CHAPTER 496: THE FALL OF OLYMPUS 11

Hades stepped back, his form wreathed in deeper shadows as he raised his bident high. "Tell me, mortal," he called out, his voice carrying the weight of the lord of the dead, "how does it feel to struggle so desperately? Your veins burn with stolen power, your very existence a theft from the natural order." His eyes gleamed with cruel amusement. "And my Helm of Darkness—did you truly think it would suit your pathetic existence? That relic of mine has tasted your essence, and through it, I know your every weakness."

The Lord of the Underworld gestured, and the shadows around him surged forward like living spears. Each tendril of darkness struck with the force of a battering ram, seeking to pierce Adam’s defenses. But these weren’t mere shadows—they were death itself given form, carrying the power to end life with a touch.

Hades’ manipulation of mortality flowed through the battlefield like a plague. The very air around Adam began to wither, plants blackening and crumbling to ash. The god’s power reached out, trying to stop Adam’s heart, to still his breath, to claim the life that had been stolen from the natural cycle.

From the depths of the underworld, more legends rose to answer their master’s call. Spartan warriors materialised in their bronze armor, their shields locked in phalanx formation, spears glinting with spectral light. The 300 who had died at Thermopylae charged forward with King Leonidas at their head, their war cry echoing across the battlefield.

Athenian hoplites appeared beside them, their democracy-forged discipline showcased in their coordinated advance. The heroes of Marathon and Salamis pressed forward, their phantom forms crackling with the righteousness of those who had died defending their homeland.

The Gorgon sisters emerged from the shadows, their combined gaze turning the very air to stone. The Cyclopes hammered forward, their massive forms wielding clubs that could crush mountains.

But Adam was no longer the same fighter who had entered this battle. Plasma beams erupted from his hands, cutting through the ranks of legendary warriors with raging abandon. Each beam carried the heat of a star’s core, vaporising shadows and melting bronze armor. Explosions bloomed around him as he channelled his chaotic essence, creating detonations that sent even the mightiest heroes tumbling.

He weaved through the battlefield like a force of nature, his movements leaving trails of superheated air. A Spartan’s spear thrust met a plasma beam that reduced the weapon to molten slag. An Athenian’s shield crumbled under an explosion that cratered the marble beneath their feet.

"You mock what you cannot comprehend," Adam snarled, his blades carving through the neck of a Cyclops. "I am beyond your understanding—beyond life and death or anything you thought you knew!"

Hades watched the carnage with growing fury. "Impressive," he admitted, his bident spinning to deflect a plasma beam. "But you face the accumulated might of every hero who ever lived, every monster that ever terrorised mortals. How long can you maintain this stolen glory when my darkness strikes from every angle?"

The god raised his arms, and the shadows deepened around him until he became a living void draped in darkness. Shadow spears materialised around him, each one carrying the promise of oblivion. They launched in coordinated volleys, forcing Adam to dodge while maintaining his devastating assault on the legendary army.

Adam pressed forward, his plasma beams clearing a path through the ranks of heroes and monsters. Each step brought him closer to Hades, each explosion reducing another legend to scattered shadows. The heat of his attacks began to melt the marble of Mount Olympus itself, leaving glass-smooth craters in his wake.

When he finally reached the Lord of the Underworld, Adam felt the familiar surge of transformation building within him. His power reached a new peak, boosted by Poseidon’s divine essence, and he embraced it fully.

Fire erupted around his form as he began to grow, his body expanding until he towered above even the tallest monsters. Dark flames roiled and churned with the power of stars dying in the void. His appearance became majestic and terrible, a giant wreathed in scalding darkness.

The ground beneath his feet didn’t just heat—it melted, flowing like lava around his massive form. The air itself began to vaporise, creating a bubble of pure vacuum around him that only his power could sustain. His dark energy blades elongated to match his new size, becoming weapons fit for a titan.

"Behold," Adam’s voice boomed across the battlefield, distorted by the superheated air around him, "the power you claim was stolen. I have made it mine through will alone!"

Hades stepped back, his shadows deepening as he prepared to meet this new threat. "Impressive transformation," he acknowledged. "But I am still death incarnate, and death cannot be burned away."

The two titans clashed in the center of the battlefield, Adam’s elongated blades meeting Hades’s bident in a shower of sparks that lit up the sky. But even as they fought in melee, both gods unleashed their ranged attacks simultaneously.

Shadow spears erupted from Hades’s form, each one seeking to pierce the heart of his transformed opponent. Adam responded with plasma constructs—swords of pure energy, shields of superheated matter, and spears of concentrated starfire. The projectiles clashed around them in a deadly dance, shadow meeting plasma in explosions that shook the foundations of Olympus.

The battlefield became an inferno of dark flames and writhing shadows. Where Adam’s fire met Hades’s darkness, reality itself seemed to crack and splinter. The air filled with the screams of vaporising matter and the whispers of shadows being burned away.

Adam’s massive form moved with the flexibility inherited from Achilles, his fiery blades carving through the darkness while his plasma constructs provided covering fire. Hades fought back with equal fury, his bident weaving patterns of death while his shadow spears sought any opening in Adam’s defenses.

The ground beneath them had become a sea of molten rock, the air above a maelstrom of competing energies. Neither god gave ground, their attacks creating a sphere of destruction that consumed everything around them.

Then, in a moment of perfect clarity, Adam saw his opening. Hades’s bident thrust forward in a strike meant to pierce his heart, but Adam twisted aside, letting the weapon pass harmlessly through the superheated air. His elongated blade swept up in a counter-attack, the dark flame that wreathed it burning hotter than ever before.

The blow struck true, piercing through Hades’s shadowy defenses and finding the god’s core. The Lord of the Underworld’s eyes widened in shock as the dark flame began to consume him from within.

"Impossible," Hades whispered, his form beginning to dissolve. "Death cannot die..."

"It can," Adam replied, his voice carrying the dark satisfaction of claiming revenge for his humiliating escape from the underworld. "By one who refuses to acknowledge any authority, even yours."

The god of the underworld crumbled to ash, his legendary army dissolving with him. The shadows that had covered Mount Olympus began to lift, revealing the devastation their battle had wrought. Where they had fought, only a crater of glass remained, still glowing with residual heat.

Adam stood victorious in the center of the destruction, his transformed body slowly returning to its normal size. The dark flames that had wreathed him flickered and died, leaving only the echo of power that had challenged death itself and won.

The silence that followed was absolute, broken only by the distant rumble of Zeus’ lightning and the Hecatoncheires’ roars. The Lord of the Underworld was no more, and Adam had proven that even the most fundamental forces of existence could be overcome by sufficient will.

But in the back of his mind, he knew this was only the beginning.

Zeus remained. But not for long.