The silence said everything. The history everyone knew had just shattered before their eyes, and the man many had taken for a simple demigod had declared himself Damon, firstborn of Rhea and Kronos, the true hero of the Great War against the Titans.
Worse yet, Zeus and Poseidon, two of the Big Three, were completely defeated in his hands. It was not just what Damon was saying. It was the ease with which he had crushed everyone that made it impossible to ignore.
And the fact that Hera, Hestia, and Demeter were standing on his side in front of all Olympus made one thing clear to many: Damon was not the one inventing a story. Zeus was the one who had buried one.
The redhead kept his gaze high, but for a moment, his eyes met Hera's. The goddess was looking at him with deep affection, and it was obvious she was holding herself back from running toward him, hugging her brother, and then hitting him for abandoning her. Damon knew that conversation would come sooner or later. The same could be said for his other two sisters.
With that said, the least affected by the current events was Hephaestus. The god of the forge simply lowered his gaze for a second before looking back at Damon. He did not seem surprised by the declaration as much as by the way everything was starting to make sense.
He was a god no one paid much attention to, but at the same time, he was very observant and quiet. He had always wondered many things about Zeus, about his family, and about why they were all so dysfunctional. So, with what Hestia and the other two sisters had said, the change was easier for him to accept.
The respect he had felt for Damon at camp had not come from nothing. There was something about Damon, something that could not be faked the way others did, and the god of the forge liked that. Hephaestus showed his support for Damon with a simple nod, and Damon answered the same way in thanks.
As for the goddess of wisdom, her jaw was tense, her eyes moving between Damon, Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Hestia, and Demeter. While Athena did not exactly favor her newly revealed uncle because she did not know him, she could not help feeling like an idiot. Many things she knew were a lie. In fact, fixing all of this was already giving her a headache just from imagining all the wrong information that existed in the human world.
With that said, she had many questions for her uncle, especially about where he had been. She had an idea after connecting the dots with the Norse runes she had seen the other day, but she certainly had many other doubts. To Athena, it was clear Damon was very strong; in fact, she assumed he had to be in the top ten strongest beings in the entire supernatural world. After all, only some beings at that level could allow themselves to do what Damon had just done. The goddess thought logically.
Leaving Athena aside, the queen of the sea, Amphitrite, took a step forward, catching everyone's attention.
But the goddess had her gaze fixed on Poseidon. The lord of the sea was still bleeding golden ichor, his body hanging weakly from Damon's hand. The queen of the seas wanted to scream, demand an explanation, even throw herself at the redhead. But seeing and hearing the current events, she did not think the firstborn of Rhea was in the mood, and she also did not want to test her luck.
After all, if Olympus had ended up like this, what could she do? She was a goddess, yes, but in simple terms and compared to the monsters in front of her, she was a weak goddess.
Damon's gaze was fixed on Amphitrite. For a second, the queen of the seas felt as if the entire sky was looking at her.
Damon said nothing at first, recognizing that she must be Poseidon's wife. With that, he released the god of the sea, throwing him toward her as if he weighed nothing.
Amphitrite moved quickly to catch him. Even so, the weight of her husband's broken body forced her to fall to her knees, her arms wrapping around him while several nearby nymphs stifled a scream. Even Hestia had to close her eyes. After all, she was the goddess of family, and Poseidon was still her brother. She was not truly comfortable with the current situation, but having Damon back gave her more happiness than anger, so she had no desire to cause a scene over Poseidon.
The goddess came back to herself when she heard her brother's voice, loud and clear.
"Heal him," Damon said, looking at Amphitrite seriously. "This is his second chance."
Amphitrite raised her head, trembling with fear.
Damon held her gaze without blinking.
"Tell him to think things through and present himself before me when he's ready. But let me warn you: if he raises a weapon against me again or does something stupid again, I won't be so merciful next time."
Amphitrite did not answer. She only lowered her gaze toward Poseidon, swallowing hard as she began to use her power to keep him stable.
"You lied to me," a trembling voice said, interrupting the slight silence left after Damon's words to Amphitrite and Poseidon.
The voice came from the side.
Clearly from a woman.
Several gazes moved toward her, and it was none other than Iris, who stood near a broken column, watching everything with a grimace on her face. The goddess of rainbows did not dare look Damon in the eyes, but her anger was clear to everyone.
"Didn't you promise me you wouldn't harm Olympus?" Iris asked, tilting her head.
The atmosphere tensed again.
