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Zagreus looked over his most recently awoken weapon with a critical eye. He turned the contraption over and over in his hands, his fingers caressing every crevice. He ran his nails through each groove, trying to tease out whatever arcane secrets may be hidden within.
Exagryph. The Adamant Rail. A gun of sorts, once the weapon of Hestia during the Titanomachy. Cast in bronze and blue, it was larger than the handgun that Alchemist used and far, far smaller than the rifle used by Flamel. The fore of the weapon was shaped as the head of an eagle, two barrels jutting forth from beneath its beak.
Zagreus was hardly too proud to admit that he'd not considered the device in the past. It seemed... Well, truly it did not feel to him as though it were the weapon of a warrior. Holding the weapon out and unleashing destruction from the hole in the front? Any fool could do that!
But... He'd seen both Alchemist and Flamel use similar weapons. They were ruinously powerful, truly wicked tools in such hands as theirs.
"Faster!" Diana shouted on the other side of the room, hovering above the battlefield and watching Jinx train with Kary. The woman had found a strange determination ever since the battle with Flamel. "Faster, Jinx! You're letting Kary dictate the flow of battle! You're guaranteed to lose if you don't take control!"
Alchemist had actually brought out a different weapon- Two of them, though they were identical. They looked rather similar to the rifle used by Flamel, if significantly smaller. There was something truly odd about them, however. The man had placed a pair of very thick books with incredibly thin pages at one end of the training room and set himself up against the opposite wall. With one gun, he would shoot the book on the left. With the other, he would shoot the right.
Whenever he shot the book on the right, Zagreus could swear it was somehow being struck three more times. Or, if not struck, it sounded like it was?
Honestly, it reminded the godling of the few times he'd found truly massive caverns out in the depths of Tartarus. Places where any sound he made, from the fury of battle to the sounds of his feet slapping across the cavern floors would be repeated in the distance.
He'd never managed to make a sound that repeated more than once, though.
The curiosity bothered Zagreus enough that it kept distracting him from his own efforts to learn the feel, the timing of the Adamant Rail. There was a rhythm to the weapon, a balance between firing and reloading that he couldn't quite get a feel for and he wasn't accomplishing much by getting distracted every few seconds.
"...How are you doing that?" Zagreus eventually found himself asking, rubbing at a spot just below his ear. Sounds felt muffled and he could hear a ringing but couldn't really point out a source.
"Doing what?" Alchemist asked, setting aside one of his weapons and grabbing a small pad of papers held together by a metal coil at the top. It was barely a moment later that he was jotting down notes using a strange cylindrical device.
"The way your second gun seems to echo." Zagreus pointed at the weapon, mindful to keep the Exagryph pointed down.
Alchemist could be rather frightening, in his own way. Once the man started talking about safety, then yelling about it when Zagreus had seemed a bit too carefree... Well, Zagreus got the feeling he wouldn't be dying by accidental discharge.
"Ah, that. Alright. Come on, we'll walk and talk." Alchemist clicked a button on the side of one of the guns and a small, black box dropped out of it. He pulled a lever on the side and a brass cartridge was expelled, an object he very quickly grabbed and stowed in a pocket.
Then he did the same to the second gun, emptying it of ammunition. They were both checked a second time before being leaned against the wall. Satisfied that the weapons were 'Safe', Alchemist nodded and began to walk over to the books he'd been shooting.
"I can move properties around on objects, even imbue new ones using magic or specially crafted objects." Alchemist began to explain as they crossed the impromptu shooting range. "One of them is called 'Attack Decision'. No idea why, honestly, given that 'Echo' would have been adequate and more descriptive. It causes any blow or strike to be immediately followed by another such blow at half the strength."
"That's... A rather curious capability, sir." Zagreus could quite readily see uses for such an ability. Bolstering his strength by half? Against the many powerful souls that resided within Asphodel and beyond? It would drastically increase his ability to push forward towards his goal.
"Assuming it works as it's supposed to? Yes, it can be." Alchemist agreed before he picked up the two books. They were strangely flexible, bending readily under their own weight. Sliding one under his armpit, Alchemist opened the first book, pages flipping rapidly.
Alchemist stopped at less than a fifth of the way through and began to backtrack, several pages at a time.
"Seventy-three pages in... Johnson, Navin, R. Well, things are going to start happening to you, now." Alchemist mumbled, plucking small pieces of deformed metal off the paper with his thumbtip. "Looks pretty consistent, seven out of ten shots are on this page."
"What is this book, sir?" Zagreus asked, trying to make sense of what was on the pages. They were clearly letters, possibly even numbers. All aligned in rows and columns.
"A printed document containing all of the names and addresses of publicly available people within a region of the world." The mage explained, slotting it under his other armpit and then extracting the second book from its place.
