Noah glanced down at Tet, whose shoulder he had one arm around. She only reached his chest in height. Might as well sample the taste of an Old Deus while he was at it.
Old Deus, gods, Archons—from a foundational standpoint, they were all essentially different. But because they were all classified under the system he established, they appeared similar on the surface.
In the present age, even in Teyvat, Old Deus could be born. The crystallization of rules, known as divine essence, could be activated into divinity through intelligent life and its wishes.
Nowadays, there were no shortage of Old Deus in the universe.
Upon birth, an Old Deus would possess the essence of a True God. Though their strength might not exceed that of an Upper God, they had no potential bottleneck. Even if they did nothing at all, accumulating concepts alone would lead to growth.
A truly blessed existence.
"Let's go, Tet," Noah said with a slight smile.
"Okay," Tet replied. She didn't know where they were headed, but since Lord Heavenly Principle told her to follow, then follow she would. What else could she say? Besides, even briefly following Lord Heavenly Principle's side was something countless gods could only dream of.
The Witches' Council—the headquarters of witches across the entire universe who study mysticism, astrology, and similar forces.
Throughout the universe, the Witches' Council wielded no small influence.
Especially within the Endless Planes and the various civilizations of Pan-Human History, myths and legends about witches and priestesses were quite common.
In these tales, traces of the Witches' Council could often be found.
It wasn't just witches. The legendary grand magi and liches found in Pan-Human mythologies were all tied to the Witches' Council as well.
Witches, sages—they always appeared alongside heroes and champions. Sometimes infamous, sometimes revered, but most often they appeared as mysterious, neutral figures.
Unlike gods who selflessly aided heroes, witches operated on the principle of exchange.
Even within the main universe, witches were scattered across every divine pantheon.
The "Gold" Alchemist of the Abyss, Rheindottir; Nicole Reeyn, the witch of dreams from Sumeru; and Barbeloth, the astrological witch of Fontaine.
Each of them was renowned across the divine pantheons. Even the most exalted Primary Gods and God-Kings treated them with respect.
Mainly because the Witches' Council had vast connections—witches existed in every pantheon, and their authorities were all bizarre and unpredictable.
Even a God-King could easily fall victim to one of their tricks if not careful.
While their authorities might not be extremely powerful, they were certainly unpleasant.
This brings us to the famous incident that made the Witches' Council's reputation explode.
During Mondstadt's Wine Festival, various divine pantheons were invited.
In front of the assembled guests, Aphrodite, the Goddess of Beauty from the Greek Pantheon, publicly insulted the Seven Deadly Sins Witches, claiming witches were a profession unworthy of the stage, belonging to the sewers.
The ridicule drew roaring laughter from many divine guests. The Seven Deadly Sins Witches flushed red with anger, and the incident offended witches across the entire universe.
At the time, Aphrodite was merely a Primary God, and the Seven Deadly Sins Witches were only Upper Gods. They could only endure the mockery.
But after the Seven Deadly Sins Witches broke through to True Godhood, they combined their authorities to weave a vast lie and spread it throughout the universe.
Though most people treated it as mere gossip, ignorant mortals believed it outright, and tales began to spread of the Goddess of Beauty Aphrodite being a promiscuous and fickle goddess.
Aphrodite was directly struck by Pan-Human History backlash and fell from her seat as a Primary God.
Not only that, but the myths and legends of the Greek Pantheon suffered distortions as well.
The Greek Pantheon's reputation took a devastating blow.
They paid a hefty price to get a multitude of poets to once again sing praises of the Greek gods.
Even though the loss was just a small portion, it still implicated many gods.
Terrified, the gods rushed to bring Aphrodite to apologize in person. The Grand Witches of the Witches' Council harshly humiliated her before allowing her to leave in shame.
In the end, it wasn't until Athena personally came to establish relations with the Witches' Council that the Greek Pantheon's storm finally settled.
The Witches' Council then withdrew the falsehood about Aphrodite.
That immediately showed every pantheon in the universe just how much power the Witches' Council wielded.
The Authority of Sin was, after all, at the Primordial level, and would receive scaling adjustments based on the strength of Pan-Human History.
Upon reaching True God, they could wield a portion of that power.
With the Seven Deadly Sins and the Witch of Vainglory Pandora acting in concert, it wasn't difficult to alter the mythology of a Primary God.
The damage might not be physically severe, but the insult was extreme. It was even effective against God-Kings, though it couldn't shake their divine rank...
