7 Titanomachy (I)

The Titanomachy had begun. The Great War between gods and Titans for complete dominion of the mortal world. The first battle had been fought after Cronos had recovered and ordered the cleaning of his throne room and the call for Atlas who he considered to be his greatest and most loyal general. Atlas answered the call albeit begrudgingly he had recently (for an immortal) had his children and he feared that Cronos would hurt them in retaliation for his disobedience.

Even if he was sure that there was a chance he could win against Cronos, for his physical strength was beyond the other titans, he couldn't say the same for his powers, while he had control of the earth to cause devastating earthquakes, Cronos possessed control over aspects of time, he could peer into different timelines seeing how his enemy would make their moves, and even accelerate or backtrack time over an area or a being.

But he knew that in the end, it was just an excuse, the reason he didn't rebel was that he was afraid because he was a coward, he would try to justify it, saying that in their rule mankind lived in a golden age, but that wasn't true mankind was oppressed by the constant fear of their divine rulers. Many titans had devasted human settlements for one reason or another mainly because they were bored and found oppressing the ones they were meant to rule as 'fun'.

Atlas knew all of that, and he would never agree with that part of his mind that named him a coward, so he hid behind the facade of the loyal general fighting against the rebel children of the great king that would cast his domain into chaos. Because that was all he had or at least that was what he told himself.

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The war had not yet achieved its heights that would come to much later, only three years had passed but even then the lands had many scars in them. Lakes and rivers were boiled until only the rising streams remained, mountains were torn open from the earth and hurled at the enemy, volcanos, ancient geological beings that slept since time immemorial awoke at last and bathed the earth with fire and the skies with ash that blocked the sun.

Cronos was not the only one with an army at his back and call, Zeus had been communicating for decades with dozens of minor gods who were oppressed by the Titans, playing on their hatred and anger he had managed to gain the direct alliance of many of them even before he had freed his siblings, he had bolstered of the fact to them with his usual pride but grew irritated when Hades said to him that an alliance forged by hatred was fragile at best.

He had scoffed at his words, but he would be haunted by them in the future.

The minor gods had been divided into six different divisions one for each Olympian as they were now called since they had made their base of operations on Mount Olympus, all of them would lead their divisions against the Titans in various conflicts, such as Poseidon fight in the oceans against loyalists of Cronos. Oceanus had decided to throw his lot with the Olympians much to Cronos's immense rage, he helped Poseidon on the seafront.

Zeus had taken the fight against Iapetos and his children Menoetius and Epimetheus, his other children Atlas and Prometheus were both on the frontlines of the war, Atlas serving as the leader of the Titan forces and Prometheus serving as his Chief Strategist since he had a mind that was built for the strategy of a conflict, he knew just how exactly to navigate the lines between victory and defeat and for that he was much appreciated by his brother.

Hades had decided to join the frontlines, his talents making him a nightmare to the Titans as he and his forces could mask themselves from their sight, and strike at any moment, he had fought against Kreios and his children: Astraeus, Pallas, and Perses. They were all a dangerous combination as their powers augmented the other to invoke acts of untold destruction.

Hera, Hestia, and Demeter were embroiled in their battlefronts against many of the Titans, such as Hyperion and Coeus who were the most aggressive of the Titans even surpassing Kreios and his children in their ferocity.

These of course were not all of the Titans and the Olympians knew that and so were wary of any surprise attacks or offensives.

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Hades had thought that he was prepared for the Titanomachy, to say that he wasn't was an understanding, the conflict was something in legends, the geography of the land had been changed by the conflict, forests were burned and lakes and rivers had been evaporated into pure steam, the constant ash storm had blocked the sun a long time ago and coupled with the rivers of lava it was truly hell on earth.

He had also discovered that he was quite larger than he expected, entire forests were little more than simple ground, and if they were not larger or deep enough, cliffs and mountains mattered very little to him.

His training had paid off as his powers came very handy, especially his invisibility as he could not only obfuscate not only himself but also his forces from the enemy, ambushes and surprise attacks were their specialty, this didn't mean that they couldn't face the enemy head-on, he just didn't want to wait for his troops to regenerate, as they were gods they possessed phenomenal regenerative powers but even they took time to get up again. And immortality did not mean that they didn't feel pain.

Of course, he had other priorities at the moment as he dodged a beam of silver starlight thicker than some mountains.

Kreios's gaze was filled with hatred that was concentrated solely on him. Hades had launched a surprise attack on Kreios and his children who were moving to support Iapetus against Zeus, Hades had founded them by complete accident as he was moving towards Hyperion as the Titan had retreated after he was made to retreat against the attacks of Hestia, who had managed to wound him with her fire which was something that had never happened before.

Even when he warred against his Father he hadn't been wounded, the feeling of pain was foreign to him and so he retreated in fear, even though he could have pushed on against Hestia and scored a victory for the Titans.

"Insolent brat give me your life!" Kreios roared as he launched beam after beam of starlight, Kreios had been the only one who had gained his father's ability of Stellar Manipulation, as his body who was composed of silver starlight and rock could attest to, this meant that he could manipulate the energy of stars which he used to brag in the past. "Sorry can't do that," Hades' answer only caused Kreios to blast the entire surface in front of him in an attempt to get rid of the god.

