NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 1: What once was and what will be
[Vunreon, before Creation]
In the nothingness that existed before creation there existed six vaguely humanoid figures whose body's were formed out of pure Elements. They are known by many names, some call them the six Primordial Gods, others call them the Creation Gods or the eternal Gods. These are just some of the names that they gave themselves or were given to them by others. But even though they each held full control over their Element, they exist since Time immemorial without doing something.
This was because this Universe, while having all necessities for the creation of matter and life, had nothing to hold it together as it lacked the concepts of Time and Space, two powers above even the six founding elements of Fire, Water, Earth and Wind, as well as Light and Darkness. Without time, everything was in a constant state of pause. While the six were capable of moving themselves even without time, no matter what they created it was in a permanent stasis. The lack of space meant that even these completely static pieces of creation would simply drift aimlessly, not being contained by space. This changed with Darganth's arrival, who used his power to create both space and time in this universe.
This allowed the six gods to create both inanimate matter as well as life. During this all seven gained part of the power of creation, with only Darganth receiving the power of destruction, this one in its full form. This was because they each took part in creation, Darganth was the only one among them to destroy all that is by himself as it is all build upon space and time, which he rules over.
After some time, the six Gods decided to not just look over the Universe, but influence it and walk in it, so they learned to take on physical forms. During these times many other, lesser gods were born. They held control over elements that were once part of the six but split from them forming new ones, like Lightning, and were now separate elements. Additionally they were not bound by a limited Lifespan, but were not wholly immortal as the primordials and Darganth could end their existence permanently. While their position would soon go to a new God, normally a freshly ascendent mortal, the old god is permanently gone. Thus these gods were called Elemental Gods, to differentiate them from the primordials.
During the rise of the first Elemental Gods, the universe also gave rise to new planes and planets, transforming it into a multiverse, with Vunreon at its center. During the rise of these new planets, the mortal species diversified, splitting into humanoids, beasts and monsters. Humanoids held no innate power growth, instead relying on learning aura and magic to grow stronger. The most prominent of them are the humans, elves, dwarfs and the beastmen.
Beasts meanwhile are simply an evolved form of normal animals. They absorb mana from the surrounding to grow in power and evolve after absorbing enough mana. While they can also learn aura or magic, most choose to rely on their own powers as it was tailored for them and thus they could call upon more of its potential.
Lastly, monsters are a broad term for any species not under either of these category’s. Their forms vary, with most being similar to humanoids or beasts, and they have little in common between species. What leads to their classification is their nature to destroy the land around them, either by their simple presence or due to their way of living. This leads to them being shunned by other species as a coexistence is impossible for most.
After these species established themselves as the dominant ones, lesser gods started appearing, mortals who ascended to godhood with conceptual Authority, like Guardianship over a country. Additional there are those who ascend without an Authority, thus gaining no control over any Aspect of Creation, but still benefiting from the immortality of lesser gods. This immortality is one mainly to ignore limiting lifespans, as they are even less immortal than elemental gods, with even the elemental gods holding the power to kill them permanently.
A lesser known group of gods who ascended during the same time were a new group of elemental gods. Their ascension didn't form any new elemental energy's, instead they gained partial authority over a part of an element. While the original god retained the authority over this part of his element, the new god held power just below that of the main god over his part of the element. They are commonly referred to as pseudo-elemental gods.
This hierarchy among the gods quickly influenced the mortals, who in return once again influenced the gods. The gods started organizing themselves in groups, mostly along species lines, and tried to further the mortals under them to increase the chances of a new god being born from them. This god would then strengthen their group in relation to the other gods.
This permanent circle quickly lead to the mortals fighting small scale wars, in the larger picture of the entire species, and the gods being mostly a deterrent. Nearly every time this stalemate was broken it happened due to an Elemental or Primordial Gods involvement. Some of them intervene for their own benefit, others for their own amusement. Sometimes a lesser God also annoys one of the higher gods, resulting in their death and a change in the balance of power.
The outliers to this were the dragons, angels and demons. The dragons held their position as the most powerful mortal race due to being Darganth's creation, even having the right to call themselves his descendants. Their power grows greater with age and the more powerfull species of dragons are not limited by a lifespan, while even the others live for centuries without problem. The oldest among them can even fight against the strongest of the lesser gods while being mortal.
While rare, they can ascend to godhood, but not obtain a Autority. In return, once they do they gain a small part of Darganth's authority over dragons as well, on a similar level to pseudo elemental gods, and gain the same immortality he holds. While this immortality is slightly weaker, meaning that they take loner to fully resurrect, it still allows them to stand above even elemental gods.
The angels and demon hold their status due to being the creation of the Primordial of Light and Darkness respectively. Thy engage in an eternal war, that no side can ever win, and their fields of battle regularly destroy worlds. This war started due to the two Primordial's rivalry. Now it is mostly viewed as a war between good and evil, with even all but the oldest members of the two races believing this.
