Chapter 155: CHAPTER 153
[Ororo Munroe POV]
Honestly, Ororo didn't know what to expect when she came back here.
A word of advice, some lost teachings or maybe even learning why she always felt drawn to nature aside from the people calling her a Goddess.
Her expectations were nothing grand, but what she received turned everything on its heels.
From the moment she saw that woman, she immediately understood what Draul was saying about Gods and them being real.
Although she was taught from a young age that the gods existed, all she had in them was faith in their existence and nothing more. She believed them to be real and not once did she ever thought she would be in the presence of one, and not just anyone, but one so exalted by all other Gods.
Gaea, the Mother Goddess of Earth.
…
*FLASHBACK*
The last thing she remembered was praying before a bright light enveloped her and then she found herself in what she would call the most natural place she'd ever seen.
Everything seemed to be in their truest state, shape, form and location. The air, the flowers, the trees, even the animals all exuded a natural air around them that couldn't be found in anything she'd seen on earth.
And it was then she saw her.
Exuding the same warmth as a mother's embrace. Grace, reality, love, security: these were all emotions she felt as she saw the woman in front of her that embodied all the earth's nature.
She knew who she was instinctively but before she could recover herself, she found herself being pulled into the warmest embrace she's ever felt.
"My daughter." A soft voice that seemed to wash away all worries filtered into her ears.
Ororo didn't know what she could do in such situations. Years and years of training never prepared her to be hugged by someone she very well knew was a Goddess. And it also didn't help that the hug was that intoxicating that she didn't know when she started leaning in for more.
She spent more than a few seconds in the woman's embrace, with said woman not even the least bit put off by the extended hug as she just gently patted her white hair.
"I'm sorry about that." Ororo apologized after she finally got the strength to pull away.
The woman however just smiled at her and then beckoned on her to follow. She led them to a small clearing that was surrounded by glowing flowers and then sat down and pointed in front of her for Ororo to sit.
Ororo sat there for a few minutes in which the woman did nothing but just smiled warmly at her which made Ororo embarrassed.
"Uh… I…"
"Ask whatever you wish, my dear." The woman encouraged.
Ororo took in a deep breath before asking: "Are you my Goddess?"
Instead of being offended, the smile on the woman's face widened a bit, looking at Ororo with the same fondness she had held since the beginning.
"My sister sure would love to meet you, child. As for your question, the Goddess you are talking about would be my sister, Oshtur."
Ororo didn't understand who this Oshtur was, but given that this woman called Oshtur her sister, then it stood to reason that Oshtur was also a goddess, her goddess.
"But if we worship Oshtur, why is your temple in the presence of my people?" Ororo asked. She had no ill thought to this goddess but she had to ask.
"Oh that? Well, Oshtur likes to move around, never settling in one place for long and over time her descendants started praying to me. That temple is a link to me as well as her." The woman explained.
Ororo then asked about the identity of the goddess before her. "Forgive me for asking, but who are you? I know you are a Goddess, but which one?"
"You can call me Gaea, The Mother Goddess of Earth. My sister, Oshtur, is known as the Goddess of Balance and Order, and also the Bright Lady as you call her." The woman, finally known as Gaea, introduced herself. "We have a lot to speak of, daughter. First of all, let's begin with why you came back." Though Gaea knew, she nevertheless asked. It was the very basics of keeping a conversation going after all.
Ororo then explained everything to her; her life, her friends, the ones she gained, the ones she lost, her goals, why she fought, her favored, and her desire for strength. She told Gaea everything.
"Hmm, if you wish to learn more about yourself, then I'm afraid I'm not the one to tell you. You are Oshtur's descendant, so by right she should be the one to tell you what you wish to know about yourself. I am only here because I wished to speak with you, child."
Ororo became slightly frustrated by that, only slightly.
As if, probably, knowing what was going through her mind, Gaea chuckled.
Her chuckle brought back Ororo from her thoughts. "You said you wanted to meet with me, may I know why?"
"For two reasons, dear. The first being that I wanted to finally meet someone who was as connected to me as you were and secondly was because of your boyfriend."
While the first had somewhat flattered her, the second made her curious.
"What do you mean, Goddess Gaea?"
"What I mean is that he is walking a path of absolute destruction, one where the universe would be affected. And the worrying part is that he knows this all too well."
That made Ororo's blood run cold.
She wasn't as shocked as she was frightened.
"W-what do you mean?" She asked frantically.
"You have seen it, have you not? That red embodiment of destruction. What he is goes far deeper than anything the mortal eyes could see on the surface." Gaea said.
"I'm afraid I do not understand. What are you trying to say about him, because I can assure you he is no demon of destruction." Ororo defended.
