14 Universal Death: Chapter 10 ~ Darkness in the Sea
A Year Later
Deep into the wastelands of the underworld, where throughout the land, no life can be naturally found, practically abandoned by every divine figure that weren't hiding away.
But there was one section where seemingly, small, incredibly small portion of the land of the dead, had small amounts of life growing, mostly trees, a few couple dozen, but the fact that there was any at all would've caused Anciant figures to blink at it in confusion.
Especially one in the middle that seemed to be the center of these sprouting trees.
Demeter for the past year has been busy, now free from the stomache she has spent most of her life in, she was free to experiment and grow her divinity in ways she couldn't even dream of before.
With newfound freedom she grew all sorts of flora that, while not in the same light of wonder as their sister, the rest of Siblings did find enjoyment out of the new colors, especially Hera.
It was a mixture of natural and artificial, each of the six added something to the mix of their hide away that soon became a home, they expanded from the original tree to down below and to the side making an actual building,
Demeter has structured the tree in such a way that even if it was hollowed out with us living in it and below, it was actually still alive, it did look pleasing to the eyes though.
It was a mixture of all sorts of styles, not that any of his siblings realized they were following any, though he thoroughly enjoyed their looks of bewilderment and amazement on what I have created with my power with what I could remember of the modern era.
Couches, chairs, lanterns, all of these were part of the small handful of memories I had of my past life, after a while, I almost forgot that there was a life before my arrival to the stomach, as having so few of these memories and spending so many years in Kronos.
He attempted to have his siblings train, though he only managed to succeed to small ways, Hestia at the least enjoyed making food, but other than that, she no longer really needed to continuously conjure fire, especially when we lived in this much greenery.
Demeter, seemed to enjoy making her plants, so he didn't really need to convince her, she experimented extensively with her power in any chance she got.
Hera,…well there wasn't really anything she could do with her domains, and even when he tried to get her to learn power through general divinity magic, she was resisting every step of the way.
The only one who seemed to actually enjoy the training to get stronger, now free to grow, he was taking every chance to make his water deadlier.
There wasn't really any way to teach them weaponry, any weapon he tried to make, they would end up breaking in the matter of minutes, or at least Demeter and Poisedon did, Hestia and Hera seemingly had a hard time learning as they awkwardly swang.
So he eventually gave up on that for the moment.
I, Hades, in the other hand had to much to learn, and hard time learning any of it, Death while the easiest, the only thing he had as a target was Demeter's plants, but she didn't exactly like it when I went about hurting her flora, so that was left on the back burner.
Commanding the Undead isn't really viable against the Titans, and he had the feeling, at the moment Weaver of Destiny will only be frustrating and practically useless until he had tons of proficiency in it.
Life, wasn't exactly the priority at the moment, perhaps when he can actually properaly defend himself, he could learn Renewal to be capable of healing his family later on.
Creation has two power to it that I taken, which was literally to create…and what essentially amounted to Damage Control.
He decided on learning on Days of Genesis, for the simple reason that it had tons of uses, be it combat or everyday life, if he so needed a weapon? He shall bring it forth, if he needed a hard wall to block attacks? So be it, need a place to sit? Here's a chair.
Herculean Might, was an obvious choice, he needed strength to fight strength, his baseline power may of risen from becoming an Ananta, but he held no delusion he will be overpowering his foe with it alone.
Movement Master is a much, it's something he believes will actually be an advantage against Kronos and his siblings, they had strength, but there was a chance he could just our speed them.
He had no clue how strong Charon's Hand would be at pulling the soul out, as he wasn't actually sure if it even a possibility at this point, what if when he unlocks it it will simply be strong enough to pull out mortal's souls and not much else without long training sessions.
Though he thought Night Child could be incredibly useful, he already had a lot on his plate to consider it at the moment, and he doubted freezing the Titans would be easy, and unlike the Eldritch Old Gods he might need to later face, Monster's Maw isn't useful here.
…he was actually very tempted on taking up Psionic Godhood, but with everything he wants to learn, he will have to decide between this and Night Child when he learned what he considers to be immediate priority.
All in all,…he decided on the first three he must Learn, Herculean Might, Movememt Master, and Days of Genesis.
Those three he much learn at all cost.
Though not master, as that would take too long, he just needed to learn to access them for now.
Which was what he has spent most of his time learning through several meditation sessions and trying to sense his own energy.
When he finally arrived back to the black void, surrounded by several flames in a circle, he reached out for the White Flame, Creation.
It had numerous uses, both for combat and everyday life, he had spent three months constantly grinding it to be useful, in the beginning he was only capable of making a small flame or a small pebble, now he can properly make things like a chair or a decently sized boulder.
