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The morning after Ervas and Veronica dream with a certain squirrel-kin heroic goddess, Anna, Ismene, Amelia, and Acathea received the Divine Protection of Ratatoskr, while Pekorina, Pekoran, and her family received Ophelia's Divine Protection.
?
The news about the gods granting such a large amount of Divine Protections wasn't something to scoff at, Divine Protection were incredibly rare occurrences that happened every dozen of years on an incredibly talented individual.
Sometimes, there would be hundreds of years without any god even giving its protection to any mortal… the Divine Protections were a sign from the gods themselves, that those blessed by them would become future heroes and legends of their respective races.
Due to this… there was a commotion going on inside of the small castle of the recently paved citadel in the middle of the Devil Forest.
"Ervas, Veronica, we got divine protections! Does it mean I will become extraordinarily strong?" asked the little Amelia, daughter of Ismene who was celebrating her divine protection and the implications that they meant to her future.
"Well, you're already quite strong, Amelia," said Ervas while eating a sandwich.
"And how about me? I also got it! I am already quite strong, not going to lie! But with this, wouldn't I become a hero one day? As Ratatoskr-sama chose me?" wondered Acathea, the half squirrel-kin, and half bear-kin girl, who was already like a sister for Ervas.
"I think you have a lot of potential, Acathea. Ratatoskr has a good eye in choosing her champions," said Ervas, remembering how clueless Ratatoskr was over who to give her divine protections, Ervas and Veronica had to give her various suggestions for her to realize that her children had quite the good potential for growth.
In truth, Ratatoskr is a more battle-oriented goddess that has never put time into her life to see her children in detail and give them her divine protection to foment them to grow into heroes, as she often thought that other gods were there for that.
"This was rather unexpected, to be honest… but as the chief of the tribe, receiving the blessing of our beloved heroic goddess is a great honor," said Ismene while drinking tea reproduced through Ervas plant-type monsters.
"I think so too… but why me? I am just a blacksmith… why would I receive Ratatoskr-sama divine protection? I am not even that faithful and I haven't prayed for her in years…" said Anna, thinking that because she didn't pray, she was not deserving of divine protection.
However, faith and prayers, although important, were not essential for a god to grants its divine protection to a mortal… as long as the mortal knows the god's name and some of its authority or story, it should be good enough for the divine protection to happen.
There are also stronger divine protections like those made by the First Gods, such as Lamus and Vedon who blessed Ervas and Veronica, even when these two didn't know much about them and because they never had any faith in them, the divine protections never revealed themselves until they realized it through Ratatoskr pointing it out.
There have been cases in history about future heroes who were blessed at a young age as mere toddlers, who lived most of their lives completely unaware of the divine protection they possessed until very late when they got to know about the different gods of the world.
For Ervas and Veronica, it was a similar case, but it was mostly because they never thought about these gods since they were reincarnated at all, not even for a second… making their divine protections invisible to their eyes, even when its effects were already affecting their growth positively.
"Anna, you're a very talented warrior, perhaps the strongest warrior of the squirrel-kin. I think you are more than deserving of the divine protection of Ratatoskr. Also, you do not particularly need to have a strong faith or pray to a god to get their divine protection, as long as you acknowledge it, it should be good enough to get it" said Veronica.
"T-Talented warrior? W-Well… is that so? Then I guess it might be fine…" said Anna, a bit flustered by Veronica's usual praises.
"I also got divine protection from Ophelia-sama! I cannot believe it! Me? But I was just a wimp some weeks ago!" said Pekorina while celebrating.
"I and the rest of my family also acquired it, strangely enough… but I am not even a rabbit-kin anymore, so I don't think I should get such a divine protection…" said Pekoran, who was a Living Armory, a type of undead.
"Being of another race doesn't mean much as long as your original soul was born in the race that the gods belong to… and even then, even if you're an undead without any memories, it should be possible for the god to give you its divine protection, Pekoran. However, there is a small relationship between the mortal and the god that needs to exist for the divine protection to show all of their strength. Your relationship with Ophelia is that your soul is that of a rabbit-kin man and that you used to be one. As long as you keep being yourself, you will always be deserving of the divine protection of your goddess" said Ervas, recalling the many books he read as Anastacia about such subjects, alongside his own experimentations when Anastacia was blessed by the God of Darkness and Sins.
