#i feel like the fact Hera literally tried burning away the mortality of what later became the arguably most suicidal character

[ima-ghost-art]

Immortal Leo HC

TW: Suicide attempts & abuse

Okay so what if Hera succeeded in burning away Leo's mortality when he was a baby?? What if now, the reason he survived so long on the streets from such a young age, how multiple gods have had intense reactions to him, how he can go so long under such intense stress and no sleep and yet still manage to keep the ship running, why Gaia had always seen him as her biggest threat,,, was all because Leo was essentially immortal??

Now he wasnt a God, not yet at least. When it gets revealed by Hera after he returns from saving Calypso, she tells him, he could gain godly status if he chose a domain. The other gods couldnt challenge his claim, he was already an immortal demigod who had literally saved the world from destruction, and had the favour of multiple gods plus two camps of demigods.

All he had to do was claim his divinity and it was his.

Now.. Leo had known he couldnt die since he was a kid. Not long after the death of his mother, he had lived through things that should have killed him more times he could count, and it only fuelled his aunts hatred of him and the wishing he had died with his mom even more.

He could go weeks without eating, sleeping while he was on the streets, been beaten over and over again, in ways he knows no other kid would have been able to survive, and even attempted his own life on numerous occasions, each in a different way from the last, just trying so badly for it to end.

But instead he was seen as a "miracle" or more realistically an "exception" a "fluke" an "oddity" a "freek of human nature"

Leo still felt all the pain though, that last thin thread tying him to the fragile mortal body he was born with that still pumped with red blood. No one questioned why it shimmered with flecks of gold when he bled, no one ever looked at him long enough to care.

Being a demigod was enough to help Leo start to understand this part of himself, but just like his fire this was something else to set him apart from the others.

A little too much power

Not quite enough mortal

After his return from Ogygia, Heras announcement was only confirmed more by how Leo's blood now ran fully gold, the aura around himself stronger now, still not a God sure, but definitely no mortal demigod either.

Although his attempts too die once again, battling Gaia, (the physicians cure safely tucked away in Hazels coat pocket instead of on Festus with him) He instead finished burning away his mortal flesh, leaving everything else behind.

Unlike Percy did all those years ago, Leo never had a choice.

The Campers all saw him different now, no longer like them, the Gods now actually held him in some form of respect, even Zeus didnt make much of an argument about it.

He was expected to become a God..

Some of the campers even started giving him offerings for saving the camp. There was talks about building him a shrine, what domain would he now be the symbol of? would festus be his sacred companion?? Could they worship there friend who wasnt even dead but was he even living???

Leo never wanted to be immortal, just for once he wished to be like everyone else...