ã€ŠDivinity War - The Rise of the Godsã€‹ Chapter 01 - Welcome to the world of Gaia AN: I''ve read a few fictions about people becoming gods, so here is my take on the theme. It''s a light project for me, the updates will be slow. ****************************** The sun had already set when I left the college campus. The night was quite cold, being at the end of January. I slowly went straight home, with a slght limp in my steps and an annoying headache. It got worse once I got in my room, so I quickly took a pill and went straight to bed. I hate winters, it''s too cold and I always get ill. And I can''t do anything with this headache, not even sleeping. The pain is killing me and the only thing I can do is weakly turning around and around in my bed, trying to distract myself from the pain. After a mind-blowing surge of pain, my consciousness fadded away into darkness... ¡ I slowly regained consciousness. I didn''t know why, but I felt like something incredible and dreadfull happened to me when I lost consciousness. I felt like I went beyond a forbidden limit and lost something very important. For some reason, my mind was full of fear and grief. Then I noticed that my situation was very odd. Even though I was fully aware, I couldn''t feel a single part of my body, I couldn''t feel anything at all, and I couldn''t move a well. Also, I was no longer in my room, as I could see a planet bellow me, and it definitly wasn''t Earth. Even the most pitiful geography student would notice that the continents didn''t have the right form. Not only could I see the planet bellow me, but I could also see everything around me without turning my head or eyes, which I couldn''t even feel. I could see the 2 moons behind me, the blackness of space and the countless stars making up the galaxy. I was without a body, above an unknown planet, alone. Thinking about how I could end in such an absurd situation, I though back to what happened before I went to bed. I remembered the headache, and the paralysing pain that shot through my head before losing consciousness. I though hard on other possibilities, but I didn''t believe in them and couldn''t help coming back to the same conclusion. I had died. I had died and I was experiencing what is called ¡°afterlife¡±. I wanted to scream, cry, trash around. But I couldn''t. I was just a mass of awareness. After a little while I calmed down, gazing at the planet bellow me.

Welcome to the world of Gaia

Suddenly, a window similar to those pop-ups on the internet appeared in front of me. It stayed in front of me for several second, then it disappeared, promptly replaced by another.

You and 899 other recently released souls have been selected to become the gods of this world

I screamed in my mind reading the content of the message. The first thing that grabbed my attention were the words ¡°released souls¡±, as in released from the constrains of flesh, the written confirmation that I truly had died. Then I realised I wasn''t the only one in this situation, and the idea of becoming a god almost made my mind go blank.

You will start your new life in this world as demi-gods. To become true gods, you must earn divinity points and increase your divine rank. Once your rank is high enough you will be able to ascend to full godhood. Beware, for the number of seats as god is very limited

After the surprise from the possibility of becoming a god came the schock from knowing that all of us recently dead people will have to confront each other for a place at the top. Even though I didn''t how all of that would work, I was already having a bad feeling about it. Since the reward was godhood, it couldn''t be that simple. I wasn''t na?ve. I came from a Third World african country, living in one of the least favored area of the town, with the lack of security and sanitation, and the occasional power failures. It was thanks to my uncle and godfather that I got to study in France starting from highschool up to college. It was a giant improvement in my life style, but I still had to work to live besides my studies.

Now you shall proceed to select the area you will be sent to, and customize the vessel that will contain your soul.

Gaia has 3 main continents. Each continent is inhabited by differents sentient races. In 1 minute you will be able to select the continent in which you wish to be sent. There are 300 places available for each continent.

CONTINENT	MAIN RACES
Xaman	Humans, Dwarves, Elves
Limorei	Elves, Faeries, Bostians
Onyxon	Bostians, Demons, Humans

I was once more shocked. This world had 6 sentient races, and there were races from mythology and fantasy stories. Some races would certainly be more attractive than the others, like the elves. I could already see what kind of development each continent would have. Elves and faeries are often depicted as nature loving races, human and dwarves would develop industry, and the demons would be the bad guys trying to spread chaos... No, it couldn''t be that simple. There was nothing telling me that things would be the same as in the stories, and there were differences between areas concerning some races. Would the demons be the same as what was depicted in the religious book and other mythologic tales? What were the bostians? Why wasn''t there any informations about the races? I could feel I can select an area with a mental command, but no matter how much I concentrate on the races there were no details given. Why tell us about the races but not giving any informations about them? It felt like scam to me. I selected the third option and waited for the end of the 5 minutes. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.

