The gods were stuck bickering. They had spent countless days bickering about the recent pulse of almost imperceptible primordial energy.
Humans had many forms of mana, gods and aspects had divine energy while the ancient world makers, the so-called Empyrean Titan, had primordial energy.
It had been decades since the last major meeting of the gods. The last major meeting was when the Twilight Emperor announced their desire to conquer the multiverse.
For the gods, the sudden appearance of the primordial energy was a greater problem than the Twilight Emperor, who almost succeeded in putting the multiverse under his thumb.
"An avatar?!! Are you an idiot! If we sent an avatar now, do you think the other powers will not notice!
"What powers? Who'll dare challenge us!"
"The demon kings and the eldritch gods you dumbass!"
Many gods were bickering.
"A vessel isn't enough! Even if we create a vessel, that thing wouldn't last a second against an Empyrean Titan, even if the titan was blind, deaf, limbless, and didn't have a body!"
"An avatar?! I thought wisdom came with age! If we send an avatar, we risk dying as well!"
The bickering continues in the court of the gods.
While these immortal and powerful entities continued to bicker, an entity reclining on a highly positioned chair sighed.
Immediately, the court of the gods went silent.
One of the gods, an ascended one, looks at the entity sitting alone on a throne above the court.
"So, what's the plan oh great lord?"
The ascended god was very sarcastic. The other gods trembled. This was not a good thing to do.
But they understood why. Unlike spirit gods and living gods, ascended gods were originally mortal. Ascended gods didn't have the same level of maturity or wisdom as the other types of divines.
This particular ascended was a young god. At first, he was excited about becoming such a powerful entity and have great control over the universe but his role was minor and he was given a minor world to govern.
This pissed the young god off. He originally came from a minor world, that offered little faith and power to the gods, but he did great deeds there and was offered godhood by the infinite dragon, the maker of all.
Despite being a god, he was still originally mortal. He still had mortal feelings and mortal problems, issues that he couldn't easily let go of. And one of them was bowing to someone he didn't deem worthy.
The aspect of this court did not care. It was one of the few aspects who thought that the appearance of primordial energy being wasn't worth being troubled about.
Despite his complaints, his peers did not care and forced him to hold a court meeting.
Each aspect had a court, a court filled with gods of varying powers and strength.
This aspect was the aspect of trickery. Doing nonsensical things bored him and he wanted to have fun. But after the prank he did to the twilight emperor which almost cost him his eternal existence, he was forced to mellow down a bit.
He looks at the ascended god glaring at him then he smiled.
The aspect of trickery had a very interesting idea.
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Magnus was walking back home. Gregory carried Jordan and Elisha while the giant drake carried Zack. In addition, the bear's corpse was being dragged back home. Magnus was a pragmatic sort, he would never allow the body to go to waste, every part will be used as a sign of respect to the previous king of the forest.
Melinoe tried to speak with Magnus but he was ignored. When he tried to speak to Magnus again, Sanria was about to get angry, but Magnus told them off.
Magnus told Sanria that he was disappointed in her for not coming to help despite having the ability to do so. When Sanria tried to defend herself, Magnus told her that he could sense where she was hiding.
After that scolding, Sanria and Melinoe were both gloomy. Magnus gave Gregory an appreciative nod.
Gregory tried his best not to feel happy with Magnus's acknowledgment as his daughter showed extreme discontent.
The group slowly approached the village.
Magnus suddenly stops and the people following behind him stops as well.
"Gregory. Is there a place big enough for Humilem to stay?"
Gregory takes a look at the drake.
I have the shed... but he won't be able to move.
"We have the shed my lord but... he will be stuck. He won't be able to move properly."
Magnus thinks then he shakes his head.
"That would not be a fitting home for the first of my family to appear and willingly offer their service to me."
"Aren't we family as well?"
Sanria's voice has a heavy amount of pity in it.
Magnus looks behind him. He looks at Gregory, who is embarrassed by Sanria's attitude, and at Sanria.
Family? Hmmm...
