"So you really believe you stand a chance Coral head?" Artemis asked, genuinely curious at what the boy believed.

"Sure I'll give it a go, probably won't win, but you never know Bambi." Percy replied light heartedly bumping his shoulder into the lunar goddess as they entered the arena. The goddess merely rolled her eyes at her friend.
To an outsider it would be an odd sight seeing the maiden goddess joking around with the hero of Olympus, but then again most people didn't know how they were friends. After the whole Atlas incident Percy had many encounters with the hunt, earning him enough trust to lead them against Kronos in the battle of Manhattan. Since then they grew closer as they saw each other whenever the hunt stopped by at camp or they ran into one another while Percy was on a quest, sometimes literally.

As the two entered the arena silence encompassed the place before it was abruptly broken by the pound of feet was heard as the occupants scrambled out of the arena. Artemis turned and raised an eyebrow at Percy who simply shrugged not knowing what happened to them. In truth they were terrified from earlier events, having seen what the bane of monsters did to poor Karl this morning, and well Artemis just added to that. Not to mention it was time for capture the flag

"Well that was unexpected, yet useful." The demigod stated bluntly as he surveyed the arena's condition. All it was was a large circular pit in the ground with plain stone walls covered with indentations and cuts from the thousands of fights it had seen over the years. Along the edges were an assortment of wooden racks covered in every weapon, armour, training dummies and wooden barriers which could be used to make an obstacle course. The centre had been cleared for a lesson with a couple of water bottles having been forgotten in the rushed exit along with a few odd pieces of fruit round edge.

"So how do you want to do this, Perseus? All out or skills only, or do I need to tie my hands behind my back to give you a chance?" The goddess taunted as she summoned in her silver recurve bow along with a quiver and a couple of hunting knives to her belt.

"Why not skills only, mi'lady? We don't want you getting washed away too quickly do we?" The demigod retorted uncapping riptide and activating the shield his brother had given him. The shield had been reinforced with imperial gold over the years so it would take a bit more than a few manticore spikes to dent it. He also had a knife stored on the back of his belt just in case.

"Whatever makes you sleep at night." Was all that the huntress responded with as she got into position. The son of the sea did the same on the opposite side as they both began circling one another, each analysing the other for a single sight of weakness in their defence. In the distance the conch horn sounded giving the unofficial signal to begin.

Immediately the demigod began to rush the archer, shield raised and without his heavy armor to slow progress, he got halfway before being stopped by an onslaught of arrows ricocheting off the shield into the arena around him. The demigod had planned to rush the goddess to disable her bow before it became of any use knowing he would be trapped if he didn't. Proving his theory, the goddess stood strong firing off arrows faster than a machine gun with no sign of running out of arrows from her limitless quiver, unfazed by the repetitive strain of loading the bow due to her divine status as one of the twin archers.

The goddess frowned seeing her barrage was useless against the shield as the demigod had taken to kneeling down in order to be completely covered by the shield, which was now plastered with scratches from the deflection of godly arrows but was still able to hold strong. Smirking, the goddess continued the shower of silver while creeping towards the fortified position of the demigod slowly gaining speed until she was sprinting towards the kneeling demigod firing the occasional arrow in hope of breaking the defence. However the demigod's defence held true, bronze shiny in defiance.

Risking a glance above the safety of his shield, Percy saw the rapidly approaching goddess and immediately saw the opportunity he had been waiting for. Tilting his shield slightly to the right the demigod managed to reflect the glaring midafternoon sun straight into the goddesses eyes momentarily blinding her before she tilted her head out of the way. However that was all he needed as Percy launched himself forwards bringing his shield in an upward arc towards the unprepared goddess.

Caught off guard by the unorthodox move, all Artemis had time to do was drop her bow and brace as her momentum sent her barreling into the shield. As expected the demigod's stance was strong and the goddess was inevitably flung across the arena, getting some good airtime while doing so.  During this brief period the huntress simultaneously repositioned herself so she would land on her feet like a cat while unsheathing her knives so when she landed she was already for any incoming attacks. Although unlike the goddess Percy wasn't taking any unnecessary risks knowing how outmatched he was in terms of skill. He knew that while Ares probably didn't actually train so was easy to defeat and when he fought Hades he had the curse of Achilles so was basically undefeatable now he was fighting a true warrior. The goddess before him had trained continuously throughout her thousands of years of existence so he knew he was way out of his depth. So when he got the opportunity to, as the goddess reorientated herself midair, Percy quickly sliced through the bow sting to disable the weapon from later use. Even though the goddess could easily summon another in, good sportsmanship would dictate that unfair.

