Somewhere in America, a 12 year old girl trotted through the woods. There was a bow slung over her back, gleaming silver but there was no quiver to speak of. Her face was the epitome of beauty, lined by shoulder length auburn hair and her eyes, silver like the moonlight, comforted her features.
She wore black leggings and a tunic and behind her walked another girl of a similar age.
The moonlight seemed to seek them out, falling on their bodies through the dense canopy. The girl's eyes turned to the side, where she saw a wolf slowly walk ahead while sniffing the air.
This was none other than the goddess Artemis, along with her Lieutenant, Zoë Nightshade.
As they were walking, the canopy above them trembled and a hawk flew down from above. Zoë extended her hand and the hawk landed on her arm.
It screeched softly, as if recounting a story.
They did not stop walking, but as the hawk finishing its share of screeches for the day, Zoë momentarily paused, her eyes widening in disbelief. Her pause made Artemis get ahead of her, giving her only a part of the story.
"Mistress..." She whispered, catching up. "This... can't be real, can it?"
"Why can't it?" Artemis asked with calm, "A man slaying the Catoblepas of all things... I suppose that old cow has gotten lazy in all its years of wandering. Whose son is he? I don't remember there being any quests recently."
Zoë suddenly had a strange expression on her face. With a doubtful tone, she spoke.
"My lady, the man... it says it wasn't a demigod. A clear-sighted mortal has slain the Catoblepas."
That made Artemis pause. Her steps stopped dead in her tracks, and she looked right at her Lieutenant.
"A mortal, you say? With what weapon? And what strength?"
Zoë looked at the hawk who screeched once more.
Both of then had a complicated look on their faces.
"A Celestial Bronze weapon... Interesting." Artemis smiled. "It makes me remember the old days. When there were mortals who actually dared to challenge beasts and monsters without a second thought.
"But in the present day, and a man no less..." Her voice quieted down at the end and her eyes adopted a curious expression.
She looked at the hawk and issued a command, "Get me more information."
With a flap of its wings, the hawk flew through the air and pierced the canopy, flying away.
Artemis and Zoë stood in silence for a second before they moved on. The matter itself seemed to remain in their minds for none of them spoke for the majority of their hunt. The Catoblepas was an ancient monster. It was something one could truly describe as the remnant of the 'old world.'
A mortal killing it?
Such a preposition was as far removed from practicality as telling an ant to kill an elephant.
Artemis could already imagine some gods getting interested, though she doubted anything major would happen. But somewhere on the back of her mind, she could see a certain 'someone' getting interested in the 'male specimen.'
Thinking of her, Artemis openly scowled, not bothering to hide it. Shaking her head, she walked ahead, focusing on her own hunt.
...
...
The Greek Delta symbol on the red brick wall stared at him. Nathan blinked. Then blinked again. He looked ahead and back, the darkness encroached close on both sides and the distant sounds of creaking and bending of metal and stone were layered with muffled groans.
He looked at the symbol again and came to the conclusion that he was in some Greek Themed Architecture. Perhaps some old catacombs? Overrun with monsters? He mused.
Since Greeks shifted to America, there's no reason for some mystical and important architecture to remain back there. Mount Olympus is on top of the Empire State Building, I don't see why there can't be something under the Appalachian Forests.
He looked down at himself, naked and cold. Here and there on his skin, some blood still lingered, although he had tried his best to clean it without using up too much water.
He pulled out some clothes from his bag and put them on.
After doing that, he again looked at the darkness surrounding him.
His senses, he noted, had not receded.
His jaw tightened and he looked around once again. Both sides seemed to stretch on for an infinite distance. He could see somewhere 20 meters ahead but beyond that, everything was swallowed up by darkness. The ground, he noticed, had a faint glow, almost unnoticeable. If not for his night vision, Nathan was sure he wouldn't have been able to see it.
He looked above him. The crack he had fell through was sealed. There was no way back and he could only go forward. So he did.
Tap! Tap! Tap!
His footsteps echoed a bit too loudly in the dark halls, ringing into his ears constantly and keeping him on edge. Somewhere far in the halls, he could rear groaning and creaking.
It was not long before he came across the first change.
The hallway changed into a concrete one, with straight white walls and a dusty ground. The ceiling was only a few feet above him and seemed to be getting lower. Nathan pushed on, and so did the ceiling. It was not long before he was forced to crouch through it.
Luckily, before he could be forced into a crawl, the ceiling completely disappeared, leaving a gaping darkness up above. The walls which were now made out of wood looked to be of an infinite height. Etched into the wood, he saw another Delta symbol.
After about 30 meters, he came across the first junction. The road split off into three. One lead straight ahead with rounded sewer like walls, to the right into marble walls and to the left continued the wooden walls.
The right road had the glow he had been seeing, but deeper right ahead, he could feel someone. Or... something.
The left road had a gap 5 meters away in the floor, out of which spikes were sticking out.
A maze... Nathan's eyes widened as he finally figured out where he was. He had read about this place in the wiki, and it was only featured in one of the most prominent Greek stories of all time!
