God of War: Daughter of War

As Kratos and Flurry tracked down the sun, something both of them weren't expecting when they got the order from the gods to come to Attica, they found that darkness started to claim everything, which made sense considering that the sun itself was no longer up in the sky. It made Flurry wonder what in the world was going on, as she shared her father's brief thoughts on the matter, this was one of the most unknown events that the people of the land had never seen before, as it meant that something must have happened to Heilos, the God of the Sun. What could have happened to him was a topic they could only guess at, since he was usually in the sky, far above everyone else, so it wasn't like he could be attacked like a mortal could, and yet, despite the odds, something had brought him and the sun down. The only downside to this was that the area that the sun had crashed into was a fair couple of miles away from Attica, though thanks to her training Flurry and her father found that she could match Kratos' pace, but he did make sure to slow down every now and then so he didn't wear her out.

When they finally reached their destination, a cliff overlooking the impact site, the father and daughter discovered that the sun looked like a cross between a large temple and a chariot, with flames receding as the darkness, and some foul mist, spread out from where it was currently resting.

As they started to make their way down the side of the cliff they had stopped on for a moment, as Flurry had found a way to use her sickles like her father did with his blades, all without damaging the weapons, she found that there was a city resting below them, one that had been crushed by the fallen sun. Kratos thought about the maps he had seen and determined that this had to be the city of Marathon, as it happened to be the closest to Attica by traveling in the direction they had headed in earlier, though it wasn't long before they reached the bottom of the cliff. By entering the only building that was in front of them the pair discovered something interesting and upsetting, it appeared that new monsters were coming out of the mist, as there was a skeletal legionnaire gutting the ladies that happened to be in the structure. What was both interesting and strange about this was that when Kratos destroyed the undead legionnaire, as it's skills were definitely rusty, black smoke seemed to emit from it's body, like it was half real, to kill people, and half illusion, though Flurry didn't see anything strange about them, meaning they had to be totally real.

The streets were filled with more undead legionnaires than the buildings, where Flurry joined Kratos in cutting them down, her sickles slashing through them with ease, but as they started to move forward she glanced at the area they were in and frowned for a moment as they cleared the area.

"Flurry... is something wrong?" Kratos asked, because while he could tell that his daughter enjoyed battle, not as much as he did at times, there were times where she seemed sad by what was going on, in fact he had seen it briefly when they saw the siege on Attica earlier.

"No... it's just... this loss of life saddens me." Flurry replied, as this was different than before, these people were innocent in the grand scheme of things and now, thanks to whoever had messed with Heilos, all these people wouldn't be able to live their lives to the fullest, something that annoyed her greatly as she sighed as more undead legionnaires showed up to bring an end to their lives.

Kratos wanted to say something to her, to comfort his daughter and figure out what was going on, though he could only guess that her supposed connection to Death was causing her to feel this way, but determined that they could look into it once they solved whatever was going on right now. There were also archers mixed in with the sword wielding legionnaires, though while he hacked the front line apart with his blades he found that Flurry called forth small fireballs and blasted the archers, showing that she didn't want to do more damage to the ruined city. He was still amazed that she was capable of such a thing, quickly figuring out how to use the magical power that they had unlocked earlier, and knew that they would have to add some magical lessons to the list of things he had to teach his daughter, even if it meant finding a god or even a goddess to do what he couldn't do. With that in mind Kratos also used the power of the Efreet to smash some of their foes into the ground, burning the undead legionnaires away while making sure not to destroy the city itself, just in the off chance that there were survivors, so they'd have a home to return to.

While they pushed through the outskirts of the city, however, Kratos heard a strange melody that was familiar to him, yet at the same time he couldn't quite place where he had heard it in the past, and as they approached a wall of fog that was blocking the way they heard someone shout to stay out of the fog. Flurry, in response to that, returned her sickles to her belt and held her hands out, forming two fireballs that allowed her to push the fog in front of them back, where Kratos let her walk in front of him while he kept an eye out for dangers, though it was short lived as he found a gate to open so they could press onward. On the other side of the gate they found a more open area that happened to have some passages for them to head through, though there was also a new foe for them to fight, where Flurry found that it was like a gorgon, due to the serpent tail that had replaced her lowered body, while her torso was decayed, almost skeletal, and her chest was on full display. Kratos informed Flurry that this was a banshee, something that was a cross between a gorgon and a siren, as it had the form of one and the power of another, which have her all the information she needed to know as she pulled out her sickles, severed the creature's spine easily, before raking her head off.

Kratos nodded his head as he found a second banshee and pushed her head into the ground, allowing him to crush it by planting his foot on her face before crushing her head by applying some pressure, before discovering a spin crack that let him seal the door that the banshees were coming from.

With that done the pair moved down the path that was beyond the area that the banshees were interested in and found a wagon with a bunch of hay on it, though a few skeletal archers were guarding it and they wasted no time in crushing them like they had done to the groups before them. Instead of going back for the torch that had been in the hands of a statue, and wasting more time, Flurry set fire to the hay with her magic so Kratos could push it forward, where she switched to her bow for a time and loosed arrows at a couple of archers that were in the fog. This allowed her father to reach the end of the patch of fog they had discovered, without having to stop for anything or because he was hit by their enemies, and once they were in the clear, for a time, the pair was assaulted by a large four legged beast that seemed to have the face of a man. The beast charged at them both without delay, raking it's claws against the ground and the air as Kratos and Flurry did what they did best, splitting up to divert the attention of their enemies, and attacking it from two directions, which did seem to be very effective as Flurry thought about it.

