Eleni's Quest (Peplum Muscle), part 3

It didn’t take Eleni long to reach the Anatolian coast. When she reached the shore she started running at high speed. Only after a while she realized she had no idea where she should go. She stopped, and jumped into the air. She was delighted to find that she could jump very high now, about ten times her own height. When she landed, she sank into the ground up to her knees. She jumped again and looked into another direction. Far in the distance she spotted a group of houses.

She ran towards them and arrived only moments later. A man shook his head in disbelief as the muscular woman seemed to appear out of nothing. ‘Tell me where I can the nearest Persian army camp!’ she demanded.

‘You are Greek, aren’t you? I won’t tell you anything!’

‘Ah, you don’t seem to understand,’ she said with a smile. ‘Is this yours?’ She pointed to simple house with clay walls behind him. The man nodded. While she kept smiling at him, she marched right through the wall. To Eleni it felt like she just stepped through a curtain of papyrus. She kept on walking and also destroyed the wall in the back. The house collapsed. She flashed back to the front and lifted the man high into the air.

‘I hope you understand now!’ she shouted. ‘If you don’t tell me, I will destroy this whole place and believe me, it won’t be difficult for me at all!’

The man shook uncontrollably. ‘Please don’t hurt me,’ he cried. ‘Please! I will tell you anything you want!’

‘That’s better,’ Eleni said, and she put him back down.

He dropped to his knees, but she didn’t mind. He pointed into the distance. ‘Up there, in the mountains, is an army fortress.’

She rushed away. Very soon, she found herself in the hills, with bigger mountains in the distance. Several streams and rivers were in her way, but she simply jumped across them. ‘I just love how strong my legs are now. Running and jumping is completely effortless! I can’t wait to destroy those weak soldiers, and become even stronger!’

She looked down at her peplos and her arms, which were covered with the dust of the clay walls. She sighed. ‘The disadvantage of being so strong, is that I get dirty all the time.’ After some more running, she discovered a pool that was surrounded by high trees, so she stopped to clean her peplos once more. ‘Maybe I should find some other clothing which doesn’t get dirty so quickly. Then I could spend my time on more exciting things. Like showing off my strength.’

She laid the wet peplos on a big stone, so it could dry in the sun, and took a bath. Her head was the only part of her body that was above the surface. She ran her hands over her herculean muscles, and enjoyed their size and hardness. She closed her eyes and loudly moaned. ‘Oh, touching myself feels so good!’

‘Yes, I can imagine that touching a pretty woman like you could be exciting,’ a voice said.

Eleni squeaked and quickly turned around. A man was sitting beside the pool, watching her with a smile on his face. His upper body was bare, showing an impressive chest. He noticed what she was looking at, and flexed his pecs. They were big, bigger than those of any man she’d ever seen - but they were no match for the monstrous slabs of muscle Eleni owned.

‘Maybe you would like to touch something else for a change?’ He winked at her.

Eleni blushed. ‘Oh no, I can’t do that. I am married to Mikkos.’

The man looked turned his head. ‘There seems to be no one around. So why don’t we have some fun together? I promise I won’t tell anyone.’

‘No,’ she said, and she turned away from him.

‘Come on! I know you are attracted to me. I saw how you looked at me. I guess your husband isn’t nearly as handsome as I am.’

‘Yes he is!’

‘But he can’t be as strong and powerful as I am!’

She turned around again and looked at him with hungry eyes. ‘Are you? Strong and powerful, I mean?’

He stood up and flexed his biceps for her. Eleni had seen some very muscular rowers on the trireme, but this mysterious man easily surpassed them. She licked her lips at the thought of adding his strength to hers. ‘Ah, now I’ve got you!’ he said. ‘You like strong men, don’t you?’

‘I do. The stronger, the better!’

His biceps seemed to swell as his confidence increased. ‘Well, as you can see I am bigger and stronger than ordinary men. And you know what?’

She raised an eyebrow.

‘Can you keep a secret?’ he whispered. Eleni nodded.

‘I am not an ordinary man. I am a god.’

Eleni put her hands to her mouth. ‘What?’

The man beamed at her. ‘That’s right. I am Lips, the god of the southwest wind.’ He grew bigger still, his muscles bulging with unnatural strength.

‘Ooh! So you mean you have godlike powers?’

