While Alsvartr followed the red dragon, I spent my time trying to organize all the information about gods in my head. From what I could gather, souls are not forever. After someone died, if they worshiped a god, they would go to that god’s realm. Some gods would hoard the souls, allowing them to grow stronger by learning spells or practicing martial skills. I assumed it was for some ultimate battle in the future between good and evil.
Other gods choose to have their believers fight and consume each other to become stronger. The weak fed the strong. Those who died were destroyed. Some gods even fed off their followers to become stronger. Of course, these types of gods were mostly demons and devils who had ascended to godhood.
When someone died, their soul was usually drawn to the plane where the person's deity resided. If someone didn’t worship any particular god, they were often judged by a god of death. Even if a god of death didn’t personally judge a soul, the person’s soul was usually drawn to the plane that most exemplified their alignment. Once a soul was claimed by a god, they rarely wanted them to leave their domain.
In the infernal realms, souls were tormented until all their soul energy was used up. Righteous souls might be sent to the Heavens, where they lived contentedly until their souls faded away. Mortals that cast Reincarnation, Raise Dead, and other similar spells often attracted the attention of the gods. Many of them resented the fact that a mortal had taken away a soul that belonged to them. They guarded souls like dragons guarded gold.
However, despite how gods felt about losing souls, in most cases, before a soul completely dissipated, most gods would allow the souls within their realm to be reincarnated. They did this for several reasons. One reason was because the person’s soul was rejuvenated when he or she reincarnated. Then, once the creature died again, the gods could harness the soul energy again. It was sort of like recharging a battery before using it again.
Of course, mortals could make deals with gods. Souls were like money to gods. If the god was offered up a good enough deal, they were often more than willing to give something in return for a soul. When a mortal entered into an agreement with a god, they were tying their soul to a divine or infernal realm. This would tether their soul to a certain realm.
It should go without saying that there was a limited amount of power a god could possess, at least until they became an overgod. Just like souls weakened over time, so too did the souls of gods. Gods could also suffer injuries. Perhaps they lost followers or were injured by other deities, but whatever the reason, they needed extra energy, no matter the source. In order to recover the energy, some of these deities absorbed the souls of the dead and made them “one with god.” However, nothing was ever free. Deities who did this often paid a price.
If a “good” god devoured the souls of evil mortals, a sliver of that evil would contaminate their being. It was sort of like good gods might be considered cold water and evil gods as hot water. Once the amount of cold water decreased, a good god might need to refill their tank. The hot (evil) water would change the cold (good) water. The opposite was also true. Even though evil gods loved tormenting innocent souls, they would rarely absorb them.
While this might stabilize a dying god, if they continued to collect random souls that were too dissimilar to their essence, the deity would eventually lose focus and become a detached god. They grew to become less in touch with reality and eventually faded away. Either that, or they became monstrous gods, much like the Lovecraftian gods.
Gods needed beings who were similar to them to lessen the negative effects. A god of fire who continuously absorbed the elemental essences of ice might lose his connection to fire. However, if they consumed fire elemental essences, they might grow stronger. Because of this, sometimes when a god of good was weakened, his followers would offer their souls willingly to help their god recover. Of course, evil gods might consider the evil souls they have collected as backup batteries to be used when they are low in energy.
I had learned most of this information from Hyggiandi and from being a twilight theurgist. Although I wasn’t certain all the information was actually accurate, I suspected that most of it was true. However, I was more concerned about creating a godhead, not repairing an existing godhead. Because of this, I tried to concentrate on what I had learned about newly created gods.
New gods usually were under the sway of a more powerful god. They were often allowed to use some of the domains of the god who granted them the divine spark. For example, the god of the sun might create subservient gods, such as the lesser god of fire and the lesser god of light. Of course, even gods could be killed and have their domains stolen.
Neither of these really pertained to me though. I needed to concentrate on what differentiated gods and mortals. Sighing, I started trying to focus my thoughts by organizing my thoughts on paper.
