39 War V - The climax

(3rd Person POV)

The war was nearing its climax. Let us divide the battlefield and go over all parts of it. 

The three main battlefields are the air above Mount Othrys, where Zeus is raining lightning down on the palace and the Titans living there. He is supported by the Cyclops and Hecantochires who are sending giant boulders at Mount Othrys.

The second battlefield is the land between Mount Olympus and Mount Othrys. That is where our boy Hades has been fighting. There is not much field left of that battle, though. 

The third battlefield is located to the south of Mount Othrys, particularly the sea. That is where Poseidon has been sending Hurricanes, Storms and Earthquakes to keep the Titans' attention divided. 

Poseidon has had to stop though as he had been attacked by Oceanus some time before Hades had finished his battle. And they were still duking it out. 

The rest of the Olympians and their allies fought all over the land. Hecate was using spells to stop Iapetus from doing too much damage and killing their members. His divinity of mortality was dangerous in such a fight. He had already cost them most of their troops by making them mortal for a time and then killing them. Then they had to reform and that could take years.

Hera was fighting Crius and Demeter was fighting Coeus. 

Prometheus and Thetis were doing their best to reduce the amount of monsters there were. And they were probably one of the more successful groups. Hera was doing well against Crius but it would take a long time for her to win ... if she would win at all.

Demeter was doing good too, but Coeus was not the Titan of foresight and intelligence for nothing. He saw her flaws and exploited them brutally. She needed help from Prometheus more than once to get her out of trouble. 

After initialising the fight, Zeus focused on doing the most damage possible using his divinity of lightning and creating devastating thunderstorms. Together with his symbol of power the Master Bolt, he did a lot of damage and got the attention of the king of Titans, Cronos himself. 

And that is what the 'supposed leader' of the Olympians has been doing since shortly after the fight began. Among all the chaos that was going on, Hades had been the most successful as he had taken out two Titans singlehandedly.

Hades looked at the two parts of the Titan lying on the ground in front of him. The golden ichor soaking the ground. Atlas was split into two parts with a circular giant hole missing from his body. 

"Truly you have a remarkable ability to regenerate. But you won't get up any time soon, I reckon. Better see what else I can gain from this. Hm... now that I think about it ... why not see how Hyperion is doing?", Hades said to no one in particular.

He could feel Hyperion had seemingly entered his domain of light and his soul was not available to take for Hades. Well ... that is not quite accurate. He could take it forcefully, but that might damage the fabric of the world. The light was important after all. And what's more, he wanted to have something that angered the future god of light/sun Apollo. 

Hades decided to leave things for now and focus on looking for another battle. It was very rewarding and fun to grow mid-fight. He had gone through a breakthrough and his understanding of Infinity as well as math and gravity had increased greatly. He guessed it wouldn't be long until he gained a minor divinity in those aspects. But he was not in a hurry. 

He had taken it slowly during the fight and mostly responded to the other's attacks while trying to feel pressured. He did get what he wanted, but he always knew that he was in no danger whatsoever. 

.

Making his way towards Mount Othrys, Hades could feel the fight taking place on the top. His father must be fighting Zeusy and from the feel of things ... father dearest was not doing as well as expected. Cronos should be wiping the floor with Zeus but ... he wasn't. What was going on here?

"...ah, I see. So that's how it is. Interesting."

Hades could feel what was happening. His Six Eyes were still active after all. He could feel all sorts of energies and at that moment he could feel a very special energy around Zeus covering and infusing him with power. 

Fate!

That was fate energy. They were weaving their little stories about how they liked and used this to give the youngest Olympian a boost in power. How foolish they were. There was no way Zeus won this fight without his brothers.

But perhaps that was the idea. To give Zeus enough power until they arrived. That only meant one thing for Hades.

... he would wait and see how long this boost lasted... What? There was no way he would give those three anything they wanted. 

.

The fight dragged on. Zeus was holding his own and he was growing while he fought. Impressive stuff but it wasn't enough to bridge the gap that thousands of years of experience did for Cronos. Hades could see the different ways his father used the concept of time to help him in the fight. 

The surprising thing was to see how ... crudely Cronos used his divinity. It seemed like he was either rusty or just bad at using it. But that seemed impossible. How could a being of his standing and age be this unimaginative? 

Using his Six Eyes, Hades could understand and would in the future replicate the techniques Cronos used. Time was closely connected with space and he had some years of experience with the concept of space. However, it has to be said that using the Limitless Technique, does not equal understanding the concept of space itself. It does help tremendously though, and with a bit of effort, he will master it soon. 

