Geryon was fastening his whip to his waist when he finally noticed that the light illuminating his face no longer came from the torch at the cell door.
He looked up at the window in the ceiling of the cell with his usual yellow grin, then turned around.
Hermes was lying curled up against the wall. And now, in addition to the injuries from the previous afternoon, his head bore the marks of the violence he had endured.
His beautiful white locks that once reached his neck were gone.
His scalp was scarred—cuts, abrasions, blows. Marks of resistance.
Unfortunately for him, resistance didn't seem to have been enough.
Beneath him, a river of blood.
Some tufts of his hair floated on the pools of his suffering, while others mingled with the filth of the cell floor.
He didn't answer.
He felt dirty.
As dirty as the floor of this cell.
No. Even more.
His divinity had been violated, his essence tainted.
How could he still be considered a god?
Geryon grinned even wider, affirming the young man's submission.
The sight before him told him he had finally put the slave in his rightful place.
"Get him up and take him downstairs," Geryon told his men, who had spent the night outside the cell just listening to the ogre "educating" his servant. "Don't let him rest."
The guards entered the cell as the giant left it, and they hurried to lift the young man.
Hermes didn't resist and stood with the men's support.
His empty gaze didn't convey the pain he felt, but a storm raged inside.
"Is this humanity?" he thought, bitterness corroding his mind. "All my insolence, all my rebellion… it was for them. For defending them from my father's paranoia and…"
The image struck him, not as a memory, but like a physical blow. Apollo's yellow eyes, wide with shock. The sickening sound of the Caduceus piercing his brother's flesh. The silence that followed.
"No…" The denial was a silent scream in his soul. "It wasn't for them. It was for me. My pride. My blind rage."
He felt the echo of Geryon's violence in his body—the humiliation, the sensation of being an object—and a terrible, poisonous truth formed in his mind. The monster in the cell had violated him, broken him… exactly as he, in his own rage, had broken and erased his brother.
"This hell…" he concluded, drowning in despair. "This pain… is my punishment. The echo of my own sin."
His legs gave out, and he stumbled even with a guard holding him. Soon, another grabbed his other arm, and they dragged him out.
They descended a circular ramp, and Hermes, in the depths of his weakness, managed to glimpse people in dirty, torn clothes, all wielding pickaxes and mining something in the tunnels alongside the ramp.
Despite his vision, everything seemed to slip from his senses, and all he could focus on was the pain inflicted on him.
At the bottom of the pit, the guards finally let him go.
He fell face-first to the ground, in the dust among the other slaves who had already begun working.
"Is this what I deserve for what I did?"
An empty expression stared into nothingness. Soon, a pickaxe fell in front of him, beside his face.
"No slacking here, bum," one of the guards snarled at him through clenched teeth and with disdain in his eyes.
Hermes looked at the pickaxe with a hopeless gaze and didn't move.
"Don't want to work, huh?" The guard spoke arrogantly, reaching for the whip at his waist.
He raised his arm.
But a hand stopped him, gripping his wrist before he could strike the young man.
The guard turned, irritated.
"My lord, allow me to help him," said a bearded, experienced-looking man in a calm tone, shirtless and wearing worn-out trousers.
The guard gestured to protest, but the man interrupted him again.
"You know we can't afford to lose manpower, my lord, am I wrong?" he said with his calm expression. "Would Lord Geryon be pleased to know that a newly acquired servant is already useless?"
The guard opened his mouth to retort but thought better of it when reminded of his superior.
He yanked his arm free from the man's grip.
The guard returned the whip to his waist while rubbing his wrist with a disguised expression of pain—likely from the man's grip.
"Take this filthy one away and get him to work at once!" he barked, pointing at Hermes on the ground. "If I catch him slacking, both of you will pay!" he warned angrily, finger in the man's face like a snarling dog.
The man didn't react.
His gaze didn't waver for a moment.
Nothing on his face—no anger, no fear, no tension.
He was calm.
The guard clicked his tongue in annoyance and walked away, leaving the two behind.
The servant watched him go, then approached Hermes on the ground.
"Get up, young one," the man said, kneeling beside him. "The ground is no place for someone in your state."
He took Hermes by the armpit and, with some effort, helped him to his feet.
He picked up the pickaxe that had been given to Hermes, carrying it with him.
Hermes felt his consciousness slipping as he was lifted. His body and mind were exhausted.
His vision darkened, and the last thing he saw was a hooded figure hurrying toward them.
"Is he alright?" asked a worried female voice.
...
Hermes opened his eyes.
To his surprise, he was no longer where he had just been. The stone walls, the ogre—gone.
He found himself in a dark, cold, damp forest.
He wore his usual clothes—not the filthy, tattered ones, but his divine garments.
The Caduceus was fastened at his waist.
The trees around him twisted into one another, opening and closing paths one after another.
Looking around revealed a labyrinth of trees.
He looked up at the sky and saw nothing but night.
The stars shone brightly.
Despite the calm and silence, save for the sound of cicadas, Hermes felt uneasy. His heart was beating faster than normal.
He decided to walk, to leave that place.
He tried to leap into the air and fly, using his divine abilities. He failed.
The wings on his sandals seemed too stubborn for such a thing.
An incessant discomfort gnawed at him. His heart matched his mind in its restlessness.
Looking around once more, he saw the same thing as before.
However, behind him, the trees seemed to weave together. A warning from nature:
"No return."
He decided to keep walking, making his way through the trees ahead that still allowed his passage.
After some time, he realized he was getting nowhere. On the contrary, the trees in front of him seemed to close his paths more and more.