Hades sank into the shadows, an after effect of the skies of the mortal world being covered in ashes, is that he didn't need to concentrate on creating shadows as they were plenty of them around for him to use, he then emerged behind Kreios back having traveled in them. He launched himself in the air and created a gaping maw of darkness that consumed all light it touched as it headed straight towards Kreios who simply scoffed and waved his hand unleashed a wave of starlight against the darkness.

Light and dark crashed against each other, causing a shockwave that spread across the ruined battlefield, for a time the two forces were locked in a stalemate before the darkness started to give in which made Kreios laugh aloud, did this so-called 'God' really think that he could stop his light. But Hades was not worried that was right into his plan, even as he was consumed by the starlight of Kreios his expression was never of pain or anger, but of fulfillment.

Kreios was about to gloat when he felt something wrong, the light which consumed the little god was now rapidly shrinking seeing this Kreios quickly cut off the flow of energy to the star beam. The light then shrunk itself until it was fully gone revealing Hades who was unharmed by the attack much to Kreios shock.

"You know, this is pretty new to me so forgive me if it is unrefined" Kreios was about to ask what in Tartarus he was saying when the world went red.

Upon the land that would be known as Rhodes in the distant future, Hades fired a beam of red starlight at Kreios who was knocked back by the sheer power of the attack, the mighty Titan fell to the earth causing cracks to appear in its surface, Kreios rock and star skin was cracked and torn open, causing him to bleed. Kreios had never experienced this much pain in his existence, but he wasn't an Elder Titan for nothing as he immediately started trying to get up and at the same time trying to comprehend how had Hades gained this power. He had faced the little god before and he had not shown this level of strength or even the use of this new power.

That was the moment that he understood, Hades had been playing with him baiting him to attack him again and again until he fired that gargantuan wave of starlight, all to absorb it.

"Oh," Hades smirked his body covered in the red aura of a star, which was made from Kreios own power, absorbed and transformed to be made of use by the eldest Olympian "You have figured out not that it is going to help you, thanks to you I don't need to concentrate I can just use your power" Kreios tried to get up but was met with a wave of red starlight, which knocked him to the ground and made new wounds appear in his body as well as worsening the ones already there.

Kreios was lifted by a red aura and made to kneel before his enemy, and he was too weak and in too much pain to do anything. "You are going to be my test subject on this Kreios" Hades then lifted his right hand and blasted Kreios with his red starlight, the light dug into Kreios expanding itself into his entire body, his eyes, and mouth lighted up as he screamed in pain and fear.

There were two ways to kill a god, one method was to use a weapon or artifact of power that could destroy them, the other method was being a being of greater power, Hades did not have the fist but he was the latter, at least in comparison to Kreios.

"Father!" all three of the Creionides shouted in anger and worry, they had been busy handling Hades army and had heard their father scream in pain and were now making their way to his position in a hurry. They had always believed in their father's strength but to see him laid low like that made them feel an immense level of shock.

They had been treating this conflict like some kind of joke especially after they had shown their superiority over the Olympians, but as the years passed the Olympians grew more and more experienced with not only their powers but also on the matters of war.

Hades did not look at them but raised his left hand-fired in their direction, a gargantuan beam of red light hit them in full, it was not enough to hurt them but it was still strong enough that when it washed over them it started to push them back.

"Worried over your father aren't you!" Hades shouted at the Creionides but he never turned his head over to them, his gaze solely focused on the screaming Kreios "I really can't say the same thing! But don't worry after I am done with him I am going make sure you four are reunited!"

Hades only had spared a minimum of his attention to the three Creionides, but the rest of it was focused on Kreios, killing an immortal was not an easy thing to do if you did not have an artifact of great power, Hades had to use his forces to make something that should have seen the end of the universe meet its end. It was a straining effort even for a god which is why he had focused almost all of his concentration on killing the Titan.

This is also why he didn't erect any defenses against the giant fist, which hit him and sent him straight to a nearby volcano.

"A-Atlas?" The heavily injured Kreios groaned out before falling to the floor, his sons quickly came over to check on him and the results were severe. The attacks of Hades had cracked open his skin. and several of his internal organs were now visible, it was only thanks to his immortality that he wasn't dead.

"Take him to Othrys" Atlas ordered the Creionides which proceeded to do exactly that.

Atlas waited for Hades to resurface, and he did not have to wait for long as the top of the volcano exploded and Hades appeared. He was severely wounded by that single hit of Atlas, he wasn't called the Titan of Strenght for nothing after all. Seeing this threat Hades decided he needed to go all out on the Titan.

Shadows gathered themselves around his body, molding and shaping themselves into armor that covered his whole body, then not only the recently acquired and mastered Starlight but also fire and ice, along with heat and cold. His body was surrounded by an aura that was both cold and hot and flames and ice were created and extinguished/melted around him.

Atlas saw all of this and if he didn't know any better he would confuse Hades for a monster belonging to Tartarus.

He flew towards Atlas, "You know I would have preferred Cronos but I am going to enjoy this anyway" His voice was distorted, sounding daemonic rather than the regal voice he was known for even amid battle.

Atlas remained silent, noticing from the corner of his eye how the army of Hades had retreated, rightfully thinking that they would only serve as distractions between the fight of the two. Hades charged at Atlas and the latter did the same.