Chapter 74 - Confrontation
Apollo walked closer to Hades, frowning at him. "Call of your deal with Ambrogio. I will not let you such thousands upon thousands of souls into the underworld. This madness has to end now!"
Hades leaned forward putting up a fake smile. "And if I refuse?"
"We have no option than to bind you. We are here on Zeus' order and you must do his bidding." Artemis said as she approaches Hades' throne.
"Silence!" Hades yelled as he quickly stood to his feet enraged.
"I am not your subject, you can't silence me!"
Immediately King Gilbert walked in bearing a cup that looks like a human skull. Since Persephone and Thanatos returned him to the underworld, he has been made Hade's cupbearer. Apollo can easily tell if any soul deserves to be in the underworld or not.
On seeing King Gilbert, he saw he had a gentle and excellent soul. He picked interest in him as he approaches King Afa. "What are you doing here? You are not supposed to be here."
Before King Afa could open his mouth to speak, Hades ordered Cerberus to drag him out. Glaring at Apollo he said in a loud voice. "You dare not question my subject. And as a matter of fact, you have overstayed your welcome. Is time for you to go."
Artemis drew out her arrow and inserted it on her bow. Without hesitation, she has it pointed to Hades. "My brother and I are not leaving without that soul."
"Is that so?" Hades giggled. "You dare come into my dwelling and dare me to a fight?"
"There won't need to fight you Hades. Just hand over the soul to us."
"Apollo, his soul belongs to me and has overstayed in the land of the dead. You don't expect me to hand over my possession to you, do you?" "He does not belong here. You know it and I know..."
Apollo's words were pushed back to his throat as Set stormed the place blasting Apollo to the wall with a fire blast. "Go back to where you came from."
Swiftly Artemis switched her target to Set and quickly releases the arrow. The arrow hits Set's shoulder. He groaned and pulled it out.
He was enraged and charged towards Artemis. Before he could be able to get hold of Artemis, he was grabbed from behind and smashed through Hade's throne.
From where he has fallen he looked up. Behold was a tall, muscular man who wore the armor of a Greek warrior. "Egyptians gods are not welcomed here." He said. He then stretched out his hands; spear and shield appeared in his hands. Hades was already fed up with the chaos in the underworld. He has geared up for battle. But on seeing Ares, standing in front of Set, with Set on the floor, he relented.
Ares is the god of war, as well as violence, revenge, vengeance, bloodshed, and bloodlust. He just saved Artemis from being rammed by Set.
Hades knows it will be disastrous to let the two gods of war battle in the underworld. He did not want the chaos to escalate as he quickly rushed towards Ares. "Stop this madness."
"Zeus knew you are a hard man to talk to, that's why he sent me as a backup to Apollo and Artemis and now not only I'm disappointed about your stiff-neck, I am ashamed you make your bed with Set, the Egyptian god of war." Ares has never come face to face with Set but he has heard bad things about him. Hades is seen to be bad by the rest of the gods and even mortals, what happens when he associates with another god that is worst than him? Hades and Set can't be trusted when seen together. This baffles Ares and for the first time, the great god of war Ares is showing concern.
Set that was still on the ground kicked Ares down as he quickly jumped to his feet. Artemis inserted her arrow into her bow and fired yet another shot to Set, but this time he saw it coming and waved it with Ares' shield. "Everyone calm down. There is no cause for all this."
Is not that Hades cares, but he just doesn't want things to get messy in his domain. They can take their fight somewhere else but since he has a personal interest with Set, he wants to protect that interest as he tried to calm everyone down. "Set is my visitor and you will treat him with respect."
Ares drags himself up. He didn't like what Hades just said. He glared at him. "He's not welcomed here."
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Apollo approaches Hades. His mood wasn't bright. He stared Hades in the eyes. "Do you know what it means for an Egyptian god to attack an Olympian god? Perhaps let me educate you. This means a call for war and it won't be ignored. If you fail to hand him over to us, we will pardon you, but if you don't, the underworld will cease to exist."
With much giggling, Hades couldn't hold back anymore as he boldly stared into Apollo's eyes. "Read my lips, go and hump yourself. Or better still, hump Artemis."