Prologue - The Dawn of Hell
The Mayfield mansion was now nothing more than a howling stone shell beneath a sky of charcoal-black ink, torn open by the violence of a fury that was not human. The Triad had struck with surgical precision, transforming Althea’s memories into a smoldering mass grave. Flames licked at the ancient woodwork, casting shadows that seemed to perform a macabre dance upon the gutted walls. The acrid smell of sulfur and blood mingled with that of scorched earth, creating an apocalyptic scene of terrifying beauty.
At the center of the chaos, Althea gasped for breath, a fiery glow ignited in her eyes. She stood as a vision of resilience amidst the ashes: her red hair, the color of glowing copper, fell in a wild, untamed cascade that seemed to capture the very light of the underworld. Her emerald eyes shone with fierce determination despite the soot that smudged her delicate features and freckles. Every movement of her body, clad in black, was that of a warrior forged in trial, the last bastion of life in this devastated realm, her aura as a pyromancer vibrating under the onslaught.
Facing her, Seth stood with a venomous elegance, a cruel smile on his lips that distorted the perfection of his features. His sharply chiseled face, possessed of a cold and unsettling beauty, was framed by jet-black hair, damp from the exertion of battle yet impeccably styled. But it was his eyes that made the blood run cold: electric blue, piercing and merciless, they fixed on Althea with the sadistic pleasure of one about to shatter his finest toy. A demonic flame danced in the depths of his gaze, and his power emanated from him like a wave of frost, a silent promise of destruction.
A few meters away, her two protectors fought with the fury of Titans against the ceaseless waves of attackers, finally revealing their true divine stature. Their movements were flashes of lightning in the darkness, deadly ballets driving back the creatures of the shadow.
Kai, the ferryman of souls, embodied a raw, dark force rooted in the earth itself. His square jaw and prominent cheekbones gave him a proud, almost imperial air, like a warrior-king. His brown hair, curly and damp with sweat, fell across his forehead with studied carelessness, adding to his wild magnetism. But it was his eyes, black as obsidian and deep as the abysses of the Styx, that never left Althea, while his imposing frame, carved from rock and power, served as a living shield for Ethan, the dying father, weakened by the fight and the revelation of his true nature.
At his side, Elian moved with the lethal grace of a predator of royal blood. His long, silky dark hair framed a face of melancholic perfection, where every feature seemed sculpted by the poetry of death. His eyes, the color of molten gold, a warm amber as sad as a setting sun over a battlefield, seemed to see through the veil of life and death, piercing souls and destinies alike. Clothed in a black laced shirt that emphasized his slender, elegant figure, he wielded Death’s scythe with an almost sacred nobility, each stroke an inescapable dance towards oblivion.
Suddenly, Elian felt an icy burn against his hip.
Beneath his fingers, the spectral parchment no longer trembled; it screamed. When the name ALTHEA became etched into its ethereal fibers, Elian felt an abyss open within his own chest. It was not just another soul; in a way, it was his own. For years, he had protected her from the shadows, watching her laughter, her anger, and her light... and now, the Immutable Order demanded her end.
A visceral refusal, almost sacrilegious for a God of Death, held him back. Not her. Not today. Time seemed to stretch cruelly. He saw Seth begin his movement, a deadly trajectory Elian knew by heart, having mowed down millions before. But this time, he was not the executioner. His feelings, that mixture of protective brotherhood and an affection he had never dared to name, screamed at the injustice.
Every beat of his divine heart cried out the urgency: if he did not break the sacred laws of fate in that very instant, he would no longer be protecting a life, but sending a shadow back to the Styx. Panic, a feeling foreign to his eternal nature, drove him to action. He had to act, no longer as a servant of Death, but as a bulwark for her.
He looked up, his golden gaze meeting Althea’s, just in time to see Seth lunge forward. The black blade of the traitor, the man whom Althea had once loved with a devastating passion, plunged with lightning speed toward the redhead’s heart. In a few seconds, the electric blue of Seth’s eyes would be extinguished by the reflection of Althea’s blood.
— “NO !” Kai roared, his voice resounding like thunder from the bowels of the earth.
His obsidian eyes met the molten gold of Elian’s gaze. A silent pact, an ancestral understanding, was sealed between the two Gods. The sacrifice was necessary.
— “Kai, now!” Elian commanded, his voice filled with divine urgency.
With a majestic gesture, Elian unleashed a blast of pure shadow, his dark hair lashing the air like serpents, creating an impenetrable wall of ethereal energy between Seth’s deadly steel and Althea’s skin. Time bent to his will, freezing the fatal moment.
Taking advantage of the bulwark, Kai teleported to Althea’s side. He seized her arm with his powerful hand, the contrast between his dark, weather-beaten complexion and Althea’s pallor striking one last time beneath the blood-red glow of the flames. His gaze, usually so impassive, was filled with deep pain.
— "Forgive me, Althea… this is not how you were meant to discover the truth,” he whispered, his deep voice lost in the roar of the fire.
The ground gave way beneath their feet, sucked into a vortex of shadows. When Althea opened her eyes again, she was lying on the cold, polished floor of a vast hall, facing a throne of shadow and obsidian where the only man capable of standing up to her past awaited her: Hades.
