Death welcomed Ratten as he walked through a spatial portal, his clothing slightly disturbed but his condition otherwise pristine. Underworld flames graced the walls of the arrival chamber. They were mundane things that had once graced the entire underworld, but in this day and age, they were a rarity.
The door to the chamber opened automatically as he walked towards it; he stopped, just short of a pink monstrosity of a tongue, followed by a second and a third. “Now, now, Cerby,” said Ratten as he dodged the tongues and placed a hand on the lead head of the playful but obedient guardian dog. It was barely three times his height, a travesty if there ever was any. “Daddy’s busy today, Cerby.”
He moved to leave the chamber, but the tongues blocked his way a second time. Ratten rolled his eyes and pulled out a large chunk of meat from his ancient storage ring to produce a chunk of rotting flesh. “Here. Ouroboros flesh. Best thing there is for a growing pup.” The ‘small’ dog leaped on the chunk of divine meat and ignored Ratten as he made his way to the shore of the river sticks.
He’s still so small, but still much bigger than he was 400 years ago. He’d found the puppy frozen in a chunk of underworld ice, with most of its divinity drained away to avoid enemy detection. Such a smart boy. Such a good boy. It had taken centuries of effort to restore a modicum of his power, but the effort had been worth it.
Really, though, it should have taken little more than a decade to recover everything he’d once had. But no, his useless brother just had to capitulate to that stupid fox, all to preserve his admittedly impressive lineage.
Alas, such had always been Ratten’s lot. It was always up to him to make the hard decisions whenever his kin messed things up. That said, could they even be considered kin at this point? Very few remembered the good old days, let alone his old name, which had finally been ripped away from him by the grinding wheel called Historical Amnesia.
“What will it be today, young master?” greeted Ratten’s Chief Butler. His name was Sharn these days. His name hadn’t been ripped away like Ratten’s, but it had been unwillingly modified.
And it’s a much better name than Ratten, to be sure.
“Would you like to soak for a while in the abyssal springs, or would you care for a concert in the Halls of Agony?” continued Sharn. “We’ve many fresh souls on our hands that have yet to experience their first screams.”
Ratten flicked a silver coin at the boatman, who then pushed the slender barge forward through the sickly remains of what had once been a great river. “It’s strictly business today, I’m afraid. I’ll be inspecting the dam and making a few… alterations.”
Sharn was a quiet individual that didn’t speak much beyond obligatory small talk. That was fine by Ratten. Minions were meant to remain silent and leave any monologuing or bantering to their superiors. And when it came to hierarchy, well, let’s just say that he’d been at the very top for a very long time. His brother’s cowardice and the dedication of his blood descendants to play janitor all but cemented Ratten’s seniority.
Though shallow due to Death syphoning souls, the River Styx was wide as twenty barges and was still capable of a peak capacity of ten thousand souls per second. Ratten barely felt a thing as the boatman maneuvered their boat through broken shallows and trapped twists and turns —remnants from the time Heroes looking to prove themselves made a big deal of barging into sacred river.
Sharn’s skills had not diminished in the slightest; the boat soon arrived at an ocean-sized waiting pool where souls resided as they gradually faded into oblivion.
Once upon a time, a large sluice gate would have allowed Ratten to channel these souls into the Underworld Bident. Two things currently stopped him from doing so: the Syphon located so far up the River Styx even he couldn’t reach it—that was where Death split off nine tenths of the souls originally meant for him—and the Dam, a seal on the true form of the Underworld Bident that blocked off the sluice gate, reducing the amount of strength Ratten could drawn on at once from a raging river down to barely a trickle.
“This is as far as I can take you, young master,” said Charon, stopping a few miles out from the dam, just shy of the Seal of the Dreamer.”
“I’ll be back shortly,” said Ratten, stepping out onto the river. Wailing spirits couldn’t help but press up under his feet to produce solid steps that took him past the invisible boundary that would render any mortals or heroes even unconscious.”
“Hypnos, Hypnos,” said Ratten as he approached the seal. “A terrible tragedy, what they did to you.” The ancient God of Sleep’s bones had been ground into the mortar keeping the soul sealing stones of the dam together. Even most Godlings would have no chance at resisting the bound god’s spell.
There were workarounds, of course. Melinoë’s distortion had worked wonders in the earlier days. It was for that reason that the Pandoran Council had pulled her away from Mattapan and pushed her down the inevitable path of betrayal and oblivion.
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They would pay for it, of course. Everyone would pay for what they’d done to him and to every member of his line. If not in this life, then in the afterlife. Their souls were specially marked according to his agreement with Death and would eventually find their way into the Ocean of Oblivion.
The seal was a massive block of impermeable material, largely without flaw save for a small crack where the ocean’s underworld water met the soul-sealing abomination. The flaw had already been there when he’d discovered the place; Ratten suspected that it was a last act of defiance by Hypnos to spite his jailors.
This crack had expanded over the past few centuries. Ratten had spent many reincarnations to dig a tunnel straight into the center of the dam where the true form of the Underworld Bident was sealed. Many seals still suppressed the bident. It was unfortunate, but Ratten’s current strength couldn’t hope to damage or even loosen those seals.
