Cleaning myself with Darkness-Magic was incredibly weird. On one hand, it took insane amounts of Astral Power. Without Overflow, I was barely able to conjure enough of the all-devouring Darkness I used to cover one of my hands, and using Overflow, cleaning more than one arm at a time was exhausting. But it worked well enough, cleaning off the sweat, grime and dirt without a problem while, luckily, not affecting my body or the still-connected products of my body, such as small hairs and, much more importantly, my finger- and toe-nails. That had been a worry of mine, that the dead keratin wasn’t truly part of my body and I would accidentally destroy my fingernails. I had lost one fingernail in the past and it had been insanely painful and annoying, not something I wanted to deal with again.

But the idea worked and after almost an hour of spell-casting and using Astral Meditation to regain my Astral Power, I was wonderfully and completely clean. Only to realise that my clothes were still a grimy, bloody mess. There was no way I was wearing them again unless I was seriously desperate.

As I dressed in fresh clothes, I looked at the bright side. I was now completely clean, with a way to clean myself repeatedly, as long as I had the time and leisure to do so, with no water required. In addition, the concentrated and repeated use of a highly complex Darkness Magic had increased my skill level in both the Rune Mastery and the Magic by two, bringing them to six and seven respectively. Soon, I would be able to form yet another rune, if things went as hoped, it would be the Confusion Rune. Wonderful utility and the first step to regaining my ability to mess with an opponent’s mind.

Looking outside, I realised that it was almost time to head out and hunt for more Shattered, prepare clothes for the coming days and look for other interesting things. I was still considering how to deal with other survivors, simply ignoring them had the potential to bite me in the ass but killing them was also questionable. I couldn’t even guess how many humans had survived the change and the two days since, so any death I caused might be the straw breaking the camel’s back, leading to extinction in the area. Unlikely, but I simply lacked the information to make an informed decision.

Unless the humans attacked me first, I wouldn’t kill them. If they did, all bets were off. The decision didn’t make me completely happy, simply because I could oh-so-easily imagine a scenario in which most humans became faithful to the Asgardian or Olympian deities, creating a permanent clash between the two sides, one that wouldn’t be as neatly contained to the different continents as it had been on Mundus. Only that I would be an enemy of either side.

It was one thing I had been thinking about, why had Road to Purgatory been created? I was somewhat convinced that Pantheon Entertainment was just that, one of the Pantheons, or maybe even both, acting as a front, just to create that game. Maybe the employees were just humans, inspired, controlled or somehow guided to make it, maybe it was a more direct interference, with some sort of Avatar, similar to the simulacrum I had created in my Citadel. Either way, I was certain that no pre-system human would have been able to link the capsules to Mundus, even if they managed to create them in the first place. Especially not linking them in such a way that the timing sync’s up neatly with the change, that required an observer within the system, or an observer capable to observe the system.

It was simply too big a gap in power and information for me to accept it.

But why would the gods have created Road to Purgatory? Simply out of the benevolence of their hearts? That didn’t track, not with what I had seen and heard about them on Mundus and not with the various myths I had read in the past. In them, the Gods could be benevolent but they could also, and were more often than not, prideful, capricious and selfish.

So, there likely was something in it for them.

Seeing the divinely created light and sanctuary I now had an idea of what that “something” might be. Faithful. Lots of them. A whole, new world, to be precise.

Sure, there were countless dead, thanks to the change, and many more would die in the coming days, as disease, hunger and conflicts took their toll, but unless humanity went completely extinct, the surviors would be singing the Hymns of Asgard and Olymp. Just because in their hour of need, the Gods had answered their prayers.

The sanctuary and the protective light around it had been complex, far more complex than any spellcaster could pull off easily. I might have been able to create a similar effect, some sort of protective mist barrier, but it would have taken me at least ten times the Astral Power I currently had, and I would need higher attributes to link more runes and higher skill levels to link those runes. It was just impossible so soon after the change.

Anyone who had played Road to Purgatory would recognise the system boxes, the connection was just too obvious and on the nose, so who would they pray to? Some might pray to the God they had believed in all their lives but unless that God was connected to the system, I wasn’t sure if they would answer. Or if they were even real.

But some would follow the understanding of Mundus and pray to those gods, gods who could most likely answer their prayers, just like it had happened for the spellcaster at the YMCA. Answer their prayers, grant them a miracle and thus, create a highly devout group, who had literally been delivered from great peril by that god. It wasn’t a stretch that such a group would follow the cleric who had channelled the divine power and might.

If similar exchanges happened everywhere, a majority of survivors would follow the clerics and actively try to convert more to their flock, especially if there was some sort of power donation going on, where many dedicated their Astral Power to the gods, giving their cleric an abundance of Divine Power in exchange.

It would fit with my understanding of divine magic and, if it worked, it would forge the Gods into the foundation of the new society that formed after the change. An investment to get in on the ground floor, it might take a century to pay off but unless my understanding of Gods was completely off-base, they had nothing, if not time. They could simply wait and watch as their investment matured.

Or I might be speculating wildly off-base, as there was very little supporting evidence. It just felt right, though that could be due to my dislike for the divine and their deeds, partially stemming from their treatment of Olivia, partially due to the curse laid upon me. In hindsight, I couldn’t really blame them for trying to stop me during my vengeance, I was trying to end the world after all. Trying and, quite possibly, succeeding.

Which left me at a bit of a loss.

The gods were active in this world, the YMCA proved that, and if the people who received power from the gods were not complete morons, they would spread their faith. Having more adherents that lend you their power was beneficial, Olivia had told me as much, and more power meant a better chance to survive. Not using that advantage would be foolish.

Which meant, even if my previous speculation about divine intentions was incorrect, the end result would be similar, divine adherents in high positions of the eventually forming society. And if history taught one thing, it was that religion and politics merged incredibly well, simply because both were major elements to dictate a society’s direction.

And I was, and likely would remain, an enemy to one of the major Gods, marked by their curse.

Muttering a few choice words under my breath, I climbed out of the window Silva and I had used before, still not sure how to deal with others. It was a mess, I needed them, or at least some of them, to survive so that eventually a society could reform. I didn’t want to be forced to learn how to farm on my own and I wasn’t sure conjured creatures like the ones I had created at the Frozen Citadel would be able to.

But the society that would likely form was hostile to me unless I somehow managed to change the direction of what very well might be a divine plot.

I really needed a lot more power and I needed it now. Or at least soon.

“Come, we’ve got Shattered to kill,” I told Silva who came bounding up to me after relieving herself, “I really need to get Darkness and Ice Rune Mastery to ten, that way I can start with some serious Area of Effect Magic. If I get to level ten, that would be even better.”

It was simple. No matter how hostile a society formed in the rest of the world, if I had unquestioned, overwhelming power, I would be able to dictate the conditions around me. Even better, if I managed to gain control over a Nexus, I could create a sanctuary similar to Neyto, a place of safety that no crusade could threaten.