Holy fuck! Was he going to use that dagger on us?
No way. I was not okay with that.
The other initiates also widened their eyes.
If we all protested, they might stop the ritual. I scrutinized the other initiates for even a spark of rebellion. My shoulders sagged, in stark contrast to the others, who all stood tall and proud—even the four other outsiders. I’d be the only one standing up to the priest, and one voice would be easily and quickly smothered.
The priest’s piercing silver eyes sparked with lightning as they swept over us, identifying him as a descendant of Zeus. The god’s blood must be potent in him.
I sniffed. Yep, his power grade was like seven.
He fixed his flashing gaze on me a second longer than the others, and I wondered what I’d done wrong this time.
Uh, I was inhaling and judging his power. I instantly put on a blank mask. No one liked to be sniffed at, which typically implied you had an unpleasant odor or something.
The priest shifted his gaze away from me and glided a hand in the air like a conductor, as if to signal the first violinist to start the first notes. But there was no orchestra but us, the nervous bunch of initiates and the stone-faced, cold-hearted observers.
However, at his wave, an operating table of wood and steel materialized between him and us.
My throat tightened; my breath shortened.
Shit, the priest was going to get everyone to lie on the table one by one and cut them with the blade and see who could survive it.
Could I still run?
Anxiety shot through me, and I felt the urge to pee. Should I raise my hand and ask for permission to go to the bathroom first?
It might be my only chance to escape.
Just when I was about to shoot my hand up, intense wind and light twirled through the hall. Power charged the air, whipping it like living electricity. Water, too, made an appearance as humidity drenched the air, thick and heavy against my skin.
Then three giant figures materialized, each sitting upon a throne. Everyone’s attention was glued to them, and the initiates’ eyes went round with awe.
It wasn’t merely the power rolling off the demigods in spades. They were the most gorgeous beings I’d ever seen. Each of them had the kind of perfect male physique men would die to attain—and women would die for a chance to ride—and I bet the demigods didn’t even need weight training to maintain those hot vessels.
Even I felt a bit overwhelmed. Unlike the drooling initiates around me, though, my mind was too occupied with dread over the ritual to fully appreciate the demigods’ masculine beauty.
When you were worried about your own mortality, lust had to take the backseat.
My gaze found Axel first since I’d had some kind of dealings with him already. His amber eyes focused on me. He even winked at me good-naturedly as a strand of rich, brown hair dropped to his bright forehead.
I wasn’t in the mood to wink back. I’d learned the hard way that getting the attention of a demigod was never a good thing.
I tore my livid gaze from him to regard the regal demigod perched on the throne of lightning. The Demigod of Sky had deep blue eyes and cropped golden hair that made him look more like a military god than the Demigod of War. Maybe Axel didn’t like people to stereotype him, so he aimed for a casual, playboy style?
The Demigod of Sky had a red cape draped around him, and his silver and black armor highlighted every taut muscle and defined every ridge.
The lightning in his eyes was much more potent than that in the priest’s eyes.
The sky demigod looked too delicious for his own good.
Fine. Next.
My gaze drifted to the giant of a man who’d taken possession of the throne with the symbol of a trident protruding from seafoam on it.
The Demigod of the Sea.
Silver hair flowed down to his broad, armored shoulders. It looked so silky and smooth and shining that it made me wonder what kind of shampoo he’d been using. He might consider it blasphemy if I asked him about that, though.