Percy Jackson: The Firstborn

Chapter 185: Chapter 185: WHAT

The Goddess of the Hunt went completely still when she realized that she had just used the name of the God of the Underworld himself as a curse while he was standing right in front of her.

"Uh... no, Lord Hades. I wasn’t referring to you," Artemis replied quickly, a faint blush of embarrassment appearing on her face.

Hades fixed his flat stare on the nervous eyes of the Goddess of the Hunt. "That’s what I thought."

Damon couldn’t help but show an amused grimace. Hades really had no sense of humor. Artemis, for her part, pressed her lips together, clearly regretting that of all the expressions she could have chosen, she had picked that one.

Marcos, who by that point had already managed to get down from the tree with Percy’s help, watched the small interaction between Hades and Artemis while leaning slightly toward the son of Poseidon. Curiously enough, the two of them seemed to have gotten along rather naturally. "Uh... who’s that?" Marcos whispered.

Percy glanced briefly toward Artemis before lowering his voice. "Artemis. Goddess of the Hunt."

Marcos’s eyes widened slightly after hearing that before he looked back at the obvious anger on the goddess’s face. "And is she always that angry? She looks... I don’t know, weird."

At those words, a massive sweat drop might as well have appeared behind Percy’s head as nervousness washed over him. "Don’t say that out loud or she’ll turn you into an animal," he warned quickly.

Artemis, hearing her name being spoken, turned her gaze directly toward Percy.

The son of Poseidon swallowed. "Okay... probably not the best time to talk about this."

Marcos felt a chill run down his back. "Got it....."

A few steps behind Artemis were Leto and Chiron. The Titaness couldn’t help letting out a small laugh before approaching, briefly greeting Damon with her eyes and a slight bow of her head before settling her gaze on Hades. "And look who finally decided to leave the Underworld. Hades, I feel like I haven’t seen you since the Titanomachy."

The God of the Underworld shifted his gaze toward her. "Leto." He recognized her immediately. In ancient times, the Titaness used to spend a good portion of her time wandering around with Metis.

Leto studied him for a few seconds before an amused smile appeared on her face. "You still look as gloomy as ever."

Hades gave her a completely flat stare. "I see you’re still as funny as I remember," he replied without laughing in the slightest.

"Good to see you too," Leto answered without losing her smile, more than accustomed to Hades’s personality despite the fact that they had probably interacted fewer than ten times throughout all their millennia of existence.

The small exchange seemed to ease the tension Artemis had created moments earlier. The Goddess of the Moon relaxed her shoulders slightly, mentally thanking her mother for rescuing her from the embarrassment by distracting the God of the Underworld. Hades, for his part, decided that the best response was simply to ignore everyone’s looks.

"If you’ll excuse me, I have things to do." He turned his head slightly toward Nico and Bianca before placing one hand on each of their shoulders. "I’m going to take my children to their cabin and make sure they have everything they need. I’ll leave you to deal with your problems with Damon."

And just as quickly as calm had returned to the clearing, it vanished again when Artemis’s expression hardened once more. Damon let out a sigh when he noticed the silver-eyed goddess’s stare. "Okay. What is it now?"

Artemis turned toward him with an incredulous expression. "Are you seriously asking me what’s wrong?" The Goddess of the Hunt pointed toward all the children around them. "Look at all this! We barely managed to get the demigods who were already at Camp Half-Blood to defend themselves decently, and now you show up with a whole bunch more kids."

Damon crossed his arms as he listened. Ever since he had decided that Artemis would participate directly in training the camp’s demigods, the goddess had obeyed. Sure, it had practically been forced on her, but she had obeyed. Damon understood perfectly well that she disliked men, but he had also made it very clear that if they wanted the Greek Pantheon to become strong again, all of their demigods needed proper training.

For weeks, she had worked alongside Chiron and her Hunters until a good portion of the campers had improved considerably. Damon only had to remember Percy and his companions’ fight against the Gorgons to see the results. Many who had barely known how to hold a weapon properly before could now defend themselves against basic monsters and work as a team without becoming a burden. The best example was probably the daughter of Aphrodite, whose improvement had been far greater than anyone would have expected at the beginning.

That said, in Artemis’s mind, she was finally beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel regarding all that responsibility. After weeks dedicated to training the demigods, it finally seemed like she would soon be able to leave most of that work behind and return to focusing on what she actually enjoyed: hunting alongside her Hunters. But now Damon had suddenly appeared with thirty more children and, from the Goddess of the Hunt’s perspective, her seemingly endless job as a trainer had just been extended all over again.