Focusing back on the battle the two circled each other eyeing one another for any weaknesses in the others defence. While doing this Artemis took the time to pop her jaw back into place after having been dislocated from being thrown across the arena. "Nice hit reef skull, might actually have to pay attention to put you in your place, boy." Artemis commented wincing slightly as she regained movement in her jaw.

"Why were you distracted by something you liked before, girl?" Percy teased back, secretly quite proud to actually challenge the goddess even slightly.

As expected this riled the goddess up, though unexpectedly she gained a slightly animalistic smirk before launching herself like a panther at the seasoned demigod. Anticipating this sort of reaction the demigod had already begun raising his shield to catch the incoming blow. Unfortunately, the demigod had not accounted for the godly strength behind the blow causing the half-blood to fall to one knee and grit his teeth under the force strike. Two fresh scratch marks now lay on the bare bronze surface, the arm underneath would surely feel the attack in the coming morning.

However Percy had no time to recover as the goddess of the hunt had began a deadly barrage of rapid slashes forcing the son of the sea to retreat while parrying or deflecting the strikes away. After quickly regaining his balance the demigod growled behind his shield before using his superior body mass to shove the shield through the incoming slash from the goddess, connecting with her body and causing her to stumble backwards before she was forced to retreat under Percy's incoming flurry of attacks. While these were not as fast as the goddess's they were just as precise with far more power behind which meant the goddess could only parry or evade in fear of being disarmed due to the sheer power of the stroke.

And so the duel continued with Artemis holding the superior speed and skills, light on her feet easily weeping around Percy's strikes trying to breach his superior defence. Though for what the demigod lakes in speed he made up for in the advantage of range and power given by the sword over the knives, coupled with the protection of the shield the pair found themselves at a standstill both masters of the blade, neither willing to give in. Like the tides and moon regularly going back and forth the two continued to fight neither gaining a major injury on the other as they took turns trying to break one another's defence. This was not to say they got off without injury, no both were worse for wear. The demigod had a slight trickle of blood flowing from the edge of his mouth due to a cross the huntress had disguised as a slash, as well as having the complete left side of his body go numb from the repetitive hits of the knives and overused shoulder barge. Artemis however was bleeding profusely from her right thigh due to a particularly nasty slash she received from riptide, as well as a broken nose received courtesy of one of the many shoulder barges from that damn shield. Both however were also littered with smaller surface cuts and bruises causing their clothing to be no more than rags of their previous outfits.

Although like all good things they must come to an end. Inevitably the son of the sea began to tire simply unable to compete with Artemis's godly stamina meaning when receiving a particularly heavy blow from the goddess he didn't quite tilt the shield to the correct angle for a deflection. Seeing this the Olympian smirked sinisterly as she put all of her godly strength behind the incoming blow, turning it from a quick downward slash into a heavy stab.

A deafening crunch could be heard as the structural integrity of the shield gave in under the force of the knife, allowing the blade to pass through the metal and a good inch into the flesh below. Crying out in pain, the demigod made a desperate slash downwards with riptide in order to deter the huntress. Unfortunately for the son of the sea however the huntress was still holding her knife as she ripped it out trying to retain her blade. This didn't go entirely to plan however for either party. The knife, firmly lodged in the metal of the shield, escaped the goddess's grasp who had not expected resistance, causing her to lose balance and fall onto her already injured leg, spraining the ankle in the process. The demigod however was far worse off, the attempted retrieval of the hunting knife had not only left him with a nasty gash in the bicep but also the force behind the tug was enough to trip his arm from his shoulder leaving it dislocated, hanging loosely from his side, shield slipping from his grasp clanging against the arena floor as it leaves the heroes side. Both fighters simultaneously release a cry of agony receiving their injuries.

Stepping back from the downed goddess Percy took a few moments to get over the shock and once again assess the damage. Realising what needed to be done Percy gripped his shoulder, steeling his nerves for what was to come. With a sickening pop the demigod gritted his teeth as he jerked his appendage back into its correct position before returning his attention to the goddess, who had used the time to draw her auxiliary while regaining her footing, though having to hobble quite a bit.

"Ready to give in yet Perseus? We wouldn't want you to get hurt would we?" Artemis teased, with an ear splitting grin on her face obviously enjoying herself despite the injuries she had received due to the duel. With an identical grin Percy retorted sarcastically.
"Tis but a scratch,"

Both warriors looked slightly crazed, grinning maniacally, blood oozing out of the many injuries they had both received, cackling at each other's appearance. Readying themselves once more, the huntress and the hero slowly circled, barely a metre between them, ready to fight till their last.

