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Monster? No, I'm a Cultivator! (Percy Jackson): Chapter 49
🕑 Added 2025-09-05 12:21:27 +0000 UTCCamp Half-Blood was quiet.
Far quieter than it had been in centuries.
Perhaps 80% of the demigods that usually stayed in camp were now gone. Mobilized and taking treks across the country on a quest with no real goal in mind.
Hopeful that the ‘missing’ items of the gods could be found.
Even the gods didn’t have a clear direction for them other than to travel ‘West.’ The idea is that eventually fate will lead to the ‘quest’ being settled, and with more demigods participating, there was a higher likelihood of it being completed.
Quests were usually interlinked heavily with Fate.
There were two primary types of ‘quests.’ Those ordained by Fate and delivered through Prophecy, and those simply created by a god because they needed something done and couldn’t do it themselves.
Despite not having a proper prophecy to work with, this was most certainly a quest with a heavy Fate attached to it.
The gods, other than Apollo of course, didn’t need to have domains connected to Fate or Prophecy to at least feel and understand that much.
They were adept at understanding the flow of the world.
A prophecy was weighty, but sometimes words unspoken also carried with them a certain heaviness.
It wasn’t merely because of Hera’s Golden Apple Tree either. That certainly lit a fire under their proverbial butts, but it was just one factor.
Too much happened in too short of a time frame. Zeus’s lightning bolt was stolen, which started everything. That alone would have started a quest, most likely dictated by Fate.
But then, several more incidents.
Not the least of which was the other pantheons coming over and giving them a black eye. They hadn’t willingly swallowed that indignation, but there wasn’t much they could do at the moment.
And now, Hera’s Tree.
It also made the gods wary, like something was just simmering beneath the surface, something much worse.
Thus, the Demigods were deployed in numbers that hadn’t been seen in centuries.
Which made it much easier for someone to sneak inside.
No one noticed the little black raven hopping across the ground between cabins.
It expertly dodged any eyes, avoiding the perception of the Goddess of the Hearth, who sat at the center of camp. And even the Centaur, who would have without a doubt noticed its peculiarities had it been caught.
The bird, without being seen, approached the oddly out-of-place bulletin board set up and quickly charged at it, slapping a piece of paper onto its surface and shooting off into the sky before anyone could notice.
Far away, in another realm, the King of Gods of the Norse smiled.
However, his face was pale, and sweat poured down his brow, and his legs wobbled slightly as he found a seat and nearly collapsed into it with deep breaths.
“That brat owes me big time for this.” Odin grumbled.
He had paid a price for interfering with another Pantheon’s prophecy.
It wasn’t a simple matter of finding an opening to throw a wrench into the plans of the Fates, but he directly stuck his hands into the actual mechanisms of the world with his latest stunt.
“Father, I got the—” Thor entered the room where his father stayed, and he immediately saw the condition of the All-Father. “Father, what happened? Are you harmed?”
Odin let out a laugh. “Just made my last move; it took a bit out of me. Don’t worry about it.”
Thor furrowed his brow. “Our new friends settled in; I quite like them. I believe they will fit in with us very well.”
Odin nodded. “Make sure you don’t visit them again for a while.”
“Yes, yes. You told me already, you don’t want Loki to find out.” Thor just nodded. “Father, you look very unwell. What did you do?”
Odin grinned widely despite his pale complexion. “I did what the kids these days call a pro gamer move.”
“...Father, have you been playing the video games again? You know how your blood pressure gets when you play with the mortals.”
“Bah!” Odin harumphed. “I will master these confounded things one day, and then we’ll see who is having relations with whose mother!”
@***@
Up on top of the Mountain of the [Insert Name Here] Sect, a Cyclops swung his sword as he had been practicing for days now.
It wasn’t Ocean Song, but his junior brother, Tyson.
Tyson was oddly talented, mostly because he didn’t have any distractions. He was young, basically a child, despite his size and technically being an adult due to being a monster.
He was told to practice, so he practiced without a second thought.
Though, that wasn’t to say he was unhappy. Quite the opposite, Tyson was the happiest he had ever been.
He had a home, he had a family, and he could do fun things like make stuff, eat good food, and play with everyone.
After he was finished, he began on his ‘chores.’ Though, ironically, Ocean Song forgot the important part of assigning sect members chores, and Tyson had been doing them all on his own.
He started with sweeping the courtyard as he does every day, making sure his home stays nice and clean.
It was only when he was nearly finished that he looked at the glowing bulletin board, and it caught his eye.
He knew what it was, but he hadn’t been on any ‘commissions’ yet. Ocean Song said to wait until there was one suited for him. Of course, Ocean Song meant something crafting-related, knowing that his junior brother was still rather naive about the world.
