Athena nodded at Axis, then placed one hand atop his head and carefully probed his current condition.
The divine power within Axis startled even Athena. It was at the Primordial God level, far surpassing the power of any Olympian or God-King. Even among Primordial Gods, it already ranked near the very peak.
The man before her was on the verge of breaking through to the Absolute God tier: the level of a universe's creator, or a supreme being capable of annihilating several universes single-handedly.
Long ago, the Absolute God who had created their universe, Apsu, had been driven out by Primordial Gods who had awakened the Divine Cosmo. Those Primordial Gods all bore legendary names: Uranus, God of the Sky; Gaia, Goddess of the Earth. All of them were ancient Primordial deities.
Athena, or rather Saori Kido, fixed her violet eyes on Axis and spoke in measured tones:
"Mister Axis, I now understand your condition.
"Your body contains immense yet fundamentally foreign divine power. Under the rules of this universe, it is like a blaze ignited by force without anything to guide it, and it is on the verge of spiraling out of control.
"What you need is 'the Divine Cosmo,' the foundation upon which every god in our universe exists, the very wellspring of our power. Once I help you awaken it, you will be able to command the Divine Cosmo as your own."
"I see," Axis replied. "Miss Saori, could you explain the hierarchy of divine beings in detail?"
"Of course. In our universe, all things are composed of 'Cosmo.' It is life, it is the soul, it is energy, it is the universe itself.
"A mortal's Cosmo can be elevated by burning willpower and life force. But the gods..." Athena's gaze settled on Axis. "The gods are born already possessing the 'Divine Cosmo.' It is the core of our godhood, the manifestation of our divine authority, and the bridge through which we resonate with the universe. Under normal circumstances, however, the fuel that sustains a god's Cosmo is divine power, which is quite different from a human's. For humans, the fuel is their own life and willpower."
Athena explained the concept of Cosmo to Axis in thorough detail. Put simply, Cosmo was the equivalent of building a furnace inside one's body.
The furnace a god constructed was naturally far more powerful than a human's. If a human's furnace was a coal-burning hearth, then a god's was a nuclear fusion reactor.
Humans fed their furnace with life force and willpower, the equivalent of shoveling coal to keep the Cosmo burning. A god's divine power, on the other hand, was fusion fuel. The energy it produced was beyond anything an ordinary mortal could ever hope to match.
In theory, no matter how powerful a mortal became, they could never rival a god, unless they received the aid of another god and awakened a God Cloth, gaining access to a portion of divine power.
There was, of course, one other path: comprehending the legendary Cosmo known as Omega, the power of creation's first dawn. It was a force on the scale of a universe's birth, and in theory it could defeat every being short of a Transcendent God or an Absolute God.
Axis nodded thoughtfully. So that was it. His current predicament was that he possessed vast quantities of fusion fuel but lacked a suitable reactor.
Athena then began to lay out the hierarchy of divine beings in their world.
Tertiary Gods: beings such as Oneiros, the Dream God, and the Goddesses of Calamity. They possessed divinity, but their power was limited. They functioned more as enforcers of cosmic rules or embodiments of specific domains.
Secondary Gods: beings such as Thanatos the Death God, Hypnos the Sleep God, and the Fury Goddess. They served directly under the Olympians, wielded formidable divine power, and held specific divine authorities. Their strength was sufficient to influence entire realms such as the Underworld. They were extensions of an Olympian's will and their most important combat assets.
Primary Gods, the Olympians: beings such as Hades, Lord of the Underworld; Poseidon, Emperor of the Seas; and Athena, Goddess of Wisdom and War. They held dominion over the universe's core authorities: the Underworld, the Oceans, the Earth, Wisdom, and War. They possessed the most supreme tiers of Divine Cosmo.
Primordial Gods: beings such as Gaia, Mother Earth; Uranus, God of the Sky; and Tartarus, God of the Abyss. They were ancient deities who had existed since the very birth of the universe.
Their power was unfathomably deep. They were the creators of cosmic rules or the living embodiments of the universe's structure, and they typically remained in seclusion. Zeus currently existed at this level, though he had vanished years ago.
