RE: Deity - The Breath of Creation

Nyxteria clacked its beak in anticipation, waiting patiently as Statera stood before her portal, expression slowly souring. Despite her dramatic declaration of "Morgan, come say hi," no one had yet emerged from the portal. Nyxteria hoped it would be a bird. That would be nice.

"Having trouble, there?" The Emperor asked, visibly amused as he tapped his fingers against the table. Nyxteria had once considered asking the golden-skinned god for a gem from his crown, but it had enough gems for the moment. Maybe when the time flowing through said gems was worth freezing, but for the moment they were still developing. Maybe in a few more million years – Nyxteria wasn't sure why the Emperor didn't just forcibly advance their development. They would be beautiful once they were finished growing.

"Sorry, this one's the rebellious one." Statera apologized, before sticking her entire head through the portal. What followed were the muffled sounds of conversation, Statera's voice easy to make out, while the other was indistinct and indecipherable. "Yes, now come on. No…no! No, I am not giving you a choice. Quit sulking! We are going. I don't care if you don't like it, now come on!" With a small burst of power Statera pulled her head back through her portal, hair slightly disarrayed, tugging a grey-furred wolf with eight spider legs sprouting from its back through behind her.

"There is no reason why I should have to play at siblings with those other…fools…" the wolf trailed off as it finally noticed the other beings in the room were clearly not its siblings, eight red eyes narrowing, a frown tugging at the corners of its mouth. "What is this." It deadpanned.

"This is a meeting between gods." Reilly helpfully supplied, slurring his words slightly as the effects of all the alcohol he'd been drinking finally took its full toll. Nyxteria cocked its head to the side as it examined this…Morgan, watching it closely. "Is this one like Steward?"

"He's my Steward," Statera supplied, whatever that meant.

"I am no one's steward." Morgan growled.

"You've been hiding things from me, Statera. How could you keep such an interesting being hidden?" The Dragon rumbled, lifting herself off her pile of drones, slowly degrading as they were beneath the sheer power she radiated, to peer at Morgan curiously. Then, with a smoke-filled snort, she laid back down. "Not a god yet, which is good. Not a Dragon either though. Pity." Morgan bared its teeth at the Dragon, and Statera rapped the wolf on the head with her knuckles, giving it an admonishing look.

"If you pick a fight with Sehuyun, I won't protect you." Nyxteria knew that was a lie, everyone in the room knew it was a lie, including Morgan if the way it cocked its head to the side was any indication. But clearly Statera had made her point, as the spider-wolf lowered its head and tail in a half-sulk, sneering at the assembled gods.

Sensing a chance, Nyxteria hopped forward, space distorting around it, time flowing in twenty directions so each little step, each flex of its wings, each cock of its head and clack of its beak was all but unnoticeable, leaving the very air around it undisturbed and untouched. Statera was one of the few who could see through the nuances of Nyxteria's power, her attention immediately snapping to it as it hop-skipped over to the horned god and her wolf.

Morgan was not so lucky as to notice.

Nyxteria took its time examining Morgan, sensing the flow of time about each individual part of it, the space it took up, both in the metaphorical and physical sense. Its limbs were longer than they looked. Its jaw wider. Its power deeper, and still shaking, still looking for something to latch onto…the spidery limbs sprouting from Morgan's back rustled slightly, even in the slowed down time Nyxteria was using to observe the wolf. Their carapace was black and shiny, scratches marring the surface…and the one it had its eye on felt older than the others, with more history behind it.

"Nyxteria wants a leg." Nyxteria proudly announced, puffing up its chest feathers and startling Morgan, the wolf whirling with a snarl. "Will you give Nyxteria one of your legs? The spidery ones."

"A leg?" Statera asked, raising an eyebrow. "That's a bit gruesome, isn't it? Morgan, don't worry about the big bird." Morgan kept its eyes narrowed at Nyxteria, glancing only once at Statera. All eight eyes blinked, its scowl turned into something more sinister, and with a flash of movement it twisted its head around, gripped the spider leg Nyxteria had been eyeing in its maw, and promptly ripped it out of its back. Black blood splattered everywhere, a few droplets landing on Statera's face as she watched her child rip its own leg off without an inch of hesitation.