"No."
Sanria becomes more downtrodden.
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"At least not yet."
Hearing this, Sanria suddenly recovers. Sanria beams at Magnus. Gregory smiles as well.
"What about me, my master?!"
Melinoe sees the happy emotions between Sanria, Gregory, and their master. He feels envious.
Sanria was about to become angry but Magnus chuckles. Sanria and Melinoe were surprised by that.
Magnus chooses not to answer Melinoe's question.
"Gregory."
"Yes, my lord?"
"If you told these people about the drake, will it cause trouble?"
Gregory nods.
"Yes, my lord. And... if travelers come, some of them will likely speak of it."
Sanria scowls. She knew how much the village loved to gossip.
For them, exchanging stories with travelers and adventurers was one of the blessings of being a frontier village.
"Hmmm... Humilem."
Humilem, the drake, perks up at the call of its name. It almost shows a sliver of a smile.
"Come."
Magnus raises his hand and the drake quickly approaches. Lowering its head, Humilem lets Magnus touch his head.
For dragons and their descendants, bowing was only reserved for one's betters, sometimes not even. In some cases, dragons would rather die than bow.
Humilem waited for Magnus.
"Melinoe."
Melinoe perks up and quickly approach the side of Magnus.
"Yes, master!"
"Watch closely. I will cast a rather complicated spell. I want you to remember it, practice it, and then cast it."
Melinoe, who was excited to learn, suddenly felt his jaw drop. He felt his balls suddenly enter his body due to fear.
"Le-learn? A complicated spell?"
"Yes. In your tongue, it is called polymorph. I can use it to transform myself but I prefer my natural polymorph abilities. I will be transforming Humilem so that he can live with us."
Despite staying silent on Magnus's decisions, Gregory was thinking of the cost of daily living.
Will they eat much? Wait, they're in their human forms. Surely, they'll eat only as much as we do. Sanria... eats a lot... She eats twice as much as our biggest men... don't tell me, my master and this drake will eat as much!
While Gregory was having a financial crisis, Sanria was staring at Magnus. While she couldn't cast spells due to the lack of a magical foundation in her body, she wanted to learn magic as well. If she learned polymorph, she can transform herself into a dragon. She would be like her master.
Sanria felt very giddy at the thought of being like her master.
While Sanria was stuck in her delusions, Melinoe was about to ventilate.
Melinoe was proud but this was not confidence. It was a misplaced pride, created so he could protect his fragile ego. Now that he was being faced with a great task, he was afraid he would fail like all those times in the academy.
He was afraid he would be deemed worthless again.
"Ma-master. I should start with the basics first... I believe that even your basics are greater than the knowledge in my previous school!"
"Melinoe."
"I- I mean! There's nothing wrong with starting in the beginning right?!"
"Melinoe."
"I mean come on! Polymorph! I haven't even heard of the spell!"
"Melinoe."
"I haven't even repaired my magical foundation! It's still incomplete! I can't cast magic missile, one of the simplest spells, much less a great spell such as that!"
"Melinoe!"
Magnus raises his voice and Melinoe's incessant chattering was immediately silenced. He looked at his young master.
Oh no... I did it again... My master will hate me...
"I'm not teaching you because I have expectations."
Melinoe looks at Magnus with a surprised face.
"What do you mean my lord?"
"I have no expectations for anyone. I only wish to learn and in this case, teaching you might teach me. So, will you try this with me or not?"
Melinoe's felt his heart soften. His master did not expect anything from him. He would be taught without any conditions or any expectations.
That... That feels nice.
"Ye-yes! I'll do it for you master!"
"Good. Now watch closely, I will only do it once. Commit it to memory. This will be your first lesson from me, a reward for following me despite the unnecessary abuse you received."
Melinoe nodded vigorously.
Yes, I was abused a lot!
Melinoe was about to look at Sanria but the vicious woman glared at him.
Magnus, ignoring the interaction between Sanria and Melinoe, speaks in an arcane tongue.
