'Fear'
It wasn't an emotion that Olympians admitted feeling. However, just like everyone else, they felt fear too.
As Liam tore through his strongest generals that were as strong as him in terms of fighting capabilities like they were nothing and marched towards the central palace walls, Perseus felt fear gripping his entire body as he contemplated the choice between running away and confronting Liam.
'There's no way I can fight that monstrosity' he thought, as he was on the verge of running away when Liam's spectral storm started to slow down and dissipate, as Liam himself dropped down to both his knees looking like a thin and brittle skeleton.
"He's down..... he's finally down .... The toll of using that power is finally forcing him to die" Perseus told himself in elation as he gripped his sword and charged out like a fearless lion, smelling the weakness in his prey.
"Rally around me men!
Today we kill the mad professor...." He said boldly, as he encouraged a few of his royal guards to charge alongside him, however, the moment a few of his guards approached the dying Liam, the professor raised his arm while being on his knees and projected a dark wave of death which instantly claimed the lives of 30 odd soldiers, pausing right before Perseus, as the 30 men instantly dropped dead on the spot, even though there wasn't a single cut on their body.
"What the hell old man? What's your problem? Why are you doing this?" Perseus asked, his face ashen white with fear, as he now felt unsure of whether or not he was supposed to attack Liam or not.
"Why...? Why.... You ask" Liam said, his voice sounding raspy as he looked at Perseus with his hollow skeletal eyes.
"Why do you keep sending scouts and assassin's to my university? Since when was it okay to provoke the mad principal ...." Liam said as a small murderous glint returned to his hollow eyes.
"What? You are doing all this just because I sent a few scouts to check on my sister?
Screaming with pain as his skin was torn apart and then regrown, Perseus felt the worst sort of pain that could be experienced for several seconds.
His men rallied around him, chanting healing spells and trying to protect him as Liam finally breathed his final breaths.
Whether Perseus died or lived, Liam was never able to see the outcome of his effort, as he turned to ash himself after unleashing that move and banishing the seed of death to a separate spatial portal that he had created specially for this day.
Liam knew that he could not let this terrible weapon fall into the hands of the enemy and had decided to long banish it to the shadow realm whenever he was done using it, and hence once he used his last bit of energy to try kill Perseus and acknowledged that he was on the doorsteps of death, he used all his remaining power to banish his treasure to the shadow realm, before accepting his grim fate.
Unfortunately for him, because of the special treasure given to him by Poseidon, Perseus did not fall to his final attack. However, he was left in a pitiful condition with dark spots covering all of his body when everything was said and done.
Although he had failed in killing Perseus, him being alive was a worse punishment than death, as he was now going to be forced to write a letter to his father informing him of the attack and explaining the circumstances behind it.
For Perseus, who was especially instructed to not provoke Liam, having made the foolish mistake of sending repeated scouts to the university was going to see him get heavily reprimanded, as Perseus was sure to lose standing within the family because of this incident.
Unlike Sophia, he wasn't a Champion of Poseidon and hence was always on a tightrope.
He did not have the leeway to be a failure as his standing within the family was solely dependent on his competency as a floor master.
Under such circumstances, writing a letter explaining the death of three top generals, three top legions and 400,000 general troops was going to be a worse punishment for Perseus than death as the entirety of Olympus was sure to bear the shame of defeat that he had experienced today.
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/// A/N - Bonus chapter for hitting the GT Target, good job everyone! ///