You have 10 minutes to chose your gender and name

I was born a guy, so I choose to remain one. I though it would be akward to be a girl when I used to lust after them. Having guys lust over me was a terrifying idea, and thinking that I might lust over other guy was as terrifying. Thinking about sex, I also though the girls had the short end of the stick since they could suffer during the act, wether due to hymen, the size of the tool or the amount of lubrification. Guys really had it easy. That also got me thinking about Earth. To my knowledge, there were more guys trying to become girls than girls trying to become guys. More guys wished to be girls. I though that there might be a fair amount of guys changing their gender, and got anxious about the possibility of meeting a hot ¡°girl¡±. As for my name, I simply chose to use a part of my name and my surname and somehow link them. Back on earth I was named Issa Bakar. I turned it into Ish''Kar, which was a bit similar to Ishtar, and I loved the name Ishtar, so I was quite satisfied with my new name. I guessed that the next thing would be to customize our appearance and I was quite eager to do it.

You have 30 minutes to customize your appearance and voice. The base model has traits from the main races of the continent you chose, and the modifications you can make will be limited to what is available for these races.

After thinking for a bit it clicked in my mind. If we chose our appearance before chosing our continent, we could end up in a place with no familiar race, which would make things difficult. After all, people are more likely to follow someone similar to them rather than something completely different. It also reminded me of something else. We would be sent to that world as demi-god, which mean we would still be mortal. We could very well be attacked and killed by the natives. With how things proceeded, that risk was reduced, but not erased. I made a mental note about that and started to modify my appearance. I had only a little more than 25min left, and there was a lot of things to do. First, I set my height to 190cm. Thanks to a friend that was into fitness, I learned a bit about body type, so I choose what was called an ectomorph-mesomorph body type. If 1 was skinny and 5 large, what I chose was 2, below average. A fit body with a low amount of fat. Women needed a certain amount of fat for sex appeal, but not me. Thinking about it, I was sure no woman would have less than C cup. I also though a lot of guys would go with mesomorph type, the built type. The apparent age of the body could also be modified, with a minimum of 12 and a maximum of 40. I didn''t know about other, but I prefered to have a mature body, and by mature I meant the end of the teenage when the stop growing. Those first modifications only took a few minutes, but it was the easiest part. The eyes, nose, ears, hairs, skin and extra appendages. My base form looked human, with a furry tail, eyes with a vertical slit pupil, furry ears and 4 small horns. I guessed the furry parts were from the bostian race and the eyes and horns from the demon race. After experimenting for a bit, I realised that the demon race and bostian race offered a huge amount of possibilities. I started with what I wanted from the human race that I was already familiar with. As a former african, I kept my brown skin and black hairs, though contrary to my past self I chose long hairs, dreadlocks style. I got myself a handsome, but not overly beautiful face, like some might try to do, because I knew beauty could be a curse. Back when I was in middle school, I had seen a girl being beaten up by other girls because she was pretty and popular. It was in an abandonned building where I often played, and when I heard the people coming I hid in the ceiling. There were holes that I could use to see. It looked like one of the bullies loved a guy who fell for the pretty girl, while the other were jealous of all the succes she had. After hitting her the bullies called some guys. I watched as 3 guys gangraped her, the other girls also watching with satisfaction in their eyes. When the guys were done, the girls took pictures of the sullied victim and they all left while laughing. I watched as a girl 15 or 16 years old experienced what had probably been the worst day of her entire life. The worst part was that despite seeing such a terrible scene, I got hard and released a big load in my pants, and when the guys left, I didn''t help the sobbing girl and ran away from that place. I had been both very scared and very excited at what happened, and I was to ashamed to have gotten off from that. I never knew what happened to her after that and didn''t try to know. The guilt from that incident never left me, as I could have helped to find and punish the perpetrators. Enough about that. From the demon race I got myself a pair of dark silver horns that started from the top of my forehead and curved backward before curving once again and pointing skyward. (AN: the horns from Kurosaki Ichigo''s hollow mask, at least how they were when he killed Ulquiora, because I''ve long stopped reading/watching it) I also got a 150cm long black tail with an arrow head tip. From the bostian race I got emerald wolf-like eyes and white hawk-like wings. There was so much choice for change, I could even change the size of my penis so I made it 18cm long, but still average thickness. I didn''t want to hurt any future partner. For my voice I chose a strong but melodious tenor voice. Because all the changes were made using mental commands it went quite fast. I though 30 min would have been too short, but that wasn''t the case. Though I bet it would too short for some women... And some guys as well. ****************************** AN: Hope you enjoyed Chapter 02 - The descent AN: Second and final part of the starting process ****************************** After the 30 min went by another window appeared.