Lips thrust out his chest. His back was growing wider before her eyes. ‘Sure! I have the physical strength of about ten mortals. And I can command the winds.’ He pointed at the line of trees around the pool. ‘Do you see those trees? I can uproot them with just the power of my lungs!’ His chest kept on expanding.

Eleni thought about this for a moment. ‘Oh. Is that all?’

The god looked at her in confusion and he quickly shrank to the size of a mortal. ‘What? What do you mean?’

‘Well, uprooting trees isn’t really a big deal, isn’t it? I guess even I could do that. It doesn’t sound very difficult.’

Lips stared at her. ‘Woman, I’ll forgive you, because you obviously don’t know what you are talking about. It requires immense strength to uproot a tree. Only gods are capable of doing that!’

She looked at him with big, innocent eyes. ‘Oh really? So you mean that if a girl like me tries, nothing will happen?.’

He laughed out loud. ‘Yes, please try it. And if you fail, maybe we could do some touching? Then you can experience what an immensely strong man feels like!’

‘And if I succeed, I can have whatever I want?’

He smiled at her, his confidence restored. ‘Yes, sure.’

‘Okay. Now please turn around, I’m getting out of the water to put my peplos back on.’

The god obeyed. ‘I promise you that when we are touching each other, you will soon be so hot that you’ll take it off again!’

Eleni quickly wrapped the peplos around her massive body. She ran towards a tree and hid behind it. That was not so easy, because her upper body had become incredibly wide. She put her forehead against the tree. What had she done? Everybody always said you should never gamble with the gods. She had no idea if she was strong enough to tear a tree out of the ground. Would the strength of two hundred men be sufficient?

She took several deep breaths and calmed down. She peeked around the tree. ‘I’m ready!’

Lips turned around and came closer. ‘Why are you hiding behind that tree? I’d like to see your body. I guess it looks as gorgeous as your face does.’

She giggled. ‘Please be patient. You might be surprised!’

‘O, I just love surprises!’

‘Okay,’ Eleni said, and she wrapped her bare arms around the tree.

Lips’ jaw dropped. ‘Wh...What?’ He stared in shock as Eleni’s arms expanded to freakish dimensions. Each pumpkin-sized biceps was covered in dozens of snake-like veins, some of them thicker than his fingers. His gaze followed the thick vein that capped her biceps as it ran up to her shoulder, growing thicker and thicker before it vanished behind the tree. He returned his gaze to her powerful forearms, bulging with strength, seemingly eager to dig into the tree. Lips felt like a small boy next to Eleni’s man-shaming body. And she wasn’t even flexing yet. ‘You… How…’

Eleni didn’t pay attention to the babbling god and concentrated on the tree. She was glad her back had become so wide she could completely embrace the tree. Her chest, her biceps, her forearms and hands all pressed against the bark. She slowly increased the pressure. She could feel her upper body swell as she willed her muscles to grow bigger, harder, even more inhuman than they were a moment ago. The muscles on her forearms became incredibly defined.

Eleni’s hands looked strong enough to crush rock, but even they couldn’t prepare Lips for the onslaught of muscle he was about to witness. Her forearms were as big as an ordinary man’s thigh, only infinitely more muscular. Further up, her biceps were expanding rapidly. Each was an insane orgy of muscle and veins threatening to burst through her skin. The split between each hyper-developed head was so deep it looked like two mountain peaks. As Eleni held her flex the twin beasts rushed towards each other, the wood in between powerless to stop them. She closed her eyes and smiled. The huge tree was sliced in two like it was made of soft clay and fell down. Eleni was left standing empty-handed, flexing for all she got. Once she came out of her muscle-induced trance she found that most of her field of view was taken up by muscles and veins. Her godlike flex caused her pecs to swell up to her chin, her traps pressing against her ears. Eleni’s peplos was stretched drum-tight over her incredible upper body.

She looked up at the suddenly very small god. ‘Oops. I guess I have to be a bit more careful.’ Lips had to sit down. He was in shock.

She walked on to the next tree and bent her knees a bit. Once again, she wrapped her arms around it, but this time she was careful not to apply too much pressure. She stood up straight and pulled the tree right out of the ground. She laughed. ‘That was easy! I am even stronger than I thought I was!’ She put the tree over her thigh and it snapped like a dry twig.