This state of affairs remained largely the same, until Darganth's death at the hands of the Water, Earth and Wind Primordial's. They used the combined power of the two swords Darganth gifted to Visuria and Nemoress, the Primordial Goddess of Darkness, to shatter his soul, something even he didn't believe possible, though the two swords were destroyed in the attack.
After his death, the three used the two Goddesses rivalry to imprison Scalladras, the Flame Primordial, while they remained in conflict against each other. Afterward they used their numerical superiority to also imprison Visuria and Nemoress in their own realms, hunting them down each time they leave, just like they did with Scalladras. Due to not being able to communicate with each other, they always had numerical superiority during these fights.
Now the three rule the multiverse without any meaningful opposition, as angels and demons continue their war while their creators are too preoccupied to care about them, the dragons do not believe in the possibility that their ancestor and god would loose and the other mortal races are waring at a scale never before seen, believing all seven of them to be simply somewhere else, while the lesser Gods share this mentality. The Elemental Gods are the only ones to know about the state of affairs, but wouldn't dare to try changing something, to prevent themselves from dying at the hands of the Primordial's. But few of them even want to change anything, after all they now hold near complete freedom as long as they don't act against the three.
Thus the current situation in Vunreon was born, where the lesser Gods use the loosening of the Laws of Space to summon mortals from other universes to fight their wars. Now the time where the gods walk the battlefield is nothing more than a legend of the past, as the elemental gods revel in their freedom and are more volatile than ever. Fights between lesser Gods remain hidden as best as they can, while the mortal battlefields are now centered around those who are chosen by the gods, be they summoned hero's, a gods Apostle or something else entirely.
[Void]
After going through his memories before his death and of what his soul has seen from the void, Darganth was planning where to descend to. Currently there were three criteria a world had to fill. The first is, that it is away from the prying eyes of the gods, or at least the important ones. The death of a few regional Gods of a remote planet would rarely be of interest for most gods. But no matter how small the chance of someone being interested in their death, it still rises the chances of being found. While it is a criteria that is manageable, the other two a creating far bigger problems.
The greatest problem is to find a world with a high power ceiling, meaning a world that can sustain his growth to a certain level. The problem with those worlds is, that they are nearly always under a gods control, after all, if a world can support the rise of a god with its resources, it most likely has at least one god.
And lastly there is the matter of how fast of a growth the world can offer him. For that there are multiple options, making his search a bit easier. The first is the presence of dense, high quality Mana to ensure that his Magic abilities start recovering. The second factor are a worlds magical herbs and other materials, as most dragons can strengthen their power through raw consumption of those far better than through the use of potions and similar Items. The third and last factor is the presence of dragon clans, as while he may no longer hold his power, he didn't doubt that their loyality would have remained.
Now all that mattered was finding a world with those qualities, which is quite a lot easier in theory.
'I have already found a number of planets with minimal compromises, but I will keep the as reserve plan for now. I highly doubt that I can't find an at least nearly optimal planet out there.' Darganth thought.
[Realm of Light]
For the first time in centuries Visuria left her palace without leaving her Realm too, so the Angel's became astonished by this. Of course the news spread fast across the realms capital. Most couldn’t believe it at first, after all, while angels don't die of old age, most of those who have lived when she regularly walked among them, have either fallen in the war against the demons or held a high rank and thus were currently either at the front lines or sitting in the council that is the reason for her to leave her palace.
Since Darganth's death she stopped taking part in the affairs of her subjects, instead using her time to find a way to evade the three primordial's detection. She had partaken in one of the council's sessions, trying to convince them to fight against the three, but failed miserably. While her subjects would normally not speak out against her, even during these millennial's she spend in isolation, the danger of attacking a primordial and her state at the time due to being forced back into her realm once more gave them the courage to do so.
Now that she knows that he is alive, her behavior returned to what it was before. Not caring to make hast to reach the council, she walked through her city and enjoyed talks with its inhabitants. While not the Goddess of good mortals often make her out to be, this misconception didn't come into existence poer chance. While part of it is due to her and by extension the light elements close association with order, another is due to her enjoying social interactions with others, leading to her having more frequent contact with mortals than most other gods.
While Visuria was having her walk, the council descended into chaos rather quick after the news reached them. The last time she left her castle, she demanded of them to attack three primordials and none among them wanted to hold this discussion again. Some quickly found hope in the fact, that she wasn't there yet and theorized that the council may not even be her target location.
While this notion lead to most of the chaos subsiding, but the reasons were different for the different members. The younger ones became calmed down, because they believed that this might be the truth, after all they only knew the Queen as a lazy woman who remains in her castle all day long for no reason.
