The underworld didn't echo with screams like mortals imagined. It was quiet. Too quiet. Still. Heavy.
Like a grave that never forgot.
Hades sat on his throne of obsidian, elbow resting on the armrest, cheek propped against his knuckles. He didn't blink much. Didn't move either. His eyes—dull gold with a hint of something older—stared into the shifting black mist swirling in the pool before him. It wasn't water. It wasn't lava. It was memory. Things whispered in it.
The dead. The forgotten. The ones who saw things they weren't supposed to.
His fingers tapped once against the stone.
Then stopped.
Again.
Then stopped.
The surface of the pool twitched. Not from him. From below.
Tartarus.
It was laughing.
Not loud. Not manic. Just… humming.
Happy.
Hades leaned back, shoulders pressing into the cold throne as he squinted slightly at the pool.
That was never a good sign.
The abyss never laughed unless something terrible was on the way.