His ADHD getting the better of him, Perseus lurched forward bringing down a powerful strike which required both knives to block. Grunting slightly at the shock it sent through her body, disturbing her injured leg, the goddess's defence held true before she managed to push the larger sword off and restart her assault and thus their deadly dance continued.

However this time it did not last so long. Even with the advantages of power, range and speed, inevitably the demigod began to tire and while his strikes were still fluid they lacked enough force to be considered to be considered a threat to the goddess of the hunt. Seeing her opponents fatigue Artemis took the opportunity to execute one of her favourite tricks, taking Percy's incoming stab by maneuvering to the side while simultaneously running her blades along both sides of the blade before quickly jerking the blades in opposite directions. This resulted in Riptide being brutally yanked from the shocked demigods hand, clearly not expecting the complex maneuver, leaving him weaponless as his sword clanged down on the arena floor a few metres away. Of course it would return to his pockets momentarily but just as Artemis couldn't summon another bow he would now have to fight without his trusty sword.

"You did much better than I anticipated young Perseus, but alas not good enough, hmm." The goddess teased while casually pointing a knife towards the demigod, clearly expecting him to yield due to the lack of weaponry and exhaustion. However, Percy merely gave a lopsided smirk to the goddess as he retained his crouched stance.

"While I thank you for your compliments Milady, but you know what they say, 'It's not all over-" The hero began before leaping into the air with an extraordinary amount of grace for a supposedly fatigued demigod, "-till the fat lady sings." The hero finished while performing a perfectly executed tornado kick. For Artemis the world seemed to freeze as she could only watch as the hero's boot stuck her outstretched hand causing the blade in it to fly across the arena before sticking hilt deep into an unsuspecting dummies heart. Being so distracted by the first kick she failed to notice the far more dangerous incoming second boot which connected with her square in the chest, sending her flying once again across the room with her breath knocked out of her.

The demigod landed nimbly on the balls of his feet crouched and ready for another attack, while Artemis crashed to the ground like a rag doll skidding slightly before coming to a halt a couple of metres away. However, unlike what the demigod had expected, the goddess did not rise again instead favouring her prone position on the floor. Instantly suspicious of what the goddess had planned, knowing full well that the kick was not what had caused the famed huntress to stop, Percy gradually inched forward ready to draw the auxiliary knife, which was still in the back of his belt, at a moment's notice.

Faking injury, Artemis took her time to analyse her options knowing that her opponent would fight until he falls to exhaustion before giving in easily, and that according to his previous display of grace was quite some way off yet. Noticing she had landed in a pile of fruit from the earlier class, Well if that's how you want to play this, Perseus... Artemis though as she silently wrapped her fingers round a nearby apple, knowing that her body would hide the action from the approaching demigod. She had also seen a bottle of water which she could have grabbed but figured it would be counter productive to use that in the spar.

Waiting until he was only a couple of feet away, Artemis suddenly flung the apple towards Percy which he instinctively caught thinking it was a weapon of some kind. However, while he took a moment to examine the fruit the son of the Sea momentarily let his guard down. Ceasing her opportunity Artemis leapt up from her prone position, tackling the distracted demigod to the floor. The lunar goddess smirked upon hearing the gasp of surprise emitted from the hero as he realised too late what was happening.

The instant the pair hit the ground Artemis used her spare hand to pin Percy's good hand to the floor, even though it was still numb from the kick. Her hips straddled his locking them in place preventing any movement. Unfortunately, due to this the huntress found that her chest was pressed right up against the hero's in order to pin both arm and legs. Percy groaned under the goddess due to the sudden impact on the ground jolting his many injuries in a less than comfortable way, not to mention the fact he also had a goddess on him. Artemis smirked down at the demigod below her bringing her knife to rest on top of his throat, once again signalling that he should yield to her. Unable to resist the urge to tease the boy beneath her she retorted, "Nice kick Coral breath, didn't see that one coming. Though you should really know by now that you're not the only one with tricks up their sleeves, it might help you avoid getting into positions like this. Hmm?"

"Touché, though I never took you for a trickster, Bambi. But to be honest I'm not particularly complaining about the positioning." Percy responded in a teasing tone, casually flirting with the deity currently residing on his chest. The desired effect occurred as planned though as the goddess flared up in a luminous golden blush, looking away to try and hide it. Seizing his opening, Percy slammed his knee into the goddesses wounded thigh causing her to gasp from the sudden acute pain while the son of the sea once again used her distracted state to his advantage as he broke free from her grasp and quickly shoved the goddess off using his injured arm to quickly whip out his knife from its sheath at last, albeit with a great deal of pain.

