Magical Soul Parade

Both Finn and Deacon's concealment spells ensured no one would see them. But in the heat of a riot, with bottles, tables and bodies being flung around, someone could randomly hit one of them despite not registering them, making for an uncanny display that could draw attention.

So Finn and Deacon exited quietly, stepping out through a side entrance.

The street outside was darker now, the sun was setting, but the town was getting heated. Finn could hear similar arguments erupting from other building. The news of the statue shattering was spreading fast, and with it, religious panic.

"This is worse than I expected," Deacon muttered as they moved through shadows toward the rendezvous point. "The entire settlement is literally getting divided."

Finn nodded passively as they walked briskly to their rendezvous point, he looked far off in his thoughts, pondering implications with an idea brewing in his mind.

They reached the alley where they'd split up earlier. Tavian materialized first, expression grim. Then Osric, equally troubled. Finally Keeva emerged from the direction of the temple.

"The temple is in chaos," Keeva reported immediately. "The head priest is maintaining that the Guardian is eternal, that the statue breaking is just... a test of faith or something. But I overheard younger priests in a back room arguing. Some fervent believers felt the Guardian's presence fade into nothing, so they know for sure it's gone."

"I counted two hundred and forty-seven people around the fringe edges of the city," Osric reported right after. "No professional military. Just civilian guards with spears. And I saw maybe... twenty people openly discussing The Radiant One. Secret believers, I think. They're becoming more vocal now."

"The settlement has only ever worshipped the Guardian," Tavian added. "I found traces of old foundation stones buried in the area. There used to be other structures here, but they were destroyed some generations ago. The Guardian's temple was built on top of ruins."

"They made it so there is only one God," Deacon confirmed. "The entire town. No competing faiths, no alternatives. Just the Guardian."

Finn processed this. A mono-theistic settlement whose God had just died, that had no framework for religious pluralism, no experience with divine competition. And secret believers of The Radiant One already embedded, waiting for exactly this moment.

This town was a boiling pot about to pop open with change.

"We should send someone back to report," Finn said. "Thalia needs to know the situation is developing faster than expected."

"I'll go," Tavian volunteered. "My Passage concept can get me back quickest."

"Tell Thalia the religious tensions are escalating rapidly," Deacon instructed. "Within hours, not days, there would be action. The Guardian believers and the secret Radiant One converts will clash. It's going to get violent. But..." He paused.

"The chaos would make things easier for us. It'll provide perfect cover for the others whose concepts are not as… subtle," he said. "Everyone will be too distracted to notice strangers."

Tavian nodded and faded, heading back toward the dunes.

"We should keep observing," Keeva said. "If these 'Gods' are real, they'll have to act eventually, right? The Radiant One will claim this territory, or the Guardian will... return somehow?"

"If it can," Osric muttered.

Finn remained silent, listening but barely hearing.

His mind was mostly elsewhere, consumed by a thought that had been growing since he'd sensed the worm's fading divinity.

An opportunity. Dangerous. Unprecedented. Possibly insane.

But an opportunity nonetheless.

The Guardian was dead. Its believers were desperate, leaderless, vulnerable. Its divine essence was gone, dispersed into nothing… but it's believers still remained. Their faith still remained… without something divine to latch onto…

But Finn carried something divine… something far superior to what the worm creature had carried.

The 0.27% Rank II divine essence stolen from Garuda, preserved within him, unused.

What if...

"Finn?"

He blinked, realizing Deacon was staring at him.

"You've been quiet," the Truth bearer said, golden eyes narrowed slightly. "What are you thinking?"

"Just… processing," Finn said, which was true enough.

But Deacon's eyes blazed brighter for a moment, and Finn knew the Truth bearer sensed something — agitation, calculation, intent that didn't match his words.

Deacon didn't call him out, though. Just watched him carefully.

Finn forced himself to focus on the immediate situation. "We should split up again. Cover more ground. The Radiant One believers are getting bolder, we need to know their numbers, their organization, whether they have a leader."

"Good idea," Keeva agreed.

They dispersed once more, fading into the settlement's growing darkness.

But Finn's mind wasn't on reconnaissance anymore.

He was thinking about Gods. About how they were made.

Not in this world — he had no frame of reference for that. But on Earth. In the myths and religions he'd studied as an anthropology student. The patterns that repeated across cultures, across centuries.

Gods evolved. They changed. Sometimes gradually, sometimes abruptly.

A fertility Goddess became a war Goddess when her people needed warriors instead of harvests.

A trickster God became a wisdom God when society valued knowledge over chaos.

A death God became a resurrection God when believers needed hope.

The deity's name stayed the same. The temples remained. The priests continued their rituals.

But the God itself transformed, adapted, became something new because that's what the believers needed.

It happened in Egyptian mythology. Greek. Norse. Hindu. Mesopotamian.

The God "died" and was "reborn" as something greater.

What if Finn could do that here?

The Guardian was dead. Its statue shattered. Its divine essence dissipated.

But what if the Guardian returned? Changed. Evolved. More powerful than before.

What if Finn became the Guardian?

Not literally — he wasn't the worm. But if he could appear to the priests, to the believers, claim the Guardian's identity while manifesting something stronger...

The 0.27% divine essence from Garuda was vastly superior to what the worm had possessed. Finn had sensed that immediately. If he could somehow channel it, manifest it in a way that resonated with the Guardian's existing faith structure...

He would need a mouthpiece. Someone fervent, devoted, desperate enough to believe. A priest or priestess witnessing a "divine vision." Proclaiming the Guardian's return in a new form.

The believers wanted their God back. They were terrified of abandonment, of being left defenseless against The Radiant One's expansion.

If Finn gave them what they wanted, showed them their Guardian had transformed, ascended, become powerful enough to protect them even from other Gods...

They would believe. Because they wanted to believe.

And belief was how Gods were made.

Finn stopped walking, pressed against a wall in a shadowed alley, breathing hard.

This was insane.

He had no idea if it would even work. The mechanics of divine essence, of faith-based power, of claiming a dead God's identity — he was purely extrapolating from Earth mythology, applying it to an alien world with an actual functional divinity.

It could fail catastrophically.

And even if it worked...

The Radiant One was out there. A real God, from what Finn had heard, not a proto-God sustained by folklore, but an active, aware, expansionist. If Finn claimed the Guardian's territory, he would be in direct competition with something that could probably annihilate him.

Then there were his teammates…