What had happened to the old gods we used to worship?
How long has it been since they became nothing more than bedtime stories—fables to scare children into obedience, or dusty relics in museum exhibits? How long since we traded their altars for skyscrapers, their temples for shopping malls? Did they vanish because we stopped believing, or did we stop believing because they vanished?
You might be wondering who the hell I am, sitting here scribbling this down like some deranged prophet.
Let me tell you something about the day the world ended.
There is always something keeping the end from arriving... until someone messes up and brings the apocalypses straight to earth's front door.
Now, who would have been so stupid to mess up something so important that they ended up bringing the apocalypse? Well, that was me, because of the actions I had taken that day, he was able to arrive and destroy our world.
Where was I when the world ended? I was miles underground exploring a recently discovered ancient city hidden deep under Greece. I was there because of a failing grade. A last-ditch field assignment to scrape together enough credits to keep my scholarship. Digging through a recently discovered temple under Mount Olympus, sweating through my shirt, trying to ignore the way I seemed to know far more than I should have.
The things that had happened that day had caused so much of my life to flip on its head. How was it that I, a mere mortal, was the one who was selected to have the one chance to change the world? To be reborn as one of the gods that come from our storybooks and somehow save the world from being destroyed?
Well, now, here I am, writing down my story, the first chapter of my own biography. A true account of history from the mouth of someone who lived through all its greatest and worst moments. This is how Nathaniel Rhodes became Hades, the God of the Underworld, and started my very own Empire.
🙛🙚🙛🙚🙛🙚🙘🙙🙘🙙🙘🙙
I never planned on going to Greece.
I planned on passing Occult History with something better than a C, keeping my scholarship intact, and working up the nerve to ask Elara Vance to coffee without sounding like I was reciting from a ritual manuscript.
Instead, I was wedged into seat 34A on a transatlantic flight to Athens, knees pressed against the plastic, staring out at nothing but cloud cover, wondering how my academic advisor had bulldozed me into this.
"You need the credits, Mr. Rhodes."
Professor Alden Pierce had said that without looking up from his tablet. He always did that as if eye contact were a privilege granted only to tenure.
"The Archaeological Immersion Program is an opportunity. You specialize in ancient theology and pre-classical myth. This aligns perfectly."
"I study esoteric frameworks," I'd corrected. "Comparative cosmology. Ritual systems. I'm not exactly Indiana Jones."
He finally looked at me then. "You're on academic probation."
That ended the debate.
And now here I am. Ten hours into a flight over the Atlantic, hurtling toward Athens, Greece, with thirty-nine other college students.
"Stop staring like you're about to summon something," Ethan muttered from the aisle seat. "You're making the old lady nervous."
I glanced right. Sure enough, the woman across from us had one eye cracked open, watching me as if I was going to do something.
"I wasn't staring," I said.
"You absolutely were."
Ethan Morales adjusted his watch—a sleek, obscenely expensive thing that probably had its own Wikipedia page. His father owned Morales Global Holdings, a private equity firm that specialized in dismantling companies for fun. Somehow, Ethan had managed to avoid turning into a corporate psychopath.
He slouched in his seat, as if first class had personally offended him, one ankle hooked over his knee. He studied Architectural History and Ancient Engineering, and claimed he wanted to "restore forgotten wonders." His father wanted him to take over the family empire. They fought about it every Thanksgiving.
Behind us, Marcus shifted in his seat with a groan that sounded like a dying mammoth. The entire row creaked in protest.
"You two done?" Marcus rumbled. "Some of us are trying to sleep."
Marcus Reid did not fit in economy class. At six-foot-three and roughly the width of a refrigerator, he looked like someone had carved a linebacker out of granite and forgotten to sand down the edges.
He played on the defensive line for Blackridge University on a full athletic scholarship and majored in Marine Biology with a minor in Marine Archaeology.
Most people assumed he took classics for an easy grade.
They were wrong.
Marcus could recite The Odyssey in ancient Greek and then bench press a small car.
