Children of a Lesser God

Chapter 311: Heaven's Gaze Within The Faded Darkness

"Oh fuck." Laz had no idea why this giant noticed him since he wasn't really standing out or trying to stand out. For the most part, Laz had just been observing around the corner of a red brick building while keeping himself mostly hidden.

How was he to know that his power and his bloodline stood out like the sun in a clear sky?

"Hello there!" Laz figured there was no sense in hiding anymore since he had been noticed and instead stepped out into the street. Laz wasn't sure the giant understood English considering it wasn't exactly an old language, but he had to try.

As Laz figured, the giant had no clue what Laz said. Instead, it closed it eyes and turned away from Laz, seeing he wasn't a threat to it.

While Laz watched on in wonder, specs of green and brown light seemed to rise up from the earth and began floating to the giant. Every time the giant took great, big breaths, the energy would be sucked into it's nose and mouth. When he exhaled though, none of the energy came back.

"So weak... maybe it would have been better to sleep longer?" The giant said out loud in it's native language that Laz somehow understood.

"So many years... so much time... wait...." The giant's eyes grew small as it suddenly stared away to the east, it's entire being focused on something that only it seemed to understand.

"Those damn tree fairies are actually back? No wonder... HA HA HA.... NO WONDER!!!" This revelation excited the giant causing it to hop around in delight while Laz felt the earth around him shake.

Despite being ignored by this creature, Laz couldn't help but hoped that it kept talking. Perhaps he would be able to reason out the answers to some questions that had long plagued him. Sadly though, as this giant continued to do it's little dance, it didn't speak anymore.

Just as Laz was at a loss as to what to do, a large caravan of military vehicles and transports appeared down the street while racing along towards the giant. Seeing this, Laz decided to make himself scarce but wasn't going to miss out on what was going on. As such, Laz bounded to the top of the building by sinking his fingers into the brick and climbing his way up. Just as he got to the top, he huddled down into a corner and calmed his breathing while slowing his heart beat. Laz planned to use just his spiritual sense to watch this meeting and therefore decided to make himself as non existent as possible.

"Eh?" The giant turned to look, feeling the changes happening to Laz before he disappeared all together from his senses, leaving nothing but a faint energy trail. Laz had no clue that his actions would cause the giant to lose track of him as well. But there was another hidden bonus Laz did not expect.

Within the golden drop of blood that was sealed near Laz's foundation, a slight burst of light formed and disappeared within moments, but in that burst of light was a technique that drilled it's way into Laz's head.

'Faded Darkness... Combines with Heaven's Gaze. Disappear into nothingness while seeing everything?' Laz said to himself, almost causing him to jump in surprise. He hadn't had a chance to practice Heaven's Gaze, but now there was a complimentary skill that appeared in his head. Despite it not being the best of time to try this, Laz felt that something was better than nothing.

'The first line of instruction was to imagine nothing, empty the mind. Slow the heart. Release the breath. Fade to black. Only the eyes see while the body dissolves away.'

While Laz embraced this, focusing on using the two techniques at once, his overall presence actually completely vanished, causing the bronze giant to be even more surprised.

Just when the giant decided to walk over and take a look for this little creature that smelled like his foes from the past, he noticed the line of vehicles approaching and put up his guard. After sensing the strange, metal creatures, he was actually able to determine that they had god's blood within them which didn't make any sense until the vehicles came to a stop and everyone riding inside got out.

The first ones to file out weren't the various armed troops. Instead, everyone who could be considered a chosen seemed to run out and gawk at the giant in awe, their eyes lit up like birthday candles.

Everyone, that is, except for Tommy.

He got out with the rest, but he didn't look at the giant with awe and that actually confused him. Like the others, he could feel a connection with this big, bronze colored giant. But unlike the others, his feelings towards the giant was almost one of... disdain.

'Why do I feel like... I'm insulted by this creature?' Tommy was having a hard time with his feelings while the others had to stop themselves from practically bowing down.

"Eh?????" The giant seemed really excited to see this tiny people with which he suddenly felt a certain closeness with. After a moment though, there was a rather peculiar feeling coming from one of them who, unlike the others, was looking at him with a strange gaze..

The giant couldn't help but return the gaze and step closer. Before the eyes of all of the shocked observers, the giant's body shrunk down to a much more manageable ten feet tall. Although still bigger than anyone else on Earth, at least now he could get a better view of these strange little people. Especially the one giving him the funny stare.

As the giant got within a few feet of Tommy, he sniffed the air a few times and his eyes went wide.

"Lord..." Although the giant couldn't speak English, Tommy understood what it was saying.

"Lord?" Tommy asked.

"You... your bloodline. You have a Lord level bloodline."

"I'm sorry... I don't know what that means..." Tommy said, hearing, but not understanding.

"EH... UH... May I?" The bronze man pointed at one of the chosen when asking.

Tommy, having no idea what he wanted to do, just shook his head yes.

