God of War: Daughter of War

After resting for a few moments, and recovering from their encounter with the Furies, Kratos stirred and Flurry got up as well, to which they resumed their trek through the rest of Apollo's statue and discovered that to leave this area they had to stand on a pressure plate to activate the way out. It didn't take a genius to figure out what needed to be done, as Kratos simply stood on the device until it was fully activated and then used the oath stone to create a copy where he was standing, letting it keep the way open as Flurry took her place on his back. After that he swung them over to a long wooden walkway and they were ambushed by more satyr, this time without a commander by the looks of it, to which Flurry got down and did what she had done the last time they encountered these enemies, she hung back and used her arrows to open holes in their defenses. Kratos was pleased with her actions, because while her attack on the Furies had been foolish, despite it allowing him to confirm that she was definitely special in some manner, normal fights like this were easy for her to get involved in without actually risking herself, since the satyrs seemed to ignore her entirely.

As such he was able to sever limbs, tear a few of his foes in half, and even tore off the head of one, before Flurry openly wondered if the oath stone would work in combat and he tried it out, finding that it did as the copy battered some of their foes into submission so he could end them, causing him to smile at Flurry when the coast was clear.

With their enemies defeated Flurry found that, once again, the only way out of the area was to climb out, where she told Kratos that one of the first lessons she needed to learn was how to climb on her own, something the warrior agreed with as he started to move up the side wall and made his way out towards what he hoped was the exit. After that he found a few more places that seemed like good spots to practice with the oath stone, one where he pulled a platform close to where he was standing, giving them time to cross over before releasing the copy, while the second obstacle required him to put it down near the leftmost edge as it lowered the platform. It was a balance of sorts as Flurry discovered, they couldn't access the main path out without having something moving everything into position, and thanks to her guardian's smarts they were able to conquer it in no time at all, even though it ended with a slide down a wooden wall and Kratos having to bash his way through a blockade. Such a thing allowed them to land outside the statue, where she discovered that they happened to be near the area she had seen the centaurs in earlier, though Flurry remained on his back as he swung at a couple of chains and used them to cross the gap between the arm and leg.

This time around they were assaulted by an Amazon, a few black furred dogs that looked rather vicious, and a much larger three headed dog that Kratos quickly identified as a cerberus, all of which served Hades, the God of the Underworld, so it was likely trapped in an illusion like the Amazons were. The dogs, as Flurry discovered, were far more interested in her than they were of Kratos, forcing her to move around the large arena as fast as she could, only to discover that they kept up with her and prevented her from using her bow on them, much to her annoyance. With that in mind she switched to her sickles and drew them in as best as she could, without placing herself in harms way, where she lashed out with the weapons and cut into the sides of her pursuers as best as she could, though she also found that, after having watched Kratos so much, that her base movements seemed pretty decent for a beginner. Kratos, on the other hand, ended his fight without wasting too much time as he stabbed the Amazon in the chest with her own spear and impaled her on the ground, before leaping onto the cerberus' back and wrapping his chains around two of it's heads, allowing him to sever them with ease before he stabbed both blades into the third's skull.

It was a sheer difference in skill, Flurry, being the novice, could only deal with the lesser enemies and cause them to limp away from her, while Kratos, the more experienced and hardened warrior, put down his foes before they became more of a problem for him, causing her to sigh as she put down the weakened dogs, causing Kratos to resolve to teach her how to fight when they weren't running from the Furies.

Once the area was cleared of enemies the pair confirmed that they were in the same area they had been in earlier, to which Flurry climbed onto Kratos' back before he climbed up the scaffolding so they could return to the fiery chamber they had been in earlier. This time around they had the oath stone in their possession and Kratos was able to use it to activate one of the pressure plates, allowing him and Flurry to stand in the middle of the chamber, away from the flames that did nothing to his copy, as the platform started to rise towards whatever was far above them. Some satyr decided to appear on the large platform as it moved, though instead of actually fighting them Kratos simply latched onto them and kicked each one right into the flames that they passed by, setting them all on fire and allowing them to burn themselves to death in no time, all so neither of them had to raise their weapons to them. Even a statue warrior joined the fun at one point, though this time around Flurry knew what to do as she got behind it and brought her sickles down into it's back, just as she had done previously, and found that her tactic worked once more as the statue collapsed into an heap, which let Kratos focus on any other foes that showed up.

After clearing out the area they found that the lift came to a stop, far higher than the area they had accessed previously, a fact that Kratos confirmed as he and Flurry walked out onto some scaffolding and discovered that they were far above the water this time around, causing him to inform her that they were near Apollo's chest, his ribs no doubt.

