The chase was undignified. My heart pounded—a frantic bird trying to escape my ribs. My lungs burned. Thorns tore at my silk robes with every stumbling step.

  This body wasn't built for this!

  Twenty years ago, we Younger Gods inherited a shattered world. To walk among mortals, we underwent éntheos—binding our divine souls to mortal vessels.

  I chose this body, this girl who died of fever, alone and forgotten. I kept her name: Dia.

  And now Dia's body ran through a forest at night, bleeding from a dozen cuts, pursued by death on hooves.

  The guttural snorts of the Centaur were too close, hot breath fogging the air at my back. Not even a significant monster to my family—a mere nuisance. To me, alone and newly mortal, it was the end of everything.

  Expectation: A grand descent from the heavens. Omens. Cheering mortals. A wise elder god guiding me to my destined, noble Retainers.

  Reality: Shredded silk slippers. A tangled mess of hair, leaves, and sweat. Death in a muddy thicket.

  My only epitaph would be the coarse, mindless bellowing of a brute.

  This was the world twenty years after the Titanomachia.

  The Greater Gods were silent, their shattered eternity now a cage for the Primal Evils in Tartarus. We, the Younger Gods, were all that was left—flawed and fragile.

  This body knew hunger. It shivered in the cold night air. It knew the raw animal terror of being hunted.

  I bruised. I bled.

  A root caught my foot. I crashed forward into damp earth, the world spinning. My palms slammed into mud.

  The Centaur loomed over me, crude stone axe raised high.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  The weight of those wasted days crushed me harder than any axe ever could. I was a fool. A lazy godling who spent twenty years in the divine courts, waiting for a "proper" destiny instead of forging one.

  Is this how it ends?

  -?-

  The sound wasn't what I expected.

  Not the thud of axe into flesh. A sharp crack—like a dry branch snapping. A pained grunt rumbled from the beast.

  I dared to open my eyes.

  A young man stood between me and the monster.

  Dark leather armor—buckle-strapped vest over a cream shirt, hooded green doublet. A large shield with bronze dryad knotwork braced his left arm. A tall wooden spear adorned with mistletoe rested in his right.

  Tousled black hair framed serious yellow eyes. Hunter's eyes, tracking movement with predator focus.

  He just... stepped in.

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  "Hey, ugly," a female voice drawled from my left.

  A slender girl with snow-white skin leaned against a tree. Long red hair, partially braided to frame her face. Prominent fangs caught the moonlight. She wore an asymmetrical bandeau that left her midriff bare, flowing into billowing harem pants with an orange-patterned sash. Dark segmented armbands wrapped her forearms.

  Her ember eyes—fierce, burning—regarded me with boredom. Pyraei. The heritage of Prometheus written in flame-colored hair and eyes that burned.

  "You're interrupting our nap."

  The Centaur recoiled, stumbling back several paces. Then, with a roar, it committed to a full crushing charge.

  The young man was going to die. They were both going to die because of me.

  But he didn't meet the charge head-on. A fluid sidestep—so smooth it looked rehearsed. His staff whipped around—CRACK. The wood slammed into the beast's knee, echoing through the trees.

  The beast stumbled.

  The red-haired girl was suddenly there, impossibly fast. No weapon, just fists wreathed in roaring crimson-gold flame.

  THUD. Jaw.

  CRACK. Chest.

  The flame didn't just burn. It concussed. The force vibrated in my bones.

  The Centaur collapsed into a heap of twitching limbs and fading corruption.

  The whole fight took less than ten seconds.

  I was still braced for impact. But it was... over?

  My knees buckled. I caught myself against a tree, bark rough under my palms. This body—the girl I chose for éntheos—wasn't built for this!

  None of us Younger Gods had our full power anymore. That was the price: walk among mortals, guide them, protect them... but do it in flesh that bruised and bled. I could barely light a candle with divine power now.

  My only gifts were what remained of my domain: I could ease weariness, mend minor wounds, bless the young with vitality.

  Small mercies.

  Not enough to fight. Not enough to survive alone.

  The young man prodded the unmoving form with his staff. "Okay, that was scary."

  "Nothing useful but the hooves. And those are heavy. Another one crazy because of the miasma of a labyrinthos, I guess."

  He glanced at the girl. "Right, Lena?"

  The girl—Lena—kicked the corpse once for good measure, her sharp gaze turning to me. "Alright, 'princess'. You owe us."

  She strode over, eyes calculating, running a quick appraisal. "Nice clothes." Her fingers brushed the torn silk of my sleeve. "Soiled now, but fine make."

  A glance over her shoulder. "Wouldn't you agree, Nihl?"

  I scrambled backward, my hands digging into cold mud. "I... I have no coin!"

  "We're not interested in your coin," the young man—Nihl—said calmly as he approached from behind Lena.

  "We're interested in why something like that was so determined to chase down someone who smells like they bathe in flower water."

  They thought I was a spoiled noble's daughter!

  A wave of hysterical laughter almost bubbled out. I forced it down, fighting the sudden dizzying panic that choked my throat. I ran out of breath, my chest heaving against the cold air.

  They were both just staring.

  "You don't understand!" The words tumbled out before I could stop them. "It smells the god on me! If we don't kill these things, the land gets sick from divine sorrow! It becomes a... a Labyrinthos! A living dungeon born from a god's grief! And if it grows, it will birth a Calamity that devours everything—"

  Nihl gave a slow, deliberate blink. "...Right." An uncomfortably long pause. "So you're not just rich." He looked at Lena. "She's crazy."

  Lena's grin was all sharp, predatory teeth. "Crazy people from powerful families pay the best."

  My chance. I had to gamble or I was as good as dead!

  "I'm not crazy!" I pushed to my feet, trying to summon any last shred of divine presence into this trembling frame. "I am Hebe! Goddess of Youth! Daughter of Zeus and Hera! And I... I am forming my own guild."

  They stared again. Expressions unreadable.

  Nihl tilted his head, a flicker of genuine curiosity in his eyes. "So... no reward?"

  Desperation clawed at me.

  Father had made that clear: prove yourself in the mortal realm, or remain in our shadow forever. If I failed here, if I returned to Olympus empty-handed... I'd never be more than the cupbearer's daughter. Never reclaim what little domain I had.

  "I can offer you something greater than gold!" My voice trembled with a conviction I barely felt. "A place in my Guild! I can bless you! Make you Retainers! Your names will be—"

  A derisive snort from Lena cut me off. "Yeah? And what's your guild's name? Where's your fancy temple?"

  "It... it will be the Hebe Guild!" My mind raced, landing on the only safe place I knew—and embellishing it with a desperate lie. "And our headquarters... is a discreet, abandoned villa overlooking Agriovathra Bay!" A pause. "Very exclusive."

  Nihl looked at Lena. A silent, entire conversation passed between them in a single glance. "You see any other offers coming our way?" A smirk from Lena. "No."

  A sigh from Nihl—long, theatrical. Then a small resigned shrug.

  "Alright, 'Lady' Hebe." He used the name I gave them. "You've got yourself two brigands. Try not to get us killed before payday."

  The most pathetic guild in the world was born not with a fanfare, but with a resigned sigh and the stench of dead corrupted centaur.