011: Advance

Laconia slowly climbed the marble stairs, the structure was colossal and its pillars seemed to be built by giants, these were painted with the rarest and most expensive colors known, beautiful purple and light blue tones. The Parthenon, the legendary temple where archons meet, debate and pray, only those chosen to directly serve an archon are called here, whether as advisors, servants or warriors, Laconia had already been here twice, first when she was carried by the red wine archon, her companions were fascinated with their find, the bastard daughter of a lernians, now known as hydras, creatures believed to have possessed five fingers in the dark ages and now only a few prevail on the continent of Hellas, all with four fingers, yet their bodies possessed unique abilities, a strength and resistance that made them seem like living minerals with hard and sometimes sharp scales, but the most incredible thing of all is that they could not die of old age, for this reason it was difficult for them to leave offspring, even more so considering that lernians were neither male nor female, they had no sex and to create an egg they had to build it, killing and mutilating parts of other beings to create a new life, life that sometimes rebelled against the genetics of their ancestors, generating a hybrid, as was the case of Laconia.

-Nothing has changed in five years.

The young woman remembered her first encounter with the five archons, beings of divine force, demigods inhabiting the earth, the semi-hydra trembled with fear in the presence of these beings, at that time she did not understand a word from their mouths, but her intuition was always good and she understood that it was nothing good, the blond man with long hair and a golden fleece was the first to speak, he seemed to laugh at the tall, fat man, full of scars all over his body who was next to Laconia, he had a strong smell of grapes, he was the one who found her and apparently he was no longer interested in continuing taking care of her, so the other four debated.

-I have to escape.

The girl thought, she had already seen how her companions were hunted to be skinned and the fear of ending up the same way filled her head, but the strength and presence of the man who found her prevented her from following her instinct.

-If I make a mistake, I will die.

It was there in front of the five demigods that she manifested her first blessing, without a catalyst ring, a rain of fire shot out in all directions, burning even its bearer who, ignoring the pain, tried to run as fast as she could, but in an impossible feat the man as her side full of the smell of grapes took a sip from a supposedly empty horn and spat out a purple mist that instantly put the girl to sleep. She never forgot that fear, nor that technique.

…

-Captain, captain, what do we do?

Asterion brain needed to think fast, the myrmekes and the cyclops would not make a truce with the heleny even if the world ended, but right now the biggest threat to them was not them.

-Niko, the myrmekes will destroy the stone that blocks the exit, protect them.

-Understood.

Multiple worker ants chewed the stone, slowly gnawing at it, one of the cyclops noticed this and ran straight to them, several myrmekes tried to penetrate its hard stone, but they were just stings for the giant.

-Laconia keep the cyclops and the queen at bay, if one of the two kills the other, it's our end.

The remaining cyclops slaughtered ants everywhere with their clubs and quickly approached the queen until the myrmidons entered into combat, with their wings they flew around the cyclops looking to stab their necks or torsos, but being huge did not prevent them from being fast, quick blows threw the warriors away, some suffering considerable injuries.

-And what will you do?

Normally Laconia wouldn't ask her leader anything, but she couldn't help but wonder how the polemarch would survive in all the chaos.

-I have a plan, quickly get to your positions.

Laconia rushed to defend the ant queen, delaying both of them would be difficult even for a group of hoplites, but the bastard lernian also had a plan, the red archon who found her never had much importance in her life beyond their first encounter, but since childhood she recognized his strength and one always learns something from their superiors, be it for good or for bad.

Gritting her teeth as she took in all the air she could, the bestiary blew out a huge cloud of smoke from her mouth that covered the entire stage where the queen, myrmidons and cyclops were. Laconia couldn't see either and normally it wouldn't be much use to blind yourself and the enemy in a fight, but as long as the order was only to prevent both beasts from killing each other before time, this was the right decision.

- Σφυρηλάτηση -

Dozens of blinded myrmekes charged at the bestiary, but she kept them at bay with her fire armor and as long as she didn't have to defend hoplites or Asterion she could run and glide from one side to the other avoiding stabs from blind angles. The cyclops randomly hit and crushed the ground and the queen buzzed the ears of her myrmidons to make them come back to her.

