The fifth cohort already had their hands full with the flying monsters, these new ones would surely overwhelm them. The fourth and third moved towards the back to assist as slowly more and more shadow monsters came down.
There one some that looked like giant staples, some that looked like underwater monsters that could only be imagined in the minds of the terrified. They were the size of two men and they all came crashing down.
The demigods made as much space as they could for the monsters to land, but some didn't have enough causing the monsters to land on top of them, crushing several demigods under their feet causing them to vanish in a bright light.
"Nico!" Bianca called out as she charged towards the fifth cohort with her spear and the shield of Ares.
"Right behind you sis!" Nico called out as he followed with his blade. The two children of Hades looked up at the shadowy breach and held their hands up, slowly gaining control over shadows. They couldn't make the monster move, but they could hurt them.
Suddenly the darkness inside the very portals the monsters came out of started to attack them. Spikes of darkness pierced monsters before they could even land. Tentacles wrapped around their form crushing the very life out of them. They didn't get all of the monsters however, as more still kept coming.
"Fourth cohort! Form a circle around them!" Julia roared out pointing at the siblings of Pluto, "Third cohort to the fifth's aide!"
"Aye!" the romans obeyed.
"Ares attack squad help out the fifth!" Thalia commanded, "protect the healers and the archers from the monsters!"
"AH!" came the cry of the united demigods as they all began to move. The attacks squads form an insulation between the fifth cohort and the healers and archers. The fifth slowly moved away from the concentrated location where most of the monsters fell, they managed to regroup with the third that stood behind him.
The fifth had lost half their members, but they still stood tall and strong. They circled around the pool of shadow monsters and attacked from all sides, trusting their spears, killing whatever landed before it could get on it's feet.
Nico and Bianca were focused on using the shadows to strike back against the monsters while the fourth cohort protected them. The monsters were pierced by Nico and Bianca's shadow weapons, destroyed before they could even move. But the few that did survive went right after them.
That was why the Fifth and Third were there, defending them. But a legion of demonic goats shadows were particularly determined, jumping over the and charging at the Fourth Cohort around the children of Pluto.
The Fourth rallied together facing the leaping goats together. A few of the monster jumped up into the air, intent of crossing over them, but the moment they were airborne several arrows from the hunters of Artemis shoot them down dead.
The goats on the ground tackled the Fourth cohorts wall shield, pushing them back. But the demigods held true. The goats pushed and pushed, and a small crack gave through.
"BAH!" they cried out and out of the encirclement of the Fifth and Third cohorts jumped out a large three headed goat that breathed fire. It charged at the small crack in the Fourth wall, intent on knocking them down.
"Not so fast!" came a feminine yell as a baseball bat came crashing over the goat's center head, cracking open it's skull.
A red haired haired woman in a red track stood before the goat and started hitting it away and again. The metal thumps of the bat hitting the skull was loud enough for all to hear as she swung from one head to another like a pinball machine. She reduced the goat to mush,standing over it's headless corpse before it disappeared.
"GRA!" another monster yelled out as it came flying down from the sky. It was a half human half crab hybrid covered with coral shells and a giant lobster claw. It landed besides Artemis and thrusted it's claw forward around her head.
Artemis backed away and brought her bat up for protection. The crab monster shut it claws, snapping the bat in half. Artemis looked in horror at her bat before she fell on her back trying to get away.
The monster swung it's claw again, aiming to clip off her head as easily it clipped off her bat when suddenly in a flash of bronze a celestial bronze sword found itself lunged in the monster's back.
It screeched in pain, slowly disintegrating revealing a man holding the sword behind it. He had messy black hair and sea green eyes. He looked so familiar Nico and Bianca almost confused him for Percy, before they realized they had the wrong son of Poseidon.
"I told you not to run off on your own," John growled as he helped Artemis up, "this isn't like any battle you've faced before."
"Yeah, I'll say," Artemis held up her bat and growled, "I liked this thing."
"Well you're going to like this even more," John turned to a legionnaire, "have an extra blade?"
"Yeah," the legionnaire nodded a she took out the crystalline sword Percy had created for them which people kept around as spares. John thanked her and gave the blade to Artemis.
