In just a few days, thanks to his drastically increased appetite and an overall enhancement of his physical qualities, including patches of fine golden scales growing on his body, the sorcerer Isaac was certain he was no longer purely human.
"Are void gods truly this terrifying?" Isaac gazed at his transformed hand, awe etched on his face. "I only made the briefest contact with it—no, not even contact, just a mere glimpse. Even such a minimal interaction has fundamentally altered the essence of my existence."
"If I were to truly encounter such a being and behold its true form, what would I become?" Isaac's curiosity grew.
What had started as a bored experiment had given him an unimaginable opportunity. Compared to his gains, the materials consumed in the ritual were trivial.
Isaac had tested himself thoroughly. His very life essence had been transformed. He was now a being far superior to ordinary humans, with greater vitality, strength, and longevity.
The meager cost of his experiment had yielded life-altering results, a stroke of fortune so extraordinary that Isaac, usually composed, felt compelled to attempt a second summoning.
But this time, nothing happened. As he stood over the ashes of the ritual array, his expression shifted repeatedly before settling into gloom. A strong sense of frustration and lingering hope drove him to repeat the ritual multiple times over the following months.
The results were the same as what he had originally expected before his first attempt: wasted materials and time. Not a single response came.
Isaac's obsession with the ritual became so pronounced that it caught the attention of other sorcerers, who noticed the sheer quantity of materials he was purchasing. They mocked and tried to dissuade him.
"They just don't understand," Isaac thought disdainfully.
Having once, by sheer luck, experienced even a brief intersection with a supreme being from the void, Isaac no longer cared for the opinions of others.
After months of frenzied attempts, he finally calmed down. He realized that the success of his first ritual was likely a fluke. Perhaps the majestic being had, in a moment of boredom, deigned to glance his way.
"Isaac, you fool," he muttered to himself. "How could a mere ant like you hope to interact with such a mythical existence more than once? Surely, you've already spent a lifetime's worth of luck on that one encounter."
He mocked himself and dismissed his foolish hopes, regaining clarity. "As I am now, I'm utterly unworthy of such contact. What I need is to train and grow stronger. Only when I reach a sufficient level of power can I hope for such a being to glance at me a second time."
In a world steeped in primal wilderness, giant beasts as tall as mountains roamed the land, and enormous birds whose wings spanned the sky circled above. This was a newborn world, recently birthed from the void.
"Recently," of course, was relative to the lifespan of worlds. The archaic era of this world—dominated by massive beasts—was nearing its end.
The reason? A species of intelligent creatures had emerged: giant apes who had learned to walk upright. These apes, having gained rudimentary intelligence, began using tools and working together to hunt.
Once prey to these fearsome beasts, the upright apes had turned the tables. Through cooperation, they brought down predators that once sent them fleeing in terror. The flesh of the beasts became their food, granting them strength, while the bones and scales—far harder than metal—became their weapons.
Through relentless struggle, the apes spread across the land, their population growing. More and more beasts fell to their coordinated attacks.
But in a supernatural world, sheer numbers only got you so far. Eventually, the apes encountered creatures so powerful that their swarming tactics proved useless. This led to the birth of reverence among the apes.
In their awe and fear of these untouchable beasts, the apes began to worship them. Thus, the earliest forms of totem worship emerged, with each ape tribe venerating the extraordinary beasts near their territory.
However, not all tribes lived under the shadow of such monsters. Some, fortunate to reside in relatively safe areas, encountered no threats they couldn't overcome.
These unique tribes lacked reverence because they believed there was no creature in the world beyond their ability to kill.
Freed from fear, these tribes directed their worship toward intangible forces: towering mountains, vast rivers, raging thunderstorms, the radiant sun, or the gentle moonlight.
One such tribe chose to worship the vast sky itself. While their object of worship was unconventional, it wasn't unheard of. However, their belief took a unique twist:
The tribe believed in a supreme being dwelling in the sky—a being far more powerful than anything on land. This being, they claimed, ruled over the cycles of day and night, commanded the winds and storms, and was the master of all existence.
It sounded impressive, but compared to other tribes worshiping real, extraordinary beasts, this tribe's god was a product of their imagination.
In a supernatural world, collective belief and worship could sometimes bring imaginary entities into existence. But this tribe's deity, as they envisioned it, would have been the ruler of their entire world. For a small tribe, even centuries of fervent worship would not suffice to manifest such a being.
Unless this tribe could dominate all others, rule the world, and ensure billions worshipped their god for millennia, their deity would forever remain a figment of their imagination.
Thus, their rituals and worship were little more than self-indulgence. With no real god to receive their faith or offerings, their efforts yielded nothing.
However, exceptions always exist. While the ruler of the sky they envisioned did not exist, there were beings beyond the sky—beyond their world—who bore similarities to their imagined god.
On the day of the tribe's monthly grand ritual, they placed their finest game on the altar as offerings.
None of the tribe hesitated to contribute their best kills, knowing that their god would never actually take the offerings. The food would ultimately be enjoyed by the tribe itself during the ensuing feast.
The ritual fire burned brightly atop a 50-meter stone platform as the tribe's shaman, draped in feathers, danced with a group of female tribe members.
As they danced, the shaman tossed items of mystical significance into the fire. These items, though seemingly precious, were of little practical value to the tribe.
The shaman's dance, passed down through generations, was a chaotic and improvised performance. Every shaman added their own flair, making each generation's ritual unique.
Just as the ritual neared its end and the gathered males began contemplating how to woo the females during the feast, the fire on the altar suddenly surged.
A majestic presence, akin to the sky god they worshipped, descended upon the ritual.
The red-yellow flames rapidly turned golden, radiating a terrifying, consuming force. The piles of offerings around the altar were devoured at an alarming rate, their essence sustaining the presence's manifestation.
The once-abundant offerings turned to ash before the stunned eyes of the tribe. As the wind scattered the ashes, the tribe's faces contorted in dismay.
"Our food… it's gone!"
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