Intata's Tall Tales
patreon
Godhood: for Dummies - Chapter 17
🕑 Added 2024-11-17 05:42:32 +0000 UTCOdin sat on his throne, Gungnir clenched loosely in his fist. He and Heimdall were the only ones in all of Asgard that were still looking for his wayward son. Lost in the void, as he was, he could feel it in his bones that this would not be the end of Loki. Just another trial for his family, in the end. A trial that he might have prevented, if he had been strong enough to avoid Odinsleep just a little longer.
But no, he reflected. Thor’s trial on Midgard was expedited due to his failing, and facilitated by Loki’s trickery. If one insubstantial little detail changed, he might not have been able to waken in time to pull even one of his sons from that ordeal.
He should be glad that Thor gained the wisdom and temperance necessary for kingship, though this, but it was soured greatly by the loss of Loki. A loss that was reported as final to all of Asgard.
A loss that he would not personally believe, unless shown the body. And even then, he would suspect otherwise until the day he died.
The God King did not pretend that he was a good father. To go all this time, and not see the hurt, the pain that his son was going through. To not see the jealousy that rot in Loki’s heart. To not curb Thor’s bloodlust sooner. To not make abundantly clear that he loved his sons.
He feared that he would be unable to do so, now. Too stuck in his ways. Too preoccupied with politics, the weight of his crown, and the defense of the realms. Anything he might accomplish was hampered by his grief for his missing son, and the bone-crushing terror of his lack of time to make amends.
He could only hope that when Loki was found, his son would listen. He could only hope that his words weren’t taken as platitudes, or spoken too little, too late.
The world, no. Existence itself shifted.
Odin’s hand tightened on Gungnir, and his lone eye swiveled over his domain.
He stood from his throne. Any shred of his regality lost in pure surprise.
“Heimdall.” He said quietly, knowing the man would hear him. “Ready my chariot.”
__________
“Well.” She said slowly, looking around with vague amusement. “You certainly went all out, here.”
Nathan shrugged, and moved to the newest addition of his ‘temple.’ He had added it in about an hour after completing Starsplitter - because he thought it would be funny, but the damn thing didn’t form in the way he had specified. No, instead of a cheap-looking folding chair (made entirely out of precious metals), a full, honest to god(himself?) throne materialized directly in front of the chryselephantine statue.
Nathan wished it would have at least looked gaudy. If he couldn’t have his folding chair, he would have wanted it to be eye-meltingly fabulous. What he got instead was something almost tasteful. The throne he was left with, was made of stone. A black marble with sapphire veining, capped on top with a vibranium volute, and inlaid with tiny orichalcum stars throughout its body. It looked as if a nebula had solidified upon the dias.
Very different from the folding chair, and Nathan wasn’t entirely certain he liked it.
The universe - or whatever power was doing this - was a better artist than he was, and it was shanghai-ing his own power to rub it in his face.
“I mean,” he began, studying the throne. “I can’t take credit for all of it.”
The Ancient one hummed, her eyes set on the hearth. “You do realize that the fire is divine, right?”
Nathan blinked. “No?” He turned to look at her, then the hearth. “I did use one of the ‘holy’ fires, but that shouldn’t have been permanent.”
The lady laughed. “You called on Hestia, right? And Hephaestus, if I’m not mistaken.”
“Well, I called for Hephaestus’s knowledge on how to make the thing, then Hestia to actually light it.” He tilted his head in thought. “Figured if I designated this place as ‘home,’ I’d get some sort of response.”
The Sorcerer Supreme glanced up at the Statue of Nathan. “Who then, for the statue?”
“Nobody.” He shrugged again.
Her brow furrowed. “Well then, you’re either a much better artist than I thought, or something else helped of its own volition.”
“Hey now.” He deadpanned. “Uncalled for. I can make pretty things.”
She was quiet for a moment, just staring intently at the statue. “Have you sat on the throne yet?”
“Nope. Too freaky.”
