4,596This was not the outcome Artemis had foreseen. In her hunt to capture a beast tied to Olympus's bane, she had tracked and pursued the trails it had left behind, but was caught unprepared against a sudden ambush.
Worse yet, Artemis could not say that the adversary was unfamiliar. In fact, he was someone she wouldn't fail to recognize considering the war fought between Olympus and the attacker's ilk.
"Still defiant I see," a booming voice caused Artemis to sneer despite panting for breath.
"…" Artemis did not deign to respond to the voice's goading. Shifting her position, she shot a silent look to the child of Athena quivering beside her to keep calm.
"Pathetic," the voice continued with derision.
Finally glancing up at her oppressor with indignant eyes, Artemis stared at the face of a Titan that should have been restrained and bound at the end of the great war.
"…And you speak too much, Atlas." Artemis hissed before she let out a silent groan.
Atlas's current strength was beyond any known measure of his capabilities in the last Titanomachy. Taken by surprise, Artemis had kept her composure during the ambush, but quickly found herself defeated and captured. Taken against her will, she found herself pinned under the same burden Atlas was so famous for.
The weight of the world bore down on her shoulders.
It wasn't without merit that Atlas was known as the Titan of Strength and Endurance, bearer of the Heavens. However, he had never been this capable.
His strength was one thing, but Artemis had found herself dumbfounded when his speed and reaction time had been able to keep up with her own during the ambush.
Even now, it was a bitter pill to swallow.
The Gods of Olympus would not act in her rescue.
She knew full well that a Quest would be made through oracle, and yet, she could not see how the campers or even huntresses could overcome this wall.
"Too much, isn't it?" Atlas mused as his muscles rippled with each step. "The weight of the world is lost on a Goddess too obsessed with hunting and women."
Sweat beaded over Artemis's brows, but the burden on her shoulders was too much to even retort.
"By now, that camp and your hunters should be facing death." Atlas bellowed while staring fondly at a golden chalice in his palm. "Such power for such a tiny trinket."
Artemis clenched her jaw thinking of the mortal danger her hunters and the campers would face. She knew full well the sheer number of monsters under the 'General's employ. Empusas and the Nemean Lion alone would prove difficult, but even the minitour and harpies were present in armies.
How she wished she could take an arrow and gouge Atlas's eyes as he derided her, but there was simply no choice but to sit there and take it.
Artemis carried no hope for rescue. Rather, the act would be akin to sending moths to a burning flame.
Only death awaited any quest goers at the end of the path.
And yet…
And yet- why?
Artemis stared blankly at the thread of moonlight perceivable through only her gaze.
Even now, that thread of light pointed in her direction and disappeared off into the distance. Yet, the most peculiar aspect of the light, was that her very own divinity was what maintained it.
Someone was coming. It wasn't something like intuition or reasoning giving her that feeling, but the weight and emotion in the divinity that maintained the thread of moonlight.
This feeling…
This presence…
And so, she waited, bearing the burden of the world. Sure enough, she perceived it just as Atlas had when a flying boat began rapidly sailing towards her location. Keen eyes revealed that it was dutifully following the thread of moonlight, but more importantly, that ship…it was familiar.
"The Argo," the words escaped Artemis's mouth unbidden, interrupted only by the sound of wings on feathered heels.
Hermes was watching, Artemis mused, but how could Hermes not?
Standing at the wheel of the floating ship was none else than Jason, Captain of the Legendary Argo. He was somewhat different from the man Artemis remembered, but his presence was unmistakable.
Yet none of that truly moved her, what did was the figure directly connected to the thread of moonlight she perceived. No one else in the group of Demi-Gods Jason led gained any attention from Artemis.
Everything was focused on that distant figure.
Eyes widening, she opened and closed her mouth, but before she could utter a word, Atlas acted.
Space twisted and condensed under pure strength, creating a gravity well that pulled everything in.
Artemis glanced down in muted shock in the direction Atlas had caused the group of Demi-Gods to plunge towards.
That man, the muscled arms, and trained gait that traverses the woods.
The name Artemis had long buried came to mind.
It was not the Monster that he had become, but the one that she'd thought she'd never see again.
The Hunter, Orion.
Artemis's thoughts jumbled with visions that were her own yet not her own. It was an effect of resonating divinity.
Love, t'was a distant feeling and not something becoming of friends.
And yet, she was sure. He would make her way to her. Surely, just as he did before.
…because he promised.
Promise?
Artemis knit her brows.
Something stirred within her, a vision of the lonely moon and the gleam of the tri-star.
Waking up with a start, Percy darted up and hurriedly checked his surroundings. He first noticed that he was still on the deck of the Argo, but the scenery around him was no longer that of the sky. Rather, as he glanced up, the sky itself appeared warped and twisted as if caving in on itself like a gravity well.
Percy could only blink in bafflement before a voice spurred him back to reality.
"You're awake," Shirou offered a tentative hand, making Percy realize he'd been lying sprawled on his back.
"Yeah," Percy took Shirou's hand and Shirou pulled him onto his feet.
