(A/N: With the usual shout-outs to -JASONSGRACE and Imaginebooks here, plus TsarinaTorment and TheTimeTraveler24, some new people are getting shout-outs here because going forward, their OCs will be characters in this fanfic. So shout-outs to goddessofwisdom- , Az56796743 , and Galatea-Green-31 here too as some of their characters (that I like) make their debut in my fanfic in the final interlude.
One note in here about the new faces - I can't help but low key insert a couple of Hunger Games characters. However, despite them basically being mostly the same characters from that franchise, these two are OCs in this one, adapted to this franchise for convenience so this remains a PJO fanfic.
One small casting change announcement due to Az56796743 since their OC (who is played in their fanfic by Sadie Sink, who I will announce now plays Rachel Elizabeth Dare in this series and Adagio Dazzle (Equestria Girls) in the expanded/crossover version of the series, first book of which I am concurrently working on and that one is called "Keeper Of Their Hearts") has to be cast by a different member. So, with an early Book Two casting here now.. welcome Claire Capek who playing Adriana Sendria (Az56796743 's OC).
So yeah, there's all that.
With that out of the way, on to the chapter!)
- — - — - — - — -
It could safely be said that in the next two weeks, a lot of things changed around Camp Half Blood. After the battle, Chiron extended the camp session by another four weeks, which was.. to put it bluntly in my own opinion.. very, very generous indeed.
Probably the defining moment of all of this - and the figurative thumbnail to it - was me and my Ares cabin siblings' father Ares himself visiting camp only hours after Rachel had become Oracle to once again make another camper an honorary son of Ares, this time being none other than Michael Yew. Needless to say, both me and Kayla were very proud of him.. and believe me, it honestly suited Michael.
As to how things changed, the place changed in quite a number of ways. First of all, where the seeking satyrs had been finding very few demigods during the war except really young ones every once in a while, now we had once more had kids starting middle school and some older than that joining the ranks of camp. And believe me, with me and some of the other experienced campers including Luke and Percy being called out to assist the satyrs, some of the introductions of campers to the Greek world also served as a jumpstart introduction - both to me in terms of the abilities I could now use, most from the blessings but quite a few related to me being the Monster King - and the new demigod(s) that had to been explained then and there that I wasn't your typical demigod.
I won't go into much details on what transpired on some of these outings, as the information contained in them would likely lead me away from what I'm discussing here, but just so you know, one of these outings did lead me to bump into a demigod from another Pantheon.. Egyptian, I think it was. No.. this one has no idea that I'm the Monster King, since given the King's past, it was probably for the better that I avoided confrontations with other pantheons both for the sake of Olympus and for myself. (A/N: Before you say anything, no he did not bump one of the Kane siblings, though I will admit, it was definitely one of their fellow Egyptian demigods. I'll reveal which one when we get the Giants' Tower in Book Three.)
Point is, we were bringing new campers at higher levels than before, and I was witnessing it along with everyone else first hand. We were all getting new siblings left and right, and kids from not just deities, but Titans as well were showing up. Some of them were more interesting than others for different reasons, and some of them.. I had a feeling that given what was coming, they would play some sort of role in the next Great Prophecy. I just had no idea how at this moment in time.
One of my newest siblings in the Ares Cabin, a thirteen year old girl by the name of Clove Vasquez, definitely took after me in a way, and I couldn't help but somehow rapidly become one of her favorite older siblings. She was a bit shorter than me at five foot three inches tall, with dark hair that was usually either in a ponytail or a braid, dark eyes, and some freckles.
The unusual thing about Clove was that as her preferred choice of weapon, she used a different ranged type of weapon that wasn't a Greek weapon. Whereas I was using guns, she used knives, particularly very sharp throwing knives. She was accurate and lethal with them, making me wonder when exactly she had started learning to throw them.
If Clove was small and vicious, with looks that were both beautiful and could also make you shit your pants if she got angry, then her best friend was the big, up close and personal brute counterpart that could make you run screaming for your life. I am not exaggerating on this one.
Cato Richards was a son of Kratos, the Greek god of strength, and believe me, he fit the definition of a demigod son of Kratos to a T. He was just above my height, at 6 feet tall at only fifteen years of age. But this dude was packing muscle, with a robust stature and very powerful, well-muscled arms. With short-cropped dirty blonde hair and ice blue eyes, the dude looked like an absolute tank. Plus, he had been training with a sword, his preferred weapon of choice, so much he was already one of the best swordsmen - right up there approaching Luke by the time he had arrived at camp.