"Hard for anyone to sleep with your snoring," I shot back. "Sounds like a freight train."
"Shut up, Nate."
The first time I saw Ethan Cross, he was sitting in the principal's office with a split lip and a smirk that said "worth it." Second grade. Some prep school kid had called him a "trust fund brat," so Ethan—still in his stiff new uniform—laid him out behind the jungle gym. They transferred him to our public school the next day.
Marcus broke his arm the same week, trying to parkour off the monkey bars. His cast smelled like Sharpies and regret by the time it came off.
And me? I was the kid sitting cross-legged in the dirt, nose buried in a dog-eared copy of Bulfinch's Mythology, pretending I understood any of it.
People said we made no sense.
A nerd, a jock, and a rich bastard. What a trio we were.
The wheels struck the runway hard enough to rattle teeth.
A few students gasped. Someone clapped once, awkwardly, then stopped when no one joined in. The engines roared in reverse, pressing us forward against our belts as the coastline of Athens slid past the window in flashes of white buildings and blue water.
The intercom crackled. "Ladies and gentlemen, we have arrived in Athens. Please remain seated until the aircraft comes to a complete stop."
Ethan leaned back and blew out a breath. "Finally. I swear this flight aged me five years."
Marcus rubbed his neck. "You slept for most of it."
"That's not the point."
I kept my eyes on the window. The Aegean shimmered beyond the runway. Somewhere north of here, Mount Olympus cut into the sky. Somewhere beneath that mountain, buried in stone older than recorded history, was a structure no one had known existed six months ago.
Forty students. Four professors. A partnership with the Hellenic Ministry of Culture. Access to what the media had already named the Olympian Hypogeum.
The Tomb of the Gods.
The seatbelt sign chimed off. Chaos followed.
Overhead bins snapped open. Backpacks dropped. Someone cursed when a suitcase clipped their shoulder. The air smelled like recycled oxygen and impatience.
We shuffled into the aisle with everyone else. Professor Pierce stood near the front, already in motion, clipboard in hand. He looked energized, not tired. He thrived on this kind of field work.
When we stepped onto the jet bridge, the air changed. Warmer. Heavy. It carried jet fuel, humidity, and something mineral I could not name.
Inside the terminal, signs flashed in Greek and English. Families waited near baggage claim. A news screen over a café replayed footage of Mount Olympus. A red circle highlighted a section of its northern face.
Marcus followed my gaze. "That's it."
"Yeah."
The Olympian Hypogeum, or as it was commonly called by everyone else. The Tomb of the Gods.
Six months ago, Dr. Alexandros Stravos had been conducting a survey using ground-penetrating radar along a restricted zone near Olympus. Officially, he was mapping seismic fault lines. Unofficially, he had been chasing inconsistencies in satellite imaging that did not align with known geological formations.
What he found rewrote textbooks.
The radar returned a void. Not a cave. Not a natural chamber.
A structure.
Symmetrical. Engineered. Massive.
Subsequent scans revealed corridors extending nearly two kilometers beneath the mountain. Chambers is stacked vertically. Reinforced stone walls with measurable tool marks. A central vault of unknown depth.
Stravos called it a hypogeum, but even he admitted the word felt inadequate.
Excavation began under strict secrecy. Within weeks, his team uncovered carved reliefs unlike any previously catalogued. Not classical Greek. Not Mycenaean. The iconography predated established timelines by centuries.
They found inscriptions in a dialect no linguist could immediately classify. Symbols that paralleled early Linear A yet diverged in structure. Depictions of figures identified as Olympian deities, but rendered in forms that did not match later artistic conventions.
One chamber held burial offerings. Gold leaf fragments. Obsidian blades. A ceremonial helm forged from a metal alloy not matching any known ancient Greek composition.
Radiocarbon dating of organic remains suggested an age far older than the accepted date of the rise of Hellenic civilization.
History departments worldwide had been forced to pause and reassess.
Now, universities were being invited to send top students in archaeology and classics to assist. Under supervision. Controlled access. Real excavation, not simulation.
