Rise of Erebos: Search of the Hidden

Chapter 13: A Real Night of Revelation

If you're a demigod like me, then you'd definitely understand how it feels to relax after a long day of being chased down by monsters and encountering a vengeful goddess.
Oman dropped us off at LionsWorth Enterprises so he could go get fuel and we could get a good night's rest. Usually, I might have thought that stopping to get some rest during a quest was a bad idea, but after encountering Nemesis, I definitely wasn't complaining.
We went down to an underground bunker on the bottom floor of the company and set down our supplies. The bunker was a medium sized room with bronze walls and floors with several rows of racks that contained spices, herbs, medicine, and supplies. It stank of what smelled like expired curry and dumpster trash, which apparently expelled monsters, so it made the perfect sleeping place for demigods. There were also a couple of bunk beds and a small brown sofa.
We each sat on a bunk, preparing to go to sleep. The bed felt like it was made out of stone and rocks, but nonetheless, it was somewhere to sleep.
"So...is everyone ok?" Amethyst asked with worry. "After what Nemesis showed me..." she trailed off.
"It was horrifying," Kai admitted, shuddering. "I think I'm gonna get some Dracula-inspired nightmares tonight."
"What did everyone see?" I asked. I wondered if they saw the people they hated the most like I did.
"Nemesis is known for being able to summon illusions," Amethyst said, twirling her hair. "I think she summoned the people we hated most. The people we wanted to take vengeance on."
"In my illusion...it replaced each one of you with my Get Vengeance On list. It showed me my old teachers from my old schools and also...It showed me Hephaestus," Kai explained, hesitating near the end.
Geneva gave Kai a curious look. "Why do you hate Hephaestus? What did he do to you?"
Before Kai could answer, Alexander butted in. "I saw my entire family, from Uncle Rob to my Aunt Lily."
Kai looked at him graciously. "I'm sorry for that, buddy. Nemesis really gave our minds a beating."
A solemn silence fell across the room. We had all seen some bad things from Nemesis and no one was too keen to go into any more detail than they had to.
    "I'll go next," I volunteered. "Nemesis showed me my mom and a couple of people from my past that weren't particularly...nice. She also showed me my... sister." I tried to hold back my tears as I let my sister's death sink in. With all these events going on, I hadn't really gotten a chance to process what happened to Marianne. Honestly, I had to admit, it was nice getting a distraction to get away from what had happened. But after what Nemesis showed me, well I didn't really know what to think.
I missed my sister with all my heart and wished she could come back, but it didn't mean that I wasn't angry with Marianne. She'd never gotten along with me, and to be frank, she had always hated my guts. As much as I hated to admit it..part of me also resented Marianne.
"I'm sorry, Rose," Amethyst sympathized. "If it helps, Nemesis showed me all my old teachers that kicked me out of school."
"Anyways," Arthur said. "We should get some rest, we've got a long day ahead of us."
Geneva nodded. "Good night, guys." She climbed down her bunk and turned off the lights.
I turned on my side and immediately fell asleep. I hadn't realized how tired I felt from today. However, no matter how tired I was, I couldn't avoid having weird, random visions.
My vision began with my body hovering above a dark, abandoned factory. The factory was as large as a house with a couple empty racks and foyer belts that appeared to be deactivated. There was also a large wooden podium with a microphone in the front of the factory where Ares stood, wearing his same biker clothing and dark shades. The factory was packed to the brim with monsters, ranging from hounds to large vultures. Amongst the crowd was Nemesis, listening eagerly for Ares's announcement.
Ares pressed down on the microphone, testing out the sound. "Hello fellow friends, today I have gathered you all for one reason: Vengeance!" This got a large cheer from the audience, monsters growling hungrily.
"Those punk heroes tried making fools of us! The Olympians disrespected us and for that, we will start a war!" Ares continued. The monster cheered once again, yelling out all sorts of insults about us. One even said I looked like a chimpanzee! The nerve of that guy! He literally looked like he'd been trapped on an island for eons and had forgotten to shave!