“Father teleported out of here immediately after it formed, then had a minor panic attack.” Alice piped up. Her little hologram booped him on the nose.
“Oi.” He waved her off. “Don’t tell my boss that. She’ll think I can’t handle the crazy stuff.”
His daughter gave him an unimpressed glower. “Starsplitter is still buried in the next mountain over. You should really go get that before some hillbilly finds it, like they did Mjolnir.”
“Hello, Alice.” The Ancient One smiled kindly.
“Hello, Grandmother!” The little AI figure beamed back. “Please fix Father. This whole situation threw him something fierce.”
“Grandmother?” Nathan mumbled. “Wait, no it didn’t!”
“Yes it did.” His daughter shot back.
“Definitely didn’t.” He pouted.
“Children. Behave.” The apparent ‘Grandmother” said.
Nathan threw his arms in the air dramatically, and stalked back over to the throne. “Anyway.” He growled. “So we have a talking statue, a throne that I didn’t make on purpose, and a divine fire burning without any fuel.” He turned to his teacher. “Any clue?”
The Ancient One rubbed her chin in thought. “Well, no, Actually. None at all.”
He looked at the Celtic woman with a half-lidded stare. “Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
“Is the Time Stone just a pretty rock, now?”
“I’m saying, Master Quill, that this occurrence was not known to me. Including the use of the Eye.” She looked at him meaningfully. “This is outside of its influence, much like your own appearance.”
He blinked. “Goddammit.”
“Quite.”
“So now what?” He asked, eyes staring off into space, contemplating everything.
“Now,” she began, hesitantly, “you sit in the chair.”
Nathan’s eyes turned to her slowly, like an animatronic puppet from Chuck E. Cheese. “What’s four plus fifteen?”
“Nineteen.” The Ancient One answered, eyebrow raised.
“Square root of one-twenty-one?” He walked toward her mechanically.
“Eleven?” She questioned, wondering where this was going.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Twenty-seven. Stop doing that with your limbs, it’s unsettling.”
Nathan ended his bastardized Asura spell, letting the four extra arms dissolve from where they attached on his forehead. “Your mental faculties seem intact.” He nodded to himself. “So why are you speaking crazy?”
“Um.” Alice waved from her default holographic position on Nathan’s wrist. “I’m going to side with Father on this one, Grandmother.”
His teacher sighed. “It’s the next logical step in whatever ritual you have put together, here.” She tapped her foot on the obsidian hearth. “There is no active divinity here besides the fire, and there is no obvious source of power for any of this besides yourself. None of this seems malevolent, and whatever possessed that statue helped you create - what I can only assume is - a divine weapon.” Her eyes zeroed in on him. “A divine weapon that, from what I understand, answers only to you.”
Alice sighed. “I had hoped you would talk him out of sitting in the freaky chair.”
“Me too.” Nathan hedged, then shrugged. “Alright, well if we’re doing this, then prep for the worst, right?”
Nathan sat down, ignoring the looks he got, and started forming his Celestial energy. Two rings appeared in his hands, both vibranium, and both utterly covered in etched runes.
“Nafadh 'iiradti, 'ayuha al'iilahi, wahfir allawh.” His hands twisted, and the rings began to float. Eldritch energies congealed in the air around him, and converged on the floating rings in a continuous stream. “Baind, Chen. Liga, chain. Dése, alysída. Bandhah, shrtrunkhala!”
Both rings glowed with a multicolor light, burning hot, as if they had come straight from the forge. Then fell to his outstretched palm, steaming, yet not burning his skin as they cooled. The whole process took about two minutes.
Nathan opened his eyes and examined them.
“Dramatic.” Alice summarized.
“At least two of those were unnecessary, but good form, Master Quill.” The Ancient One held out a hand, already understanding her student’s preparations.
Nathan nodded, both to himself, and his teacher’s words, then slipped one of the rings around his own finger. The second was dropped into the older sorcerer’s hand - along with another that he formed on the spot. Then, after a moment, slipped his Kimoyo bracelet off, and dropped that in with the rings.