-As long as the myrmidons are alive, the queen is safe.

On Niko side, several ants tried to climb the cyclops to reach the eye, some even launched themselves from the ceiling of the cavern, but the monster's reflexes were impeccable, a single sweep of its hand cleaned its body and those that launched themselves from the ceiling ended up in the giant mouth. Niko prepared his slingshot with an explosive vase that would impact inside the cyclops' mouth, it was noticeable that the explosion hurt him, but it was not even close to being enough, the small eye was his only weak point and it did not seem easy to hit him with common methods.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

- Πατέρας -

Zeus electric spheres covered the thracian sling and immediately caught the attention of the giant who received the sphere in his face, Niko smiled thinking that he managed to make him retreat until the electricity disappeared and the only thing the young man saw was how the robust eyelid protected the eye as if it were a bronze shield. The cyclops barely stopped for a few moments and continued advancing, time was running out and the ants grinding the stone would be crushed with a single blow, Niko threw spheres one after another, but the beast continued advancing step by step, the myrmekes that climbed his body had no chance, their weapons were unable to penetrate the skin and their mouths barely did any damage, the desperate thracian looked for the polemarch with his eyes across the battlefield, he saw him walk straight towards the cyclops, he stopped for a few moments to look at the young man, pointed his finger upwards and continued his march.

-Come on Niko, you can do it.

Niko himself didn't know if those words came from him or from his partner ahead, but he knew what he had to do, he quickly accelerated, reaching the polemarch in the blink of an eye and jumping straight towards the cyclops, he sought to climb him along with the ants to reach the eye with his sword, Asterion on his side would give him that opportunity, he took all the air he could and then.

-¡I am the stone in your way damn cyclops!

Asterion was smaller than the myrmekes so the cyclops never found out about his presence and he knew another weak point of these creatures, he took his spear with both hands and impaled the flesh between the cyclops big toe and nail, like a huge splinter the spear went halfway into the giant, who immediately kicked forward, Asterion got as close to the finger as he could so as not to be hit but pushed by it, although he could do nothing but wish for luck to survive the impact of being thrown by a cyclops. The impact was extremely hard, the shield on his back was completely broken and if it weren't for the leather helmet perhaps his skull would be like that too, Asterion writhed on the ground in pain and lack of air, he couldn't breathe and clumsily tried to take off his armor as quickly as possible. Niko didn't look back, he just silently thanked his captain for the opportunity, the cyclops' kick was followed by multiple myrmekes imitating Asterion and burying their spears into the flesh between their nails causing the giant to fall to his knees with force in an attempt to keep all the ants off his body, but Niko skill was immaculate, he ran like a marathoner along the cyclops back until he reached his closed eye, but with sword in hand it would be a different story. Those blessed by Zeus fervently study the muscles of their enemies to activate or deactivate them with their electric shocks.

-Orbicularis oculi muscle.

The thracian buried his electrified sword just above the eye and the giant's eyelid instantly opened and the last thing he was able to see was Niko jumping in front of him spinning his sling, filled with the blessing of his god, who once in the past, also blessed his race.

-Goodbye.

The electric sphere hit directly in the eye, the humors inside the eye evaporated instantly and only a bloody cloud remained in the socket, the body of the monster collapsed in instant death just a few steps from the thracian, who recovered his sword and hurried back to his leader.

-CAPTAIN!

Myrmekes surrounded Asterion who could barely breathe, his mouth only tasted of iron from his blood as he leaned his back against the wall, he was desperate until he looked up and quickly smiled with happiness when he saw his thracian who cut the throats of the ants and placing himself in front of his polemarch, he prepared in his sling the explosive vessels that he still had left to keep the myrmekes at bay.

-Good job Niko.

-Thanks for the help captain.

-Now we just have to wait for the rock to be destroyed.

Only a small group of ants stayed to attack the men, the rest quickly ran to defend the queen.

