Location: Larissa, Aeolia
Time Remaining: 1 month, 8 days
The fourth challenge was combat. Ares tried to recuse himself again, but Aphrodite brought to bear the full force of her pouty charms. Reluctantly, Ares agreed, but only on one condition – all of the contestants would fight him, together, and they would be armed, whilst he would fight barehanded. The last man to tap out would win the combat challenge.
Nearly all of the contestants were terrified by the prospect, but Apollo and Dionysus actually joined their side, making it two-to-one odds on the god front. The contest began with Ares chained in the center of Larissa’s arena, with all of the competitors in a circle around him. Aphrodite announced when it was time for the suitors to attack, but no one moved – no one wanted to be the first man to attack Ares.
Finally, Diomedes, still carrying a chip on the shoulder for Ares picking him up and throttling him, said that the other suitors were “fucking pussies,” walked up to Ares, and struck him in the testicles with a spear. It wasn’t a hard enough swing for the bronze blade to cut into the god’s supernaturally tough dermis, but Ares grunted from the pain, and felt his temper rise as Diomedes got up in his face and taunted him with an array of insults. When Ares reached a critical level of offense-taken, he leaned back pulling against the chains, and kicked Diomedes straight in the chest. The mortal man flew across the arena, and knocked over several of the suitors. His ribcage was shattered, but Apollo ran to him and used his power to heal him while men started attacking in chaotic waves.
Ares’s angry tromping and stomping broke limbs, cracked skulls, and sent dozens of men flying through the air, Apollo anxiously trying to heal them all.
Odysseus rallied the last men standing, and began giving orders to form up. Ajax moved in first with his massive shield, flanked by Menelaus and Achilles, both with their own smaller shields and long spears at the ready. Behind them, Teucer, Paris, and Odysseus fired their bows at Ares’s head, hoping to get a shot at his eye. Teucer hit Ares several times in the face, but it was lucky Paris who finally drew blood, one of his arrows skewering Ares’s left eyeball. Ares roared – his eye would grow back, but the pain was no less intense. With a mighty heave he ripped the chains from the ground, and swung them as flails at the Achaean’s frontline. Achilles took the blow, and was knocked hard into Ajax. Odysseus shouted for the archers to separate and flank Ares, hoping to attack him from all sides.
Ares flailed again, and crushed Menelaus’s shield. The adopted Spartan threw it aside. Ares swung his chains overhead, but Menelaus braced himself, holding his spear high as a shield. Ares’s chains wrapped around it, shaking it violently, but Menelaus spun the spear once to twist the chains again, and rushed at Ares. Ares pulled up on the chains trying to yank the spear from Menelaus’s grasp, but Menelaus was too close – the chains had too much slack. Menelaus dropped, narrowly missing Ares’s descending fists, and slid between the gods legs. He rolled to his feet and jammed the spear as hard as he could into the earth.
Ares pulled angrily on the chain, but that simply brought the heavy metal up hard against his crotch. If he’d regained his senses, he might have simply climbed off the chain as easily as getting off a horse, but the beast that raged inside him had taken over. Ares pulled again and Menelaus’s spear snapped. Fortunately, the others had made good use of the time to regroup. Ajax swung his mace underhanded and clocked Ares on the jaw, and then dropped, holding his shield low but away from Ares. Ares staggered back and spit out a tooth, stunned that a mortal could hit that hard. Before he could react, Achilles sprinted up Ajax’s lowered shield, using it as a ramp, and leaped over the larger warrior to thrust his spear straight at Ares’s face.
Achilles, though, was not yet the warrior he would one day become – the spear point skidded across Ares’s cheek bone. Not sure what else to do as he tumbled through the air, Achilles let go of the spear and grabbed onto Ares’s head. He swung around onto Ares’s back and wrapped his legs around the god’s neck and began squeezing as hard as he could. Ares whipped one of his chains around, wrapping it around Achilles, and yanked the chain to fling Achilles off of him.
Ajax swung his mace at Ares’s torso, pounding the god of war’s ribs hard enough to crack them. Ares groaned, but he grabbed the mace, yanked it from Ajax’s grip, and backhanded him with it. Ajax blocked the blow with his shield, but the force was still enough to fling him clear across the arena. Ares flipped the mace once in his hand, and then threw it at Teucer like a javelin. Teucer manage to duck quickly enough to avoid being hit squarely by the project, but it clipped his head hard enough to lay him out flat.
This left only five men standing in the arena. Dionysus, who’d been wandering about drinking the entire time. Apollo, who had made no attempt to join the fight, having plenty of injuries to tend to instead. Menelaus, who had backed off after finding himself unarmed. Odysseus, who was desperately trying to think of a way to outwit the rampaging war machine, and Paris. Perhaps emboldened by his lucky coin, or perhaps mad with love, Paris pulled out his knife, screamed at the top of his lungs, and made to run at Ares. Menelaus and Odysseus grabbed the boy by each arm, and dragged him away, shouting, “Forfeit! Forfeit!” Apollo hefted Teucer, and followed them.
Ares, overwhelmed by his bloodlust, might have chased them down and pulverized them, but there was still one contender left – Dionysus hadn't tapped out of the fight. The god of revelry had evidently had an exceptional amount of it already today, because he staggered and weaved as he walked towards his older brother. Ares lashed at him with his chains, but Dionysus’s teetering, unstable movements seemed to miraculously move him out of harm’s way each time. When Dionysus got close enough – still drinking from the same bottle he’d been carrying the entire fight – Ares swung one of his massive fists at his younger brother’s head. Before the swing could connect, though, Dionysus tripped and fell. He grabbed the chain still tethered to his brother’s wrist, as if trying to catch himself, and then rolled behind Ares. The god of war threw the elbow of his other arm back to hit the god of wine, but Dionysus erratically dodged again, and looped the left arm’s chain around the right arm. Before Ares could work out what was happening, Dionysus snatched up the other chain, and wound it around his brother, thoroughly tangling him. Ares struggled against the chains, and bellowed a feral roar in Dionysus’s face. Dionysus blinked at him, and belched. The choking, noxious gas that issued forth from the hedonist’s gut finally knocked Ares flat.
Dionysus took another swig of his wine, and calmly left the arena to attend another orgy.
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