The battlefield stretched across the Olympian plains, a once-verdant paradise now scarred with divine conflict. Storm clouds churned overhead, not the natural gray of mortal weather but something more—a tempestuous mixture of black and gold that pulsed with raw power.
The air itself seemed to crack with tension, reality bending under the weight of godly wrath.
At the center of this chaos stood a single figure clad in midnight-black armor. The metal lit in blue flames didn't merely absorb light—it seemed to consume it, leaving only a void where reflection should be. Intricate runes pulsed along its surface, ancient symbols that predated Olympus itself.
Zeus and Hades hovered in the tumultuous sky, their normally immaculate forms marred by battle. Zeus's right arm hung limp and useless, golden ichor streaming from a ragged wound. Hades fared no better, his left leg severed below the knee, the wound cauterized by his own hellfire.
Below them, Poseidon lay sprawled across a crater of his own making, his legendary trident shattered beside him. A gaping wound carved across his chest pulsed with fading divine light, his normally vibrant sea-green eyes now dimmed to the color of a stagnant pond.
"You... were always... too ambitious, Alexios," Poseidon wheezed, blood bubbling at his lips. "Some heights... are not meant... for mortals to reach."
The figure in black—Alexios—turned toward the sea god, his helmet masking whatever expression might have crossed his face. "Ambitious? I surpassed you all long ago. This isn't ambition, Poseidon. This is reclamation."
"ENOUGH OF THIS FARCE!" Zeus bellowed, his voice cracking with thunder. "BROTHER, NOW!"
The two gods—once bitter rivals—raised their remaining arms in unison. Between them formed a swirling vortex of opposing energies: Zeus's golden lightning and Hades's midnight shadows intertwining in a display of power never before witnessed in the cosmos.
The combined might of Zeus and Hades struck like divine judgment, a column of gold-and-black lightning that connected heaven and earth. It engulfed Alexios completely, the ground beneath him cracking into a spider-web of fissures that glowed with molten fury.
When the light faded, Alexios had fallen to one knee, his perfect armor now cracked in a thousand places, wisps of smoke rising from each fissure. He raised his head slowly, his helmet splitting down the middle and falling away to reveal a face of startling beauty—sharp features that spoke of both divine heritage and mortal determination.
That's when the immortal army descended again.
Thousands of lesser gods, demigods, and divine servants swarmed across the battlefield, weapons gleaming with celestial light. At their forefront stood three figures who shone brighter than all others—heroes whose legends transcended mortality.
Theseus brandished his blade, its edge glowing with the light of the Labyrinth. Perseus raised his shield, its polished surface once used to slay Medusa now turned against a different monster. And Hercules, greatest of them all, cracked his knuckles as the Nemean Lion's pelt rippled across his shoulders.
"Brothers," Alexios whispered, his voice somehow carrying across the battlefield. "After everything we've endured together..."
"You left us no choice," Theseus replied, his voice heavy with regret. "You crossed lines that should never be crossed."
"The prophecy," Perseus added, his eyes uncharacteristically cold. "Your actions in Olympus on the goddesses and your ambition threatens the very fabric of Olympus."
Hercules said nothing, his silence more damning than any words could be.
They attacked as one, with the synchronicity that came from centuries of fighting side by side. Theseus struck low, his blade slicing through Alexios's already damaged greaves. Perseus attacked from above, his shield's edge crashing down on Alexios's shoulder with bone-shattering force. And Hercules—his punch connected with Alexios's chest, the impact sending shockwaves across the battlefield.
Alexios fell backward, his once-invincible armor now little more than decorative metal. He stared up at the swirling sky, at the gods who feared him enough to unite against him, at the friends who had betrayed him.
"So this is how it ends," he murmured, feeling the last vestiges of his divine power slipping away. "Not with glory, but with betrayal."
As his consciousness began to fade, a strange pulse emanated from his chest—from beneath his armor where a small, unremarkable amulet rested against his skin. The battlefield fell silent as the amulet began to glow with an impossible light.
[Forbidden Time artifact activated!]
The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, resonating not in ears but in souls.