She tossed the remains of the tree away and turned to the god. ‘See? That was even easier than I thought it would be.’

‘Who… who are you?’

‘Oh, I’m just an ordinary girl with tremendous muscles. And you owe me something, you know.’

‘What do you want from me?’

Eleni closed her eyes as she received his powers. ‘Aah. I think I’ve already got it. Thank you.’ She smiled at him. ‘Now, if you excuse me? I have something to do. Maybe you can find someone else to impress with your muscles.’

She continued her journey, and quickly found the Persian fortress. It was built on a plain, overseeing the land below. A single road led up to it. She slowed down and examined it. It was made of wood, its walls were about four times her height. The gate was closed, and a couple of Persian soldiers stared down from the battlements at the gigantic woman below.

Eleni didn’t pay attention to them. ‘I can break trees with my body, so a little army fortress won’t be able to offer me any resistance,’ she said. ‘Now, let me see. There are so many ways I could enter that fortress. I could jump over the wall, kick the gates open with my strong legs… But I’ll try something else.’

She pulled up her peplos and pressed her body against the gate. ‘I wonder what will be stronger. This gate, or my muscles? I’ll start with my thighs.’ She slowly tensed her leg muscles. Her thighs, already as big as tree trunks, started expanding in all directions.
They were like beasts released from their chains, and she was enjoying this way too much
to even consider stopping. Soon her thighs doubled, even tripled in size - her quads had grown so big her knees were hidden in the deep shadows they cast. A sickening network of veins appeared over her gigantic quads, struggling to feed the growing monsters. The split between each massive muscle in her thigh was deep enough to lose a drachm in. She flexed harder. The wood couldn’t resist the enormous slabs of muscle pressing against it, and caved in.

‘I just can’t believe how big my muscles have become! Every time I think they can’t get any bigger, they expand even more. I wonder how big I will be after I have defeated those puny soldiers in this fortress?’

When her thighs had reached their maximum size, she turned her attention to her chest muscles. She gave her pecs a mighty flex, causing her superhuman chest to erupt outwards. The quivering globes of pure muscle grew bigger with each passing second. Soon they were so big they started pushing against Eleni’s chin, but she didn’t, or couldn’t, stop herself from flexing. A roadmap of thick veins emerged all over her chest. The two freakish muscles soon started pushing against the gate. The wood started to creak from the strain the huge masses of muscle were subjecting it to, and gave in completely. Eleni flexed each pec separately a few times, making the holes even bigger.

She had saved her arms for last. With her head pressed against the wood, she watched in fascination how her arm started growing. It was like a volcano erupting. Layer after layer of muscle was added to her arms, but Eleni wasn’t satisfied yet. She bit her lip and directed more power to the already insanely big muscles. Their growth was unstoppable, and created more holes in the wall.

When she was finished, she stepped back. She looked with glee at the holes she had created. The holes were so big and deep, and so far apart from each other, that an unknowing passenger would never have believed those holes had been created by simply flexing muscles, let alone by a woman.

Because there was not much left of the gate, she just needed to push gently to ruin it completely.

She marched into the fortress. A group of Persian soldiers was waiting for her, on the square in the middle. She saw about fifty of them; maybe there were some more in the buildings around the square. By looking at her sheer size, they knew she was dangerous. A horseman tried to trample her down, but she simply lifted the horse with the man and tossed them away.

This awesome feat of strength caused panic. Some soldiers ran away. Another mounted a horse and escaped through the gate. ‘I’ll come back to you later!’ Eleni shouted after him. ‘I will first have some fun toying with your friends here!’

Several braver soldiers tried to attack her with their swords and spears. She just put one hand on her hip and let them try. Only when they were aiming for her head she would repel their attacks. She knew that the rest of her body had become nearly invulnerable. The soldiers were only able to scratch her skin a bit, sometimes.

She smiled at the soldiers. ‘I bet you have never encountered someone as muscular and strong as me. But I have met lots of soldiers like you in the past few days, and I know your strength is nothing compared to mine. I have become so strong that I can crush you and your little weapons between two fingers, as if you are little bugs.’

After a while they realized their uncoordinated attack was useless, and they fell back. The officers shouted orders, and they formed a perfect line. They held their shields on front of them, spears and swords were aimed at her through the small spaces between the shields.