"Nemesis, Hypnos, I want you to bring groups of monsters with you and gather more weapons. The rest of you, hunt down the heroes, and kill them! Do not let a single one roam free, or else I'll tear you apart with my bare hands! Understand?" Ares commanded, his purple eyes examining the crowd.
"Yes, sir!" The audience responded, as if they were a class addressing their teacher. The monsters roared loudly once again.
My vision changed again, shifting into a cave, more specifically, the cave from my last vision. I looked at the cage where the woman was still trapped, her hair smeared with grime and her dress torn to shreds.
The magician lady was still performing magic on the cage, mocking the poor caged woman. Next to her was now another woman, with dark hair styled into a cone with gems. She also had a regal face, making her look like a statue. She was wearing a long, sleeveless golden dress and a pendant made of blood red rubies. Her eyes glimmered with so much hate that I couldn't help but cower away.
Also standing near the cage was the same twenty-foot tall giant I saw in my last vision. Near the back of the cave was the same group of monsters and demigods that were in the cave last time. However, there seemed to be much more of them, almost twice the amount as before. It was if they duplicated overnight.
"We can't let those heroes get to the first mask. Circe, send a message to the Gigantes. Olivia, you were able to open up Tartarus temporarily, correct?" the voice from my last vision boomed.
Olivia whimpered. She looked even worse than she did before, with her curly blonde hair almost gray with stress and her dark blue eyes dull with tiredness. "Yes, my lord. I have successfully completed my mission."
"Good. That means the Gigantes are free. Circe, convince them to join us and then get them to protect each of the masks. If we are to win this war, we can't let them access the masks," the voice commanded.
"Yes, my lord," the sorceress said, bowing toward the sound of the voice. 
"Back to your stations!" the voice instructed, the monsters and demigods shuffling into position.
My vision ended, waking me up instantly. I took a deep breath. I was drenched with sweat and my mouth was extremely dry. I climbed down my bunk and examined the room. I was the only one awake, with everybody else sleeping soundly. (Especially Alexander, who was snoring while mumbling about chasing cotton clouds.)
I took a quick shower and changed my clothes. After dealing with all those monsters yesterday, I smelled like absolute crap, so getting a shower was nice. When I came back to the bunk room, Amethyst was now awake and wiping her eyes from grogginess.
"Good morning, Rose," Amethyst yawned, stretching her arms out wide.
"Good morning to you too," I replied. "Look, I had another dream last night."
She looked at me with a concerned look. "Oh. Well in that case, I'll go wake up everyone."
"Oh, you don't have to do tha-" I began saying, but she was already heading off to get something before I could finish.
When she came back, Amethyst was carrying what looked like golden cymbals.
"Whoa, where'd you get that from?" I asked.
Amethyst shrugged. "There were a couple of metal, dome shaped food coverers or whatever you would call them."
Before I could say anything else however, she banged the cymbals against each other, delivering a sound so ear-shattering, that my ears began ringing. In an instant, everybody woke up, groaning and complaining about the sound. However, Amethyst didn't stop there, she kept banging the cymbals together, the same ear-piercing waves traveling through the room like a never ending siren.
"Geez, woman! Stop that!" Kai groaned.
"STOP, MOM!" Alexander screamed. Thankfully, Amethyst got the message and dropped the two cymbals, making one, last, awful sound.
"Sorry," Amethyst mumbled, as she put up the cymbals.
Arthur got out of bed and smoothed his hair. "What seems to be the problem, Amethyst?"
Geneva rolled out of the bunk underneath Arthur's and joined him, giving him a kiss on the cheek. Somehow, she still managed to look like a supermodel even though she had just gotten out of bed, with her hair still neatly wrapped into a chignon and her face as regal as ever.
Amethyst nodded towards me, asking me to explain. I told everyone about my visions, from Ares building up his army to the earth-man requesting that the masks be blocked.
"That's not ideal," Arthur said, intently staring at the floor. "Now we're going to have to go through a Gigantes before claiming the masks."
"It's like this guy insists on making our lives more difficult than they should be," Kai groaned, combing his hair over. Unlike Geneva, he looked like a true mess, with drool on his shirt and his hair so tangled, that it looked like a bird's nest. All in all, he looked like a zombie who just came back from the dead.
