Circa 800 BCE – Ancient Greece
Long before democracy, before Sparta and Athens ruled the world, Marcus stood beneath the thunderous peak of Mount Olympus, where the sky cracked with lightning and the air shimmered with belief.
He wasn't supposed to be there.
Mortals didn't climb Olympus.
But Marcus wasn't just mortal anymore.
He arrived in a small village near the mountain, where people whispered of Zeus's wrath and Athena's wisdom. A storm had destroyed their olive groves, and Marcus helped rebuild them, all while spinning ridiculous stories to children.
"You know, I once arm-wrestled Hercules," he told a wide-eyed boy. "He won, but only because I was holding back. It's rude to beat a hero in his own legend."
The villagers laughed—until the gods showed up.
One night, as he looked at the stars, a glowing figure approached. She wore armor made of moonlight and eyes like polished bronze.
"I am Athena," she said. "You don't belong in this age."
Marcus blinked. "Lady, I don't even belong in this planet's timeline."
She didn't laugh, but she didn't strike him down either.
He was summoned to Olympus—not as a god, not as a threat, but as a curiosity. Hermes found him amusing. Ares challenged him to a duel (and lost). Dionysus tried to get him drunk (and failed).
But Zeus... Zeus watched Marcus with uneasy eyes.
"You walk with power not given by us," he said.
"I walk with power I earned," Marcus replied. "And I don't want your throne."
"You already sit on it," said Hera quietly. "In the stories yet to be told."
Before he left, Hephaestus gifted Marcus a bracer infused with divine energy. "You'll need this," he muttered. "When Ragnarok comes."
Marcus raised an eyebrow. "That's not your mythology."
"Not yet," Hephaestus said.