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Sand erupted as Hermes tore himself from the ground in a blur of light, blood flicking from his lips, wings on his heels flaring wide as he vanished and reappeared a dozen times in the same moment.
He skidded to a halt atop a jagged dune, chest heaving, eyes locked onto the charred god below.
"Alright," Hermes said, wiping crimson from his mouth with the back of his hand, forcing a grin that didn't quite hide the tension in his eyes. "We started off wrong. Let's reset. You punch like Ares on a bad day, and I talk..."
The Firstborn vanished.
Hermes's instincts screamed.
He twisted sideways, barely avoiding a downward hammerfist that collapsed the dune beneath him. Hermes flashed behind the Firstborn, driving a glowing kick into his spine.
The Firstborn didn't budge.
Hermes's eyes widened.
The charred god turned slowly, sand sliding off his shoulders like ash from a pyre.
"Still talking," the Firstborn growled.
Hermes disappeared again, ricocheting across the desert in streaks of gold and wind. He struck from every angle jabs to the jaw, spinning kicks, rapid-fire blows moving faster than mortal perception. Each impact cracked like thunder.
The Firstborn absorbed it all.
Dark energy pulsed through his fractured skin, his aura flaring violently as he swung a backhand.
Hermes blocked.
The collision detonated outward, shockwaves flattening dunes for miles.
Hermes slid backward, boots carving trenches, arms trembling.
"…Okay," he muttered, breath sharp. "I see now.. How Apollo vanished.."
The Firstborn lunged.
Hermes flashed forward, met him head-on fist to fist.
They collided at god-speed, trading blows so fast the air ignited. Sand fused into black glass beneath their feet. Hermes ducked, spun, landed a glowing knee to the Firstborn's ribs
Crack.
The Firstborn snarled, grabbed Hermes mid-motion and hurled him through the air like a meteor. Hermes flipped, stabilizing at the last second, dragging his feet across the desert to stop himself.
"Hey!" Hermes shouted. "You ever consider therapy? Rage management? Talking.."
The Firstborn was already there.
A brutal elbow smashed into Hermes's jaw.
Hermes flew again, blood spraying across the sand. He twisted, vanished, reappeared behind the Firstborn, breathing hard.
"Listen to me!" Hermes snapped, frustration bleeding through his bravado. "I didn't know about you! None of us did! Only Zeus ca.."
The Firstborn's eyes flared.
"SILENCE!"
His roar shook the sky.
He surged forward, faster than before far faster. Hermes barely kept up now, dodging by instinct alone, speed straining to its limit. A punch grazed his side, tearing through divine flesh like paper.
Hermes screamed, tumbling, barely catching himself mid-air.
"Listen here Firstborn!" Hermes shouted, desperation edging his voice. "He fears what you are! But this.. this won't fix anything!"
The Firstborn caught him by the throat.
Hermes froze.
The charred god lifted him effortlessly, dark aura swallowing the light around them.
"He feared me," the Firstborn whispered, voice low and venomous. "So he tried to erase me."
Hermes struggled, his energy growing weak.
"You don't have to do this.."
The Firstborn slammed him into the ground.
The impact cracked the desert floor open like an earthquake. Hermes lay in the crater, gasping, vision blurring.
The Firstborn descended slowly, shadow stretching across the broken god.
"I was his first mistake," he said coldly. "And I will be his last."
Hermes forced himself to look up, blood streaming down his face, eyes wide with realization.
"You're going to Olympus…"
The Firstborn raised his fist, dark power coiling around it.
"I WILL BE Olympus."
The punch came down.
The desert did not explode.
It opened.
The Firstborn's fist had gone clean through Hermes's torso, dark power compressed into a single, obscene moment of silence. Divine light flickered wildly around the wound.
Hermes's breath hitched.
His eyes went unfocused.
For a heartbeat, neither of them moved.
Then the Firstborn pulled his arm free.
Wet sound.
Light spilling, Blood and godhood pouring into the sand.
Hermes collapsed forward, knees striking the glassed desert, hands clawing weakly at the hole in his chest that refused to heal.
He laughed.
A broken, choking sound.
"…Heh," Hermes wheezed, blood bubbling at the corner of his mouth. "Guess… guess I finally ran out of road."
The Firstborn loomed over him, aura boiling, eyes burning.
Hermes looked up at him, vision swimming.
"May you be cursed," he spat weakly. "May whatever you are rot from the inside out."
The Firstborn didn't flinch.
Didn't even blink while looking at the dying Hermes.
"I'm already cursed," he replied, voice calm now, dead calm.
