The God of Gravity part 3: Apocalypse

Paths Cross

“How did you find us?” asks the goddess in front of us.

We don't like her glare so we glare back. Her relic sword, it's burning with violet flames. I can somehow sense traces of men she slew with it. She's the real deal. But if it goes down to fighting her, we can match her. The vampire at her left, Darius can nullify whatever his power is. He doesn't have a relic with him so he's no threat for a few seconds. The red-haired god is narrowing his eyes at us, inspecting us head to toe. His face looks somehow familiar. And his smirk—I know I've seen someone smirk like that. I see Philip behind them! I gotta save him!

I close my eyes to visualize their power. I see the red-haired for cannot fight. Only the goddess and the vampire are the threat. The vampire controls blood. The goddess controls blades and far much stronger and… she knows Dimensional Touch? That's all I need to know so I transfer the stiffness of my body to the already-frozen Zol. 

The red-haired god says, “Are you-”

“Darius!” I shout.

With a grunt, he uses his Cessation. I charge at the goddess. Although I knew it was coming, she's quick! Her sword almost slices my scalp. I roll past them to grab Philip. Then I feel her sword swinging down to slice my spine from behind.

Give me a break! I don't want to lose a friend! 

I explode a force from my whole body. Her swing misses short. I prepare, “Fist of Seven:”

She prepares, “Sword of Eight:”

Simultaneously, we say, “Millenium-”

“s***h!”

“Punch!”

My fist against her sword, the ground explodes beneath our feet. She's quite surprised but I have seen this happening earlier. It's my advantage as I was able to react faster than her. I kick her abdomen but she thinks she can take it with her Sword Breaking. She's wrong!

“Argh!!” I exert. Through the walls of the building behind her, she goes. 

-

*

Darius's fight against Hyun happens in the street after getting blown away by Leo and Sayuri's clash. Hyun has never have been surprised in his life. He's fighting Darius without power. He could barely keep up with his speed but when he is about to counter him, he disappears.

From behind, he hears, “Fist of Two!” and gets blown away back to where they came from.

*

-

I grab Philip and he is about to say something but I didn't give him a chance. We have to get out of here now. This is as far as my vision. I don't know what happens next. The building is crumbling and it's dangerous. 

“Leo!” he blurts out as I take him to the rooftops.

“We'll take you to somewhere safe!” I say to him. “Just hold on!” I put a mask on his face and that is when he pushes himself out of my grip. He falls into the street. “Philip!” I try to reach for him but I notice that he is wearing winged boots. 

That looks familiar.

I stop on the roof building on the other side of the road. He is looking at me and shaking his head. 

“What the hell's your deal, Philip!” Darius rages beside me. “We're trying to rescue you!”

We dodge the violet slice coming toward us all of a sudden. The fire is so hot that it melts the debris of the building we come from. The building is sliced in half along with the building before and after it. Damn, that could've killed us in an instant!

She's right there floating in the sky standing on a wide sword. Her eyes glow violet and her presence turns out to be more powerful than I expected. Much like one of the Fourth Seaters of Olympus. I don't know what she has done with Philip but she needs to go down! She will become a threat to Olympus!

I see Darius has already thrown his dagger at her. With my power, I get off the street to fly and aid him. He appears in front of her and she dodges his attack. Her counterattack is dodged by him. My turn to attack comes up. She flies down and I miss my punch. Her eyes glow, ready to slice me in half but Darius is there to save me. She blocks his punch from her side so she goes flying away to the distance.

At this distance, I can still hit her. I execute the move with my gravitational power. But then it's slower than her so she dodges. Darius tries his own but she dodges too. 

What?!! She just disappeared! No way! She's already behind us! We got to-

“Soul Cutter,” she says.

“Ugh!!” Darius and I grunt in pain. What did she do?

I feel pain without a wound! It's like I'm imagining it but I feel the pain at my side! What is going on? We land hard on the ground. My cheekbone against the hard concrete. Then I lie down watching her descending from the sky and into the street. I stand up, Darius does too and leaves a mark on the road. He is touching his side just as I am as we retreat. Meanwhile, she is walking towards us. Her sword looks thirsty for our soul. Why is that?

“Who are you?” I ask her. She gives me no answer. “Well then…”

I hold out my hand, aiming at her. With my power, I pull her toward us. Darius appears from the ground we fell on earlier and as retribution, he punches her so hard in the face. She gets blown back a hundred meters away and feet deep into the road. 

I am panting hard… What technique did she use? We have no wounds on us but we feel pain. This goddess is dangerous. Darius's punch gives us time to recover from the painful slice. I can sense that she's still alive in the distance. No wonder it would take more than that to kill her. I don't know her but sure she's interesting. And… that god disguised as a bird above us. Who is he?

-

*

“These kids are strong!” exclaims Jasper while transforming from the form of a bird. He is talking to Hyun—who is at the moment feeling great pain in his chest. “And that kid… He knows I'm not just a bird in the sky. And his power, no doubt he's the God of Gravity!”

“That demigod!” Hyun growls. “He has a power like Enzo.”

“I know, right?” Jasper laughs. 

“It's not the time to laugh, you know? Our lady needs our help. Let's kill those brats! Tell me what to do!”

“Just stay there,” he says and smirks.

“What do you mean?”

“Lady Sayuri could've killed both of them earlier but she didn't. I don't know why she decided not to but it means we can't kill them yet.”