[Time...]
Reality shuddered. The ground beneath Alexios cracked not with destruction but with something far more fundamental—the fracturing of time itself. The three heroes stumbled backward, their expressions shifting from triumph to horror as they witnessed what should have been impossible.
Across the battlefield, gods froze mid-motion, their forms blurring at the edges as if reality itself couldn't decide what shape they should take. The clouds overhead began to spiral inward, day and night cycling in rapid succession as the cosmos struggled to maintain order.
[Reality threads compromised! Temporal displacement imminent!]
Alexios felt his very essence being torn apart, molecule by molecule, timeline by timeline. The Forbidden Time artifact—a last resort he'd never truly believed would work—was rewriting his very existence.
"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?" Zeus's voice boomed, his godly form beginning to fragment as time itself unraveled.
Alexios might have smiled, had he still possessed a mouth. "What gods fear most—I've changed the rules."
Time warped.
Reality collapsed.
Darkness.
*
[You have died and regressed back with the Forbidden Time artifact!]
The voice penetrated the darkness of sleep like a javelin, jerking Donatos awake with such violence that he nearly fell from his narrow cot. His heart hammered against his ribs, each beat a painful reminder that he was, impossibly, alive.
His chambers—if the tiny, windowless room could be called that—were dark save for the faintest glow seeping beneath the door. Servant's quarters. The realization hit him like one of Heracles' famous punches.
His trembling hands moved to his chest, expecting the familiar weight of divine armor, finding instead the rough fabric of a servant's chiton.
Donatos closed his eyes, the crushing weight of his memories threatening to suffocate him. He had been... no, he *was* Alexios, son of Aphrodite, the only child born of the goddess of love who had risen to challenge Olympus itself. Now he sat shivering on a straw mattress, his once-godly muscles diminished to the wiry frame of a common laborer.
Foreign memories—not his, yet somehow also his—flooded his consciousness. Memories of a life spent in servitude, of carrying Zeus's ambrosia, of cleaning the king-god's chambers, of being invisible in the most literal sense. Gods rarely bothered to look at servants; they were furniture with legs, nothing more.
"A servant?" he whispered, his voice hoarse and unfamiliar. "I, the son of Aphrodite, reduced to... this?"
Worse, the memories told him he wasn't just any servant. He was the newest, lowest-ranked attendant in Zeus's personal quarters—the one assigned to empty chamber pots and clean spills when the god-king entertained his countless lovers.
Donatos—no, Alexios in Donatos's body—felt bile rise in his throat. The humiliation burned worse than any wound he'd suffered in battle. Worse than death itself.
He rose on unsteady legs, moving to the small basin of water in the corner.
The face that stared back at him from the rippling surface was both foreign and familiar—younger, unscarred, with none of the gravitas that had made immortals tremble. But the eyes... those remained his own, burning with a determination that no servant should possess.
"So," he whispered to his reflection, "the artifact didn't just send me back in time. It recast me entirely."
The betrayal of his brothers-in-arms still stung fresh, their final attacks replaying in his mind with painful clarity. Theseus, Perseus, Hercules—the legendary heroes he'd fought alongside for centuries, gone from comrades to executioners in an instant.
He clenched his fist, surprised by how weak it felt. Gone was the strength that could shatter mountains. Gone was the speed that outpaced lightning. Gone was everything that had made him a threat to Olympus.
Almost everything.
Because deep within this unfamiliar chest, he could feel it—the barest ember of his former power. And more importantly, he retained the one thing gods truly feared: knowledge. Knowledge of their weaknesses, their secrets, their futures.
A tentative smile curled his lips. "Back to zero," he whispered to himself. "But zero is just the beginning of a new count."
Outside his door, a bell rang—the summons for morning duties. Servants across Zeus's palace would be rising, preparing for another day of invisible service to immortal masters.
Donatos straightened his shoulders. He would play this role, for now. He would be the perfect servant—unnoticed, underestimated. And he would watch, and learn, and plan.
After all, he had all the time in the world. And this time, when he rose, not even the Fates themselves would see him coming.