After only two brief encounters, Ares believed he had seen through Russell's true nature: arrogant, conceited, disdainful of everyone, extremely self-centered, greedy, lecherous, and shameless.
Arrogance was merely a symptom. Its essence was ignorance!
Ares could understand. A demigod who had lived among mortals neither knew nor had the right to know just how vast this world was.
With such an overbearing temperament, there was no reason for him to pass up the Divine Authority of "War." Therefore, there was only one truth: Russell really was injured, and badly at that.
Afraid that others would see through him and take the chance to retaliate against him, he was doing everything he could to hide it.
"When the Sun God, Helios, faced a challenge, he wasn't as timid and hesitant as you."
Ares sneered. "If you truly don't dare, stay away from Aphrodite from now on. And Queen of Heaven Hera as well. Put away that arrogant attitude of yours. There's no place for you to run wild on the Divine Mountain."
"Don't be ridiculous. Who said I wasn't accepting your challenge?"
Russell pointed his nostrils at Ares. "You want a fair fight? Fine. In ten days, I'll beat you until you're crawling around looking for your teeth."
Zeus watched the two arguing with a grim expression. He snorted and sent a message to Hera. "Look what you've done. When two tigers fight, one is bound to be injured. No matter whether Ares or Russell loses his Divine Authority, it will do neither of us any good."
That was you, not me!
Hera did not think she had done anything wrong. Russell had come for her, and he had made no attempt to hide it since arriving on the mountain.
He had dared to provoke her endlessly even as a demigod.