Olympia. The City-State known for being the closest to the dwelling of the gods—Mount Olympus.
It was built here long ago, in a time when people still believed that by being near the great sacred mountain, they would be protected by the presence of the gods.
Today, that belief is long gone, and the city once considered a special place of worship is now just one among many other poleis. Perhaps a stop for eccentric priests and pilgrims.
It is not very different from other great City-States: a massive city surrounded by a stone wall. Outside the walls, a few scattered farms spread across treeless fields.
Tonight seems calm, and the sky is beautiful, enhancing the brightness of the constellations against the dark heavens. Few clouds, little noise. The Milky Way—Hercules' masterpiece—decorates the firmament for the delight of stargazers.
The city guard patrols among the large houses in the high, noble part of the city—the Acropolis—while others focus their watch near the walls.
Atop one of the posts on the great walls, two guards spend the night in a relaxed manner. One is a recruit, seemingly seventeen years old, and the other an older guard in his early forties.
"It seems we won't have anything to do tonight again," the young man said, chin resting on his hand, gaze lost among the stars.
"May the gods hear you, boy," the older guard replied gruffly, not taking his eyes off a piece of wood he was carving with a sharp knife.
"You really believe in them, Sergeant?" the younger one turned toward him, surprised.
"It's just a way of speaking," the old man retorted. "A curse we pick up from our parents."
The young man sighed, a little disappointed. "My grandfather swore he once saw a cyclops near Nemea. He told stories of heroes and monsters…"
"And the only monster I've seen this month was the Archon's tax collector," the older man cut him off, forcing the knife into the wood. "Believe me, boy, the gods are too busy to care about us. Whether they exist, whether they don't, they can go to hell for all I care."
The young guard returned to gazing at the sky, disheartened. The sergeant's reaction was the most common. The great tales of heroes were now nothing more than that: tales.
Lost in his thoughts, he noticed something strange. A beam of light cutting through the night sky, moving with surprising speed toward Mount Olympus. He narrowed his eyes, and then, a sudden recognition made him leap from his seat.
"SIR! LOOK! IT'S THE MESSENGER! IT'S HERMES!" He pointed at the golden trail with an excitement he hadn't felt in a long time.
"Stop babbling and be quiet, recruit," the old man grumbled, not even bothering to look.
"No, seriously! You have to see this! Look! Look!"
Desperate to prove his point, he ran over and grabbed the older guard by the shoulders, shaking him. The sudden movement made the man's knife slip, cutting his hand.
"Argh! You son of a—" the sergeant stood up with a grimace of pain, his face contorting with fury. Before the recruit could explain, a violent punch hit him in the face, throwing him against the stone wall of the rampart.
"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT DEAD GODS!" the old man roared, face red with anger. "If you have so much time to look at the sky, grab a mop and clean the latrine! And don't come back until it's shining!"
"Y-yes, sir! I'm sorry!" the boy got up clumsily and ran toward the stairs, fleeing his superior's wrath.
The sergeant watched him disappear, muttering as he looked for a cloth to clean the cut. Suddenly, a gust of wind brushed past him, a shiver crawling up his spine. He turned toward the direction the boy had pointed.
There was nothing. Only the quiet, starry sky.
"Humph. Hermes. Tch!" he scoffed, sitting back down.
But for a moment, the cynicism on his face gave way to a shadow of doubt, as if the echo of a divine presence still lingered, unseen, in the night air.
...
Far from the wall, the golden trail cut through the night sky. For the few mortals who saw it, it was a shooting star—a portent. For him, it was simply the way home.
Hermes, the god of messengers, moved through the air not with the effort of a bird, but with the certainty of a force of nature. The wind was his domain, a river of air through which he sailed. Below, the mortal world stretched like a dark carpet, dotted with faint lights from campfires and distant cities. From his altitude, he could see trade routes like glowing veins on the earth, could feel changes in air pressure that foretold storms days away. It was his craft.
In his right hand, the Caduceus rested inert. In his left, he lifted a small metal jar, drinking the last drop of ambrosia. The divine nectar, which should have tasted like eternity, seemed flavorless today. With a careless gesture, he tossed the empty jar, letting it vanish into the darkness toward a forest below.
He accelerated, the golden trail behind him growing brighter. Zeus's summons echoed in his mind. "Urgent." It was not a word his father used lightly.