Absolute Gods: beings such as Apsu, the God of Darkness who once ruled the universe. They transcended the Olympians entirely, possessing the power to create or destroy a single universe. They were the masters of cosmic cycles or harbingers of universal annihilation.
Transcendent Gods: beings such as Chronos, God of Time, and his incarnation Saturn. They were conceptual existences that stood above time and space itself. Their power encompassed the multiverse; they were near-omniscient and near-omnipotent, the architects and observers of all rules.
"So, Miss Saori," Axis asked, "does divine rank determine everything? Is a Primordial God always stronger than an Olympian, and an Absolute God always stronger than a Primordial God?"
"How should I put this?" Athena replied. "In terms of raw divine-power tier, an Absolute God is certainly more powerful.
"But in an actual fight, an Absolute God would not necessarily defeat a Primordial God.
"After all, Apsu, the Absolute God of our universe, was driven out by the Primordial Gods when they joined forces."
Actual combat power simply could not be neatly categorized. During the very first Holy War, for example, a Bronze Saint had been anointed by Athena's divine blood, triggered a miracle, obtained a God Cloth, and wounded Hades's true body. That mighty warrior's soul had continued to reincarnate ever since.
He had always been her most powerful weapon: the god-slaying Pegasus. His combat strength surpassed that of ordinary Tertiary Gods and even outmatched Secondary Gods, yet at his core, Pegasus remained a mortal.
Beyond all of that, Athena could sense something else within Axis: a horrifyingly destructive force brimming with the aura of annihilation. If that power ever erupted fully, it would be enough to rend the heavens and shatter the earth.
"Mister Axis, the power contained within you is unquestionably beyond the Olympian tier," Athena stated with certainty. "It approaches the purity and vastness of a Primordial God and has even begun to touch the domain of an Absolute God, though I can sense that you have not quite reached that threshold."
Axis nodded in firm agreement. The standard for an Absolute God was the ability to create a universe, and he clearly could not do that yet. Destruction, on the other hand, was well within his reach.
Even so, unleashing that level of devastation would exhaust all of his power. He was, in essence, a Primordial God, though thanks to the augmentation of the Destroyer's divine power, his raw output was somewhat greater than that of a typical Primordial.
"However, what you lack is the key that allows all of that power to function 'correctly' within our universe: the awakening and mastery of the Divine Cosmo."
Athena rose and stepped closer. Her golden Divine Cosmo spread outward like a warm tide, reaching toward Axis of its own accord.
"To guide the foreign divine power inside you, which is on the verge of detonating, and convert it into a Divine Cosmo native to this universe, a deep spiritual resonance and precise divine-power channeling are required.
"I will use my own Divine Cosmo as the catalyst and perform a 'Divine Communion' with you: a fusion of spirit and divine power that transcends language and reaches the very origin of the soul. The process will demand an enormous expenditure of my divine power, and it carries significant risk. Furthermore, both parties must hold nothing back. Is that acceptable?"
"What exactly do you mean by 'both parties holding nothing back'?" Axis asked.
"Precisely what it sounds like, Lord Axis. I must use my Divine Cosmo to guide the divine power within you. The process is extremely dangerous.
"If anything goes wrong, the divine power could kill us both. You must therefore reveal your power to me without the slightest reservation. I will help you bring it under control." Athena spoke plainly.
"You said I need to mobilize my divine power at full capacity, correct? Then take this. It contains potent life energy, and I believe it should be of use to you." Axis nodded, then produced a first-generation Fruit of the Divine Tree and handed it to Athena.
The fruit, brimming with life energy and carrying a faint trace of divine power, immediately piqued Athena's curiosity.
"The life energy within this is extraordinarily potent. This is a fine treasure indeed. I did not expect you to possess something like this. With this fruit, I can burn my divine power far more freely and push my Divine Cosmo to even greater heights." Athena smiled and accepted the fruit from Axis's hand.
"Then let us begin, Athena. I can hardly wait."
"I must confirm one final time. Mister Axis, I need your word: once you have successfully awakened and mastered the Divine Cosmo, you will help me bring this Holy War to a definitive end by killing Hades, Lord of the Underworld.
