Chương 15: The first trial starts

The space between spaces was dark, quiet, and somehow still aggressively pushing against the soul of Gu Zhao. He had managed to pass the tribulations from Heaven only half a year ago, stepping into the God Realm. He was still at the very bottom of said realm, but no immortal cultivator could even hope to fight him. It was such a massive jump that even he himself had been shocked by how his dantian had tripled, if not more, in size.

His silken hair flowed, though there was no wind, while his silk garments hugged his well-built but young-looking body. He was almost nine hundred years old but looked like a man who had barely passed twenty. His jaw was elegantly curved, like someone had carved it from porcelain and given it life. His eyes were warm but sharp at the same time. Gu Zhao came from a righteous sect through and through. He may have had a few setbacks and gathered quite a few enemies along the way, but he had done it.

The test of the Eternals was the last real boundary. A strict and deadly wall put up by the Eternals, as he had learned. All newborn gods would eventually be called to be tested and culled. Of course, he knew that being unsure was the enemy of success, so he believed that he would pass. What he did not expect were the other god-seeds. His first thought was that he would see cultivators just like himself, perhaps a few spirit beasts that had made it to godhood. This… was not it.

As it just so happened, he was the only human in the gathering of godlings. He saw a massive green entity covered in spiraling vines with no face, some horrific underwater fish monster, an entity made of pure light, and more creatures that he could barely begin to comprehend.

"Hey, good to see a human here." A deep voice came from beside him. Not that of a monster, but of a man. Yet it came from a massive dragon with scales shining like moonlight. The horns on the dragon's head were mismatched, as if they had come from two different dragons, yet he smiled… as well as a dragon could smile.

"Considering the turnout…" the dragon chuckled.

"Well, I too like having something recognizable here. Though this is supposed to be a test. Are you maybe interested in teaming up?" Gu Zhao raised an eyebrow.

"I don't know if that is even allowed, but sure." The dragon nodded.

"Call me Joshua Steel."

"Gu Zhao." He bowed.

"Let us hope we survive. I learned that this test can easily get us killed despite being newborn gods."

"Kind of figured that from how my tentacled friend talked about it…" the dragon sighed.

"Well, if it comes to it, let's avoid offing each other." He chuckled. Gu Zhao was not really in the mood to joke, but he allowed a faint smile. - - - - - - - - - - Joshua found himself floating in a dark void, only to see random figures scattered around him. The area was not really a flat plane, so there were entities to the left, right, above, and below. He did not need to move, as his neck could turn in all sorts of ways anyway. Most, if not all, of the god-seeds were monstrous. One was a ball of light, and…

one beside him looked like a man who had just popped out of a cultivation story. The man seemed extremely focused but still joined in on some small talk. What was weird was that Joshua could understand him, even though the man clearly did not speak his language. Sadly, the space was soon pressed down, and text appeared in front of everyone.

"The Eternal Council tests all young god-seeds. Your first test is simple. You were summoned randomly, so there would be a similarly random selection of life forms taken with you. Be they sapient or not, these are your resources. Keep them alive in a new, harsh land. Imagine that each and every one of them is worth points. Points you cannot lose. If all your life forms die, you lose the test. Duration: seventeen rotations of the planet you are placed upon. Killing each other's life forms is not forbidden."

"Wait, what?!" If Josh had still been in human form, his face would have gone pale. Several of the god-seeds were chuckling. It was not unlikely that the four from nineteen had already known about this rule and positioned powerful entities near them.

"Curses." The human cultivator said it while looking exactly like Joshua felt.

"Let's join f..." Josh said to him quickly, but was cut off as he suddenly landed in a red desert. Only there was a sudden lake. Loch Katrine, to be precise, had been plopped into a circular hole in the middle of the desert. Trees, animals, and, yes… the agents from the US had all been brought along as well.

"DOYLE!" Josh shouted, turning his head toward a part of the hill that had come with them.

"I am here!" came the faint answer.

"What happened?" The four next to Josh looked around, their faces filled with shock and confusion.

"What happened?" Raeriku's voice was shaky, but unmistakably scared. The other three simply waited for the dragon to speak. Josh took a long breath and placed two clawed fingers against his forehead. He might not have had a migraine, but… well, this was certainly close enough.

"I am afraid you got caught in my god-seed test, set up by some Eternal Council or whatever." Josh used his divine sense to see farther than ordinary eyes ever could. The planet was massive, far bigger than Earth, yet its gravity was only slightly stronger. The rocky desert stretched in almost every direction except the south, where he sensed a savannah-like area. That in itself was not a big problem. What was, however, was that his powers were limited here, much like they were on Earth.

In the realm of Gaix, he could turn mountains into oceans and do far more. Here, his divine power was being restricted to something much closer to what he could do in his own world. The other big problem was the life forms on this planet. Everything was either massive, toxic, or absolutely deadly.

"What? A test for gods? Then why are we here?" Grevar asked with a shaking hoof.

