Eighteen Times She Chose the Mortal Chapter 08
Cassia’s POV
“Lady Cassia! Where on earth have you been?!”
The moment I dragged my broken body back into the War Council’s halls, Lycus ran up to me.
He was wearing one of Aresion’s old silk robes.
He didn’t notice the scorch marks on my armor. He didn’t see the blood on my lips.
He just held up his finger-the one with the scratch.
“My hand hurt all night. You said you would stay with me, but you left me all alone.” He pouted, demanding to be coddled.” Don’t you care about me anymore?”
Looking at his pathetic, posturing face, looking at the clothes he wore-Aresion’s clothes-a wave of pure disgust twisted my stomach.
For this broken finger.
For this useless, pathetic creature.
I had been so blind. I let him suck Aresion’s dignity and life away, bit by bit, until I personally forced my dying, bleeding partner to the Isle of Oblivion.
“It hurts, does it?” I stared at him, my voice dead.
Lycus paused. He thought I was about to coddle him. A smug smile spread across his face.
“It hurts a lot. It will.only feel better if you put the medicine on it yourself.”
SLAP!
The sound echoed through the hall. The force of the blow sent him sprawling.
Lycus clutched his swelling face, staring at me in shock. “Lady Cassia? Are you insane?!”
I strode forward and grabbed his wrist.
Divine power surged, raw and violent. With a sharp CRACK, the priceless Hephaestus bracer on his wrist shattered.
It was a resource that should have belonged to Aresion.
“My bracer! You gave that to me!” Lycus screamed, scrambling for the pieces.
I kicked him away.
I raised my hand. My power formed a blade, stripping him of every ward, every artifact I had ever given him.
“You are a mortal.” I looked down at his terrified face, my voice like ice. “You are not worthy of his things. Not a single one.”
“Lady Cassia! What did I do wrong?! I’m your servant!” Lycus wailed, kneeling on the floor.
“Get out of the War Council.” I closed my eyes. The sight of him made me sick. “Get off Olympus. Forever. If you are still on this mountain by sunset, I will personally grind your bones to dust.”
Lycus collapsed, his pleas turning to desperate sobs.
I turned and walked toward my private chambers.
His crying was just noise in my ears.
All I could see was Aresion’s face. His eyes. Cold, empty, looking at a stranger.
What was the point of a thousand victories if I had lost him?
Aresion’s POV
I grew used to the sound of waves crashing on the rocks.
But after that day, a new noise was added to the symphony.
Every Friday night.
No matter how hard the rain fell or how cold the wind blew, the war goddess who called herself Cassia would appear.
She could not pass my starlight shield.
So she would stand outside my door, enduring the agony of her broken oath, and talk to herself.
“Aresion, I destroyed the lair of the beast that poisoned you today.”
“You always said I was too obsessed with being strong. The truth is, I was just scared I couldn’t protect you. But I lost you anyway.”
“Do you remember the first time we fought side-by-side? It was raining that day, too.”
Her voice was often broken by painful, wracking coughs from the curse’s backlash.
Sometimes she would tell stories all night, trying to wake something in me with a past I did not own.
Sometimes she would just lean against the wall outside, her sobs quiet and repressed.
But to a man with no memory, her stories were just theatre.
I felt nothing. It meant nothing.
The door to my home, and the door to my heart, never opened for this strange woman again.
I spent all my time in training.
In the depths of the Isle of Oblivion, ancient beasts still slumbered-the last scions of the Titans, creatures like the Sirens and Charybdis.
I walked into the deep sea. With pure starlight power, I tamed them, one by one.
They bowed their heads to me, becoming my willing servants.
Forged in starlight and the deep sea, my divine spark was reborn.
I was no longer a general of Olympus.
I had become the most powerful guardian in the history of the Isle of Oblivion.
Time passed peacefully.
In my second year on the island, the woman who came to cry outside my door every Friday… suddenly stopped.
The nights were quiet again.
She never appeared again. No tears. No stories.
Perhaps she finally gave up. Perhaps she found a new distraction.
I didn’t care.
I just continued to temper my power in the deep, enjoying the strength and solitude that was mine alone.
Until the spring of the third year
A massive golden rift tore open the sky above the island.
Hermes, the highest messenger of Olympus, flew through the mist and knelt before me.
“Venerable Lord Aresion.” The god held out a solid gold decree. “The Olympian Council has witnessed your power. We humbly invite you to return to the mountain and take your place among us as the Lord of Stars.”
I took the scroll. Golden light swirled around my fingertips.
Return to Olympus.
A place that held a past I had forgotten.
But my heart was now unbreakable.
I donned a robe embroidered with constellations and walked calmly toward the shimmering rift.
Endless starlight bloomed at my feet.
The rift roared open, and the raw aura of a celestial lord swept across the sky.