"And my curse…"
His lips twisted into something close to a smile.
"…is Zeus."
Hermes coughed hard, crimson splattering the sand. His fingers trembled as he tried and failed to push himself back.
The Firstborn raised one hand slowly, dark energy coiling around his fingers like living shadow.
Hermes's eyes sharpened just a little, a last spark of clarity forcing its way through the pain.
"…Wait," he rasped.
The Firstborn paused.
Hermes swallowed, voice barely more than breath.
"It was you…"
A shaky inhale.
"…you who killed Apollo, wasn't it…?"
The desert wind whispered through the silence.
"He vanished a long time ago," Hermes continued, eyes glassy, unfocused. "No body. No echo. Just… gone."
The Firstborn's smile spread wider.
"Yes," he said softly. "I killed him."
Hermes's breath stuttered.
"And thanks to that bastard," the Firstborn went on, eyes glowing brighter, "it took me a lifetime to recover."
He stepped closer.
"But here I am," he whispered.
"Stronger than ever."
Hermes tried to move.
Tried to run.
Nothing responded.
The Firstborn's body shifted.
Dark veins tore free from beneath his charred skin unnatural, writhing things, black as night and alive with hunger. They slithered outward, branching, multiplying, forming long, serpentine tendrils that pulsed with power.
Hermes's eyes widened in pure horror.
"Oh gods…" he whispered. "That's..."
The tendrils pierced him.
Not once.
Not twice.
They wrapped around his limbs, his chest, sinking into divine flesh and drinking.
Hermes screamed.
A raw, broken sound dragged from the depths of his soul as his light was torn away piece by piece. His divine soul disintegrated into ash. His speed, his essence ripped from him like breath from lungs.
The Firstborn closed his eyes.
And fed.
Hermes's screams faded into wet gasps. His body convulsed once… twice… then stilled.
The light left his eyes.
The tendrils retracted, slick and satisfied, melting back into the Firstborn's body as Hermes's form crumbled into lifeless stillness, divine blood soaking into the sand.
The Firstborn looked down at the corpse of the messenger god.
"One down," he murmured.
Then he lifted his gaze toward the distant sky toward Olympus.
"I'm coming, Zeus." he said.
****
OLYMPUS -
Zeus sat upon his throne, fingers drumming absently against the armrest as clouds drifted lazily through the open arches of the hall. The gods spoke in low tones Athena and Poseidon in measured debate, Hera watching Zeus with an unreadable expression.
Then
Zeus stiffened.
The air around him snapped.
Lightning crawled along the veins of marble beneath his feet as he rose so suddenly the throne cracked behind him.
"Hermes…"
The name left his mouth like a gasp torn from his chest.
The room froze.
Hera turned instantly. "Zeus?"
Zeus's eyes were wide now.
Panic.
"I can't..." His voice faltered, thunder stuttering with it. "I can't sense him."
Poseidon straightened, grip tightening on his trident. "What do you mean you can't sense him?"
Zeus closed his eyes, reaching outward through the sky, through every divine current that had ever carried his messenger's presence and all those of his blood.
Nothing.
"Nowhere," Zeus said hoarsely. "He's nowhere."
Athena's expression sharpened, dread sliding beneath her composure. "Father… he can't simply vanish."
Hera stepped closer, her voice low but urgent. "You sent him to watch the mortal."
"Yes," Zeus snapped, then caught himself. His hand trembled. "Yes. To observe. To report. Not to fight."
Poseidon's eyes darkened like a gathering sea. "Then something found him."
A deep silence fell.
Thunder rolled outside but this time it sounded uncertain.
Athena turned slowly toward Zeus. "Can you feel his life-thread?"
Zeus swallowed.
"I don't." He stopped, jaw tightening, then forced the words out.
"I feel nothing."
Hera's breath caught.
His hands clenched.
"It's as if he was… extinguished."
The word hung in the air like a death sentence.
Poseidon took a step forward, disbelief etched across his face. "Hermes is strong."
Zeus laughed once short, broken.
"So I believed."
Athena's eyes widened slightly as pieces aligned in her mind. "I don't think it's the mortal.." she murmured. "He did mention to me that he felt a divine disturbance, Hermes meant to investigate it…"
"It matters little now," Zeus looked at her. "I'm afraid this can only mean one thing.." he added narrowing his eyes.
/-\
If you Like this story! Check out my other stories! Solo leveling in Westeros.
&
If you wish to read more or simply support me than check out my patreon at
"https://www.patreon.com/FrenzyAren"
You can Get Access to 3 More Chapters OR 7 More Chapters if you want