"For me to try and keep you from ending up dead." Just as he said it, a songbird that had been frightened by the unfamiliar surroundings flew from the edge of the forest. A football-sized desert bug immediately caught it, ripping the poor bird in two before munching down on it. Joshua's eyes widened as a tiny window popped up. 720 → 718 points. That cute little bird had been worth two points from his limited reserve.

"Did something happen?" Warg asked, noticing that Josh had suddenly turned his head toward the forest.

"Yes. A songbird died from a bug. It seems this world is designed to be anti-life in every possible way." Doyle suddenly arrived, running for his life as a millipede the size of a prehistoric monster chased him across the gravel.

"I DON'T WANT TO DIE!" He shouted as his legs hit the ground with as much power as they could muster. Josh jumped and landed directly on the millipede's head, crushing it beneath his weight. He immediately pulled his talons away as the stones beneath them began to hiss from the highly concentrated acid leaking from the creature. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"What is this? The fucking Alien movie?" Josh shook his claw toward the bushes, accidentally burning several leaves with the acid that had splashed onto them from his talons. - - - - - - - - - - - The god-seed trial was not something any god should simply watch. It was not against the rules to observe, but it was also not something the Eternals advertised. The trial was meant to be nothing more than a culling ground for unworthy gods. That being said, they were not the only ones watching. Far from it, in fact.

If anything, the trial had become a yearly show for many major and lesser gods who had passed it once and simply wanted to laugh at the newcomers. Bets were placed, and arguments bloomed between some who already had bad blood with the other observers. Old gods barely ever cared for such an event. In fact, most considered it something ridiculously beneath them. So when Cthulhu himself joined the audience, it caused quite a big wave.

Some small gods shrank themselves until they were barely visible, while major gods immediately began coming up with theories. The murmurs had barely started when another ancient entity arrived, sitting upon a throne made of vines and roses. Oberon sat sideways on his throne, popcorn resting on his lap while a wine flute floated beside him. One of them appearing was already a big thing. But two? Just who was in this year's trial that had made the big players come to watch?

No one dared to ask, fearing for their own lives and sanity, but the bets suddenly became much larger.

"Five sextillion souls bet on Joshua Steel." Cthulhu casually tossed a soul card into the betting pool. The messenger god responsible for collecting the bets nearly fainted.

"Same here." Oberon casually tossed his own card into the pool. Anyone who had bet against Joshua before the duo arrived was pale now. Their bets might as well have been nothing… Or they would win so enormously that everyone else would hate them for it. The odds on the board changed so quickly that it almost felt like a joke. This was no longer some casual yearly culling. If Joshua died, the big gods might rage and kill a dozen or so lesser gods simply for having contributed to the loss.

A few observers immediately checked out and decided to swallow their losses, as they dared not wait and see what was going to happen. - - - - - - - - - - - - Luna was halfway through a game when she suddenly stopped her hands. Something was wrong. She could still hear the game sounds, but all of it seemed to fade into the background as she focused on the strange sensation in her chest. Her connection to her father had always been there.

Even when Josh travelled to another realm, she could still feel him faintly, like a distant warmth somewhere beyond the world. Now that warmth was almost gone. Far too faint to be normal.

"Dad…" Her heart tightened in her chest and she swallowed hard. She quietly stood... by the time she reached the bathroom, she was already turning invisible. She pushed the window open and shot into the sky. The first sonic boom rolled across the city as she accelerated. A second followed only moments later when she pushed herself even harder. She barely cared about being seen or maintaining her disguise. Her father was gone, and whatever had happened, something was terribly wrong.

The countryside blurred beneath her as she flew toward Loch Katrine. When the familiar landscape finally came into view, Luna slowed sharply. Or rather, what should have been the familiar landscape. A massive circular hole had appeared where a huge portion of the lake had been. The remaining water was still rushing toward it, pouring over the edges in a chaotic torrent and forming temporary waterfalls into the enormous depression.

Luna descended and landed near the edge, her eyes desperately searching the strange landscape.

"Dad? DAD!" Her voice echoed across the hills before disappearing into the distance. Then a powerful gust swept over the area. Luna turned just in time to see Felix descending from the sky. The demon butler landed nearby with Kate in his arms, the calico maid clinging tightly to him as her ears lay flat against her head. Felix's steel-grey hair was being blown wildly around his sharp features as he looked over the changed landscape.

"Where is he?" Kate asked almost panicked.

"I don't know." Luna's voice trembled as she stared into the enormous hole.

"He just… disappeared." Felix slowly looked around. His expression, normally calm and composed, had become grim.

"He did not merely travel elsewhere," the demon butler said quietly, folding his batlike wings into his uniform.

"I can barely feel our connection to him." Kate stared toward the empty space where their master should have been. For perhaps the first time since Josh had created her, genuine fear appeared in her eyes.

"We have to find him."

"We will," Luna immediately replied, clenching her fists.