Ethan kicked my sneaker. "Earth to conspiracy theorists."
"I'm not—"
"You're staring into space again," Marcus interrupted, twisting in his aisle seat. "What's got you worked up anyway? As long as you participate, you will get a passing grade."
We reached baggage claim. Luggage thudded onto the carousel.
Ethan grabbed his duffel and slung it over his shoulder. "So. Largest tomb ever discovered. Under a mythic mountain. No pressure."
Marcus adjusted his glasses. "It's not just the size. It's the stratification. If the lower chambers predate the upper ones, that suggests prolonged use across eras."
"Which means?"
"Which means whoever built it wasn't a single generation."
I tightened my grip on my backpack strap.
Stravos had given one press conference before the excavation was fully restricted.
He had stood in front of Mount Olympus, wind cutting through his coat, and said, "We are standing at the threshold of a structure that may represent the oldest organized funerary complex in Europe. What we have seen so far suggests continuity of ritual and political authority on a scale we did not attribute to early Greek societies."
He looked tired when he said it. Not excited. Concerned.
The initial artifacts alone had forced revisions in three major academic journals. Burial rites were more complex than previously documented. Trade networks were wider. Metallurgy was more advanced.
If the central vault matched the scale projected by scans, it would dwarf the Valley of the Kings. It would challenge the narrative that Egypt held the crown for monumental ancient tomb construction.
And we were here to help unearth it.
Outside the terminal, buses waited for our group. The sky was clear. Heat pressed against my skin.
Professor Pierce gathered us near the curb. "Listen up. We head to the temporary research compound near Olympus. You will not enter any restricted chamber without direct authorization. You will log every artifact. You will follow instructions from Dr. Stravos and his team without exception."
Ethan leaned close to me. "You think they'll let us anywhere near the central vault?"
"If we prove we're useful."
Marcus scanned the skyline of Athens behind us, then turned toward the distant outline of mountains.
"Mount Olympus," he said quietly. "Home of the gods."
I looked at the horizon. The mountain rose in the distance, hazy but unmistakable.
Buried beneath it was a tomb older than the myths written about it.
A structure that should not exist.
I adjusted my grip on my bag and stepped toward the bus.
By the time the bus groaned its way up the last stretch of gravel road, dust had worked its way into my lungs and settled there like a second atmosphere.
Mount Olympus didn't look like what people expected. No thunderheads. No golden aura. Just rock. Stone layered over stone like the earth had been stacking ribs for centuries. The air up here felt thinner, drier. Cleaner.
And the site…
It wasn't ruins scattered in some romantic sprawl. It was organized chaos.
White tents. Generator hum. Stacked crates labeled in Greek and English. Roped boundaries around carved entrances cut directly into the mountainside. Equipment cases. Folding tables. Folding chairs. Floodlights mounted on metal rigs aimed at a jagged opening in the rock face.
And people.
A lot of people.
Two other buses were already parked near the lower clearing. Clusters of students from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and the University of Crete gathered in groups of matching jackets with university logos stitched on the chest. Greek lettering everywhere.
Ethan leaned forward in his seat and whistled low. "That's… a lot of competition."
"Not competition," Marcus muttered. "Collaboration."
Ethan snorted. "You're adorable."
The bus doors hissed open.
Heat hit first. Then the smell of earth. Not city earth. Not landscaped soil. Raw ground that had been recently disturbed. Fresh excavation. Dry stone dust.
We stepped down into it.
From what I could see, each school had brought 40 students, so there were 120 students taking part in this program. I wondered how they planned to have all of us work together.
Twelve professors stood near a folding table, each with a clipboard. Dr. Stravos was easy to spot. Mid-fifties. Sun-darkened skin. Beard trimmed short. Sunglasses pushed into his collar. He carried himself like a man who hadn't slept properly in weeks and didn't care.
He waited until we all gathered before speaking.
"We will form twenty teams. Six students per team. Each team will consist of three from one university and three from another. You will live, work, and document together. This is not optional."