There was a loud crash from behind that drew Zagreus's attention and the man turned around, looking on in confusion as Jinx had turned into a dragon as well and was holding Kary by one leg, slamming her into the ground before swinging her overhead and into the ground again. By the time Zagreus had turned around, Alchemist already had the next book open.
"And this penetrated all the way in to page ninety-five." Alchemist mumbled, rolling his finger over the small, misshapen lump of metal that had penetrated the book. "Right on to the ad for Wormwood Used Cars."
"...Forgive me if I'm wrong, but your other gun got to page seventy-three, yes?" Zagreus asked, quickly checking the math against his fingers. At Alchemist's distracted nod, he continued. "And half of that would be... Thirty... Seven? Well, thereabout. Seventy-three plus thirty-seven comes up to one-hundred and ten. Ninety five is rather short of the mark, isn't it?"
"Half the strength doesn't actually equal half the penetration." Alchemist began to explain, snapping the book shut.
Across the room, Zagreus noted Artemis flinching before the goddess looked at them nervously. The green haired girl looked at Alchemist, briefly, before glancing back down with a strange mix of guilt and fear, then turning back to her own practice with her knife.
"In fact, it becomes significantly less. My gun was enchanted to echo not once but three times, each one causing half the damage of the previous echo. In raw damage, it's a significant improvement but, as you see here, it encounters its own limitations." Alchemist dropped the book but it disappeared before it could hit the ground. "Honestly, I'd be surprised if the last echo penetrated more than two or three pages."
"Sir, if I may?" Zagreus asked, reaching out for the other book before Alchemist had a chance to put it away. The man looked at Zagreus's outstretched hand for a moment before offering him the book. "Thank you. I'd never thought to test how thoroughly my own weapon could penetrate something."
Zagreus set the book against the wall and began to jog over to the far wall. Alchemist was only a half-step behind but well to the side.
Turning back around, Zagreus grinned and held out his Exagryph with both hands.
"You may want to cover your ears, sir!" Zagreus offered, excitement bubbling in his chest as he tried to line up a shot. His first three went wide, the Adamant Rail rather lacking in the 'Sights' department but his fourth shot hit the book just left of center!
"Yes!" Zagreus crowed, punching into the air with his gun. "Come on, I can't wait to see how it did!"
This time, Zagreus jogged alone to the book. He was about to pick it up when Alchemist simply appeared next to him, not so much as a peep. The god was not too proud to admit he may have jumped in surprise at Alchemist's sudden appearance.
"Well, let's see..." Alchemist said, picking up the book and flipping through it. Zagreus noted with no small amount of pride that the bullet hole he'd made dwarfed the little pinholes that Alchemist's gun had made. They were more than halfway through the book before a large, bronze ball dropped out and landed on Alchemist's foot.
The room did not suddenly go silent. There was no pause to the chaos happening behind them. Still, Zagreus could see the sudden changes go through the man. The way Alchemist clenched his fists, the sound of the papers being torn from the spine of the book. How the wizard hissed in agony and his teeth were clenched.
Zagreus was half-expecting him to shout in pain. Instead the man just hissed loudly and inhaled sharply before the god felt magic coming from the wizard.
"...Three-hundred and fifty pages." Alchemist got out after nearly a minute. "Very good for round-shot."
"There are other kinds of bullets?" Zagreus asked, curiosity clear in his voice.
"Loads of them." Alchemist told him, setting the book back in place. "Hollow-point, armor piercing, high-energy... Guns are the tools of warfare and humanity has done a fantastic job in turning war into a profession, a craft. And there are countless craftsmen out there trying to make a better tool. Hunters love these weapons, too, and just as there are bowyers, you'll find gunsmiths plying their trade."
"In fact, I might be able to show you something. May I see your gun for a moment?" Alchemist asked as they began to walk back to where they'd fired from.
Hesitating for a second, Zagreus did eventually agree to let the man hold the Adamant Rail. The wizard accepted the weapon and held it up near his face, the barrel pointing straight up. He turned it to the left, then the right. Zagreus could tell that he was looking over the weapon, admiring its divine construction.
"I see your prideful fall. Down from the Heavens to the Flames." Alchemist spoke, power in his words as he held the gun out before him.
To Zagreus, it sounded like some form of proclamation. The weapon changed, morphing and shifting until Alchemist was holding a gun that was gleaming in white and gold. On the front, rather than the visage of the great Gryphon it now had a gorgeous face though Zagreus could not tell if it was meant to be a man or a woman. A golden halo hovered over its brilliant blond hair, the opposite of the black light that would hover about Kary when the woman got too excited.
"Sing, Lucifer." Alchemist commanded, holding the gun out to face the book and squeezing the trigger. A brilliant ray of light, molten gold and gleaming so brightly it burned into Zagreus's eyes came from a crimson jewel attached to the forehead of the gun.
"...What -is- that?" Zagreus asked, rubbing the palm of his hand against his burning eyes.