Kayla's cabin also got a new sibling as well, and before I mention some of the other new campers that got on my radar, I'll describe the new Apollo camper here. Whereas Cato and Clove were both strong - in their own separate ways and absolutely scary, A.J. Hood was scrawny, un-athletic and yet still beautiful in her own way. With blonde hair, glasses, and a mostly skinny frame, at fifteen years old.. she had nearly died to an Aethopian Drakon near the border of camp that me and the guys (and yes, a large group of male campers from camp including me) collectively managed to kill in a team effort with zero casualties, thus saving her life. Needless to say, she was rather grateful for the intervention. Aruna, Aurora, Kayla, Victoria, and Alice all have really taken a liking to her.
Some of the other campers were rather interesting for known reasons and some for reasons that didn't seem to jump out at me, yet still left me convinced that they would be interesting to observe at least.
Alec Thompson was one of those who was of the first category, being interesting since when he was claimed roughly 8 hours after arriving at camp, it was by the Titan Hyperion. So, in addition to having a great hero in Percy, the astronomically powerful duo of me and Kayla, the Ghost King in Nico Di Angelo, and a few other dudes (Luke, Ethan, Annabeth, Chris) that had been claimed and blessed by more than just their original godly parent, we also now had a Demi-Titan in our ranks at Camp Half Blood. Needless to say, it was a weird thing to adjust to.
Rose Louloudi was of the second category, being a rather pretty daughter of Demeter that showed up at camp three days after the end of the Battle Of Manhattan. She didn't have much on the outside that made her interesting, yet I had a gut feeling that there was more to her than met the eye. So, I just observed her from a distance for now. Belle just adores Rose, to be honest. She practically dotes on her a lot of the time.
Another redheaded beauty showed up a day later and if a Demi-Titan was weird, then having basically a Demi-primordial in our ranks just added more confusion to the mix. Adriana Senderia was a daughter of Gaea that definitely made more than a few heads turn at camp, with her beautiful appearance and flowing red hair, that's for sure. I probably would have too, if I wasn't you know.. already dating an even more beautiful redhead that meant the world to me at that time.
So yeah.. we were getting an interesting mix of campers.
Cabins were going up in rapid succession. Construction of the Hades Cabin, the Nemesis Cabin, the Kronos Cabin, and The Typhon Cabin had started only about three hours after Rachel had become the Oracle. The number of cabins in construction (or in queue for construction) then rapidly increased in the following days as Cato's arrival at camp put the Kratos Cabin on the list, followed swiftly a couple hours afterwards by the Iris Cabin as Butch Walker, who had been saved by Kelli prior to the Battle of Manhattan (and who he was now rather fond of), was claimed by.. Iris, of course.
Side note here, the other demigod Kelli saved - Damien White - was claimed by Nemesis around the same time, so Ethan now had a sibling related by his 'biological' (given that Gods don't have DNA, we use this term loosely here) godly parent. Being a fellow son of Nemesis, in typical Nemesis fashion, his reaction to it was something along the lines of half happy, half frustrated. For what reason he was half frustrated, I have no clue.
Then, another couple of cabins were added to the list moments after Butch's claiming when twins Holly and Laurel Victor were claimed by Nike, followed shortly afterwards by Clovis, a new sleepy dude who got claimed by Hypnos.
Then, of course with Alec and Adriana coming along, that boosted the list up even further, in addition to the fact that we also had the Hecate, Hebe, and Tyche cabins on the list of cabins to built as well, since we now had kids from those three gods and goddesses that they had claimed in among us. So yeah.. things were changing a lot around Camp Half Blood.
It wasn't just Camp Half Blood where change was occurring. Well.. change and exploration, as well. Mind you.
Like that one dream about the lake had foretold, when some of us had gone down to the lake one day, part of the hillside on the northwest side was now gone and there was a portal that led into another dimension and straight to that imposing castle from the same dream.
I hadn't seen Cháris or any of the other heralds for a while, but I am sure it was a shock to the new campers when he appeared out of nowhere while those campers who had went to the lake and found it were talking to Chiron after having run back to the dining pavilion, since we were having breakfast at the time that morning. Cháris was really exerting insane control over his fiery armor, keeping his flames to just bare minimum.. that is, you could still see them but the flames were quelled to the point that there was zero chance he would accidentally cause a fire and burn down the camp.
