"Dude. You said you are in hermes. Your cabin is literally never
going to amount to anything more than mess. Have you guys ever
passed an inspection?" Keene asked. He figured he was all set, his
area was nice and neat with everything stowed under the bed, and
the bed made. Honestly, if he left he didnt think anyone would
notice. He had never hung anything up around his bed or marked it
at all as his own. If it werent for his cabin leader he was pretty
sure the next new ares kid would end up with his bed.
"So far, no we haven't." She facepalmed, chuckling. "Then again, it
is pretty normal. Until the cabins for the minor gods and Hades are
built, were gonna be pretty crowded." She ran her fingers through
her hair as she looked up again
I never change this
click the image above to go to my toyhou.se
"So for until the end of time, pretty much" Keene joked as they
arrived at the pavillion. "I'll talk to you after breakfast." He
said, silently acknowledging the rule against sitting at the other
god's tables. He blended in with the crowd getting breakfast as
they parted, making it rather difficult to see which table he was
headed to.
I turned to to my surprise see Keene wave at me, that
didn't usually happen often. But I replied with a small wave back,
I didn't want to shout and get a bunch of eyes beam at me. That
would be unnecessary trouble that I personally didn't want to get
into. Hopefully the other Hermes campers realized that the cabin
wasn't even clean yet, I didn't want to think about it anymore. I
walked towards my respective table, which was with the Hermes
cabin. The crowd was making it quite difficult getting around but I
managed to get a tray of food and get myself situated at my table,
now ignoring the other campers and eating my food in
silence.
Keene wolfed down their breakfast, mostly ignoring the other Ares
kids, other than to interject points about why certain weapons
wouldnt work well against others. They sat at the table for a
little while afterwards, listening to the flow of conversation
around them, and thinking about how their day was going so far.
They had held a proper conversation with Mackenzie, and had waved
at a boy coming from the direction of the training center. Maybe
the two of them could spar, Keene considered, having seen the sword
on the boy. Would be fun to see how their staff's anti-splintering
enchantment was holding up. And to fight against an actual person.
Keene left the dining pavillion and their half siblings, asking
someone who was coming late to breakfast what they had got. They
gave a nod at the 4 they received. Sure, they werent as neat as
say, the Aphrodite kids but it wasnt too bad. Better then the wreck
that is the Hermes cabin. They went back to the Training center,
practicing on one of the dummies and hoping someone would come in
who wanted to spar. Or a whole class of people they werent all that
fussed about their schedule.
I didn't expect a high grade, since the cabin was always
messy. So I wasn't surprised when we got a two, I finished my food
with a few quick and ravenous bites before standing up and heading
towards the training center. I then continued thrusting and jabbing
the poor, innocent dummy. It didn't really fight back, obviously
and continued to get beaten senseless by my sword. I noticed Keene,
the boy who'd waved at me, I averted my face for a few seconds
looking at him before quickly returning to my vicious
assault.
Keene moved from his dummy to beside the one that Blake was
mutilating, while being sure to be outside of accidental-stabbing
range. "Good morning!" Keene all but chirped, leaning on his staff
for a moment. "I understand you must have a tough grudge against
this poor dummy, but, would you care to spar with me?" Keene asked,
fitting a joke into the question.
I inched a few inches back from where Keene was leaning on
his staff, ignoring the dummy completely "Morning. And, this dummy
didn't do anything to me, if it did it would've been shredded into
oblivion long ago." I sheathed my sword, awkwardly shuffling my
feet. I didn't socialize much, which meant this was going to be
either really embarrassing for me or really amusing for
Keene.
"Was a joke, sorry, thought it was obvious. Silly stuffed things
arent all that malicious." Keene said with a shrug. "But yeah, I'm
Keene and do you want to spar?" Keene repeated his main point,
adding in his name. Figured it might chill the other guy out, he
had seemed to be pretty focused while beating the stuffing out of
the dummy, pun fully intended.
"Oh, sorry." I replied, then introduced myself "I'm Blake
Ryder, son of Hades. Nice to meet you Keene." I looked at my weapon
and back at Keene "I can't use my sword on you, since it's Stygian
Iron. If you don't know what it is, just think of it as an upgraded
version of Celestial Bronze or Imperial Gold." That's basically why
I sheathed my sword earlier, I'd have to use a different
weapon.
"You imply that you are going to land a few blows" Keene said,
practically rolling his eyes. "go grab a sparring sword then" He
said, gesturing in the general area of the swords with the end of
his staff. "And it is lovely to meet you, Blake Ryder, son of
Hades" Keene half joked by parroting back Blake's full title. He
didnt really understand why everyone went around saying who their
godly parent was while introducing themself.
"Likewise." I walked over and tested a few swords out, when
I finally found one suitable and got into an offensive position,
then with a sudden outburst of speed I charged at Keene, making a
feinting motion before going to a foreswing and following it with a
powerful backswing.
Keene brought up his staff to deflect the blows, using its length
to his advantage. Backing up a few steps, Keene aimed for Blake's
wrists and the hilt of the sword in an attempt to make him drop it.
Keene focused on the defense, with a few offensive swings here and
there.
The blows I made were unfortunately, deflected. I moved out
of the way, realized Keene was trying to make me drop my weapon,
not that that mattered. Keene's offensive strikes hit me before I
deflected a few of them. Should I use my demigod powers? Sure, you
only live once. The ground began to tremor in an attempt to knock
Keene off balance then out of the ground a skeleton hand grabbed
Keene's leg, creating an opening, taking the chance I jabbed my
sword in an attempt to graze his shoulder.
Keene half shouted half squawked as the skeleton hand grabbed his
leg, stumbling backwards as Blake grazed his shoulder. Keene
slammed his staff down on the skeleton's hand, shattering a bone or
two and getting it to let go. He regained his footing and went for
a more offensive approach, lots of rough battering with the sides
of the staff on Blake's arms, still aiming to disarm his opponent.
I dodged some of the attacks, but the last few caught me
off guard, sending my weapon sprawling behind me. "Alright,
alright. I give up." I spat at Keene admitting defeat. I looked at
him with admiration for getting that far.
"Dude that skeleton hand scared the daylights out of me" Keene
said, leaning on his staff. "Like seriously, nightmare fuel right
there" He gestured at the broken bits of bone for emphasis. "so
youre the dead half and not the riches half of hades then,
seriously tho. Terrifying"