She wore both without preamble, but asked, “Why the other?” Then slipped Alice’s home over her own wrist.
The young man shrugged. “I realized I never paid you back for that ring you gave me. This one should be leagues better for storing energies, and such.”
The woman huffed a quiet laugh. “You did not owe me, but I do appreciate it.”
Nathan waved it away, got up, and moved toward the throne. The rings he had just made were a Djinn Binding pair. The same device - if a good bit stronger, due to material, and a little extra magic - that had bound the exceedingly powerful, extraplanar beings.
He supposed he could have made an oil lamp, but he didn’t want to be subjected to an itty bitty living space, if the rings would work just as well.
Nathan looked back, noting the gathering energies around his teacher’s ring, before taking a deep breath.
He sat on the THRONE.
__________
The Ancient One. The Sorcerer Supreme. One of the oldest, most powerful people on the planet - if not the cosmos - nearly collapsed in the resulting storm that raged through the underground temple. Every layer of protection around her had crumbled, like they were made of tissue paper. Protections that had withstood the might of gods. Protections that let her walk among the realms and dimensions as if strolling in the park. Protections that did not protect her any longer.
The storm ripped visibility from the physical plane, the surroundings shifted and melted until there was only a colonnade left of the walls. Only the hearth, roaring with a blue, divine flame, in the middle of the room. Only Yao, the Elder Celtic, standing alone, and only Nathan, on his throne.
Even the Ancient One could not describe the scene beyond the colonnade. She had seen the birth of stars, the death of galaxies, the flourishing of life through the ages, and the very end of time. This, however. This was what one might experience inside the liminal space of a dying tesseract. The nebulous, shifting sands of a million, trillion Big Bangs. Frozen in time, yet vibrating in pure creation.
Nathan, or what might not be Nathan anymore, sat in the center of it all. Eyes closed, and unmoving. A hand-ax of Native American design, barely larger than the young man’s forearm, had appeared in his clenched fist - as if it had always been there.
The Binding Ring on her finger melted off, metal and magic dispersing into the storm, but she did not notice. Could not notice, as her every sense was focused on the titanic figure in the distance. Haloed in the rainbow of creation, the light of the afterlife, and the blind god’s salvation. Livid in its birth, yet serene in death, the statue that had previously stood behind the throne stepped atop the multiverse itself.
Cracks along its gold and ivory body, shining with a divine, blue fire. Its eyes, carved from the deepest concepts of existence. Sclera naught but a flickering, dying, candle flame. Its mouth, open, as if to speak.
“He Sits Upon His Throne.” The statue declared. “A Quill, Mightier Than Thy Sword. Rejoice In His Apotheosis.”
Nathan’s eyes opened, and all that existed collapsed into them. All that had been, all that would be, funneled into the two, round orbs on the young man’s face. The most distant galaxies, the titanic statue, the floor of reality, the ceiling of soul, and the walls of power, space, time, and mind. All held within the young man’s gaze for one, endless second.
He blinked.
The world righted itself. The temple, its walls, the statue, everything back to how it had been when they arrived.
Nathan blinked again. “You saw that, right?”
The Ancient One could only nod, and even that, only barely. Unconsciously, as her mind was elsewhere, her fingers danced in the air, pulling the surrounding energies together to remake her protections. She vaguely knew that this lapse would cause problems. Later reflection would bring her to curse.
Now, though, she had to see to the infancy of a new god.
Comments
BBTR
I hate when my students go through apotheosis. Gotta clear my whole week after that...
NaN03
The eventual brotherly reunion sure is going to be interesting...
MyAfroAteMyDog
Another great chapter
Apostle_of_Tea
Fuckin’ hell, epic description and visuals. The start of a new age in the blink of an eye. Quite literally
DJC (MagicLover2128)
Very nice.
Nicholas
Nice, troll got trolled
Squeeky602
Sick