"A memory." Alchemist answered, offering the gun back to Zagreus. "Of something Chaos witnessed before the age of the titans. An echo of a power that could not be commanded, that broke free of its father and refused to kneel."
Zagreus accepted the weapon silently. He turned the weapon over and over in his hands, taking in the new form of the Adamant Rail.
Igneus Eden, a sibilant voice, rather similar to Medusa's, whispered in his mind.
The name of the gun, perhaps? Zagreus did not know but he would be forced to admit that there was something deeply unsettling about the radiant beauty of so deadly a weapon.
"Come on, Jinx!" Alchemist shouted, drawing Zagreus's mismatched eyes away from the device and over towards the 'Spar' between the two women. He'd missed it but somehow Kary had broken free of the dragon and regained her weapon. Jinx, still a dragon, was twisting about, lashing out with her wings and tail to try and catch the older woman off guard. "Stop trying to hit her and hit her!"
Zagreus looked back down to the gun, then over to the book they'd been testing.
The burnt, smouldering ashes of the book they'd been testing.
If the Adamant Rail had such a powerful form hidden within... Did the others?
Was there some secret to his Stygian that he'd yet to reveal?
Zagreus did not know... But he resolved to himself that he would soon find out!
-----
Medusa felt... Quite a lot of things. She felt her hands, she felt her toes, she felt... Well, when she'd finished her duties for the day and retired, she certainly felt a few things -With- her hands. That was certain.
Taking time off of work to recover from her ordeal, quite the backlog had built up. Rooms needed dusting, the kitchens needed cleaned, the tables in the mess hall were, well, a mess! Covered in grease and cold, raw bits of onion from messy eaters.
Thankfully, her ability to get everything done had risen dramatically. She now had hands!
Hands!
She could hold a duster or rag in -Both- of them! Combined with the skill she'd developed in using the snakes upon her head to wield such powerful instruments of cleansing might, she could now work at triple her former pace!
And... Well, she'd almost finished catching up with everything after only a few days. Looking forward, Medusa had come to the startling realization that, unless her workload increased? She was going to have a lot of free time on her hands.
She wasn't really sure what to do with it, truth be told. If it were possible, she'd have loved to spend some of that time with her sisters, Stheno and Euryale... But they weren't dead.
In a fit of madness after her transformation, Medusa had devoured them whole. She'd eaten her siblings but, somehow, the two eternal-children weren't dead. They weren't listed among the archives within the House and Thanatos had no recollection of encountering them. It was a matter that had kept her awake at night, ever since her body had been restored to her.
How?
Who?
Why?
Medusa somehow doubted that Athena would feel bothered to send someone to check on the gorgon's body. The spiteful witch had done nothing when Medusa had begged for protection but she'd been all too willing to curse Medusa after the fact. What little the Gorgon knew about the other side of the matter, it looked more and more as though the Goddess of Wisdom had used Poseidon's lust against the man.
It had destroyed Medusa's beauty, leaving it far easier for Athena to lay a claim upon the title of the fairest among the gods. And, while Zeus had been less than willing to censure Poseidon for his actions, he'd still demanded the Sea King hand over an island and a temple with a connection to the underworld to Athena in recompense for fouling her temple with his actions.
That the witch had intended to take Medusa's siblings and lay them so low as to be her priestesses, it had driven Medusa into a rage with nearly no equal. When the red had finally faded from her eyes, Stheno and Euryale had been swallowed up and Medusa herself had fled back to the island she'd called home for countless years.
There she'd remained, isolated and alone but for the murderers sent after her by Athena. Until, at the end, Perseus had stolen into her cave. The bastard hero had cut off her head, a blow that wasn't truly fatal for either part of Medusa but it was incredibly inconvenient. Then he'd traipsed back to Olympus to offer Medusa's head back to Athena, an offering with a curse that the witch had fused into her mockery of Aegis.
With that final insult, Medusa's time among the living had come to its end.
"I care not if you are one of the creations of Chaos." Medusa's legs froze and the Gorgon nearly tilted over, a basket full of bloody, sweaty clothes in her arms. She'd been performing her duties, gathering the clothes to be cleaned from Artemis's room when she heard Nyx talking to someone. "Such trifling connection does not make us siblings."
Stopping to peek just around the corner of the hallway, Medusa could see the ever-so imperious Nyx talking to one of the guests. The tall woman with brilliant green eyes and flowing black hair.
Kary? At least, Medusa thought that was her name.
"I did not ask to call you sister." Kary(?) said, her arms crossed and her eyes fixed in a glare. "I wished only for your insight. Chaos is calling for something, perhaps someone. If not you, does he summon Zagreus?"
"If he is calling for the master's child, then that is a matter between only them." Nyx glared, her yellow eyes burning in a way that Medusa had never seen before. "It is a matter beyond your ken, plaything."
"...Perhaps so." Kary sounded... Calmer, than she had a moment ago. The malice in her gaze crystallizing. "Perhaps I am simply a plaything. But I, at least, grew beyond my purpose. Yet here you linger, a ghost in your own domain. The legacy made by you and yours has rotted, a bloated corpse of incest, cannibalism and rape."