Damon looked at Iris with a small smile, noticing how the goddess's shoulders trembled.
"I didn't come to harm Olympus, little Iris," Damon said, his voice spreading throughout the broken plaza. "And I have no intention of breaking my word to you either. I promised in the name of Chaos that I would not harm this place, and that promise still stands."
The mention of Chaos made several of them tense.
Even Athena took a few seconds to register what had been said. An oath made in the name of Chaos was not something said lightly. After all, it was not a political excuse or an empty phrase meant to calm the masses. It was something even a god would think twice before breaking.
Damon let everyone process that before continuing, seeing that reaction as an opportunity to use Chaos's name to assert his position even further.
"But don't misunderstand my words. I will not harm Olympus. That does not mean I am going to stand by while all of you drag it into oblivion yourselves."
Iris nodded with a small blush. The way Damon called her little brought back a memory. The goddess remembered that Damon used to pat her on the head when she was younger. It was something she would never forget: the kindness with which he had treated her.
Damon let out a small laugh when he saw the minor goddess so nervous.
As for Hera, she watched the interaction with narrowed eyes, confused by Iris's reaction. What the hell did Iris have to do with Damon? Had they already had contact before?
That certainly did not please the goddess of marriage. Her brother was hers before anything else.
Little did Hera know that a certain Shinto queen had already beaten her to it.
Leaving Hera's jealous thoughts aside, Zeus, still held by the hair, coughed up a mouthful of golden ichor. His body was destroyed, but his pride, large enough to call itself the god of pride, could not accept what had just happened.
"Don't listen to that thing!" he shouted with a broken voice, looking at the rest of Olympus. "I am your king! I saved you from the Titans! I defeated Kronos and Atlas myself! I built this Olympus! I am the god of the sky! I—!"
Damon lowered his hand to the back of Zeus's neck and squeezed, knocking the air out of the god in front of everyone.
Zeus released a choked groan.
"You are nobody, Zeus, so you had better stay silent," Damon said seriously.
Zeus fell silent, but his eyes showed contained fury. Damon lifted him a little higher, forcing everyone to see the state of the king of the gods.
"You are a liar with a crown you did not earn. You are unworthy of the sky, and it was never yours in the first place. You are unworthy of your robes, unworthy of your title, and unworthy of the loved ones you have hurt so much."
Zeus tried to respond, but Damon placed two fingers on his forehead. The domain of lightning inside Zeus began to be suppressed quickly.
Zeus opened his eyes, feeling for the first time in eras that the lightning did not answer his call.
Damon brought his mouth close to his ear, his voice low and heavy.
"Do not force my hand more than you already have. What I have prepared for you can be even worse, so for now, be a good boy and stay still."
Zeus froze, fear in his eyes.
With a snap of his fingers, under everyone's gaze, Zeus's body froze. He remained motionless, his mouth open halfway through a scream. Damon opened a small red crack beside him, and inside it was a dark space.
Damon threw him into the crack.
Artemis took a step forward.
"What did you do?" the goddess demanded, clearly caring little about everything that had been said before. To her, all of this about Damon still sounded like a children's story.
Damon looked at the goddess.
How many times am I going to have to hit her? She's like a female version of Sasuke… There was no doubt his patience was already running out, but he remembered Kaia's and Hestia's words, calming himself.
For now.
"Relax. I only locked him away for now," Damon said, making it clear with his tone that he was not asking for permission. "But I'm warning you now, eventually I'll deal with him. Whether you like it or not, Zeus will soon be a distant memory."
Artemis glared at Damon with rage, but even she seemed to understand that throwing herself at him again would only end worse.
As for Damon, he only scoffed. He did not understand this woman. Shouldn't she be happy, after all? Wasn't she supposed to hate men like Zeus? He truly did not understand women.
Then a shadow spread over the broken marble.
Several nymphs immediately stepped back when a figure dressed in black appeared in Olympus. His presence was cold, heavy, and silent, very different from Zeus or Poseidon.
Hades observed the destruction around him. Not seeing Zeus anywhere already made him happier than he wanted to admit; his younger brother could matter very little to him at that moment. Then he looked at Poseidon, more dead than alive.
Finally, his eyes moved toward Damon.
As for Damon, he recognized the presence instantly, a small smile appearing on his face.
"Well, did you come to face me too, Hades?"
>>>>>>>>
Stones please ))))))))))))))
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P@treon: Brotato up to chapter 106