There was immediate noise. Some groans. Some nervous laughter.
Ethan leaned toward me. "If I get paired with three guys, I'm transferring."
Marcus rolled his eyes.
Names were called.
Ours came midway through the list.
"Nathaniel Rhodes. Ethan Morales. Marcus Reid. You will join… Daphne Papadopoulos. Sofia Dimitriou. Cassandra Kallias. You six are going to be in Tent 9."
Three girls stepped forward from the Greek cluster.
Cassandra carried herself like a statue from antiquity—high cheekbones, dark curls framing a face that belonged on a coin, olive skin warmed by the Mediterranean sun. She studied us with the detached curiosity of someone used to being admired.
Sofia's delicate features betrayed her Asian heritage—almond eyes catching the light as she offered a small bow of greeting. Her posture was precise, almost rehearsed, but the warmth in her smile felt genuine.
Daphne moved last, her rich brown skin and sharp nose marking her Indian roots. She didn't look at us so much as through us, one eyebrow arched like she'd already heard whatever we were about to say.
Ethan straightened immediately.
"Yassou," he said confidently in Greek.
Daphne blinked once.
Sofia smiled politely. "Hello."
The rest of us gave simple greetings as we hauled our things to where the tents had been set up, a half mile away from where we had gathered—Marcus effortlessly carrying two duffels like they were grocery bags, Ethan complaining about dust ruining his designer hiking boots. I watched the three women we'd just been shackled to exchange glances that promised this would be interesting.
The tent was military-grade—one of those khaki monstrosities that could survive artillery fire. Inside smelled like canvas and stale adventure. Six cots lined the space with insulting proximity, storage crates stacked like a drunken Jenga game in the rear. A single lantern swung from the center beam, casting restless shadows.
Ethan tossed his bag onto the nearest cot with a theatrical flourish. "Behold our palace," he declared, flashing that Morales grin—the one that made trust fund kids and baristas alike weak in the knees. "I've stayed in worse five-star hotels."
Marcus claimed the cot nearest the entrance without a word—all 6'3" of him moving with that unnerving athlete's grace. I knew why he picked it; same reason I beelined for the rear corner cot wedged against two tent walls. Old habits from too many childhood sleepovers, where Marcus played human shield against imagined monsters.
Daphne noticed first. Her dark eyes tracked my path to the corner like she was solving an equation. "Claustrophobe?" Her voice was smoother than the local wine.
"Not too much," I admitted, testing the cot's springs. "I just feel more secure sleeping near a wall."
She nodded once, filing that away, while the others began unpacking with varying degrees of enthusiasm. The moment stretched awkwardly—six strangers pretending not to study each other.
"So if we are going to be working with each other, why do we not get to know each other?" Ethan spoke up, breaking the silence as he looked between us. "Who wants to start?"
"Right." I cleared my throat when nobody spoke up. "My name is Nathaniel Rhodes. I go by Nate for short. Grad student drowning in mythology and occult studies."
Sofia grinned as she sat down at her cot. "Sofia Dimitriou. Environmental science with a focus on paleoclimatology."
"Cassandra Kallias." The Greek girl flicked her dark curls over one shoulder with lawyerly precision. "Forensic anthropology and corporate law. If we find bones, I'll tell you who killed them. If they're recent, I'll sue the killer."
Ethan perked up. "Daddy's got the best attorneys if you need referrals—"
"Morales." Marcus didn't look up from lacing his boots. "Shut up."
Daphne's lips twitched. "Daphne Papadopoulos. Materials archaeology." At our blank stares, she sighed. "I study how civilizations collapse by analyzing their garbage. Currently writing my thesis on 21st-century microplastics as cultural artifacts."
Ethan threw his arms wide. "Ethan Morales! Majoring in Architectural History and Ancient Engineering."
Marcus finally looked up. "Marcus Reid. I study Marine Biology with a minor in Marine Archaeology." His bicep flexed as he went to grab his duffel bag.