The woman turned and began to walk away, her gaze lingering on the silently fuming Nyx. "I will soar beyond the heavens and you... You can wait here, crawling among the dead and playing in the dirt."
Medusa remained silent as the grave whilst Nyx stood in place. Her fists clenched so hard they shook, a hot gust of air blew along through the halls in time with the furious panting of the primordial goddess. If Nyx could turn someone to stone with her gaze, Kary would've been a statue. A sculpture of confidence and bravado to walk away after making such a damning statement.
Except, such a power had once belonged to Medusa. And now, now it remained in the hands of Athena, stolen from the Gorgon as a final insult.
Medusa really, really needed to find something else to think about. Being angry over her murder just was not helping to get anything done.
"...It is impolite to eavesdrop, Dusa." Nyx called, the woman's eyes were still closed but she'd turned to face Medusa's direction.
"...Sorry?" Medusa offered, stepping around the corner with Artemis's basket in hand. "I didn't want to interrupt, Lady Nyx, and you seemed kind of stressed so I didn't want to-"
"Be. Silent." Nyx inhaled sharply through her nose and brought one hand up to cover her eyes. "Your conduct has been simply appalling, Dusa. Skipping work, distracting Zagreus, now you've chosen to listen in on matters that do not concern you? That is enough! I will be talking with Lord Hades to... To..."
Nyx had taken her hand away from her face, her furious golden gaze shifting quickly to confusion when she caught sight of the Gorgon.
"You've... Regained your body." Nyx stated, confusion in her voice. The woman's eyes looked up, then down. Medusa felt slightly violated, as though her toga didn't actually cover herself. "How did this come to be?"
"I... Don't know?" Medusa said, trying to shrug. The basket made her efforts rather futile. "It just, umm, well... It kind of started about a week ago? One of my hands tried to grow out of my neck and, uh... It really hurt."
Medusa shifted the basket so that she was holding it against her hip with one hand while she rubbed at her neck with the other.
"It hurt a lot." Medusa admitted, looking down at the ground. "It started with a hand but I think everything was jammed up inside. I, uh, I actually needed help to get everything, uh, out."
"I see." Nyx closed her eyes again and turned around. The woman shook her head and began to walk away. "I suppose, given these... Unique circumstances, your behavior may be excused. But!"
Nyx turned around, her gaze burning into the Gorgon's own eyes.
"Be certain that you are more mindful of your betters, Dusa." Nyx's words sent a cold chill down Medusa's spine. "My mercy has its limits. Do not test them."
"Y-Yes, Lady Nyx!" Medusa shouted, dropping into a panicked bow. "Thank you, Lady Nyx!"
"Good." Nyx turned away once again, disappearing around a corner. The woman's voice lingered in the hall, however. A small reminder of the power she could wield within the palace. "Now, return to your duties!"
Medusa needed to further prodding. Holding the basket of sweaty, bloodstained rags against her chest, Medusa ran to the laundry room.
She never saw the jade eyes watching her, nor did she see the struggle between pity and fury within them.
-----
After training for the day, Jinx still needed to find something to do.
One thing she could work on, her combat spells were still fairly weak. Not actually weak, just weak in comparison to Alchemist. Or she could put some work into Energy Burst.
That thing... It was listed under 'Abilities' but it was almost as much a spell as it was anything else. Whoever the woman was at the bottom of the Item World, she'd put together a monstrously complex attack.
It started off by altering the configuration of whatever weapon it was channeled through to imitate some... Well, Jinx didn't actually know. The mechanisms were honestly beyond her, it involved sciences well in advance of anything that she'd been taught in school and then it began etching ones and zeros into the various components that were altered.
Her work with Gate did let Jinx understand that the spell, ability, thing was ripping micro-tears into the structure of reality and drawing in energy from a higher dimension that was being focused forward.
Just thinking about it, Jinx could already feel a headache starting to form. She didn't want to deal with magic manipulating high-energy, extra-dimensional physics-breaking machinery, not right now.
Maybe not ever? She kind of wanted to say 'Never' but Jinx had a long, long time to learn new things.
So what else could she do?
Zagreus was still busy training with his funky, face-shaped gun so Jinx didn't need to chill in the demi-plane on the off-chance that he'd beat his dad and the quest would finish up.
She still went back to the demi-plane, though. If she couldn't think of something else to do, she planned on grabbing a nether scroll and warming a couch-cushion.
Next to the door, Hypnos looked... Awake. And like the man was debating something. He was looking back and forth between the door and the floor, shuffling from foot to foot like he was trying to work up some courage to do something.
If he wanted to talk, he knew where they were.
"-and teleport it to the left!" She heard Alchemist saying the second she opened the door. Jinx walked deeper into the infinitely-more comfortable environment and saw that Alchemist was working with the familiars.
