𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄 𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐒 𝐀𝐋𝐋 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐍 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐄𝐍𝐃 -- hoo

𝐢. 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐘𝐆𝐎𝐍𝐄 𝐄𝐑𝐀

You cannot know how frightened gods are of pain. There is nothing more foreign to them, and so nothing they ache more deeply to see.
——— Madeline Miller, Circe

THE ERA OF THE GODS WAS GONE. One by one, the gods were consumed by Mother Earth. The first one had been Hestia, for where was home if the Hearth was gone? Then it was Dionysus, then Hermes... From twelve to one. One by one, their ichor was spilled, a roar of fury, grief and rage. Mother Earth laughed. The Fates wept; their tears were seen by her, but were left unheard. For what kindness would she give them if they had never spared her a single drop? Humanity and godhood were one of the same, ungrateful little leeches. She mourned for her children, her beloved creations that she had carefully crafted with her soft touch. Of course she was cruel, she had ordered her children, the Titans, to kill their father without a second thought——her eldest, Kronos, using his scythe to sever his father; and she watched as golden ichor flowed through his fatal wounds. Mother Earth had proclaimed her eldest as the lord of the universe as Chaos watched on, releasing the Elder Cyclopes and Hekatonkheires, and she slumbered. When she awoke, she had found that her Titan children, her beloved creatures that she treasured so deeply, were imprisoned in the Pit. There, she spoke to Tartarus and thus the Gigantes were born. The Gigantes opposed each god, but they had been defeated by Heracles and a then-demigod Dionysus. Her final act of defiance was her son, Typhon whom she had persuaded to attack Mount Olympus, only to be imprisoned on Mount Etna. The Elder Olympians, despite their direct lineage——her grandchildren——did not spare her any mercy. She had mourned for why could they not coexist peacefully? She slept, in constant mourning and her rage solidified.

Hearing of a Prophecy, she stirred. Once again, she had attempted to overthrow the gods, ushering her children, the Gigantes, and by proxy, that of Marie Levesque. However, the mere mortal's blasted half-god spawn had derailed it quite quickly. Then it had been Leo Valdez, destroying the one thing he had loved most consumed by fire; haunting the child for years to come.

Octavian had been a good pawn; he had been the doom of the Seven of the Prophecy. The Seven had failed in saving humanity. They died screaming. First it was Pluto's spawn. Then it was Hephaestus's. One by one they fell. Finally, it had been Poseidon's spawn——the hero of Olympus. The one who had indirectly killed her eldest, scattering his essence across the four winds.

Octavia had heard of the Seven's failure and untimely death; rumors floated around the world, even as she sought to survive in the wasteland that once had been lush with green. Food was scarce, and endless fights for things that had once been considered something meaningless was now a rare luxury. Lives were lost, limbs were severed, the ground was littered with bodies. Of mortals, demigods, and the golden ashes of monsters, alike.

She, like many others, was left to pick up the pieces. Oftentimes, she wondered as to what had gone wrong. An unnamed demigod had been their doom, or at least, that is how the rumors went. He had stood tall as he became the right-hand of the Primordial being until his death a few years ago. His name, a forgotten memory, and thus he rotted amongst the ash and bone that littered the Greek and Roman Pantheons.

History had been derailed, the Fates wailed in grief and agony.

As Hestia was the first to fall, (for what is home if the heart his gone), Elpis had emerged after Pandora's pithos had been shattered, and she screamed. Mother Earth had grasped her by the throat and she cared not as Elpis became ash. For a Primordial to kill another Primordial was blasphemy. But Mother Earth had not hesitated, for Hope was a fickle thing. The savior of humankind. If Hope was gone, then humankind would not be saved. 

When Octavia was born, Time had rejoiced and so had the Fates. For a half-god child of a Primordial was a rarity in itself; for the raw ability for a Primordial's offspring was dangerous; Octavia had once dared to dabble in her innate abilities, however swore to never use it ever again——for what was the reason if she would only see more destruction? Time was a dangerous thing to manipulate, and even she was not immune of the consequences that would follow. She had nearly been killed by Chaos's hand once they had found out about the transgression.