- Kill One Hundred
- And Then A Hundred More
- Let Them Drown In Their Own Blood
- And Seize Victory Where There Is None
- Kill One Hundred Gods
Long ago, in the land of Magna Orbita, there were a hundred Divinities.
Each God had their own domain, and their own phase-aspect: a manifestation of their domain within their soul, which itself split into a number of minor souls. These "minor souls" were the Gods' children, their angels, and parts of them in the same. Simply put, each of the gods was a crystal or a gem, with multiple facets; and yet, each facet being its own independent crystal.
A hundred Gods, then.
Ten of the Supreme Celestial Circle, and three of the Second Celestial Circle for each of the Supreme, and the remaining sixty children among the Third Celestial Circle. And below these all-powerful Celestials were beasts and monsters: children born of their blood, salt, sweat, and ichor. The Gods of the Terrestrial Circles, of which there are many, and in which the humans dwell almost at the very bottom.
In Magna, humanity is nothing but a low sub-race. A dozen hunters for a less-than-percentile chance to defeat a Divinity of the Third Circle, or a hundred to scratch one of the Second in a manner which it will forget about within seconds. Cogitate not even of a strike against the Supreme - they shan't notice your wan efforts, and you cannot comprehend how to damage them in the first place.
Theirs was a reign of tyranny and brutality: a city of humans displaced and destroyed, for Lethos, the Flowerbed Panoply, the Primordial Deity of Nature, needed a place to settle down. The flower's roots consumed countless homes like merciless spears, destroyed ancient ports and temples by overgrowing them in noxious thickets, and sucked power from the very earth, turning every crop of barley and wheat into a deadly, withered poison.
Its lower souls - its angels, of the Second Circle - assured the humans it meant no ill, it merely required a place to sit down and bask in the sun's beauty... and if a couple hundred thousand meaningless lives were extinguished in the process, who cares? Humanity is a bonfire meant to provide the Gods warmth, affection, and worship: its individual sparks meant nothing and were to be extinguished as the Gods pleased. It was the way of life and the way of being.
Until one mortal, meaningless, decided these Celestials have ruled over humanity for too long.
If you beat flint against stone for a hundred years, eventually, one of the trillion-trillion sparks will fly off, refusing to extinguish like the rest. Where the other sparks of heat died down in seconds, crushed by circumstance or lost to the uncaring cold of the universe, one spark is often enough.
One spark, in the right place, at the right time, shearing its way and ignoring the cold, dodging the leaves carried by the heavy wind, settles down as an ashen ember.
It settles down, and even though it knows it is about to die, with its last breath, it lights a brilliant fuse. The flammable zeal of the fuse will not stop where the spark had - its flame will grow brighter and more brilliant with each day, moving closer and closer, until it finally reaches its terminus...
And the Gods will now drink their own blood for their sin.