And yet, there had been a disturbing silence surrounding the call. He had delivered the message to all—from Ares in his training fields to Aphrodite in her temples. None of them knew the reason. Not even Poseidon, whose knowledge of the depths rivaled that of the skies.
It bothered him. Hermes was the god of secrets, of the information that ran between worlds.
His mind drifted to the last time he had felt this same tension in the air of Olympus. The Titanomachy was ancient history, but the war against Typhon was a fresh scar. He still remembered the terror in the eyes of the other gods, the desperate fury of Zeus, the sight of the colossus whose head touched the stars. He remembered the smell of chaos.
The air tonight carried a hint of that same smell.
Absorbed in his dark thoughts, he didn't notice the familiar glow of Mount Olympus drawing near. When his mind returned to the present, he had already overshot his destination, his own speed betraying him. With an irritated sigh at himself, he halted in the air, his body vibrating with contained energy, and retraced his path.
He landed softly atop the mountain, in the center of a huge altar of marble and black stone. The air there was cold and thin.
He waited, impatience his old enemy. For a being made of motion, stillness was a form of torture. Hanging the Caduceus at his waist, he clasped his hands and closed his eyes. One did not set foot on Olympus uninvited.
Suddenly, the previously clear sky answered. A lightning bolt descended—not with rage, but with surgical precision—enveloping his body in blinding light. A thunderclap echoed through the mountains and, when the smoke cleared, the altar was empty.
Above Mount Olympus, on a kind of floating island, lies Olympus itself—the dwelling place of the gods.
The island, somehow suspended in the sky, held exquisitely crafted structures for the gods' use, whether for leisure or other purposes.
Coliseums, grand buildings, houses, and even vast gardens. All these elements together gave this place a pure and divine aspect.
...
At what seemed to be the entrance to the great floating island, Hermes appeared. He adjusted his tunic—not to clean dust off, but like an actor preparing to step onto the stage. He composed his face, forcing the crease of worry into his usual smile, the mask of irreverence everyone expected from him.
Soon, he noticed a familiar figure a little ahead, sitting with his back turned on the fragment of a broken pillar, playing a lyre.
A young man with golden hair and a slim, elegant build. It was Apollo. But the melody drifting in the air was not one of his cheerful or epic compositions. It was a low, melancholic song, full of dissonant notes that seemed to get lost in the vastness of Olympus.
Hermes approached silently, curiosity outweighing his urge to make a joke. Instead of flicking his brother's head, he gently placed his hand on the lyre's strings, muffling the sad sound.
Apollo startled, turning with wide golden eyes. Upon seeing his brother, his expression was not one of anger but of tense relief.
"Hermes…"
"What a funeral melody, brother," Hermes said, the sly smile on his face not quite reaching his eyes. "Did someone die and forget to tell me?"
"Not today, Hermes. Please," Apollo replied, his voice low and worried. "The air is heavy. I feel something is wrong."
"Wrong?" Hermes raised an eyebrow, taking the lyre from Apollo's hands before his surprised brother could react. "You've always been the most dramatic among us. What's troubling you? Did Father finally forbid your mediocre poetry?"
He held the lyre as if to play it, a teasing gesture meant to provoke a genuine reaction.
"This isn't a joke!" Apollo stood, anguish clear on his face. "No one knows the reason for the meeting. No one. Not even Athena. My father… he's different. There's a fury in him I haven't felt since the war against the Titans. And you, of course, arrive late as always."
Before Hermes could respond, a third voice, cold as marble, cut through the air.
"He has reason to be concerned. And you, as always, care only for yourself."
Both turned. Hera stood there, her purple eyes scanning them with evident disdain. Her presence was imposing, and the already tense atmosphere grew icy.
"H-Hera…" Apollo stammered, bowing his head in respect.
Hermes, however, only offered a charming smile, though a shiver ran down his spine. "Always a pleasure to see you, stepmother. Radiant as ever."
She ignored him. "Hurry. Your father awaits you. And he is not in the mood for your insolence."
She turned and walked away, her tunic gliding silently over the stones, a queen in her domain.
Apollo looked at Hermes, his worry now tinged with panic. "See? I told you. Something serious is about to happen."
