The apartment building's lobby smelled like floor wax and quiet desperation—the particular scent of a space that had been cleaned just enough to meet legal requirements but not enough for anyone to actually feel good about it. Fluorescent lights flickered overhead, casting everyone in that sickly yellow-green pallor that made even healthy people look like they were recovering from food poisoning.
Lester-Apollo looked like he was actively dying, so the lighting didn't do him any favors.
"Third floor," he wheezed, leaning heavily on Meg as they approached the elevator. "Apartment 3B. Or possibly 3D. One of the 3-letters, definitely."
"You don't know which apartment?" Jason asked.
"I'm the god of prophecy, not the god of remembering mortal addresses! Do you have any idea how many apartments there are in the world? How many buildings? I used to be able to simply sense where people were, and now I have to rely on—" he squinted at the directory on the wall "—reading. Like some kind of... of... mortal."
"You are a mortal," Meg pointed out.
"TEMPORARILY!"
The elevator arrived with a ding that seemed unreasonably cheerful given the circumstances. They piled in—Lester slumping against the back wall, Meg jabbing the button for the third floor with more force than necessary, and Jason trying to catch his reflection in the brushed metal doors.
Still not his face. Still that annoyingly handsome Erlang Shen face with the cheekbones and the flowing hair and the mysterious forehead mark.
He'd spent the cab ride trying to remember everything he knew about the actual Erlang Shen from mythology. Three-eyed warrior. Nephew of the Jade Emperor, son of a mortal woman and the Emperor's sister. Wielded a three-pointed, double-edged lance. Had a celestial hound named Howling Celestial Dog. Was famous for being one of the few beings who could match Sun Wukong in combat, and eventually helped capture the Monkey King.
Oh, and he'd played the hell out of Black Myth: Wukong, so he had approximately forty hours of watching Erlang Shen boss people around in cutscenes. That had to count for something, right?
Method acting, Jason thought. I'm just method acting. For survival.
The elevator doors opened onto a hallway that was marginally less depressing than the lobby. Someone had made an effort with a potted plant near the stairwell, though the plant looked like it was seriously reconsidering its life choices. The carpet was that particular shade of industrial brown that had been chosen specifically because it wouldn't show stains.
"This way," Lester said, shuffling down the hall. "I'm almost certain it's this way."
They stopped in front of apartment 3B. Lester raised his hand to knock, then hesitated.
"What?" Meg demanded.
"I just... I want to prepare you both. Percy Jackson is a hero, yes, but he can be somewhat... irreverent. Disrespectful. He once called me 'a Greek god with a sunburn problem' to my face."
"That's kind of funny," Jason said.
"IT IS NOT FUNNY. I am the GOD OF THE SUN. I don't GET sunburns. That's like saying Poseidon has hydration issues, or that Ares has anger management—actually, Ares does have anger management problems, that's a bad example. The point is—"
Meg reached past him and knocked on the door.
Silence.
Then footsteps, approaching. The sound of a deadbolt being turned.
The door opened.
Jason had been expecting a lot of things. A grizzled warrior covered in scars, maybe. A giant of a man with muscles on his muscles. Someone who looked like they'd saved the world four times and had the emotional baggage to prove it.
What he got was a teenager.
Okay, not quite a teenager—probably eighteen or nineteen, with the lean build of a swimmer and the perpetually confused expression of someone who had just woken up from a nap and wasn't entirely sure what year it was. He had dark hair that stuck up in approximately seventeen different directions, sea-green eyes that seemed to shift color depending on the light, and was wearing a t-shirt that said "I Survived Camp Half-Blood (Multiple Times)" and pajama pants with little tridents on them.
"Uh," said Percy Jackson, hero of Olympus, savior of the world, slayer of monsters. "Can I help you?"
"Percy Jackson!" Lester spread his arms wide, a gesture that would have been more impressive if he wasn't covered in garbage juice and blood. "It is I! Apollo! God of the Sun, Music, Poetry, and—"
"Who's the weird old man?" Percy asked, looking past Lester to Jason. "And why does he look like he's about to give me a side quest?"
Jason blinked.
Old man?
He caught his reflection in the window of the apartment across the hall. Okay, not old, exactly, but definitely... mature? Distinguished? The face of someone who had seen centuries pass and remained unimpressed by most of them?