Seven True God-class Deadly Sins targeting a Primary God was already the absolute limit.
Another event that rocketed the Witches' Council to fame occurred during the course of universal expansion.
Some shameless buddhas from the Buddhist pantheon attempted to subtly influence galaxies developed by the Witches' Council, trying to seed Buddhist faith into the civilizations there and gradually convert them into Buddhist worlds.
Naturally, the Witches' Council couldn't allow that. They directly confronted the Buddhists.
But some of the great buddhas shamelessly played dumb and tried to reason with them. In the end, Barbeloth nearly converted to Buddhism herself.
Realizing what was happening, Barbeloth was furious—she had almost been persuaded by the twisted logic of those bald frauds. She immediately rushed to the Abyss to summon her sisters.
Countless Abyssal beasts surged out of black holes and drove the bald frauds away.
Then Rheindottir personally arrived and stormed Ling Mountain, capturing all those scheming monks and dragging them into the Abyss.
From that incident forward, the witches of the Witches' Council and Rheindottir gained the title of Mahāmāra (Great Demon Kings) in Buddhist mythology—even Pan-Human History acknowledged it.
Buddhism had aimed to profit but ended up suffering a massive loss, becoming the laughingstock of the entire universe.
During the age of cosmic expansion, most pantheons avoided direct conflict. But even so, disputes and outright clashes did occur.
In some cases, enmity ran so deep that gods directly applied to the Cosmic Nexus for a life-and-death Gift Game.
Naturally, the Cosmic Nexus would not indulge such requests lightly.
...
Noah brought Tet to the location of the Witches' Council.
The entrance to the Witches' Council's planar world lay in the cosmic sea not far from the Fontaine Court. With the protection of the Seven Sins' Origin Powers, no god outside the Witches could locate it.
At this moment, the Grand Witches of the Witches' Council were gathered together, seated around a massive round table, discussing Fontaine's upcoming Cosmology awakening.
As part of Fontaine, the Witches' Council naturally had a stake in this.
But relations among the witches were not nearly as harmonious as they appeared. There were many internal conflicts.
Each meeting usually began with a few snide remarks directed at witches they disliked, followed by hours of arguments before any formal discussion even started.
None of them noticed that a malicious presence was quietly drawing near...
"Ara~ You've only developed a few scattered planets and barely established any civilizations. Such limited capability, yet such big attitudes. How amusing," the Witch of Vainglory Pandora remarked, inserting a lazy jab as the witches resumed bickering. Her usual smiling expression instantly delivered a critical hit to the others.
The Greed Witch Echidona wore a smile as well, responding with her own casual barb: "Tch~ What an obnoxious woman. So what if her authority is a bit versatile? This so-called reality rewriting isn't much—just bullying the weak who lack Origin Power. Absolutely laughable."
Nicole Reeyn, the Dream Witch, burned with fury. "Pandora, Echidona—what's with your AOE slander? Did I offend you two or something?"
In terms of authority, she was probably the weakest among them, possessing only powers of dreams and precognition. Purely supportive, with little offensive capability.
While still formidable, compared to the likes of the Seven Deadly Sins, whose powers could reach Supreme or even Primordial levels and rewrite reality, hers was far too mild.
Unless Cosmology aligned with that of Her Majesty Rukkhadevata, allowing her to ascend in one leap, her potential likely capped at Primary God or God-King.
Barbeloth, the Astrology Witch, was also fuming. She slapped the table with sharp smack smack and shouted angrily, "Don't lump us all into your broadside attacks! We are elegant and noble witches, at least put on the proper pretense!"
"Also, I am the President of the Witches' Council!"
She was internally seething.
Clearly, she was the one in charge, yet this unruly bunch never listened and always did as they pleased.
If she had to say, well, her bestie was a God-King of the Abyss. She knew the Supreme of Mondstadt and had acquaintances among many great gods.
She even met Lord Heavenly Principle once—albeit only in passing.
Still, she was a woman whose chest had been groped by Lord Heavenly Principle.
Yet these witches gave her absolutely no face.
But she couldn't help it either. She understood that witches were, by nature, willful, eccentric, and unpredictable. She herself was no exception.
Alice waved her hand and laughed. "Oh please, little Barbie."
"We already put on a good act out there. In here, it's just us witches. Even if we put our feet on the table, no one would see."
She didn't just say it—she actually did it, placing her elegant legs right onto the table.
This time, since Lumine had brought the Traveler Pantheon to Fontaine and would be staying a while, Alice decided to reside at the Witches' Council for a bit too.