The Argo was a mess. The mast was snapped in the middle, and parts of lumber and decking were chipped and fractured.
Remarkably though, no one was dead.
"W-We're alive," Thalia shivered, pushing out of a pile of debris.
Wordlessly, Zoe appeared from another pile across from everyone alongside Bianca.
It was unheard of for them to get off this lightly with that level of divine attack. There was no helping it. One would have to be Achilles and bath in the river Styx to have any chance, and yet here they were.
The reason for the group's survival would soon become apparent.
Blood dripped from Shirou's lips as he coughed from strain. Nevertheless, he persisted.
Percy tentatively walked towards the edge of the Argo and peered over the guard rails before giving a silent exclamation. "…Cool," he marvelled.
Zoe knit her brows upon hearing Percy, but she was in no mood for any snide remarks. Not when she could feel her Goddess Artemis so close. Instead, she chose to see for herself what had caused Percy's exclamation. The others were quick to follow.
Swords.
Thousands of floating swords were pushing the bottom of the Argo with the flats of their blades.
Zoe's eyes widened as she stared at Shirou with grudging respect. Skill wasn't to be belittled, more so when it was a life debt.
"Impressive," Achilles whistled, uncrossing his arms while Orion gave Shirou a curt nod.
"It won't hold for long," Shirou said with a grunt, sweat dripping down from his chin. "There's a downward force that keeps pulling us down."
"Gravity, and Divine Authority," Orion said fingers curling as his hunter's intuition flared. "This feeling is…Atlas."
"Oh, first time fighting a Titan," Achilles said, expression growing serious. "It seems that we're being pulled towards a center of mass that's distorting reality."
"English please," Percy interjected.
"Black hole, seaweed brain," Thalia shivered. "It's like a vacuum and we're at the edge of the suction."
Percy paused, staring at Thalia with a new light. "For a second there you sounded like the Wise girl."
"Tch," Thalia grumbled, but it was mere charade. Her expression was pale, and she kept glancing beneath the floating swords and towards the dark void trying to pull them in.
Thalia was no science person, but she understood that going through a blackhole was the same as being crushed and to pieces and scattered through a tiny funnel.
"Hold on and wait." Achilles said, bending his knees as he stared up where the Argo had originally fallen from. "Something like this is just another obstacle."
Achilles leapt high before anyone could stop him. His jump created a shockwave as his body traversed the gap ahead with Godspeed.
"Idiot," Jason rasped with a groan as the last party member to dig himself out of the rubble. His eyes trailed the green comet left in wake of Achilles's sprint all the way until it impacted against an unseen wall.
A thunderous reverberation echoed up high, swaths of green magic energy spiraling into a tip unable to pierce through a film of gravitational energy. The moment the initial energy of Achilles's dash waned, the wall rebounded him back down into the vacuum.
Achilles fell faster than he ascended, crashing into the deck of the Argo and breaking into the inner cabins.
"M-My ship!" Jason screeched with his hands over his head, but no one paid him any mind.
Rather, Achilles stood up, looking no worse for wear as his invincibility absorbed the majority of any recoil.
"Tch." Achilles clicked his tongue while glaring at the authority that barred his path back up.
"We're trapped," Bianca muttered, watching as even Achilles was rendered unable to escape. Considering their own capabilities, what could they even do?
"We need to pierce a hole through the authority, and then be quick and durable enough to squeeze through it." Orion surmised, having observed Achilles actions without blinking an eye.
Orion could be flamboyant and flippant, but when the man got serious, there was no hunter better or keener than him.
Gathering his strength, Shirou let out a long breath as he began to ease the number of Traced swords beneath the Argo's hull. The moment he did so, the ship lurched forward as if about to fall, causing Thalia to pale and grab onto the remaining mast of the ship while the others staggered.
However, this was calculated. The fewer Traced swords there were, the more he could redirect his energy elsewhere.
"Leave cutting a path forward to me." Shirou said as a black bow longer than he was tall materialized in his grip. "Rider, can we count on you?"
Achilles paused, staring at his temporary Master before letting out an uproarious laugh. "If you can't count on the finest of the Myrmidons, then who else here, Jason?"
Jason ground his teeth, snorted, and glanced away. He was too focused on maintaining the Argo than to bicker with Achilles.
But to Shirou, the Warrior of Troy's words were enough.
"Trace. On." Shirou murmured, the hammer of a pistol cocking in his mind.
Heat formed a circle of fire around him before circuit-like patterns flared over Shirou's skin. The clashing of steel reverberated with Shirou at its center, followed by a layer of rippling air that marked a boundary.
Low on energy, Shirou knew that he didn't have the output to project a Noble Phantasm that could directly overpower Atlas's divine Authority, but power didn't have to solve everything.
The mystery of a concept was what belied its strength, and structure changes properties.
A sword formed in the air before everyone's eyes, radiating a distinct presence before its metal warped and twisted into the form of an arrow Shirou quickly notched.
"Bend and twist!"
Magic gathered and flooded the arrow until it shattered into fragmented pieces held only by wisps of mana.
Hecate of the concealing mist furrowed her brows from a location far away, but to Percy and the others, they witnessed the impossible.