Right. Erlang Shen. Ancient deity. Probably looked like he was in his late twenties or early thirties by mortal standards, but carried himself with the weight of millennia.
This was fine. Jason could work with this.
He drew himself up to his full height, arranged his face into an expression of distant superiority (based almost entirely on the cutscenes he'd watched in Black Myth: Wukong), and spoke in the most imperious voice he could manage.
"I am Erlang Shen," he intoned. "Nephew of the Jade Emperor. He Who Captures. Warrior of the Heavenly Court."
Percy stared at him.
"Cool," Percy said. "That doesn't explain why you're at my door at—" he checked his watch "—two in the afternoon on a Saturday."
"The Jade Emperor has sent me to observe Apollo's trials," Jason continued, the lie flowing surprisingly easily. He was apparently a natural at divine bullshitting. "The Chinese heavens have taken an... interest... in Greek affairs. It was decided that a representative should be dispatched to ensure that the fallen sun god does not cause an international—or rather, inter-pantheon—incident."
"Huh." Percy scratched his head. "I didn't know Chinese gods were real."
"All gods are real, Percy Jackson. Surely you have learned this by now."
"Yeah, but I kind of figured it was just our gods. Greek and Roman. Maybe Egyptian, because I've heard some weird stuff from my cousin. But Chinese gods?"
"The heavens are vast," Jason said, which was a phrase he'd definitely stolen from a cultivation novel. "All pantheons exist. All mythologies contain truth. The Jade Emperor rules the celestial bureaucracy of the East, just as Zeus rules Olympus."
"Celestial bureaucracy?"
"The Jade Emperor is very organized."
Meg tugged on Percy's sleeve. "Are you going to let us in? Apollo is bleeding."
Percy looked down at her, then at Lester, then at Jason, then at Peaches (who was lurking in the hallway looking unsettlingly hungry), and then back at Jason.
"Sure," he said, in the tone of someone who had long ago accepted that weird things happened to him constantly and resistance was futile. "Why not. Come on in."
The apartment was small but comfortable—a living room with a couch and TV, an attached kitchen, doors leading to what were probably bedrooms. The walls were decorated with photos: Percy with a blonde girl who radiated "will stab you if necessary" energy, Percy with a group of teenagers in orange shirts, Percy with a middle-aged woman who had the same kind eyes.
Lester immediately collapsed onto the couch, groaning dramatically. Meg followed him, perching on the armrest and watching Percy with suspicious eyes. Peaches scuttled into a corner and began gnawing on what might have been a decorative pineapple.
Jason remained standing, because that's what a stoic warrior deity would do.
"So," Percy said, leaning against the kitchen counter. "Apollo got turned mortal again?"
"AGAIN?" Lester sat up so fast he nearly fell off the couch. "What do you mean again? This has happened before?"
"Dude, you got turned mortal like... twice that I know of? Once for killing the Cyclopes, once for something with Asclepius—"
"Those were different! Those were noble punishments for righteous actions! This time Zeus is just being PETTY because of the whole Roman-Emperor-God-War thing—"
"Is that what we're calling it now?"
"—which was NOT MY FAULT, the Oracles went silent on their own—"
"Pretty sure you made some bad choices there, man."
"I am APOLLO! I do not make bad choices! I make UNCONVENTIONAL choices that others fail to appreciate!"
While Lester and Percy argued about divine responsibility, Jason allowed himself to actually look around the apartment. It was so... normal. So mundane. A space where a hero of prophecy apparently just lived, watching TV and eating cereal and doing whatever mortals did when they weren't battling titans.
In every cultivation novel he'd ever read, powerful beings lived in jade palaces or celestial realms or at minimum a really impressive mountain peak. They didn't have apartments with trident-print pajama pants visible through the bedroom door.
Maybe Western mythology operated on different rules.
"So, Erlang Shen," Percy said, suddenly addressing Jason directly. "You said the Jade Emperor sent you to babysit Apollo?"
"Observe," Jason corrected, because 'babysit' was beneath his new dignity. "And not I alone."
Percy raised an eyebrow. "There's more of you?"
And that was when the window exploded.
Glass rained across the living room like a crystalline waterfall. Lester screamed (a very undignified scream, Jason noted). Meg dove behind the couch. Percy's hand went to his pocket, presumably for some kind of weapon.
Jason just stood there, because he was already having a premonition about what was coming through that window, and he wasn't sure if he should laugh or cry.