"Yeah, why can't he just let us eat shawarma peacefully and play video games?" Alexander complained. He played with his Tom and Jerry pajama shirt and scratched his spiky black hair, which didn't look much better than Kai's hair.
I nodded. "Is Oman awake? We should be heading out soon."
"I'll go check on him," Amethyst said, walking away.
As everybody got ready, Cynthia LionsWorth came down to our bunker, dressed in a blue pant-suit with a white shirt that had beaded straps and blue high heels. She still wore her same black glasses with her brown hair wrapped up in a tight bun.
"Mom," Arthur said, blankly. "What are you doing here? I thought you had a meeting with Kremen Technology." He said that last part like he wanted to get rid of her as fast as possible. I didn't know Arthur well, but it was clear he had some problems with his mother.
"I do. However, before you leave on your quest, I wanted to borrow Rose for a second," Cynthia answered.
Arthur looked at me with a suspicious look, like he was saying "good luck with that". He also seemed to have a twinge of envy in his eyes. Yeah, he definitely had some unresolved mommy issues.
She motioned for me to follow her, leading me into a wide room. The room had a large domed ceiling with a magnificent view of the city. The walls were covered with Ancient Greek mosaics, showing historical scenes throughout Greek mythology. The room was carpeted with a large black training mat with gym supplies and weapon racks to the sides. To the right of me, there were training dummies and red punching bags that made the area almost look like some karate dojo.
"Whoa, what is this place?" I marveled. The Hecate training area paled in comparison to this place.
"This is the training dojo. This is where I train Arthur every night," Cynthia explained.
"Interesting," I muttered. "Anyways, why'd you bring me here?"
It seemed pretty random that she chose to only bring me here, especially when her son was also in the room.
"It's important for you guys to know how to deal with powerful illusionists. I watched the security tapes yesterday, which is how I knew to come to the abandoned store. I saw that you used the Mist while you were fighting, so I brought you here to train you," Cynthia explained.
My eyes widened. I really hope she wasn't referring to full-on training, like conditioning, beating down dummies, knife-fighting, and practicing magic. First of all, it was way too early in the morning, and secondly, there was no way I was going to be able to handle a full on workout without barfing my guts out.
As if she read my mind, she said, "Not like that. I want to teach you how to summon an illusion. It's an ability shared by children of Iris and Hecate."
"The key to summoning an illusion is by imagining what you want to summon, whether it be a copy of yourself or a different item," Cynthia continued. "However, to successfully trick a foe, you have to summon an illusion that would trick them."
I nodded. "I see. Um, can you show me?"
Cynthia nodded. She closed her eyes and then reopened them, a duplicate Cynthia spawning next to her.
"Wow," I said with shock. Her duplicate looked exactly like her, not missing a single detail.
Cynthia merged back into her full form. "Now, you try it."
I closed my eyes and began clearing my head, only thinking about creating a duplicate version of myself. Thankfully, I didn't have to think too much about what would trick Cynthia, so I reopened my eyes and looked to my right. I jumped back with surprise. Next to me was a duplicate of me, staring at me blankly.
I couldn't believe what I was seeing. My duplicate looked exactly like me. It had my same flowing black hair and silver eyes along with the same clothing I was wearing, including my dark blue jeans and plain black T-shirt that said a name of some weird rock band from the nineties.
"Wow," I managed. I closed my eyes again and merged back into my normal form, which felt like being dipped into a cold ice tub.
"Well done, Rose," Cynthia said. I felt pretty proud of myself as Cynthia walked towards the entrance, with me following.
She led me back to the bunker and left shortly, leaving me with the rest of my friends.
"So, what was all that about?" Arthur asked.
I shrugged. "She just showed me how to create illusions, that's basically all she did."
"Ooh, like a wizard?" Alexander asked.
"I guess," I said, not really understanding what Alexander was talking about. To be fair, I don't think anyone understood what he was saying most of the time.
"Nice. Anyways, Oman is waiting for us outside," Kai said.
"Great," I muttered, as we began heading to the elevator.
How could this day get any better?