"The Labyrinth..." His words echoed in the empty, dark halls. "A self expanding structure... almost as if it's alive..."
Suddenly, Nathan realized why his senses had refused to recede. The labyrinth itself was alive. Living architecture was also in the realm of the mystical, and while it couldn't be called a monster, there was nothing really differentiating it as well.
That dichotomy was the reason Hunter's Instincts had continued to work and Monster Lore hadn't given him the name of the Labyrinth when he first landed here.
"Well shit. I'm in a maze." Nathan looked at the right path again, the path that exuded the light he had been seeing. "Is this an illusion? It was said the Labyrinth has its illusions and plenty of traps. There was also an arena with a giant inside who was apparently unbeatable while touching the ground."
This was Nathan's limit of knowledge about it. The rest came from the myths, how the minotaur was imprisoned, King Minos and Daedalus, Ariadne and Theseus. Another thing he knew was that distance in the Labyrinth was non-linear. He had not paid the Labyrinth itself much importance when scrolling the wiki. He was pretty sure Percy found someone named Rachel in the series to navigate it, just like how Theseus found Ariadne.
Nathan mused for a moment before deciding to go forward.
His Hunter's Instincts had two distinct features. One was his senses, which for now were continuously dialed up to eleven. As for the second function, it was both a sort of danger sense and a modus operandi in fights of tracking that his body naturally followed.
In the moment, he found that the danger level ahead was manageable.
To confirm whether it was indeed a monster and not ambient noises like the groaning he kept hearing, he pulled out his Monster Pointing Compass. Sure enough, the compass pointed forward. The labyrinth didn't seem to confuse it like it did Hunter's Instincts.
Maybe after upgrades, Hunter's Instincts doesn't care about the distinctions between monsters and mystical things anymore? Anything alive and magical will trigger it to activate? The description still says monsters... Worth testing out sometime.
Cracking his neck, he headed down the front. While walking, he noticed that the light trail was following him. That got Nathan thinking. Was this the true path? Rachel was a mortal as far as he knew, and clear sighted. He too was a clear sighted mortal. Was it possible that the light trail was the main path of the Labyrinth?
Thinking of that, Nathan decided to continue forward. If he turned around, he could still follow along the trail and end up going back to the intersection. Besides, this was a maze sprawling all over America, having grown for thousands of years. There wasn't going to only be one true path. He was sure if he went long enough in the wrong direction, the paths would still connect.
As for where the paths would lead, that was naturally Daedauls's Workshop.
Nathan had little desire to meet the man. He wanted to find a way out of the Labyrinth or hunt monsters in the Labyrinth itself. Anyone would do.
But if he stayed too long, he was sure the sound of his own footsteps and the ambient sounds coupled with the constant darkness would drive him insane.
I should focus on escaping rather than following a particular path. He thought. Just as he thought that, the light path shifted. It now led down the same road he had chosen, down into the dark.
"... what if I want to head to Daedalus?" He adjusted his destination again, and lo and behold, the path shifted again, leading him back.
"That's convenient." He chuckled.
With escaping the Labyrinth no longer a very difficult endeavour, he steeled himself and headed forward. He could stay here for a month at most if he wanted to. Time was frozen in the Inventory, he had tested that with fresh cooked food.
As such, he had many delicacies and energy rich food waiting in the inventory. Naturally, there was water and fresh clothes too. His vision took care of the darkness and well, so long as the monster's weren't too strong, he could probably take them.
Since the opportunity's presented itself, let's just try and hunt some more in the Labyrinth. He grinned.
...
The path was a collection of sewer pipes. Rounded concrete walls with canals on both sides of the floor extended forward. Many small holes were in the walls from which dirty water trickled down into the canals and flowed forward. The smell was certainly something Nathan didn't appreciate - it was one of the disadvantages of having his senses swell up in such an environment.
Nathan's instincts warned him of more and more movement ahead. And in the dim glow of the celestial bronze, it was not long before he saw them.
There were 4 Nathan identified at a glance.
Black Chitinous Exoskeletons wrapped around them like armor, blending them into the darkness as they skuttled along the damp walls. Their eight legs made crackling sounds as they grabbed the concrete and their lobster like pincers opened and closed in a staccato manner.
A tail hung behind them, armed with a stinger than promised pain to anyone stung by them. And then there was their size.
All of them were half as tall as Nathan and nearly twice as wide. With their pincers, they would have taken up the entire walkway if they weren't taking the walls as their paths.
Monster Lore got to work, and Nathan found his first monster that wasn't named. His Perk classified them simply as Giant Scorpions, their weak points being the gaps between their exoskeletons and their underbellies.
The moment the golden glow of his sword was in view, one of the scorpions twitched and turned its giant body around.
It let out a disgusting screech, one that made the other three turn as well.
Nathan smiled, thought his smiled seemed a bit pointed.
"A poisonous enemy huh... I've had enough of those recently."
...
...
A/N: The 1000 PS bonus Chapter will be released in some time.
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Bonus Chapter every 250 PS!