A figure landed in the middle of the living room in a crouch, surrounded by the settling shards of what used to be Percy's window. Slowly, dramatically, the figure rose to its full height.
He was shorter than Jason had expected—maybe five foot eight, compact and wiry, with muscles that suggested not bulk but explosive power. His face was sharp-featured, almost vulpine, with eyes that gleamed with barely contained mischief. He was wearing what could only be described as "celestial warrior casual"—armor that looked like it had been through several wars, a circlet of gold around his forehead, and a fur-trimmed cape that had no right to look as cool as it did.
In his hand, he held a staff.
Not just any staff. A staff that seemed to thrum with power, that made the air around it vibrate with contained potential. A staff that was clearly magical, clearly ancient, clearly the weapon of someone who had fought heaven itself and lived to brag about it.
"HAHA!" the figure bellowed, striking a pose that was equal parts heroic and ridiculous. "The Great Sage, Equal of Heaven, has arrived! Sun Wukong graces you with his magnificent presence!"
Jason felt several emotions crash through him simultaneously.
Anger: Because of COURSE Wukong would make an entrance like this. Of COURSE he would break a window when the door was right there.
Resignation: Because if he was apparently playing the role of Erlang Shen, having Sun Wukong show up was probably inevitable. The two were legendarily linked, after all.
Happiness: Because holy SHIT, that was THE Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, one of the most badass figures in all of mythology, and he was standing right there looking exactly as awesome as Jason had always imagined.
Annoyance: Because the window thing was really unnecessary, and also Wukong was already grinning at Jason like he knew something Jason didn't, which was incredibly irritating.
Jason facepalmed.
It was not a small facepalm. It was a full-palm, full-force, I-am-so-done-with-this-nonsense facepalm that probably echoed through the celestial realms.
"Wukong," he said, the name coming out as a sigh.
"Erlang Shen!" The Monkey King's grin widened, showing teeth that were just slightly too sharp. "It's been what, three hundred years? Four hundred? You look good! Still got that stick up your ass, I see."
"I do not have—"
"Still doing the whole 'I am so dignified and honorable' thing? Still pretending you don't know how to have fun?" Wukong bounced on his heels, vibrating with energy. "The Jade Emperor sent us both! How great is that? Working together again! Like old times!"
"We never worked together," Jason said, even though he had no idea if that was true. "I captured you."
"Details, details." Wukong waved a hand dismissively. "The point is, we're both here, watching over the sun god who somehow managed to piss off his own father badly enough to get demoted to mortal. That's impressive, by the way." He pointed at Lester. "I've annoyed a lot of gods, but I never got turned into a pimply teenager."
"THIS IS TEMPORARY!" Lester shrieked.
"Uh," Percy said, still holding what Jason now realized was a ballpoint pen (which seemed like a weird weapon choice, but who was he to judge). "Can someone explain what's happening? Because I had plans today. Those plans involved Netflix and not having my window destroyed."
"I'll pay for the window," Wukong said cheerfully.
"With what money?"
"I'll steal some."
"That's—that's not—" Percy pinched the bridge of his nose. "You know what, forget the window. Why are there now two Chinese gods in my apartment?"
Jason decided to commit to the bit.
"As I said, the Jade Emperor has taken an interest in Apollo's trials. I was sent to observe and ensure no... complications... arise that might affect the celestial balance." He gestured at Wukong with barely concealed irritation. "The Great Sage was sent because..."
"Because I'm the best!" Wukong finished. "And also because the Jade Emperor doesn't trust Erlang Shen to have any fun. He's very serious, you know. Very proper. Very 'honor this' and 'duty that.' Someone needs to keep things interesting."
"We are not here to keep things interesting. We are here to observe."
"You're here to observe. I'm here to crack some skulls." Wukong spun his staff with a flourish. "I heard there might be fighting. Is there going to be fighting?"
"Probably," Meg said. She was eyeing Wukong with a look that was half suspicious, half intrigued. "Monsters have been after Apollo since he fell."
"Excellent! I love fighting monsters. They're crunchy."
"Crunchy?"
"When you hit them hard enough."
Percy looked at Jason with an expression that said is he serious?
Jason returned a look that said unfortunately, yes.
Lester had hauled himself into a sitting position, staring at the two Chinese deities with an expression of dawning horror. "The Jade Emperor sent you. Both of you. To watch me."
