Interlude:1
The school bell rang thrice signaling the end of lunch break, immediately after a human wave of grumbling kids chaotically moved through the corridors headed to their classes. One of such kids barely 15 instead of joining the random chatter around him kept looking around, anxiety and fear clearly evident on his face.
As he neared the safe area of his chemistry class something crashed on his left side destroying his balance and sending him against the wall. Hitting the wall he fell powerless to the ground, his glasses in hand’s reach, however when he extended his frail arm to reach them a foot beat him to it and cruelly crashed them.
Looking up, although in a blur, he could recognize the owner of the foot; a bully 2 years older than him who for the past week had been pestering and abusing him at every given chance.
“Poor little Tim, were those your glasses? Oh well, guess I did you a favor, now you won’t look as ridiculous as usual hahaha. How are you going to pay back my generosity?” asked the bully with unhidden cruelty in his smirk.
Tim had no idea what he had done to attract the ire of this stereotypical school bully, he just knew that one day he started pushing him around and took a liking to it. He had tried telling the teachers and his parents, unfortunately, no one had been able to hold the little beast back, on the contrary, the attacks had just gotten worse and worse.
“I have nothing for you, billy! Leave me alone!” Yelled Timmy with all the air he had in his body before trying to get up and sprint at the same time towards the classroom, unfortunately for him, Billy had a very fast and strong grip and caught his backpack before he could flee.
“Now, that’s no way to say thanks.” Said billy pulling on his backpack and throwing him again on the ground under the curious stares of other people. “That’s the place worms like you should stay, the ground. Now pay up, otherwise.”
Holding back the tears in his eyes Timmy fished out what he had left of the lunch money his mother had given him and surrendered it to Billy.
“Always a pleasure to make business with you, hurhurhur.” He said taking the money and going away, leaving a shaking Timmy alone on the ground.
“One of these days…” Said Timmy getting up while hugging his ‘incredible Bulk’ backpack, his eyes and face burning up in shame and rage he finally managed to enter the classroom. Some of his classmates threw him a few glances of either pity or mockery yet no one offered him any words of comfort as he walked down to an empty desk and sat down.
Shortly after the teacher entered the classroom and started illustrating the ionic bond opening up a lame 007 joke. (if you guys can’t figure it out yourself the joke is “my name is bond, ionic bond”) As the whole classroom groaned feeling awkward for their own teacher, Timmy stared in the void, while his eyes looked empty behind them he had his own whole world, and it was a world of fire.
In his little world he was a god who could smite anyone, blood flowed in rivers and the whole world burned, all those who ignored or humiliated him were subjected to the cruelest of tortures and he reigned alone atop a throne of ashes.
Something suddenly woke him up from his little daydream, four blue textboxes with something written on them.
“Your world is being invaded by the Quarith horde, to give your world a chance of fighting back the god of creation has bestowed upon all of you three choices of fate to help you in the war.”
He stared dumbstruck to the text, looking around he saw everyone else in his classroom with many different expressions going from surprised, to scared to skeptic.
Confirming he was not crazy he read the other three boxes.
“fate of the Blood: Your ancestry is full of oppressed and cowards, it’s time to break your chains! Choose this fate to gain the skill [Suppressed Rage]”
“fate of the Desire: Your desire for death and destruction has been acknowledged above all other earthly desires, choose this fate to receive the sparkle of divinity.”
“fate of the Human: Your species have been found to have unlimited potential, choose this fate to remove all limits to your growth. Warning: choosing this fate will give you no starting bonuses or abilities.”
He read the text twice trying to understand if he had read wrong or something. Finally convinced he had read right he clicked on the fate of desire box, his hand, and reasoning guided by 5 simple words: “desire for death and destruction”.
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Another little box appeared asking if he was sure and after he confirmed his world changed in a moment. Everything just seemed more real, his poor sight immediately became focused and even more, he could see more than he had ever seen even with glasses, even from 10 meters he could distinguish the single grains of chalk on the blackboard.
Looking around he could “see” things that weren’t even there, sparkling dust-like particles in the air, colored glows around other people. looking down on himself he saw something no one else had, inside his heart he could see a spark, as if someone had been rubbing two rocks against each other in the darkness the spark would appear and disappear in a moment making anyone who saw it ponder if they had actually seen it.