You have 10 minutes to distribute 100 bonus points to your attributes. You can''t allocate more than 25 points to a single attribute.

BONUS POINTS: 100
Strenght:	10	Constitution:	10
Agility:	10	Dexterity:	10
Intelligence:	10	Willpower:	10
Leadership:	10	Charisma:	10
Wisdom:	10	Luck:	10

When I saw the window with the attributes, I got a little confused. Was 10 the average for a child or a young adult? Because it was possible to change the appearance to a 12 year old, I was wondering if that age was used as a base for our starting attributes. Well, it wasn''t that important at that time. What was important was what the attribute did. I surmissed that strenght and constitution was for the power type, agility and dexterity for the speedy type. Intelligence and willpower was probably for the magic type. With races like elves, faeries and demons, there would obviously be some magic. Leadership and charisma had to do with social interraction. Luck should be the probability of good things happening, as for wisdom. People who are knowledgable and often take the right or the best decision are often called wise. No, more than knowledge, it would be better to say experience. Usually it''s old people who are called wise, and if a young one show the same ability he is said to be wise beyond the years or somethink like that. Wisdom must be related to use everything I learned and experienced to reach the best possible outcome, so I won''t underestimate that attribute. Luck my increase the chance of god things happening, but I doubt it would decrease the chance of bad things happening. Preparations is the best way to deal with bad scenarios. I bet those who rely on luck would encounter bad situations they won''t be able to deal with. Since I didn''t know where I would land, all those stats had their importance. Growing in an area with poor public security has made me cautious. I became the kind of guy that would rather avoid troubles than facing them. And I believe that after arriving in a new area, that kind of thinking would keep me from biting more than I can chew when I''m still weak. So I put 15 points on strenght, agility, intelligence, charisma and wisdom. I added 5 to each of the other attributes except luck. The points for luck were put in dexterity. With strenght I can deal some damage, with agility I can avoid some damage. I believed intelligence would help me learn things faster, and charisma would help me get along with the natives. Dexterity would make me more precise in my actions.

You have 10 minutes to distribute 100 bonus points to your resistances. You can''t allocate more than 25 points to a single resistance.

BONUS POINTS: 100
FIRE: 00	AIR: 00	EARTH: 00
WATER: 00	LIGHT: 00	DARK: 00
ARCANE: 00	ILLNESS: 00	POISON: 00

This window was easier to deal with than the previous one. For me, who had grown in an area with poor sanitation, I understood how dangerous poisons and illnesses could be. I''ve been ill plenty of time and nearly died twice. Most living being are vulnerable to fire, and for me, fire and ice were quite dangerous since they damaged the cells and made recovery more difficult. But from some games and other things, darkness was quite scary, attacking not only the body, but also the mind. Thus, I deemed poison, illness and darkness to be the most dangerous. I put 25 points of resistance in poison and illness resistance, 20 points in darkness resistance and 15 points in fire and water resistance. Then I waited for the next part of our ¡°vessel configuration¡±.

You have 10 minutes to select 3 starting skills in the following list.

