A young woman sat with one leg atop of the other, tapping her fingers restlessly on the counter.
Aphrodite; whom now goes by the name Amara in human form. "To think that the great Goddess of Love and Beauty would have her true charm stripped away from her."
She posed dramatically with the back of her right hand on top of her forehead, left hand outwards for a prolonged effect.
Her head held high to let others see her side profile and the first thing they would notice was obviously the small tears dripping down out of the corner of her eyes.
"Oh please Aphrodite, no sorry, Amara. But we don't have time for your acting. We need to prepare a generous amount of money set aside for ourselves if we want to regain our powers back." Apollo, whose actions were the cause of all this realised that they would not last long without power.
If one were to look at him they'd see that he was a normal teenager with good looks, no in the eyes of others he was a very handsome person.
But in the eyes of God he was just a very good looking one. After all their sense of beauty had a high standard due to the innate ability 'Divine Charm.'
An ability that allowed Gods to show off their strong points and true self without literally showing their true divine forms.
Even Hephaestus had it, it was an incredible ability that allowed even him to marry Aglaea, Goddess of Beauty and Splendor, youngest of the Charites.
Although Aphrodite was pissed off at that fact, she did admit however that despite the myths saying Hephaestus was ugly, he wasn't actually that bad looking, they just had a high standard for beauty and he was at most an average mortal in terms of it.
But with Divine Charm? Incomparable, she may have not regretted divorcing him but she was however sad that she could not see Hephaestus use the ability a lot.
"Hey wait a minute. I just realised something. How is he still able to use that ability?" Aphrodite felt something was off and soon found out something huge.
"Clay, Jacob! Look at Luke. See this pale Aura around him? Isn't that the signature imprint that Divine Charm leaves whenever you use it?" The two boys closely inspected Luke, which made him somewhat uncomfortable.
Clay was the first to speak up as he was more knowledgeable about God Tier Skills more than them, "You're right, this is the Divine Charm. No wonder I found you looking good for someone that just transmigrated."
Luke bashfully rubbed his head, feeling good that he was complimented early on in the morning. "You think I look good?"
And unsurprisingly Clay responded with, "Yeah." Amara glanced back and forward at the two of them, feeling strange about how they were acting.
"Oh, actually you know what, this might have been my fault." Jacob snapped his fingers recalling one small mistake he had during the transmigration process.
"Yeah, you see when you use the Path To Freedom spell you're bound to transmigrate with your real body. That is why if you have abilities, you have to seal away 95% of them but that does not include abilities you were born with and only learned or developed abilities can be sealed."
Jacob turned around taking out a notepad and a fountain pen which Luke found vaguely familiar. His heart thumped remembering who the pen used to belong to. "Shakespeare's pen?"
The other two were wide eyed. The three were scared of what this person could do. "Ah, as expected of a former God of the Arts, you surely know a lot."
His strokes were short yet forceful indicating that he was in a rush. "This is Shakespeare's Pen, yes indeed. However I changed it into an Artifact and placed a bit of William's will inside it to make it even more powerful."
The trio were startled at this fact. They had once witnessed how powerful the Artifacts the God of The Unknown could create, but they never knew how he created them.
"And done!" Out of curiosity and intense fear Amara neared him respectfully and asked, "What's done?"
He smiled mischievously, which made them even more curious. "Shakespeare's Pen allows me to alter reality on a low level. As of now I could only try one line out. 'The four Ex-Gods were going to the academy.'"
Academy? This word resounded in their minds. Sincere emotions flooded them, this moment was one of joy and gratitude.
After all, every deity knew that the best place to make trouble was a school. Ever since Christianity rose, many of the Pantheons became bored and watched the daily lives of mortals for entertainment.
Among their favorite shows was one about the daily lives of humans. It showed them playing around, eating, sleeping and then going to school on weekdays.
That was when things got interesting. All the Gods would cuddle up in their homes and watch how school turns out for them.
The results of their tests, what they were going to buy for lunch, the interesting subjects they learned. Everything was a novelty to them.
And every the times Agnostos came back from his reincarnations he would tell everyone the days of suffering at school, the hellish and horrific pain that humans agonized over during their younger years.
Extending into college and university just for a better job. It was always their greatest guilty pleasures that all of the deities agreed on.
"I've never been to an academy! Quick how's my hair? I want to look good in front of the boys." Amara was stunned, she had always lived the mean girls cliche.
"You're absolutely fine. But can I ask, do I look dark enough to be a loner or an emo? Should I put dark circles under my eyes for that cutely yet moody look?" Clay was concerned over his image of a loner, he knew it was a bad thing, but he resonated so well with those guys.
"No, that would just make you more of a grumpy person. Wear a mask of a monster to make you more of an enigmas actually." Luke was not so concerned about his image since he knew he'd be fine.
"Wait guys you're forgetting something... Wait enigmatic effect? Hey! That's my thing. Find your own you b*stards!" Jacob was concerned over his place as the mysterious cool guy.
Not that he's cool or anything but whatever. "Guys wait, this pen alters reality but it takes a long time for it to take effect. See the numbers beside it? That's the date this line will come true."
Jacob pointed towards the glowing green numbers right beside the line. They were saddened, but this was still exciting news.
But for now they had to think of what to do about their money problems.
"What if we had a shop?" Luke knew very little ways to earn money since it was never his problem, but now....
"Heh, don't you think I thought of that. I've been down in the mortal realm for a long time during 3000 or so years I've been alive. And I sure know more about the modern world than you do." Jacob was far more experienced on mortal affairs more than any God has ever been.
His constant choice of reincarnating every four years was very strange but a delight to all the deities since he bought many novelties along with him.
"Aren't you 14,967 if you include all your human years?" Clay calculated the years he had been away plus his current actual age of 3,678.
"That means you've been away for 11,289 years? That's impossible!" Amara was shocked, that'd mean that for every mortal life he'd had must have been longer than the average lifespan of that era.
His life both mortal and divine were separate. That meant added together his mortal age is actually longer than his actual age.
"Oh please, why do you think I look like a 14 year old? Three out of a hundred lives I lived died early and fifteen out of a thousand lives because of progeria, plague, not being vaccinated, murdered, human trafficking, terrorist attacks and many more!" His list went on and on, saying that many of his lives were lost and their lives were so short and unfulfilled that he had to reincarnate three times every year to get a good life.
"Oh, I see." Do not be fooled by their nonchalant demeanor. On the inside they were actually crying for him.
'*Sniff.* How sad, to think that he'd had to repetitively reincarnate so many times to get past infancy. What a cruel world.' The trio of former Gods were unsurprised by the cruelty of the mortal world but they never realised that it was that bad.
"Hey, wait a minute. They'd be barely a week old. How many did you actually reincarnate to get one perfectly average or long life?" Clay found an inconsistency in his words and doubted him for a second.
"Oh I think around, 1,459,675,699?" Then the sadness flooded away, horrified by the truth of his age.
"You're over a billion years old! That's like impossible, wait that would mean every single life you've ever lived accounts for your true age. Then you'd be as old as us, no far older than the Titans." The light God fell back in shock.
Amara on the other hand did not find this so surprising, "It makes sense though. After all he is a Protogenos, like my son Eros." True Protogenoi were far older than they seemed to be.
No one could be sure of how long they've lived. Especially not even Gods, after all age was a sensitive thing.
Not that it matters to Jacob, however to him he was actually pretty young and has a twisted view of age.
Only time would tell when that would change.