Something big is coming this way.
Or not.
Is it fear?
Is it terror?
Or it is your imagination playing tricks?
Difficult to tell which is which, when the only signs of light are the torches.
There is no hope where you're going.
There is no salvation.
There is only death.
Hell and Death.
****
Hecatoncheires.
The mortals did forget them.
Do not blame them.
Sometimes ignorance is truly a blessing.
The Hundred-Handed Ones were so terrifying children and great-children of scions having never seen one with their own eyes still lived in terror at the idea of one attacking their homes.
Wherever they walked, the Titans shivered. Whenever they went, the world broke.
Do you realise how dangerous something has to be for a Primordial to decide one of their spawns is too dangerous to walk under the Sun?
Are you truly capable of acknowledging how dire things have to be for Kronos to think the collateral damage in lives is unacceptably high?
No. You don’t.
You only know the forgotten bones of the old story. You were told that the King of the Sky, their father, imprisoned them in his deepest and most impregnable prison.
Your understanding is limited.
Rejoice.
The truth is far more horrible than what your sanity can endure.
Yes, you know their names: Briareus, Cottus, and Gyges.
Or rather, should I say, you know the name of the Eldest Hecatoncheires.
For they were not three of them when Ouranos, King of the Sky, First of the Primordials, decided to stop the ravages of his dreaded children.
They were over two hundred.
They were thrown deep into pits which would today make the Fields of Punishment erected by Hades an almost-pleasant holiday camp by comparison.
It was there, away from the eyes of their parents, that they slaughtered each other.
Hecatoncheires killed Hecatoncheires in a war that is destined to never be written about.
When Kronos came to free them, only the three remained.
It was largely enough to tilt the balance of the war in his favour.
For Hecatoncheires, under the light of the true Sun, can multiply and replenish their numbers.
The Titans understood very quickly that sometimes, the cure could be worse than the disease.
Hecatoncheires. Ananke loves the irony, doesn’t she?
These children of Ouranos and Gaea do indeed have a hundred hands. A hundred arms.
The name is accurate.
It just fails to mention the hands and the arms are just some of their least redoubtable physical attributes, not the most formidable.
They are-
They are Destruction Incarnate.
They are the beings which could have inherited the Earth, if their strength was not as immense as their utter inability to unite together.
Of this there is little doubt.
Listen to me, and feel your heart beat faster in fear, mortals. The Hecatoncheires are completely immune to the sight of Titans and Gods in their divine forms.
Whoever wants to win a fight against one, will need to overwhelm them by might and skill.
It is something far easier to say than to accomplish.
A young Hecatoncheires is fifteen metres-tall, and boasts, aside from its one hundred arms, fifty heads, and four legs.
If you ever encounter one, run away, and do not look back.
No mortal being ever fought a Hundred-Handed One to a standstill, and it was not for lack of trying.
Armies have perished and failed to slow down one.
Empires have shattered. Citadels were turned into ruins. Heroes have been slain in such numbers mountains could be created of their bones.
You do not win against that.
Run. Run away as fast as you can.
****
You can consider this your forewarning, readers and minions, that the writing phase of chapter 41 of An Impractical Guide to Godhood, Hell and Death, is about to begin.
The Penguins won't save you this time.