The skills were dagger mastery, sword mastery, spear mastery, axe mastery, hammer mastery, bow mastery, shield mastery, fire magic, air magic, water magic, earth magic, light magic, darkness magic, arcane magic, appraisal, handicraft, herborism, prospecting, dismantling, tracking and camping. This time I was a bit stressed by the time limit, those skills would be my lifeline at the beginning, so I decided to take 5 minutes to think things from the start. I and 899 people would have to compete in this new world. There would be 300 people per continent. The goal was to accumulate divinity and reach godhood. I would need followers, start a religion. To get followers I would need to earn the respect of the native. With skills like sword mastery, bow mastery and fire magic, coupled with the existance of fantasy races, I could tell that the world was in a middle age-like era, or maybe a more primitive era. That would mean an era where violence and bloodshed wasn''t rare, an era where strong warriors would be valued. I remembered the history lessons, with aggressive civilisations defeating or annihilating the weaker, least aggressive ones. I would need to fight and kill in this world, but how would I fight? Did I want to fight upfront or sneak around? Did I want to be close or at a distance? There was also magic. How would I deal with opponents only sensitive to magic? Someone who doesn''t sneak around would probably be better seen than someone who does. However, I would still prefer to keep a distance with an enemy. I didn''t fight a lot in my previous life and I was quite scared since losing ones life would be easier in this new world. So I choose spear mastery as my first skill, so I would have a good range and keep a security distance with an enemy. Then I chose arcane magic. There wasn''t any details given, but I felt that arcane magic would have the least amount of creature immune to it. Though I wasn''t sure it would have proper attack spell like one would expect from fire magic, at least I hoped there would be something. Stolen story; please report. As for the third skill, considering what was proposed, fighting wouldn''t be the only way to advance. People needed food to live, and materials to make tools and objects. They needed ingredients to make medecine, and they needed experts to make all these. But the most important part for me were the basic materials. Everything came from the ground, good soil for farming and for plants to grow, ores to make mettalic tools and weapons, stones for sturdy constructions. I believed that prospecting would help find the best places to thrive and prosper, to find the promised lands. Though prospecting had more to do with finding ores and stones, I though it would help recognise good soil as well. Besides, they were just starting skills, meaning I could get other later.

The preparations for your vessel have been completed. You are going to be sent down on Gaia in 60 seconds. Once there, you can access your informations by thinking ¡°status¡±, ¡°skills¡± or ¡°full status¡±

I waited with both excitement and anxiousness. Even though we were allowed to chose a lot of things, nothing was done about the starting items. I didn''t know if I would have clothes on me once there, or basic equipment. After a short wait I felt the pull of gravity on me, and started to descend toward the planet. I watched as I moved toward one of the 3 continents. This continent looked to be on the southern hemisphere of the planet, in an overall crescent shape. As I entered the atmosphere, I felt its resistance on me as if I was a meteor, but there was no sense of pain or heat, it was neither pleasant or unpleasant. The area around me started to glow, and I was sure I truly looked like a meteor. With my 360¡ã field of view I noticed 3 other glows far away from me, slowly getting even further away before disapearing. My mind momentary grew cold as I confirmed that I had 3 rivals near my area. Though I wouldn''t meet them too soon as the land bellow was surprisingly wide. I was a little dazed by the speed at which I was moving. The glow around me turned into flames, flames that I could feel as if they were part of my body. Which they were. As I pierced through the clouds and sped toward the ground, the flames grew and adopted a humanoid shape. Looking at the approaching ground again, I tried to memorise the general geography of the area as much as possible. Though I was moving toward the inland, the sea wouldn''t be too far from my estimated landing point. There were more forest than plain, and a mountain range nearby. I noticed a town not far and took note of its general location. As I was nearing the edge of a forest, I felt my body reach its complete form. I heavily landed, lifting a small cloud of dust in the air and leaving a small crater on the ground. The flames around my body died out, leaving me there... completely naked under the rising sun. ¡°... Sight... Whatever, for now, ''full status''!¡±

Name:	Ish''Kar	Race:	Demi-God
Age:	-	Gender:	Male
Alignment:	Neutral	Reputation:	0
Primary class:	-	Subclass:	-
Secondary class:	-	Subclass:	-
Level:	1	Bonus points:	0

Divine rank: 1

Divinity: 200

Faith: - , 0

Titles

Life: 85/85	Mana: 120/120	Stamina: 90/90
Regen rate: 100	Regen rate: 100	Regen rate: 100
Status effects	-