But Tyson took that differently; that’s why his expression suddenly changed, and he smiled brightly, quickly grabbing the paper off the board and running back into the main buildings.
“Miss Mel, Miss Mel!” He shouted, the paper flapping in the wind between his fingers.
“Tyson?” Mel—also known as the Goddess Hel—peeked out from the kitchen doors. “Are you okay, dear?”
“Bawhooo.” Nessie also peeked out from behind her.
Nessie had been teaching her how to cook, and Hel had taken over being the ‘cook’ for everyone, with help from Nessie.
Strangely, she enjoyed doing such a menial task.
Tyson seemed to remember something else, and he started fidgeting in his pockets. “Oh, um, I got something I made…” He finally found it in a side pocket of his robes. “I made this for you, Miss Mel!” He smiled, holding up a carefully sculpted bird, specifically a raven. It was very lifelike, despite it being small enough to fit into a normal person’s hand.”
“Aww, you’re such a sweetheart. Thank you, Tyson.” He happily accepted it. If it were anyone else, she would have thought they were flirting with her, but with how innocent and genuine Tyson was, she knew he was just being sweet.
She reached up, gently patting him on the head.
To her, him being a Cyclops wasn’t even a thought. She was a Jotun even if she was a goddess. A Cyclops? That was basically a different type of Jotun as far as she was concerned.
She took a look at her new bird figurine and realized it looked very much like a certain god’s pet raven.
Her lips thinned slightly, but she decided against saying anything.
“Dinner will be done soon.” She told him. “Do you want to wait, or do you want me to call you when it’s ready?”
For Hel, living here was rather soothing. No ‘responsibilities,’ no other gods to bother her—which didn’t really happen either—but mostly, she could just run away from her troubles back home for a while.
Even if everyone here was strange, she felt like she fit in rather easily.
“Wait! I forgot, I got this!” Tyson quickly remembered the reason he originally came. “Look, I got a job!”
Mel furrowed her brow; she too was familiar with the quirks of the Sect. She was aware that the others often went out to do ‘jobs.’ In fact, Medusa and Daedalus were out right now and wouldn’t be back for a bit because they were ‘working.’
She also knew that Tyson was basically a child, so she was a tad concerned about him ‘going out.’
“It’s perfect for me, just like Brother said! See, it even says One Cyclops, right here!”
Hel picked up the paper and read it.
It was a vague request for ‘help’ with a strict requirement of needing a Cyclops. It included a very specific location way out in the west, at a very specific time.
Hel almost tore it up on the spot.
She felt like anyone would be able to see the obvious strangeness of this kind of ‘request.’ It all but had a red flag attached to it, waving around.
“...Are you sure?” Mel looked up at him.
“Yes, just like Brother said, it’s just for me!” Tyson nodded happily. “But um…how do I get to D-Denver?” He looked at the paper still in Hel’s hands, doing his best to pronounce it.
“Bawhooo!” Nessie threw her head up and let out a happy noise.
“You’ll take me? Thank you, Nessie!” Tyson preened happily. “Let’s go; I can’t wait to come back and tell everyone I did a job too!”
Tyson hopped onto Nessie’s back, and Hel watched as the strange dinosaur creature began to scoot across the ground and out the door with a Cyclops on her back.
Hel let out an exasperated sigh, then went back to making dinner.
For her, after only being here for days at this point, this wasn’t even the strangest thing she’d seen.
@***@
“Turn, turn, turn!”
“I see it!” Luke shouted back as Annabeth braced herself.
The car jerked, and Percy smacked his head against the side of the car while Malcom did his best to keep himself from thrashing around.
There were a bunch of bikers with weapons attacking their car. They all wore leather jackets and full-face bike helmets, so you couldn’t see their faces.
Their weapons weren’t normal either. They were wielding Greek weapons—swords, spears, bows, that sort of thing.
The car swerved several times as one of the bikers stabbed his blade right through the side window next to Luke, who nearly got stabbed.
Malcolm rolled down the window, picked up his bow, and fired an arrow, only for one of the bikers to deflect it rather easily.
“Is this normal in this place!?” Percy asked, ducking down because on the other side, one of the many bikers stuck a spear through the window. He quickly grabbed it from inside, yanking it forward, making the biker, who was riding up next to the car, stutter and swerve, falling over and hitting the ground hard as his body disappeared in the rearview mirror.
“Why would you think this is normal!?” Annabeth shouted.
“Smelly Gabe always went on about how liberal cities like Denver have higher crime rates and riots.”
“This is not the time!” Luke yelled.
“Road spikes!” Malcolm shouted, pointing ahead.
There were several leather-wearing, helmet-wearing guys on the sides of the road further ahead, and as they got close, they saw road spikes that they had set up ahead.
