I got in a fun weekend with my freinds - chapter 17
The arena bleachers creaked under the weight of restless campers. Nobody wanted to be here, but Dionysus insisted on making an "announcement."
He stood on the platform, hair messy, tunic wrinkled, and—for some reason—not drunk yet. He cleared his throat with unusual sobriety.
"So," he said flatly, "me and the old goat decided it's time for the monthly Parents Day. Yay."
Silence. Not even a cough.
Dionysus frowned, reached into his sleeve, and pulled out a bottle of wine. He took a long swig, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Who are we kidding? None of you are going to see your parents. You'll just run around the city streets, buy snacks, and waste drachmas. But, whatever." He waved his hand dismissively. "It's the weekend. Go. Save the camp some money."
He took another gulp, then keeled over, unconscious, rolling off the platform with a thud.
No one cheered, but everyone took the hint.
But at the beach day pov:
The mortal sun felt almost fake after weeks under camp skies. Ethan kicked water up as he dove into the waves, laughing. Beside him, Eden swam with practiced strokes, his movements cutting the tide like he belonged in it.
Closer to shore, Enlight sat half-buried in sand, scrolling on his phone without looking up. A shade umbrella leaned over him like a lazy sentinel.
Clarita sat a few feet away, cross-legged, sculpting lopsided sand castles with surprising dedication. She squinted at the towers, brushing stray grains into place as if the castle might actually stand against the tide.
"Having fun without us?" a voice teased.
Ethan turned. Leyla strolled down the beach with Jean at her side. Leyla wore jean shorts over her swimsuit, trying to hide her discomfort. Jean, however, had no shame—grinning like a cat that caught a bird.
Jean's eyes slid toward Clarita. "Ohhh, looking good in a swimsuit. Fifteen and already starting to develop, huh?"
Clarita rolled her eyes without even looking up. "You're fifteen too."
Jean shrugged. "True. Can we join?"
Leyla sighed, already regretting coming here
The sun blazed overhead as Clarita adjusted her sand castle moat. She tilted her head, then noticed something gleaming on Jean's wrist.
"Wait—who gave you that cute bracelet with your name on it?" she asked.
Jean grinned, flashing it proudly. "From that little shop down the street. The guy there is soooo hot."
Her voice dragged the word like she was hiding something, which of course meant she was.
Clarita pouted. "Aww, I want one! But… I've got no money on me."
She looked at Leyla expectantly.
Leyla huffed, folding her arms. "Okay, I took the hint. I'll get you one."
She marched off toward the shop, muttering under her breath.
The bell jingled as she pushed open the door. Trinkets glimmered in the sunlight, bracelets and charms hanging in neat rows. She stepped up to the counter.
"Excuse me—"
The clerk turned slowly.
Leyla froze. "W–what the actual—Abyss?!"
He looked at her with the same dead-serious expression he wore in battle. "Yes. Why? Did you see a ghost?"
Her jaw dropped. "What are you doing here?"
"My first real time in mortal society," Abyss said evenly, as if he were explaining the weather. "I've lived in Olympus or in the middle of monsters. I mean, sure—I came here before, recruiting demigods. But I've never interacted with humans."
He tapped the counter casually. "I asked the shop owner if I could try being… normal. After some weird looks and questions I ignored, he agreed."
Here a pov of a previous time shown:
The shop owner, Marco, had been minding his own business when the door opened and blocked out the sun.
He looked up. Then kept looking up.
The young man ducking through his doorway was built like someone had taken the concept of a person and scaled it incorrectly. Six feet, nine inches of sharp angles and complete stillness. He stood in the middle of the shop and stared at a wind chime like it had personally offended him.
Marco cleared his throat. "Can I… help you?"
The young man turned. His eyes were unsettling — not mean, just utterly unreadable, like looking at a wall that happened to have a face.
"I want to understand how normal people spend time," he said flatly. "I have observed a shop. This is a shop."
Marco blinked. "...Yes."