"Here." It spat the leg at Nyxteria's feet, black blood pouring out of the wound and down its side, matting its fur. It was an utter waste. That was perfectly good blood that could have been preserved!

"That is not what Nyxteria meant. Let Nyxteria fix that for you." Nyxteria clacked its beak once, time twisting…but it couldn't go about this the usual way, reverting the injury to its previous state. The presence of so many origin deities, fixtures in time and space, limited the amount Nyxteria could temporally manipulate things – but it could still duplicate a limb, and urge the wound to heal by accelerating time.

In the blink of an eye, the limb Morgan had torn off duplicated, a temporally exact replica of the limb appearing in the place it had been. Blood flowed backward, wanting to return to within Morgan's body, the wound sealing shut as the replicated leg was placed back upon its bleeding stump and promptly fused back together. Morgan blinked its eight eyes uncomprehendingly, while Nyxteria examined its work with a satisfied nod.

"There, all fixed! Now," one clawed foot reached down and grabbed the leg it had been given, sealing it in a chunk of timeless crystal. Another priceless artifact, to add to the collection! This one would go right beside MR-10's drones. And Reilly's dice. "Let's go to Nyxteria's ocean of stars!" With a happy skip Nyxteria led the way, the living sun that was its plus one, Sol, floating along silently behind it. No one had noticed when Nyxteria had switched it out for another sun, not even Statera. Nor when it had switched it out three other times, and eventually came back to Sol.

Nyxteria was proud of that, but more importantly, it was proud of its collection. It couldn't wait to show everyone, and place its newest additions in the pile!

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***

Morgan was at a loss. The limb it had torn off was perfect in every way, exactly the same as the old limb had been down to the tiniest of molecular and energetic differences. Normal healing did not do that, it knew. Cells would be different, energies would twist in flavor due to time flowing through it…this limb was the exact same in every way. Even the phantom pain that should have been present from tearing off one's own limb was gone, the nerve endings soothed and calmed.

Morgan looked up at the Great One, eyes narrowed.

"What just happened?"

"That is Nyxteria, an origin deity like me. It is a god of Space and Time." They said firmly, gaze drifting over the remade limb. Their hand twitched, looking as if They might reach out to touch Morgan's no-longer existing wound…but the Great One did not, instead turning to the other so-called Origin Deities. Morgan, satisfied with the reaction it had gotten out of the Great One, let its gaze rove over the collected group.

They did not seem like much.

A machine. A bird. An overgrown lizard. An ostentatious fool clad in gold. A beggar.

The Great One was more than all of them. And yet, as they walked toward the portal the bird led them towards, through the blissfully silent room that reminded Morgan so much of the Void, of the time before the Four Realms, Morgan couldn't help but wiggle its new-old limb. A quick glance at the Great One showed them to be utterly at peace, slowly pulling karmic threads off of Their body or twining them together, expression serene and calm.

Morgan wiggled its leg again, and recalled what the Great One had once told it. Time is my great limiter. Its gaze returned forward as the portal before it loomed. What great secrets, then did a god of space and time hold? What great secrets does the Great One wish to show me, here?

Morgan breathed out and followed the Great One through the swirling black and silver portal, only to be struck by the vastness of space that appeared on the other side.

Stars gleamed in a great black void, a million tiny suns glittering amidst the sea of darkness. But there was something wrong with it. Some stars aged faster than others, some aged backwards, and space was distorted every which way Morgan looked, almost as if the universe was viewed through a lens. Streams of light twisted and turned, weaving together in strings that blended and melded together before separating completely…it was disorganized, yet somehow wholly complete. Nothing felt out of place, even if some dimensions were layered below others, or slipped between fractured space, and time was as strange as it could get.

"I knew Nyxteria was large," the Great One breathed in awe, eyes wide as They stared up at the skies above. "But not this big." Morgan looked skyward and saw nothing but more stars, nebulas, and comets hurtling through space between them.

"I could feel the distortion in space," the chaos butterfly, Sylphina, started. "But the extent to which it had shrunk itself was…beyond my expectations."

"This exceeds my understanding." The skeleton, Shin, admitted. Morgan turned to the foul, unnatural creature, beside whom the bird Nyxteria had just been standing. Only it was gone, leaving behind a cloud of purple gasses that had taken a shape reminiscent of its own.

