TGS - Chapter 132
Chapter 132: The Bloody Ritual
On the northwestern border, outside Digebia City.
Separated by a barrier of divine power, the gods of Solancia stood opposite the other two pantheons. The god power field, invisible to human eyes, was extremely distinct in the perception of the gods, its presence as tangible as a mountain range.
A mountain range could at least be crossed, but the semicircular barrier offered no passage. For the powerful foreign deities to enter Solancia's territory, they would have to break through with an equivalent amount of divine power.
This was not difficult.
The barrier was not the sum of the Solancian major gods' power. The divine power it held was finite and would be gradually consumed. Perhaps a few strikes from the Sanur Wolf God could not breach this defense, but if a real fight broke out, the barrier would not be of much use.
What truly had a deterrent effect were the Solancian gods themselves, suspended in the air behind the barrier.
The God of Sky and Wind, En.
He took the form of an infant and presided over the gods, his expression solemn and stern. Such a look might seem comical on a child, but as everyone knew, a god's strength was never judged by their form.
For a long time, not a single god spoke first. They stood silently opposite each other, yet the atmosphere did not feel strange, as if it were merely a moment of thought before a conversation began.
A whole night, for them, was indeed just a moment.
And during this time, Digebia City behind the gods had completely fallen. The tribe from the highland steppes had become the temporary masters of this important city.
The Wolf God was the first to speak.
"Day has broken." Huracan bared his sharp fangs at the gods, his tone laden with meaning. "The humans will offer us sacrifices—the skulls, hearts, and fingers of Solancians, from morning till night, from the first to the hundredth—"
The God of Wisdom, Nierde, frowned. "Excuse me, may I interrupt?"
The Wolf God: "What, are you displeased?"
"No, I just don't understand why you're saying all this." Nierde paused. "To let us know that you can count from one to a hundred?"
The Wolf God bared his teeth and brandished his claws threateningly.
Nierde closed his eyes. "My apologies. I overestimated."
This beastly appearance probably couldn't even count to ten.
The Wolf God's grim eyes darted left and right, his gaze sweeping from the Moon Goddess on the far right of the opposing side to the Death God on the far left, finally settling on the small form of the Sky God.
A bestial ferocity flashed in his eyes, but in the end, he only muttered, "Solancian gods, hmph."
The Solancian gods.
The earliest pantheon to form on the continent, and also the one that had existed the longest. It was established at the same time as Solancia several thousand years ago.
And among them, the King of the Gods, En, the God of Sky, was perhaps born even earlier.
Even earlier, when the scattered city-states on this land had not yet been built, when the separated human populations still worshipped their respective animal totems, the Sky God might have already existed as a totem.
The tribes of that time could not yet be considered civilizations, and the totems they worshipped could not, of course, be called gods. But it was certain that En was one of the very first gods.
This brings up the question: what determines the strength of a deity's divine power?
It is the attributes bestowed by humans in their myths, and the amount of faith they receive from the mortal world.
Under normal circumstances, the former carries more weight than the latter. However, when comparing pantheons from different civilizations, a new criterion is introduced: time.
A pantheon that has existed longer naturally possesses greater divine power.
And although Solancia was not like the Sanur, where every citizen was a soldier, nor like Kasnie, which revered martial prowess...
...this ancient kingdom occupied the vastest territory and had the largest population. Both conditions were advantageous, so it could be said that the Solancian pantheon was naturally stronger than the other two.
Opposite the Solancian gods, the Goddess of the Mind, Perseus, watched in silence as these thoughts crossed her mind.
Immediately after, the smile on her unchanging face seemed to deepen.
Even if the Solancian pantheon was the most powerful, in this divine war, they would be the ones at a disadvantage.
...After all, it was one against two.
At this thought, the Goddess of the Mind spoke up. "The Solancian pantheon has eight major gods, but there is also a River Goddess. Why is she not here?"
Hearing this, the Solancian pantheon had yet to react, but the Sanur pantheon looked over in confusion.
A deity with a sheep's head nervously clutched its spiraling horns and said timidly, "Solancia's River Goddess... I don't think she has ever appeared."
The Wolf God sneered. "That's their pantheon's... what's it called, a human-god. She's never fully formed, has she? Probably can't even join the battle."
A look of schadenfreude appeared vividly on the wolf's face, but it quickly turned to confusion.
"Could it be that she has awakened?" the Wolf God asked bluntly.
The Goddess of the Mind smiled faintly and nodded.
The Goddess of Love, Adia, yawned—gods, of course, do not feel fatigue, but the gesture was an excellent way to express mockery. She lazily curled her lips. "That was only about ten years ago. You know about it so clearly, you must have been preparing for a long time. Right, Perseus?"
The Goddess of the Mind: "Just a bit of concern. After all, she was a 'human' I once knew. She left a deep impression."
Adia didn't know much about Lotus's past before she became a god, nor was she aware of any interactions between these two deities from different pantheons.
She looked at Perseus, a hint of uncertainty in her eyes.
The Earth Goddess, Suojia, shook her head and said kindly, "Don't bother with her, Adia. Perseus was difficult to deal with even thousands of years ago."
The Goddess of the Mind sighed. "Words like that really don't make a god happy... So, is Lotus truly not here?"