Strenght:	25	Constitution:	15
Agility:	30	Dexterity:	25
Intelligence:	30	Willpower:	20
Leadership:	15	Charisma:	25
Wisdom:	30	Luck:	15

FIRE: 0/15	AIR: 0/0	EARTH: 0/0
WATER: 0/15	LIGHT: 0/0	DARK: 0/20
ARCANE: 10/0	ILLNESS: 25	POISON: 25

Skills
Spear mastery Lv1	Arcane magic Lv1
Prospecting Lv1	-

Special abilities

Divine body

Divine tongue

Divine aura

****************************** AN: That there ¡°subclass¡± twice isn''t a mistake. Feel free to create your own demi-god in the comment section (with a basic summary of their personality, field they have some knowledge in, likes and dislikes). Maybe I''ll use them later in the story... Chapter 03 - New body AN: Last ¡°introduction¡± chapter ****************************** After opening my full status I looked at the informations displayed carefully. Some of the informations displayed confused me a bit, and by concentrating on them I would sometimes get additional informations. First, the age displayed wasn''t a number, and it was due to the race ¡°Demi-god¡±. It gave me 3 racial skills which were listed as ¡°Special abilities¡±. The ability ¡°divine body¡± made us ageless, we wouldn''t grow up or get old. I wondered if those who chose very young appearance would like it. The ability ¡°divine tongue¡± gave me knowledge of the languages in my continent, and ¡°divine aura¡± would let people feel that I''m a special being. Apparently there was a class system, and the reason why there were 2 subclass cases was because I could get a subclass after advancing my primary job, and another subclass after advancing my secondary job. The most important things concerned the divine rank, the divinity points and the faith. The divine rank could rise up to 5. At that point, one would be able to ascend to godhood. The divinity points were like a special currency to acquire things from the system, including divnity ranks. I could use divinity points to acquire items, skills, special abilities or improve current kills. In fact, I could use the 200 divinity points given to me to get basic clothes, equipment and weapons. Faith would be the name of my cult or religion, and the amount of faith people would have in me. The higher the number of followers or the stronger their faith, the higher my amount of faith would be. Faith could be traded for divinity, but not the other way around, and trading faith would have consequences. My attributes were differents from what I chose at the beginning, but the cause was the skills I chose. The skill ¡°spear mastery¡± gave me 5 bonus points in both agility and dexterity. The skill ¡°arcane magic¡± gave me 5 bonus points in intelligence and willpower, and the skill ¡°prospecting¡± gave me 5 points in wisdom and luck. For the elemental attribute, the first number represented the affinity, and the second number represented the resistance. It looked like by raising my spear mastery skill, I would be able to learn spear techniques. My level 1 ¡°arcane magic¡± skill only gave me the spell energy dart, which used 10 mana points to cast. The ¡°prospecting¡± skill gave me the subskills ¡°ore identification level 1¡±, ¡°rock identification level 1¡± and ¡°soil appraisal level 1¡±. After making sense of what was shown in my status window, I spent some of my 200 divinity points to get rid of my nakedness. The only thing available were basic items: Male underwear (10d), Female underwear (15d), Short leather boots (15d), Long leather boots (20d), Leather pants (20d), Leather vest (20d), Shirt (10d), Leather belt (10d), Hooded cloack (20d), Short dress (20d), Long dress (25d), Dagger (20d), Short sword (25d), Hatchet (20d), Lightt spear (20d), Club (20d), Short bow (20d), 20 arrows (10d), Small wooden shield (20d), Leather backpack (15d), 3 days rations (20d), First aid kit (30d), Camping tent (30d), Cooking tools (25d), cleaning set (20d). I used 160 points for clothes, the spear, the leather backpack, the rations and the cleaning set. The shirt and leather vest were adapted for winged people so I didn''t have any trouble putting them on. Same for my tail with the underwear and the leather pants. The cleaning set was made of a towel and a piece of soap. The rations were dried meat and hard bread with a pouch of around 1.5L of water. The items purchased in the system appeared in front of me with a small light show. After dressing myself, I put the rations and the cleaning set in my backpack. The spear was made of light, thin wood and the head was made of bronze. ¡°... Before moving I should get used to my body. When I was dressing myself I had little control over my wings and tail. Besides, it''s still early.