Unlike Melinoe and most mages in the world, Magnus had an excessively large amount of mana, even in his young form, but unlike most mages, Magnus did not need to draw power from himself.
With the arcane works clearly spoken, Melinoe watches in rapt attention as Magnus commands the world to twist and turn to his very whims. Humilem, the drake which Magnus adopted, looks around with a dopey face. Its tongue was lolling out as Magnus surrounded it with the spell. Humilem releases a cute sound as its body slowly contorts. Its scales slowly become peach in color and its body becomes smaller. Within a few seconds, Humilem transforms from a rather large scaly predator to a young child, around the tender age of 6.
Humilem had cute features and due to Magnus being the one to cast the spell, Humilem looked a bit like Magnus. One could say that they were like siblings.
The transformation of Humilem seems to have utterly shocked Gregory and Sanria, especially Gregory. Gregory watched as his problems grew and grew.
How will I explain that I have 2 more kids?
While Gregory is exasperated by his situation, Sanria is smiling.
If I learn this spell, I would be able to transform! Now... I just need to ask this worm how to cast spells.
Sanria looked at Melinoe but the mage was too focused on understanding the intricacies of the spell Magnus cast.
Now that Humilem did not have his draconic form, it was safer for the group and their unconscious adventurers to enter the village.
Magnus takes a look at his servants, the unconscious adventurers, and the bear corpse.
"Let's go."
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The aspect of trickery called upon the tribune, a collection of the many aspects of reality. Like the gods, the aspects were entities who governed specific concepts or laws that made up the vast multiverse but unlike gods, who usually commanded specific or limited domains, aspects commanded vast and almost infinite concepts.
The aspect of trickery did not only govern trickery but also laughter, joy, sadness, betrayal, good humor, and many more concepts. The other aspects controlled a similar amount of concepts as well. One's importance to reality determines one strength and rank in this cosmic hierarchy. The aspect of trickery was quite important but also not so much, it was more or less in the middle.
"So trickery, what is the purpose of this meeting?"
The one who called trickery was a higher aspect named order. Order encompassed the many concepts relating to its name.
"Well, it was not I who called the meeting but..."
Trickery purposefully stopped his sentence which annoyed many of the tribune members.
"Speak already trickery or I shall smite you where you stand!"
War, one of the more powerful aspects, screamed. His scream sent out an invisible psionic force which spelled the doom of many unlucky planets in the multiverse.
Trickery chuckled. He couldn't die, at least not in such an easy way, but being smitten by an aspect was still painful, at least for the conscious and sapient aspect.
"As I said, it wasn't me who called this meeting but!"
Trickery gestured his incorporeal hands to the hypothetical door.
The members of the tribune looked at the quantum door and they see their leader, the greatest of them all, the aspect of creation and destruction or also known as the infinite dragon.
The aspects collectively gasped. The infinite dragon has not shown its face ever since the dawn of creation. At the time of creation, only the aspects of order, chaos, life, and death were present. The aspect of creation and destruction ordered the four aspects to spread his will so that the multiverse would come into existence. After that order, the infinite dragon disappeared. Why would he appear now?
Order, chaos, life, and death studied the aspect of creation and destruction but they could not divine its intentions.
Before the aspects could speak their thoughts, the infinite dragon spoke. With a few words, the entirety of creation seemed to shake.
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Magnus was currently reading a small parchment while tapping his fingers on the dreaded book that he took from Melinoe.
Oh?
Magnus turns his head towards the window to look at the sky.
Hmmm...
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The aspects agreed with the current plan. According to the infinite dragon, the pulse of primordial energy came from a dangerous enemy.
What this enemy was, the other aspects did not know. But what they did know was that they needed a proxy, a powerful entity that they could use to face this enemy. Despite being a dangerous enemy, the infinite dragon also explained that it was currently weak but it would gain power if left alone. To counter this, the aspects decided to summon not a vessel or avatar but a hero. A powerful hero gifted with enormous talent, unfair abilities, and most of all, a malleable personality.
And so, the aspects called their slave.