The giant then proceeded to reach out and grab the man before he could respond. Just as the man wanted to use his power to fight the giant, he felt like everything inside of him was dragged out through the giant's hand. His entire earth channeling root dried up within a second and withered. Whether he could recover his ability to call upon the earth's power was an answer he could only find in the future.

As the brown mass of energy flowed from the now almost crippled man into the giant, the giant closed his eyes for a time, focusing on the information now flowing into him.

In just a few moments of silence the giant opened his eyes and stared again at Tommy.

"You must be a master of this human race, yes?" The giant asked, his words were now English, something that he had gained from draining the earth type chosen.

"Something like that," Tommy said, thinking he meant his status in society where money was king.

"Yes. I can tell. Your god bloodline shows that you would be. I'm sorry for any disrespect I have shown," the ten foot tall man then took a knee and saluted Tommy before standing up again.

"Again, forgive me. Since I have just awakened, things are not clear. Although I have gained some understanding from the draw, that particular human's power was rather lacking and there are still many things I am unsure of. For instances, why are you surrounded by regular humans? Are they your worshipers?" The giant asked, indicating the armed military that had surrounded them. Although they had their guns trained at the giant, seeing it talk in such a fashion to Tommy allowed them to put down their guard. The only one who still seemed worried was Agent Wallace.

Even if the government was working with the so called chosen to round up the obviously dangerous infected, the fact still remains that the government wants to be the sole body in charge of the country, the same way it would be in any other country. And while the infected have been proven to be a risk, the chosen could be argued as being an equal risk to the country. And seeing this massive giant of a man who could change his size and claims to be one of the chosen caused chills to go down Agent Wallace's spine. He couldn't help but picture a world where there were hundreds, if not thousands of chosen as strong as this one.

"We are working together to defeat our enemies, those with infected blood."

"Infected blood?" This term didn't register with the large man.

...

Laz's body had disappeared into a cloud of black smoke, showing that he had indeed achieved the beginning level of understanding of Faded Darkness. If there was some sort of a ranking among the Asura for their ability to quickly understand this low level skill, Laz would have ranked on top. In all honesty, the skill wasn't that hard to imagine as Laz is what one could consider a modern man. If you assume that the normal asura who would have tried to learn this skill would basically be a child and part of a world that didn't have things like global networking, then their views would be very limited to just those things that it experienced. As for Laz, a child of the digital age, the amount of understanding and learning stored in his brain would be hundreds of times that of a normal Asura child. Due to these factors, the things which would stump a first timer were almost a no brainer for Laz.

Laz was really into the fact that he could turn his body to mist and back to a solid form. Although that wouldn't be very helpful for fighting, it could provide a sure fire dodge if used at the right time. But the big key is that between learning that and learning the beginning level of understanding of Heaven's Gaze, Laz could now cause his weightless body to be able to see while being able to go unnoticed. As such, he put away his desire to continue learning the second levels for both skills and instead focused on the talk between the giant and Tommy.

...

"So all this time passes and you still war with the Jotunkind? To think that the blood within us would still desire such an end. At our strongest, the Jotunkind were nothing to our greatest warriors. But the battle still spread and engulfed this world, causing the rise of some pantheons and the fall of others. And the Jotunkind came from places other than the Jotunheim... and somehow now, our blood and their blood was somehow passed down... To think we made such mistakes even while the world was ending. It was glorious, but at what cost?" The large man seemed to be lost withing thoughts of the past and things long gone so Tommy didn't disturb him.

"So you were a god within the old world?" Tommy finally asked, waking the bronze man up from his thoughts.

"I was. One of the lesser branches of a once glorious tree. A bastard son of a god and my mother whom he took with no thoughts to her wants."

"Then would you be willing to help us fight them once more? As the infected awaken, the raise havoc among regular humans. In turn, we can take care of you, teach you everything about this new world and get you whatever you want. The world is very different and although I can tell your power is astounding, I still feel it seems to be very weak overall," Tommy suggested. He was trying to recruit this old god for many reasons, not the least of which would be to use as a weapon.

"Join you? Perhaps... I had awoken with the thoughts of setting up a kingdom before my brothers and sister's arose, but it seems that I was truly nave. This world has changed far too much and I can tell that despite the weak power I sense from all of you, several of you will be able to overcome me soon. Not to mention the hot weapons of war that I saw in that weaklings vision. To think that you have been among the stars and could wipe away all life on this planet, just by someone launching a few metal tubes into the sky..."

"There is much for you to learn and for us to learn from you."

"So... you say that the Jotunkind, uhh... the infected are your enemies who target the people?" The bronze giant asked. He had used his brain far more than he was used to even before he went to sleep and he needed something to clear it.

"Yes. That's right." Tommy confirmed.

"Good. TIME TO COME OUT LITTLE RAT?" The giant yelled at the building that he had previously seen Laz on.

Then, before anyone could react, the giant swung his fist at the red brick building.