¡± I got some distance away from the forest before starting to exercise my body. The trees could hide a predator or a bandit and leave me with to little time to react. I first tried to move my tail around. In the first place, I chose it not for aestetics but as a back-up means for fighting or something else. After getting used to move my tail around, I tried to move the spear around with it. It was harder than I expected, and it would take a while before I get good enough to fight with it. At the very least I could whip opponents with my tail or grab them and pull them. I believed the tip of my tail could pierce unprotected skin, but my control wasn''t precise enough. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. After spending more than 30 min training my tail, I warped it around my waist and tried to move my wings. In the first place, I chose wings to have a high mobility from the beginning. After thinking about it for a bit, I wondered if I could really fly with these wings or just be able to glide. One way or the other, I wouldn''t have to fear height anymore unless my wings were to be impaired. Getting used to my wings were harder than using my tail. It took me around an hour to reach a decent level of control over them. After resting for a bit, I finally tried to fly. First, I bent forward and furiously flapped my wings, trying to lift myself from the ground, with no success. Next, I tried after running, but with little success. I didn''t get more than 10cm above the ground and I didn''t last more than 2 seconds. Still, being able to fly, even for 2 seconds, felt really good. ¡°... Maybe it''s because my attributes aren''t high enough? Maybe I lack strenght to lift my body, or agility and dexterity to properlly move my wings for flight? I''m still level 1 after all. Maybe I need some affinity with the wind element. Well, I''ll have time to deal with it later. Next on the agenda are my skills.¡± I picked my spear and made some tentative thrusting and sweeping moves. I realised I already knew the basics of how to handle a spear. Within 5 min I already had a good grasp on it. Then came arcane magic. The only spell I knew, energy dart, requiered a short chant and a hand sign, and turning one''s raw mana into arcane mana and gathering it where the spell would be activated. The mana conversion and gathering was a bit complex to achieve. The chant consisted of just one word, ¡°Yol¡±, and the hand sign was quite simple, having the tip of my thumb, middle and ring finger touch each other. I casted the spell 3 times and rested for a bit. ¡°Magic in this world is harder than what I saw in games and television. It require chanting, signs and mana manipulation. If it''s already like that for a basic spell, how would it be for an expert level spell or a master level spell? ¡ Sight... Right now, I need a full second to cast the spell, once I find a place to settle, I should train to reduce that time to half a second, it''s my only mean of long range attack after all. For now, let''s move toward that small town I saw when I was descending.¡± I gathered my belongings and started to walk. I decided I would try my third skill on the way on places without grass like the plain I currently was in. Reaching the town would require me to travel through the forest, which made me anxious as it was supposed to be the territory of monsters, a danger zone. The trees of the forest were at least twice thicker than those of an ordinary forest from earth, and they were also taller. However the lowest branches were around 2m in height so I could easily climb on a nearby tree if necessary. It was also darker under the morning sun. I advanced in a slightly crouched position, being carefull about where I put my feet and keeping my ears strained to catch any suspicious sounds. It saved my life as I caugh the sound of something cutting the air above me, and the sound was rapidly getting closer. I hastly threw myself away from where I was standing. BANG!! I glanced toward the place I previously was as I hastly stood up and took a defensive stance. In front of me was a terrifying being. A yellow and green snake monster, as thick as my hips and several meters long. It was trashing on the ground. That sight almost made my blood turn cold. Ever since I was little back in Africa I''ve been afraid of snakes becauses of stories I heard about people getting eaten by constrictors snake. Also, once in a while people would find venimous snake in the area where I lived. Because of that, there was even a period where I often had nightmares about snakes, either being crushed to death or being biten. The worst of the nightmares were those where there weren''t just 2 or 3 snakes, but dozen of them swarming toward me as I tried to run away or climb on the roof of the house. And now, after being reincarnated, right in front of me is one of my worst nightmares. ****************************** AN: These first 3 chapters were a little like the teaser of the story, so the fllowing chapters won''t appear so soon. Still, please do tell me what you think about the premise of the story