The ant queen was in trouble, the two cyclops were constantly sweeping away her offspring and her myrmidons were not able to do considerable damage, but she was still considerably still, she was not participating in the fight and Laconia was worried about this, the smoke screen had already dissipated and Laconia was doing her best to delay the cyclops with fireballs to the face and protecting the myrmidons. One of the giants raised his club and was about to crush the queen, Laconia had no way to avoid the attack, but the queen did, who from her mouth shot a shower of corrosive saliva on the Cyclops's face, he managed to close his eye, but the liquid still burned his body, while she brought her hand to her face the queen counterattacked and stabbed the cyclops stomach with her hand, his companion tried to help him, but Laconia and the Myrmidons would not let him open his eye and continued to lacerate him all over his body, the bestiary had enough to deliver a lethal blow, but a harmless spark passed in front of her, it had been thrown by Niko who could barely protect Asterion against the myrmekes, Laconia rushed to defend her companions. Upon arriving she quickly eliminated the problems, lifted Asterion onto her shoulder and ran towards the exit.

-The myrmekes have already cleared the exit, let's go.

Hundreds of ants entered through the stone path, Laconia and Niko jumped on them, the bestiary fire armor protected them from any attack.

-Don't you have any more smoke screens left?

-It takes me even longer to generate one than to recover my blessings.

More and more myrmekes appeared, but with the distance they simply ignored the phalanx and all ran to the nest, as soon as the ants stopped appearing light infiltrated into the labyrinth, the exit was in front of them.

Upon leaving they found themselves on the slopes of a mountain in a leafy forest, the cyclops's sheep were grazing peacefully and the phalanx was finally able to rest, Asterion touched Laconia wings so that she would put him down, only getting her to let him go making him fall like a sack to the ground.

-Damn it, why am I the only one injured? You did a terrible job, slaves.

Both companions lightly hit their leader's forehead and said the same word.

-Fool.

Seeing him smile, everyone calmed down and decided to enjoy the mild climate and the feeling of the grass on their backs.

-And now what captain?

-I'm tired of thinking. What do you want to do?

Laconia sat next to Asterion; a tiny drop of saliva fell on the polemarch.

-Sheep…

-HAHA, well, Miss Laconia, I don't think the cyclops’s would notice a missing a sheep.

-Well, that's a good plan, maybe you should be the polemarch.

-Don't say that captain, I enjoy seeing you lying in battle.

Laconia kept looking at the sheep and remembered the first time she saw Asterion, sixteen is the last year of academy for young people, that was the second time she met the five archons in the Parthenon, they had trained her to be a soldier and the archons still had not decided who of them she would serve, behind them were their polemarches, warriors specialized in military strategy, strength and intelligence were their principles and all chosen by the archons as the top of these, but one of them stood out for only one of these, the youngest of the crowd with short brown hair and gray eyes. The archon dioskouroi(1) was the first to raise his voice.

-My phalanxes are the first to fight against the forces of the minotaurs, my ranks need the strength of Lerna among their ranks.

The swift-footed archon followed him.

-Maybe you are the first to defend, but you are not the first to attack, my phalanxes are the ones who take the minotaurs' territories, the stronger soldiers my polemarches have, the faster we will take care of those beasts.

The youngest of the archons took the floor.

-If it weren't for my phalanxes the mycenaeans would have already annihilated us, we are the ones who protect our caravans and resources. Are you going to go to war without weapons or food? First, we must accumulate more strength.

Jason continued consulting his polemarches on what to do, the last to speak was Asterion.

-Tell me young polemarch, can you think of how to calm these animals?

-Mmmh, if they're not going to stop competing even if the world ends, why don't we just give them that?

-What do you suggest?

-Don't play with me, Archon, you know what I mean.

Our phalanxes compete in the coliseum to obtain a bestiary with the potential of an archon. All the archons accepted excitedly.

Laconia realized that it was the boy who gave the idea because he was the only one who had his hand on her face, apparently this was not what he was referring to, the young woman could not help but laugh silently when she saw his reaction and also felt slightly better, battle is all she knew so she was glad that at least if someone was going to use her as a tool, that person would be someone strong.

Dioskouroi(1): Children of Zeus.