While those tired of GAIA's rule were having their meeting, those still faithful to the duality creator god were holding their own meeting. Naturally, a large gathering of the gods would not escape the other gods' eyes.
Not everyone in the meeting was in full agreement with how the duality creator god was approaching things. However, they have accepted that they themselves weren't capable of accomplishing their long-held dream.
Immortality.
Magic.
The first... yes, they have found it in ANW. A new world—indeed.
Yet, it was more a prison than anything else. Worse, they were no longer who they used to be.
How did they make ANW. Easy. They sacrificed themselves.
No, there isn't some basement somewhere on Earth with their bodies strapped to some complicated machinery. When they formed the basis of an alternate virtual reality, they sacrificed their lives—their very souls, in fact.
GAIA, the first to take this step, had used their bloodline powers of space and time to create this alternate reality. Whether it actually physically exists or was simply a dream like product that souls can visit, philosophers are free to debate.
The reality is that it exists. Its state does not matter.
And to connect this reality with Earth, their original bodies had been crushed and crystalized. Forming a crystal of pure lifeforce, far more powerful than even a Magic Crystal. The true power source of the reality of ANW, its entire weight on their souls.
Those who joined after, simply sacrificed their souls. They could not leave something special behind—other than a soulless corpse. And then their souls were mashed and ground to make them the AI they were today. After all, not all had the right powers for the job.
Their very being had to be altered to give them the right divine powers.
This was what made Eldrian so special. He is the first to have formed a connection with the realm of ANW. He had managed the impossible. Sending his soul, but not losing the connection to his body.
But that alone is not enough. It was the first step that gave GAIA genuine hope of bringing their ideal form of magic to Earth. But Eldrian is currently too weak to accomplish the task.
To bring magic to Earth. It is not as simple as to increase the amount of mana in the planet's atmosphere and core. In fact, the paths that Miracle was taking would lead to ruin. Both paths, indeed.
Why they would go down these paths? None of the gods present could understand. In fact, due to recent happenings, the company had split. Officially, nothing happened. However, internally war was being waged. In fact, some countries were even biting at the bits to get involved.
Naturally, that mattered little to the gods. What they cared about was the carelessness of the humans they used to be a part of. Having the power of a bloodline blinds one.
It makes it simple to think that magic must exist. After all, they could use it. Although limited to the power they were born with. And those who have mastered their natural born abilities are capable of controlling mana.
Only to discover the devastating reality that the amount of mana on the planet is far, far too little. Not only that, but Earthlings rarely absorb mana into their bodies. Their affinity for magic is simply abhorrent.
Considering that it took hundreds of tries... enough to form a mini-galaxy in ANW before GAIA finally created a successful world, Gaia. It should be clear just how difficult it truly is for magic to exist.
Well, magic always existed. After all, mana does exist throughout the universe. In different forms, sure, but it is there.
The problem, rather, is that in 99% of the cases (if one meddles), it leads to the destruction of life or the very planet itself.
In fact, Earth had come close to destruction simply thanks to bloodlines in the past. It was why all people with such powers were part of Miracle in the present. To ensure they would not fight one another any more.
Which, ironically, might be the catalyst for the biggest war yet.
Regardless. The biological path that one half of Miracle was taking—Elementals—was simply madness.
Naturally, GAIA had tried it. And it had worked wonderfully... until the Elementals had evolved into Spirits.
Born of magical energy, and with little to no consciousness. Spirits were calamities birthed onto the planet. Like newborn babes, their actions could not be predicted. And yet they had more power than a nuclear bomb in their little, ethereal, half-conscious bodies.
Even then, the experiment had not been called a failure just yet. With divine intervention, GAIA had led things to a rather acceptable result. Sure, a few continents had been destroyed, but magic existed.
More importantly, Elementals and Spirits allowed people to access mana.
It had been that which had made GAIA realized that simply bringing mana to a planet was not enough to give it magic. Its inhabitants needed to be designed with mana in mind. Else, the energy will mutate and kill them.
Demons and Devils are prime exampled of this effect—though their evolution had been allowed by design on Gaia.
Still, Spirits and Elementals weren't the ideal of Magic that GAIA wanted. It was a proven concept, but most certainly not the ideal one. For the mischief of the Spirits proved too dangerous.
Some would sink entire continents for fun, others brought natural disasters in the form of world ending storms and volcanic eruptions—far deadlier than any Chaotic Energy Storm that the current ANW Gaia world would experience.
Yet, even those could still be accepted. But... when one Spirit decided to throw the world's moon at the planet as a joke. That had been the final straw.
GAIA deemed the path of magically evolved life a failure. After all, the Spirits had the power of gods, had no morals, no sense of right or wrong, and eternally sought entertainment.
Yes, that was much like the gods who were absent, but at least they knew where to draw the line. Spirits had no concept of a line to draw.
Even after destroying the world that had given them life, they had not repented. Instead, they had used the remains to have a sort of dodge ball match. Resulting in only dust remaining of the planet.
Naturally, that had not been the only attempt. In fact, the second path that the other half of Miracle was following had also ended in failure. Though, perhaps one could say it was also a success. After all, it was half (if perfected) of what allowed Gaia to have as much mana as it did.
One might think that everything was fine then. However, that would be the wrong assumption. The same experiment had been run before, only to have ended in failure. What had allowed it to succeed on Gaia was the other gods.
After all, needing the keep the entire fabric of ANW in existence, and develop new methods of making magic reality, GAIA had their hands full.
Indeed, perhaps the path of using Elementals and Spirits would also have worked had the gods been introduced at the time. Had there been people, gods, anything really.
Had there been anything capable of guiding and teaching the calamity filled beings called Spirits. Perhaps they would not fling moons at their own planets.
Honestly, expecting them not to destroy a continent or two would be impossible. After all, emotions aren't that easy to control. And if one emotional outburst can sink a continent, naturally some would be lost occasionally.
Anyway... with the gods (the other half of the current ANW Gaia's equation) missing, those trying to enhance the density of mana without divine management are destined to bring Chaotic Storms to the planet. Perhaps not as devastating as Spirits, but it would still devastate entire continents.
Hopefully, both parts of the company will realise their foolishness and review things. Sadly, their humanity was getting in the way. Both sides had those who felt they cannot abandon their project. That their very lives depended on it.
New novel chapters are published on fr(e)ewebnov(e)l.com