"He covets the earth. He enslaves the souls of the dead. His very existence is an eternal threat. Only by annihilating the source of his soul can true peace be achieved.
"Can you accept that condition?"
Athena needed confirmation, and she was not about to exhaust all of her divine power and Cosmo helping someone awaken for nothing. She needed at least a word of confirmation.
"No problem. You have my word. Once my Divine Cosmo has awakened, I will help you destroy Hades." Axis nodded, formally accepting Athena's terms.
As far as he was concerned, it was a trivial favor. Saiyans never left debts unpaid.
Athena broke into a radiant smile, then seated herself cross-legged before Axis. The two pressed their palms together, and Athena's Divine Soul began burning her divine power at full intensity, causing her Divine Cosmo to blaze with blinding brilliance and radiate an aura of magnificent grandeur.
She then began guiding the divine power within Axis. That power had originally been born from the strength of Super Saiyan God, then augmented by the might of Khorne, the War God of the Warhammer universe.
He had subsequently comprehended the Power of Life, integrated everything in the Dragon Ball world, and then consumed the Fruit of the Gods on top of it all.
This divine power was extraordinarily primal, which actually made it easier for Athena to work with.
A golden radiance enveloped the two of them.
Athena's Cosmo, pure and vast, warm and majestic as a golden sun, extended delicate yet unyielding threads of golden light that wound their way toward the rampaging sources of divine power inside Axis.
The Divine Communion had begun.
"Ngh!" Axis let out a stifled groan as his body involuntarily went rigid.
The sensation was profoundly strange, as though his soul had been peeled open and its deepest secrets laid bare before another being. At the same time, however, a powerful force was combing through and soothing the violent energy raging inside him.
Axis's consciousness was pulled into an extraordinary realm. Within that golden radiance, he saw everything that Athena was.
The goddess, born from the skull of Zeus, clad in golden armor, bearing the Aegis shield and the Spear of Victory. The instant she came into the world, she had proclaimed the union of wisdom and might.
Her maneuvering and struggles among the Olympian gods. Receiving the legacy of Gaia, Mother Earth, and gaining the right to protect the mortal world.
Her conflicts with Ares, with Hades, with Poseidon. Her guardianship over humanity.
Countless cycles of Holy War. Fated confrontations with Hades and Poseidon across the ages. With each reincarnation, her resolve to protect the earth never once wavered.
And buried in the deepest recesses of her heart, a memory steeped in eternal sorrow, the accidental killing of her dear friend Pallas. That bone-deep remorse and loneliness was something not even a god could erase.
Athena, for her part, felt somewhat shortchanged. She could only perceive what had happened to Axis after his arrival in this world. His past before that had not been recorded by the power of Cosmo.
What was supposed to be a mutual baring of souls, each revealing all secrets to the other, had turned into a one-sided confession on her part.
Still, it confirmed one of her suspicions: Axis truly was a god from another world.
"You have gained quite the advantage here, Lord Axis." Athena's Divine Soul radiated golden light, her spiritual form unclothed, as she slowly guided his power.
The two had entered a singular state, something akin to a communion of divine souls. Their spirits were melded together at a profound depth.
Even Axis had not anticipated that things with Athena would unfold this way. This primal exchange of divine power and soul was far more intimate than any act of physical union.
Now he finally understood why Athena had emphasized that this was her first time. Of course it was the Virgin Goddess's first time.
"Ahem... I should mention, I already have two wives." Thank the heavens it was Athena he had come to. If he had needed to do this with Hades or Poseidon instead, two grown men... the thought alone sent a chill down his spine.
"Then it would seem I have become the third." Athena's divine consciousness worked like the most masterful weaver, guiding and ordering the chaos of Axis's divine power.
"Well, what's done is done. Where there's one there's two, where there's two there's three. It's fine. I will take responsibility." Axis said.
"Jokes aside, now, the critical moment approaches. Axis, you must hold it in, then release everything at once, like a Big Bang, to form your own Cosmo." Athena's divine power continued to stimulate Axis, driving his energy into escalating turmoil.