However the huntress wasn't so easily escaped from. Using her good leg, Artemis kicked out the recovering demigods legs causing him to fall back to the ground with an unceremonious thump. She then once again lurched forward in hopes of pinning the slippery demigod properly this time.

Unfortunately, the demigod was expecting this. Rolling towards the leaping goddess he passed clean under the huntress causing her to crash into the stone floor. Before she had the goddess had time to recover the demigod jumped on top of her, grappling to get a pin on the famed huntress. With his legs straddling the goddess's thighs in order to keep them in place Percy had to lean right over the goddess in order to use his good hand to pin Artemis's unarmed hand above her head while he used his injured one to rest his blade at the goddess's neck.

"Well as fun as this was, Doe face, like all good things it must come to an end. Don't you agree?" The hero commented with a smirk, obviously expecting the goddess to yield. However, the huntress was not quite done. Smiling sweetly up at the man above her she locked eyes with him as she tapped the back of his neck with her last knife, which she had managed to sneak around Percy's guard, signalling a fatal blow withdrawn.

"Alas, it must. You did well, for a boy." Artemis replied jokingly, though it was clear she was impressed with his handy work despite her joke. Smiling down at her Percy chuckled at her antics clearly unfazed by the potentially fatal position he was currently in. "Draw?"

"Yeah I think that's about right." He commented casually, despite being unable to move from the knife sticking into the back of his neck. A comfortable silence settled over them as they lay on the ground together, knives still pointed at each other though neither particularly minded if they were being perfectly honest. The world seemed to fade into nothing as the two lay on the cool area floor, unsure of what to do next as they stared into one another's eyes.

Fortunately, however, that problem was soon dealt with as the slow sound of applause broke them out of their daze causing their heads to snap toward the origin of the noise, clearly unaware that there had been spectators present. In truth though, the capture the flag game had ended over an hour ago with camp receiving yet another gruelling defeat to the superior skill of the hunters, despite camp numbers being at an all time high this summer. After the match had finished and the apollo cabin had finished patching up the numerous injuries that the campers had suffered everyone decided to check on how their respective leaders were doing, though no one had expected to see, however, the saviour of Olympus leaning over the maiden goddess in an arena covered with blood both red and gold in what would have been considered a lover like position only if not for the deadly weapons at each others necks.

"Most impressive work, my boy. I don't think I have ever in all my years as a trainer of heroes seen Lady Artemis fought to a stand still." Chiron announced smiling proudly at the son of Poseidon, slowly clapping as he trotted towards the pair. Seeing the crowd that had gathered Percy figured it might be a good idea to remove himself from on top of the huntress, rolling to the side and onto his feet. Offering a hand out to the downed goddess with his signature smirk. The goddess merely smirked back in response before performing a kick up, landing gracefully on her good foot perfectly balanced. "Though you might need to stitch that little scratch up yourself, I don't think Will is in the best of moods with you after what you did to Karl earlier." The centaur commented casually as he picked up the broken shield in passing before stopping in front of the duo.

The demigod merely shrugged in response as he summoned all the water from the numerous bottles scattered around the edge of the arena to him, instantly cleaning away all traces of blood from his body though it did nothing to the stains his shredded cloths held. The other advantage was as the water was absorbed into his body the numerous cuts he received stopped bleeding and thinned down to nothing more than thin red lines accompanying the far more numerous white ones which littered his body. However, it did little more than stem the bleeding and numb the pain in his left arm which still had a deep slash in it running from the top of his shoulder down through the majority of the trident burnt into his arm and bisecting the SPQR tattoo. Unfortunately, the knife had been serrated so the cut wasn't the cleanest, having taken a large portion of flesh with it. Frowning Percy further inspected his recently relocated arm, confused why it had started to leak blood again. Chiron two was confused not seeing why the water had not done the job it usually did but Artemis just grinned knowingly, before mentioning, "You do know that my knives will cause a wound to bleed continuously for some days before it can be healed, quite useful for tracking down inured prey you know."

"Great." The demigod groaned as he reached out and took the busted shield from the centaurs outstretched hand, inspecting the damage the knife had done, noting it was still embedded in the metal. "Dad is going to be pissed about the tattoo being ruined."

