The thing about Hephaestus and his forge was that the Smith God never seemed to actually leave it.This made it supremely easy for the God of War to carry on his eons old affair with the blacksmith's wife...something Ares had accepted some time ago but never really let stop him. Still. He was a little, a lot, irritated with Zeus in particular about the whole thing. Or perhaps Hermes was truly to blame. Hephaestus wasn't that clever to have come up with the loophole on his own...whoever was responsible, though, really paled in comparison to who benefited in the end.



There were no wars going on. There was nothing to distract Ares from his moodiness or his eternal boredom. Aphrodite was off fucking someone else and his other goddess sisters were quite prudish. This left him with no alternative but to be bored. In a search for entertainment, his eye had turned to a beautiful, gleaming bronze shield that Hephaestus had made for him. Ares admired it for a bit but his thoughts rolled toward the creator of the shield and his jealousy thereof - husband to the most beautiful of all the goddesses.



Pettiness really should have been beneath him...but it wasn't.



He'd had to stake out the forge for the past several months - time for mortals meant nothing to the gods. Months were not the same - Until finally, one day, Hephaestus was called by Zeus to deliver more lightning bolts. Perfect. Ares strode toward the temple and pushed open the doors. He looked around and wrinkled his nose. The place was a wreck.



Without the molten glow of the forges, alive with fire and liquid bronze, it was just a sad, dark space. A bit like Hades' realm. Of course, this was no ordinary smithy owned by any mortal blacksmith. The stone that housed the metal was marble and it was not soft like that of the marble the mortals used. This was polished black stone, gleaming and beautiful. But this looked nothing like his own temple, which automatically made it inferior.



The tools that Hephaestus used were laying strewn about across his work bench, on the gigantic anvil, leaned up against cold forges and hanging from hooks along the walls. There were unfinished projects or unworkable ones left here and there. Ares stopped beside a helmet that was meant for him...but the side of it was bashed in. He arched an eyebrow and put it down.



"Passive aggression isn't good for the heart," he said slyly to himself.



Passing through this room, he came to where Hephaestus slept. The room his wife ostensibly let him touch her in. The thought was nauseating. Ares touched the bed linens and turned them a brilliant crimson. He touched the bed posts, turning them scarlet. The frame became a deep maroon. Only one pillow did he leave white - the one used by his lover. Hephaestus's was turned pink as a fully bloomed rose.



"How sweet," Ares said to himself. "He can fuck her on colors dedicated to me." The smith could ignore it all he liked, but the goddess of love infinitely preferred the god of war to a lowly blacksmith. Even a divine one.



Hephaestus would not be able to undo the color change easily, or potentially at all. Even if he did manage it, which Ares doubted, it would still cause the god a bit of trouble. And that made him a bit happy.



"Good night, Hephaestus..." he whispered as he left the temple. Was it petty? Yes....Beneath him? Absolutely. Would he do something even more stupid but no less irritating for his rival? Forever.