“Let me tell you all a story—a story about how this all began.

Three and a half millennia ago, in a land long since lost—a queen emerged from among her people. Her husband believed himself to be the descendent of a god, and he was worshipped by his people for his false lineage.

Unbeknownst to this king however, while he was not spawn by divinity, he lay with it. The years would go by, and the king would pass, but his queen lived on. She would inherit his kingdom and rule in his stead. She excelled at policy, economics and even warfare. But what was even more outstanding was her timelessness.

She was as strong as she had ever been when she celebrated her first centennial. By now, no one could deny her divinity—not even her. They were all forced to accept that their queen was no more—the title beneath her—the woman once known as Fu Hao needed to die. In her place, Geon, the Sun Shen was born.

Another century would pass in service to her people, before the Sun Shen left in search of others like her. Her pursuit of gods born into the realm of men took her to Africa—to rumours of a woman proclaiming to be the spirit of the earth itself.

It was there that I met Geon. I was in my prime and elated to finally lay eyes on one of my youngest daughters. She was as excited to meet me as I was to meet her.

We each displayed our gifts—happy to have found each other—but it quickly became apparent that my abilities vastly outstripped her own. Humbled by the display, she became my disciple, living and training with me for the next two centuries. She was a quick study, much faster than her older brothers had been, despite her not sharing their primordial potency.

My training cemented her as the apex of her race and heralded the commencement of an ancient rite of passage for your people.

She was understandably confused. She questioned whether or not she had surpassed me. So naïve, this child.

I did my best to explain that I was merely the architect of the world she inhabited and the engineer of the life that inhabited it. I was no god then—nor should I be considered one now—merely a maker, commissioned to do many great works.

Part of these great works was the evaluation of my creations—and for this task, I had created Destroyers to unmake them. Geon’s confusion grew. She could not understand that if my creations survived their Destroyer, then they would be truly well done.

As she struggled to understand a mother’s love, I cast off my own divinity and summoned another presence into it. This presence—my son—was equal parts majestic and repulsive to his younger sister. She watched with horror as he took shape. He was given the name Teros and entrusted with the task of reducing her world to ashes, while she was charged with preventing this fate and proving that her race deserved to rule over this Garden.

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It was then that the two clashed for the very first time. The conflict ended in Geon’s decisive victory and Teros’ first escape—the first of many.

These siblings would clash again and again, with each sortie slowly growing in Teros’ favour.

It would not be for another three centuries that Geon would find another like herself. In an age of wonders, rumours of demi-gods emerging within the war between the budding Greek empire and the all-conquering Persian Empire spread like wild fire. My daughter tracked the exploits of an exiled Persian royal that had fled to Greece and an orphaned Greek who now commanded the Persian armies.

She was initially sceptical of the stories about these two women, but after decades of tracking their exploits she finally witnessed them in battle. Artemisia of Caria, the would-be assassin and her target Aesis of Persia. Geon watched for days as these women battled each other to a stand-still—a battle not unlike her last bout with my son.

I wonder if she felt as I did when she took these young women under her wing—convincing Artemisia to give up her quest of assassinating Aesis while she prevented Aesis from extracting revenge on the assassin for her son’s untimely demise. I suppose ‘convincing’ might be a generous term.

Nonetheless, to aid in the psychological growth and spiritual healing required to elevate these women from mortal enemies to immortal sisters-in-arms, she stripped them of their past identities and renamed them—just as she had been renamed.

Aesis was christened Synchros and Artemisia, Khaaos.

Two centuries later the three would once again defeat Teros—though this time barely. His strength was growing at an impressive rate. The three would not be enough to defeat him once he reached his apex.

This knowledge led to the recruitment of the final member of your Guardians: Boudica of the Iceni. Like her sisters before her, she would bury her human incarnation and take on the name Dias. Geon continued to train her sisters, teaching them as I had taught her all those centuries ago.

With Dias’ help, they would once again manage to rout Teros, but once again their victory would come by the narrowest of margins—and also at a cost. Teros’ powers had finally matured. As he did in life, he had once again tapped into the power that erased his kin from the annals of time—but this time he brandished it to dismantle the sisters that had been awarded the earth in his stead.

In the three centuries that passed between their next battle with Teros, Geon would recruit four more warriors to their cause, but none would survive. My power had become his once again, and it was too great a weapon for these youngsters to resist.

Subsequent battles would take their toll, so in their desperation, they devised a risky strategy. My daughters would shed their corporeal shells, unfettering their power as I had done and passing it along to the next generation. The warriors of their choosing would make up for what Teros took from them, and with their accumulated knowledge, expertise and power, they would guide new generations to succeed where they had failed.

Four generations of Guardians served before you, but none of them saw through my gambit.

You did.

Your evaluation—started over three millennia ago—has finally been completed. You, my children, are finally worthy of my Garden.

My name is Gaea, and you, my Great Works, are Well Done.”