Hermes returned the lyre to his brother, his smile finally fading, replaced by a mask of contemplation. He patted Apollo on the shoulder.
"Then we'd better not keep him waiting," he said, the lightness in his voice now sounding forced, even to himself.
As they walked toward the coliseum, Apollo's somber melody still echoed in Hermes' mind, a terrible omen of what was to come.
...
The air inside was cold and still. Unlike other gatherings—usually filled with conversation and music—this one was dominated by a heavy, oppressive silence. The gods did not speak; they stood frozen in their designated places, their faces masks of stone.
In the marble thrones, the tension was palpable. Beside the empty throne of Hades, Poseidon, god of the seas, tapped his fingers impatiently. His black hair was already streaked with gray, and his deep blue eyes were a contained storm. The great scar crossing his chest seemed to twitch with each passing second. Hera, with her long black hair and sharp purple eyes, stood beside the central throne, her hand resting on her husband's shoulder, her face a mask of regal disdain.
With his smile gone, Hermes entered the hall, feeling the weight of dozens of divine gazes upon him. He and Apollo took their places, and an even deeper silence settled over the room.
Zeus rose. His figure was imposing, his long white beard falling over a chest strong and marked by time. His eyes—white, without pupils—swept over the assembly, containing the fury of a storm held back.
"I have called you here to speak of the mortal world," he said, his voice a restrained thunder. "The faith of men, the source of our influence, diminishes with each passing day."
"And you've summoned us only to state the obvious, brother?" Poseidon retorted, impatience overcoming caution.
"No," Zeus's voice turned to ice. "Humanity forgets us, but do not be mistaken—their faith does not vanish by chance. It is being… corroded."
He paused, letting the weight of his words sink in.
"I feel an energy I have not felt since I chained my father and the Titans in the abyss. A profane energy, from Tartarus itself, is leaking into the mortal world."
A murmur of shock and disbelief swept the arena.
"Impossible!" Poseidon roared, standing. "The gates of Tartarus are sealed! Hades guards them!" He gestured toward his absent brother's throne.
"It is not an escape, Uncle. It is a fissure. An influence," Athena's voice rang out—calm, analytical. Standing with her shield at her side and her spear steady in hand, her brown eyes seemed to dissect the very air in search of logic in the crisis. "Someone, or something, is building a bridge."
"Then we must crush that bridge before anything else crosses it!" growled Ares. The god of war, whose red eyes burned with the promise of violence, stepped forward, his long red hair swaying over his scar-covered chestplate.
"What mischief…" a wet, muffled laugh came from a corner. Dionysus, plump and red-faced, raised his wine cup, a crown of dark grapes drooping over his hair. "Perhaps they were never truly locked away…"
Apollo, pale, ignored the drunken remark and turned to his father. "Who would dare act against Olympus, Father? Who would betray us?"
Zeus's white, electric gaze swept the arena.
"An oracle brought me a warning. A fragment of an ancient prophecy, nearly forgotten." His voice lowered, becoming a dark secret. "It says: 'The note of armageddon will herald its coming when the herald has, at last, delivered his final message.'"
Murmurs once again rippled through the hall.
Artemis muttered something to herself, an annoyed look on her face, a white streak of her short black hair falling over her eyes. Aphrodite twirled a strand of red hair between her fingers, her green eyes tense.
Apollo swallowed hard, the question stuck in his throat as if he didn't truly want to ask it.
"B-but who? Which herald?" The question came out low, almost a whisper.
The god of thunder did not fix his gaze on a distant enemy or a shadowy conspiracy. His eyes settled, cold and heavy as a death sentence, on his own son.
"A herald," Zeus continued, each word a stone sinking into a deep well. "One who travels freely between realms. One who knows the secrets of Olympus and the underworld. One who could, under the guise of his duty, deliver a message to our chained enemies, opening the fissure that now threatens us."
The silence that followed was absolute. All eyes turned to Hermes, the god in white chitōn with elegant features. Apollo stared at him, mouth slightly open in horror.
"Hermes is the traitor!" A thunderbolt crackled across the clear sky at Zeus's declaration.
Hermes, target of the entire pantheon, met his father's furious gaze. And, to everyone's astonishment, a slow, indecipherable smile touched his lips—a smile without joy, born from the sheer disbelief of what he had just heard.