"That's… certainly enlightening, lord Ervas… I suppose I have to make the best use of this divine protection to protect my family! Ophelia-sama, I shall not disappoint you!" said Pekoran while raising his sword.
The whole group was currently sitting in front of the large table in the morning, having a generous breakfast that included many types of fruits, vegetables, bread, and meat.
Thanks to Ervas' ability to tame plant-type monsters, many types of plant-type monsters have appeared, many of them being very useful in the production category, being capable of mass-producing fruits, vegetables, and seeds as long as Ervas granted them enough of his mana.
"But my lord, we didn't get a divine protection!" said Lilith at Ervas side.
"Well, perhaps on another occasion…" said Ervas, as he was given a spoonful of potatoes and carrots purée by Nyarlathotep who had shapeshifted as Lilith, having Ervas sitting on her thighs.
"Objbjbj" she said with a gentle smile.
"Hey, Nyarlathotep, don't shapeshift as me! Also, I should be there and not you… Impostor!" said the real Lilith, wanting to have Ervas sitting on her thighs instead.
"Sorry but today is Nyarlathotep's attention day, so I will say yes to anything she wants to do… don't worry, she is a very sweet girl," said Ervas with a mild smile.
Nyarlathotep was a genderless being but always shapeshifted into women, so Ervas decided to call it a 'she'.
Nyarlathotep herself did not seem to mind, and she was rather pleased to be recognized as a woman, it seemed that that was her goal.
"Bubuiliililili" said Cthulhu, who was sitting atop Ervas' head while extending its tentacles to grab on steaks of grilled meat.
"And also, Cthulhu day," said Ervas.
"Hmmm… and when are Lilith and her sister's day?" asked Lilith, as her three sisters glanced towards Ervas.
"Maybe… tomorrow? Or past tomorrow" said Ervas.
"That's not so bad!" said Lilith.
"Anyways, my lord Ervas and lady Veronica… would you tell us more about that dream you had? Did you frankly spoke with the goddess of the squirrel-kin?" asked Mysticia, who had invited herself into the breakfast, bring Riaan with her.
"Mysticia, you shouldn't ask our lord and lady those things…" said Riaan.
"Oh right, well yeah, we almost forgot," said Veronica with a small chuckle as she finished eating the large grilled steak of Giant Lizard that she was currently enjoying.
"Well, pretty much we went to sleep, and we were dragged into her Divine Realm," said Ervas nonchalantly.
"Eh? That's it?" asked Mysticia.
"She seemed a bit weakened, as her appearance was that of a little squirrel… she informed us that she was currently sleeping and was using her consciousness to leave an oracle with us, but due to Veronica's soul, that oracle was bounced and I ended up sending us there," said Ervas.
"Yeah… I cannot really control the effect of that… Anyways, Ratatoskr had a very adorable voice… I was resisting the urge of petting her many times… and well, she was weakened because of a battle that she had against some gods that wanted to bypass the barrier created by the Dark Gods in the Demon Continents. They managed to fend off the gods, but her, Ophelia, and Daeva were weakened and had to go to take a nap to recover for a few hundred years" said Veronica.
"That's… quite shocking to be honest… does it mean that the gods are still battling even at this point?" asked Ismene.
"Yeah, it seems so… although nothing of large scale and only small skirmishes… from what I can tell, the Bright Gods Faction are actively trying to find a way into the Demon Continent to gather information or directly attack the demons and beastmen settlements," said Veronica.
"That's just scummy!" said Pekorina.
"Yeah, why are they so mean?" asked Amelia.
"Can't gods get along nicely? I don't understand why they fight so much... Shouldn't they work together to maintain the world peaceful instead? They're doing the complete opposite!" said Acathea.
"It's… more complicated than you girls can imagine… but this is isn't the place to discuss that for now… so let's continue with the main topic…" said Ervas.
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