Wow look at that. 2 years later and people are still posting reviews questioning if I'm still alive. Finals are coming up and I was cleaning my laptop. I found an unfinished QFO chapter and within minutes I was able to add an extra 1000 words. It had been two years since I even continued that chapter but for some reason, I still knew exactly what to write. The story I had planned was still clear in my head. It just had been years since I picked up a PJO book or even followed the RA series.

I honestly do want to follow the two series but I couldn't even get past the first page of Magnus Chase and it's hard to get a hold of the new RA books where I live. When reading, I was into Alex Rider and Inkheart for a while (spent a lot more time reading chess strategy books. I got into Yuri on Ice for a while, and Coco the movie. I'm excitedly waiting for Kingdom Hearts to come out.)

Not much time to enjoy life in college though, so sorry for the very very late update. Surprisingly though, I managed the 1000 words in an hour so who knows, the plot bunnies may still be alive.

You can always send me a PM or follow me on tumblr (tundrainafrica) to check up on the story. Thank you for all the support until now.

Breakthrough.

That's what Percy had texted Annabeth, no hint as to what that breakthrough was but that text was enough leverage for both Will and Annabeth to leave the cafe they had settled in a little more than an hour ago.

The silent halls of Goode High School were a farcry from the Sunnydale college they had visited days ago and Will couldn't help but feel a chill wash over him.

"Everyone's in class." Annabeth explained as if she sensed the unease WIll has been feeling since they entered the school. "And it's summer school so not too much students."

Will nodded and smiled reassuringly when she looked at him. She did not look like she was in the mood for questions so even with his doubts, the ranger chose to keep silent as they navigated through the halls.

"We're here." Annabeth stopped in front of a set of double doors. "Are you ready to find out the 'big breakthrough'?"

"Now or never." Will replied. He watched as Annabeth opened the double doors and followed her inside.

"Will!"

Will saw a flash of light and felt like his body was being crushed. He could have sworn he was going to die, a million thoughts ran through his head, one of them being that everything behind those double doors was a trap, that he was being crushed by what could have been a large snake or maybe a boulder. As he slowly came to his senses, he realized he was still breathing and his heart was still beating and that crushing feeling was actually a benevolent one. He was at the receiving end of a bear hug and this hug felt very familiar.

"Horace..." There was no need to rack his brain for any names. His mouth moved on its own and before he knew it, he was returning the hug, his arms wrapping themselves around the larger man's back.

"I thought you were dead. Gilan and I looked everywhere for you... Halt too..."

"Why..." Will asked, so softly he could have been talking to himself. That question was meant for Horace though. At that moment, if nothing was running through his head, he could have raised his voice but as he touched his friend and looked at those familiar blue eyes, something changed within him and he started to remember and with that, he started to understand that warm feeling that overcame him.

He was Will Treaty, ranger and former apprentice to Halt O'Carrick. The man in front of him was his best friend. He was married to Alyss Mainwaring.

Was married.

When Will started to recall his past, it wasn't a flash of memories and scenes. It felt more like a switch that just suddenly turned on inside his head. The memories just appeared inside is head and with it, the ideas, beliefs and opinions he had formed within him through his experiences. They were nothing though compared to the emotions that overtook them.

Sorrow. Loneliness. Anger. Rage. Disappointment. Regret.

He felt Alyss' death once again. Alyss succumbed to food poisoning during a banquet in Redmont castle only a year after they were married. He felt the devastation, the loss of strength and resolve. He remembered the weeks he spent cooped up in the cabin, only to go out during wee hours of morning to hunt for food. He felt the loneliness and disappoint, having to come to terms with the fact that he and Alyss would never have a family nor will they grow old together.

After weeks cooped up, Will had started to do his own investigation, acquiring details on his wife's autopsy, the food they had eaten in the banquet only through some investigation did Will realized that it was no accident.

Someone had wanted him dead and that person spiked his share of the meal.

That was when he felt the regret. It was he who had given the plate of food to Alyss. His wife had just come back from a mission that day and she was starving. He had given her his share of the food so that she could go ahead and start. Had he been a little more selfish, he would have been the one who died, not her. Had he tasted the food first, Alyss would not have died. Halt always told him to be cautious and that was the one party that he decided to let loose a little.

He felt the anger then the rage that caused him to go through a rampage of revenge, a hesitant Gilan and Horace behind him all the way.

Will had spent years training and working in this craft, finding out the identity of the perpetrator was only routine for him. He was able to trace the poison to one of the chefs from Redmont castle who had resigned right after the banquet. Through some more investigation, Will was able to track the rogue chef in one of the smaller villages in the outskirts of Picta. The cabin the man settled in was secluded, making Will's goal much easier. Before he truly understood what he was doing, Will had already cornered the poor man, drew his saxe knife and stabbed him right in the chest despite his pleading for his life and his friends' attempts to talk him out of that cold blooded assassination.

"And then what happened?" WIll asked, raising his voice to his friend. The last thing he was able to muster up was a feeling of regret. Why did he feel so heavy? "What did I miss?"

"A lot, Will. You went missing. Pronounced dead. You almost drove Halt crazy."

Halt!

"You actually did drive Halt crazy."

Will instinctively looked back to see another familiar face. "Gilan..."

"Our master who happens to be the most level headed, responsible for having debunked a lot of the rumors about magic in Araulen, was the one who decided to dabble in black magic, all so he could find you." Gilan went for one of the chairs by the door and sat down, dropping his bag on the chair beside him.

"You're dismissed early." Horace said, letting go of his friend. He kept one hand on Will's shoulder as he looked to Gilan.

"Great to see you again Will." The ranger smiled at his junior.

"Will, you need to sit? This might be a lot to process."