Reis was sitting back on her haunches, green light glowing in front of her and the grass underfoot ruffling in a breeze that was contrary to the actual wind. Ash, Cinder and Nostradamus were all staring at a handful of objects, broken chairs that Alchemist must have stolen from the Shinra Mansion, which were... Blinking from the right to the left, or forward and back, sometimes they ended up in the air before dropping and breaking a little more.
Magic? Alchemist was working on teaching the familiars magic? Jinx knew he'd taught Ash and Cinder how to cast Cure but now he was working on Teleport?
And he wasn't having them teleport -themselves-, which was good! Really! The lower levels of the spell -Hurt- to use... But Jinx was a little bit-really upset because that was how she'd learned, and she knew it was how Alchemist learned but she guessed that wasn't how the spell -had- to be leveled up.
Leaning against the side of the cabin, Jinx watched on with mixed feelings. She was happy that Alchemist was taking some time to work with the familiars. She was frustrated because he'd taken his own failures in learning himself or badly teaching Jinx and used them as a learning experience.
There was something else, something she couldn't quite identify that twisted uncomfortably as she was reminded that, for all that Alchemist seemed confident and capable, he was still learning all of this himself. He only had a few months of experience over her, not years and years of practice.
('Confidence, Jinx.' Alchemist had once told her. 'It doesn't matter if you don't know what's going on. It doesn't matter if you make a mistake. Do it with Confidence, take every day to learn more, and eventually, that'll be Certainty, instead.')
Jinx frowned in consternation while Alchemist smiled, genuinely, and rubbed his hands around Cinder's ears. Her familiar's tail wagged excitedly before the wizard said something and her dog pointed her snout at one of the increasingly-frayed chairs and it teleported to the side.
The girl sighed and pushed off of the wall. Thinking around in circles like that, it wasn't going to help anything. There wasn't any point in making herself more and more depressed over things that they were actively working on fixing and improving.
"Who's my good girl!" Jinx shouted, drawing quite a few eyes to her. She barely had a second to prepare before Cinder was barreling down on her.
"I am!" Cinder shouted, running around and around Jinx while shoving her nose into some very uncomfortable places. "I am! I am! Me! I'm a good girl!"
"You are!" Jinx leaned down and wrapped her arm around the dog's neck, her other hand landing on top of her fluffy head to give her a noogie. "You're my best girl, yes you are!"
"I am!" Cinder agreed, loudly. Jinx had been left wondering, ever since they'd started talking, if it was because of the attribute-boosting foods they'd been fed or just part of the familiar bond. If they were growing into what Jinx or Alchemist needed. "I'm best girl!"
"You are!" Jinx agreed, laughing as she pet her dog.
Ash wasn't the same as Cinder. She was quiet in comparison. Braver, too. Reis was an entirely different kettle of eels, secretive and angry. Jinx had never yet heard the baby dragon speak but Alchemist was gladly teaching her elemental magic, something he wasn't trusting either of the Hellhounds with.
"She's doing great." Jinx looked up, a smile on her face as Alchemist approached. "She picked up Teleport pretty well, we just need to put in some practice so she can use it however she wants."
"Is that a good idea?" Jinx asked, pushing her gangly puppy on to her side so she could rub the dog's belly. "Teleporting dogs?"
"It's a terrible idea." Alchemist agreed, reaching down and placing a hand on Ash's head. "They're going to get into all kinds of trouble."
"Okay then." That didn't answer Jinx's question at all. "Why are you teaching them, then?"
"Eventually, someone is going to get the bright idea to use them against us." Alchemist told her, crouching down until he was even with Ash. "And I'd like to preempt that kind of stupidity before it gets to us."
...Yeah, Jinx could see that. The number of times that Robin had been kidnapped in Gotham was kind of ridiculous, actually. Not to mention Bruce Wayne's ward, Dick Grayson. The kid probably spent more time hanging around villains than he did Bruce Wayne!
Although... Jinx didn't think the two had even been kidnapped at the same time? That was kind of odd, now that she thought about it.
Or maybe it wasn't and she was just making weird connections. That was probably it. People getting kidnapped was supposed to be rare, not something that was so common it would guarantee two people meeting eventually.
"I would ask about the cat." Jinx started, looking at the smug little shit. She really wanted to know how Alchemist got it to hang around and listen but she was fairly sure she saw a packet of treats sitting in Alchemist's pocket. "But it's a cat."
"His kind have a gift for portals." Alchemist explained anyway. "We'll need to work on his magical stamina before we start on spells like Gate, though."
Teleportation and extra-dimensional shenanigans. Jinx knew, she just knew, that Nostradamus was going to cause problems.
And Alchemist was encouraging it. Because he wanted to spread the chaos around so it hit deserving targets as much as it did them.
Jinx should really try and put a stop to this.
"Do you want some help?" She asked instead.