Suddenly his introspection was cut short by another blue box.
“Congratulations, you have made a step towards the top, all forms of life bows down to deities. As deity you have unlocked the following skills:
Divine sense: Allows holder to see past most illusions below rank 9. Able to spot divine energy and mana fluctuations in a 500 km radius from the user. Unlocks the skill observe (lvl max). All languages can be understood. Prevents mental attacks below rank 10.
Universal authority: the elements of nature obey you.
Divine body: user can’t be killed by those who do not possess the [divine] trait. User body is immune to death by aging. Strength and vitality are enhanced greatly.
Divine Flame: Able to melt anything below rank 10.
Divine spark: The divine spark is the core of a deity’s power, collect more of them to enhance and gain Divine skills.”
He felt full of power and invincible, his muscles twitched and pulsed growing bigger and bigger ripping his clothes and revealing a perfect golden tanned body emanating power.
Immediately he thought about summoning the divine flame and as if hearing its master calling a ball of white fire appeared above his hand, he tried to touch it and to his surprise it didn’t burn at all, it felt warm like a hug he willed it with his mind to move towards the desk and to his surprise the moment the flame touched the desk, the wood basically evaporated in a black plume of smoke.
He got up from his seat and watching the people around him he simply thought: “It’s time for my payback.”
Hours later of the Jim-Jeffrey high school remained only ashes and charred remains. Few survived the massacre taking with them the tale of a crazy boy able to control fire and among them, none would ever forget the gruesome spectacle of their friends turning to dust while running or the screams of terrors echoing among the corridors of their once safe school.
Walking among the ashes Timmy dragged Billy in front of the school. While walking he would laugh manically, thinking of all the way he was going to take revenge upon his old tormentor. Spoiling his fun the Divine sense warned of something coming very fast in his direction, turning his head and focusing his eyes he could see something resembling a big leathered bird flying towards him, its light blue scales reminiscing him of a frozen lake.
He quietly activated the observe skill and his mind was flooded by information.
[Name: Exalted O'Hara
Traits: Airborne, Elemental, Dragon, Divine.
Titles: Betrayer, One who killed its maker, Lord of the sky, Master of ice, One who feast upon Dragons, Xenocide, Ender of worlds, Traveler, Dread of the living, Universal Enemy, God Slayer, Divine spark holder.
Story: Created by a crazy mage on the world of Azrael by fusing a timino bird and countless frost fairies. Currently wanted dead or alive across the multiverse for the assassination of various divinities. Extremely dangerous.]
Timmy frowned upon looking at the horrendous beast heading its way, his new clarity of mind made him realize his use of Divine flame had attracted the monster his way. He could choose to flee but turning his gaze down on the whimpering bully he felt full of himself, “all who stand on my way shall perish.”
Recalling his flame he turned Billy into dust and prepared for the epic fight against the beast. Snippets of his previous massacre replayed in his mind, some of his ex-schoolmates trying to retaliate, some wielding powers similar to his, light swords, ice beams and martial arts, however, nothing worked.
Even when scorching flames burned off most of his muscles to charcoal and a particularly sharp kick cut his body in two, he would regenerate in a matter of seconds laughing off any attempt to resist.
Feeling full of power he watched as the blue bird opened its beak and fired a blue geyser at him, without moving an inch he sent his flame towards the attack, the two clashed and disappeared together.
Watching dumbstruck at his flame disappearing he tried to resummon it, however before it could appear the beast landed on him pressing him down with its sharp talons. Long cracks appeared on the concrete where the beast had squashed his body.
*CRAAAA!* (“I can smell one stupid little deity who is about to die, can you smell it too?”)
Said the bird with a mocking tone, its wings flapping happily as it could already feel another spark joining its collection.
“I just smell roasted chick- ARGH!” everything happened in a moment, the moment Timmy summoned his flame and prepared to attack O'Hara, its beak dived into Timmy’s chest and ripped out his still beating heart. Without the heart containing the spark, the Divine flame ran out of power disappearing into the void, leaving its master to die alone.
*CRAAAHAHAHAHA!*