Modi reacted first, shouting with his usual mocking tone. "Oh no, brother, the little freak has a bow, and the other one has a sword. What are we going to do?" he said as he blocked the arrow that Sindri fired at him.
Zelos stood slightly behind Atreus, raising his hand to cast a very basic Zoltraak spell. It was intentionally weak, controlled so it would not tear apart the battlefield, and Modi's enchanted shield blocked it easily.
Zelos lowered his hand and spoke with deliberate calm, staring directly at Modi. "Do not worry. I will not use my sword on the likes of you. I do not want my blade to be sullied by the blood of Aesir, a bunch of lunatics who piss on themselves."
Modi snapped his attention toward him with a twitch in his eye. "Oh, we have a slick tongue here. I want to see how you talk when I rip your tongue out of your own head," he said before leaping forward.
Lightning sparked across the head of his mace as he swung, but Zelos cast another controlled Zoltraak, gently redirecting the weapon's path.
Zelos tilted his head. "Cannot you aim correctly? You are already a disappointment to your family. Are you trying to disappoint even your enemies, too?"
He stepped in and kicked Modi in the stomach, sending him flying back. Modi slammed into the mountain wall with a grunt.
Zelos laughed. "What a pathetic little boy. You are older than me in years but so much weaker. Should I close my eyes and use one hand to fight you? Just say the word and I will do it."
Modi growled and lightning erupted around him. Rage pushed him into faster movement, so fast Atreus had trouble following.
Meanwhile, Kratos continued battling Magni, yet he held back in subtle ways, distracted by the knowledge that killing a god always had consequences. His mind weighed the past and the future even as the present demanded his focus.
"Shut up! Do not talk about me like you know me, you freak!" Modi yelled as he swung repeatedly. Zelos dodged each blow with small, precise steps.
Zelos mimicked his voice with mocking exaggeration. "'Shut up, do not talk about me like you know me, freak.' What are you going to do about it? Cry to your mother? Let me help you. Say it. Mother, a mean enemy, is teasing me. Let me suck on your tits for comfort, you inbred fool."
The insult made even Magni glance over in anger. He pushed Kratos back with a heavy strike and charged toward Zelos.
Before the older brother could reach him, Zelos fired a concussive spell modeled after Cyclops' blasts. The beam hit Magni square in the face and hurled him backward.
Zelos looked at Magni with no concern at all. "Focus on your battle, friend. I am not done with this inbred fool. Maybe that is why he is so stupid. He is probably the result of an inbreeding between Thor and his own grandfather. He only says Sif is his mother, so people will stop teasing him."
This time, even Mimir laughed loudly, and Atreus tried to stifle his own snort. The more they reacted, the angrier Modi became. Rage overtook any remaining sense.
Modi screamed and abandoned his shield and mace entirely, lunging at Zelos with bare hands.
His punches were blind, fast, and unrestrained, filled with lightning but lacking technique.
Zelos met each strike with his own fists, and although he did not use his full strength, every impact chipped away at Modi's bones.
Punch after punch echoed across the chisel site. Each time their fists collided, a crunch or crack followed, until the final exchange ended in a sharp and horrifying series of snaps. Modi's hands completely shattered.
Modi stumbled back, the pain finally cutting through the haze of anger. He screamed, a raw sound of agony that carried across the frozen cliffs. The scream distracted Magni long enough for Kratos to finally commit fully to the fight.
The Spartan stepped in with full force, striking again and again with deliberate viciousness. His axe was carved into Magni repeatedly before Kratos ended it by splitting the god's head in half.
Modi saw it and screamed again. "Magni!"
He tried to stand but collapsed instantly. Zelos did not give him a chance. He bound Modi's feet to the ground, then grabbed him by the hair, forcing his head up so he could not avoid the sight of Magni's corpse.
"Take a look at this, Modi Inbredson," Zelos said, pushing Modi's face toward the mutilated remains. Modi trembled, unable to move yet unable to look away.
"You will regret this! I will repay this blood a thousand times! I swear on my soul that I will not rest until you get what you deserve!" Modi shouted.
Zelos raised a brow. "Do you even have a soul? If I remember correctly, Aesir do not have souls. But anyway, you should appreciate the view you are seeing today."
With a calmness that unsettled even Kratos, Zelos used a modified form of Odin's binding magic. Unlike the original spell used on Mimir, this version trapped everything, including the remnants of Modi's essence.
Zelos then dragged Magni's body and hung it on the tree where Mimir had once been bound. After that, he forced Modi upright and bound him to Magni's corpse, leaving them both at the tip of the chisel.
Modi struggled, but nothing he did mattered. The magic sealed him completely.
Kratos watched the scene unfold and felt a strange mix of unease and recognition. There was cruelty in Zelos' method, a cold precision that reminded Kratos of darker parts of himself.
Mimir and Atreus felt the same confusion, unsure where Zelos learned such a merciless approach.
What none of them knew was that Zelos carried the weight of Faye's anger. The hatred she buried deep in her heart, the resentment passed down by generations of Jotnar, and the despair of their extinction.
Zelos inherited all of it, even the rage that Faye refused to act on. And remembering Modi insulting his mother, even if that world was only a game to him at first, tore open memories and emotions he could not ignore.
Zelos looked at the struggling Modi one last time, silent and unreadable, carrying the quiet fury of an entire people inside him.
------------
PS: IF IT SEEMS OUT OF CHARACTER, ALLOW ME TO APOLOGIZE, BUT WHEN I WAS REWATCHING THE PLAYTHROUGH OF GOD OF WAR, I COULDN'T HELP BUT FEEL ANGRY. I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHY, SO I MADE IT HERE. FORGIVE ME ONCE AGAIN.