Curse of the Triblood

Chapter 48

Percy POV

We ran through the maze and found little resistance from monsters. There were a lot of traps. I almost had my head cut off three times. Rachel was stabbed in the back three times, but I let her borrow my black lion's fur coat. She wasn't killed; she wasn't even hurt.

We followed Rachel and got closer to the center of the maze. We rested on the way over there and reached a modernized hallway. The lights from the ceiling were like the rectangular LED lights. The floors were white square, marble tiles. The walls made of steel and many night stands with vases were placed on top scatted around sporadically leading up to the main door. The door was a large door made of metal and nearly ten times bigger than the rest of us.

"How are we going to open it?" Beckendorf asked us.

"Don't worry, I am here," I said. I walked up the door, and with a single kick, the door dented inward, and with another, it flew off its hinges and into the workshop.

When we walked into the room, we could see a large room that resembled Athena's cabin. It had many diagrams and parchments on the wall and blueprints of machines, structures, automatons, and other things that could potentially be made. Books were in towering piles, somehow they stood up in ways that should defy physics. The room was white marble with many perfect structures and placed to hold up the space. Looking up, there were at least five levels or floors with marble and golden relying on, keeping people from falling over the large gap between the floor, allowing everyone to see each floor above or below. Most of the floors were libraries that seemed to have no end.

The far wall was a large window instead of a regular fence; it stretched from the top floor to the bottom floor and was long enough to reach each corner of the entire room. Light shone through, and many people would have felt like they were in an Olympian library.

"Daedalus is a genius. Those structures and blueprints are so advanced," Annabeth was awed.

"The blueprints for the engine are amazing; he could make never-ending renewable energy. Then the automatons running off of it... I didn't even know metal could do that," Beckendorf said.

"Say's the son of the god making metal do things," Elana said. I actually forgot she was there until then.

"He's an artist too. The paintings and drawings are amazing."

"He's like Da Vinchi," I uttered.

"Leonardo Da Vinchi came after...so technically Da Vinchi is like him," a voice said behind us pointed out. While looking around, I felt a presence coming up from a marble staircase. I turned to see Quintus standing there with familiar Greek armor, Athenian armor. Then it clicked in my head, but I stood still, not uttering a sound. I tightened my imperial gold arm, Quintus seemed to see my change in demeanor.

"Athenian, traitor, give me one reason why I should not use Olethros on you right now," I told him.

"Like it worked last time," he countered.

"What are you doing here?" Beckendorf asked.

"He was probably sent here to speak to Daedalus for Marcus," Annabeth informed.

"Smart girl, but nonetheless wrong," Quintus told her. "I don't work for anyone but myself."

"Then why are you here?" Rachel asked.

"He is Daedalus," I told them. "Marcus came here and spoke to you already, didn't he? Got the stupid string too, I bet."

"I'm afraid so; you are several hours too late," Quintius told us.

"How can you be Daedalus? He should have died long ago," Beckendorf asked.

"If you are Daedalus, you have to tell me your skincare routine; you don't look anything older than fifty for a guy over two thousand years old," Elana commented.