"We have to." - - - - - - - - - - - Far away, Briggs was receiving a very different kind of warning. His satellite terminal suddenly began screaming with alerts. He nearly knocked over his coffee as he turned toward the screen and stared at the readings.

"What the hell?" The equipment they had installed to monitor the area had detected a massive spatial disturbance. More importantly, the signal associated with Doyle had simply vanished. Briggs immediately grabbed the phone and called Joshua. The line could not connect so he tried again on the home phone.

"Come on, pick up." It simply rang out, but no one picked it up, not even his new butler.

"Shit." He grabbed his coat and rushed outside, his mind already racing through every possible explanation. The drive to Joshua's house took only minutes, and Briggs barely waited for his vehicle to stop before rushing toward the front door.

"Joshua!" There was no answer so he pulled out his glock, opened the door and stepped inside. The house was completely intact, but there was no Joshua, no Luna, no Kate, and no Felix only Princess the golden retriever greeted him with tail wagging and a happy bark. Briggs checked every room anyway, as though the answer might somehow be hiding in a cupboard. He slowly lowered his weapon.

"What the fuck happened?" He pulled out his phone and contacted command.

"We have a major problem. Joshua is gone. So is Doyle." he knelt and gave the dog a scratch between the ears, he needed to touch something and the affectionate dog helped to ground himself. - - - - - - - - - - - Meanwhile, Veridian's command center had descended into chaos. One moment, their four agents had been perfectly visible on their monitoring systems. The next, all four signals had disappeared.

"Agent Warg's signal is gone! Grevar too!"

"Agent R.?" Agent Rellis shot op from her chair, walking to the screens.

"Nothing!"

"Check again!" She leaned over the man working the computer. Technicians frantically worked through the sensor feeds, switching between systems and running diagnostics. There had been no recorded deaths, no energy surge that matched an attack, and no indication that the agents had moved. They had simply blinked out of existence.

"A massive spacial anomaly was recorded thirty seconds ago." an agent at the other side of the room pulled out a scan showing a spike in measurements.

"Satellite imagery?" Agent Rellis asked.

"Cloud cover is too thick. We can't get a clean visual."

"Then send a drone gods damn it!" she slammed her palm on the table. The order went out immediately. An unmanned drone was launched from one of Veridian's nearby vessels and began flying toward the meeting site. It disappeared into the thick clouds covering the loch, its cameras struggling against the darkness and mist. Then the feed suddenly cleared. The operators stared at the screen. Loch Katrine was no longer the place they had sent their agents to.

A massive circular depression had replaced a significant portion of the lake and its south side. Enormous quantities of water still rushed into it. The surrounding landscape looked almost as though someone had scooped a section of the world away. The drone adjusted its altitude and zoomed in. Standing on the shore was a white dragon. Beside her were two human-looking figures.

"We got visual of Luna Steel and two anomalious entities, but no sign of Joshua Steel or our team." the agent beside the screen stated. - - - - - - - - - - - -"How long do we have to survive here?" Raeriku asked.

"Seventeen planetary rotations," Josh said as he remained on high alert, watching for any incoming monster.

"As this planet is bigger, I have no idea how fast or slow it turns, but I think all of you can feel that there is a slight increase in gravity."

"Yeah, I can feel it," Doyle nodded. He was the only human in the team.

"I am starting to hate my job."

"Welcome to the club," Warg laughed, but his expression suddenly changed as his eyes went wide. A small beeping sound came from somewhere around his neck.

"No… no, no! The bombs inside us!" He looked frantically at the others, all of whom shared the same realization as the faint beeping began to emanate from them as well. Josh reacted immediately. He focused his divine power on the four of them, searching through their bodies until he found the bombs. With a quick use of his power, he teleported all four devices out of their bodies and into the nearby desert. Four small explosions sounded almost simultaneously in the distance.

"Huh?" Warg let out a faint whine and stared down at his chest.

"How are we not dead?"

"Like I would allow you to die from something like that," Josh snorted.

"You are literally mine to defend, and I shall do a fucking good job, thank you very much." He shook his head.

"Remind me to yell at your bosses once we are back."

"It will be my pleasure, given we get there." Warg laughed, the sound wild and almost relieved. Josh, however, was not laughing. Another fifty or so points had already disappeared as a few squirrels and fish died somewhere nearby. At this point, any animal in the forest that did not stay hidden ended up becoming a meal for some kind of bug. The rocky desert might have looked empty to ordinary eyes, but Josh could tell that it was far from such.

Hundreds of thousands of different giant bugs were scattered beneath the rocks and sand, simply waiting for someone foolish enough to get close.

"What's the plan, big guy?" Doyle asked, trying to lighten the dread building in his chest.

"Working on one." Joshua thumped his tail against the shore as he sank deeper into thought. Seventeen rotations, hundreds of thousands of creatures that could kill them and every single life form around him was worth points he could not afford to lose. Joshua began to understand just how difficult this test could end up as the desert heat beat down on the previously chilly area.