the natural rhythm of the body. It synchronized heartbeat, muscle contractions, neural firing. It turned the human body into a perfectly tuned instrument, operating at peak efficiency.

And with my Old Blood enhancing my body's vitality and essence potency?

This was going to be fucking insane.

Ἀναπνοὴ Ἡλίου seared itself across my shoulder in characters that glowed like molten gold before fading to match the rest.

And that… was all she wrote.

I lay there for a moment, just feeling the changes. My body hummed with power, my brain buzzing with sword-fighting techniques that made my previous wielding of Soulfyre feel like a blindfolded kid with Down Syndrome trying to bust open a pinata. The injuries that had been dragging me down minutes ago were gone. My essence reserves felt bottomless. And underneath it all, there was this new awareness. Like I'd been living my entire life slightly out of sync with my own body, and now everything had clicked into perfect alignment.

‘Time to test it.’

I shifted on the bed, sitting up cross-legged despite my tight jeans protesting the movement. I closed my eyes and rested my hands on my knees, clearing my mind as best I could with the information and glow of five new Perks bouncing around in my skull. It took maybe thirty seconds, but eventually I managed to calm my excitement enough to hit a satisfyingly brain-empty lull.

The first step of Total Concentration Breathing was deceptively simple: maximize lung capacity with every breath. But it wasn't just about breathing deep. It was about breathing right - engaging the diaphragm fully, expanding the lungs completely, holding the breath at peak inflation to allow maximum oxygen absorption, then exhaling in a controlled manner that expelled all carbon dioxide while maintaining internal pressure. 

I wasn’t the best at biology, but with the Perk came a shit ton of terminology that I understood on a fundamental level. Science, in other words. The science of the body. Hopefully it would help with kicking ass, because I definitely didn’t plan to go to some normie college.

I inhaled.

I could feel my diaphragm descend, creating negative pressure in my chest cavity. My lungs expanded like balloons inflating, ribs spreading, intercostal muscles stretching to accommodate the challenged space. Air rushed in through my nose, down my trachea, flooding into the alveoli. Oxygen molecules crossed the membrane into my bloodstream at an accelerated rate thanks to Old Blood enhancement, and I knew right then and there that this body of mine was made for this. For the challenge. Demi-God physique - or its Primordial equivalent - combined with Old Blood gave me a ridiculous foundation to build upon.

‘Hold.’

At peak inflation, I held the breath. I didn’t strain myself, didn’t force my lungs to surpass its limits just yet. I just maintained what already existed. I felt my heart beat once, twice, pumping that super-oxygenated blood through my system. I could feel it reach my muscles, feeding them fuel. Feel it hit my brain, sharpening my thoughts to crystal clarity. The dim, fuzzy tendrils of exhaustion that had been teasing the edges of my psyche was suddenly forced away by what felt like burning sunlight, and I had to blink my eyes to adjust.

Four seconds. That was the optimal hold time for the basic technique.

‘Exhale.’

It had to be a controlled release. Diaphragm rising, lungs deflating evenly, no collapse or rushing. CO2 expelled in a steady stream. But, and this was the key part… I maintained internal pressure. I kept my core engaged, spine straight, posture perfect.

The cycle completed.

And immediately, without a single second of rest because that would fuck it all up, I started the next one.

Inhale. Hold. Exhale. Inhale. Hold. Exhale.

After three cycles, I could feel the difference.

My heart rate had slowed despite my body being more active. My blood pressure stabilized. Muscle tension that I hadn't even realized I was carrying melted away as oxygen flooded previously restricted areas.

And even then, I kept going.

‘Inhale.’

This time, I focused on the essence component. Sun Breathing wasn't just physical - it was spiritual. The breathing rhythm acted as a pump for internal energy, circulating it through pathways that mapped roughly to what martial artists called meridians, and I could feel my essence responding to the breathing pattern. Each inhale drew power from my core, from my soul, and pushed it outward through my body. Each exhale pulled it back, condensed it, refined it. 

The circulation created a feedback loop. Physical breathing enhanced essence flow. Enhanced essence flow strengthened physical breathing. Round and round, building momentum.

‘Hold.’

At peak inflation, my essence surged to every extremity. My fingertips tingled. My toes flexed within the confines of my Nike socks. I could feel power pooling in my muscles like liquid lightning, ready to explode into motion.

‘Exhale.’

The essence pulled back to my core, but it didn't disperse. It compressed, becoming denser, more potent. Like coal being crushed into diamonds.

Five cycles. Ten. Fifteen. Minutes went by, the sound of water fading away only to be replaced by fabric rustling and more giggles. But I was so far beyond the thought of sex, so sunken into my meditation, that it barely even registered.

My body temperature began to rise. It wasn’t uncomfortable - my Old Blood's enhanced vitality regulated it perfectly - but I still noticed the shift. Heat radiated from my skin, the air around me shimmering faintly, but still I breathed.

‘Sun Breathing generates heat. Makes sense.’

Twenty cycles.