"I'd love some!" Alchemist turned his head to look at her, a smile on his face. One that Jinx returned, her own mood fully lifted.
Teaching dogs to teleport was a bad idea.
Teaching a cat to teleport was a terrible idea.
They lived in a terrible place, though, so common sense wasn't worth a damn thing.
"Anything else you think we should try and teach them?" Jinx asked, standing up and stretching.
"Mage hand." Alchemist answered immediately.
"...God." Jinx actually giggled at the idea. Not only able to teleport, he wanted to give them all the ability to finely manipulate objects? Nostradamus would knock everything off of every table, wouldn't he? "You're awful, you know that?"
"So I've been told." Alchemist agreed, standing up as well. He pulled a wrinkled foil packet out of his pocket and held it out to her. Taking it, Jinx saw that it was, indeed, a bag of cat treats. "I'll handle Ash and Reis if you want to take care of Cinder and Nos?"
"Sounds good to-" Jinx started to say before she was cut off by the sound of someone nervously clearing their throat.
Turning around, Jinx saw the thin, wiry form of Hypnos waving at them awkwardly with a hesitant smile on his face.
"Uh... Hello?" The god- no, Jinx corrected herself. The titan began to speak. "I, um... I was hoping I could speak with you? Alchemist? Or, uh, Jinx? Both? Right! I was hoping I could speak with the both of you, if you don't mind?"
"...Sure?" Alchemist sounded confused. Turning around, Jinx could see that he obviously didn't know what was going on. "What did you need?"
"I... I've seen your dreams. Both of you." Hypnos began, holding his hands up placatingly. Jinx didn't know why.
He was the god of dreams. Of course he'd seen them.
The lack of reaction that Hypnos got from the two of them must have confused the man because he froze for a moment until Jinx waved her hand, motioning for him to continue.
"So, I know why you're here. I know what you're trying to do." Hypnos placed a frail hand on his chest and his casual, carefree smile slowly morphed and twisted into something nightmarish. "And I believe that we need to have this conversation someplace a bit more private. Wouldn't you agree?"
Jinx turned back around and looked at Alchemist. He'd lost his grin, face blank but for the calculating, considering look in his eyes.
"Ash. Cinder. Nostradamus. All of you, keep working on Teleport. You'll get treats if I'm happy with your progress." Alchemist said, his voice soft but commanding. "Reis, once you have a feel for Aero, move over to the pond and begin working with Water. We'll work on Cure and Holy later tonight."
The man placed his hands over his pockets, ready to call one of his weapons if need be. Jinx mirrored his readiness, both of her hands loosely clasped together behind her back to mask the summoning of a knife or gun if needed.
Alchemist jerked his head to the side, towards the house.
"Come on." He said, walking towards the building. "Let's go somewhere private for this little... Conversation."
-----
Alchemist's hands itched as he led the god of Dreams towards his home, Jinx at his side. A part of him, one that hadn't existed that long ago, wanted to draw one of his weapons. That part of him wanted some surety that the situation would be under control, even if that was the potential of violence.
Alchemist kept a tight lid on that growing issue. For all that Hypnos was -menacing- them, he wasn't -threatening- them. The difference, much as some might think otherwise, was very important.
They walked silently into his house and Alchemist walked through the entryway, into the kitchen and then turned around into the re-purposed pantry where the stairs were that led downstairs. Across from the guest room door, through one that was normally locked with a little sign on it warning about cleaning chemicals, Alchemist led them to their destination.
He did not turn to assess the god as Hypnos likely saw the armor and weapons lining one wall of the narrow room, across from the various bottles of bleach, alcohol and soap. Instead he reached for the doorknob of a door that was set against a solid wall with no room on the other side.
"Close the door behind you, Hypnos." Alchemist said, turning to look at the small, frail god at the opposite end of the procession. The man hesitated for a moment before turning around and doing exactly that.
Doing so, the dampening wards around the room were re-completed. All three of them should have felt the discomfort of being cut off from the magic of the demi-plane. Alchemist certainly did.
"Come on." The mage said, opening the door in front of him. "And stay close. I'll need to clear the room so we can talk in peace."
The doorway led to empty space immediately in front of it, there was a short but intentional drop beyond it. Alchemist landed in a crouch, his eyes immediately roving over the crystalline expanse. A quartet of absolutely massive crystals were arranged throughout the room, parallel halves to backwards 'C'.
And, throughout the ever-expanding space, smaller masses of living crystal moved about above a strange, glowing membrane. There were no dragons, no great behemoths or wicked necromancers. No small, angry orange balls full of undead hatred and wickedly powerful elemental magic.
Just magic, enough to power a world, and the fledgling Crystelles.
"So." Jinx began once she landed next to Alchemist. "This is what you did with those crystals. It's... Already bigger than your demi-plane."
