I

Jet black canopy was paved with silver stars which light was brighter than the one of thousand diamonds hidden in the darkest depths of Earth’s grounds. Far above, among the silver light, hung two bright objects, separated from each other by millions of years, but yet always tightened together. The Sun and the Moon. The first objects to separate day from night, one co-existing with another, and none able to live if the other dies. A tale as old as time, and forgotten like the sweet dream that disappears the moment first rays of sun chase away the darkness. A tale of beginning, the first breath, first step, first word; of first dream that shapes the dreamer into a concrete form, a form beyond the body, a form of thoughts, ideals, opinions, views and emotions. Something more, than just a mere human being. Humans. A pair of legs, arms, a single head filled with brain that uses only twenty percent of its capacity; beings so mere and small and just as useless like lion’s hunting skills in zoo. Zoo, a place where wild animals are held to entertain people; people who took away their homes, lands, their Earth. Earth, a zoo full of people unknowingly serving as an entertainment to gods.

Gods. Creatures so disgusting and laughable, they themselves became an entertainment for forces greater than them. They were an example of one of very few things that people could do pretty well. Dream and create. They sometimes seemed to be craftsmen, perfected in the art of shaping stardust. Whenever they came up with yet another ridiculous idea, with enough faith on their behalf, it came a true, living source of energy. Like, for instance, gods. An idea so primitive it was hard to take it seriously at first. But then that was where people found peace. In explaining what they did not understand, with the only thing the knew how to do – imagine and name. Names held a very powerful magic within them. They are the first lock to anything, and once this one lock is broken, it only gets easier and easier with other ones. A mystery, once named, is not a mystery anymore. A stranger once given a name, is not a stranger anymore. A danger named, loses much of its dangerous charm. Because the biggest fear seems to always be the fear of unknown. And the easiest way to get rid of the unknown, is to name it. And so, when people failed to understand more and more about surrounding them world, and the fear of unknown was only growing, they started naming things and forces. After having the name, the started creating shapes, features, attributes, and attitudes. And because people were always proud, they slowly started turning their images of gods into those of more human, more down to earth, at the very end, turning their god into a human made from flesh and blood.

That was how life on Earth had been for millennia. Gods were coming, rising to power, and fading; just to be replaced by new ones. In different parts of the world, be it cold Scandinavia, or hot Egypt; and in various eras and centuries, the gods were differing between each other. For some unknown reason, people were never able to create one god, but there were always as many of them as there were groups of people; if not even more. However, the balance was always kept, and even though gods never die, they fade. When the time came, one set of gods was giving their place to the newcomers, taking the well deserved rest, never dying, only fading into shadows of centuries, becoming a mere memory of past ages, then legends and fire camp stories, just to finally end among the pages of history books and be called “mythical.”

This is the life of a god.

The day will come, the beginning will return. That day, the curse will be broken.

That day, forces bigger than greek gods themselves will take over the world, and that day shall see the dusk of the era of gods.

⚚⚚⚚

The night was cold, windy, and unwelcoming. There were no people wondering outside, the surrounding was deserted, anyone who knew where to hide from the approaching changes in the weather did just that.

„Massive fires destroy a major part of the southern forests.”

„Despite high temperatures the water in Cheju Strait freezes overnight.”

„A strong wind may cause hurricane on the East Sea, near the costs of South Korea.”

The weather was changing, and everyone was blaming it on the climate change. Never before had there been any fires at this time of the year. Never before had shores frozen at this time of the year. The weather was going crazy, and because no one knew why, people decided to blame the first most possible thing they could name.

Little did they know.

A strong wind started blowing, chasing heavy clouds away, letting the silver light of the moon touch the ground. A shape appeared at the shoreline, so swiftly and silently that not even sand moved when when heavy boots landed on it. The wind was roaming around him, but the tall boy stood unbothered. He was looking up at the moon, silently greeting his love. The wind gently lifted a few grains of sand mixed with flowers that fell from the nearby tress, and drops of water from the Yellow Sea, and sent them up high, towards the moon, as if delivering a gift. He ran a hand through his golden locks, and took a deep breath.

“You two are still so disgustingly cute,” a deep voice brought the young man out of his thoughts. He smiled at the sound of the familiar voice, the one he had not heard in centuries.

“Chanyeol!” a cheerful scream vibrated though the night air surrounding them, and the boy turned around, running towards a man whose arm had already been opened wide.

“You haven’t changed a bit, Sehunnie!” the other cheered as well, embracing his friend, “it’s been so long! I started doubting I’d ever see you again!” the boy said, faking a sob.

“Ever isn’t that long, Channie, don’t be a drama queen, leave that to Baek,” the blond laughed, but then stopped, seeing a pained expression on his friend’s face, “don’t worry, Chanyeol. We’ll find them,” he whispered, placing a hand on the other’s shoulder, “we’ll find him,” he added even quieter, for only Chanyeol and him to hear. He did not want even the wind to hear that.