He began to hear strange sounds in the forest.
Whispers. Animal noises.
His heartbeat quickened; his mind worked to understand the scene unfolding around him.
Suddenly, he felt a sharp pain in his chest. He brought his hand there, slipping it under the fold of his chiton. He felt a scar in that spot—a mark in a strange shape.
CLACK VUUSH
Suddenly, from behind him came the monstrous sound of something snapping, followed by something slicing through the air.
His heart pounded faster than ever.
He turned, startled.
Fear gripped him.
He saw a bolt splitting the skies, consuming the stars in its path—and, worse, coming straight for him.
He stepped back, terrified and unable to comprehend.
VUUUUUSH
He saw that spear of light and lightning tear through the sky and everything in its way, seeking him.
He turned and ran with all his strength, weaving through the trees.
His head grew hot. His chest ached with the pounding of his heart, each beat feeling like a blow.
He couldn't run as he once did. His speed wasn't there, and every time he tried to push for it, the pain in his chest only worsened.
The pain came from the mark.
The noise behind him only grew louder, closer.
In his desperation, he tried to scream—to call for his father's help.
No sound came.
Then he felt something seep from his chest. Something viscous.
He looked down and saw a black stain spreading across his chiton near his nipple.
Still running, he once again touched the mark. It was wet. Something like iron—but filthier.
His already weakened strength faltered.
His run slowed.
He pulled his hand away from his chest. He saw his blood—but it wasn't golden as always. It was black. Thick. Dirty.
Gasping, he slowed further and eventually stopped, leaning against a tree.
The lightning spear, unlike him, only grew faster.
He closed his eyes as the pain in his chest became unbearable.
VUUUSH CLACK TLACK
He heard, at last, the forest giving way, opening for his pursuer's passage.
A blinding light revealed itself to him, even with his eyes shut. He clenched his teeth. The pain only worsened.
Click Tec
Hermes regained consciousness to the sound of crackling fire and the sensation of someone running their hand over his head.
He pushed himself up, bracing his hands against the cloth beneath him—only to lose his balance as whatever supported him swayed.
BLAM
He tumbled down, landing just centimeters from the ground.
The pain of hitting his head made him spring up quickly, still on high alert.
To his surprise, he saw a girl sitting on the ground beside a hammock. Someone he had seen before. It was dark now—night had fallen—but he recognized her anyway.
Her hair, tied at the nape of her neck, looked darker than the brown Hermes remembered. Her delicate, fine features gave her an air of innocence—naivety typical of the youth she still seemed to enjoy.
In her lap, over her now-dirty dark blue tunic, was a grimy cloth stained red.
She looked at him with uncertainty and a trace of fear.
"Gulp— Wh-who are—" Hermes swallowed hard, staring at the girl with a tense expression.
"Á-Ágatha!" she quickly replied, still looking at him with some doubt.
"Help him up, little one," a calm male voice requested from behind the girl.
Hermes grew alert again and backed toward the wall of what seemed to be a cave.
He hit the wall and felt a stab of pain in his torso—the agony of his broken rib. He clutched the area, grimacing in pain.
"Kuhk—" he groaned, gritting his teeth against the excruciating pain.
"Calm yourself, boy," the man said, standing behind the girl. "Like you, we are servants. There is no reason to fear us." His expression remained calm as he spoke.
Hermes stared at him, breathing heavily from the pain.
Still wary, he took in his surroundings.
A kind of cave, likely part of a mine. The walls had a few wooden beams for support. Beside the girl, still seated on the ground, were hammocks.
Hermes realized that was where he had been resting. He noticed the girl's blood-stained hands and clothing. The cloth she held, originally white or some light color, was now filthy red. She was covered in his blood.
Looking down, he saw his torso was wrapped in thin bandages. Only then did he realize the burning on his back was gone—his wounds had been treated.
The image of Geryon came to mind, and he glared at the two with restrained anger.
He tried to stand on his own, but a sudden movement strained his broken rib, sending him back to the ground with a groan of pain.
Ágatha looked worried, quickly standing to help him.
As she did, her elbow brushed the back of his head, where the hair was thinner from being torn out.
The touch was light, accidental. But to Hermes, it was as if Geryon's crushing hand was on him again. The ogre's stench of sweat and rot filled his nostrils; his disgusting laugh echoed in his ears; the memory of pain and humiliation flooded his mind. It wasn't Ágatha touching him. It was him. The monster.
"GET AWAY!" Hermes roared—a guttural, animal sound. He shoved her roughly, not from anger but from blind terror—the instinct of a cornered creature thrashing against its predator.
She fell with a small gasp, landing seated on the floor.
Ágatha drew her hand back, her face a mix of fear and hurt. She opened her mouth slightly to speak, but with a sorrowful expression, decided against it and returned to sit by the fire beside the man.
Hermes stared at them, breathing heavily, body trembling. This was not the anger of a god touched by a mortal—it was the panic of a victim reliving torment. That simple touch to his scalp had hurled him back into the hell of that cell—an agony that left him stripped bare and terrified.
The man looked down at Hermes, his usual serene expression unchanged.
"Give him time," he told the girl behind him. "We've tended to his body. Now he needs peace to tend to his own mind." He spoke while placing a wet cloth on the hammock where Hermes had been lying.
The man stepped back and sat beside the fire, which Hermes only noticed now.
Silence filled the cave for a few seconds.
The girl glanced at Hermes, as if about to speak, but refrained. Instead, she leaned against the tunnel wall, eyes on the flickering flames.