"What is going on?" Morgan demanded, claws digging into the space beneath it and finding no purchase. The Great One laid a hand upon its head, stilling the panic that threatened to well up inside of it at the lack of ability, and pointed skyward with Their prosthetic hand.
"The skies move." They said, and Morgan took a deep breath, looking heavenward once more. Morgan narrowed its eyes and poured all of its focus into sight, peeling back layers of reality like it knew the Great One could do simply by breathing, only to find –

The skies moved.

Energy rushed past Morgan as a great eye blinked, peering down at all those collected with a curious look. The eye alone was easily the size of the Realm Sun itself, if not exceeding that size. Space was folded about the bird's feathers, entire dimensions contained within the creases.

Morgan's eyes grew wide, taking an involuntary step back as the reality of the situation dawned upon it. Nyxteria, the great bird of Space and Time, was looking down upon its universe like a child might look down upon a particularly shiny rock. Anything Morgan had ever seen was dwarfed in size by the great bird, streams of time and space flowing around its feet.

And yet, despite its size, Morgan did not feel it was the greatest thing here. It glanced at the Great One, staring up at the giant bird with such interest gleaming in those green eyes of Theirs. They had changed. They were changing. Back to what They were in the before, growing closer to the grandness that had been Them. Morgan felt itself relax a little, stepping closer to the Great One.

Elvira may have created the heaven realm, but no heaven compared to Them. And certainly no stupid bird.

"Nyxteria," when the bird spoke, space was twisted and time was turned to sound like it was standing just beside them. It was so subtle Morgan wouldn't have noticed it were the Great One not standing beside it, guiding its ears and eyes with Their power. "will grow you too, so you can see my stars as Nyxteria does."

Space warped for a moment, and suddenly the universe seemed much…smaller. Morgan had not grown in size, it found, as it appeared beside the newly-enlarged Great One beside the bird Nyxteria, merely that space around it had been warped to make it seem larger. Suns were like grains of sand on the beach, distance but an afterthought. It felt empowering, but Nyxteria's power tainted the feeling, and Morgan fought the urge to reject such unholy power.

It knew no god than the Great One, but…it could at least play along, for Their sake.
So Morgan turned. A sea of stars lay before it, dimensions and time streams flowing and rippling endlessly, mimicking waves. Morgan could see the edge of the universe, where a shimmering wall of frozen time held back the relentless Void, and pushed back against what was made by it. And below its feet lay a nest. Time streams warped and churned, dimensional layers pushed up against each other and folded an endless number of times to form a crude nest, green crystals of frozen time piled up amongst the walls.

"This is Nyxteria's nest!" The bird proudly crowed, ruffling its feathers.

"And you are still not full size. Amazing." the Great One said softly, clutching Their stomach, face contorted. They looked down at Morgan, meeting its eyes though it quickly looked away. "Sorry, this layered time is making my stomach churn. I will do my best not to interfere."

"The time is disorienting, but this is…fascinating. Do you carry entire dimensions beneath your wings?" one of the gods asked, though the answer was lost to Morgan's ears as it focused its attention upon the Great One.

Their face was indeed green, appearing sick to Their stomach as They listened to whatever explanation was given. Morgan looked back at the universe before it, stretching its senses to the absolute limit. Physically, it may not encompass as much space as the Four Realms. But because of how time was stretched here, because of how space was distorted, its true mass was far, far greater. Morgan was having trouble understanding it, so it focused on what it did understand.

Time was the Great One's great limiter. Nyxteria was a god of time. And the Great One was growing closer to what They had been, as opposed to constantly surrendering pieces of Themselves. Even as Morgan watched, They continuously bound karmic strings together, forming a cohesive whole instead of the mess that entangled Them before; the strength that had been once so pervasive now slowly returning, a confidence reentering Their posture.

Even despite looking sick, Morgan noticed this.

Morgan licked its lips, forcing down a grin. The Great One was overcoming its limitations. Now it knew how it could force Them to overcome one more, to become the being it knew They truly were. To become what They thought They were not.

And this was the perfect place to discover just how to do that.