“I know, I know,” the dark hair boy nodded, closing his eyes and counting to ten. Then he smiled, and his previous mood was back, “I can’t wait to explore this new world! So much has changed!” he exclaimed excitedly.

Suddenly, the temperature around them dropped, the water started freezing, and little snowflakes started falling from the sky. Even the wind turned into ice, hurting the two boys’ skin.

“Hyung! Stop it! It hurts!” Chanyeol shouted into the space surrounding them, and suddenly the icy coldness left the wind. The two boys sighed in relief.

“Then stop wasting time on small talk. Our clock is ticking, the race has started,” a sounds reached their ears, and they looked around, trying to find the source of it. Both of them raised their eyebrows, upon spotting a dark shape seated between the brunches of one of the trees near them. The boy jumped down, and after straightening himself, a shiver ran down Chanyeol’s and Sehun’s back.

Even though the boy standing not so far from them was nowhere near their height, there was a creepy aura surrounding him. As one of the first three elements to ever exist, the elder was emitting with strength and danger. It was hard not to feel respect and fear towards him. His hair was jet black, just like the sky above their heads, his skin fair like the light of the stars up high; eyes were dark like the coldest depths of the oceans, with white circles that looked like snow, distinguishing the irises from his pupils.

“Aren’t we waiting for the rest?” Sehun asked, straightening his back. His normally grey eyes turned darker, the wind started swirling around them, creating a small sand storm.

“Yixing is already waiting for us, and we cannot count on Jongin.”

“Let’s end this, once and for all,” Chanyeol murmured, looking at two elements in front of him. They all nodded, and disappeared in a flash of colorful lights.

The day will come, the beginning will return.

⚚⚚⚚

Twelve gods were sitting in a massive, circle, white room. The tall pillars behind each seat were disappearing in the darkness, as if marching with the sky, holding the ceiling that was universe from collapsing on Earth. On one side of the room was a pair of massive, heavy, golden doors, on the opposite side was a massive window, with a view on all the Earth, people, and daily routines. In between, in a circle stood twelve seats, each in a different shape, style, and color. On them, sat the mighty Greek gods. At the top, in the golden throne was seated Zeus, with his electric white lightning in one hand. On his right was Poseidon, the master of the seas, and on the left was Athena, the source of all knowledge in the world. That was their existence, their course that they put on themselves, upon returning. The First Era of Greek gods was long gone and forgotten, they were doomed to fade with the arrival of Roman gods. And would disappeared in the shadows of history if it was not for modern humans, who started digging up the past to an extend that the believes in Greek gods blossomed again. And above all, messing with ancient charms is the most dangerous out of all crimes. The Greek gods claimed their thrones back, and although no human worships them anymore, people’s interest, desire to discover, and simple will to rule, is all the gods need to sit on the Olympus, pride and vain as thousands of years ago, playing with people’s faiths once again, turning the world in a stage, people into actors and their lives into their favorite dramas.

But even after thousands of years, there is past still lingering in the dark of the Olympus’s shadows, dark magic of the gone ages soaked into the walls, poison, blood and tears still running in the waters of the mountain’s streams. A prophecy once written does not wash until it is fulfilled.

“Something bad is going to happen,” Athena whispered, and before anyone could react to her words, the candles blew out, the temperature fell below zero, so the air started turning into steam after exhaling, and ice started covering everything in the room. Suddenly, fire appeared around in the middle of the room and creating a circle, it trapped the gods inside. The window opened with a bang and a strong wave of wind hit the room, opening the door.

There, in the darkest, the gods heard steps. Four figures stepped into the room, and the gods gasped.

“Who dares to enter the Olympus?!” Zeus’s voice roamed in the room, echoing in the distance.

“I believe we do not need to introduce ourselves,” a soft and calm voice spoke, and a young man of black hair and green eyes appeared in the circle of light emitting from the fire. The flames moved to the sides, creating a small entrance to the middle of the room. When the four men stepped inside, the flames connected again, preventing anyone from escaping.

“Then, I will ask how dare you enter our grounds?!” the high god asked again, clenching his fist on his lightning. Everyone was seated, only Zeus was standing, and the air was heavy from anticipation and nervousness.

“Those grounds were once ours, do not forget it, oh mighty,” the same calm voice spoke again, nearing the god.

“Why did you come back? We defeated you once, we can do it again!”

