The Greatest Sin

Maisara sighed. Arika had moved away from the Pantheon and she still wasn’t allowed to return Olympiada. Why even have a White Pantheon if it kept its strongest Divines away from the Mountain? The whole world was moving away from them, and she had been tasked to clean up Anarchians in Epa. She gripped her axe and walked into yet another warehouse that was supposedly a place of meeting for them.

“Keep your cool.” Arascus said to Kassandora. She wasn’t one to lose control, but that didn’t mean she never did. Olephia and Neneria could keep their cool, but Kassandora? It was rare, but it did happen. “No killing until they move.” Especially if it was unplanned. Kassie always needed a plan, then she’d stick to it better than anyone he knew, but if there was no plan… He sighed as he looked as his daughter.

Kassandora was grinning madly, her eyes burning up as she looked at those thunderstorms and lightning clouds approaching Nanbasa. It was a beautiful day over the ring city. Beautiful and tranquil, apart from that tiny and contained thunderstorm approaching from the north. Much too fast to be a natural storm, and much too small. Storms were contained, it was obviously Zerus, Sceo and Alkom approaching. Hopefully only them.

Olephia tapped Arascus. He turned to the Goddess of Chaos, she stood her in her violet dress, with those big violet eyes staring up at him. A piece of paper in her hands with her pretty handwriting on it: If you throw me up, I can keep it contained to just the air, I won’t damage anything here down here.

That was… that was a good idea actually. “You’re not allowed to speak though, if Alkom makes a Sun, then let it land before you do anything.” Olephia nodded as Arascus turned to Kassandora, he had just thought of a plan she could follow. “If we chase them away, you can use this moment to pass the army-implementation law. Cite self-defence and reliance on us, and how Kirinyaa needs its own army for true independence.”

Kassandora sneered like an angry wolf. “Brilliant. So just humiliate them.” She leaned off the balustrade and clapped her hands. With her crimson hair and that military HAUPT suit, the long coat falling past her knees and shirt underneath, she looked exactly like the Goddess of War she had been a thousand years prior. “That, I’ll take great pleasure in.” Olephia quickly wrote down some more words on her paper.

You’re terrible Kassie. Kassandora laughed at the text as Olephia gave Arascus her hand. He spun, heaved, and sent her flying into the sky. The Goddess of Chaos disappeared into the sky.

Sceo was fast, Sceo with her husband Zerus were faster. It took them less than a minute to cross from the horizon to the northern districts of the ring-city. Then it took that storm a few more seconds to close in on Arascus. It stopped a few hundred metres short of them, and then gradually calmed down. Cars stopped in the street as people raised their phones to record. This wasn’t going to be a battle of power, it would be a battle of people’s minds. “Don’t don your armour if they don’t attack.” Arascus said again.

“Oh do not worry.” Kassandora replied. “This is a news interview, it’s not a fight.” Arascus smiled to himself, it was good that they were on the same page, he always loved that about Kassandora.

The storm slowly started to clear and three figures came into view as they descended from the clouds. Zerus, God of Lightning, old but muscled. With a great beard and crystal-clear blue eyes, like the sky above. His wife, Sceo, Goddess of the Sky, ever beautiful, ever charming, with long hair but a cold glare in her eyes. She looked at Arascus and Kassandora with all the pleasantries of a howling wind in the middle of the winter storm. And Alkom, God of the Sun, tall and thin, with golden hair that fell down his back. He had a narrow face. All three of them wore the white-gold robes of the white Pantheon, each with patterns bearing signs of their respective demesnes.

Arascus took the initiative as they looked down on him in surprise. He rose into the air until he matched their altitude, then a little further so he looked down on them. “I am back.” His voice boomed and he lay into the attack immediately. “What are you doing here?”

“We have come to confirm your existence.” Zerus answered back. When it was these three, he always spoke for the other two. “And now we have.” He said in a colder tone.

“You can watch the news to see if I’m alive.”

“We had to see it to believe it.” Zerus answered back. Now that they were before him, Arascus wanted to extract as much information as he could.

“Could Allasaria not have come herself?” Arascus shouted at them. Was Allasaria dead? Or did she just flee? What Zerus said was true, some things you just had to see to believe.

“We have to come to check for the entire White Pantheon.” Zerus replied. “Why are you here?” That was a good reply, it gave nothing away, with a follow-up question too. Zerus did have the looks of an old man, but his mind had always been sharp as lightning.

“Epa rejected me, I am in Arika now.” Arascus said. He made sure to claim the whole continent for himself. “So? Your mission is done, return now, flee to the Divine Mountain and stay where you are wanted.”

“We have come to investigate Kirinyaa for traces of your corruption.” Zerus replied. Arascus looked down to Kassandora below him. She was stood there, arms behind her back, waiting for a sign that the situation was going to take a turn for the worse.

“Kirinyaa does not want you.” Arascus’ voice boomed across all of Nanbasa. He would say it like it is. “The White Pantheon did not help Kirinyaa as the Jungle crossed its border. It did not help when the Jungle started to devour cities. It did not help when the Eastern half of the country was lost. What credentials do you have now to come and make demands?” He heard people below him cheer, so he lay it on a bit further. “Where was the Pantheon when the Clerics arrived two hundred years ago? What help did you give Kavaa when she fighting against the Jungle? Kassandora is the first Divine to establish a plan on how to defeat it and now what? Have you come to tell us to stop?”