It was at that. Possibly twice the size and in only a fraction of the time. Alchemist still had four crystals that needed to be placed, the ones harvested from the elementally charged Crystelle inside of the great tree. He was just waiting for the space to expand a bit more so he could have everything symmetrical and balanced, as all things should be.
"This is... Amazing." Hypnos murmured, just loud enough to be heard as he floated down towards them. "I didn't even know this was possible."
"It's also two realities removed from your own." Alchemist explained, casting Telekinesis to latch on to the doorknob overhead and close the door. "And well warded against every kind of intrusion I could think of. Scrying, past, present and future viewing. There are only two entrances and that door is one of them."
The other was Gate. Warding the bubble in reality against Gate was possible, absolutely, but it would lock Alchemist in as much as it would lock everyone else out. Given that it was possible to overload such defenses with raw might, and the consequences of doing so... Vulnerability was the lesser of two evils.
Dropping a world's worth of magic into the Bleed, the Fade, the Blind Eternities- Whatever someone wanted to call it didn't matter. Destroying a lesser reality would throw its contents out and into extra-dimensional space where they could have all kinds of consequences that couldn't be predicted.
Alchemist turned back around as Hypnos and Jinx took in the crystalline world. As they felt the magical charge that was literally growing with every second before the plane itself consumed that same charge to fuel its growth.
Instead of thinking about that, Alchemist was instead turning his attention to the living masses of crystal that were slowly crawling towards his group. There were dozens of them, living concentrations of physical magic, just lacking some purpose or drive that would properly define their potential.
Alchemist had a few suspicions on how to catalyze that change but, unfortunately, it would need to wait for a fresh batch of Crystelle to form. The current group...
The wizard snapped his fingers and, one after another, a dozen impossibly-black floating swords appeared from nothing. The weapons, Black Blades of Disaster, darted through the air to begin the grisly task of slaughtering the slowly encroaching horde.
"So, Hypnos." Alchemist began, his eyes tracking the action of the swords, his focus on the monsters. "What was it that you wanted to talk about, again?"
"Ah! Y-yes." The god sounded nervous as he sidled up next to Alchemist. The wizard could practically hear him gulp audibly as he watched the surgical execution of living, un-typed elementals. "I... I wanted to talk to you two about, about my... Freedom."
That... Wasn't what Alchemist had been expecting.
"Can't you just leave?" Jinx asked from Alchemist's other side. She didn't seem quite so surprised about things, but then she wouldn't. She'd been right at Alchemist's side when he'd stolen the elemental crystals in the first place.
"Technically? Yes." Hypnos sighed quietly, defeat in his voice. "Realistically, no. I put Zeus to sleep in order to help a goddess with her plans. Upon waking, he declared vengeance on me. I fled to the Underworld and I've been hiding in Mother's shadow ever since."
"Ah." Alchemist responded, listening intently. "That's... Well, that sucks."
"It really does." Jinx agreed, sitting on the ground with her legs crossed as the black blades finished their grisly work.
"I've been stuck here for centuries." Hypnos whined, 'sitting' down on the air and floating in place. "Sometimes it's not so bad. Than is great and Charon... Cares, in his own way. But mom is... She loves me, I know she does but I also know she thinks I'm a disappointment. Anything that doesn't meet her expectations, like me, we're treated like an after-thought. I'm safe in the House of Hades but... I'm not happy, you know?"
Alchemist could see that. He doubted the way Nyx doted on Zagreus helped things at all.
Sitting down himself, then laying back as his blades faded away after killing the last of the current batch of Crystelle, Alchemist crossed his arms behind his head.
"So." Jinx started, leaning forward enough that she could place her elbows on her knees and her chin in one hand. "What do you want us to do about it?"
"Well..." Hypnos hummed quietly, rubbing his chin. "Killing Zeus would probably be a bad idea. Just, you know, to start with. The mortals Alchemist gave god-killing magics to, they won't do much for Zeus anyway, though. Just thought I'd get that out there."
"I didn't expect they would." Alchemist knew there was a world of difference between a warrior god and the others. Maybe, if the Greek city-states could teach those spells to a pack of demi-gods, maybe they'd be able to overthrow Olympus. "But the threat that humans -could- rise up against them should temper some of their behaviors."
"...Yeah." Jinx sighed when Hypnos turned a confused eye on Alchemist. "We already know that killing Zeus wouldn't really accomplish much. He'll wash up in the Styx and we're not sure if Hades would do his job and keep him in the realm of the dead. He might not even be able to, y'know?"
"...Huh." Hypnos sounded stumped. Alchemist waited for the titan to get his thoughts in order rather than expose their own plans first. "I'm not used to hearing Champions actually think about things, you know? I mean, like, Hercules was considered clever and his first thought on dealing with the Nemean Lion was to just beat it to death through its invulnerable hide."
"Hammers and nails." Alchemist said, reaching out with one hand towards the sky and waving it about meaninglessly. "Herc's a hammer and everything's a nail. Unless it's got to do with tricking Atlas or hunting Artemis's deer."
