Introductions

~PERCY POV~

A portal opens right in front of me. Reminds me of Dr Strange portals, neat. Out of the portal, walk out several humanoid figures. Looking at them made my head spin. The story told by Athena was confusing enough, but the structure of these Gods is too odd to be real. I was confused if they are Gods or Monsters.

The first God to walk out was male. He had one head and two legs like a normal human, but he had four arms. One left arm held a Lotus, and one of the hands held a shell, I think it is called a conch. One of the right and held a mace, while the other held a discus. That discus was weird, it radiated power. I would barely look at it as if it would burn me into ash if I tried. The discus had a small hole in the centre. That man held it by putting his little finger through it. That God had a peaceful face as if he was meditating. His complexion reminded me of dark clouds. He was wearing only a cloth which was tied to his waist, while his upper body, though naked, was covered with gold ornaments. He had black curly hair and wore a big crown made of gold.

Two women stood on either side. Both women had a fair complexion and wore a crown similar to that of the man. Both had an elegant look on their face and four arms attached to their body. They probably were the man's wives. The goddess on the right had Sitar, which she held using two hands while one hand had a book. She wore a simple white Saari, the traditional Indian wear. By her looks, I could tell she was Saraswati, the goddess of wisdom and arts. On the one on the left, that goddess was the opposite of Saraswati. She had a Saari embroidered with threads of gold. Two of her hands were free while the other two had gold coins in them. I was sure that she would be Laxmi, the goddess of wealth.

But wait, if these two are that man's wives, that means that that man is-

"Lord Vishnu." I heard a voice next to me. I turned to look at Artemis who suddenly gave me a peck at my lips. "When did you get here?" I whispered to her. "When you were listening to Athena. I have been staring at your face ever since."

"UH, weird" I responded, to which she said "Don't think that I don't know that you come to look at me every night." I blushed. "Uh…ah…Look, the Indian gods are arriving."

Then from the portal came out another man, this time with a fair complexion. He had 3 heads, one looking left, one looking right, and one looking front. He had four arms as well. (Is this some sort of trend?) One of his hands held one of the Vedas, one held a lotus, one held a container of water and one held a necklace made of beads. "The necklace of beads is called Rudraksha while that water container is called Kalash which contains purifying water. That person you are looking at is Brahma, the creator of the universe," Artemis said looking into my thoughts. "Stop reading my thoughts," I told her off. She winked at me and looked back at the portal.

After Lord Brahma, out of the portal came several gods. It was easy to identify them. Agni was the god who fires coming out of him. Vayu was the god who had flying hair. Varun was the god who had wet hair. None of them had a very distinctive look except for Indra, who was their King and had some more jewels than others. Each one of them had two hands and was like normal humans. It made sense that they were a normal human who had been given godhood.

After the gods, came two teenagers along with their mother. It looked like the woman was really sad. One of her sons was a normal human. While the other had an elephant head and pot-belly. Artemis then said "They are Lord Shiva's wife and children. The woman is Parvati, Goddess of marriage, while the thin one is Kartikey, the god of war, while the Elephant-headed one is Ganesha, the remover of obstacles."

"But then where is Lord Shiva?" I asked. Artemis shrugged. After that few more people walked in and the portal closed. One of them wore yellow clothes and had a skin tone similar to that of Lord Vishnu and he held a flute in one of his two hands. He also had a peacock feather attached to his hair.

There was also a man who had a similar skin tone to that of Vishnu. He had clothes like an ascetic and had a bow in his hand. Even though he looked like a son of a king, his eyes were as humble as those of a beggar.

There was also an ape in there. It was as if he was a half evolved human. He had a muscular body and a strong tail. He also had a big mace held in his hands.

There was also one plain-looking man next to that monkey. I was not sure what he was doing there. Behind that man stood a horrible sight. There was a man who had all sorts of cuts and bruises which were inhabited by fungus. I wanted to puke. Artemis knew nothing about them either. So I waited.

The Greek gods got up to meet and greet their Indian counterparts. Artemis did not go to greet them. "Oi Artemis, Why is there such a great disparity among the Indian gods? Look at it, Vishnu is wearing so many ornaments while the gods wear so few. Why?" I asked

Artemis looked at me and said, "It isn't as simple as it looks. Indian Gods are divided between two groups, Ascetic, and householder. Gods such as Lord Shiva are ascetics. They wear nearly nothing, spend all their time meditating and they have withdrawn from the world. They do not even have time for their family. Householders, on the other hand, are involved with the world. They are the ones people usually go to ask for help. Lord Vishnu is a householder and that is why he wears so many pieces of jewellery. Do you understand?"

"Somewhat…" I muttered.

So, the gods had finished their greetings, so all the Gods and gods, except Artemis, stood in the middle of the room, in their near-human sizes. Vishnu took a step forward and began- "Greetings, mortals. I am Vishnu. As I have been told, you probably know all of us, Gods, and know the basic structure of Hinduism. A grave problem has occurred, which if not solved would put the whole of Humanity in trouble. And if we do not take any action right now, No Greek god, deva, or even Bhagwan would be able to do anything. I would be talking about the problem in hand a bit later, but let me introduce you to some people, Athena didn't tell you about."

With this, he brought forward the people not even Artemis could identify. He, pointing at the two dark-skinned people, said "these are Rama and Krishna. They are my incarnations, which had a godly presence that turned them into immortals. Rama was the perfect human and he defeated Ravana, the ruler of Lanka, the ten-headed ascetic who nearly destroyed the Earth. Krishna defeated his uncle, Kamsa, who, too, had become a tyrant."

Then he called the plain-looking man. "This is Vibhishana. He was the brother of Ravana. He joined Rama's side to fight his brother. He can differentiate between right and wrong. He was given immortality for killing his brother."

At last, Vishnu called the man in a bad state. He said "This is Ashwathama. He is one of the strongest warriors ever known to us. He is also one of the most loyal people. Even though he was cursed with immortality, when he heard of the problem, he came to help us." With that Vishnu touched Ashwathama's face, and suddenly all the wounds disappeared and he became normal. "I am healing him because of that, but his curse shall never go.

"Excuse me!" I heard Leo shout. "What do you mean 'cursed with immortality?"

Vishnu smiled and said, "One of the rules of war says that one should not attack any woman or child. Ashwathama attacked a pregnant woman at will, for this, he was given immortality, but at the cost that whatever wounds he had at the time of war and the wound he gets in future, shall never heal thus keeping him in eternal agony forever."

I flinched. Artemis flinched. The whole hall except the Indians flinched.

"You said something about the Problem, what is it?" I asked.

Vishnu's face grimaced. "You are Percy, right? You came to India some while back?" I nodded. Just then Hades asked, "Vishnu, Where is Shiva, I haven't seen him yet."

"That is the problem Hades," Brahma said in a grim voice.

"The thing is, Shiva has turned against us."