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After looking over the list I had made, I realized that as soon as I had declared myself a god and gained believers, I had become a false god. At the moment, I was a quasi-god. To become a minor god, I needed to create a divine body. After that, I would need to create a divine realm if I wanted to become a lesser god. As for a true god, that probably involved combining a divine body and a divine realm. Then, if I died while outside my divine realm, I would be resurrected within my divine realm. Eventually, if I became a powerful enough god, I would become one with everything. Faith was the energy gods needed to move from one stage of existence to the next.
Actually, there were a few things I probably should have added to the descriptions of the gods. If the divine body of a god was killed, the god would need its believers to revive. Even if the god was revived, their divine rank would fall. Most gods tied their longevity and power to ideas or concepts instead of a mortal body. In fact, they often personified those ideas or concepts. Perhaps I could use faith to condense a divine body that was composed of the essence of those ideas.
Then, as long as those things existed, I, as a deity, would exist. For example, assume I became the god of lamplighters. Since that profession no longer existed, and if that was my only domain, I would start to fade away. Because of this, gods often tried to have core portfolios, such as fire or life. Since I was condensing my divinity around the concept of death, I wouldn’t have to worry about having a weak foundation.
Usually, gods don’t like to share their domains since this would reduce the power available that they could draw on. They didn’t want another god to siphon off the faith they needed to survive. However, the more common their domain, such as a god of death, the more they were more willing to share their domain. For example, I eventually might create a minor god of murder or a minor god of disease. Having a central or core domain created a vast reservoir of power to utilize. If I had more water than I could use, I would be more likely to share the water.
After thinking about my situation, I realized how lucky I was. Other gods had to fight from scratch. They created their own unique or obscure domain so that they were less likely to offend a more powerful god. They were basically eating the leftover crumbs.
Eventually, they might grow strong enough to fight for the more central domains. New gods were often like new businesses, They often didn't survive for too long. Their market was either too small or the big businesses got upset about losing some of their profits. Then the established god would swoop in like Walmart to destroy the small guy. It would take a lot of finesse to straddle the line and start working their way up the divine ladder.
However, since true gods merged their divine bodies and their divine realms, they weren’t able to step back into the mortal realms. Because of this, they had to create avatars. However, because the gods were no longer tied to the mortal realms any longer, their powers of their avatars would be reduced when not in their own divine planes. This was also the way that many newer gods were born.
To create an avatar, a god had to imbue that avatar with a portion of their divinity. If the Avatar was killed, the god would be able to reform in its realm. However, they would be unable to go back to the mortal realm for a long time. During that time, mortals could take the divine essence from the avatar and create a divine spark. They might even use that time to establish themselves as gods.
Again, I was getting distracted though. I really needed to concentrate on one thing at a time. I needed to create a divine focus and a divine body. From what the system said, I needed to create some type of divine focus first. I would probably need to infuse all my faith points into a divine focus. Then I could concentrate on creating a divine body. What I wasn’t sure about was what I needed to do to create a divine body. I at least had some clue about the divine focus.
While I assumed that it was possible to make a divine focus out of a regular item, I also suspected that the more valuable or unique the object, the easier it would be to transform it into a divine focus. The divine focus probably needed to be very durable. I might even need to take it to a place surrounded by my divine domain when I infused it with faith. For example, if I was a god of fire, I might search for something extremely valuable, and durable, that was associated with fire. After that, I could take the item to a volcano.
I was also extremely lucky that the Necropolis was nearby. It would be the perfect place to conduct any spell or ritual that concerned death. It was the promised land for necromancers. The only worry I had about going there was that I wasn’t sure how the clerics of the dead god of death would react. They still worshiped Banasár and might not be happy to see someone else taking over his domain. Still, it was the best place for me to infuse faith points into a divine focus. While I would most likely need to use a ritual to accomplish this feat, it also sounded like something I could do, at least theoretically.
However, how could I form a divine body? Did I need to use the divine focus like a wizard might use a magic staff? Also, exactly how long did I have to create a divine focus and a divine body? I would assume that the weaker a divine domain, the longer I could endure as a quasi-deity. However, the domain of death was a core domain, which meant that my time was probably limited. Since the system had warned what would happen if I didn’t achieve both goals, I really needed to accomplish them as quickly as I could.