The Olympian gods arrived in full force.
There were a lot of laws and restrictions that limited what a god could do, ironically enough. What they could interfere with, how they could alter the world at their whim.
It was only after Atlas had been ‘defeated’ that they came, and that was intentional.
There was a reason specifically. If Zeus came flying in to throw thunderbolts as Atlas, it would have escalated the conflict into a full war.
It was a delicate balance of how much they could push and how much could be pushed back.
A war, it was a simple declaration. It was a metaphysical concept, a challenge to the world’s hierarchy that governed the Greek cosmology, which now oversaw Western civilization.
By initiating a war, it would have given all the enemies of the Olympians a foot in the door, leeway to act beyond what they normally could. The authority of the Olympians would be held in question, and it became possible to usurp the thrones.
Because a declaration of war was a type of acknowledgement.
The Titans were far from gone; they all knew that.
Immortal beings didn’t die; they simply disappeared for a time. They would return sooner or later, and the Olympian Gods didn’t want to give an opening.
Even so, one of their own ignored those implications entirely.
Ares knew he was up shit creek without a paddle.
His excuses were flimsy at best.
Not only that, but everything was so clearly seen by not just the Olympians, but the entire world.
Across the world right now, it was like a giant light shined on this location when Rhongomyniad tore through the layers containing this miniature world.
A beacon that hadn’t been seen since many eras ago.
“Uncle Dionysus, did you see! I fucking beat him up!” Arachne threw her arms up in excitement, completely ignoring the tension in the air.
Dionysus, to his credit, completely ignored it too. “You’re goddamn right I saw.”
If his favorite niece wanted to be a little goblin until his dad turned her into paste, then by his father’s beard, he would encourage her until the end.
It was the least he could do.
Though a glare from the King of God had Dionysus clench up hard.
“Ares.” Zeus spoke, and the sky rumbled. “You broke the rules.”
Ares winced but remained otherwise unmoving. “Rules? Which ones were those again?” He played dumb.
A blast of lightning came down from the heavens, and the God of War let out a startled shout followed by a groan as he lay on the ground.
“Hey!” Arachne, despite her exhaustion and pain, shot to her feet, grabbing the nearest spear, about to charge right in to defend him.
But a hand on her arms stopped her.
Ares forced a smile even though getting hit by his father’s lightning was never a pleasant experience. He pulled the little spider back to stop her from making a mistake.
“It was just a joke, Pops.”
“A joke.” Zeus’s eyes lit up with lightning, and the sky growled in anger. “Do you know what you could have done?!”
“What? I was stopping that asshole from rebelling. You should be thanking me.” Ares crossed his arms, though his expression shifted slightly.
“You would have started a war!”
“I am the God of War.” Ares answered back, his own divinity erupting as the two collided.
There was a brief moment of conflict; Arachne blinked, and Ares had hit the ground again, much harder. A crackling, almost solid bolt of lightning was impaling him through the chest, pinning him to the ground.
Ares coughed up golden ichor onto the ground, only made worse by his previous injury. “F-fuck, pops, couldn’t you hold back a little bit?”
Zeus didn’t respond to that.
His calmness reflected his fury.
When he wasn’t shouting or throwing threats around, that was when he was truly furious.
“Hey, don’t treat him like that!" Arachne shouted. “He saved me; stop hurting him!”
Zeus’s eyes turned to hers, and with that, lightning filled the world around them.
Though, before the wrath of the sky could befall her, the shadows at her first swirled and enlarged, and a hand reached out from within the darkness to grasp the lightning and repell it.
“Hades.”
“Zeus, stop throwing a tantrum.” His brother didn’t even bother with decorum. Zeus shot him a look and looked like he was about to start fighting the God of the Underworld. “Poseidon, your brat is currently holding up the sky with the help of my helmet. I would very much like it returned, so could you please go help him?"
Those words alone were enough to startle everyone present.
“Percy!?” Poseidon, who had been watching, immediately got concerned and shot over towards the direction of the sky.
It wasn’t so much that they didn't know, but they were so focused on Atlas in particular and Ares that the smaller details had been overlooked.
Zeus glared at Hades, but the God of the Underworld just crossed his arms.
“She dared to speak to me so insultingly, and you protect her?” Zeus looked at his brother.
“She returned your Lightning Bolt and my helmet." Hades responded. “Are you going to be so petty over a few words from a child?”
“A child that fought Atlas.”
Hades didn’t have a direct counter to that.
Maybe in another situation, he may have been just as concerned.
Hades also wasn’t too keen on demigods of others. If they weren’t his children, he normally didn’t treat them too well either.
A demigod of another who was far stronger than they would like, it was a recipe for disaster oftentimes.
“A fookin beat him.” Arachne corrected.
“Not helping, little spooder.” Dionysus told her.
“Get your facts straight.” She didn’t care and stuck her tongue out.
The King of God’s fingers twitched, and Hades let out a sigh. The two had a clash of Divine Power, but it couldn’t even be called a spat.
“Child, would you please stop antagonizing my brother?" Hades asked in a very tired voice.
The other gods, while present, didn’t want to carelessly interject themselves into what was happening.
One wrong move and they could earn the ire of the two, and it wasn’t something they wanted to do lightly.
Despite this, Athena spoke up.
“Father.” As soon as she spoke, Zeus snapped his head towards her. “We can clean things up to a degree that satisfies you.”