"Or horse shit." Jinx offered at his side. "You actually have to think to send a river where you want it."
"...Fair, fair." Hypnos quietly sighed, shifting so that he was laying on his side in the air. "Playing to one's strengths where it is possible is always a good idea, really. Though, since you mentioned Artemis... You are aware that Zeus has given her an order to try and seduce you to the surface so he can show you how upset he is over your words?"
"Yep." Alchemist told him, one word failing to give up how he was made aware of such a thing.
"Uh-huh." Jinx followed up, equally obtuse.
"...Do you intend on... Doing anything?" Hypnos hesitantly asked. "To her?"
"Not unless she forces the issue." Alchemist admitted. The girl didn't want anything to do with the order she'd been given and, really, Alchemist didn't want anything to do with it either. "Once we finish up and go home, I doubt it'll matter anyway."
"...That's going to go over well." Hypnos sighed again and Alchemist watched as the god pinched the bridge of his nose. "She doesn't want to follow that order, her nightmares are clear enough on that front. But she's also going to be upset if she -can't- follow it, because half of her dreams are about how she's this untouchable beauty, how people that want her can't have her and that she's so tragic because of it."
"So... Teenager." Alchemist deadpanned, he was familiar with the drama. He'd been a teenager himself a few times. "I feel for her, kind of. But I can't really spare the empathy for folks working on seeing me tortured to death, regardless of what it'll do to their self image."
Jinx's snickering next to him was only a little malicious.
"Fine, fine." Hypnos capitulated, giving up on the topic. "Back to Zeus and my own issue. Killing him won't work and the mortals probably wouldn't do much more than irritate him if they tried. I might be willing to help you but I'd need to hear a real plan."
Alchemist pursed his lips, thinking on the matter. Severely interfering with the local cosmology felt like a bad idea. Giving the humans on the surface the tools to take charge of their own fates was one thing, still drastic but less so than murdering or sealing away the gods. This wasn't his own reality, imposing his will and morality on it... Rubbed him the wrong way, on a multitude of levels.
On the other hand...
Hojo.
"I guess I've got two options for you." Alchemist began, thinking about the situation. Trying to look at it from further and further back, beyond his own interference. "But I'll need some information from you, I need to understand a few things better."
"Well... I suppose I can try?" Hypnos offered, shrugging awkwardly.
Alchemist sat up and opened his inventory. Typing quickly, he soon had a chalice of Nectar in hand which was offered to the god. For Jinx and himself, Alchemist extracted some orange juice.
"If a god is removed from reality, what happens to their domain?" Alchemist asked after waiting for Hypnos to take a sip.
"Well..." Hypnos hummed, delight in his voice at the familiar taste he'd been offered. "It depends. If they're slowly broken down then their domain can actually die with them. It's what Zeus is currently doing to the other titans locked in Hades' basement. A sudden removal, though? It sort of splinters the domain, leaving behind open concepts for new gods to be born into."
That, Alchemist reflected as he slowly drank his juice, was very good to know. Horrific, absolutely, but still very good to know.
"Alright. So, we're still back to two choices." Both of which, Alchemist thought, were valid choices for the titan. That did not mean they were equal. "If you'd like, you could join my team on our return to our reality when Zagreus eventually bests his father. That doesn't mean you have to help us fight or do anything but I will warn you that returning to this realm may well be impossible."
"I see..." Hypnos mumbled, holding the chalice with both hands as he gazed down to its golden contents. "And the other option?"
"If you put the other residents of Olympus to sleep?" Alchemist stood up awkwardly as he kept his orange juice level so as not to spill it. "My team should be able to ambush and deal with Zeus. We have most of our equipment ready but we're still a few weeks away from being able to pull something like that off, though."
"...You said deal with him, not kill him." Hypnos pointed out. He was looking into Alchemist's eyes, waiting for an explanation that never came. After several long moments the god brought the chalice up and took a slow, considering draw from it. "...Can I have some time to think on it?"
"Certainly." Alchemist agreed, turning towards Jinx and offering her a hand up.
"Yeah." The girl grunted as she was pulled up and off the ground. "Just make your choice soon, okay? Once Z beats up his dad, we're getting kicked out whether we like it or not."
"Alright." Hypnos stood as well, though the gesture was mostly pointless since he'd been floating anyway. "I'll have an answer for you soon. I... Shouldn't have to say this, but, well, this is a matter that must remain secret."
"No, really?" Alchemist asked, sarcasm in his voice. "Here I thought we should go and tell Artie the good news!"
"...I suppose I deserved that." Hypnos grinned, a soft laugh on his lips as he shook his head. "So, how do we get out of here?"
In response, Alchemist opened a Gate that led back to the store room housing the door into this elemental realm.
"That is incredibly convenient." Hypnos mumbled, stepping through the hole in reality.
"Yes." Alchemist agreed, following behind him. "It really is."