"This statue has certainly seen better days." Flurry remarked, as they were so high up that it allowed her to see the broken arm that seemed to be connected to the Lantern of Delos, meaning that to recover it they would have to repair all of this damage, which seemed to be the path that Orkos might have been suggesting without actually saying it.

"Agreed, and there is more to climb before we can find a suitable place to use the amulet." Kratos stated, because based on what he was seeing right now the amulet would only do a small amount of fixing if he tried to use it in this area, which told him that there had to be some specific place that would fix everything in a matter of seconds.

Flurry nodded her understanding as she found a note that appeared to be something Archimedes wrote, revealing that his statue had been damaged and that he could rebuild, making her wonder if the Furies had been behind the damage so the Eyes of Truth could be hidden forever. Kratos, seeing that the only way forward was to use his blades and swing on some chains, causing Flurry to say nothing as she took her usual position on his back before he started to move, though it also included sliding down a smooth surface inside the fractured arm and launch himself at another point. From there he had to climb up the inside of the arm, jumping from point to point and even smashing through a loose section of stone that let him make his way up on the outside, and while he did that Flurry kept an eye out for the Furies or Charybdis, to prevent them from being ambushed again. While he climbed Kratos had to wonder how the little girl had been able to see through Tisiphone's illusions, as if her eyes were blessed by the power that the Eyes of Truth possessed, but considered it a small blessing since it meant she wouldn't be confused by anything the Furies used against them.

While they climbed, however, Flurry openly wondered how the workers were supposed to move their supplies around the entire statue when the scaffolding wasn't linked together by anything, where Kratos told her that Alecto likely made sure everything was broken to drive Archimedes insane, or one of her sisters did the deed in her stead.

After moving around the various pieces of scaffolding, and having to latch onto a point when a platform collapsed when he landed on it, Kratos found an area that had a satyr commander and some lesser satyr, causing Flurry to back off as she raised her bow and let him deal with their enemies once more. What made things more interesting for the pair was the arrival of a second commander, despite the first one not taking too much damage from Kratos' blows, but since they did ignore her Flurry was free to let a few arrows fly as she paid attention to the fight. Her arrows struck their mark, which was the exposed chest and stomach of the two foes that were standing in their way, and when one of them staggered Kratos took advantage of it's weakness by stealing it's weapon and hacking it apart like he did previously, opening the way for her to claim her arrows as he dealt with the second one. As the second satyr commander fell, however, they found that such a thing was followed by silence as no other enemies showed up, causing Kratos to tell her that she was improving with her current weapon, causing her to rub the back of her head as she gathered the still usable arrows.

Once she was done they headed inside the section of Apollo's chest they had landed near and Flurry stood near Kratos as he used his might to move a few metal gears out of their way, utilizing them as moveable corridors to be exact, before he opened the way into what appeared to be the heart of the entire statue. It was a massive furnace, a place of fire that had to contain a path leading to the head of the statue, or at least the shoulder based on what he had seen previously, and it meant there was likely a puzzle for them to complete to turn everything else on. At the same time Flurry found more of the eggs that Kratos had told her to take down the first time she had seen it and, with a quick nod from him, she set out with her sickles as she removed them once more, allowing him to focus on the rest of the area as he found all sorts of metallic items scattered everywhere, gears and heaters and all sorts of things he didn't recognize. As he did that, however, a cyclops pulled itself up into the square area they were standing in and Kratos rushed at it without delay, since this was a foe that was too much for Flurry to handle, allowing her to deal with the rest of the eggs before standing off to the side as her guardian dodged the creature's attacks and dealt damage to it.

As the cyclops fell, however, a grated door lowered and revealed a moveable brazier that had a massive chunk of coal in the center of the bowl, where Flurry stood back as Kratos pulled it out of the chamber it was resting in before moving the device into another one that rested near a rotating gear that multiple people had to work together to move. Kratos just showed off his insane strength once more as he moved it on his own, which caused a large metallic gear to move towards their position and lock into place, though it also moved a platform that they had to utilize first, since they were sure that it would help them turn everything on. The path on the other side brought them right up to what appeared to be the small workshop of Archimedes, whose corpse was resting on a table as they soon discovered, where Flurry looked at a couple of diagrams that detailed the full scope of what the statue was supposed to look like. She also discovered something that she decided to take as a souvenir, a set of scrolls that Kratos told her were likely Archimedes' notes, his treatise on math and engineering, a relic that people might kill for if they knew she had it, where she shrugged and added them to her pouch so it could join the idol she found earlier.