I wasn't sweating yet, but I could feel the Explosive Sweat glands activating in response to the rising temperature, priming themselves for a battle that wasn’t coming. I had to consciously suppress it - didn't want to accidentally coat myself in nitroglycerin right before group sex with monster girls.

‘Focus. Keep the rhythm, Andre.’

The breathing pattern was becoming automatic now, muscle memory forming in real-time. Inhale for four seconds. Hold for four. Exhale for four. Perfect twelve-second cycle.

But I could feel the technique's potential for more. Total Concentration Breathing: Constant would take time to develop and master. More time than I had right now. But it was a major goal; the same way the strongest Demon Slayers were capable of using Total Concentration Breathing 24/7, without rest or pause, I would learn to do the same - except I had other supernatural powers compounding upon this foundation. Everything that I did, everything that I learned, would see exponential growth.

And holy shit, I was fucking looking forward to it. To seeing just how strong I could become.

Thirty cycles. Thirty-five.

I opened my eyes.

The room looked sharper, the dark, seductive colors more vivid. I could see individual threads in the red satin sheets. Could track the tiny dust motes floating through the air, backlit by the soft ambient lighting. My hearing had sharpened too. I could distinguish four separate voices now. Isabella's sultry purr, a higher-pitched giggle, a husky laugh, and a shy murmur. I could hear their hearts beating. Slow, steady, reptilian rhythms.

And I could smell them. 

They’d just sprayed perfume, four distinct scents. Something floral and sweet. Something spicy and exotic. Something clean and fresh. Something dark and musky.

Forty cycles.

My muscles felt like coiled springs, packed with potential energy. I flexed my right hand experimentally and watched the purple-gold Greek flare to life, pulsing in sync with my heartbeat. When I swatted my hand out to the right, air wooshed to rush out of the way, my tendons stretching and snapping like rubber-bands. I was stronger, could move faster, was overall a shit ton more durable - though I’d have to test that out to see just how much. I was becoming better in every measurable way.

And the best part about it was that this was just the baseline. This was Sun Breathing at its most basic level, the constant rhythm that would become as natural as my normal breathing used to be.

Once I mastered the Thirteen Forms, I'd be able to cut through monsters like a hot knife through butter.

I couldn’t fucking wait.

But first…

Click-

The bathroom door opened.

Steam billowed out, carrying those four distinct perfume scents on a wave of humid heat. Through the mist, I saw movement. Shapes. The sinuous coiling of serpentine bodies.

"Ohhh, mijo," Isabella's voice purred from somewhere in the steam, her Latina accent thick enough to send electricity straight to my dick. "You look delicioso sitting there all shirtless and dangerous…"

The Spanglish was horrible. She was clearly fluent in the language somehow, but the whole thing was so obviously shoe-horned in that it sounded more like a cheesy porn script than anything else. But I was young. I was horny. And I apparently had a fetish for monster-girls who identified and roleplayed as POCs, so why not just full-send and go all-in? Not like I was going to Heaven at this point anyway. 

“I usually skip this part,” I grinned, my hands already reaching for my belt. “But eh. New year, new me. May as well smell the roses while I’m here, right?”

From somewhere deeper in the steam, a second voice emerged - lower than Isabella's, smoother, with an accent that was more controlled but no less deliberate.

"Ay, papi," the mysterious Lamia purred, and I could practically hear the smirk in her tone. "You think we're gonna make this easy for you? Qué lindo. How… optimistic."

Ooh, she was playing the sophisticated tease. Cool girl energy. I could work with that.

Before I could respond, a third voice burst through - higher-pitched, rapid-fire, absolutely vibrating with manic energy.

"DIBS ON GOING FIRST!" she shrieked, and something in the bathroom crashed - probably her tail knocking into the counter and throwing toiletries across the floor. "I called dibs in the shower, Isa, you PROMISED! I get first ride on the hot Demi-God and his monster co-!"

"Rosa, we talked about this-"

"-I'm just SAYING what we're all THINKING!"

And then a fourth voice cut through the chaos. It was softer. More nervous. So quiet I almost missed it beneath the sound of ‘Rosa’ and her enthusiastic ranting.

"Um… h-hi," she whispered from within the billowing steam, and there was an adorable little squeak at the end that made my grin widen. "I'm… I'm Marisol, and I just… I wanted to say that you're really, um… guapo? And I'm really nervous but also really excited and I promise I'll try not to mess this up and-"

"Hermanita, breathe-"

"-okay I'm breathing! I'm breathing and also maybe hyperventilating a little but that's FINE-"

I dropped back onto the bed, laughing so hard my still-healing ribs protested. My belt dropped somewhere on the floor.

Four Lamia?

Four sets of snakussy?

For supernaturally strong monster-girls?

Andreas the Monster Fucker was on the fucking case.

And if I got another Drachma out of using my TCB to put their asses through the fucking mattress? Well…

I’d never been the type to complain about my steak being too juicy.

Yeah. Not going to Heaven.

But I’m completely fuckin’ okay with that.