"The Greek pantheon's instability has drawn celestial attention," Jason said, because it sounded official. "Your father's punishment of you has created... ripples. The Jade Emperor wishes to ensure that the resulting chaos does not spill into Eastern territories."
"I am not chaos! I am Apollo!"
"Potato, potahto," Wukong said, examining a photo on the wall. "Hey, is this you fighting a giant? Nice form. Could use more spinning though. Spinning is key."
Percy gently removed the photo from Wukong's hands. "That's from my sixteenth birthday. It was not a fun party."
"Birthdays should always involve fighting giants. That's just good party planning."
Jason was rapidly realizing that keeping up the Erlang Shen act was going to be significantly harder with Wukong around. The Monkey King clearly expected him to behave a certain way—to be the straight-laced, honorable warrior to Wukong's chaotic energy—and Jason had no idea if he could maintain that for any length of time.
Also, there was the small matter of him having no actual divine powers, whereas Wukong was clearly the real deal.
Fake it till you make it, he thought. That's practically the first rule of cultivation.
"Wukong," he said, in his best imperious voice. "Perhaps you could refrain from breaking things for the next few minutes while we assess the situation."
"You're no fun."
"I am not here to be fun. I am here to be effective."
"See, that's your problem. You could be both." Wukong vaulted over the back of the couch and landed next to Lester, who flinched. "So, sun god! Tell me about these trials. What do you have to do? Slay some beasts? Retrieve some artifacts? Seduce a beautiful mortal?"
"I—that last one is not—I need to restore the Oracles!" Lester sputtered. "Ancient sources of prophecy that have gone dark! Someone—or something—has corrupted them!"
"Boring," Wukong declared. "But okay. We'll help. Right, Erlang Shen?"
Every instinct in Jason's body was screaming that agreeing to help was a terrible idea. He had no powers. No training. No actual divine abilities beyond apparently looking like a Chinese deity and having a forehead mark that may or may not shoot lasers.
But he was a cultivation protagonist now. Sort of. And cultivation protagonists didn't back down from challenges—they used challenges as opportunities to grow stronger.
"We will... observe," Jason said carefully. "And if assistance is required, we will provide it."
"See? He's in."
"I did not say—"
"He's totally in. This is going to be great." Wukong bounced up from the couch. "When do we start? Now? Let's start now. I'm bored."
"You've been here for two minutes," Percy pointed out.
"That's two minutes of not fighting anything. Do you know how long that feels for me?"
Jason facepalmed again.
Twenty minutes later, they had established a few things.
First: Apollo (Lester, whatever) needed to restore the Oracles to reclaim his godhood. The first Oracle he needed to deal with was somewhere nearby, corrupted by unknown forces.
Second: Meg was apparently the one calling the shots, despite being twelve years old and smelling like a compost heap. Apollo was bound to her by divine law, which meant she was technically his master. Wukong found this hilarious.
Third: Percy was willing to help, but he had his own life to deal with—something about preparing for college (college! demigod heroes went to college!)—and couldn't drop everything to go on a quest.
Fourth: Jason still had no idea what his actual abilities were, beyond the forehead laser thing that had happened once and refused to repeat no matter how hard he concentrated.
"You seem distracted, Erlang Shen," Wukong observed, appearing at Jason's elbow with the silent suddenness of a very annoying cat. "Something on your mind?"
They were standing on the fire escape outside Percy's apartment (which had a lovely view of another apartment building), giving the others space to plan. Wukong was balanced on the railing like gravity was a suggestion he'd chosen to ignore.
"I am contemplating our mission," Jason said.
"You're a bad liar."
"Excuse me?"
Wukong grinned, and there was something knowing in his eyes that made Jason very uncomfortable. "You're not Erlang Shen. Or if you are, something's different. Changed. You don't move like him. Don't talk like him. And you definitely don't look at me like he does."
Jason's heart stopped.
"How does he look at you?"
"Like he wants to kill me but knows he's not allowed." Wukong shrugged. "You look at me like you're trying to figure out if I'm real. Like this is all some kind of story you've fallen into."
Because it is, Jason thought. Because that's exactly what this is.
"I have been... away," Jason said slowly. "For a long time. Things have changed for me."
"Hmm." Wukong studied him with those too-sharp eyes. "Reincarnation? Transmigration? Some kind of soul-swapping shenanigan?"
"What?"
