The War of the Gods (3)
The new arrivals on the battlefield were none other than the gods who had once served under Indra as their leader—the gods of Lokapala.
"Lokapala? Why are those guys here?"
After their leader Indra had performed his act of self-sacrifice by ripping out his own heart, the gods of Lokapala had vanished somewhere. So why were they showing up now? No one among me and the kids would know the reason…
"I heard they went into hiding after Indra killed himself…?"
"Why are they appearing here of all places?"
The kids seemed flustered by the sudden appearance of the Lokapala gods.
These beings, who had been out of sight for the past ten years, were jumping into the fray right here and now. Why? I had no idea what they were thinking…
If I just watched their actions calmly, I'd figure it out eventually.
"Lokapala has joined the battle…! Ah! They're starting to attack the Ennead!"
The moment Sylphid yelped in surprise, the Ennead seemed thrown off by the surprise attack from behind.
Olympus was fighting head-on, while Lokapala had abruptly appeared at their rear. Caught in a pincer between the two forces, the Ennead looked quite chaotic but pressed on with the fight.
The sudden intervention of Lokapala. From Olympus's perspective, who had been on the defensive, it was like a lifeline from the heavens.
No matter how tough the Ennead gods were, facing two forces at once was too much—they began to give ground bit by bit.
"Hmm… Now it's anyone's guess how this'll play out."
"Yeah. The Ennead gods are tough, but not enough to handle two factions at once."
"More importantly, why are Lokapala jumping in here? They haven't shown so much as a hair in ten years?"
As I watched the gods clash fiercely, lost in thought, a possibility occurred to me.
"Maybe… Indra left some kind of arrangement behind?"
"Indra? The Lokapala leader who ripped out his own heart?"
"Yeah. If he prepared something in advance, it makes sense, doesn't it?"
I had no clue what Indra had been thinking. A guy crazy enough to tear out his own heart and offer it up—who could guess his mind? Still, judging by their actions… it had to be part of some plan.
While I chatted with the kids, the battlefield gradually settled into a lull.
The Ennead had probably wanted to crush Olympus in one go, but the new enemy Lokapala made that impossible.
For Olympus, the surprise ally Lokapala had pulled them back from the brink.
The fierce flames of battle on the field dimmed little by little.
But this didn't signal the end of the war. It had been ten years since Indra offered his heart, and the gods wouldn't stop now—not when it was time to offer up another fragment of Baal.
"So you're saying they started a war to offer a fragment of Baal to the Life Goddess?"
"That's right. At first, a god named Indra offered his heart—the one infused with a fragment of Baal—and things went smoothly. But from the second time, problems arose."
The Dragon Maiden spoke in a calm voice.
A god's heart? Offering something like that? It was beyond comprehension for a human like him.
"At the time, three gods held fragments of Baal. One of them holed up in their own territory and didn't budge."
"Three… All three were fragments of Baal, you say?"
"Yes. Odin, Zeus, and Amun. Those three, plus Indra who offered his heart. The gods formed factions around these four."
Four gods…
"Odin and his Aesir followers barricaded themselves in their realm and never stepped out. And since most Aesir are battle maniacs, fighting them head-on would mean heavy losses."
"Odin…"
He'd heard that name somewhere before. Surely… while researching giant myths.
"So Zeus and Amun ignored the shut-in Aesir and waged war against each other. Countless gods' interests got tangled up in the process… and it ballooned into a war involving most of them."
"That was the War of the Gods…?"
"Yes, the War of the Gods. The war very nearly ended in one day with an Ennead victory, but for some reason, Lokapala intervened to aid Olympus, allowing them to survive."
"Ennead? Olympus? Lokapala?"
The Dragon Maiden explained patiently.
"I mentioned it earlier—the four gods with Baal's fragments formed factions. The gods following Zeus are Olympus, those under Amun are the Ennead. Lokapala followed Indra, who offered the heart first. Add Odin's Aesir, and you have the four major factions of the Pantheon."
"The four major factions of the Pantheon? There's no record of that anywhere…"
"Most records from that time were erased, so you won't find them. Only scraps they missed or info they deliberately left behind."
The Dragon Maiden's words delivered quite a shock.
He knew the current Pantheon gods differed somewhat from those of back then… but deliberately erased?
Like the info on Baal? For what purpose?
"That's not for now—let's skip that. We were talking about the War of the Gods."
"Ah, yes."
And so the Dragon Maiden continued.
"The war between Olympus and the Ennead dragged on for quite a while. About a year."
"A year…"
"They didn't fight nonstop every day, of course. Even gods need rest. Especially in a war where lives are on the line."
War… the War of the Gods… Human wars were terrifying enough, but how horrifying would a gods' war be? Unimaginable.
"The War of the Gods went on for a long time. Countless gods lost faith and declined, or fell. Gods who should have been tending to humans and gathering faith got swept into war. Losing faith was inevitable."
"Faith…"
"For gods, faith is life, currency, power. Losing it is fatal. Still, the war did have a victor in the end."
The Dragon Maiden continued nonchalantly.
"The victor…"
"I! Zeus! Have defeated Amun!!!"
The war, which had raged for over a year, finally reached its end.
The lightning spear pierced Amun's heart, transforming into a massive bolt that incinerated his body.
No matter that Amun possessed Baal's body—even he couldn't withstand a spear through the heart and flames engulfing his form… Or perhaps the patchwork stitches holding Baal's shattered body together burned away under Zeus's lightning.
Amun's fragment of Baal's body crumbled to pieces.
"The war! Is over!!"
At Zeus's roar, the surviving Olympus gods erupted in cheers.
A war with massive sacrifices. Not just Olympus and Ennead gods, but many unaffiliated ones had fallen too.
The heaviest losses were suffered by Lokapala… Nearly all their members wiped out.
What had Indra been thinking? What had he asked of his followers? To fight to the death, disregarding their lives. And not even for their own sake.
Indra had already reincarnated as a human by then… If possible, he'd like to track down that soul and ask.
"Life Goddess! We're a bit late, but! We offer this fragment of Baal for you!"
Zeus unwrapped the cloth from his shoulder, gathered the scattered remains of Amun's body—Baal's body—onto it, and tied it into a bundle.
"We offer Amun's fragment of Baal's body to you!"
I reached out toward the Baal body Zeus presented, and it floated into the air, arriving before me.
The shattered Baal body… Hmm.
I'd thought Amun looked oddly like Baal, but of course—it wasBaal's body.
Whatever. Didn't matter.
"It's all in pieces—total mess. Amun was walking around with this patched-up body, huh."
"Yeah. Looks like some parts are missing."
I caught Amun's soul leaking from Baal's body, handed it to the death god who had approached, and assembled the fragments into a complete form.
Most of the body was intact, but the heart and one eye were missing.
The eye was probably with Odin. The heart… with Indra. Which I had.
"Well then…"
After reassembling Baal's body, I took out the heart Indra had offered and inserted it in place of the one pierced by Zeus's lightning.
Now the body was whole, save for one eye.
"Looking at it like this… it's pretty handsome."
"Yeah, not bad."
No soul, of course… But managing to gather it like this was a relief, at least.
Still missing the eye and crown, but collecting those was only a matter of time.
"That said, more gods than expected lost their divinity in the war. Is that okay?"
"Hmm… Among those who vanished, were there any we absolutely needed?"
"A few, yeah. They didn't fully disappear, though…"
Well, as long as they hadn't been obliterated or sent to the afterlife, it should be fine.
"If it's just loss of divinity, I can revive them later. Let's collect them for now."
I could share my faith to restore their divinity.
Time to put my excess faith to use somehow.