Eleni just laughed. ‘Nice try, boys!’ In the blink of an eye, she appeared in front of the shields and grabbed one. She deformed the metal between her hands like it was made of warm wax. She ignored the stabbing and tossed the soldiers high into the air, one or two at a time. They soon broke their ranks and ran away into all directions.

She saw a big boulder. It was probably used for exercises where a whole group had to push it. It was a bit smaller than she was, and almost perfectly round. She picked it up and rested it on one hand. ‘It doesn’t seem to weigh much more than an apple!’ She balanced it on her neck. ‘Atlas!’ she giggled.

She saw a group of soldiers watching her from some distance. She smiled at them and tossed the boulder at them with enormous speed. ‘Catch!’

Of course, they couldn’t catch it. They were crushed or wounded by the enormous weight. She saw that other soldiers tried to hide in the buildings. ‘Why don’t you boys want to play with me?’ She sighed. ‘Well, at least you give me your power.’ She still felt the increases in strength, but it was much less intense than in the beginning.

She picked up the boulder again, and ran through the walls of the fortress more than a hundred times. When she was finished, little was left of it. A few men gathered in the middle of the square to witness her total destruction. Just at a few places, the walls of the fortress were still standing.

Eleni walked up to the men, tossing the boulder into the air and catching it again. Then, she jumped as high as she could and tossed the boulder down with incredible force. The impact caused a small earthquake. Everyone fell down and the remains of the fortress collapsed.

She landed on the ground herself and oversaw the ravage she had so easily caused. Between the ruins she saw a man with a bronze breastplate who seemed to be conscious. She lifted him with one mighty arm. ‘You look important, so I suppose you know where the Greek prisoners are.’

The man was shaking. ‘Yes. All war prisoners are sent to our capital, Babylon. Please don’t hurt me!’

‘How far is that?’

‘You have to travel to the east. It takes about five weeks on a horse.’

Eleni dropped him and grinned. ‘I am sure I can do it faster, as I have the strength of about three hundred men now. Okay, I need your breastplate. Give it to me!’

‘What?’

‘Your breastplate! Now! Do you need my help?’

She collected several other bronze armor too. She kneaded the metal together to a large lump and rushed off.

Far in the distance, in front of her, she saw the man on the horse that had escaped from the fortress. It didn’t take her long to catch up. She slowed down and jogged along the horse. ‘Hello!’ she said happily. ‘I told you I would come back to you!’

The horseman looked bewildered at the woman next to him, who seemingly had no trouble whatsoever keeping up with his galloping horse. He spurred his horse, but Eleni just kept running next to him.

‘Are you in a hurry?’ she asked him. He didn’t answer, but bent down over the neck of his horse, trying to go even faster.

‘Oh, do you want to go faster? Let me give you a hand,’ she offered. She put her hand below the horse’s belly and lifted it into the air. ‘Hold on!’ she shouted. Lifting the horse and the man didn’t seem to slow her down at the least. She even increased her pace. Soon, the man had to wrap his arms around the neck of the horse, or the wind would have blown him off. The incredible speed made him feel sick.

‘This is fun!’ Eleni shouted at him, while she was running about five times faster than any horse could. Her long black hair flew behind her and it seemed that running with a horse in one hand and a bronze lump in the other wasn’t really a problem for her.

The mountains around them became higher and higher and the road became narrow and winding. After a while, she missed a turn and they fell into a deep ravine. The man and the horse of course didn’t survive, but Eleni only had a couple of scratches. But this time, her peplos was completely ruined.

‘It’s time for other clothing,’ she said to herself. She took off the remains of the peplos. She used the lump of bronze to mould an armor for herself. She spread the metal over her body. It wasn’t difficult for her at all. The only thing that was hard, was that her muscles had become so ridiculously defined, that she couldn’t reach with her fingers into some of the deeper valleys between her muscles.

When she was finished, her whole body was covered in bronze, except for her head, her arms and her legs beneath the knees. She also made some kind of helmet, because she knew her head was the most vulnerable part of her body. Even though she was covered in metal, she could still move with ease.

When she was finished, she ran on. She didn’t get tired, so she even ran at night. In the morning, she stopped to eat a huge breakfast in a palace, not bothering about all the dumbfounded people around her. Just after noon, she stood on a hill. In the distance, she could see the Euphrates river and the city of Babylon. The fields around the city seemed to be crowded with people.

