(Recap: Why of course I can. But I thought you have figured out by now. End couldn't get the most powerful monster to do his bidding because you ride him. So he went for the second best." She said and left.
Reyna, Thalia and Annabeth looked confused but me and Skylar had pale faces. When they looked at us confused we said "The gypsican dragon. The most violent and feared of the predators in the univerese. I told you about Filos didn't I? Well just imagine a dragon almost that powerful but million times more dangerous and voracious than him. You'll get a fair idea." They nervously gupled.)

Once Nyx dissppeared, I looked back at everyone. "She was a great help, despite her nature. But the only thing we forgot to make her swear on was the truth about her so called gifts." I said, suddenly realizing how stupid we were.
"So you're just gonna throw away this wool and the pearls?" Annabeth asked me.
"I don't know. Let's take a vote. Trust her or not. We'll go with majority."
"Sounds fair. All in favour of using Nyx's gifts raise your hands, palms facing me and those not in favour raise your hands with your fists closed. Raise hands upto shoulder level everyone." Skylar announced.
The voting though, seemed unnecessary after the actual event because it turned out everyone was in favour of using those gifts. Everyone was willing to bet on Nyx if it meant no arai and a chance to escape.
"Annabeth. I thought you hated Nyx?" Reyna asked, seemingly surprised at her friend's vote.
"I still do, but the arai scare me more than her. Any chance I won't have to encounter them again and I'm grab it."Annabeth said. Reyna nodded at that logical explanation.
"Fair enough, Chase. Stormy, drop the wool and let it lead the way. Follow it, Thalia can bring up the rear, guard us from behind." Skylar said.
"Aye aye captain." I said, a bit irrirated at the use of that nickname again.
The wool suddenly started rolling. In the same direction that we'd come from.
"At least the way out is not through this scary dungeon. Let's go." I said.
The wool took turns through various places, more sulphurous and less sulphurous, dark and light, scary looking and well, more scary looking. But surprisingly we'd encountered so less monsters on our way that usually only two of us would be enough to defeat the group. Nyx had indeed helped us a lot. We'd been going on since almost about two hours, at least that's what I thought. Time is different in Tartarus. And roughly every fifteen minutes or so and there would be a small group of hippocampi or empousai or cyclops or some or the other such creatures waiting to be monster dust. This became so frequent that we began an unspoken method of fighting. One of us would hold the wool so it wouldn't go wondering and we wouldn't lose it while also making sure there was no aerial threat, two of us would watch the rear for an ambush while the remaining two would battle the monsters. We'd take turns, exchanging roles after each fight. Suddenly, the wool came to an abrupt halt and caught fire.
"Hey what's the matter? Why'd it catch fire?" Reyna asked looking at me and Skylar like we'd have an answer.
"Well I don't know, I didn't make it! Maybe we've reached where it meant to take us to so it burnt off." I speculated, confused myself.
"

Or maybe there's some kind of terrain difference here, like different air or something that made it combust." Skylar said.
"So why aren't we burning?" Thalia said.
"You sound dissappointed that we aren't." Reyna noted. Thalia just ignored that comment.
"That thing was made by Nyx herself, and even though we're calling it wool we all know it isn't exactly wool, it just looks similar. So maybe Hellfire's right and we've reached our destination, or this thing reacted with something here and caught fire." Annabeth said.
"Hey who's hellfire now?" Reyna asked confused.
"Uh.. Me? You don't remember? The fire, my palms, that sheishkebabed cage, the-"
"Oh shut it, I remember. We're just not used to people calling you hellfire. So I got a little confused." Reyna said.
"Are you really the assassin hellfire? The one whose stories we've heard?" Annabeth asked, looking at me skeptically.
"Of course I am, why you don't believe me?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"If we go by the stories we've heard, you don't look like much. No offence, of course."
"None taken. As to why I don't look or behave like hellfire, the stories you've heard would make you believe that I'm a deadly assassin, but that's my part time job. What I am in front of you and the army is mostly who I am. I act like hellfire only under two circumstances. One, when it's my job and I have a specific target and two, when I'm very angry." I explained.
"Don't worry, he doesn't have a split personality, he's usually a bit stupid." Skylar said.
"Oh we figured it out ages ago." Reyna said while all the girls chuckled.
"Hey! I thought you were on my side Sky!" I complained. She just rolled her eyes.
"Okay. Now if you girls are done chuckling and making jokes at my expense, we have a job to do." I said frowning a bit.
"So what are we supposed to do now?" Thalia asked no one in particular.
"I think I can tell the way from here. This seems like known territory." Annabeth said, scanning the area.