He evaluated her for a moment. “And what is your suggestion, Athena?" He reminded her that it was just that, merely a suggestion on her part.
“For now, Ares should be punished, yes. But let’s discuss it more. In the meantime, since Atlas is…indisposed for the moment, let Ares hold up the sky until we can return things back to how they should be.”
Zeus’s fury did alleviate slightly. Despite his rage, he wasn’t mindless about it.
He held his hand out, and the lightning bolt flew out of Ares’s chest and returned to him.
The God of War hit the ground as the lightning bolt was the only thing keeping him propped up.
“Oww.” He groaned.
“Apollo, heal Ares. He will need his strength," Zeus intoned.
“Sure thing, pops.” Apollo didn’t dare to joke around at this time. “Come on, big guy, let’s get you up and running.” The divine power of the god of healing flowed into him, and the wounds Ares suffered began to mend.
“And Athena, your suggestion for how to deal with your daughter?” Zeus looked to her, a gaze that was warning her to tread carefully.
Since she spoke up, she would have to take accountability for her words.
Not only that, but as Arachne was a child of Athena, anything she did reflected back upon the goddess.
“First, should we move Ladon back to his nest?” Athena said carefully.
The Dragon was doing its best to make itself as small as possible.
As strong and fearsome as it was, it was no god, and it certainly didn’t want to be stared at by an angry Zeus.
“Hera, take your pet back to your tree." Zeus ordered.
“Right away, husband.” Hera was likewise angry. She saw what happened to her tree, but the only reason she wasn’t in a fury as well was because it was saved, and her husband was even more furious.
If she also threw a tantrum, she felt like Zeus would direct his anger at her.
The dragon awkwardly stepped around the gods at Hera’s beckoning as she led it back to its own home.
It cast a look back at Arachne, who gave it a wave of goodbye.
Athena was navigating the situation as delicately as she could. “Demeter, would you be so kind as to start repairing the garden? I’m sure you would be the best one for the job.”
Zeus gave her a nod, and the Goddess of the Harvest went off to help fix the interior of the Gardens.
Athena was stalling; it was intentional.
She knew how her father worked.
His rage came quick and it came loud, but it could also dissipate in the blink of an eye if you were careful.
Let him be in control, fixing the world around him; it made Zeus feel like he was watching all his subjects work at his behest.
The topic she didn’t want to touch, though... it was what Zeus was focusing on.
She couldn’t entirely blame him.
If the girl wasn’t her daughter, Athena too would probably be advocating for some…less than pleasant resolutions on how to deal with her.
In the eyes of Zeus and some of the other gods, Arachne was guilty.
What crime did she commit?
The crime of being a danger, the crime of being unpredictable.
An asset they couldn’t control was an asset that became a liability.
“I suggest…” Athena chose her words carefully. “We deliberate further on the matter of my daughter. In the meantime, I believe we can limit any danger she poses by confiscating all her weapons for now.”
Zeus silently considered that.
He would acknowledge that for now, her weapons were far more dangerous than she was.
Even he, the King of Gods, felt an inkling of fear at the weapon that tore apart the Garden on a metaphysical level.
And that wasn’t mentioning many of her other weapons that were shown.
He didn’t know what they were; he didn’t know where they came from.
But he knew that they didn’t belong in the hands of a little mortal child.
"Acceptable," Zeus declared.
“Yer not touchin' me spears.” Arachne scoffed.
"Quiet, child," Athena hissed. “I’m protecting you.”
“Yer not takin' me spears.” Arachne reiterated.
“Child.” Athena narrowed her eyes. “You will hand them over. That is not up for discussion.”
“And her pet as well. There is no point in letting her continue to run around with the Bane of Olympus.” Zeus added.
Athena paused for a moment because she saw the look in her daughter’s eyes and scrunched her nose.
She was being careful, judging her daughter and just barely not tipping past her point of no return, but then Zeus went and stepped right over that line.
Arachne raised her middle finger up right at the King of Gods. “Fuck you.”
Contrary to what the others anticipated, Zeus didn’t roar in fury. No, he just smirked ever so slightly.
Athena’s eyes dilated because she realized that Zeus had done that intentionally to rile her up, to give him a valid reason.
Disrespecting the King of Gods, that was enough to allow him to give her a lesson.
In which case, the ‘lesson’ here was open for interpretation.
Zeus raised his hand towards her.
"Zeus..." Hades warned, but he was a step too late as lightning erupted out of his palm.
Ares pushed Apollo away to try and rush over in time, but he wasn’t going to make it.
The Divine Power of the King of Gods was released, Lightning that was used to secure his throne to smite his enemies, the same lightning that made the other gods so fearful.
It was far beyond what would be expected to smite an uppity mortal.
“Yeah, no.” An unfamiliar voice carried over everything else.
A spear impaled in the side of Atlas trembled.
The Boosted Spear that was given to her by Kunou before she came over to this world.
A massive hand slammed down in front of her, blocking the lightning.
All the gods, even the ones who had gone their separate ways to do various jobs, had stopped what they were doing; with eyes wide, they turned to look back.
The hand was red and scaled, claws tearing into the dirt as lightning wafted off it unharmed.
As if pulling itself free from confinement, the rest of its body joined.
In front of Arachne now sat a massive red dragon.
Zeus felt the pressure immediately, the yellow irises glowering down at him.
“You fucked up.”
@***@
A/N
Uncle Ddraig finally gets out to stretch his legs.