Which was why the Ouroboros was such a wondrous find. Any divine corpse would do, but the Ouroboros’s energies were especially useful in such a situation.
“They’ll soon notice what you took,” said a sleepy voice through the massive stone seal. “A deity without a divine core, even one with the longevity of the Ouroboros, won’t last long without the support of Mount Olympus.”
“Tell someone who cares,” snapped Ratten as retrieved the Ouroboro’s divine crystal. One half of crystal teemed with life, while the other half was rife with death. Using what little authority he currently had, Ratten peeled off layers of divinity and drilled them into the hole in the seal, melting through it as though it were mundane ice to break away not one but three seals.
“Yes, that’s the stuff,” sighed Ratten as he felt three of the chains sealing him away shatter. Death mana filled his body, infusing it with strength that the average demigod of this age wouldn’t be able to achieve. “It’s too bad I need to keep pretending I’m weak. Otherwise, I’d break a few kneecaps and show a few old fogies how terribly wrong they were.”
The chains were broken, but the fragments were still there. Ratten pulled them back into his body and bridged the gaps in the soul-chains links. “You’re not fooling anyone,” came Hypnos’s voice once again. “They know you’re breaking free. They’ll come for you soon enough.”
“Unfortunately for them, they don’t know the extent of my progress and the depths of my plans,” said Ratten. “They’ll also have their hands full once the infiltrators take advantage of the chaos the Ouroboros is causing. Then there’s the excitement that follows once the Ouroboros passes away without a corpse.”
Without a corpse?” muttered Hypnos. “I suppose that makes sense. It never did like you and would do everything in its power not to be reanimated.”
“The Ouroboros has always been loyal to mankind,” continued Ratten. “Since I’m the one who harmed it and those mutts tried to trick it in its vulnerable state, I’m guessing it will either self-destruct in a peaceful location or surprise us with another divine inheritance. Alas, that won’t be enough. I still need a few more distractions.”
“Zombie apocalypse?” suggested Hypnos. “It usually does the trick.”
“Come now,” scolded Ratten. “We’re not savages. We’re civilized now. We need to think beyond the usual plagues and scourges that satisfied the world we once ruled over. That said, Zombie Apocalypse does have a certain flare to it. Maybe I could add in a twist? Maybe the zombies could retain a few memories and have their own culture?”
“A spin on an old trope is always appreciated,” said Hypnos. “It’s much better than trying to reinvent the wheel, in my humble opinion.” A loud yawn sounded from the seal. “Sleep calls, I’m afraid. Your antics have been most draining.”
“Rest well,” muttered Ratten. “Old friend.”
Ratten returned to the barge and plopped down on its single plush seat. “I take it everything went well, young master?” inquired Sharn as the once lord of the underworld poured himself a drink and shot it back.
“Indeed,” said Ratten. “Though I’m afraid I’ve pushed the limits of what’s acceptable. I need a distraction. Zombie Apocalypse is on the table, but I feel it’s lacking a certain… pizazz.”
Sharn snorted. “That old thing? Might have worked back in the day, before the fox took over the chicken coop.”
“Indeed,” said Ratten. “Hope is a difficult enemy to cope with. It thrives on darkness and strengthens in the face of adversity.” A thought then occurred to Ratten. “My dear messenger, is the Ouroboros still rampaging?”
“It’s on its last legs,” answered Sharn. “Shall I deliver a message?”
“Yes, please inform it through discreet channels that the inheritors of Asclepius and Persephone are having a difficult time finding their way,” said Hades. “The former is wrestling with the fox and is well on his way to becoming a permanent instrument, while the latter has been disowned by yours truly and is having a difficult time advancing.”
Sharn paused for a few moments before nodding. “It shall be done but know that delivering this message will reveal one of our demigod agents.”
“A small price to pay for a successful distraction,” said Ratten. “There’s also another things that could prove useful. Weren’t we working on a few side project that we’ve been intentionally delaying?”
“More than a few,” said Sharn. “Shall I move some of them forward?”
“Yes, please move up whichever ones will cause the most chaos in the political scene,” said Ratten. “I want them creating a splash within 3-5 months.”
“It shall be done,” said Sharn. “Though not without making it obvious we were sandbagging the entire time.”
“What do I care?” scoffed Ratten. “They’re the desperate ones. Combined with whatever the Ouroboros cooks up and the incursions by Agents and mutts, I highly doubt the Pandoran Council will have time to inspect the seal for the next few years.”
Sharn’s eyes brightened. “Is it time?”
Ratten nodded. “It’s time. Our work upstream finished a few years back, and the crack has finally expanded enough to grant me the requisite authority. Now would you be a dear and brainstorm what lines would best work for my confrontation with death?”
Sharn took Ratten’s paper and looked over a few well-though through ideas. “I like ‘From Hell’s Heart I stab at thee.”
“Yes, the only problem is making the timing work,” said Ratten. “Perhaps I should hire a choreographer and work on the delivery?”
“It shall be arranged,” said Sharn. “Now please excuse me as I row upstream. The shallows haven’t been kind to these old bones, so I’ll need to give the ship my full attention.”