A shepherd told her that a huge army was gathering, to wipe away the Greeks once and for all. He had heard rumors that the army contained more than half a million men.

Eleni closed her eyes in bliss. ‘Ooh! Just imagine that I possess the strength of half a million!’

She walked down the hill towards the Persian army. They saw her coming: a sparkling bronze figure of unbelievable size. She stopped for a moment, so the soldiers who were nearest to her could take a good look at her obscene muscularity. ‘I am here to take your strength!’ she shouted. She immediately started harvesting.

She sped up, and sent the soldiers flying into all directions of the wind. She was like a sickle mowing down corn. The soldiers stood as much chance against her as a grain of corn would.

With every Persian man she defeated, it became even easier for Eleni to defeat the next one. ‘You might as well surrender to me immediately, because there is no way you can stop me,’ she said, as she tossed a huge boulder at a group of soldiers. She jumped high into the air and landed in the middle of another group, sending shockwaves around her at the landing. She stormed into a third group, wreaking more havoc.

Wherever she went, she brought chaos and destruction. She could feel her strength and muscle size increase every moment, and the feeling almost overwhelmed her. ‘Very soon I will be as strong as a goddess! No one can stop me!’

Eleni quickly approached the gates of the city. In front of the gates she saw a dozen granite statues, with the head of a man, the body of a lion and the wings of an eagle. They were huge, almost ten times Eleni’s height.

‘Release the Lamassu!’ she heard several soldiers shout. A line of priest appeared in the gate, and they all raised their hands.

‘Lamassu! Lamassu! Lamassu!’ she heard and she wondered what it meant. She stopped, because it was clear that something was happening. All the Persian soldiers ran away from her as fast as they could. The ‘Lamassu’ chanting continued, and she could hear a very low rumble.

Then, to her amazement, she saw one of the enormous statues move slightly. She wasn’t sure if it had moved for real, or if it was just an illusion. But then another statue slowly raised one of its legs. And another one. As she looked up to the giants, they started moving faster. The ground shook when a statue put down its leg.

Eleni looked around her, and saw that she was alone with the twelve creatures. The soldiers had gathered far away, to watch her.

The giants were now moving at the speed of a normal man, but they kept increasing their pace. ‘The Lamassu have never failed to protect the city of Babylon!’ one of the priests shouted, and the crowd roared. ‘Please destroy the Greek monster!’

‘Who are you calling a monster?’ Eleni mumbled. The Lamassu had quickly retrieved her. Some moved into her direction, while others formed a large circle around her. They were moving faster and faster. Eleni tried to run away, but it was hard to avoid the twelve Lamassu. She kicked one of the giants. Her powerful blow could have taken out one hundred soldiers at a time, but she could just cause very minor damage to the granite monster. She saw a giant foot coming down, and she could just jump to the side, before it would have crushed her.

They were coming at her from all directions now. She tried to dodge one, and bumped into another. They all tried to trample her with their enormous feet. She jumped up, she ran, she jumped away, but there were just too many of them.

She made a summersault to escape from one attacker and she bumped into the foot of another. The foot of a third one came down quickly, and she didn’t have time to escape. It rammed down on her.

It was only because of Eleni’s extreme body strength and her bronze armor that her body wasn’t shattered immediately. Her body had created a large hole in the ground, so the Lamassu stamping down on her didn’t hurt her very much.

She could turn her head a bit to the side, and she saw how the Persian soldiers were approaching the Lamassu. They all wanted to see how the protectors of Babylon finished off their Greek enemy.

She tried lifting her arms to stop the foot, but she might as well have tried to stop a storm.

‘Wait,’ she told herself, and she tried to think. Which was a bit difficult with the constant pounding of the granite giant. ‘A storm… I took Lips’ power, maybe I can use it now? But how?’

She looked at the soldiers again. They had come even closer, and it had become a huge crowd. Eleni puckered her lips and started blowing. It started as a gentle breeze, but she quickly put more strength to it. The wind became noticeable. Leaves and grass moved away from her.

It’s working! Eleni thought. She had some difficulty finding out how to blow a stronger wind. She had to use muscles she had never used before, but they had been growing as the rest of her body grew, and they had been waiting to be used for all this time.