If Axis had to describe the feeling, it was like reaching the eruption point of primal force.
Good grief. Was the awakening of the Divine Cosmo really this suggestive?
"You must endure. It is not yet time to release." Athena spoke while her Divine Soul continued its tireless work, combing through Axis's divine power, pushing him closer and closer to the critical threshold.
"I... I am trying." Axis managed.
Within the realm of Divine Communion, time lost all meaning.
Just as that fateful communion unfolded within the goddess's palace, the sky above the Sanctuary was abruptly swallowed by heavy clouds of death. A piercing chill and an aura of absolute despair pressed down like something solid and physical.
Three figures radiating terrifying pressure materialized on the plaza before the House of Leo, descending like the very incarnations of death.
Wyvern Rhadamanthys, Star of Celestial Ferocity! Garuda Aiacos, Star of Celestial Valor! Griffon Minos, Star of Celestial Nobility!
The three Judges of the Underworld had arrived. At their backs, surging forward like a black tide, came the army of Specters. Terrestrial Stars, Celestial Stars, and rank-and-file soldiers clad in skull-faced Surplices.
Sinister Surplices of every shape glinted with baleful light as the Cosmo of death descended upon the Sanctuary.
"By Lord Hades's command! Athena's head shall be taken by our own hands!" Rhadamanthys's voice rang out like a proclamation from the frozen pits of hell.
He had known all along that those Saints could not be trusted. Traitors, every last one of them, interested only in awakening Athena's God Cloth.
"Hmph! Finally, some halfway-decent small fry!" Ultraman hovered in midair with his arms crossed, a savage grin splitting his face.
Seiya, Shiryu, Hyoga, and Shun ignited their Cosmo in an instant and assumed battle stances. Aiolia was not present, but they shouldered the duty of defending the House of Leo.
"Specters! You will not pass the House of Leo!" Seiya roared, the Pegasus Cloth blazing with light.
"For Athena!" Shiryu raised the Dragon Shield.
Frost radiated from Hyoga's entire body, and Shun's Nebula Chain danced like a living serpent.
"Foolish brats who do not know when they are outmatched! Greatest Caution!" Rhadamanthys struck first. A massive shockwave of deathly force surged forward like an apocalyptic flood, aimed squarely at the four Saints standing at the vanguard.
"Leave this to me!" Ultraman let out a wild laugh, and his figure vanished in an instant.
In the next heartbeat he reappeared directly in front of the oncoming shockwave. His enormous fist, carrying nothing but raw physical brute force, hammered into the grey torrent of death like a pile driver.
The explosion was deafening. A violent energy storm swept across the entire plaza before the House of Leo.
The ground fractured inch by inch. Chunks of rubble shot outward like cannonballs.
Rhadamanthys's ultimate technique had been smashed apart by a single punch from Ultraman. The residual shockwave sent the lower-ranked Specters tumbling through the air.
"What?!" Rhadamanthys's pupils contracted sharply, disbelief written across his face.
"What was that supposed to be? I thought you would actually be strong! You are not even as good as that fellow called Saga." Ultraman looked thoroughly disappointed.
Compared to Saga's Galaxian Explosion from moments ago, this attack fell far short.
"Galactic Illusion!" Aiacos seized the opening left by Ultraman's punch. His massive wings beat the air and countless stellar phantasms instantly engulfed Ultraman.
This was no physical attack but a psychic assault aimed directly at the mind, designed to warp the senses and shatter the will.
Ultraman gave a cold snort. His eyes blazed crimson in an instant, and beams of heat vision, brimming with horrific temperatures and destructive energy, erupted outward.
The searing beams cut through Aiacos's carefully woven stellar illusion as effortlessly as a red-hot brand through butter.
Their momentum did not falter, streaking straight for Aiacos himself.
A direct hit would mean certain death. At that razor-thin margin, the last of the three Judges made his move.
"Cosmic Marionation!"
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I've picked up a new book, Warhammer: Blade of the Imperium, please be sure to check it out! it's a more gritty warhammer work about an transmigrator who became an Astarte and the changes he brought to the imperium! I love and I'm absolutely sure you will as well.