Perseus: Excidium Troiae

Twenty

A/N—So, this is the final chapter of this arc. I hope you enjoy it. I'll decide where and how I want this story to end before I upload the next chapter (probably some time late next year). Leave a few reviews if you can! Have a great 2024 guys! ❤️

HE DIDN'T KNOW HOW LONG they had been fighting for. Perseus' heart was thundering, and around him the wind was roaring as power surged and slammed into the two armies which had met at sunrise. The fighting was going on in earnest, and he had lost count of how many people he had killed now. His sword and his hands were stained with blood. His armour was dented and he had lost his helmet a long while ago. He was battered, bruised and bleeding ichor in several places where the Greek soldiers had somehow managed to land a few hits.

But he gritted his teeth and fought through the pain. Around him the soldiers clashed, the armies sliding at each other, hacking and rearing, each man fighting furiously to survive till nightfall. Around him Perseus felt another spike of power and swore, glancing up and tearing his sword out of the chest of another soldier.

The gods would destroy them all.

Above them, the deities which ruled the world collided, flashes of power and their overbearing presence making the air stifling. He saw Artemis, in a silver chariot drawn by deer, soaring through the sky and releasing arrows with dead accuracy into the fighting mass of men, leaving craters and ashes wherever they landed. Another chariot crossed her path, this one golden and drawn by bright brown horses with fiery manes. The steeds belched fire as they careened through the sky. Apollo released his golden arrows of death into the Greek lines, decimating their forces and leaving piles of the dead wherever his projectile hit.

They were trying to help, Perseus realised, raising his shield to block a strike and whirling himself around to slice at his assailant's chest. But if they didn't get a hold of their powers, they would kill them all.

His gaze drifted across the terrain, where Aeneas fought with unimaginable prowess and speed. He felled men as he moved, almost too fast for Perseus to see, like a machine made by Hephaestus. Behind him, Perseus could see the goddess Aphrodite, red hair flowing in the sky, guiding Aeneas' hand and flicking her wrists to draw the life out of any who her son's blade missed. There was an increase in the screaming to his left, where a river winded throughout the plain. A giant brown boar was charging through the lines of men, tusks piercing any who were close enough, spears and arrows bouncing off its hide. Perseus felt his negative feelings swell inside him to the point of bursting, but quelled them almost immediately, ducking under a wild slash and cutting off a man's head in the process.

The god Ares rampaged in boar form, tearing down men, whether Greek or Trojan, and leaving a path of damaged bodies in his wake. There was another loud scream from somewhere to his left, and Perseus swore as Aegis-bearing Athena swooped down, her shield causing all the men around her to turn and bolt. But as they ran, the goddess hurled a spear and it sailed towards Agenor, one of the Trojan Generals. The man wouldn't have enough time to duck. Perseus parried a strike which was coming for his right flank and twisted, disarming his attacker and smashing his shield into his nose. In a fluid movement, he drove the blade through the gut of the Greek soldier, whirling around to check on his companion at the other side of the battle.

Agenor was still standing, but around him men fell like flies into screaming messes of death as two immortals in two blood red chariots circled the goddess Athena. Perseus glanced around, catching the look of desperation several of the men wore. He felt a foreign emotion spike inside him—fear. And Perseus raised his arm to deflect another blow when the second feeling ripped through him, clawing at his insides and making him stumble back. The blow went wide, but as the panic engulfed him, Perseus' attacker launched himself forward—a simple soldier, really—and slapped the weapon out of his hand.