“Defeated?” the young boy chuckled, and then his eyes became darker, his pupils widened, and he lowered his voice, “you cannot defeat us, you mere gods! You would not exist if it was not for us. You might have, indeed, made us weaker, but the time has come, to fulfill the prophecy,” the boy said, quietly but clearly. The room was starting to be filled with quiet whines of gods sitting in their seats. When Zeus looked around, they were all moving in their places, sweating, and breathing heavily. Suddenly, Zeus felt it. The blood in his veins started boiling and rushing, his heart started beating faster, and his chest felt heavy. He looked at the young boy in front of his, terrified. “You might be immortal,” the boy whispered, “but we are eternal.”

“You cannot,” Zeus choked, “you cannot do anything. There is only eight of you. You will never get the rest back,” the god scoffed.

“Oh, Zeus, I think you are getting old, and therefore really clumsy,” the boy spoke, and Zeus felt his knees give out. He felt to the ground, and the young man in front of his bent down, “their souls are already free. Thanks to you, your wife, brother, and sister. You all released them long time ago. And we found them,” he whispered, and Zeus’s eyes grew in fear and confusion. “You did not expect that, did you? We will greet your son, and nephews from you and their parents. And for now, I think I will take it,” the boy finished, and tore a stone necklace from Zeus’s neck.

When he did that, the three men who were silently standing in the back the whole time moved forward, and repeated the action, taking three other necklaces from Hera, Athena, and Poseidon. The gods were too stunned to react.

“Your time has come to an end. The era of Greek gods will see its dusk. For the last time,” the green eyed boy said, and they all left the room, leaving it in a complete darkness.

⚚⚚⚚

“Zeus?” a whisper rose in the darkness, as no one dared to even breathe.

“How is that even possible?!” the man shouted, and threw his lightning in the middle of the room, creating a massive hole, “find me these kids! Find them and kill them! I want them dead, and their souls back in my hands! I will feed them to Cerberus myself if I have to! I will throw them into the deepest depths of Tartarus and have them tortured by the Titans! I will let Hades tear them to shreds! Bring me the boys, dead or alive!” he ordered, yelling his lungs out, madness visible in his eyes.

The day will come, the beginning will return. That day, the curse will be broken.

That day, forces bigger than greek gods themselves will take over the world, and that day shall see the dusk of the era of gods.

⚚⚚⚚

“Minseok,” the young man spoke, nearing his friend as the set their feet back on the ground, “I believe you should have it,” he smiled, handing the other a long, thin stone with a hole at the top. The lightning stone. Minseok nodded, and took it, at the same time extending his hand to place a twisted shell on the boy’s hand.

“And this is yours, Yixing,” he whispered, looking his friend in the eyes.

“We’ll find them, hyung, don’t worry,” Yixing smiled softly, and placed a hand on Minseok’s shoulder. The older instantly calmed down, but he was well aware that it was only his friend’s trick.

“Now that they know about them, they will want to kill them,” Minseok said.

Yixing observed his friend for a while, deeply in thoughts. Minseok’s expression was blank, washed out of any emotions, as if his muscles forgot how to move. His lips moved neither up nor down, there were no wrinkles around his eyes anymore that would always form while he was laughing. The only evidence that Minseok was not completely dead were his eyes. Orbs as black as nothingness, that were filled with nothing but pain, sadness, and fear.

As much as the other wanted to hide that, there was nothing anyone could hide from Yixing.

“Then we will get to them first,” he promised, tightening the hold on the other’s shoulder.

He looked up, and was met with determinate gazes of both Chanyeol and Sehun.

⚚⚚⚚

“I hate these trips to museum,” Jongdae mumbled to Baekhyun, as they were moving to the next set of sculptures, “it’s the third time this semester, they should try harder to figure out what to do with us,” he ranted, “I mean, it’s not like we’re paying for this stupid University, or something,” he said sarcastically, rolling his eyes, “I swear our money goes to the teachers’ monthly supply of donuts.”

His friend only hummed, and readjusting his glasses he turned the page in the book he had been reading. Jongdae raised his eyebrows, feeling deeply hurt by being ignored by his best friend, but then only rolled his eyes, and shrugged. He looked around, and after making sure that none of the teachers was looking, he sneaked out and decided to looked around the museum on his own. It is not like there was anything there that could actually grab his attention, as he knew the building like the palm of his hand, having been coming there a lot in the past, then spending there hours writing his history assignments, and having been dragged there by school already twice in one semester, now being his third time. All in all, Jongdae might have visited the Museum of Ancient Worlds over two hundred times. His favorite part of the building was always ancient Greece. Since he was a young child, he had always shown a deep interest with that region of the world. Instead of bedtime stories, he would always ask his mother to read him myths of ancient gods, and brave heroes. He always dreamt of being one. Whenever given an assignment at school to prepare a presentation about someone they admired, in comparison to other children, who would talk about celebrities, politicians or their parents, Jongdae was always talking about one of the half gods, or other brave characters from ancient history. His favorite movie had always been Hercules, and although he did not understand his mania with ancient Greece, he had always felt like there was one more mystery to be discovered about it. That was why he was where he was at this point in his life. A student of the Seoul National University, majoring in Ancient Studies, his specialization being Ancient Greece. He often found himself wondering why exactly was he doing what he was doing. Studying so like this, a career without any chances of ever finding a job. But in such moments he would always call his best friend and partner in making terrible life decisions, and they would laugh that in the worst case scenario, at least they will not be alone, because they will have each other.