"I did not mean it that way, my child. What I meant was that regardless of his unwillingness or his knowledge, he is a being of destruction. One so absolute that not even this universe would remain should it manifest. I know you worry about him but as it stands, you can't in no way help him." The Mother Goddess of Earth gave her advice, although it was one Ororo couldn't accept.
"What if I get stronger? Can't I protect the people I care about with my strength, Goddess Gaea?" She looked at the being who was called the mother of all life and asked, hope in her eyes as she seeks affirmation from one who stood above all others.
"Even if you grow stronger, will your strength be able to match his current's." Before she could answer, the world around her changed and what replaced her surroundings were red skies and red lightning streaking along the clouds. "This is Mars."
"Oh goddess." Shock and fear vibrated through her body and she saw a scarred Mars along with half of the Olympus Mons utterly destroyed.
She could see the effects of the increased gravity in the planet and the ground broke apart as magma spewed out.
The destruction she was seeing was more than enough to wipe out any country from the face of the earth and in the midst of it stood a huge red figure, that although different, but not unrecognizable.
"This is him. The strength he currently wields is acknowledged in the vast universe. Can you ever hope to compare, my dear daughter? The more time passes, the more powerful he becomes. The more powerful he becomes, the more the forces of the universe and those beyond take notice, that's if they have not already."
Ororo saw as Draul shifted back to a form she was all too familiar with. He whistled looking at the destruction he had wrought on Mars, scratched his head and disappeared from the planet.
"If you think this is an illusion, it is not. This already happened."
"Why are you showing me this, Goddess Gaea?" She asked after taking in the scene to the fullest. Yes, she knew Draul was strong. Yes, Draul had told her about his fight with the Nordic Gods Thor and Loki.
But that wasn't the only thing he had told her. According to him, there were hierarchies even more so when it came to Gods.
Truly strong Omegas could fight some Gods, minor ones and maybe a few weak major ones.
And above those were the Skyfathers – the leaders of the Pantheons as it were.
Those, those were of the 'You don't fuck with us' variety that Draul had been quite specific on stressing.
And above that, though he only mentioned it once, the Elder Gods.
To everyone else, they were at the very top of the food chain, the top of the universe.
He had told her a lot of things, even about himself that he joked that there was hardly anything that she didn't know about him. But one thing he never told her about was how strong he was. She never cared so she never asked.
"The reason I show you this is not for any malicious purpose, far from it. I care for you, daughter of mine, and I can't stand to see you make an ignorant choice, not when chaos is on the horizon."
Ororo took a deep breath and calmed her thoughts.
"I want to know." Was the only thing she said, but it was enough to make the ever present smile on Gaea's face light up.
*FLASHBACK ENDS*
….
The past few days had been an eye opener for the weather goddess.
Her talk with the Goddess Gaea shed away the layer of ignorance that had been covering her for her entire life.
Though she didn't have an in-depth comprehension about the wider universe, or should she call it the multiverse now, gods, who surprisingly were not the top as she had thought.
Cosmic beings and Abstracts Entities ran amok under the endless starry sky.
Guess Draul hadn't been lying about the Phoenix being unmatchable in the universe.
She spent the days talking with Gaea about, well just anything and everything, and she had to say Gaea truly was a mother to all.
Her view on life and death being a compulsory cycle was completely out of what Ororo expected from the Goddess of Life.
-"Now learn the lesson you have forever so feared. If you would save all creation… look beyond each single life. Let those who must fall, fall. Mourn the facing of each dead leaf. But do not pause to stop it. Instead, you create anew. Create out of ashes and death. Create out of darkness and chaos. That is how existence fought for life. Remake yourself, Ororo. And rise."-
She had been quite conflicted on that but Gaea urged her to take her time to think.
What Gaea had given were random knowledge that those who were strong enough to know, knew.
And then she met Oshtur.
From Gaea she had known that Elder God's could have different personas in different mythologies.
Gaea for example existed in different incarnations in over more than ten pantheons, same for Oshtur.
Ororo's first impression of Oshtur was a loving mother who could turn strict at a moment's notice.
You could find comfort in her presence, though not like Gaea, but you also knew not to get too close.
She strongly reminded Ororo of the fading memory of her own mother.
The first word that flowed between them after she was accepted into Oshtur's presence was the mild tease and chiding of the Elder God of Balance and Order.
"So you finally decided to visit me, child of mine." It took only those words for Ororo to fall into the Goddess' pace throughout their entire meeting.
It was from Oshtur that Ororo truly learned about her heritage, her powers and much more than she would have known about herself.
All this only made the burning fire inside her heart burn fiercer.
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