"Lead the way." Skylar said. Turned out she didn't have to lead much, because in a few minutes we saw a dungeon/cave like thing.
"That's it. That's where we saw the titans last time. If there's any beast or that monster everyone's so scared shitless about, it has to be in there." Annabeth said, stopping a few feet away from the entrance."
"What should we do?" Reyna said looking at me and Skylar simultaneously.
"You think we know about this beast?We know is that such a creature exists. We know it's a merciless, ruthless killer, known to painfully torture its prey and leave it to die." I said. The three girls shivered at that, but Skylar had more to add.
"And we've heard stories. Unpleasant stories. All we know is that it's a dragon from a planet called gypsia, hence the name gypsian dragon. Nobody knows exactly how it looks like except that it's a dragon because no one has survived long enough to pass that on after laying their eyes on the creature." She finished. We all shuddered nervously.
"So in a nutshell, all we know is that it's basically an ugly dangerous beast that likes to torture its victims." Annabeth said.
"That aptly sums it up." Skylar nodded.

Just then, the ground beneath us started shaking. It was difficult to maintain balance, but we managed somehow. There was a loud roar and some sort of voice, maybe caused by the beast's walking. "What's happening?" Skylar screamed. "Probably the gypsian dragon walking." I shouted back over the noise.
"Walking? This looks more like a friggin' horror movie with enhanced sound effects!" Thalia screamed.
In a few seconds, the shaking as well as the noise stopped.
"The noise came from there. That's where we're supposed to go."
I said, pointing to the area from where the voice had come. It looked sort of like a dungeon or a dark alleyway or something.
"The place looks dangerous. So yeah, that has to be where we should be headed. Let's go." Skylar said.
The dungeon was dark, but as we walked further we could see some light. It looked like the light was emanating from.. beds in front of us.
They were beds alright. And upon walking a bit further we realized the beds had what you could call a demigod's nightmare. Each bed for one titan. And the light came from withing them, signalling tartarus was indeed helping them in their rebirth process.

Just then we heard a growl from behind us. When we turned around we saw the infamous 'beast' that we were supposed to drfeat, and everyone had different expressions. Thalia may have seen many monsters as a hunter, but standing there with her mouth agape I could tell she'd be seen nothing that could rival this. Annabeth was taking stock of the situation and so were me and Skylar, but Reyna seemed lost in staring at the dragon in horrid fascination. The beast that stood in front of us was a 10 feet scaly dragon. It's arms were at least 4 feet, and he had scales all over his body that glowed. I didn't understand the glow, but when Skylar's expressions landed there, she turned mild pale and muttered "shit". The dragon's expressions looked voracious and demeanor extremely hostile. It had what looked like a celestial bronze spear, at least 13 feet long. Yeah, his spear was longer than he was. The gypsian dragon, I gulped nervously. Even with five of us, this was gonna be heck of a fight if we didn't use caution and let our guard down.

