Nolan's head cleared to what appeared to be a heated discussion between these deities with power to eclipse galaxies.
"You stole him from the Norse?"
"I took him from Saga," Hecate corrected.
There was a beat of silence before someone broke it.
"He is too much trouble. I suggest we end him before it escalates."
Nolan raised his head in the direction of the voice. It was a man who, frankly, was the most handsome and perfect specimen of a man Nolan had ever seen.
He had a hair of pure gold—each strand and filament looking like thin, processed gold threads. He had a tanned skin that made him look like a sculpture of sun kissed bronze, and a voice that belonged to a musician.
And just like the other Olympians, he was tall.
All of them, including the women were taller. Taller than him by a very good margin, but not crossing into the level of giants. Yet each one had a perfectly proportioned body that they might as well be normal humans.
There was a significant lack of the disproportionate asymmetry that most significantly tall people had.
But more than their physical appearance, their presence was suffocating.
If Nolan had to guess, since this was Olympus, the man was most probably Apollo. He checked out all the boxes without even trying.
Nolan didn't carry much of a strong reaction outward. He almost looked lazy and tired. But inwardly, there was a bubbling rise of fury that he knew, deep down, couldn't change anything.
He had been yanked out of his life, and before he could make sense of anything, was stolen away like a bottle of wine in a store. Being treated as perhaps an interesting commodity, and now having his life and death contemplated and discussed to his face as though they were discussing an artwork. Without anyone minding that he was present at all.
It was insulting and, for the most part of it, humbling. But at the same time, it was infuriating.
"You're unnerved that you cannot read his fate. You can't read fate properly at all because of his presence."
Hecate's voice drew his attention, responding to Apollo with what sounded more like a factual statement than an assumption.
Apollo's expression shifted. But before he could respond...
"He is a sole singularity existence. And as I have declared, is under my jurisdiction," she continued.
"Hecate..." A voice called, and all attention was drawn to the man sitting on the throne.
The throne was probably the most beautiful piece of artwork Nolan had ever seen in his life, but the situation wasn't one that let him give it a second of thought.
"I stand by what I said," Hecate responded.
"You risk war with the Norse by doing so," Zeus countered calmly.
Hecate did not respond, but there was someone else that did.
He was a mass of shredded, rippling lean muscles. One could tell that each muscle strand contained a dense well of energy from just looking at them, with the way they coiled and relaxed like serpents waiting to strike.
"Have you grown so old and weary that you fear the Aesir now, father?" He asked.
"They know better than to start a war. Especially over a... Mortal." Another god chimed from the side.
"It is to avoid unnecessary skirmishes and escalation of pointless matters," Zeus responded. "Besides, the said mortal is clearly not ordinary," he concluded, his eyes shifting to meet Nolan's at the end of his statement.
Nolan met his gaze without flinching, staring dead into the eyes of the king of gods. A man who had slaughtered gods and titans alike with regal might.
He held his gaze for a moment longer before his gaze shifted to the woman by Zeus's side, who had been staring at him intensely the entire time. So intense that even he felt a little uncomfortable.
He could feel her thoughts churning behind her gaze. But it was impossible to know what she was thinking, other than the fact that he was one hundred percent sure it had to do with him.
There was something else in her eyes beside the calculation that he couldn't name or place a hand on.
But her poise, regality and elegance. The throne she sat on. The calculating and dissecting light in her eyes...
It could only be Hera.
"Tell me," she began. "Who are you, and what is your connection to the Hollow?"
Her question left him entirely confused, and he had no intention of hiding it. He wasn't sure what he could hide at all. Even the fury he was keeping buried in his heart might as well be an open ledger to them.
"Hollow? What is that?" He asked.
"The Hollow Throne," she confirmed as though it was supposed to click something for him. It didn't.
Seeing his still confused expression, she stood.
"Perhaps you don't know."
She had suddenly appeared right in front of him, and while he did his best not to be surprised, he was still a tiny bit amazed.
She placed a hand on his head, and he felt something wash over him. It felt like some kind of stare that left him feeling entirely vulnerable, exposed and naked.
He didn't like it. Not one bit.
A warm energy passed over him, and every resistance he tried to put up was smoothly shoved aside, as though he had decided to let them down on his own.
No one made an attempt to stop her, and the process got more aggressive as the time passed that Nolan was beginning to feel the strain. Small bouts of pain slipping in through the cracks.
Finally she withdrew, and there was a different light in her eyes now. One that only Hecate who was standing before her noticed.
"He's excellent!" She praised, but there was quite the intense light in her eyes as she glanced at Hecate. One that vanished the next instant as though it was never there to begin with.
"He doesn't have a tie to that bloodline and possesses what is possibly a mutated version of the Mercury Earth Dragon spirit, which is the cause of the anomaly and the interesting difference his bloodline and constitution has from the norm."
Her steps carried her back to her throne and she sat with the regal grace of a queen.
"His singularity attribute is also a unique one. I sensed two powerful laws within. Convergence and evolution. His nature already shifts the board. Fate reading and manipulation falls short, and render even the abilities of gods useless...
He will be our ace."
****
[And Hera finally makes an appearance!!!!
How do y'all see it? Peak or mehh? 🥲]