His goal was to have this reach the level of being able to create barriers to block attacks, though knowing that his opponents are Titans, the goal…won't be anywhere near ready.
Now, as for his second ability, he was honestly stumped which direction to go in, it was basically a question between speed or strength.
Though speed provided flight, strength also provided durability, either of those were valuable to him, he couldn't go about battle without either, speed was needed to dodge and to even be able to hit in the first place, while at the same time it was important to be able to take a hit and make attacks you do matter.
In the end, he decided on Herculean Might, it didn't matter that much in the long run considering he planned on working in both of them, it was just a question in what he worked in next.
He also needed to figure out if there was a difference in using other Aspects, and there was, though it wasn't entirely obvious until you utilized your second aspect.
Initially, he hadn't noticed that his White Fires of Creation had felt incredibly dense, it was as of matter was spilling out of it, while at the same time it was almost like it was transparent, only existing as an image unless utilized.
Destruction was very different, he flinched when he first grabbed it, it felt angry, and yet it felt like nothing, it was burning red and black, and he felt phantom heat in high degrees.
Freedom was very refreshing though, The Blue and White Flames felt lighter than air, it was a cool breeze and for a moment I though I was high on something.
It has taken the better part of the year to get these to usuable degrees, he was decently strong, decently fast, and he can create basic elements and shields.
…and he had no clue how it all measured up to a Titan, he couldn't imagine them being weaker than this, but it was certainly possible they were leagues greater.
At the very least, he wanted four things covered, strength, durability, speed, and versatility.
All he had left to do with himself was to improve on them.
"H-How's this," said a Poseidon, sounding like speaking was difficult for the moment.
He currently had a string of water floating around his palm.
I stared at the piece of string, and stated, "sure, try releasing some" as I was currently standing a few feet away watching him.
It may be small in appearance, words could not describe how surprised I was when Poseidon apparently after just a few months managed to fit a small pond into that small and contained amount.
Doesn't sound as impressive as my potential strength and ability to create out of nothing…but the amount of water there…compressed to that degree? It's kinda concerning.
The problem?
PSHOOOO
"Argh," Poseidon grunted in annoyance, as the water that he attempted to release in a controlled fashion, exploded in him.
He could contain it with difficulty, but releasing it in the form of a line was hard, as it ended up going from all sides instead of in a single direction, he was already entirely focusing on compressing it, so it was difficult already trying to form some sort longer tube to put a shape to the water.
To be honest, I wasn't entirely sure what to try to teach him other than weapons and basic body conditioning.
I didn't know many water techniques that utilized water too special from each other, they each basically had the same idea of compressing the water for more energy or literally just throwing enough to drown the opponent.
Like the first thing that comes to mind when I think of "cool water moves" is the water dragon from naruto, sure it may look impressive…but if it didn't have anything that actually made it as threatening as the real deal? It's kinda a waste.
The only other thought was to somehow help him make weapons out of the water, and too some extend it works, however after hitting something with it, which destroys the the thing in the process with that much sudden pressure (poor tree), it kinda used up the weapon and needed to be reformed.
So a work in progress.
Lightning on the other hand, yeah, that's has been used soo many times to the point if I were to help my youngest sibling, who I was sure used lightning, memories were coming in everyday, many not as useful as I hoped-
Wait where was I? Right, if I were to even help him recreate half of what I remember, well it would seem like to the others that I was heavily favoring them.
This family…has kinda a lot of severe jealousy issues that tend to have them strike out, other than Hestia of course, too the point I kinda wanna avoid that as much as possible.
The point is, I need to come up with unique ways for water to be used to avoid that outcome.
…or
Am I thinking this the wrong way? Like I can see Fire not being used any differently either most of the time, their either bigger fire or compressed versions of it.
I remember some being able to raise the temperatures of the flames to being blue, and the Endeavor's fight with it showing various ways compressed fire could be used.
…maybe I should encourage him to be creative? Like instead of trying to create one water string that can cut a boulder, instead spread out the pressure to five to crush it instead.
He's still a child in god terms, despite the fact he's a teenager to the mortals, he is bound to grow more into his power, and therefore control to be able to achieve the desired affect.
…Until I remembered something, something that might actually be incredibly useful to him if he somehow managed to achieve it.
"Hey…," I called out to Poisedon who for the past minute was trying to regather the water to reattempt the pinpoint attack.
He gave me a glance, I asked him with a small smile (smirk) on my face, "how possible do you think it is to literally be able to turn your body into water,".
He stared, blinked, shook his head and gave me a bewildered look, with his only response being a "what?".
There was a lot of screams of frustration in the following months as I repeatedly passed a stick against his side.
Hestia wasn't amused I gathered when she twisted my ear.