The Persians in the front rows could now feel a sweet wind, but they didn’t know where it came from. The wind speed rapidly increased. They had trouble keeping to their feet, but Eleni was only starting to learn to use her newfound power. She took a deep breath and exhaled strongly, using her lips to aim the storm wind at a small group of soldiers. They were all completely blown away, and she felt how their strength was added to hers.

She repeated this several times. With each mighty breath, she grew stronger. And so did her lungs, so each next breath was even more powerful. After a while, she could move her head a bit, so she could blow away more soldiers.

The army was panicking now, but they couldn’t get away. The men in the back couldn’t see what was going on, and kept pushing the soldiers in front of them.

Eleni was now blowing away twenty or thirty men with every breath. She could feel her body growing, her strength increasing. The fierce pounding of the Lamassu felt weaker, and weaker, until it was nothing more than gentle taps to her. She blew a bit more, and then tried to sit up. She found she could withstand the force of the Lamassu and laughed. She simply walked away, towards the bewildered soldiers. Once more, she released the power of her lungs. This time, more than fifty Persians flew through the air.

Another Lamassu tried to pound her to the ground with his foot, but she put her incredible arms up and stopped its foot in mid-air. She sent another group of soldiers flying and when she received their strength, she found that she could even move the Lamassu foot further up.

‘I am the strongest!’ she shouted. She felt completely invincible. She didn’t pay attention to the stone giants, because she knew they couldn’t hurt her anymore. She ran towards the soldiers with incredible speed. She used her fists, legs and lungs simultaneously, and harvested the strength of one hundred soldiers every moment. The feeling of her strength increasing made her almost drunk with power. The soldiers tried to get away from the battleground, but they had become an easy prey to the mighty Greek warrior woman.

After a while, she looked down. The amount of muscle on her body shocked her. She couldn’t see the lower half of her body. Her view was blocked by an enormous mass of muscle. All the muscles in her body had probably grown one hundred times bigger than the muscles of an athletic man. The earth shook with every step she was taking, and when she turned around, she could clearly see the imprints of her feet in the rocky ground.

She saw that the group of Lamassu was still standing there. Just like earlier on, they were towering over her, but she knew they were no match for her. She ran up to the one closest to her and grabbed the bottom of one of its feet. She quickly yanked it into the air. Very slowly at first, the living statue toppled over. It crashed down with a deafening sound and crumbled into smaller pieces.

‘One down!’ Eleni said happily. She fell to the ground when a huge wave of pleasure washed over her as the huge strength of the granite giant was added to hers. This only made it easier for her to annihilate the rest of them. Just like the first one, she threw several ones to the ground. They started running away from her, but they weren’t very fast. At least not compared to Eleni, who was moving almost at lightning speed now.

She appeared below the belly of one of the monsters. She jumped high up, and sliced it completely in two. When the two halves had fallen to the ground, she picked up one. She laughed. It was an enormous slab of granite, but it felt like she was picking up a pebble. She tossed it at the four remaining Lamassu, taking them down as well. Her body shook as she gained a huge amount of strength and muscles and she sank in the rocky ground up to her knees.

She was hardly recognizable as a human anymore. Her head looked tiny, just a small circle floating in an ocean of muscles.

As there were no Lamassu left, Eleni picked up the remaining half. Laughing out loud, she tossed it high up in the air. It disappeared behind the clouds and came back down with enormous speed. Eleni patiently waited for the impact. It was just like a shower to her. But it wasn’t for everything around her. The impact caused a huge earthquake.

Even though most of the Persians were far away now, the enormous shockwaves made them all fall down. Eleni looked at the city and saw several buildings collapse. ‘Oops,’ she giggled.

‘Time to find my Mikkos!’ She marched towards the city. Because of her ridiculous weight, her legs sunk deep into the ground with each step she took. Still, it was easier for her than walking through water.

She opened the enormous gates of Babylon by just pushing against them with a single finger. Wherever she came, people dropped to their knees for the invincible, massively muscular Greek demi-goddess. No one even considered resisting her, so she had quickly found out where the Greek war prisoners were kept.