“Hold on!” Luke shouted, twisting the car wheel as hard as he could without flipping the car while hitting the brake. The back of the car swung outward, knocking a biker off his bike, making him go flying through the air, as he just managed to catch an exit before their car got hit by the road spikes.
The others went tumbling around in the back as the car reoriented itself, smoke wafting off parts of the vehicle in the aftermath of the dangerous maneuver.
“They’re still on us.” Percy looked back. “Do we have anything? Bombs?”
“Why would we have bombs?!” Annabeth again shouted back.
“Because they would be helpful!?”
“Here, use this.” Malcolm handed Percy bottles of water, and his eyes lit up.
“What’s that going to do—" Annabeth didn’t get to finish because Percy threw one out the window.
Harmless enough, two bikers, one driving the bike, the other on the back seat; the one on the back seat used his sword to swat it away, cutting it as it passed.
Percy held his hand out, clenching it, and the water sprang out; like a snake, it conglomerated mid-air and shot up the helmet of the one steering the bike.
He clearly got startled, choked, and let go of the handles; the bike, going at high speed, wobbled ever so slightly before it lost its traction and turned aggressively, causing the two bikers to be flung off their bike.
“...I take it back.” Annabeth blinked.
Percy threw out a few more water bottles, taking out several more bikers in the process, but there were still dozens, and even more seemingly joining up the longer they drove.
“Luke, watch out!” Annabeth shouted.
Out of the corner of his eye, Luke saw a couple of those same guys on a bike swerve over; one of them had a spiked mace and swung it at the windshield of the car, nearly destroying it, but spiderweb cracks littered it, making it almost impossible to see out.
Without the chance to even give a warning, they crashed.
It was hard for any four of them to say they understood what happened; the airbags shot out, and they slammed forward at such force and speeds that none of them could think coherently in the moment.
Despite being demigods, they were still young; this kind of ‘hit’ was enough to take them out of commission, even if it didn’t kill them.
The car was unmoving, steam wafted off it, and smoke began to billow from the engine.
Several of the bikers came to a stop around the car; several more quickly followed.
They unceremoniously parked their bikes, got up, and tore the doors off the car and pulled them out.
Surprisingly, they didn’t ‘harm’ the kids; instead, they threw them over the backs of their own bikes and rode off with the same casualness, like they hadn’t just been on a high-speed chase while swinging around medieval weapons.
Malcolm was the first to regain consciousness. But even then, his head rocked back and forth, his vision was blurry, and he had trouble even thinking straight.
He felt the wind hitting his face and the feeling of vibrations as the bike rode away with him on it.
It didn’t seem like they rode far before coming to a stop again.
The next thing he knew, he was flung over the shoulder of some nameless goon along with the others.
He could see they were in some sort of park? He wasn’t quite sure and didn’t have the mental capacity to make any distinctions.
Instead, he reached for the sword sheathed at the side of the goon carrying him, pulled it free from its sheath, and stabbed him in the back.
The goon fell to the ground without so much as a scream, along with Malcolm, who felt a jolt of pain go through his body.
“Hoh? You got a bit of a bite to you, don’t you, kid? Not something I’d expect from one of my sister’s brats.”
Malcolm barely saw who spoke; it was blurry, and he was still disoriented. He just grabbed the sword and swung it in long arcs around him haphazardly.
“Alright, alright, that’s just annoying.”
Malcolm felt something touch his forehead, like he had been flicked. He fell over again, but his blurry vision and twisted world around him snapped back into focus.
He then looked up to see who was there.
A similar black leather jacket and sunglasses, but the face is visible.
He also felt a strange bloodlust.
He could guess who it was.
Ares, the God of War,
“Let’s get the other brats up on their feet.” He turned around to the other demigods who had been thrown onto the ground near Malcolm, and he either kicked them—more of a nudge—or flicked their heads. Which seemed to help them surprisingly.
“I feel like I was just in a car crash.” Percy groaned.
“Because we were, you seaweed brain.” Annabeth groaned too, slowly climbing to her feet.
“Uh, guys…” Luke grabbed their attention, and the others looked around them too.
The same bikers that had assaulted them—there were easily over a hundred around them in a circle, like a wall that stopped them from running away.
“Great, you’re all awake. Nice to meet you brats, I’m Ares, God of War. Yadda yadda, worship me, bow before me, blah blah.” He snapped his fingers, and one of the biker henchmen ran over and placed a chair down for him to sit on.
Ares spun the chair around, sitting in it backwards as he played with a small but sharp knife.
“Let’s see, two of my sister’s brats.” He pointed the dagger at Annabeth and Malcolm. “One of Hermes’s brats, but we’ve already met, haven’t we?” He grinned a bit. “And lastly, we have one of Barnacle Beard’s bastards.”
“Sup.” Percy waved.
Annabeth smacked his shoulder. “Percy, do not disrespect the god sitting in front of us.” She hissed.