"So let me guess," Artemis continued as she crossed her arms. "Now you want me to take care of all of them too."

Damon narrowed his eyes slightly, but before he could respond, Leto, who knew her daughter’s tone far too well, decided to step in before the conversation turned into an argument in front of half the camp.

She could already tell that several of the newcomers were beginning to feel uncomfortable, and that was the last thing she wanted. "Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this here."

Damon briefly looked over the children and campers who, despite pretending to be busy, were clearly listening to the conversation. "Yeah. You’re right."

He then turned his head toward Hestia. The Goddess of the Hearth immediately perked up, as if she had understood exactly what her brother was going to ask before he even opened his mouth. "You don’t even have to say it, brother. I’ll handle it."

Hestia clapped her hands once to get the children’s attention. "Alright! All the newcomers, come with me. We’re going to figure out where everyone is sleeping, and after that, I hope you’re hungry because I’m going to make food for all of you."

The word food was enough to make practically every demigod perk up immediately.

"Yeah... I like her," Marcos told Percy with obvious excitement, already prepared to launch into an entire conversation with the son of Poseidon. Unfortunately for him, María appeared at that exact moment and grabbed her brother by the arm before he could begin another one of his endless talks.

Damon nodded in satisfaction as he watched Hestia begin gathering the new demigods with the help of a few older campers. Once he was sure the situation was under control, he gestured with his head toward Artemis, Leto, and Chiron. "Let’s go."

The four of them began walking toward the Big House.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

The door had barely finished closing behind them when Artemis turned toward Damon, but the redhead didn’t even allow her to begin. "First of all, Artemis, if I order you to train or help those children for the sake of the Pantheon, you’re going to do it."

Artemis opened her mouth to respond, but Damon raised a finger before she could say a single word. "But I haven’t said that. And you’re already angry."

The goddess looked away and let out a huff while Leto and Chiron both glanced elsewhere, neither of them particularly eager to involve themselves in the conversation between the two deities more than necessary.

Damon let out a sigh before raising one hand. "Okay, look. I actually have something better planned for you."

That immediately caught the Goddess of the Hunt’s attention. "You and your Hunters are going somewhere else. I want you to select a group of demigods from Camp Half-Blood, the best ones you believe are ready to leave the camp, and you’re going to take them with you."

Artemis’s expression shifted slightly. "Where?"

"Kuoh."

A small spark of interest immediately appeared in her eyes. Damon noticed it without difficulty. "You’re taking them hunting."

Now Artemis had her full attention on him. "Kuoh has an absurd concentration of supernatural activity. Stray Devils, lesser creatures, occasional appearances from other beings, and enough activity for the demigods to learn what it actually means to face enemies outside a training field. You and your Hunters will be with them to make sure none of them do anything too stupid."

The idea clearly appealed to her. A lot. But Artemis had absolutely no intention of giving Damon the satisfaction of admitting it. The goddess lifted her chin slightly before turning on her heels. "Hmph. Whatever."

Damon smiled. "I knew you’d like it."

The Goddess of the Hunt let out a loud huff before continuing toward the door, practically stomping as she left the room.

An awkward silence remained behind her. Leto slowly brought a hand to her face. "I apologize for my daughter, Lord Damon."

Damon kept his gaze on the door for a few seconds before turning toward the Titaness. "It’s fine. But I have to tell you something, Leto... At this rate, I’m starting to think your daughter is still ten years old mentally."

Leto’s face flushed deeply with embarrassment while Chiron suddenly found one of the walls extremely fascinating. The Titaness closed her eyes and let out a small sigh.

This is all Zeus’s fault.

If that idiot hadn’t indulged practically every one of Artemis’s whims since she was a child, her daughter probably would have developed a little more patience. Leto was completely convinced that if she had been given the chance to raise Artemis under her own care for longer, many things would have turned out differently.

Leto let out another sigh as she remained lost in her thoughts. Tormenting herself over it now wasn’t going to change the past.

Damon decided not to keep pressing the embarrassed Titaness and turned his attention toward Chiron, who stepped closer as his hooves echoed softly against the wooden floor. "Uh... Lord Damon. Do you really believe taking the demigods to this place you’re talking about is a good idea?"