But when she got there, she saw that part of the prison had collapsed, because a neighboring building had crashed down on it. ‘Oh no!’ Eleni cried. She yanked the gates off their hinges and marched in. ‘Mikkos! Mikkos!’ she shouted, but no one answered her. The metal bars that kept the Greeks in crumpled in her hands. The war prisoners couldn’t believe their eyes, but she didn’t pay attention to them.

She was panicking now, as she couldn’t find her husband and came closer and closer to the part that was crushed. She kept calling his name, until big pieces of stone blocked her way. Of course it was no problem for her removing them, but she hesitated. She was scared. Maybe even more scared than she had been during her whole quest.

‘Did you say Mikkos?’ one of the prisoners asked. ‘There was a man from Armenoi with that name…’

‘Yes?’

‘... but he was in that part of the prison. I’m afraid he…’

Eleni didn’t listen anymore, but started removing and crushing the debris with high speed. It didn’t take long until she found the first body. And then another. And another.

‘NOOO!’

It was him. She picked up his lifeless body and carried it outside, into the sun. Greek prisoners gathered around her and touched her gargantuan body. She didn’t feel it, but she heard what they said: ‘He was a good man.’ ‘He was a brave fighter.’ ‘Even when he was in prison, he hoped that one day he’d be free and could return to his wife.’

Eleni burst out in tears. She kept on crying until she had no tears left. When she looked up, just one old man was sitting next to her. All the others had left.

‘I hope you are feeling a bit better now,’ he said.

But she shook her head. ‘You don’t understand. I killed him! I wanted to show off my strength and caused an earthquake that caused this building to collapse… I was so stupid! I didn’t think of Mikkos, I just thought about how powerful I was.’ She started sobbing again.

The man sighed. ‘Well, he is with Hades now.’

Eleni looked up. ‘That’s it! I’ll go to Hades and tell him to give Mikkos back to me!’

He looked at her. ‘They say the entrance is located on the Peloponnese peninsula.’

Eleni rushed off incredibly fast. She headed for the west. Very soon, she reached the sea. She jumped in and swam at high speed, causing huge waves. Before sunset, she had found the entrance of the underworld. She swam across the Styx and insisted to see Hades.

When he didn’t show up soon, she started destroying her surroundings. That worked.

‘What is it, woman?’ the god of the underworld asked her, annoyed.

Eleni dropped to her knees. ‘Please, Hades, give me back my husband! I have travelled so far to rescue him, and I didn’t mean to kill him. Please!’

‘You know, mortal. Death is irreversible. No one ever came back from the dead. Sorry, I can’t make exceptions.’ He turned around. ‘Now please, leave.’

‘No! Please, Hades! I will do anything! I will give you anything! Please!’

Hades turned back. ‘Interesting. Did you say “anything”?’

‘Yes! Yes! Anything! If I can only have Mikkos!’

‘So you would even give up your strength? I thought you had come to like that. A lot.’

She hesitated, but only for a brief moment. ‘That is true. But I love my Mikkos more than anything else.’

‘We have an agreement then? Your strength for Mikkos?’

‘Y-Yes.’ Elena sighed.

There was a brief flash, and Eleni was back in the light of the setting sun. She felt different. She looked down, and saw that she had her old, scrawny body back.

‘Eleni?’

She looked around and there he was: Mikkos. He was alive, but bewildered.

‘What happened? Where are we? Where did you come from?’

She didn’t answer, but she wrapped her arms around him. She tried to pick him up, but found that he was too heavy. So instead she jumped up, wrapped her legs around his waist and kissed him.

After some time, a voice said: ‘Oh, how sweet! I am glad the two of you are back together.’

Eleni broke the kiss. It was the woman she had met at Hera’s temple. The woman was looking at the couple with bright eyes.

Eleni suddenly realized. ‘Hera?’ She kneeled in front of the goddess.

‘Yes daughter. It is me. I am so proud of you! It was so nice to see you change from a weak, shy girl into a strong, self-confident woman. I hope you will be like that for the rest of your life.’

‘I am sure I will. Being super strong was great, but being together with Mikkos is so much better.’

‘I’m glad that is how you feel. As a little present, I’ll give you the strength of two men. And that’s all you’ll get. If you want to become stronger, you’ll have to exercise, just like the athletes do!’

‘Thank you, Hera!’

As the sun went down into the sea, Hera disappeared. Eleni turned to Mikkos. ‘Come, lover. We’ll have to find a ship back to Crete.’