Will felt a warm hand on his arm, pulling him away from the entrance. He followed, his legs weak. He sat on the chair the arm led him too, he looked up to see Annabeth beside him, looking satisfied with the turn of events. "Some breakthrough." The breakthrough was not at all exciting or hopeful. As the memories started to come back to him, ironically Will started to feel more lost. After he had killed the man in cold blood, what had happened to his friends? What had happened to Halt? He propped his shoulders on the nearby table and rested his head on his hands. " Why isn't Halt with you? You used your black magic. You found me…" Will said as he tried to rack his brain for what exactly happened after he killed the man in cold blood.

"We should be asking you why you're here." Gilan said. "Last time we checked, you were in the depths of hell. How you got back is beyond us."

"What about Halt?" Will pressed.

Gilan shrugged. "Even in his afterlife he wouldn't stop looking, made a deal then jumped in to save you."

"But, I'm not there. I was never there… Right?" Ninth circle of hell. Will could not remember ever being brutally tortured in the underworld.

Horace frowned. "We knew you were there. That's why we went through all the circles. Only for Halt to fall to the depths as well and we had no idea how to get either of you out."

"That's why we're here. We climbed back up and out of hell only to gather more information on those circles through that book which turns out to be a lot more informative than a lot of the people we were able to talk to in the underworld. As soon as we learned enough, we were going to get both of you out…" Gilan added.

"And that's why you knew so much… about the circles…" The door creaked open.

Everyone looked to the doorway to see Nico there. The door was open only slightly and Nico's head stuck out of the gap as he struggled to get all the way in with an immobile leg against a door fighting to close itself.

It was Thalia and Annabeth who instinctively rushed to their cousin's side. Annabeth grabbed Nico's crutches while Thalia helped her cousin out of the gap.

"You looked like you knew what you were talking about too. I guessed you weren't fully human." Gilan commented, not as surprised as Nico by the sudden turn of events, as if he had guessed the whole time that Nico could not have been a normal student. He turned to the demigods. "So the new student was one of yours…"

"I'm… fully human." Nico corrected as he settled on the one of the chairs with the help of his two cousins.

Gilan raised his eyebrow doubtfully at the Nico.

"He's a demigod." Percy said. "He's the son of Hades."

Horace raised his eyebrows in surprise and turned to Nico. "Hades… The lord of the underworld… So you should know more than us about the nine circles…"

"I've lived in the underworld for a while, long enough to be able to guide people… I know about the nine circles because I've been to eight of them but I don't think I have any power left to call myself the son of Hades." Nico explained, putting his hands up defensively, hoping that was enough to dash any hopes the two may have about him. "I don't think I'll be much help if you plan on going down there again, beyond the first ditch in the eight circle at least."

"That's where you stopped, when you were looking for Iris." Percy reiterated.

"I made it a little past that only to find out that I was slowly losing my powers. I didn't lose all traces of my demigod identity in an instant. It was a slow process. I was my fighting my way through the second ditch and as I went along, I started to realize that even just relying on my demigod senses felt weird. It used to be second nature but then, I was struggling even to just keep myself of any monsters that could come my way. And as I fought through, them, I realized I was getting weaker and weaker, so I shadow traveled out. I could have gotten lost then and there if I hadn't."

"What did he offer you?"

"That's not what's important. What's important is what we lost, how to get past the first ditch. You managed to get past which means you lost something too, for sure." Nico said, brushing away the question of a while ago. He looked expectantly at Gilan.

"We left as soon as we realized our deal was a scam" Gilan said. "Halt was the one who made the deal. He disappeared, the toll guard disappeared. All we knew is Halt didn't think we could get further, he wanted to negotiate to get you out. What he offered exactly, we don't know." He turned to Will. "But you didn't come back, he didn't either. We thought we were both tricked."

"But you're here so that meant, it wasn't completely a scam." Horace said, his tone a little more cheerful than Gilan as if trying to lighten the conversation topic just a little bit.

But how did I even end up in Camp Half-Blood? What did all those strange dreams mean? The conversation they were having was raising more questions than answering. Will's head was starting to hurt, frustration and anger only building inside him as his mind made sense of bad news after bad news, the reunion of a while ago only a brief respite. Everything though ended with one game plan and that was to go back down to the underworld. The demigods had their quest. Horace and Gilan had their goal. All mysteries seemed to stem from the nine circles as well. The goal was so clear yet was filled with so many questions. Will looked up at the white ceiling of the cafeteria, a blank slate, something that helped him clear his mind of all the questions that only made him uneasy, something that made it easier to picture the next step.

He took a deep breath. "I don't want to hear any more about this. I don't even want to try making sense of all this right now." He turned to the demigods. "We need to go down the nine circles to find Iris." He then turned to Gilan and Horace. We need to go down the nine circles to find Halt. We have our destination. We know what's down there already. Let's just go. All the questions we have will answer themselves soon enough."

Nico, Horace and Gilan knew how to get down there. They knew what to expect. Percy, Annabeth and Thalia knew what they were looking for.

Everyone in the group had enough residual knowledge to be confident that they could jump into the underworld and play the rest by ear. It was a logical plan. They all knew what they were doing. An instinct and an easy feeling tended to linger though amongst all of them. At that moment, when Annabeth and Percy had listened as Will had said their concrete plan and as Nico, Horace and Gilan discussed the location of the entrance to the underworld, they had suddenly recalled the prophecy Rachel had given Percy before they left Camp Half Blood. At that same moment as well, Thalia had recalled the uneasiness in Artemis' voice as she relieved Thalia of her duties so she could help her cousins.

When there's an illusion of concreteness and competence though, confidence tends to spike, that brief uneasiness was soon brushed away. They had a job to finish.

Do drop a review!