"I would like to work here temporarily."
A long pause.
Marco glanced at him — the height, the jawline, the way he stood like a statue someone forgot to finish like a Greek god— and then at the empty shop, and then at the bracelet display that hadn't sold anything since Tuesday.
Maybe autism, Marco thought privately. "But very tall and handsome autism. Good for business."
"Sure, kid."
He started Marco off gently, showing him how to thread cord through the small letter beads. Abyss watched with the intense focus of someone memorizing a battle formation.
"Like this," Marco said. "You loop it here, pull it through — it's not complicated."
Abyss said nothing. He picked up the cord. His fingers, which looked designed for breaking things, moved with strange precision. He threaded the first bead.
Then the second.
Then he held up a completed bracelet in about forty seconds.
Marco stared at it. "That's… actually really good."
Abyss looked at the bracelet. Then at Marco. "I know."
"You've done this before?"
"No."
Marco didn't have a response to that.
The bell above the door jingled and Jean strolled in, already grinning before she'd even fully entered.
"Oh wow," she said, looking up. And up. "Abyss. You're working a bracelet stand."
"Temporarily," he said, not looking up from the display he was reorganizing with unsettling neatness.
Jean leaned on the counter. "How's mortal life treating you?"
"Inefficient," he said. "But the craft is tolerable."
Jean tilted her head, watching his hands move. "You actually look like you're enjoying it."
He paused for exactly one second. "I didn't say that."
Jean laughed. Marco hovered nearby, pretending to dust a shelf, clearly fascinated.
Jean picked up one of the completed bracelets and turned it over. "Okay these are actually cute. Did you make this?"
"Yes."
"Can you make me one?"
Abyss looked at her for a moment. Then, without a word, he picked up the cord and began threading. Jean watched, resting her chin on her hand.
"So," she said, "you just asked a random shop owner if you could work here?" Which the shop owner said that he is not random he's the best trinket maker in the... Beach
"I asked if I could learn how normal people operate in commercial spaces."
"And he said yes?"
Marco, from behind the shelf: "He has a very convincing face."
Jean snorted.
Abyss finished the bracelet and set it in front of her. Jean held it up — her name, perfectly spaced, the knots even and tight.
"Okay this is better than anything in the actual display case," she said.
Marco looked slightly wounded.
Abyss studied his own work briefly. Then he nodded once, as if confirming something to himself, and began untying his apron.
"You're leaving?" Marco asked.
"I've learned what I came to learn."
"But — you're good at this. You could stay, maybe just another hour—i am paying if you would young man"
Marco's phone buzzed on the counter. He glanced at it. Calling: Rosa 🌹
His wife.
He answered immediately. "Sì, sì — no, I'm at the shop — Rosa, I told you — yes, I'll bring bread—"
He shuffled to the back room, voice dropping into rapid, apologetic Italian.
Abyss watched him go, then looked back at Jean.
"That's love," Jean said, nodding toward the back room. "Terrifying, right?"
Abyss said nothing. He set the apron on the counter, straightened a rack of charms that didn't need straightening, and moved toward the door.
"Tell the others I'm here if they need anything," he said.
She grinned at her screen she gotta to take a selfie with abyss as she then goes outside she gotta to set Leyla up.
Welp now that's done back to the presents.
Then his eyes flicked toward her outfit. "…Also, what are you wearing?"
Leyla stiffened, glancing down at her swimsuit under the jean shorts. Her cheeks flushed. "Shut up."
Abyss leaned forward slightly, a rare smirk tugging at his lips. "So—you wanted a bracelet?"
Leyla swallowed, then nodded. "For me and Clarita."
"Fine." He set to work, hands surprisingly delicate as he crafted the bracelets.
Leyla grabbed them quickly and bolted out of the shop, half running, half stomping. When she reached the beach, she shoved one into Clarita's hand and immediately punched Jean in the arm.
"You knew he was in there, didn't you?!"