The older members of the council also calmed down but because of an entirely different reason and their emotions showed it. While the first group relaxed again and believed the problem to be over, they calmed down because the feared the consequences. They all received the news that the Queen was simply touring the City and talking with the inhabitants, but they knew what this meant.
They all remember the times when Queen Visuria lead them into battle personally. They know well why she remained in her castle and know that for her to leave like this and return to her previous demeanor, something must have happened that let her regain her motivation. Now none of them would even think about going against her wishes. The last time she was dejected and without drive, but speaking out against a Visuria that had her motivation once more was something only fools would do.
This was because despite her enjoying socializing, she valued order even more. While on the battlefield she acted as a graceful and efficient warrior as well as general, should one cause a disturbance in the order, she would be merciless. It didn't matter if it was someone breaking the law or someone disobeying a command from a superior, it didn't even matter if the law or command was evil in nature, as long as they didn't follow the order of things they would receive her wrath.
Visuria meanwhile was touring her City and talking with different inhabitants. While doing this she made up her mind to follow through with her current plan, even if it went against her ideals. Making her way towards the council hall after nearly two hours, she quickly noticed the tense mood. Taking a mental note of every member that continued to whisper after her arrival, she walked towards her throne and sat down.
“Give me an overview of the wars current state.” Her words silenced even the last whisper.
“Yes my Queen.” With these words a middle aged man stepped forwards and gave his report. After listening to it, Visuria grew disappointed with her army. During her height of power, her army was famed for its discipline, with her soldiers often fighting to the last men. Now it was even a game of chance if the subordinates would even follow orders. Suppressing her anger at this, she focused on the mountain of stupid decisions made in her absence.
“Who had ordered this attack?” She said towards those present, pointing towards a set of documents lying on the table in the rooms center.
“I did your majesty. While the plans were blocked, with one words from you I will follow through with them.” A man said while stepping forward, clearly trying to brag with the plan he had made.
“I will never give such an order. This plan is beyond stupid and whoever blocked it should receive a promotion. Trying to march into not just any dragon clan's territory, but a world under the control of one of the most powerful dragon clan's. How stupid are you to think that would have been a good idea.” At her reaction his demeanor instantly shifted.
“But there were demons trying to-” He started but was quickly interrupted.
“Do you truly think that the most feared dragon clan, one that is sometimes called the third supreme dragon clan, would allow a group of demons to do anything except for dying in their territory. I can tell you with one hundred percent certainty that they are long dead. Even if they were lead by Nemoress personally only she would have made it out alive.” At those words many of those present seemed to grow nervous.
'First I have to restructure my army. While I still have a few years, once he is reborn, my forces should already have reached a state as close as possible to their prime. Once they get pushed back, the demons will likely ask Nemoress to help them. Once our little war reaches the state it had all those ages ago, those three will have to focus on the two of us, reducing the chances of Darganth being discovered. Additionally it allows me to kill a few gods to make even more room for him, as nobody will find it unnatural for there to be collateral damage.' With these thoughts Visuria once again focused on the meeting.
[World of Ikrus]
Up to this point the inhabitants of Ikrus could be called fortunate for living there, as their world never became part of the demon's and angel's dispute, despite having no gods, even though the world could support them. What most of the worlds inhabitants didn't know was that both their lack of gods and their security from otherworldly threads has the same source. At the peaks of the World Peak Mountains, lives a group of beings, whose power eclipses that of every race on all four continents. These peaks are a place no humanoid has ever stood since the beginning of recorded history and few even dare to try to reach them with non of those foolish adventurers ever returning.
The Legends say, that even the most ancient of Dragons, those that even the 5 Great Powers of this continent have no chance of defending themselves against, don't dare to fly higher than half the way towards the top of the peaks. Now at one of those peaks, in a grand Hall, devoid of light a being stirs for the first time since decades.
“Yldra!” A deep voice halls across the peaks. Shortly after a young human girl comes out of a portal, that opened at the halls entrance.
“It has been a while since you called me like this, Father. I take the fact that you didn't speak to me in private that this is not about another critique of something I did?” The young girl, Yldra, asked.
“While I continue to believe that my criticism was valid and not overbearing or exaggerated like you say, this is indeed not why I called you. I need you to go down the Mountains and investigate a matter for me. I have felt a great shift in the times and I want you to find out what its source was.” the voice continues.
“That is all? Nothing better than find the source of the shift among all of this Worlds inhabitants?” Yldra asked with her annoyance clear in her voice.
“I know how little this helps but without someone of the Tempust Clan this is the best we will get.” the voice answered.
“I know, I know. It is just that the split happened because you and the Tempust Clan Leader are both old idiots whose pride is grater than their brain. I will make this little Investigation but at least let me have some fun while doing it.”
“Fine, as long as you don't loose focus” after these words the voice went silent again and Yldra vanished into thin air.