Nicholas' grey eyes seemed firm as he knocked softly at the door of his father's study. "Come in." he heard through the door. Once he opened the door he saw his father at his desk, probably reading some obscure ancient history nobody but maybe five people in the world know about.
"What is it Nick? Do you need something?" his father said with a confused look in his eyes.
"I have to tell you something, and its pretty serious." Nicholas replied going over the possibilities of the incoming conversation using his prescience to anticipate the outcomes and to choose the best path forward.
"I know who my mother is. I know I'm the child of the Goddess Athena" Nick said sternly though his eyes betrayed vulnerability, however acted it may be.
As his enhanced brain curtesy of being a child of Athena allowed him great control over his emotions, and a little manipulation could be forgiven after all, he wasn't his real father.
"What?!" Nicks father Johnathan Aldridge stood up so sharply causing his chair to flip over and papers to spill all over the floor.
Jonathan ran a hand through his hair, pacing slowly. "Wait… how do you know? Did… Did she come to you? She told me it was forbidden? They hide themselves, she told me its hidden! I looked, I tried finding the divine and yet nothing! She told me it was forbidden? You… you can't possibly see it. I've seen Athena, I've seen proof, and even that was only one time! Nothing else, nothing at all. How do you…?"
Nicholas blinked, calm "No dad she didn't come to see me. I know because I can see them."
Jonathan frowned. "See… what?"
"Everything," Nick said simply. "The things that hide from mortals — the gods, the monsters, the magic. The Mist doesn't work on me, after all I'm not a simple mortal, am I? I'm half divine."
"The… Mist?" Jonathan echoed looking quite shellshocked by the news.
Nick nodded. "It's a veil. It keeps mortals from seeing the truth. Makes monsters look like wild dogs, or ruins look like construction sites. It's how the Gods hide the divine from human eyes."
"And figuring out the rest was pretty easy, after all, monsters from myth all around us, a pet owl, incredible intelligence and then there's my ability… I call it prescience."
"When I ask the world a question, the answer appears — sometimes as words, sometimes as symbols, sometimes as raw knowing that just suddenly exists in my mind."
Jonathan blinked, struggling to keep up. "You're saying you can ask… what, anything?"
"Anything," Nicholas said simply. "How far the nearest monster is. What it looks like. The chemical composition of the dust in the corner of your study. Or," he added, turning back toward his father, "how many coins you have in your pocket. Its 23 you can check."
Jonathan's brow furrowed. "That's—" He stopped himself took out the coins and counted them silently, realizing Nicholas was exactly right.
"It's not guessing," Nicholas continued. "It's information. It's as if the world itself tells me, I think it's my gift from my mother, as the Goddess of Wisdom, and I think it passed from her to me."
Jonathan slumped down to the ground, the information hitting him all at once. "No wonder all the demigods in myths are so special… Why are you telling me this?"
"I need your help. I've made another discovery recently. I tried magic… I figured that since all of the Greek myths appear to be true, what does that mean for mystical arts" Nick said with light practically shining out of his grey eyes.
"And so, I experimented I tried some of the rituals found in the books in your library, and they worked. I executed a ritual drawing upon my mother's power as the Goddess of War to bless our home against harm… and well look it would just be easier to show you." Nick said, drawing a knife tucked in his back pocket and lunging towards his father.
Jonathan flinched out of self-preservation but at the last second he stopped himself from reacting, trusting his son. The knife slid harmlessly against him, a faint grey mist visible only to Nick appeared and then disappeared out of view.
Jonathan froze in place, eyes wide and fixed on the spot where the knife stabbed him. His breathing came in short, uneven gasps, his mind struggling to reconcile what he had just seen. "I… I don't… that wasn't—"
He looked down at the knife, then back at Nicholas, every instinct screaming danger, but his body remained rooted to the spot. "It… it didn't hurt me. How—what—" His voice cracked slightly, a mix of fear and awe.
Jonathan ran a hand over his face, trying to calm himself, but his gaze kept flicking to the spot where the mist had appeared. "You… you did this? That ritual… it did this?" he said taking the knife and checking if it was truly sharp and not just a trick.
Nicholas nodded slowly, expression calm but triumphant. "Exactly. That's how I know the rituals work."
"This was a simple ritual, but any more advanced rituals and tests would need your support. What do you say? Will you help me?"
"Yes, of course I will help you! I've spent my whole life dedicated to finding the reality of the divine!" Jonathan replied, his face filled with fanaticism.