It was the sight of a spiral drill that began to rotate and twist reality itself along its trajectory.
"CALADBOLG!" The arrow was fired, space distorting to counter the very same distortion effect Atlas's Authority propagated.
It was far from enough to overpower the Titan's Authority, but it was enough to puncture a tiny hole.
"Achilles!"
Thalia, Zoe, Bianca, and Percy could only watch in muted wonder as Achilles ran forward in the blink of an eye. A whistle escaped his lips, and three divine steeds pulling a gilded chariot manifested.
With arms on either side of him, Achilles boarded the chariot and flung bands of divine energy to form reins around the Argo.
"Run as if your life depends on it!" Achilles spurred his chariot onward, dragging the Argo behind.
The sudden acceleration rocketed everyone onto the Argo's deck at Achilles's rapid ascent, but all they could see before them was a radiant green comet chasing after the spiral arrow.
The monsters that Atlas had plunged into the void at the same time as Percy and the others began to block the way with their bodies. Those that survived Caladbolg's twisting strike, indirectly blocked Achilles path, slowing his sprint.
Right before everyone's eyes, monsters began to swarm and pile.
Muscles bulging, Achilles's eyes grew bloodshot as he pushed on.
"My whole life was a shooting star…" Achilles gnashed his teeth, one hand reaching for the shield stowed at his side.
As the distance between Achilles and the spiral arrow grew, the Jetstream Achilles was following behind it began to narrow.
In truth, it wasn't the monsters blocking the path that was giving Achilles trouble. Rather, it was Atlas's Authority growing more and more oppressive as Achilles pulled the Argo further and further out of the gravity well the titan of strength had created.
A bone snapped, causing blood to leak.
Achilles's invulnerability nullified attacks of those of lesser divinity than him, but Atlas was a titan, and damage was steadily accumulating.
Yet he was to be the greatest warrior.
"You think this is enough to stop my charge?!" Achilles yelled in challenge.
The life he gave up to purse a fleeting life had always had meaning.
Proof of his struggle and life existed alongside him even now, as his strongest bulwark and greatest shield.
Even if the pressure exerted itself over him and his compatriots, his role as the vanguard remained the same now as it did in Troy.
Unclasping the strap of his seal, he hurled it in front of him to block everything that sought to slow his charge.
"Akhilleus Kosmos!"
The great work of the Blacksmith Hephaestus commissioned by Thetis herself unraveled to reveal the legend of a hero's rage.
From the moment a baby was born clutched in his mother's arms, to the moment of recollection and understanding, then to prophecy of destined death.
The legend of the green comet expanded to encompass the words of the Iliad.
He was Achilles, the warrior destined to shine the brightest, and die just as gloriously.
Within Achilles's shield was a miniature world that drew not only a spectating mother's attention, but that of Olympus's blacksmith himself.
The pressure squeezing on Achilles's bones lessened at the shield's deployment of an inner world, and from there, he pulled a feat that Atlas had no choice but to acknowledge.
Pressing his shoulder to the deployed world, Achilles continued his charge, pushing the weight of the world onward and crushing everything ahead of him with its sheer weight.
"So that…is Achilles," Zoe muttered, lips pursed as she saw the image of another Greek hero overlay atop Achilles's figure. "It was no wonder Troy's greatest was said to rival him."
"Brace!" Orion warned before the group broke through Atlas's gravity well and Jason hastily took the wheel of the floating Argo.
Roaring to the heavens, Achilles sailed up high on flying steeds. Releasing the reins he had around the Argo, Achilles tightened his muscles and hurled the ship of heroes in the direction of a blank faced Artemis and a frowning Atlas.
"Achilles!" Percy called out before Achilles himself shook his head.
"My battle is here, cousin," Achilles pointed at the horde of monsters Atlas still had under his employ. "Besides, the titan's not my prey to face."
Orion put away his bow and firmly grasped the handle of his oversized club.
No sooner, Achilles was left on his own while the others landed in a heap before Atlas.
The impact shattered what was left of Jason's Argo, but it mattered not as it completed its journey.
Confirming that everyone had made it, Achilles shook the blood off of him and stared at the adversaries he would bar from proceeding onward.
And with that, Achilles vanished into the horde of monsters, shockwaves left in his wake as he ripped and tore through the masses atop his chariot.
"Is that all you got?! Come at me!"
It was a strange feeling of dejavu.
Percy groaned while pushing himself back onto his feet, eyes staring ahead at the towering figure of the 'General' who stared down at him and the rest with silent impunity.
Orion had eyes only for the Goddess trapped under the weight of the world, while Percy focused on the girl beside Artemis and the traitor who sided with the Titans.
Zoe appeared resigned, while Thalia began to emit sparks of electricity.
Then there was Jason who shivered under the titan's pressure along with Bianca.
Shirou observed everything as an experienced Master, but his attention was on the Holy Grail Atlas held in his hand.
For better or for worse, this matter would end here, and he'd be back to Chaldea before he knew it.
Thanks for reading! And sorry for delays. My parents called about a family emergency I had to help deal with
Cheers
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