Jump 004: Fate Legends - Empires of Antiquity

Jump 004: Fate Legends - Empires of Antiquity

Location: Greece, 1200 BCE
Age: 20
Identity: Ruler
Drawbacks: [+300] Lose Your Way, Unwilling Argument
Challenge: Twelve Labors

[Free]      Roman Holiday
[Free]      Emperor In Training
[Free]      Her Majesty's Majesty
[Free]      Wolf Mothered
[200/1300]  Hearts and Minds
[500/1300]  ROMA
[900/1300]  Crossing Arcadia
[1100/1300] Apples of Immortality
[1300/1300] Rule Breaker

It's inevitable that sooner or later, living a long life will get you into a heap of trouble. Even if you've got a way to shed the years periodically, having an ego the size of a city-state will eventually get you in over your head. When, on top of that, your purpose for existence was supposed to be a bridge between mankind and the gods and you instead chose to sunder that connection because basically HUMANITY FUCK YEAH, and quite frankly the gods being so petty that they deserved it, then it's probably a given that when you run across other pantheons, you're going to end up in a heap of trouble.

A "prove to us that we shouldn't smite you right now" heap of trouble.

While I have a great deal of experience over the years - because let's face it, a quasi-retired king is going to run around, get into a heap of trouble all over the place regardless, and do what amuses him from moment to moment - when it comes to a fully united pantheon, even I am not arrogant enough to think I could repel firepower of that magnitude. Negotiations, on the other hand? That I can swing. Appeal to their ego, make it more than just a matter of frustrating tasks and busy work to keep me out of their hair and get something out of it in the end.

Which ends up dropping me right in the heart of the goddamn Minoan labyrinth. The minotaur's a pretty decent guy as long as you speak his language, but... well, let's face it, his language is violence, and if nothing else, I am very fluent in that. And by 'decent guy' I mean he stays knocked out once you actually manage to finally knock him out, but that leaves the whole issue of escaping from the labyrinth.

And once I finally DO get out of the labyrinth, the only ride off the island is with Jason and the Argonauts, and man oh man is Jason a piece of work. I thought MY ego was bad. It could be much worse, of course, but .. well, if you've read the stories of Jason and his Argonauts, you'd understand why it's so bad when I say that it doesn't describe the half of the stupidity he got up to. Balls of steel, sure, but when he moved his head you'd swear you could hear the rocks rattling around in that mongrel's head. If I hadn't been slowly growing in power all these years, in speed and strength both, I don't think I would have survived the whole experience.

And beyond that, there are the shenanigans that were necessary to get into further. My travels went quite a distance, especially easy when I could outrun a lightning bolt, but once you get to the point that you can do that, it only means that the stakes have to get higher. My twelve labors were more geared toward the intellectual than the physical as they were with Hercules, and there was no redirecting of any rivers to clean out any stables, but ... well, it turns out my greatest enemy in this was Hermes. As opposed to Mercury. But he didn't take kindly to another encroaching on his domain, even unintentionally, and was convinced that I didn't have a mind that could keep up with my feet. Or my mouth. He got a couple of others to help him on that front, so far as that goes. Athena and Artemis.

While Hermes was unhappy that I managed to get through everything, even if it DID take years, Athena and Artemis were both good sports about it. Good enough that I was able to sneak away with a bag of golden apples to add to my treasury with no one the wiser, when I was invited to a feast (I was more demigod than their demigods, after all, even if not full fledged god).

Although the less we say about how I got my hands on the Rule Breaker, the better. Just... no.

And so the years continued to wear on.