The zipper of Marcus's duffel bag stuck halfway as he yanked it, the sound sharp in the tent. Outside, cicadas screamed in the dry heat—Greece in August was no joke. The six of us were still sweating through our travel clothes, the thin nylon walls offering no protection against the relentless Mediterranean sun. Dust from the dig site clung to everything; I could already taste it in the back of my throat.
"Christ, please tell me that someone had packed the bug spray?" Ethan dug through his bag like a man possessed, sending socks flying.
Sofia didn't look up from her tablet. "There should be some extra in the supply tent. Our Universities should have ordered several extra supplies just in case."
Marcus finally won his battle with the zipper. "By the way, did anyone else see those photos Stravos leaked to the department listserv? The ones from Level Five?"
That got everyone's attention. Even Ethan paused mid-rummage.
"You mean that stone door that's been hyped up for a while now?" Cassandra's voice dropped, as if we were being watched.
"Ten meters tall," Daphne said, unfolding a printed copy with the reverence of a holy text as we crowded around to look at it. "No visible mechanism. No weathering patterns consistent with the surrounding rock strata."
Marcus leaned in. "And the script?"
"Unidentified. Not Linear A, not Cypriot, nothing in the Aegean family. Stravos brought in linguists from three continents. They're calling it 'Door Text Alpha' until they crack it."
The symbols swam in my vision. That curling vertical line—I'd seen it before. Somewhere. The knowledge sat just behind my teeth, bitter and unformed.
Ethan whistled. "So what's behind it?"
"Nothing," Sofia said. "Scans show solid rock beyond. Stravos believes that there is something, yet he needs the right key to enter it."
"Bullshit." Marcus knocked his knee against mine. "If all the tests show nothing but stone behind the door, how does he expect to find something behind it? Whoever had carved the door had simply marked where to carve and never got to finish."
The cicadas went quiet.
Then the dinner bell rang, sharp and sudden, scattering the moment like pigeons.
"Saved by the bell," Ethan muttered. But as we filed out into the golden haze of evening, I kept quiet as I kept feeling a nagging voice in the back of my head that I needed to get to that door no matter what it took.
The dining area glowed under strings of Edison bulbs, their warm light bouncing off polished silverware and ceramic plates—real china, not disposable crap. The scent of garlic and oregano hung thick in the air. Platters of dolmades glistened with olive oil, flanked by charred lamb chops still sizzling with fat. Bowls of tzatziki swam with fresh dill, next to loaves of bread so warm they steamed when torn apart.
120 students jostled for space at the long wooden tables. Twelve professors presided over the feast like Olympian gods holding court. Silverware clinked against plates as conversations overlapped—Greek, English, the occasional burst of laughter.
I found myself seated between Marcus and Daphne, while Ethan strategically positioned himself between Sofia and Cassandra, who looked like she'd stepped off a Grecian urn. High cheekbones catching the lantern light, dark curls framing that impossible face. She ate with precise movements, occasionally glancing up with that detached, amused expression of someone accustomed to being stared at.
"You're doing it again," Marcus whispered.
"Doing what?"
"Mooning over Cassandra like she's the fucking Parthenon."
I hadn't realized how long I'd been watching her—the way her fingers deftly dismantled a dolma, the confident tilt of her chin as she debated Bronze Age dating methods with a postgrad from Cambridge.
Then those dark eyes locked onto mine.
"See something interesting, Nathaniel?" Cassandra asked as she raised an eyebrow at me.
Ethan kicked me under the table.
"You've got..." I gestured vaguely at my own mouth. "...something in your teeth."
Her perfect brows furrowed. A manicured finger probed at her lips. "Where?"
"Left canine. Spinach, maybe."
Cassandra's jaw tightened as she pulled out her phone and angled it toward the lantern light, checking her reflection with the precision of someone preparing for cross-examination. Ethan coughed into his napkin, loud and deliberate, eyes wide in mock innocence.
Before she could respond, a chair scraped hard against stone.
The sound cut through the dining tent.
