Divine Ascension: Reborn as a God of Power
Chapter 87: Theomachy (Part 24) - Uncles vs Nephews

Chapter 87: Theomachy (Part 24) - Uncles vs Nephews

The battle raged on, a storm of vengeance and fury between the shattered halls of Olympus.

Apollo danced through the ruins like a wildfire given form—his divine light blinding, erratic, fueled by anguish. His hands released bolts of searing solar fire, each one crashing into the marble floor with the weight of comets, scorching trenches into the battlefield. Every pulse of power he unleashed cracked the heavens, setting the skies ablaze with gold.

Athena was not far behind. Her movements were deliberate, each strike of her spear aimed with surgical precision. She fought with the mind of a tactician, adapting to her enemies’ patterns in real time. She parried Hades’s glaive, twisted under his shadow slashes, and countered with devastating sweeps of her Aegis shield. Her breaths were shallow, with pain etched in every movement, but she didn’t falter.

She couldn’t.

Not after what they’d done.

Across from them, Hades fought like death incarnate.

He didn’t speak. He simply attacked without mercy.

Shadow tendrils surged from the cracks around him, clawing at the light. His glaive moved like a scythe through wheat, its edge trailing necrotic magic. The earth beneath him blackened with every step. Apollo’s light faltered against the pressure—Hades was not just striking at the body, but at the soul. Each clash left behind echoes of despair, memories of the Underworld bleeding into reality.

Still, Apollo withstood it.

He screamed as he released a barrage of light that tore through Hades’s guard, slicing through armor and burning across the god’s ribcage. But Hades didn’t react. He simply advanced, relentless.

And beside him—Poseidon remained still.

His trident was raised defensively, but he had not yet struck again.

He watched as Apollo and Athena pressed forward, rage in their eyes, grief fueling every blow. He could see the fraying threads in their movements. The exhaustion. The heartbreak. The misunderstanding.

"Enough!" Poseidon shouted, stepping between them and Hades.

A tidal pulse spread outward from his body, pushing all three combatants back.

Apollo tumbled across the ground, catching himself on one knee. Athena slid to a stop, spear raised.

"Stop this madness!" Poseidon called, voice thunderous but not angry. "We didn’t want this! We didn’t want war with you!"

Apollo’s eyes burned with white fire.

"You killed our father!"

Poseidon’s face twisted, caught between regret and resolve.

"He left us no choice," he said. "Zeus would’ve dragged the whole world down with him. We tried to reason with him—"

"He was our king!" Athena roared, stepping beside her brother. "You turned on your own blood."

"No," Poseidon said quietly. "We stopped him because we had no other option. The world was unraveling and he was crazy."

Athena flinched at that, but didn’t lower her weapon.

"You betrayed Olympus," she said. "You betrayed us."

That was when Hades struck again.

With a sudden twist of shadow, he appeared behind Apollo, glaive slicing across the sun god’s back in a crescent of obsidian light. Apollo cried out, stumbling forward, rolling away before the follow-up blow could land.

Athena leapt to his defense, shield raised.

But Poseidon was already moving.

He surged forward—not with hesitation now, but with conviction. His brother had made his choice, and he had no time to argue further. He raised the trident and swept it sideways, conjuring a wave of compressed seawater that smashed into Athena, sending her flying into a column that shattered on impact.

Apollo countered with a scream of light, launching a spear straight into Poseidon’s chest.

It hit and sank in him.

But Poseidon didn’t fall.

He ripped it out, blood pouring, and with one motion, sent the solar weapon flying back like a harpoon. Apollo barely dodged in time, the projectile embedding itself into the mountain wall behind him, detonating in a burst of heat.

Then the full battle began again.

Poseidon joined Hades in a pincer maneuver—one of darkness, one of flood. Apollo and Athena were backed into a narrowing corridor of broken statues and ruin, caught between two unstoppable forces.

Hades struck low, glaive cutting under Apollo’s guard, slicing into his thigh. Apollo retaliated with a pulse of solar detonation, sending Hades skidding back in flames.

Athena lunged at Poseidon, her spear piercing through the watery barrier he raised. The tip struck his side, but a tidal backlash followed, knocking her back with the force of a crashing storm.

Every clash shook Olympus ground.

Lightning long dead flickered again above them, drawn to the sheer concentration of divine fury below. The wind howled. The ground cracked open beneath their feet.

Apollo soared upward, wings of pure sunlight sprouting from his back, hovering above the battlefield like a god of old.

"Artemis..." he whispered.

And he rained fire down like judgment.

The bombardment shook the mountain.

Poseidon raised a dome of seawater around himself and Hades, the twin gods shielding themselves as meteors of sunlight rained down, vaporizing marble, melting banners, incinerating what little beauty still clung to Olympus.

