In the unknown dimension, Cronus opened his eyes. He stretched his arms, joints cracking after eons, and released a deep, rumbling yawn. His gaze fell upon a small, empty vial. A slow, satisfied smile touched his lips.
"This potion is most effective," he murmured to the silence. "To think it could even reduce the effect of Gaea's Curse."
His eyes gleamed with blue radiance. 'Chronal Vision.' He willed the past to unfold before him. The history of his absence rewound in his mind: Hades defeating Iapetus and Atlas, the gods' assault on Mount Othrys, the Titans' defeat. He closed his eyes and the vision ended. Cronus breathed rapidly, sweat streaming from his temples. He opened his blood-reddened eyes.
A roar of pure, undiluted fury tore from his throat, a sound that could shatter worlds.
His divine scythe, a weapon forged by Gaea herself, materialized in his grasp. He slashed the air, and the dimension split open with a shriek of torn reality. Cronus stepped through the wound.
---
Meanwhile, on the island of Crete.
The sun had fallen, replaced by a beautiful, indifferent moon. Inside the villa's hall, no one appreciated the view. Shoulders locked tight, jaws sat rigid, and every breath came sharp and shallow. The air hung thick with the silence of impending judgment.
Hestia's gaze traced the beautiful full moon. 'This night will decide everything,' she thought, a cold knot tightening in her stomach. 'If we win, a new world awaits us. If we lose...' Her eyes fell on her sisters. 'Then, only something worse than death awaits us.'
Suddenly, Rhea's eyes flew open. A violent cough wracked her body, spattering golden ichor across the floor.
"Mother!"
Her daughters screamed, rushing to her side. She grabbed Hera's arm, her grip desperate. "R-run!" she stammered.
Before anyone could process the command, the answer arrived before them.
The roof and front wall of the villa shattered, dissolving into dust and splinters. Through the cloud of debris, Cronus walked inside. His scythe rested in one hand, fresh golden ichor dripping from its tip to sizzle on the floor. His body was spattered with blood, his face a mask of woken fury.
In his other hand, he held a struggling Kouretes by the neck. He exerted a slight, casual pressure.
Crack.
The struggling ceased. Cronus dismissively tossed the corpse aside. He took a knee, bringing his blood-reddened eyes level with Rhea's.
"Rhea! My, oh my, Rhea," he crooned, his voice a deep, chilling rumble. "Did you think a simple space-time distortion could hide you from me?" He extended his hand. "Come back home, Rhea. Our palace has faded in your absence." Then his blood-red eyes diverted to her daughters. "Oh, my dear daughters, you will also join us."
Rhea's response was a raw scream of defiance. She summoned her sword and slashed, a crescent of pure energy flying at his face. Cronus didn't move his feet. He merely tilted his scythe, and the attack dissipated against the blade with a pathetic fizzle.
"RUN!" Rhea shrieked, tearing a portal open behind her.
Hera and Demeter stood frozen, the deep-seated fear sown in their souls now flowering into pure terror, turning their limbs to lead. Hestia, shaking, shoved them toward the portal.
'Sacred Flare!' Hestia cried, a golden inferno showering down on Cronus.
But he was already behind them, his hand reaching out to grab them. Suddenly, their own shadows writhed and rose, taking the form of a shadowy Hades. One shadow lashed out with a chain, binding Cronus's arm, while another lunged with a spear. Cronus blocked the charge and yanked the chain, sending the first shadow crashing into the second. A sweep of his scythe cut them both down, dissolving them into dark hexes.
Another shadow leaped from Hestia's feet, opening a new portal, its dark hands pulling them toward safety. But Cronus was faster. He grabbed Hestia's ankle, his scythe severing the connection to the shadow. He dragged Rhea and Hestia back. He created another portal to the palace, then dragged them through it.
He threw them into a prison of writhing, sharpened thorns. Another slash in the air, and Hera and Demeter tumbled out from the rift, joining their mother and sister.
The thorns pierced soft skin. The palace echoed with the sound of screams and the sight of golden ichor pooling on the floor.
---
Meanwhile, at the Northern Pillar.
Hades looked upward as the arcane explosion faded. Then, he felt it—a backlash as his shadow clones were unmade. "Cronus…" he murmured.
He closed his eyes, using a secret divinity to seek his family. The vision that filled his mind was a portrait of agony: his mother and sisters, imprisoned in a cage of thorns, their divine blood watering the floor, their screams a symphony of despair.
For a single, eternal second, Hades's mind rested perfectly, terribly silent.
Then, his mind broke.
The thirteen gates of the Obillion, the prison he had built within his soul to contain one of the world's most dangerous calamities, shattered inward simultaneously.
The calamity tore through the wreckage of its prison, flooding into him, becoming him.