While we were busy assessing the dragon, it was growing grumpier and less patient by the minute. I could see it tense a bit, and I realized it was gonna pounce soon enough in the direction where thalia stood.
"Thalia brace yourself or get outta there!" I shouted desperately.
Thalia decided to roll and dodge rather than block. She was almost on time. On time because she did manage to get out of harm's way in time, almost because the dragon got a hit at her leg in the process.
"Ahh." She winced in pain and lost her balance. Skylar got there just in time to catch her before she fell down and hit her head. She steadied Thalia and said to all of us "Avoid those scales at all costs. No time to explain further. This is gonna be a seriously difficult fight, be at your best." So that's why she looked pale. The temporal steel scales. The dragon attacked again, this time it chose Skylar as it's target. But she was firm in her defense. She deflected the attack and even tried for a counter. She deflected the spear and proceeded to slash across the dragon's legs, but it proved to be too fast for something so gigantic. It not only dodged that slash it kicked Skylar square in the chest and sent her reeling back and hitting the wall.
"Skylar!" I screamed and rushed to her side.
"Sky. Are you alright?" I asked.
"I'm fine, just a bit dazed. Go help them. I'll be fine. Join you in a few." She groaned. Her head was bleeding from the impact with the wall, but she was an immortal so such wounds would heal fast. Meanwhile the three remaining girls with Thalia recovered after a dose of ambrosia and nectar were fighting off the dragon, but it looked more like it was toying with them. Just a few minutes in the battle and they were already pushed on the defensive. They'd already received cuts here and there, but fortunately nothing major. I charged along with them. Momentarily my surprise attack had us at an advantageous position, but it was all lost too soon as the dragon was pretty fast and adaptive. Soon enough we were all on the defensive. It was the same all over again when Skylar joined the fight on recovering. We were all pushed to defending. Duck, roll, parry, try to attack and brace yourself for a powerful counter attack.
We were all experienced or born leaders here. Reyna a preator, Annabeth the unspoken leader of the camp and leader of multiple quests, Thalia the lieutenant of Artemis, me the commander of so many armies and Skylar a born leader of the universe. So it didn't take us all long enough to figure out what we needed to do. As hard as the decision was, I voiced it loudly "We need a plan or we won't make it. Retreat to the entrance from where we came!" Everyone was reluctant to back off, but eventually we started backing off realizing there wasn't really much of a choice. The creature was toying with us. We'd suffered multiple cuts and bruises merely trying to defend ourselves, while the dragon was just enjoying. That's what it's plan was. Cut us and bruise us beyond repair, then leave us to die. But it realized we were trying to get back off and it came a bit harder on us.
"Wise decision, given the circumstances. Keep backing off a few more feet and that low ceiling behind us won't allow this huge creature to pass through. Let's keep going." Skylar said. Just as she finished speaking, and just as we almost reached the low ceiling to escape the dragon, it realized our escape attempt would be a success and made a last desperate swipe at us with its scaly long arms. Directly at Skylar, who was looking behind her to make sure we were alright. If the scales managed to hit her it could cause some major damage, might even prove fatal. So my brain made a split second decision. Within the moment I grabbed Sky with my left hand, took out riptide with my right and got in between her and the dragon, pushing her behind me. I tried to block the attack with my sword, but the power of the beast proved too much for me to handle. The sword slipped out of my hand and its scales left a huge slash on my stomach. It was painful, but the worrying part came when I took a look at it. The wounded area, instead of beginning to heal like it usually does, was becoming green. "Goddamn stupid invincible dragon and those bloody temporal steel scales." I thought, trying hard not to wince. Meanwhile Skylar had dramatically screamed "Hellfire!" and rushed to help me, pulling me behind before I could be attacked again. In an impressive show of strength, she hoisted me up on her shoulders and sprinted with me out of harm's way while the other girls got the dragon preoccupied. One by one even they managed to evade all the attacks and come out. Once out of that dungeon, Skylar started examining my wound, turning pale on seeing the colour. "Holy Hemera. This looks bad. Maybe it'll take a lot of time to heal." She said, with a concern laced tone, while the other girls simply nodded like bobble heads, not knowing what to do or say. Annabeth seemed irritated. Of course she would be, she hated not knowing. "Those scales got me Sky. We can only wait for the wound to automatically start healing. Then perhaps we can fathom how long till I'm fine." Her eyes widened and her lips parted once she realized the reason for the green colour.
"No. No no no. What did you do. WHAT DID YOU DO!" She exclaimed almost in tears.
"C'mon Sky, don't worry, it'll be alright I'm sure. Besides, I didn't do anything wrong. You'd have done the same for me."
"But you knew it was the scales! It's a freakin' fatal blow!"
"Wait what? Fatal? I thought he was immortal?! " Reyna said with worry evident in her voice, while Thalia and Annabeth had similar expressions.
"No, only I'm fully immortal. He is only partly immortal and can die in battles like you all. But it doesn't matter, since he got hit by those scales. They're made of temporal steel, a metal that can be deadly to even immortals." Skylar explained.
The girls just stared at her numb, maybe waiting for her to say it was a joke. But no such relief came.
"What do we do now. Is there a medicine or something for this metal's injury?" Annabeth asked.
"No there isn't. The only way is through sheer will. But it's possible. Our ex commander Omega, he was in a similar situation, but he survived. It depends from person to person." Skylar spoke softly, trying hard not to sob.
"What can we do to help?" Reyna asked with genuine worry.
"No one except him can do anything Reyna. All we can do is wait and watch." She said gloomily.
A tear trickled down her cheek. It took some effort, but I raised my hand a bit and wiped that tear off her cheek, brushing her cheek in affection at the same time.
"It's gonna be okay Sky. Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere." I croaked. That was a mistake. Once she heard my voice and the pain in it, she started openly crying. I'd never seen Sky have such emotion, or show so much vulnerability. It touched me that she felt so much for me. I was in pain, but somehow seeing her that way was more painful. And knowing that I was helpless to stop it more so so. But unfortunately all I could do was try and console her, which wasn't exactly an advisable idea if you had a chance of dying soon. Meanwhile even Thalia, Reyna and Annabeth had very concerned expressions. I realized how true they were when they said they'd blindly trusted me. That was unfair. So I decided to make it fair. I looked at Skylar.
"You want to tell them." She stated, not needing me to tell her anything.
"I think it's time. I've kept it long enough. Sometime it has to come out, so better I say it while I'm alive. We don't know what's gonna happen to me in a few hours. " I croaked.
"Don't you dare say that. Nothing's gonna happen to you. But if that's what you want, go ahead." She said. She silently got up and motioned for the three girls to come forward while she stood back.
I inhaled the poisonous tartarus air and braced myself for what I was about to say.
"Thalia, Reyna, Annabeth. I know I should've told you this a long time ago, but I wasn't ready then, and I'm sorry for that. But now I am."
"What are you talking about?" Annabeth asked confused.
"This." I said and pulled off my mask.

(A/N: PLEASE COMMENT AND VOTE, CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM IS APPRECIATED.)