1 Wrath

In the year 2025, the Earth underwent besiegement by forces beyond our comprehension. Mysterious wormholes would periodically open up across the planet, unleashing waves of mystical beings with the sole purpose to destroy and desecrate. No one knows how this occurred, or who was responsible. However, what we did know was that we would not go down without a fight.

I, a young strapping lad at the time, picked up arms and volunteered to join the military to combat these beings. Of course, hundreds of millions of others did as well.

Regardless of humanity's hopes and dreams, however, nothing good was begotten of our service—only more casualties. At times, these beings were nothing we could even hope to scratch with ballistic missiles. The 120mm smoothbore of an Abrams firing depleted uranium rounds? Hah, no. Modern warfare as the world knew it was flipped upside down overnight.

After all, who in their right minds would attempt to fight a dragon with any form of modern ballistics? Most varieties are fireproof, you know.

That all changed one day—a few weeks after the wormholes first opened up—when a "system" popped up in front of a select few.

It turned out that I was a chosen savior of humanity—one of the divines. Well, later we decided to call ourselves the "Divines", with a capital D for importance. It made for good marketing.

But! That isn't the point. We're getting there.

I was informed by this system that I was chosen by the personification of the Sun to represent it. Honestly, I don't even know what that means to this day. But, what I do know is that this made me the de facto best pyromancer on the planet. There might be some other monsters hiding in wait, but I chose the limelight.

Us Divines gathered together in a united front to protect humanity. We all had our reasons, be that common sense, the seeking of fame, glory, and riches, or to master our powers and obtain even more strength.

In total, there were 15 Divines. And of course, countless lessers who wanted to help us. In total, a few million people received sparks of divinity from the system, and with it the power to "level-up". I honestly hate how the system made everything like a video game, but whatever. What makes someone Divine is the threshold of divinity received from the system. It's like a flat multiplier that affects all of your stats and abilities. I apparently received most of my divinity from the avatar of the Sun, as I said.

Our united front did quite well, surprisingly. Over a few years, we were able to defend against spontaneous wormholes and capture ones that had gone out of control in the past.

We didn't reclaim the entire Earth or anything. For example, a supermassive wormhole opened up in Australia with a necromancer of some sort leading an army of billions of undead. They took over the entire continent in a day. And no one can really do anything about that one. God help us if they get bored and try to swim somewhere.

But, all in all, we did well. However, there was quite the paradigm shift when one day another supermassive wormhole showed signs of opening. And this time, it was straight in the middle of Berlin—right on top of the Brandenburg Gate.

We all knew the stakes. It was probably one of the most ominous phone calls I've ever received; that's for sure.

What sort of sicko opens a conversation with, "We need you to help kill a god of pestilence"? It's inhumane.

Regardless, thus we went. We stormed into the wormhole after fighting off her wretched spawn and confronted the goddess of pestilence, among other things. The battle was of reality-shattering proportions, so much so that I could hardly tell what was going on. Each participant held enough divinity to be considered at least a minor god. The entire subspace cracked under every blow.

And, guess who got the killing blow?

Not me; that's for sure.

No, for the strongest of the Divines—the blessed son of wrath—sundered her apart after a long-fought battle. He put more effort into the fight than any other and came out of it worse for wear.

He probably had upwards of a thousand diseases ravaging his body by the time she was dead, most of which didn't even exist on Earth. He was a walking corpse, and he knew it. And so, he started monologuing to us about his dying will as the subspace was collapsing, saying that we were all worthless as comrades and that Earth was sure to fall with us at the helm. He spoke of his artifacts and techniques and some unique knowledge he had learned, in an attempt to bring us up to scratch.

Wrath seemed very genuine. He went as far as to offer his prized sword to the 2nd strongest Divine, the master of magic Lucian, and told him to give it to someone worthy.

And then? That crazy bastard stabbed Wrath in the chest with his own sword! He gloated, saying how he was the strongest now and such. I was taken aback by such brazen aggression towards someone who sacrificed himself for us all, and then I felt fearful for my life.

Wrath's ire was so strong that it started to choke most of us. In his death throes, he cursed us all for being treacherous worms and swore he'd get his revenge. To be fair, no one stood up to the betrayal. Some looked amused, even. Wrath died witnessing our complacency, leaving me gasping for breath.

Lucian told us all to not speak of this to anyone, of course, and life went on. He later spun the tale to the press that Wrath had gone mad with power after killing the goddess and that he planned on taking over the world. We then allegedly banded together to kill Wrath and Lucian requisitioned Wrath's sword "for the good of mankind".

"...Sir. I'll say this with as much respect as I can muster: why are you rambling on about things that I already know about?" my esteemed assistant asked me after patiently listening for the last few minutes.

I responded to her, "Why, it's obvious. This is my autobiography—a verbal account of my long, important life. Which, might I add, is about to come to a tragic end."

Christina sighed a long, dramatic sigh. "That isn't even your biography; that was just a simple retelling of history. Secondly, just because the Divine of wrath has allegedly come back to life, doesn't mean that you're going to die. Even if it is true, he's a hero, right? Why would he come and murder you?"

The poor unpaid intern that she was, Christina just didn't get it. I turned and looked at the office television displaying the news that Wrath had come through a wormhole and announced his return.

The reporter on screen was making some sort of provocative headline. "... and it makes one wonder: just what are the intentions of the Divine that was once believed to be dead?"

Of course, given the story those journalists spat out until now, it makes sense that people would be worried. Some didn't believe the scam Lucian peddled—like Christina here—but others were afraid that Wrath had returned to conquer Earth.

"There's a joke to be made here." I spoke after contemplating for a few moments. "Local man literally too angry to die." My half-hearted joke didn't elicit a response.

It had been 5 years since Wrath had died that day. I didn't know how he had managed to come back, but that part didn't really matter. I was serious when I told Christina I believed that he was going to kill me. I believe he is going to kill us all, and I think he has the ability to do it, too.

"Christina, I need you to do a few things for me. Firstly, I'll need to liquidize most of my assets. See to it that you sell as many of my buildings as you can. Secondly, we should consolidate the artifacts and hunters in the corporation's possession. Fire the branch leaders and arrange for the key personnel to come back here to HQ. This is no longer about influence—this is about survival. Lastly, set up a press conference for me with MNT. I'll publically announce these proceedings under the pretense of strengthening the defenses of New York."

Ignoring whatever response she may have had, I thought the intoxicating words that had allowed me to obtain everything I had: Status.

—Status—

Name: Thomas Eaton

HP: 671/671

Mana: 581/581

Level: 84

XP: 1,345,503

Class: Aspect of Sun

Age: 29

Race: Lesser God

—Stats—

Divinity: 3.3x

Might: 33

Agility: 66

Vitality: 69.3

Concentration: 89.1

Soul: 214.5

It was quite the list, suitable for one of the strongest people on the planet. However, it wasn't enough. If I were to guess, Wrath's divinity factor was around twice as much as my own, and that would also allow him to gain exponentially more experience than me. His level could easily be as high as 130. For reference, the cap of this system is level 150. Or at least, we think so since all of the "world-ending calamities" that supermassive wormholes spit out are at 150.

Taking one last look at Wrath's face on the TV, I turned it off and sat down at my computer. I tried to go through a few MooTube videos to calm down, but the encroaching anxiety ate away at me. To cope, I popped a handful of caffeine pills and got to work setting up preparations for the weeks and months to come.

Quite a lot was going to have to change.