"Oh, don't look so surprised. I've been around for a long time, kid. I've seen all kinds of weird stuff. Souls moving from one body to another isn't even in the top ten strangest things I've witnessed." He leaned closer. "So what's your story? Cultivation ascendant who died and got reborn? Mortal who somehow ended up in a god's body? Dimensional traveler from a world where all this is just fiction?"
Jason's poker face, which he'd thought was pretty good, apparently wasn't good enough.
Wukong's grin widened. "That last one, huh? Interesting."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Sure you don't." The Monkey King hopped off the railing and stretched, his staff materializing in his hand from nowhere. "Tell you what. I won't tell anyone. It's more fun this way. Watching you pretend to be Erlang Shen when you clearly have no idea what you're doing is the most entertainment I've had in decades."
"I am not pretending—"
"You sat down to meditate in the middle of a fight. Erlang Shen would never do that. He'd have just stabbed everyone and been done with it."
Jason didn't have a response to that.
"But hey," Wukong continued, "you've got the body, so you've probably got the power. You just need to figure out how to use it." He poked Jason in the chest with one finger. "Try flying."
"What?"
"Flying. You know. Going up. Defying gravity. Erlang Shen can fly. So can I. So can most celestial beings worth their salt. If you're really in his body, the ability should be there. You just have to access it."
"I don't know how to fly."
"Then figure it out." Wukong's grin turned challenging. "Unless you're too mortal for that?"
And then, because he was apparently the kind of being who delivered cryptic advice and immediately disappeared, Wukong backflipped off the fire escape and vanished into a cloud of golden light.
Jason stood there, alone on the fire escape, trying to process what had just happened.
He knows. He knows I'm not really Erlang Shen. And he doesn't care.
That was both reassuring and terrifying.
Also, flying. Wukong had said he could fly.
Jason looked up at the gray New York sky, then down at the alley five stories below. If he tried to fly and it didn't work, he'd definitely die. That seemed like a bad outcome.
But if it did work...
Cultivation is about belief, he reminded himself. About imposing your will on reality. About becoming more than what you are.
He closed his eyes. Felt for that spark he'd sensed earlier—that ember of power in his core. It was still there, faint but present, like a heartbeat he could almost hear.
Erlang Shen could fly. He was in Erlang Shen's body. Therefore...
Jason stepped off the fire escape.
For one horrible moment, he fell.
Wind rushed past his face. The ground accelerated toward him. His stomach dropped into his feet and kept going.
And then—
Something clicked.
It wasn't like the cultivation breakthroughs in the novels, all dramatic energy surges and cosmic visions. It was more like remembering how to ride a bike—a skill that had been there all along, waiting for him to stop overthinking and just do it.
Jason stopped falling.
He hung in the air, about ten feet above the alley, suspended by nothing visible. The wind still moved around him, but it no longer pulled him down. He was... floating. Flying. Defying gravity like it had personally offended him.
"Holy shit," he whispered.
Then, louder: "HOLY SHIT!"
He shot upward, faster than he meant to, nearly slamming into a water tower before he figured out how to control his direction. The city spread out below him—streets and buildings and tiny people going about their tiny lives, completely unaware that a man who'd been reading web novels less than twenty-four hours ago was now soaring above their heads.
He was flying.
HE WAS FLYING.
All those cultivation novels, all those descriptions of sword flight and cloud stepping and aerial combat—he'd always wondered what it would feel like. Now he knew. It felt like freedom. Like the ground had been lying to him his entire life about where he was supposed to be.
"WOOOOOO!"
The shout escaped him before he could stop it. He didn't care. He was FLYING. He could deal with the embarrassment later.
He did a loop. Then a barrel roll. Then something that was probably illegal in most airspaces. The cold New York air stung his face and whipped his long hair behind him and he had never felt more alive.
Eventually, reluctantly, he descended back to the fire escape, landing with surprising grace on the metal platform. His heart was pounding. His face hurt from smiling.
The window beside him slid open, and Percy's head poked out.
"Did you just... fly?"
"I did."
"Without wings or anything?"
"I'm a celestial being," Jason said, and for the first time, he actually believed it. "We fly."
Percy stared at him for a long moment.
"Man," he said finally. "Chinese gods are wild."
Jason grinned.
Maybe being trapped in a Percy Jackson novel with Sun Wukong as his unwanted ally wouldn't be so bad after all.