The red haired daughter of Apollo swung the blade around before smiling, "it's balanced."
"Yeah," John looked over and smiled seeing Nico and Bianca, "you two doing alright?"
"Just fine John!" Nico called out grinning like a madman.
"Focus Nico!" Bianca hissed.
"Sorry!"
John grinned, "you're sisters right, you two deal with that, we'll protect you," John promised. He and those two were at one time prisoners of the Lotus casino. They suffered the same way, only they managed to adapt while Jon struggled. He always saw them as children, not knowing what they were meant to do. But seeing them now made the old soldier realise they knew exactly who they were, they were demigods. And he swore to protect them.
Suddenly the dark portal started to bulge. Bianca winced, "there's something big coming!" she warned.
Every look up just as a giant hand slowly came out of the shadow. It's fingers had claws, it's skin moved around like hot tar with cracks glowing hot red. The hand was big enough to crush three cohorts under it's fists, and it was slowly opening up its plans to do just that.
"We need to stop it!" Thalia called out.
"I can't!" Bianca roared, "it's too big!"
"We can't stop it!" cries of despair came roaring out of the demigods as they looked up to their destruction.
Jason looked around, he saw the horror in Julia's eyes, the helplessness in Thalia's. And he hated those looked. He wasn't going to let this happen. He wasn't going to let them get him.
Thalia ordered Charles to fire everything the tank had into the hand. Missiles, bullets, tanks shells, all of the flew through the air, breaking just the skin of the giant hand.
Jason looked over the battlefield and like destiny his eyes landed on the golden eagle. It was almost like ti was calling out for him. Like it knew Jason could stop it, like it knew together they could save everyone. And so Jason did just that.
"Praetor Rob!" Jason called out holding his hand out. The Praetor locked eyes with the son of Jupiter and understood immediately. He threw the staff of Jupiter like a javelin, it flew over the heads of many legionnaires, drawing all their eyes to it as it finally landed into the waiting hands of Jason Grace.
Thalia snapped towards her brother, "Jason! What are you doing?!"
"Stopping it," he replied as he threw away his sword, he jumped off the tank and ran towards the center of the plan. The fifth and and Third cohort saw him heading their way and decided to clear a path for him. They charged into the middle of the monsters, cutting them down, creating a wall for Jason.
The son of Jupiter stood in the center, the Fifth and Third cohort stood around him, protecting him from the monsters. He looked up and looked into the shadowy portal from which the hand came from. He could see the rest of the limb yet to come out, his eyes followed the forearm to the biceps to the shoulder, until finally he found the head.
It was shrouded in shadows, but it's eyes, its orange eyes full of hate and despair looked down upon them. Jason locked eyes with it, he didn't know if the thing even realized he was looking right at it, but he didn't care.
"TWELFTH LEGION!" Jason cried out, raising the golden eagle up into the air. The Eagle began gathering power into itself, drawing from the legionnaires around it, gathering it from their fierce sense of duty and loyalty.
"FULLMETAL!" Jason brought it down hard. The ground below him cracked wide open as he held it down. The Eagle began to vibrate, harder and harder, Jason's hands shook with pain as for the first time in his life he felt electricity start to hurt him back.
The Eagle's aura of power grew and grew, it's lighting exploded outwards, destroying all the monsters on the field in a wide arc. The lighting however wasn't focused, too widely dispersed. Jason looked up, he commanded the lighting to gather and strike the monsters above.
The arcs of electricity were like the petals of a flower that was blooming. Jason forced the petals to close together, creating a bud of lighting that arced out directly upwards, breaking the very ground around it.
"Move back!" a fifth cohort legionary yelled as he felt the lighting zap his back, "it's out of control!" The fifth and Third did just that as rouge arcs of lighting poured out of the Eagle.
BOOM!
The lighting hit the monster's palm causing it to flinch itself close from the pain. Jason's body was being pushed down, the random sparks of electricity so intense he couldn't absorb it fast enough to render it harmless.
Jason grunted in pain, he felt the lighting being thrown out, heating the staff to unbearable heats. His eyes started to water, his grip weakened, he looked up, the hand was being ripped apart, slowly being pushed back. But not fast enough.