It was now unleashed.
A corrosive darkness, no longer contained at his hands, flooded his veins, blackening his skin, consuming him from the inside out. He closed his eyes.
When they opened, they blazed with a solid, unforgiving purple.
Hades's head lifted and his gaze locked on the peak of the mountain.
"KWAAAA!!!"
A sound tore from his throat. His form dissolved into a vortex of shadow and twilight flame, from which the Black Phoenix beat its wings.
As the calamity arrived, ominous events began to happen near him and slowly spread outward. The oceans near Mount Othrys boiled into a black sea. Lush grass and trees withered instantly, replaced by forests of sharp thorns. The wind howled with a new, ominous cold. Ghosts and demonic beasts awoke, howling with amplified power.
The Black Phoenix ascended, reaching the peak in a heartbeat. It glared at the castle, gathered energy in its beak, and released a devastating beam of blue flame.
The majestic castle melted in a mere breath. Stone flowed like water, towers slumped into molten slag. White fumes rose from the burned stone, exposing the throne room within. Cronus sat on his throne, his scythe held before him, a remnant of blue flame sputtering out on its blade.
He stood, his movement a jolt of pure violence, and ran, building momentum before launching himself into the sky. The Black Phoenix dove to meet him, transforming back into the apocalypse that was Hades. Helkarion materialized in his hand, its golden blade now consumed by a void-like blackness, radiating intense energy. Cronus's scythe raged with white light.
Their weapons met in mid-air.
It was more than a clash of blades; it was the collision of two absolute domains—Time and the Underworld. The resulting shockwave erased the peak of Mount Othrys. Cronus's palace, his throne, everything, vaporized.
Rhea and her daughters, gravely injured, were blown into the air, free-falling toward the black ocean. Hecate teleported into the chaos, her form a blur. 'Psychic!' An arcane energy enveloped the falling women, halting their descent. 'Teleport.' She vanished with them, a heartbeat before the collapsing mountain would have claimed them.
Zeus and Poseidon, climbing the ascent, were caught in the shockwave and hurled back down to the foot of the mountain.
Hades and Cronus landed on the one stable piece of ground left, a newly formed plateau of shattered rock. They charged with pure and hateful instinct.
"Clank!"
Cronus's scythe came down in a vertical arc. Hades parried, the impact ringing up his arms, and instantly countered, driving his elbow into Cronus's jaw with a sickening crunch.
"Heuk!"
Spittle and blood flew from Cronus's lips. He wiped his mouth—a feint. As Hades swung Helkarion horizontally, Cronus was already moving, catching the blade with his scythe and twisting, locking their weapons. He yanked Hades forward and smashed his forehead into Hades's face. The sound of breaking bone was sharp and clear.
Staggered, Hades felt black ichor pour from his nose. Cronus pulled again for another headbutt. This time, Hades met him with his own. The sharpened edges of his horns sliced into Cronus's temples, and golden ichor streamed down the Titan's face. Hades also took damage as black ichor dripped from the roots of his horns. They stumbled apart, both wounded, both breathing in ragged, furious gasps.
Hades's voice was cold, emotionless, and final. 'Life Harvest.'
His body engulfed with twilight flame. The very life force of Mount Othrys, from the smallest insect to the mightiest Titan, began to seep out, streaming toward Hades in a visible river of green energy. Even Cronus felt a tug at his core.
Cronus watched the life force of the world drain into Hades, and the fury on his face melted into a look of stark, brutal understanding. The chaos he saw was not the rash anger of a child, but the calculated abyss of a peer.
"So," Cronus's voice cut through the maelstrom, low and resonant. "You have also unlocked one of the forbidden secrets."
A grim, approving smile touched his lips as he raised his scythe. There was no joy in it, only the cold respect of one monster for another.
'Paradoxum Temporis!' he roared, slamming the weapon into the ground. As the temporal field erupted around them, his eyes locked with Hades's. "At last, you have given me a reason to acknowledge you. You are worthy to be called my son."
A vast, white ring expanded from him, engulfing the entire island. The world began to slow, its colors draining, becoming a dull, monochrome parody of itself.
"This will end it all—flora, fauna, the world, reality and dimension!" Cronus shouted. "Let us see who remains at the end!" 'Time Reverse.' A white radiance enveloped him, renewing his life force and healing his wounds.
And they charged again, two mad divine beings set on destroying each other and the world with them.
With immense difficulty, Zeus and Poseidon escaped the life-draining aura of the mountain. Zeus looked back at the cataclysm, his face pale with a terror he had never known. "They've both gone mad!" he shouted.
Poseidon watched as the fabric of the world itself began to fray at the edges of their conflict. "If this continues," he murmured, "there will be nothing left."