Kratos noticed that and found that the pouch didn't get bigger thanks to the scrolls, where he assumed that it had to be part of Flurry's unique nature at work and decided not to question it, at least not until this quest was complete, hence why he focused on the area around them.

He discovered a slot he could fit one of his blades into and pulled back a bit, allowing Flurry to watch as he opened a metal lid the lead into the grated chamber that was below them, to which he used the oath stone to keep it open before both he and Flurry jumped down into the lower area. Such a thing allowed the pair to find that the heart of the statue was cold, a fact that wasn't hard to figure out earlier and this essentially confirmed it, before Kratos discovered another metal gear he could rotate and did so without delay, finding that it sent sparks flying and opened the main door. In that moment both of them realized what needed to be done with the set up that was available to them, to which Kratos pulled the bowl full of coal over to the new gear and activated it, allowing a couple of sparks to fly and ignite the material, quickly burning it until nothing remained. Flurry, however, beckoned for him to move the container under the rest of the coal pile, which just so happened to be above where the bowl had been resting, and once it was in place he restored it with the amulet, allowing it to burn itself out while setting the pile on fire, something that caused the rest of the machinery in the area to activate, or at least the melting pot above them.

From there Kratos moved it into the area under the melting area and poured some gold, or maybe bronze, into the bowl, something that allowed the flame to reach higher than before while keeping the material intact, allowing him to move it over to the main furnace, something that set fire to everything around it and awakened the heart of the statue, causing all sorts of gears to move into position.

After that the pair walked out into the main area again, however, they were assaulted by more enemies that came out to kill them, where Kratos spotted a newcomer among the satyrs and pointed it out to Flurry, another female creature that wore no clothing, in fact it was totally nude, and whose legs and feet had merged into a long serpent tail, while having a cobra head and a reptilian face. It was a gorgon, who used to be women who were turned into their current state by the goddess Athena for their infidelity, while some were natural born monsters, and they had no problem moving their bodies in a seductive manner or distracting men by playing with their breasts or privates. Kratos revealed that it allowed them a perfect chance to use their petrifying gaze on their targets, turning them to stone if they were unlucky to be caught in the attack, though most of the gorgons he had encountered simply attacked with the power, knowing he wouldn't fall for all of their seductive actions. Of course Kratos also informed her that gorgons could use their tails as weapons as well, so one had to be careful when fighting a creature like this, but since they were incredible opponents he warned Flurry to stay off to the side and let him deal with this, since her inexperience would only hinder them this time.

Such a thing told Flurry that he wanted her to stay safe and didn't want her caught in this fight, so while he rushed out into the arena, to clash with the satyr, she did everything in her power to remain on the sidelines and not get in his way, only to have a gorgon appear in front of her before she could react. In that moment she learned why Kratos had warned her that these foes were beyond her current abilities, as this one was far faster than the centaur they had faced previously, so she knew that her bow was useless, especially at this range, and that meant her sickles were her only means of defense right now. The gorgon, however, did something that surprised Flurry, as she simply stared at her for a few seconds, like she was trying to figure out what sort of creature she was and why she was here, before picking her up, turned towards the fight, and held Flurry like she was a toy as Kratos fought, loose enough so she wasn't uncomfortable while being tight enough to ensure she didn't get in the way. It was an odd event that she was sure would never be repeated in the future, a monster acting differently than what she was used to seeing, though it did allow Flurry to see that the gorgons had a cobra hood attached to their heads, and, when Kratos dealt the final blow by removing the head of the other snake creature, the one holding Flurry simply sighed as she noticed the sad look in her eyes.

While she was being held, however, Flurry noticed that the odd gorgon had blue eyes while the lower half of her body was more of a black color, or maybe a dark grey, while all of her fellow creatures had a more dull green color to them, and they were more of a single color. She guessed that this made the gorgon holding her more of an outcast among her kind, due to her unusual colors, though it could also be due to the fact that she seemed more intelligent than the other monsters they had encountered since she appeared in this world. The reasoning for that thought was due to the fact that this gorgon knew not to challenge Kratos, rather she knew such a thing would result in her death, so she had opted to remove herself from the fight and Flurry had presented the perfect opportunity for her to show the experienced warrior that she meant no harm to them. In the end she guessed that this wasn't a bad thing, rather it told her there might be intelligent monsters out there, or at least she was hoping that was the case and that this wasn't the only time she would encounter a creature that knew it was unwise to challenge Kratos.

When the battle was over the blue eyed gorgon slithered over to Kratos and set Flurry down, where she patted her head for a moment as the warrior just stared at the creature for a few seconds, trying to comprehend what he was seeing right now, before slithering off without even trying to do anything to them.