*

-

She's coming toward us again but she is walking casually. We need to defeat her here before she kills others. I finally catch my breath just as I stand beside Darius—putting his hands on his knees.

“Can you still fight?” I ask him.

“Who do you think you're talking to?!” he rages at me.

“Alright, let's get her this time!”

Up ahead, she lowers her stance. Then a heel kick from Philip stops us from charging in further. We stop running or else he could be hit us. It's so strong that it shakes the nearby buildings around us. How did he get so powerful? Maybe it's the boots. I remember! It's the boots of that ugly messenger god! How did it get to him?

The dust cloud clears up and Philip has this resolute look on his face. I don't like it. The goddess sheathes her sword. She looks calmer as she wears her mask to hide her bleeding nose.

“Let's settle down for a moment,” says the red-haired god beside Philip. The vampire is with him too. “And discuss things peacefully.” They wear masks now.

Darius goes, “Discuss my butt, you vermin!”

The god is startled when Darius is about to charge at him but I stop him. The god continues, “Uh… to be honest. I can't fight—simple as that but I'm here to make peace. Let's not fight here and attract more of those masked men or we will all be in grave danger.”

Darius ignores him and yells at Philip. “That's the last time, Philip! What the hell's wrong with your head?!”

“Stop this now, Philip!” I add. “We've come to rescue you! Let us help you, man… What's going on with you?”

“You don't need to save me, Leo, Darius,” he nods to us one by one. “Many of the people from the side of Olympus were with the masked men. I can't trust Olympus now and you should too. Even my father was with them.”

“What?” I ask. “You're kidding, right?”

“No, Leo. I saw his face with my own eyes after breaking his mask. I don't know where he is now but I will make him pay! And you are getting in my way by attacking us!”

“You're not making any sense, you i***t!” Darius curses at him. “You're being one of them right now!”

“They're rogue deities but they're not one of them.”

“That's right,” adds the red-haired god. “I left Olympus and that's about it.”

“Who are you?” I ask.

“I'm Jasper Windsor,” he bows. “the God Trickery.”

I gasp for a second and Darius just grits his teeth. He points at him and growls, “So you're Lady Juliet's irresponsible brother! Shame on you!”

So this is her brother. He looks pretty much like his father, Lord Narada. No wonder his smirk is familiar to me. I also heard that he's more clever than Lady Mila and Lady Juliet so I have to watch out for that. 

“I know,” he says in a submission but with that insincere smirk before wearing his mask. “I'm a jerk for a brother but she can handle herself. There are powerful deities around her after all. Like the two of you.”

A compliment from him? That's unexpected. He's playing tricks on us. “Don't even try to trick us,” I point at him and showing him my glare.

Darius takes the intimidation to the next level as he says, “Or I will blow all of you up into bits!” 

“Make sure you do what you say, child,” says the vampire. “or you will regret it.” His eyes glow red.

Darius smirks at him. “Let me guess, you're Hyeon's brother, aren't you? Three lump of treacherous pathetic men in a single group. I'm impressed. Also, I did swear to Lady Aiko that if I see you, I'll beat you into dust. Are you sure you can keep up with me, old man?" They sneer at each other.

“Darius, stop it,” says Philip. “You are outnumbered.”

“It makes no difference,” he says but I know that he knows we can't win. He's just trying to sound tough as he is. But he's right. They're still a threat.

“You guys might be a threat for us,” I continue negotiating with Jasper. “You're rogue gods and now an enemy of Olympus because of it. I'm sure it is not good if we let you go so casually.”

“That's right,” Darius nods.

“Nope,” says Jasper, taking our accusations so calmly. “we won't. Before we came here after doing chores in the Ra Continent, our goal is pretty much the same and somehow like Olympus but we have different ways of achieving it. Right now, we are hunting the leader of the Masked League—the man with the golden mask. Lady Sayuri wants to kill him with her own hands after he killed her loved ones. We will leave the survivors of Olympus alone and do what we have to do find and slay the man.”

“Words are only words. We don't know what you really think.”

“I vouch for them, Leo,” cuts Philip. “As one of your closest friends, I'm sure that they won't. If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't be here alive talking to you now. If you want to catch them so badly, then I will be your enemy.” I squeeze my eyes shut because I can't believe what I'm hearing from him.

Darius growls, “You worthless piece of-”

“No, Darius,” I stop him calmly. The look on his face, it's all angry and frowning but it means he can't believe what he's hearing from Philip as I am. 

“You're gonna defend him?!” he yells at my face.

“No.”

“Then what the hell are you doing?!”

I think about it deeply but I couldn't think of any reason. Only a heavy feeling inside my chest. “I don't know,” I answer. “but let me handle this.” I hold his shoulder.

He is gritting his teeth when he turns around violently and walks away. “I'll go back to the bunker,” he says to me with a grinding voice. He's very angry. “You deal with these bastards alone.” He throws his dagger with all of his strength mustered from his anger. Then he disappears, leaving me alone with them.

I turn to look at all of them. They are looking calmer now that Darius is not around anymore. He makes everyone uneasy after all.

“Alright,” I nod. “I believe you, Philip. You're a great friend that I've trusted even now. I'm sure that you're not lying and not being tricked by them.”

“No,” he testifies. “they didn't trick or brainwash me or anything.”

All I could do is nod. Then I've been dying to ask this question the whole time: “Where's Sander?”