Two history geeks, two freaks, two socially awkward young adults, two lost souls looking for something that none of them can name, two being wanting answers, two best friends who had never left each other’s side since the moment they met when they were a few months old.

Jongdae sat at his favorite sofa, in his favorite spot, and took out an already severely destroyed book with a countless number of bookmarks, dog’s ears, underlines, drawings, and side notes. Mythology. He smiled to himself and before opening the book, he looked around. His eyes landed on a massive sculpture of Zeus, who was looking down right at him. Or at least that was what Jongdae had felt the first time his eyes landed on the massive figure from the white stone. At first, as a small boy, he was terrified of it. He felt as if the god’s eyes were following his every movement, counting his every breath, and his hands were trying to reach him each time he turned around. It took him some time to realize it was nothing more than a lifeless sculpture. Now, whenever he fears something, he thinks of this Zeus, and he calms down.

When Jongdae opened the book, his slim fingers quickly flipped through the pages, and stopped on page 394. Ancient prophecies. This was one a few aspects that really had Jongdae interested. Not only because he found them especially intriguing, but mostly because Baekhyun hated them. He chuckled to himself, as he thought of their first classes in which they talked about prophecies, and the teacher’s confusion when Baekhyun suddenly stood up and left the room, telling him that those prophecies were nothing but stories made up by old who were high all their lives, and there was no logic or sense, or actual, proper background to them, and instead of constantly calling them “prophecies,” it should be finally established that these were lies, and for once openly admit that ancient Greeks were morons. That was probably the first time Jongdae had ever heard Baekhyun use the word “moron,” and he was teasing him about it for weeks.

He partly agreed with Baekhyun, but he also believed his friend was taking everything too seriously, especially when it came to academics. Baekhyun did not believe anything that was not backed up with logical explanations, scientific proves, or did not make sense. It was hard for Jongdae at the beginning, but he realized that was who Baekhyun was, and he had to love him for that. Beside, he himself did not need logic for almost anything, he was fine with things not having a solid explanation, and more than anything he loved when nothing was making sense. He liked chaos.

They were making a perfect duo, being like day and night, not only in their views, opinions, and system of believes, but also in clearly physical aspect.

Jongdae had hair as dark as ebony, his eyes were the color of dark, heavy clouds that cover the sky just before the storm, and his lips were slightly curled in the corner, making him appear to be always slightly smiling. Baekhyun, on the other hand, had light, as if silver hair, and Jongdae did not know how, but the boy had had them since forever, which was weird because it was not a normal color. His eyes were light grey, with a light circle on the outer side on pupils, and his expression was mostly blank, or focused.

But even though they were so different, Jongdae was not sure there was anyone in the world he would be more similar to than Baekhyun.

“Dae,” he heard a familiar voice, and when he looked up he saw Baekhyun standing in the entrance to the room, “the teachers are looking for you, you’re screwed again,” he continued, and laughed a bit at the end.

Jongdae sighed, “heavens hate me, I swear,” he mumbled, closing the book and throwing it back into his bagpack, “are you done here?” he asked, joining Baek at the door. The other nodded, and they started walking towards the exit.

As was expected, Jongdae was scolded once again, but he only shrugged at it, and after spending ten minutes of his life listening to his teach just to be given detention at the end, he left the building with his friend.

“Ugh, it’s raining again,” Baekhyun mumbled, throwing a hood over his head.

“I think there’s gonna be a storm, actually,” Jongdae hummed, looking up at the sky, and as the words left his lips the first lighting .

“Did you really have to?! It always happens! Cannot you keep your mouth shut for once?!” Baekhyun exclaimed, wrinkling his nose.

Jongdae laughed loudly, and the sound echoed in the buildings around them, “don’t worry baby, I’ll keep you out of the harms way,” he cooed, throwing an arm around his friend as they started their walk home.

Jongdae will always find it adorable, how terrified of storms Baekhyun is.

⚚⚚⚚

“Are you sure it’s them?” Chanyeol asked, “at least they’re together,” he said quietly, more to himself then his partner.

They were standing at the bottom of the stair that led to the museum gate, and were eyeing a pair of boys that had just passed them. One of them was laughing madly, and the other kept on scolding him.

“I’m sure of it,” Minseok whispered.

He would be able to recognize this laughter even in hell.

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