When Olympus Looked Down
The first thing Leon noticed was the silence.
Not the peaceful kind.
It was the kind of silence that followed judgment.
The clinic room had gone unnaturally still—no creak of wood, no distant footsteps, no hum of mana that usually lingered in healing halls. Even the oil lamp's flame had frozen, stretched upward as if time itself had hesitated.
Leon lay on the narrow bed, eyes open.
He couldn't move.
His body wasn't restrained. His muscles weren't numb. Yet something heavier than chains pressed him down—an invisible weight that wrapped around his chest, his spine, his thoughts.
The system did not speak.
That alone was enough to make his breath slow.
Since the moment he had accepted the name Anáthema, the abandoned system had never truly gone silent. It whispered in fragments, punished him with feedback, forced growth through pain. Silence meant only one thing.
Something older had arrived.
The healer stood beside the bed, one hand hovering over his shoulder. Her fingers trembled, frozen mid-motion, eyes wide but unfocused—caught in the same suspended moment.
Leon swallowed.
The air tasted different.
Dry. Ancient.
A pressure descended from above, not physical but absolute, like the sky itself leaning closer to listen.
And then—
The world split.
Not with sound, but with meaning.
Leon's vision blurred, then sharpened into something that was no longer the clinic. The walls dissolved into marble and light, replaced by a vast circular expanse that stretched endlessly in all directions.
He was no longer lying down.
He stood.
Barefoot.
The floor beneath him was smooth white stone etched with countless Greek sigils, all intersecting, all incomplete. Some glowed faintly. Others were cracked, erased, overwritten by time.
Above him loomed an impossible sky—golden clouds swirling around towering pillars that vanished into infinity.
Olympus.
Leon didn't need the system to tell him.
He felt it in his bones.
He was not supposed to be here.
A voice echoed—not loud, not soft, but perfectly balanced, as if volume itself bent to its will.
"The Anáthema still lives."
Leon clenched his fists.
Figures emerged from the clouds, seated upon thrones of light and concept. They did not all have faces. Some were shapes. Some were crowns without heads. Some were eyes floating within halos of law.
Gods.
Not myths.
Not stories.
Administrators of existence.
"It was marked for erasure."
"It rejected Moîra."
"It accepted the broken system."
Each statement struck like a verdict.
Leon lifted his head.
"So?" he said.
The word echoed far louder than it should have.
Several presences turned.
Interest rippled through Olympus.
One figure leaned forward—tall, draped in stormlight, a spear resting against his shoulder. Lightning flickered behind his eyes.
"You speak as if you still possess choice, mortal."
Leon met the god's gaze.
"I do," he replied. "That's why I'm still alive."
A murmur spread.
Not anger.
Amusement.
Another presence spoke—calm, cold, precise.
"Choice exists within Moîra."
The name pressed against Leon's skull like a tightening crown.
Fate.
"You were offered alignment. You refused."
Leon exhaled slowly.
"I was offered obedience," he said. "Wrapped in pretty words."
A pause.
The golden clouds churned.
"You were offered purpose."
Leon laughed.
It surprised even him.
"My purpose," he said, voice steady, "was to disappear quietly so your perfect system wouldn't be questioned."
That did it.
The pressure spiked.
The marble beneath his feet cracked, spiderweb fractures spreading outward as divine authority pressed down on his existence. Leon's knees buckled—but he did not fall.
Something pushed back.
Deep within his chest, the Anáthema system stirred.
Not help.
Not comfort.
Resistance.
The sigil burned under his skin.
Fragments of corrupted text flashed before his eyes.
[ERROR: DIVINE INTERFERENCE DETECTED]
[WARNING: USER EXISTENCE UNDER REVIEW]
[ANÁNKĒ PROTOCOL — ACTIVE]
Pain tore through Leon's nerves like liquid fire.
He gritted his teeth.
So this was the cost.
A throne at the center of Olympus flared brighter than the rest.
From it rose a figure wrapped in flowing law, their presence so vast Leon couldn't perceive edges—only consequence.
"Anáthema."
The name was spoken like a diagnosis.
"You are a contradiction."
Leon lifted his eyes.
"You built a world that couldn't handle contradictions," he said. "That's not my fault."
Silence fell.
Not frozen time.
A deliberate pause.
"You destabilize balance."
"You inspire deviation."
"Others may follow."
Leon's heart thudded.
So that was it.
Not fear of him.
Fear of what he represented.
"I'm not leading anyone," Leon said. "I'm just surviving."
"Survival is influence," the throne replied.
The god of storms snorted.
"End this."
Several presences shifted.
Leon felt it then—a targeting reticle not of light, but of certainty. A verdict forming, absolute and final.
Erasure.
This time, no fragments.
No survival loophole.
The Anáthema system screamed.
[CRITICAL EVENT]
[USER WILL FALL BELOW EXISTENCE THRESHOLD]
Leon's vision darkened at the edges.
So this was how it ended.
Not in battle.
Not in defiance.
But in a council chamber of beings who never had to bleed.
A memory surfaced unbidden.
The clinic healer's steady hands.
Her quiet focus.
The way she hadn't recoiled.
Human.
Ordinary.
Unblessed.
Leon inhaled.
"No," he said.
The word tore out of him—not loud, not divine, but absolute.
The fractured sigils beneath his feet flared.
Not golden.
Black.
Cracked glyphs rose into the air, overlapping divine symbols, rewriting space through refusal alone.
The gods recoiled.
"Impossible."
Leon felt his bones creak, his veins burn, his existence strain—but he stood.
"I don't need your permission to exist," he said. "I already paid the price."
The throne at the center pulsed violently.
"You would invoke Anánkē against Olympus?"
Leon didn't know how he knew.
He just did.
"Necessity doesn't care who you are," he replied. "If I must exist… then I will."
The Anáthema system surged.
Not power.
Consequence.
The sky cracked.
For the first time in eons, Olympus destabilized.
Not destroyed.
Not defeated.
But shaken.
The gods withdrew—not in retreat, but in recalculation.
"We will observe."
"You will be contained."
"Your path will be watched."
The pressure vanished.
Leon collapsed—
—and woke gasping in the clinic bed.
The oil lamp flickered back to life.
Sound returned.
The healer stumbled, catching herself against the table, eyes snapping into focus.
Leon stared at the ceiling, chest heaving.
The system text hovered weakly.
[STATUS: SURVIVED DIVINE REVIEW]
[CONDITION: UNSTABLE]
[NOTICE: OLYMPUS — AWARE]
Leon closed his eyes.
So the gods were watching now.
Good.
Let them.
Because next time—
He wouldn't just survive.
End of chapter 6