"Eh, he will have to get over it." The Olympian commented clearly not giving a damn about her fellow council members annoyance. Waving her hand summoning her bow to her back and returning her knives back to their respective sheaths however the one in the demigods shield remained trapped by the divine metal. Seeing the problem Percy grabbed the handle of the embedded knife before delivering a swift kick to the shield freeing the knife and sending the circular lump of metal crashing to the ground. Flipping it round a couple of times to get a feel of it before passing the knife back to its rightful owner, who returned it to its place on her hip. "But seriously Perseus, I'm impressed. It has been a long time since I've had a worthy opponent to fight against."

"Thank you, mi'lady." Percy replied respectfully, aware of the crowd surrounding them. Secretly he was quite proud of being able to reach a standstill with the huntress before him, expecting to have been defeated much sooner.
However what happened next surprised everyone present, especially the older hunters.

Reaching down to her waste Artemis removed the knives, still in sheaths, from her hips and presented them to the demigod before her.
Never before Artemis ever physically rewarded a hero before, especially a male. And yet here she was presenting her own personal knives to one, the same knives that had slain countless monsters and mortals alike, the same knives she slew Orion with, the same knives that had castrated a male homosapien not 24 hours before. The elder huntresses knew how important they were to her, many believing they only left her side when bathing. Despite all this she was giving them to the saviour of Olympus as a token of her respect, rejecting such a gift would not bode well. "As a reminder of or duel I would like to give you my blades. Never before has one been able to disarm them from me in single combat, and thus I believe they deserve to be with the one who did so. Don't you think?"

To say Percy was shocked would be an understatement of the highest magnitude. A display of respect of this level truly humbled the demigod rendering him speechless much like the rest of the audience. Knowing trying to deny such a gift would be massively disrespectful to his favourite goddess, Percy sheathed his current knife and gingerly reached out taking the knives from the goddess, wincing slightly in doing so from the strain on his injury. Already well aware of the design of the sacred blades he immediately attached them to the correct placement on his belt. Regaining his voice Percy managed to competently respond to the deity, "It would be an honour Lady Artemis. I only wish there was some way I could repay you."

Artemis nodded at his response with a gentle smile on her face, knowing her favoured blades were going to a good home. Now she knew that she had every right to ask for something as precious as Percy's blade riptide in return but she would not for two reasons: first that would be as outrageous as demanding a gods symbol of power in return so while he would most likely go ahead with it she risked losing their friendship over such a menial thing, second and more importantly it would be going against her former lieutenants parting wishes which was something she would never do. Instead she set her eyes on something far less valuable but something she truly wanted. "There is no need for that Perseus, you have more than earnt the right to wield them. However if you really want to repay me, let me keep your shield."

This caused the demigod to look at her incredulously, not believing what she had just said. "You want... that?" the demigod questioned, nodding to the broken lump of bronze.

Artemis just hummed in response while whipping away the dried ichor from her upper lip which came from her broken nose which the shield was responsible for. "I like to keep mementos from my hunts." was all that she gave as an answer.

"If you're sure..." the demigod responded hesitantly, kicking the shield up to his hand before handing it over to the goddess, not bothering to clean it believing she would prefer it as is.

Flashing the shield away after a brief inspection, the goddess returned her attention to the man before her. However she was interrupted by a rumble of thunder, the tell tale sign of another council meeting. Sighing Artemis smiled at the demigod. "Well as lovely as this is, I must go. Duty calls" the lunar deity commented to the hero before turning to her hunters, "Girls, we will be staying here tonight so try not to damage the campers too much."

The huntresses snickered at this, already plotting what they could do without their mistress around to stop them, strolling over to their cabin to prepare. Seeing this the campers bolted out of the arena once more to lock away all valuable possessions from the hunters pranks. The old centaur sighed and galloped after them to make sure the medical supplies wouldn't run out any time soon, leaving the pair once again alone in the arena.

"Well until next time fish boy," the goddess said preparing to flash to the throne room, though the demigod had one last trick up his none existent sleeves.

"Bambi!" he yelled, getting her attention before immediately tossing the same apple which she threw to him less than half an hour earlier. "Think fast."

Catching the incoming fruit with grace the goddess chuckled as she took a bite while going into her divine form forcing the demigod to look away. Soon after he found himself in a deserted arena in what were basically bloody rags at this point in an equally bloody arena, surrounded by broken bottles, dummies and an assortment of fruit and weapons. Chuckling to himself Percy jogged out of the arena on his way to the infirmary to raid it of a sling and a needle work set, as well as the opportunity to wind up the resident heracles spawn some more. Which left the bloody arena for the cleaning harpies to deal with later.