Dr. Alexandros Stravos stood at the head of the long folding tables. He did not raise his voice. He did not need to.
The conversations thinned, then stopped.
He was taller than I expected. Lean. Weathered. His hands bore the marks of someone who still worked in the dirt instead of directing from an office. A scar ran along one knuckle. His eyes moved across us without hurry.
"When I began my career," he said, "I expected to spend my life filling gaps in established timelines. Small revisions. Marginal corrections."
He let that settle.
"What we are standing on is not a marginal correction."
Silence held.
"You have all read the preliminary reports. You have seen the scans. What you have not yet understood is the scale."
He stepped away from the table and moved closer to us, boots scraping lightly against the packed earth floor of the tent.
"The Olympian Hypogeum extends through five primary levels beneath Mount Olympus. Each level serves a distinct architectural and cultural function. The uppermost level contains ceremonial corridors and relief carvings. Level Two houses secondary chambers, likely dedicated to ritual preparation and storage. Level Three contains burial alcoves and artifact repositories."
A few students shifted, scribbling notes even now.
"Level Four," he continued, "is structurally reinforced. The stonework changes. The tool marks change. The iconography becomes less narrative and more symbolic."
He paused.
"Level Five remains sealed."
The words settled heavily in the air.
"Ground-penetrating radar confirms a central vault beyond a carved stone door at the terminus of the fifth descent corridor. The door is intact. It has not been breached."
A pulse moved through the group. Not loud. Not chaotic. But there.
My chest tightened.
The door.
I had seen the image in the restricted briefing file. A massive slab of stone carved with figures that did not match any known artistic period. Not archaic. Not classical. Older. The symmetry of it had felt deliberate. Intentional.
Dr. Stravos folded his hands behind his back.
"This program exists because discovery at this magnitude requires disciplined manpower. You are not tourists. You are not treasure hunters. You are research assistants under the direct supervision of professional archaeologists."
His gaze sharpened.
"You will be divided according to specialization. Environmental science students will assist with soil analysis, sediment cataloging, and air quality monitoring on Levels One and Two. Anthropology and classics students will document iconography and burial configurations on Levels Two and Three."
Cassandra's pen moved faster.
"Linguistics students will work with our epigraphy team to transcribe and preserve inscriptions from Levels Three and Four."
Daphne's attention sharpened, posture straight.
"Those with engineering, physics, or structural analysis backgrounds will support reinforcement assessments on Level Four. We do not descend into unstable architecture without understanding load distribution."
He looked toward the cluster of students from our university.
"Selection for Level Five access will be limited and earned. Only senior staff and designated assistants will approach the sealed chamber. No one will act independently."
My pulse beat harder in my ears.
Level Five.
Even if it led nowhere. Even if it opened into nothing but an empty vault.
It mattered.
Stravos continued. "Every artifact is to be logged. Every measurement recorded. Every anomaly is reported immediately. You will operate in teams of six, rotating through assignments over the coming weeks."
Teams of six.
I felt Ethan glance at me.
Stravos's voice lowered slightly.
"You are about to participate in a project that will alter our understanding of early Mediterranean civilization. The fragments already recovered have forced us to revise established chronologies. Metallurgical samples from Level Three indicate alloy compositions inconsistent with known Greek production methods of the supposed era. Burial rites display centralized authority structures earlier than previously documented."
He let the weight of that sink in.
"This is not mythology. This is material evidence."
My jaw tightened.
You're wrong.
Or not wrong.
Incomplete.
He drew a breath.
"There will be no heroics. No improvisation. If you encounter something unexpected, you step back and call a supervisor. If you feel unwell, you report it. The lower levels contain air pockets that have not been exposed for millennia."
He scanned us one final time.
"Tomorrow at 0600, you will report to your assigned supervisors. You will begin on Levels One through Three. You will earn the right to descend further."
His eyes paused, briefly, in my direction.
It felt intentional.
"Get rest tonight. It will be a long day."
He stepped back.
"Welcome to the greatest archaeological project of your generation."