“Well, I can’t say that Athena’s brats aren’t entirely stupid.” Ares nodded to himself, then he flicked forwards at the air.
Percy’s eyes widened, and something invisible smacked him right in the chest, like a gut punch, and he fell to his knees, wheezing.
“The girl’s right, brat. Don’t disrespect the gods; know your place.” Ares said coldly, watching Percy gasping for air. “I’d kill for less, you know. If I didn’t actually need you, I’d have my boys dump you in the nearest dumpster after cutting off all your limbs.”
“We thank you for your mercy, God of War.” Annabeth bowed her head, being very polite in her words.
Ares snorted disdainfully but didn't otherwise give her more trouble.
Annabeth swallowed. “M-May I ask if you require anything of us?”
Ares rolled his eyes. “No, I just dragged your unconscious asses here because that’s my hobby? What do you think?”
Annabeth did her best not to react negatively. “We’d be happy to assist you in anything you need, sir.”
Ares's eyes lit up. “Oh, that’s perfect!” He looked around. “Did you hear that, everyone? The little brat is going to help! Well, I just so happen to have something that needs to be done. Since you’re so willing to help here.” Ares tossed a bag onto the ground at her feet.
“What is—”
“That bag holds Pop’s Lightning Bolt and Uncle’s Helm of Darkness. Be a dear and hold onto that for me, will you?” Ares said with clear snark.
“W-what!?”
Ares rolled his eyes and sat back down with a sigh. “Right, you’re probably confused. Let me elaborate. You see, I need a patsy to hold onto the stolen goods while I wipe my hands of this whole mess. I intended to let things play out and get a nice three-way war between Pop and my uncles; you know how it goes. But someone stole Mom’s damn tree, and now I’m up shit creek without a paddle. Everything went sideways, and I have to toss the goods, you hear me?”
“...you want us to take the blame.” Malcolm spoke up.
“Bingo.” Ares snapped his fingers, pointing at him. “One of Athena’s brats is smart at least. And bonus, I chose your group because maybe I can salvage everything anyways! Barnacle Beard’s bastard over there gets caught with this stuff? Maybe a war happens anyways! Win-win, am I right?” He let out a chuckle.
“W-why would we agree to that?” Percy gasped, standing back up.
“Good question.” Ares nodded. “Your consent isn’t needed!” He smiled. “Any more questions?”
“...Um…Zeus, I found your Lightning Bolt?” Percy spoke up, looking at the sky.
There was a beat of silence as everyone looked at him.
“Well, quick thinking if nothing else. But do you really think that’d work?” Ares looked at him incredulously. “That’s the literal first thing I blocked when bringing you lot here. Sorry kiddo, no other gods will hear, see, or know what’s going on right here. I don’t know why Pops put that big-ass storm up over the country, but even he won’t notice us right under his nose like this.”
Ares smirked; he loved seeing their expression turn from hopeful to realization. “And just like that, you know your place. So, let’s save all the hassle and—” Ares paused because the kids were staring at something. Confusion arose in him as he followed their gaze, turning his head.
He felt warm breath against his face.
“What the fuck—”
“Bawhoooo!”
Ares fell out of his chair as Nessie bellowed in his face.
“What? Who are you? How did you get here!?” Ares was quickly back on his feet, confused, bewildered, and confused some more.
Tyson peeked out from Nessie, stepping off her back. “Um, hello. My name is Tyson, and I’m here because I got this job. Um….who was it that asked for help?”
“...what?” Ares blinked.
“Am I at the right place? It says this park, at this time?” Tyson looked around hopeful. “Who asked for help?”
The demigods looked at each other.
Percy raised his hand. “...we did?” What did they have to lose by saying yes here?
Tyson’s eyes lit up. “Hello, I’m Tyson. I’m here to help you!”
There was a moment of stunned silence.
Even Ares blinked several times, slowly lowering his sunglasses as he stared at the cheerful, one-eyed giant standing next to a dinosaur.
“...What in Tartarus is this Saturday morning bullshit?” Ares muttered.
Percy, still half in shock, leaned over to Annabeth. “Did we just get rescued by a Cyclops… on a dinosaur?”
“Percy, that’s not a dinosaur.”
“Hey Cyclops, bro.” They could clearly tell that Tyson was a Cyclops. “Is that a dinosaur?”
Tyson tilted his head. “No?”
“See.” Annabeth said smugly.
“Nessie is the Loch Ness Monster.” Tyson corrected.
“...what?”
@***@
A/N
Tyson to the rescue, or something. I'm sure it'll turn out okay.
Comments
J
“...What in Tartarus is this Saturday morning bullshit?” Ares muttered. PEAK!
Kz3838
Thank you for the great chapter, stay safe out there and keep up the good work!