Zerus opened his mouth and Arascus raised his tone, he was not finished yet. “Traces of my corruption? Yes!” He shouted. “There are traces of my corruption everywhere here! They’re evident. They’re evident on the news, where we reclaim lost land. They’re evident in the future Kassandora has given to this land! My corruption is evident in the Caretaker defeated! That’s my corruption Zerus! What is yours?”

Zerus fell silent for a moment as the people of Nanbasa cheered underneath. It was an easy tactic, one he had mastered a millennia ago, to accept and flip and amplify. To declare the accusation correct, and then reframe it as a positive. Zerus finally mounted a reply. “Kirinyaa is still bound by the rules of the Pantheon Doctrine!” He shouted, but his tone was weak. “The Pantheon has preserved world peace for a thousand years! You will drag it into war Arascus! You will unleash the beast stood below you.” His hand moved to indicate towards Kassandora, Goddess of War. “And you will once again bathe Arda in blood. The White Pantheon exists because of YOU! Because you are the greatest threat this world has ever faced!”

“I am the God of Pride Zerus. To get rid of me, you will have to wipe out every sentient being on this world. Even dogs have their pride.” Arascus smiled at the man as he saw news crews set up on rooftops.

“You are using these people!” Zerus shouted back.

“My use for them is to free them from you!” Arascus shouted back again. A cloud of dust suddenly burst from a skyscraper, Fer stood up, in her light clothes she had used to visit the zoo. Like Kassandora, she could not fly, but both of them could reach the three White Pantheon Divines that had travelled here from the ground. Arascus smiled as Sceo’s face hardened and Alkom shook. Now they were even, three for three. With Arascus and Kassandora, it may have been a hard fight, with three of them here though, it wouldn’t even be a battle. And Olephia was up in the sky still, most likely he had thrown her too high and now she was returning to the clouds.

“And what credentials do you have to free anyone? You want Kirinyaa to exchange the rules of the White Pantheon for your chains?” Arascus burst out in laughter.

“My credentials Zerus? My credentials are very simple! I AM ME!” He shouted back. “What does a God of Lightning know of humanity? A Goddess of the Sky? A God of the Sun? What are you here for? To stand against Mankind’s Pride with your overwhelming force? Mankind has a very simple reply for you! Mankind says NO!”

The crowd below cheered. They didn’t need much to agree with Arascus. The White Pantheon had put Kirinyaa under embargoes and sanctions. Epa had been forced to stop all trading with the country, the UNN had agreed with the White Pantheon, although from what Arascus knew of their history, they always followed along with the Divine Mountain and imposed a full embargo on everything. Why should the people of Kirinyaa have a single spot of softness in their hearts for the White Pantheon?

Fer was loved as a kind-hearted whisperer of the fauna here. Kassandora was loved as the leader of the Reclamation War. Olephia was loved as the Goddess who felled the Caretaker. What did the White Pantheon have to offer?

“We have come to talk with the government.” Zerus shouted. Arascus thought up of a reply instantly, letting Zerus talk would be bad, he had to paint the man in a bad light.

“And Allasaria could not come herself? She could not even send the dog that is Elassa? She sent the three strongest forces the White Pantheon has? Have you come to talk, or have you come to intimidate?” There, that did it. Now no one would want to even to what Zerus had to say in Nanbasa.

“I will not ask for you permission to talk with the government of this land!” Zerus shouted.

“And I tell you, you will not intimidate people under my protection.” Arascus shouted and he saw Zerus’ turn a bright blue. Arascus used his own power in return. He had wanted to test it out for a long time. One by one, a hundred golden spheres appeared behind, a blade, a spear, an axe or a hammer slid out of each, teetering on the edge of being launched. Alkom’s face grew grim as he raised his hand. A ball of fire appeared in his grip and it started to expand. Winds began to howl around Sceo as she tapped into her own energies. Lightning burst around the clouds that formed above the three.

Fer roared from the side lines as she took a step forward. A heavy thud sounded from below. Spiked, black armour appeared around Kassandora, Joyeuse, her greatsword materialized into her grip and she spun the heavy blade, as tall as two men, easily around her herself.

The standoff lasted for a few seconds, and then Olephia ended it.

Arascus heard her before he saw her. The Hum of Chaos sounded from above in Olephia’s pleasant voice. Red lightning arced across the sky. Heat hotter than the Sun hit Arascus in the back, and the three White Pantheon stopped immediately. He saw it in their eyes, raw fear as dark clouds overtook Sceo’s pale ones and then split to reveal Olephia.

Arascus knew what she looked like, he had seen her many times before. She hovered there, her eyes red, her hair sprawled out into the sky as she hummed. There was nothing she had to say. The hum was enough.

The three White Pantheon Gods turned and fled. Away from Nanbasa, away from Kirinyaa.

Olephia’s hum stopped and she fell from the sky. Arascus caught her as he descended.

They had chased these three away, and they had just now assured that Kassandora would have her army by the end of the week.