Chapter 57 - 53: The Twin Gods pt.1

Around the time Joselin left to engage Teelin...

John emerged from the shadows in a more isolated area of the national park throwing Pan onto his back, scarring the earth beneath him as he slid 4 meters before rolling to his feet. On guard in his ebony-colored suit of armor and wings that seemingly defied any known logic of physics.

As he looked around at his new surroundings, he noticed that it was something that wasn't right as soon as his eyes laid upon an eerie tree with white luminescent leaves. The tree's bark had white luminescent lines that ran from the leaves down through the bark of the tree and down into its roots. 

As Pan looked at the tree for a moment, he knew what it was as he watched as the white luminescent lines on the bark pulsed upward through the tree's bark and into the leaves making the whole area brighter.

Pan looked at John with worry as he yelled, "JOHN, How do you know of this world tree!? This tree has been hidden from the gods since even before the goddess of creation came into existence. So how!?" 

John stood there silent as he himself was confused. He had intended to bring them to a clear field south of the quickly ending battle between his forces and the remaining human survivors hold up in Alaska. Instead, he received information that he was sure was not meant for any mortal to know, especially the fact that the world tree existed before a being with a name that heavily implied that they were part of the reason everything existed.

Nothing made sense except for one easily understandable aspect he had come to hypothesize. What if there were more than just the gods meddling in his trials of ascension to godhood? After all, it makes sense in the long run.

See John had come to understand during his time living the sewer rat life along with many of the other homeless of Hornbrew city that it was better to always be thinking a few steps ahead, but that wasn't enough to survive in those sewers as one had to always think fifty if not a hundred steps ahead of the next person. From John's experience and understanding of his past years in the sewers is that treating life like chess and being ahead of the desperate and depraved meant the difference between being murdered and/or r.a.p.ed for some of the residents. After all, not even the police dared to police the underbelly of the gruesome creature that was Hornbrew City.

So with said understanding, John knew for a fact that now his major concern was not that of just rebellious gods and mortals not ready to face eternal damnation as a soldier of the undead, nor was it the gods that seemed to have an ulterior motive for choosing him. No, from seeing how he was unintentionally warped somewhere with some importance allowed John to see that there was at least another party at play and one probably unknown to others at the moment. This only meant that someone somehow hijacked his intended destination and made him exit the shadows into a place he'd previously hadn't known about. John knew this was trouble beyond Pan as even Pan seemed unaware that they would be a tree that radiated so much magic power that he couldn't by chance gauge it, yet the tree remained undetected by even the gods. This was indeed troublesome.

Knowing it would be best to go along with it, John decided to play the hand he was dealt and said, "A pity that the mighty and wise Pan remains ignorant of the current situation of things if I may say so so leisurely." 

Pan watched John with wide eyes since realizing that he was within the presence of what many beings had only theorized existed. He began to question things as he himself didn't personally know John, but through the rumors of how he was before becoming an Undead Nephilim, he knew he had a straightforward personality, so what changed and when.

The mighty and powerful world trees were something that could easily tip the balance of the current power ranking of the gods themselves, yet none had ever been found one until now. Pan was confused as he was sure that John had just reawakened recently or so he believed, or better yet, was John truly going through a process of evolution as everyone believed. These thoughts ran wild through Pan's mind as he tried to focus on John's latest remark.

"Hmm, it seems that you do not fully understand what this means do you!? You have found one of the biggest balance-breaking things of this universe, and yet you continue to prance around the topic of my question. We both know that you don't have the habit of dancing around the topic as your a straightforward person even in death, even with your current path of destruction and death. So be straight with me before we begin this fight. Who is pulling your strings as I refuse to believe you alone could have discovered this place by yourself even with the help of a god who unbeknownst to the others have somehow located a world tree." Pan preached as he walked to the left and right with his eyes never leaving John.

John looked on without a word as he comprehended the information he'd obtain while formulating a plan to handle Pan. John knew that at the moment, they were both in the dark, and this was in his favor as he had played his card right as right, and Pan now believed he was nothing but a puppet. Although him being a puppet in someone else's much larger plan was surely a high possibility seeing how everything since his death has transpired, it makes sense as this all seemed drawn and planned from a perspective, even from the moment of his selection of being a God of death to the civil war between the gods. One question now floated in John's mind, who benefitted from all of this other than him.

Realizing that he had spent far too much time thinking about something that could wait, he pulls out of his shadow a weapon that matches his current career path, and that was none other than a pitch-black scythe with an aura of death. It was a weapon purely made from his shadow, yet with a touch of his necromancy, the scythe was made to instantly absorb one's soul and essence with a touch as long as they were of equal strength or lower. The downside to the weapon was that opponents that were of greater strength than him only had fifteen percent of their health base health taken. Now, what the scythe did with the souls and essence of those that are absorbed into it? Well, that was up to the owner as the weapon had the option of becoming stronger with each soul and essence taken or healing wielder even if they are of an undead race. 

From the sight of the weapon, Pan shuddered ever so slightly as he had never seen such a conjuration of darkness and death magic. Even the aura coming off the scythe made Pan's senses go on alert as he knew this weapon was far too dangerous to exist, especially in the hands of someone who is as damaged and dangerous as John.

You see, the scythe was something that John had made several concepts of in his mind. The weapon was made from a single skull and spine, which was actually the fusion of many souls of people who Joselin had mentally broken and treated like pets, along with the many people who had mentally become broken and spiritually damaged. The Blade was made from an unknown metal that Joseph had found in an abandoned government facility that several survivors had taken up residence trying to find a way to cure what was happening to the world using the labs there.

"A pawn can take a queen if given the chance is given, but does the pawn forget that it is a pawn after taking the queen, does the pawn even know that it is a pawn, does it even know that it is a just one of many who believe they are knights, bishops, rooks, queens, and kings," John said as he prepared himself for the fight by readying the blade to be swung in an overhead arc.

Pan prepared himself as well by materializing a pitch-black blade with a white hilt while taking in what John had just said and asks, "And in that analogy what are you exactly?"

John chuckled at the question as he clearly knew his role as he said with a slight frustration present in his tone, "Oh, I am what one can say is that I am a queen with the same position and status as a pawn."

This answer was something that Pan was not really expecting, but it shined a light on his perspective of John.