"Flurry... what happened?" Kratos inquired, because with her there seemed to be a never ending series of events that he couldn't explain, and even when he thought he could explain some there might be a chance that he was just wrong on the matter, even though he had no idea why a monster would do such a thing.

"I... honestly, I have no idea." Flurry replied, as she was still processing what had just happened as well, because she had shown every monster that had come near her that she was more than willing to fight them, so they shouldn't see her as a toy or whatever the gorgon had seen her as, "Could she have been recently born, or recently turned?"

Kratos doubted either option, as neither made sense when he thought about it, rather he was sure that the gorgon had simply seen Flurry as something to keep safe and had done so, and once the battle was done the creature fled to avoid being killed like the other monsters. He stood there for a few more moments, just to make sure it didn't come back after he lowered his guard, before heading back over to the first large gear they had seen and turned it again, allowing the long platform to return so he and Flurry could continue on their way. After reaching Archimedes' resting place they found that the way forward required them jumping on the lids of the device that Kratos had pulled the lever in front of not that long ago, to which Flurry remained on her guardian's back as he started to move. It took him no time to reach the center of the pipe in question, which happened to include a lift that took them up to the next area they had to move through, which had a walkway being bathed in fire that he had to deal with, though there was a pause in it's flames that Flurry spotted and Kratos nodded as he saw it.

With that in mind they were able to bypass the first set of flames and continued down the path, climbing up the side of an upper walkway before finding a metallic gear that Kratos spun with a single push of his hands and let it fall down into the slot that was below it, activating another set of machinery as more of the heart came to life. Of course more satyr had to appear out of nowhere and interrupt them, though instead of wasting time on them, fighting anyway, Kratos grabbed all of them and hurled them into the flames that were all around them, allowing Archimedes' contraptions to kill them so he could get himself and Flurry to safety. Such a thing meant jumping from one platform to another for a short period of time as Flurry watched a number of material pots moving above them, carrying materials around to devices that would power the heart or be melted down to be fashioned into other usable components. Fortunately there happened to be a point of sorts between the various pots that Kratos latched onto with one of his blades and swung over to the highest point of the area, what appeared to be Apollo's shattered shoulder, where the chain holding the other sections of the arm rested, and, just as the pair expected, more enemies showed up to do battle.

Since it was just satyrs Flurry was able to join in, using her arrows to open holes in their defenses so Kratos could tear his foes apart, at least until two juggernauts showed up and demanded his attention for a time, something that caused him to use their strength against each other so he could finish them off as brutally as before.

Once the coast was clear the pair approached the rusted chain, which seemed days away from breaking thanks to what the Furies had done to Apollo's statue, where Flurry looked over the edge and stared down at the destruction as Kratos raised the amulet once more. A few seconds later the fallen stone fragments shifted for a moment before starting to move back into place before their eyes, something that allowed Flurry to watch as the fallen sections of the arm, and the other one based on what she was currently seeing, were affected as well. Chunks of stone and metal moved back through time as they were lifted into the air, rotating and piecing themselves back together in a matter of seconds, showing them the vast power of the amulet once more as the damage to the chest was reversed as well, fixing a good chunk of everything the Furies had done to keep the Lantern hidden. In addition to that she could see the Lantern moving as well, being pulled out of the water as the chain it was connected to was pulled along with the rest of the arm that she and Kratos happened to be standing in, until eventually the entire arm was sealed and they heard the sound of everything sliding into place not a few moments later.

"Have I mentioned how cool that amulet is? Because it's awesome!" Flurry remarked, because seeing time reverse and fix all sorts of broken things like this never seemed to get old for her, especially when they were fixing something that would no doubt appease the gods, or at least Apollo when she considered it for a few more seconds.

"It sure is." Kratos said, as he agreed with Flurry, the amulet was powerful and it was worth collecting it from the temple it had been resting in, in fact the sheer amount of damage it could repair still surprised him whenever he used it, especially after seeing the ruin that Alecto and her sisters left the statue in when they attacked it, before he put it away and started to move towards a new path, "We must keep moving, because with the restoration of the arms it is only a matter of time until the Furies realize where we are and come rushing back to catch us... we must reach the Lantern and claim the Eyes of Truth before that happens."

Flurry nodded as she followed Kratos' lead once more, all while silently hoping that they could reach their destination and claim their prize before the Furies even realized what was going on, and hoped Orkos was able to keep them distracted while keeping himself safe, before readying herself to face whatever else the statue could throw at them.