Athena emerged from the smoke, spear crackling.

Hades met her.

They clashed midair, glaive against divine bronze, shadow against wisdom. .com

Poseidon exploded out of the water dome and met Apollo in the sky. Their trident and fists clashed, a dance of storm and flame.

On consequence, the mountain was collapsing.

Each blow sent tremors through the bones of Olympus, echoing down into the underworld and up into the darkened heavens. Wind screamed through shattered archways, carrying with it ash, blood, and the dying echoes of divine power.

Apollo fell first.

Poseidon’s trident struck him across the chest with the force of a tsunami, the impact sending the god of the sun crashing into the remnants of a colonnade. Columns shattered like brittle trees beneath his weight, divine light leaking from his body in thick streaks. He coughed, blood—gold and flickering—spilling from his lips as he struggled to rise.

Above, Poseidon stood wreathed in waves and storm, his presence crushing. Water spiraled around him in a living cyclone, and when he moved, the air buckled with pressure. He was no longer the wise king of the sea, but a leviathan in humanoid form—an ocean given wrath and will.

Apollo launched a blast of concentrated sunlight, the beam cutting a trench through the battlefield, glowing hot enough to melt divine stone.

Poseidon batted it aside with his trident.

The wave that followed slammed Apollo into the mountain wall, cracking the cliffside and burying him under tons of debris.

"Apollo!" Athena called.

She didn’t look at him because she couldn’t afford to.

Not now that Hades was on her.

Every strike from him left her slower and numb.

Athena parried one blow, then another, but the third caught her across the midsection, shredding armor and cutting deep. Her shield arm faltered. Her knees buckled.

Still, she fought.

Her spear lashed out in a burst of silver flame, carving a path through Hades’s midsection. Smoke and void leaked from the wound, but he didn’t slow. He never slowed.

He struck again.

This time, he drove his glaive into her shoulder. The impact sent her spinning, crashing to the ground. She rolled to her feet, her shield broken and her spear’s glow dimming.

She blinked—and he was already in front of her.

The next blow sent her skidding across the broken marble, blood spraying in an arc behind her.

She barely got to her feet.

Apollo burst from the rubble behind them, blazing with divine fury. Wings of sunlight unfurled once more behind him as he charged Poseidon with a scream, fists glowing, body radiating raw solar fire.

He struck Poseidon full in the chest—once, twice, three times.

Each blow dented the sea god’s armor and burned his flesh.

Poseidon staggered.

But then he roared.

A pulse of oceanic pressure blasted outward. Apollo flew backward, coughing, clutching a cracked rib.

Poseidon didn’t let him breathe.

He surged forward and caught Apollo midair, one massive hand grabbing his throat.

Then he drove him into the ground.

The impact crater swallowed them both in a shockwave of shattered stone and geysering seawater.

Athena rose to her knees.

She was bleeding and was breathless.

But her eyes still burned.

She hurled her broken spear at Hades. But it was deflected by a wave of shadows.

And then he was in front of her.

His glaive pierced her thigh, then twisted, driving her down. Her scream was muffled by the wind and her pride.

Suddenly he leaned close and raised his weapon again.

But before he could strike, Apollo returned—half-broken, glowing with dying sunlight, and burning with rage.

He tackled Hades away from Athena, both gods rolling in a blur of light and shadow across the field.

Poseidon appeared behind Athena.

She spun, stabbing with the broken haft of her spear.

He caught it midair and shattered it.

Then he struck her with the back of his trident—once, twice—until she hit the ground and didn’t rise.

The fight was over.

Even if their hearts hadn’t accepted it yet.

Apollo broke free of Hades, panting, burned, barely able to stand. His golden hair was singed. His divine form flickered in and out of cohesion.

He looked at Athena.

She was broken and bleeding. Still reaching for her shield.

So...he screamed and flew upward, charging all the power he had left into a single, suicidal burst of solar wrath.

The sky turned white because of the light of the attack.

And then—

Poseidon caught him in midair.

A trident through his side.

The solar blast fizzled.

Apollo coughed once. Choked. Light bleeding from his eyes and mouth.

Poseidon didn’t twist the weapon. He didn’t need to.

The point had been made.

He set Apollo down gently beside Athena. Not as an act of mercy, but of respect.

They had fought well.

But they had lost.

Around them, the ruins of Olympus smoldered. Thunder rumbled no longer. The wind wept for gods brought low. And still, in the distance, battles raged—but here, the silence was heavy.

Poseidon stood tall once more, trident in hand.

Hades stepped beside him, his glaive lowered.

Neither of them spoke. f|ree(w)ebn\o.vel.com

There was no look of triumph in their eyes.

Meanwhile and behind them, the mountain cracked again.