The beast tried it's best to push Kratos to the ground and kill him, but he pushed the creature back and latched onto it's head with his blades, allowing him to forcefully pull the creature up so Flurry could duck under it for a few moments and slice it's stomach open before getting out of the way, allowing her father to drop it off to the side as they realized that this was a dead end, so they attacked a rock wall and made their own path.

"It's a good thing our weapons are magical... attacking a rock face like that would break any other weapon." Flurry stated, where she looked over her sickles and found that neither of them were damaged by the few seconds they had struck the dead end they had discovered, which was great since since had no idea how to actually repair their weapons and wouldn't want to pause their quest to fix them up.

Kratos nodded as he found that they were at the end of the city, which made sense given the path they had been following, and spotted a worn path he could climb up to reach the area above them, though as he and Flurry did that he found that there were three statues on odd structures, a stone tablet that held information, and a path leading straight to what looked like a temple. Flurry spotted some writing that informed them that Boreas, the North Wind, rested here and that he was the one leading Zephyros, Euros, and Notos, the West, East, and South Winds respectively, where Kratos confirmed that she was correct, meaning she had taken her reading and writing lessons to heart. Interesting enough there were levers on the three statue bases near the writing she had read, though it appeared that they were missing something and made their way down the other path, leading straight to the temple that seemed to be Helios'. The path in question turned out to be a bridge that linked the two areas together, though as they reached the other side Kratos paused for a moment as he heard the strange melody he had heard not that long ago, though before he could even react to it they found a few more legionnaires simply appeared to fight them.

The undead soldiers were easy to take care of, while the banshee that joined them was cut down by Flurry before it could do anything, before passing by a head carving, likely Helios' given the temple that was above them, before finding an area that they could climb up to reach a level that seemed to be sealed off, but it was the one beyond that one that had what the pair was looking for, especially since it had a statue of Athena on it.

Kratos... the statue said, revealing that the goddess was speaking through it, no doubt assuming that someone, anyone, would come to investigate the sun falling out of the sky and had prepared a message for whoever it was, while the pair just stared at it for a few moments.

"Athena? What madness has befallen us?" Kratos asked, because if there was anyone who might understand what was going on, and could point them in the right direction, it was the Goddess of Wisdom, so which he was a little surprised to see one of her statues here, outside Helios' temple, he considered this to be a good thing for them.

I am afraid that there isn't much time, Kratos... Olympus has need of your services once again. Athena stated, almost as if she was ignoring the fact that the pair wanted information as to what was going on, as they figured that the gods needed their mortal champions to deal with the sun falling out of the air suddenly.

"Have we not given enough, Athena? We have given Olympus five years of faithful service, saving the lands from all sorts of monsters, without any sign of the nightmares stopping!" Kratos snapped, because he had assumed that the gods would have done something, anything, to show him that they were upholding their end of the bargain, and yet most nights he suffered the same nightmares that had started after Orkos' death, with Flurry's presence being the only thing keeping him sane these days.

It's not for you to say when your servitude will end! Athena replied in kind, showing Flurry that even the gods could lose their patience and treat their own champion like total dirt, or in this case act like her father was their servant, with her simply being an add-on that they clearly weren't expecting to discover.

"That's not what he meant, Athena!" Flurry snapped, something that caused the pair to pause for a moment, because her father knew she was usually respectful towards the gods, meaning she was annoyed with the one in front of them, while the goddess herself happened to be stunned by a strange mortal talking back to her, "Father just wants to know that the gods are upholding their side of the bargain... in fact, even if you take the nightmares away, we'd likely continue doing all sorts of quests for you, since it spreads his legend to the rest of Greece. Besides, wouldn't it be better for you to treat us with more respect? I mean, it's like you said, Olympus needs us."

...yes... you are correct, young one. The urgency of this situation unseated my courtesy. Athena said, her tone telling them that something drastic was happening and that Kratos speaking to her like that had caused her to snap, where she turned her eyes towards Kratos and found that, while he was accepting what his daughter had said, he was still unhappy about something, Be at ease, Spartan, as I am doing everything in my power to help you... help us with this matter and I'll do everything I can to convince Zeus to give you what you desire most.

"...very well. What is going on right now?" Kratos asked, where he decided to simply move on and focus on whatever was happening right now, and what needed to be done to set the world right again, something that made Flurry smile, as she didn't want her father to argue with the gods, since that was a way to make everything worse.

As you can see, the God of the Sun has been ripped out of the sky... the temple that stands before you, and the area that surrounds it, is the Chariot of Helios. Athena replied, confirming their suspicions on the matter, though it still failed to explain why it looked like a temple, and would be defended like one, when it was usually up in the air, before Flurry came to the conclusion that this might be the form it took in case something knocked Helios out of the sky, Without their master to reign them in, the Fire Steeds have drive the Sun Chariot into the earth... and without Helios, there is no one to stop Morpheus, the God of Dreams, from seizing permanent power over the rest of the world. Many... of the gods... have fallen into a deep slumber, and I am... afraid... that I will soon join them.

"Okay, so we have to find Helios and get him, plus the Sun Chariot, back into the sky, probably deal with tracking down the Fire Steeds, and figure out what knocked him out of the sky in the first place." Flurry commented, once more showing her father that she was smarter than people gave her credit for, as she was piecing together a plan of sorts to help them do what Athena and the gods were asking of them this time around, and it seemed like a good one based on what they had learned from the goddess so far, "Did I miss anything?"

Athena said nothing as she and Kratos noticed that the divine spark that had been powering the statue had vanished, like she had pushed herself through Morpheus' power to deliver them their next quest, their marching orders as it were, to which he and Flurry faced the temple as they readied themselves for whatever dangers might be inside it.