On the temple's stage, nine children waited in middle of the stage when a bald young man wearing white robes and with some other people entered the stage.
"My name is Richard, and I will be the priest in this ceremony, so children stay in line and I will call one by one." then Richard talked to a middle-aged man on his side and called.
"Adrian Fordge."
"Yes, sir." Said the boy on the front before he walked to Richard.
Richard stood in front of Adrian with a cold face and asked. "Adrian, you know that only a few people can receive a bless and serve a God, so are you ready?" "Teacher, i'm ready."
Then the five priests on Richard's side chanted a spell and a strange aura appeared in the room.
Adrian closed his eyes and felted warmth on his body when a crow descended and stayed above his head with a proud look. "Welcome Adrian Fordge chosen by the Crow God, now follow lord Drake to see your parents and decide if you want to enter an Academy." Richard spoke before he pointed to the middle aged man on his side.
...
After several hours only one more was blessed, Chloe Branches, Elijah's cousin who was chosen by Goddess of healing Eir, and the first genius in the clan after Ophelia was Chloe's elder brother Noah, who had reached the peak of the Divine Beginning Realm before thirty and was a teacher at the Royal Academy.
"Elijah, it's your turn." a little boy who look nervous as he reached the stage and looked around. On the right, he saw four elders from the clan. These elders didn't hold as much power as the great elders but nevertheless, they had quite a bit of say and weren't pushovers. Besides these elders were young men that had shown promise and talent.
"Uncle Michael." said the boy, felling very nervous with the eyes of the crowd focused on him.
"Elijah, i'm going to cast the spell, be prepared."
But this time just like the other kids, nothing happened on Elijah's turn and after the Ceremony end, he returned to his home while Chloe had returned to the Capital and disappeared a few months later.
As for Elijah, he begin to practice a Spiritual Body Manual from his family. The period after that followed proved to be incredibly dull. Aside from his daily practice and meditation, Elijah would occasionally wander in the Green Lake City and go out with his friends from the City.
The seasons arrived in secret and left in silence. In the blink of an eye, 10 years had passed.
Within those years, even after reaching the sixteen years, Elijah with his low-level talent had only been capable to reach final phase of the 9 level and did not even succeed to break through to the first realm.
In the end, he was sent by his family to work as the head of a small village on the extreme north of the kingdom, and more 15 years have passed like this. After marring with one of the village girls, Elijah was playing with his younger son when he received the news about the Briles Kingdom waging war with his country and the destruction of the capital and that the Briles Kingdom was discovered to be connected to an organization outside the continent and with the help of this organization and a few other kingdoms and empires, they attacked the Thunder Hammer's royal capital and several other places, leaving the entire continent on chaos.
Knowing it was not safe here, Elijah takes his wife and child to escape the village and when they were about to leave the village he discovered the sad truth as his wife stabbed him with a dagger, other than him, everyone in the village was part of the organization and not even his son was truly his, but just as his body was about to fall, Elijah's Divine lineage awakened with a extraordinary might invoking the fury of the heavens as dozens of lightning fell on Elijah, covering him with a lighting cloak as his hand turned into a lightning blade which he used to kill everyone there.
But as was just a common mortal without cultivation, and after wiping out everyone in the village, he lay on the ground. Looking at the sky, numerous drops of water fell on his decrepit body and just as he thought it was the end, he saw a green-red star falling on his direction.
'Boom!'
An enormous explosion could be heard from near the ruins of the village, gathering the last bit of strength he had, Elijah walked to he area where the star had hit and seeing the image of the person laying on the crater. Elijah said in a shocked voice, a name he had almost forgotten after so many years: "Chloe?"