Technically speaking, she was still a founding elder of the Council.
Minerva, the Witch of Wrath, stood from her chair, gritting her teeth. Her clear eyes welled with tears as she shouted, "I'm angry! So angry! Why do Pandora and Echidona always have to insult everyone every single time?"
Pandora blinked innocently. "Ara~ Is everyone upset? But I was merely stating the truth. Are we running from truth now?"
Echidona scowled, spreading her hands. "Pointless. Pandora's a disgusting woman with a twisted personality. A born degenerate."
Sekhmet, the Witch of Sloth, lay limp in her chair, barely opening her eyes, as if she'd forget to breathe and die from sheer laziness at any moment.
"Huff... Two nasty personalities clashing... huff, this is inevitable... huff. But dragging us into your quarrel... huff, that's really low... huff..."
"Even though I don't like Pandora... huff... I'm too lazy to care."
Pandora smiled gently. "Ara~ it hurts to be disliked by dear Sekhmet."
Camilla, the Witch of Lust, nervously stammered, "E-Everyone... let's not fight... maybe it's all just a misunderstanding... can't we talk this out?"
Daphne, the Witch of Gluttony, on the other hand, took out some food from her personal space and began crunching away. Crunch crunch She spoke while chewing, "What's the big deal? It's just about developing planets, right? I've already finished three galaxies."
"Daphne remembers, Echidona only completed two. That's even fewer than Daphne. Seems like the lowest of everyone," she said while crunching away.
"Even Mona has finished as many as Daphne."
Mona lay slumped over the round table, twitching at the corner of her mouth.
So this whole argument started over who had developed more planets? They were mocking each other and escalating to personal attacks over that?
Yes. That was exactly what started all this.
Typhon, the Witch of Pride, tilted her head innocently at the shouting match around her, confusion written all over her face. "What is everyone talking about? Why isn't Typhon included? Typhon wants to play too."
Satella, the Witch of Envy, hurriedly grabbed Typhon and gently said, "This isn't playing, Typhon. They're arguing. You shouldn't join in."
Typhon's eyes sparkled like little stars. "Arguing? Sounds fun! Typhon wants to argue too!"
Emilia, the Witch of Frost, quickly stepped in and pulled Typhon back. "No arguing, Typhon. Arguing is bad."
Echidona sneered at Satella and Emilia, who looked exactly alike as they consoled Typhon. "Tch. Such green tea behavior. So you're saying we're the ones being unreasonable?"
That one line instantly made all the witches turn to look at Emilia and Satella.
The two witches panicked. "No! That's not what we meant at all!"
Echidona pressed on. "Oh, I think that is what you meant. Always the same with you two—acting like you're the victims every single time."
"Echidona!" Minerva, the Witch of Wrath, slammed her hand on the table.
Before Minerva could erupt, a sudden round of applause echoed through the room.
Clap! Clap! Clap!
The clapping seemed to carry some strange magic that instantly silenced the witches. All heads turned toward the sound.
Applause? But only the Grand Witches had access to this meeting chamber. Who else could be clapping?
When they saw the two figures who had suddenly appeared, their pupils shrank.
The petite and dainty figure was none other than Teyvat's Fontainean God-King of Games, Tet.
But the other figure—that one made their faces drastically change.
The Seven Deadly Sins Witches hadn't attended the Divine Assembly and thus didn't know that Noah was the Heavenly Principle.
But they did recognize him.
The last time they met was back when they hadn't yet become gods. In that little planar world, it was this great being who resurrected them—the one who had claimed them as his chosen property.
And he had bestowed upon them the Primordial-level Divine Seats of the Seven Deadly Sins.
They had long suspected that this being was at least a Primordial God.
They had been searching for him ever since—the god who resurrected them and gave them the Sin Divine Seats.
Barbeloth and Nicole Reeyn, however, did know that Noah was the Heavenly Principle.
Barbeloth had faced him directly. Nicole Reeyn had met him during the Divine Assembly.
Only Mona was dumbfounded. She had only become a True God in the last few centuries and hadn't attended the Divine Assembly, so she had no idea who Noah was.
Alice, who had a rather intimate and mutual "I-know-your-depths-you-know-my-lengths" relationship with Noah, was overjoyed.
Noah looked at the witches, whose expressions changed all at once, and clapped with a smile.
"Didn't expect to walk in on such a spicy drama."
"It's been a long time, witches."
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