At Any Cost
"Cr... Cronus? H-how did you— Ghk—aaargh!!!"
Atlas's voice tore out of him as something closer to a scream than speech. Hades drove into the opening without hesitation and brought the Titan down.
"Hah..."
"You did well, little sister."
Hestia offered him a weary smile, sweat still beading on her brow. Hades felt a brief flicker of relief — but his gaze was already turning toward the ones who had felled Cronus. Toward Hephaestus, and the young gods who had stood with him.
When Atlas crashed into the fight, I thought it was over...
Atlas was one of the mightiest Titans alive — a foe even they could not bring down lightly. The moment he barred their path, despair had settled cold and heavy in Hades's chest. If Cronus escaped, everything ended. The chance they had clawed together would scatter like ash.
And yet, as if to mock that very thought, Hephaestus — and the young gods who followed him — had done it. They had brought down Cronus, king of the Titans.
Hephaestus's power had been decisive, but without the young gods fighting at his side, the feat would have been impossible. Their individual strength was still incomplete, yet watching them fight with so much room still left to grow filled Hades with a pride that belonged to an elder — and, beneath it, a thin thread of unease.
For now we stand together against a common enemy... but what comes after is what worries me.
A child who shone too brightly always became a parent's burden. Among the deathless gods, that truth cut even deeper — such brilliance invited wariness, suspicion, and the urge to keep it in check. His own father, Cronus, had proven it. His grandfather Uranus before him. So what would Zeus do?
Zeus was king of the gods, ruler of Olympus — and yet in this war he had accomplished almost nothing of note. His own son Ares had claimed greater glory. And the first among them all was not even an Olympian, but Eurynome's son, Hephaestus.
Hades could already see the storms that fact would raise. The concern settled in him, solid and impossible to ignore.
Meanwhile, far from Hades's private misgivings, Hephaestus and the others were already binding Cronus's fallen body and bringing the chaos under control.
"Mother!"
"Athena!"
Athena ran straight to Metis, seizing at last the reunion she had set aside. The warrior who had stood so valiant moments before now clung to the mother she had thought lost forever and wept like a child. Even those who knew nothing of their story felt something quiet and warm settle in their chests at the sight.
But one person watching felt something else entirely. In Hera's heart, an unnameable discomfort stirred — something that might also have been envy.
They did it... my sons... the sons I bore finally did it... but I...
Hephaestus and Ares, who had brought Cronus down. Other gods had helped, and helped greatly — but in this moment Hera's eyes saw only her sons. The children who had seized the greatest glory of the day. Children she was so desperately proud of.
And yet she, their mother, could not bring herself to approach them. Not the way Metis and her daughter held each other in joy. A sin still clung to her, unforgiven — the terrible crime of failing to see her children's worth, of casting them out and crushing them under her own hand.
I want forgiveness... from Hephaestus... and from Ares... no matter what price I have to pay. At any cost...
Clutching that desperate wish — that purpose — close to her heart, Hera stood as nothing more than a mother who had sinned, watching in silence as her sons encouraged each other.
Then—
"What are you standing around staring for? This isn't over."
"H-huh? What do you mean, Sister Hestia? Cronus is down..."
Hera frowned at Hestia's words. Her confusion did not last long.
"Kill them all! Avenge Lord Cronus!"
"Damn it! Forget vengeance — fall back! Retreat!"
The moment Cronus fell, the Titan ranks dissolved into even worse chaos. Ordinarily the other side would have seized the advantage — but Olympus had nothing left to seize it with. Most of their forces were already down. Enemies had already flooded the castle. They had cut off the head, but the thrashing body still had to be pinned.
Recognizing that it was far too soon to relax, they finished a brief regroup and prepared to clear the stragglers inside the castle first.
Then—
"Wait."
"Hm?"
"What is it?"
At Hephaestus's word, they stopped.
And then...
"Damn it! Hold them! We have to hold them somehow!"
"They've got to be tiring by now! Attack!"
The gods of death tore through the Titan ranks without pause. Even a god of tremendous power was helpless before sheer numbers — unless they stood at the level of the Primordial Gods. Immortality did not mean infinite stamina or divine power.
And yet—
"Ghk—aaargh!!!"
"W-what— they still have this much strength— Guh!"
Time had passed, and the gods of death were not tiring. If anything, they fought harder. The Titans had not understood. These were gods of death in the truest sense — beings who embodied the concept of death itself and fed upon it. A battlefield already thick with the dying and the dead was a feast that pushed them far beyond their ordinary limits.
And the one reaping the greatest benefit of all was the figure at the front, slaughtering with the most terrifying ferocity of any of them: Keres, goddess of violent death.
"Kahah! Kyahaahahaha!!! Yes! Yes! Come on, pile in denser! More death! More desperate screaming!!!"
Spears and blades rained into her, carving her body to ribbons — and she only laughed harder, a horrible, ecstatic sound, and killed with even greater savagery. She was death itself gone mad. High Titans might have been able to do something about her if they stepped in, but even they hesitated before the sheer murderous pressure rolling off her. Immortal or not, none of them wanted to suffer pain that felt like dying.
"Kihihit! You there... what are you waiting for? Come on and try me."
One severed arm was already sprouting back, blood still dripping from the stump. The agony should have been unimaginable — and Keres only called out in a voice thick with rapture. This was not mere endurance because she could not die. She was enjoying it. Other people's deaths, her own pain, even her own death — all of it was nothing but a violent game to her. That monster turned a smile like a wound toward the high Titans and screamed.
"I'm getting bored of the small fry's screaming! Your turn to howl! Come on! Hurry!! Now!!!"
Her body was in tatters, and her presence had not diminished by a single degree. Faced with that blood-chilling provocation, Iapetus and the other Titans reached the same conclusion: if they wanted to stop the bleeding, they would have to step in themselves.
"No choice. We take them down, even if it costs us. Then we move to aid Lord Cronus."
"U-understood."
The high Titans drew their weapons and advanced. Thanatos and Moros both frowned slightly.
"This will not be easy."
"This fate does not feel favorable."
They tensed at the approach of foes stronger than any they had faced so far. Keres, meanwhile, only grew more delighted, her laughter ringing with pure anticipation.
"Kyahaahahahahah!! Yes! That's more like it! Come on, then! Let's see how the faces of the Titans who once ruled the world twist when they break!!!!!"
That chilling laugh rolled out as Keres poured forth a murderous surge of divine power. She had seemed almost tame since coming aboveground — but of course her true nature had never changed. Her brothers sighed quietly, then readied their weapons.
In that instant—
—BWOOOOOOOO!!!!
"!? What?"
"W-what is that?"
A vast trumpet blast rolled across the field, shaking the air in every direction. Every gaze on the battlefield snapped toward the sound — Olympians, Titans, fairies, nymphs, and humans alike.
And there, holding every eye, stood a force that stirred entirely different emotions depending on who looked upon it. A host advancing in tight formation, armed with spear and shield, carrying a presence so overwhelming that even the Titan army that had been sweeping Olympus flinched back. Everyone present knew the truth: only one being in this world commanded a legion like that.
"Th-that can't be..."
"W-why is he here?"
Even after Hephaestus's appearance, this was a presence they had never truly expected. A man who commanded a mighty host and had still held to neutrality through it all. Lord of the oceans — Oceanus.
Facing the gods and Titans who stared at him in shock, he spoke in a voice calm and clear.
"I have come to end this war."