His concern was understandable. For practically the entire modern existence of Camp Half-Blood, the idea had been exactly the opposite: keep young demigods inside the camp’s borders whenever possible. Deliberately sending a group into another supernatural territory to train against real threats was something completely different.

Damon made a small gesture with one hand. "Relax, man. It’ll be fine. Besides, I’m not taking the entire camp. Like I said, Artemis will only bring the ones she believes are ready, the most capable ones for now."

Chiron continued watching him with concern as Damon crossed his arms. "This is only the first step. Demigods can’t spend their whole lives training against other demigods and expect that to prepare them for everything that exists outside. I want them to start learning about different kinds of enemies, different factions, and different fighting styles. Eventually, we can make this routine for everyone who reaches a certain level."

That made considerably more sense, and Chiron began to relax slightly until Damon added with complete casualness, "Besides, I’m thinking about finding a way to give Sacred Gears to the demigods."

The centaur blinked. Leto also slowly turned toward him. "Sacred Gears?" Chiron repeated.

"Yeah. I recently got another one, along with quite a bit of information from the leader of another faction. I just haven’t had time to study it properly yet." Damon rested one hand against his chin as he thought about the matter again. "The problem is that I can’t just hand them out like ordinary weapons. The Sacred Gear system is tied to human souls and the system created by the Biblical God, so I need to figure out how to replicate the principle without depending directly on his system."

Chiron stared at him for several seconds. "And you intend to create... another system?"

Damon shrugged slightly. "More or less."

The centaur closed his eyes for a moment. Altering a fundamental rule imposed upon the supernatural world could create an absurd number of problems, but if anyone was capable of finding a way to do it, Chiron was fairly certain that someone was Damon. Finally, he let out a long sigh.

"I’ll trust you, brother," the centaur said in one of those rare displays of deep trust he showed Damon as his half-brother.

Before Damon could respond, the door to the Big House opened and Hermes entered at a brisk pace, holding a rolled-up message in one hand. "Lord Damon. This just arrived."

Damon raised an eyebrow slightly before taking the message and unrolling it, a strange sense of déjà vu washing over him. He could have sworn he had already gone through something like this before.

His eyes quickly scanned the contents in silence... It was an invitation addressed to all pantheons, calling for a meeting between the various deities.

Damon wasn’t surprised by the gathering itself. In truth, both he and Amaterasu had seen something like this coming. The supernatural world had been far more active than usual lately, so it had only been a matter of time before the different pantheons decided to sit down and speak with one another... The only thing Damon hadn’t expected was for it to happen so soon.

He rolled the message back up before turning toward Hermes. "Hermes, do you have any way of sending a message to the Aztec Pantheon?"

The God of Messengers blinked, genuinely caught off guard by the question. That was not what he had expected at all. In fact, he had assumed Damon would ask something related to the invitation. "The Aztecs?"

Damon nodded.

Hermes hesitated for a moment before slowly nodding himself. "I can do it."

Damon narrowed his eyes slightly..... Of course he could.

Hermes wasn’t merely the God of Messengers. He was also the God of Travelers, roads, and those who crossed borders. If anyone within the Greek Pantheon knew the routes, methods, or contacts capable of reaching territories belonging to other religions, it made sense for that person to be him.

That, however, caused another question to surface in Damon’s mind. How much did Hermes actually know about the other pantheons?

And more importantly, had Zeus really never thought to take advantage of something so obvious? In fact, Damon found it somewhat surprising that the God of Lightning, considering how paranoid he had been even in ancient times, had never shown greater interest in something like this.

Damon decided to leave that question for another time. "Good. Then contact them for me."

Hermes raised an eyebrow slightly. "What would you like me to tell them?"

Damon tightened his grip around the invitation. This meeting had accelerated his plans far more than he had expected, but that was fine. "Simply tell them that I want to meet with them and that I won’t take no for an answer."

Hermes remained silent for a moment before respectfully bowing his head. "As you command, Lord Damon."

A moment later, he disappeared in a blur of speed.

Damon looked at the invitation one last time before the paper began to burn between his fingers, completely consuming itself until only a few traces of ash remained. Beside him, Leto and Chiron exchanged a brief glance.

"Is everything alright, Lord Damon?" Chiron asked.

Damon turned his gaze toward them and gave them a small smile. "Yeah. Everything’s fine." The god paused briefly before letting out a sigh. "I’m just wondering what the future has in store."

>>>>>>>>

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!