"She was delayed by something. Anyway, now is not the time for a major god to intervene," Adia said with a shrug.
The Goddess of the Mind: "Is that so? What a pity."
She was still smiling as she said this and didn't ask any more questions, as if she readily accepted the fact that Lotus had formed but was not standing with the other gods.
Or perhaps, Perseus had long expected that the River Goddess would not appear.
Suojia lowered her eyes and let out an imperceptible sigh.
It seemed Lotus was right. Perseus knew her current situation, which must mean she truly had placed a shadow in the royal city.
Placing a shadow in Solancia and being prepared for the start of the divine war... so... the connection between the Kasnie pantheon and their humans was far closer than they had previously imagined.
To Suojia's right, the twin gods of the sun and moon stood side by side. One was beaming, the other cold and indifferent, but they both pricked up their ears in unison.
Among the major gods of the Solancian pantheon, besides Lotus, the two of them had formed the latest. When it came to the past of a god they had never heard of, they were always a little curious.
Especially since this seemed to be related to Lotus?
When Lotus had first awakened and arrived in the Kingdom of the Gods, she had asked about her own past. However, the sun and moon deities were born too late and knew nothing. Lotus found it a pity, and so did they.
However, under the gazes of the two gods, the three goddesses from the opposing sides fell silent again, merely smiling. Adia's smile was thoughtful, Suojia's was kind and amiable, while the Goddess of the Mind maintained her unchanging smiling face, not revealing another word.
Standing beside the Kasnie pantheon, the Wolf God was not smiling.
Within a pantheon, the difference in combat power between gods could be unimaginably vast, especially for those deities who were the main focus of human faith.
In Solancian terms, these were the major gods. As the major god of water, Lotus accounted for, if not one-eighth of the Solancian pantheon's total combat power, then at least one-tenth.
"It's just one goddess. It doesn't matter if she's awakened." Beside the Wolf God, the Vulture God with bird wings on his back was unconcerned. He raised one wing and pointed toward Digebia City below them.
"We will defeat you, and the humans of Sanur will defeat them," the Vulture God said. "Look! Our humans are about to hold a ritual. The sacrifices are the Solancian captives!"
As his voice fell, the sun rose from the horizon.
In the newly conquered Digebia City, a human sacrifice was about to begin.
The Sanur tribe from the highland steppes lived as nomads and were ferocious by nature.
They retained many primitive customs, some of which people from other kingdoms could never comprehend.
For example, cannibalism during times of extreme food shortage, including the old, weak, sick, and disabled of their own tribe, and even women.
Another example was human sacrifice, or what could be called a bloody ritual.
The Sanur people did not hold sacrifices on specific holidays, nor did they have a clergy. The one responsible for the ritual was often the tribal chief.
Before a great migration, or before and after a conflict, they would select suitable human sacrifices, usually young girls from the tribe or captives plundered from other places.
For a relatively ordinary ritual, they would choose only one or two human sacrifices. For a larger one, ten. But for a major event like conquering an important Solancian city, with an ample supply of captives, the number of sacrifices could reach up to a hundred.
The "sacrifices" would be taken to a high place, their limbs bound, and then bled one by one. On the verge of death, their hearts would be cut out, their fingers chopped off, and finally, their heads severed. These were the gifts for the gods.
In the past, each tribe would only sacrifice to its own totem god, but after the tribes were unified, the chief established a new standard—
In the morning, they sacrificed to the Vulture God. When the sun had moved a quarter of the way across the sky, they sacrificed to the Sheep God... and so on, finally sacrificing to the Wolf God Huracan after nightfall.
The warriors would howl at the moon like a wolf pack from a high place, eat meat and dance around a bonfire, and then conclude the day's ritual.
Primitive, bloody, savage.
This was a portrait of the Sanur, and the impression left by their sacrificial rituals. These same traits shaped the Sanur pantheon—these deities with the heads of beasts.
The captives were escorted onto the city walls.
In this city, the walls were the highest point. The Sanur chief, holding a scimitar, cut a series of gashes on the captive's arm—not deep, just enough to facilitate the bleeding.
The loss of blood slowly drained the captive's life force. He tried to kill himself, but failed.
The first sacrifice stared up at the corpse of the city lord hanging from the wall until his pupils dilated.
The chief smiled in satisfaction and swung his blade, cutting out the still-beating heart.
The morning's sacrifice was offered to the Vulture God, which for him, meant a replenishment of faith.
The Vulture God opened his beak. Feeling his divine power swell, he delivered the first taunt of the divine war.
"Wait to be torn to shreds by us, Solancian gods!"
The Sky God: "..."
The Sky God: "We shall see."
At the same time, a flash of silvery light glinted on the surface of the Yilu River near Digebia City.
It resembled the splash of a thrashing fish. In fact, it was the slender caudal fin at the end of a fishtail breaking the surface, reflecting a streak of silver light.
Lotus surfaced from the river, concealed her divine power, and gazed at the barrier outside the city.
After traveling all night, her incarnation, the Silver Mermaid, had finally reached the northwestern border.
...with a Kasnie prisoner of war in tow.
So Lotus thought, looking at the Dream Succubus she was dragging behind her.
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