Jean only grinned wider. "Maybeee~"
Though Ethan pov
Ethan and Eden kicked a worn-out football across the beach, their laughter scattering with the waves.
Eden passed too hard—thunk. The ball smacked into the chest of a tall boy leaning against the pier.
The guy turned, his eyes dark and mean. "You looking for trouble, kid?"
Ethan blinked. He could've crushed this guy with a flick of strength, but the sudden hostility threw him off. His hands twitched uncertainly at his sides.
Then a voice rumbled behind them.
"That guy's with me."
The sand shifted, rising like a dune come alive. Out stepped a figure broad as a wall, shoulders scarred, grin sharp enough to cut glass. He caught the delinquent's wrist mid-swing and squeezed until bones popped.
The guy yelped before sprinting off down the beach.
Eden exhaled. "Ethan—that's Leo. The chosen of Ares."
Ethan stared. The air around Leo practically hummed with raw aggression, his presence like a battlefield condensed into one body.
Swallowing his nerves, Ethan blurted, "C–can you train me?"
Leo raised a brow. "Train you?"
Ethan nodded, eyes burning with honesty. "Clarita's already titled. She's stronger. And me? I… feel weak. I don't want to stay weak."
Leo stepped closer, looming until Ethan had to tilt his chin up to meet his gaze. His grin was all sharp edges.
"Look into my eyes, kid. You'll never beat a titled Demigod." He let the words linger, heavy as iron. Then, his grin softened—just slightly. "But I can train you to be a good fighter. Maybe even dangerous."
The smirk returned, wolfish. "Up for it?" then later everyone sat together first who spoke enlight
"Why are mortals arguing about Harmonic Cythera again…?"
Ethan glanced over. "Who?"
"Some ancient figure people turned into a self-improvement icon,"
Enlight muttered. "Forums, podcasts, weird motivational edits."
Jean snorted. "Isn't that the guy they call 'the man untouched by emotion'?"
Enlight looked genuinely disturbed.
"…If only they knew bro how corny that is some people associate him with toxic masculinity."
Of course not everywhere was rainbow and sunshine where it flips to the iraclis society
"We need to be acknowledged!" one of them hissed, pacing. "The gods can't just ignore us forever. We—"
A sharp voice cut through the murmurs. "We literally ate a god's heart! We are not forgiven!"
A tense silence fell over the room. Some nodded, others lowered their heads, while a few shook their fists, their faces etched with defiance.
"Not really," another said, voice rough. "I was cursed by some gods to be like this. Most of us are. We didn't choose our path, but that doesn't mean we're powerless."
The argument escalated, passion and resentment colliding like storms. They were on the edge of chaos when the air shifted—a chill that made the candles flicker, shadows stretching unnaturally.
And then he arrived.
Garon, the god of slavery, stepped through the cracked archway. His presence alone seemed to sap the room of light. He didn't speak at first; his dark eyes swept over them, measuring, weighing, claiming.
Then, with a slow, deliberate motion, he raised his hand. Chains, black and writhing like living things, shot forth and wrapped around every member of the Society. They screamed, struggled, cursed, but it was useless. Garon's control was absolute.
"You want revenge?" he asked, voice like grinding metal. "So do I."
The chains tightened, cutting off breath, stopping movement. Even in their fear, some tried to resist, but his power pressed against them like iron walls.
A sinister smile crept across his face. "Hey… why don't we work together?"
The room erupted in panicked shouts and futile struggles, the clanging of chains echoing through the ruined hallways. Desperation and fury collided in one violent rhythm, but one truth remained undeniable: none of them had a chance against a god who had claimed dominion over bondage itself.
And somewhere in the distant shadows, the Iraclis Society realized a terrible truth: some battles could not be fought with hearts alone. Some wars were only just beginning.
The air trembled. The chains tightened. And Garon's laughter rolled through the ruins, a sound colder and heavier than any darkness they had ever known if he said he was the devil they would believe.