Fifteen minutes later, there was me and Kayla with Cháris by our side stepping through the portal with everyone else watching as we disappeared through it. Stepping out the other side, staring up at the imposing castle in front of us, seemed so surreal, yet felt so natural.
As if this was where me and Kayla were meant to be.
One of the other heralds, the one in dark armor, was waiting for us at the foot of the drawbridge that led over the moat.
"Welcome home, your highnesses.." he said to us, bowing respectfully and then kneeling at our feet as if we were ourselves gods, which was a little bit unnerving.
I looked at Kayla. She seemed to look the same way.
"Atmos.. please.. chill with the formalities, brother.." Cháris said to the figure in dark armor, who merely started to profusely apologize to his brother. Cháris then turned to us.
"You'll have to excuse Atmos.." he told us. "Comparatively, he's the youngest of us heralds.. so he tried a bit harder than he should sometimes."
"Point taken.." I said back to him as hand in hand with Kayla, we walked over the drawbridge and into the castle. Behind the first wall was what could be described as an army camp, but filled with monsters of all kinds, rather fitting if you ask me.
If I had to judge from what I could see around us, I estimate that there were at least several hundred monsters in the area between the outer and inner walls. Doubtless hundreds more lurked on the other side hidden from our view by the castle in front of us.
"Looks.. a bit rustic.. and dirty.." Kayla commented, definitely not at all amused by the filthy, cobweb littered, and torch lit interior that greeted us after a pair of skeleton warriors pulled the main doors to the castle open. "If I'm going to live like a queen, I demand you all clean this pigsty." She looked at Cháris with a very annoyed look on her face. "The kids in the Athena Cabin as well as my own siblings in the Apollo Cabin always kept things clean."
She then proceeded to tear into Cháris, delivering an angry rant to him about how filthy the interior was before storming back out to return to Camp Half Blood, escorted by two other heralds, the ones in water and earth themed armor respectively.
I cleared my throat. "Even with.. this.. subpar mess of an interior, would you mind showing me where you keep the records from the past, if you all have them?" I asked Cháris. He nodded.
"Of course, my liege.." he replied, and then proceeded to guide me through the murky, decrepit, dark and dirty interior of the castle. Even with lit torches everywhere, it had obviously not had people inside it for a long while and it showed.
And to think that this was going to be me and Kayla's residence on official Monster King and Queen related business.. probably would be wise to ask Chiron about if the Gods have any good exterminators and cleaners on their payroll right now. I jotted that thought down to do later.
- — - — - — - — -
The Typhon Cabin was completed on the same night as the Kronos, Nemesis, and Hades Cabins, which was a couple days after all the stuff at the castle went down, and me and Kayla instantly moved into it. Whoever built this cabin - I hadn't been paying attention to who had been working on this - had an insanely cool sense of design because while the cabin looked normal on the outside, apart from the swirling masses of black mist that looped around the roof on the outside in multiple, narrow bands, the inside had basically unlimited space. The floor was like you were walking in mid air, and the cabin counselor room, basically co-shared by me and Kayla, was also customized.. with half of the room being stocked with my stuff, with a bathroom on my side, and the other half being stocked with Kayla's stuff, with a bathroom on her side.
Needless to say, being inside it knowing we were basically the only occupants of the cabin now, it was safe to say that we started to understand how Percy must have felt when he had - and basically still does for the most part - the Poseidon cabin all to himself.
"Compared to the castle.." Kayla remarked to me. "..this is way better. Though to be fair.. it does feel a little bit odd being made co-counselors when we're not kids of Nike."
I simply nodded, because yeah it kinda did feel weird. Plus, like I said earlier, it was just us in the cabin. So yeah.. it was weird. It didn't stop Kayla and I from enjoying it anyway.. as for the first time in what seemed like forever, we could finally make out with each other and not have to bother with people walking in on us. We made out with each other for a good long while that night before we both went to bed.
What neither me or Kayla noticed that night outside the cabin was the multiple pairs of pure red eyes that watched us from the dark woods in the distance, pairs of red eyes that I would find out who the owners of them were.. all too soon.
(A/N: Turns out I'm not quite done with the Ninja Turtles references yet. You'll find out more very, very soon.)