Fear struck Jason's heart, he didn't want to fail them. His sense of duty as a Roman wouldn't allow it, he would rather die than disappoint the people he loved. And he accepted the fact that at this rate that just might happen.
As his grip weakened and his eyes grew heavy Jason knew it would be his last moments alive. He didn't think even Morpheus would be able to save him, there was too much raw power coming it out of this thing, if Jason disappeared then there would be no one to hold onto the staff. The power would explode outwards and hurt the demigods. He couldn't do it. He wouldn't do it.
But just as he blinked what he believed to be the last sight he would ever see in his life, a second set of hands grabbed onto the staff.
Jason's eyes shot open in surprise as he saw Thalia stand besides him, grunting in pain. She looked down at him and smiled, "you didn't actually think I would let you do this alone did you?"
Jason smiled, he didn't have the strength to reply, but she knew what he wanted to say.
With the pressure lessened Jason was able to stand up again, his hold on the staff manageable as more and more power came bursting out. Jason felt his power mix with the lighting being sent up, and then suddenly he felt something else mix in with the power.
Blue lightning started to fuse with the beam of yellow, Jason turned to saw the lighting rolling of Thalia by the bucket loads, she was pouring everything she had into the attack. And slowly the hand began clench into a fist.
"Full power Jason!" Thalia roared, the ground below them cracks, the sound of thunder blasting through their ears. The siblings focused all their might into the attack and a final bulging blast of pure energy burst through the staff and collided with the hand.
The hand was sent flying back, it's skin scorched and burnt as it went behind the shadow portal. The demigods looked up in wonder, they had been saved. Thalia and Jason san to their knees holding the staff straight as they looked into the portal above. It looked to be over, when it started to move towards them again.
"It's coming back!" cries of horror roared out. Thalia tried to get to her feet to launch another attack but she found herself unable to even get back up.
"Nico! Close the portal!" Bianca called out as the children of Hades manipulated the shadowy portal. They felt a primordial connection to the darkness before them as they forced it close. The hand came inches from crossing over again when the large tear in the sky sealed itself shut, closing off for good.
The demigods was tunned in disbelief. Bianca and Nico collapsed from exhaustion, panting hard as they smiled at their good work. Thalia finally managed to get back on her feet, supporting Jason as he did so as well.
The looked to the Eagle and slowly let go. The warm glowing golden staff was now iron cold, almost lifeless. And suddenly a small crack in the staff's spine spread as it broke in half. The Eagle came toppling down, the romans watched in horror as their symbol fell. Hope began to die, but it never touched the ground.
Thalia grabbed it with one hand, refusing to let it go. She brought it up and turned around to the faces before her. They looked so lost, they had fought for so long. Thalia of all people wanted a break, but she knew they couldn't afford one.
She cleared her throat, "we have a warn to win. And I intend to win it," and with those simple words she moved towards the tank where Julia watched her with pride in her eyes.
"Alright listen up!" Julia yelled out, "we have closed the portal over here but the monsters are still coming from the front!" she pointed to the First and Second cohort currently engaging in the animal hybrid soldiers of the Titan army, "Third cohort and Fourth cohort assist them! Fifth cohort you stay back to defend the healers! Greeks! Let's see if Morpheus needs help!"
It was a testament to how much respect the daughter of Venus commanded when the greek demigods obeyed her without a second thought. The demigods were on the move once more, the cohorts combined their forces easily pushing the titan soldiers back while the greek moved towards the side where Hypnos and Morpheus were locked in a death battle.
Hypnos locked horns with Morpheus, sending him on the defensive, always moving back to protect himself. But Hypnos was do distracted he failed to realise the swarm of demigods gathering around him.
Morpheus smoked, which just pissed Hypnos off. "Why are you smirking?!"
"Look behind you," Morpheus pointed with his blades.
Hypnos did, and suddenly was flooded off his feet by the greek demigods tackling him into the ground. They brought their weapons down on him, piercing his back with swords and spears.
"ARGH!" Hypnos yelled out as he threw them all off of him. The demigods went flying back as Hypnos stood enraged and in pain. He charged Morpheus again, intent on killing him, when a volley of arrows pierced his left side.