An important thing to note though, is that Hades is not actually interested in mastering as many divinities as possible. He is perfectly fine with having the ones he has now. His divinity of boundaries is something that will take him beyond what is believed to be possible and his second wish will stop anyone from interfering with Hades' wish to achieve those heights.

So it mattered little to Hades whether he understood space or not. He lived to enjoy himself or at least he tried to. And that was also seen in his fight with the two Titans. 

Had Hades wanted to, he could have removed the barriers that held the body together. He could have removed the Van-der-Waals or Electromagnetic forces and watched them dissolve into nothingness. But he didn't do that. He enjoyed the fight for what it was, a chance to improve himself and have fun. 

That is what Hades wanted and that is what he enjoyed. He always thought that the cultivators from those stories must live the most boring lives because they just cultivate. Meaning they sit there and try and absorb energies from the world to progress and get stronger.

And that just wasn't for Hades. 

Sure the occasional 'young master' would be fun to mess around with but the long time it took to progress and the necessary sitting and whatnot, just wasn't for him. And yet he never wanted to have to worry about being too weak for something. He wished to be free and travel. Absolute freedom was something that Hades thought about wishing for. 

But he decided to go with Boundary manipulation instead as that included absolute freedom as well. 

So now, standing here and seeing Cronos' use of such vestigial moves and techniques disappointed Hades. 

The outcome he was expecting started to show. Zeus was no longer able to keep up with everything that Cronos dished out. The fate energy had depleted substantially. Soon Zeus would be defeated and Hades would have the stage ...

... or so he thought. Just before Cronos dealt the finishing blow, someone sprang into the fight and intercepted Cronos.

"Poseidon?", Hades was surprised. Not that he sprung into action without thinking and neither was he surprised because he hadn't seen him coming. No, he was surprised that his fight with Oceanus was finished. 

Hades guessed that something must have happened for Ocanus to either leave or let Poseidon go. There was no way that Oceanus had lost though ... unless ... of course. The fate energy. It could have played a role in his fight too. But then ... it didn't play a role in Hades' fight. So maybe Zeus was the chosen baby by fate?

.

Hades was correct in his assumption. Shortly after Hades had won the fight against Hyperion and Atlas, one of the Pleiades, who had been watching the fight, had rushed to Oceanus in tears and told him all about the battle and the sad fate of her father Atlas and Hyperion. 

Oceanus had stopped fighting Poseidon then and decided that it would be smart to go back to being neutral. He was a family man at heart, but his brother Cronos was not someone who was very likeable, especially in recent years. 

So in the end Oceanus conceded the fight and let Poseidon go. Poseidon having heard what the daughter of Atlas said, decided to rush to Mount Othrys, correctly assuming the final fight against Cronos to take place there. 

*Sigh*

Hades sighed. In the end, he didn't get to see Zeus getting crushed by Cronos. But it was still worth it to watch. Now though it was finally time to end this war and get back to building the Underworld. 

.

Cronos was parrying the trident of his second youngest son with the scythe that he had gotten from Gaia. He punched Zeus in the face and was about to cut Poseidon when the blade ... just stopped.

He looked to see a hand touching his scythe. 

"WHAT?", Cronos said in confusion and surprise.

That was ... impossible. Or at least it was thought to be impossible. Anything the scythe cut, had its soul cut as well, making it one of the few weapons that could kill gods ... for good. 

But who are we talking about here? It was Hades, the one who broke boundaries and commanded them. He said what was and wasn't possible, he was the one to decide when things ended, for he had the final say.

"Surprised father? This is the second time we have met and I would like to formally introduce myself. I-"

"Hades. So you've come. And what an entrance you've made. I heard about the reason why you never entered the battlefield. How your siblings framed you and shunned you. 

Why do you fight for them? Why not fight for me? Fight with me? I could use your help and I know that you are not fond of them."

"... I am surprised. I thought you were a baffoon that used his strength and power as well as his dick to decide everything. And now I must find out that you're actually really cunning. 

I understand now why you were the king of the Titans. You have my respect for finding out the only thing that you could have said, that MIGHT have made me change my mind about the war. 

However ... I have decided. I am here for one thing only ... and that is your scythe. After that, you can duke it out on your own, I don't care."

"The scythe!? You won't get the scythe boy! This weapon holds far too much power to hand it to you. It is mine and that will stay this way."

"Very well then. I can accept that and that is why I am fighting you. So let us use our most powerful ... or at least in your case, the most powerful move and be done with this."

"If that is your wish then so be it child. Prepare yourself."