The sun hovering in the sky illuminate the dark red sand. Only then did Thomas suddenly realize that perhaps he was on Mars and the ancient Greek gods were actually Martians!
As Thomas was lost in that realization the story continued. Walking down the path, Prometheus passed the numerous buildings and other gods as he headed to the temple on top of the mountain.
Inside the temple, twelve huge beings were sitting in astonishing big thrones. in the central throne was an old man with long white hair and scars all over his face. Other than his 10m(32feet) tall body and muscles that could defy physics, he could be easily mistaken for an strangely strong yet human old man.
'Is that man really Zeus?' Inside the body of Prometheus, Thomas couldn't do much other than to relax and watch what would be the worst experience of his life. In his memories about Greek Mythology, Prometheus was born a titan that worked as a god after the fall of the titans. And before he fell out with Zeus, he was the god of fire and a master craftsman with a similar position as that of Hephaestus.
Other than his pitiful "fate", he guessed that maybe there were more stories about him than the ones that were told in old stories.
"Prometheus! You've done it again." Thomas' line of thought was immediately interrupted by Zeus' thunderous voice. Before him images of mortals battling one another while wearing armors and swords, some had intricate designs that were too advanced for the people of the mortal world.
Zeus breathed deeply before he continued. "It has been over two decades since we discovered there was life on other worlds and once again your love for mortals has taken over you. Going to that other world and bestowing knowledge of craftsmanship and other arts upon them was already testing my limits. Those barbarians don't even deserve the air of our presence, yet you always go there, helping them."
"I don't find a problem with that." A red-haired man with a long sword made of bones on his back murmured softly. What was wrong with wars, it was in fact his primary source of faith. Without war, what other use would he have.
Unlike last time, all words were easily translated for Thomas which made it a lot easier for him to understand. Another thing he noticed was that some of the voices didn't match the movement of the mouth of the gods, clearly whatever language they were speaking wasn't any of the human languages which made sense.
As for killing their own kin, Zeus and the others have been doing that far longer than the mortals, not that he would dare say it out loud. But as the king of the gods, how could Zeus not hear some of what he said?
"Ares, this has nothing to do with you. There is a right time for everything, maybe those lower beings can achieve great things in the future. The true problem was that this time, Prometheus has gone beyond his position and shall be punished if you like those creatures so much than go take care of them, for the next three hundred years you shall live among the mortals and only return upon certain meetings. Agreed?"
Besides Zeus, all the other gods nodded with the heads, symbolizing they agreed with Zeus suggesting to be the mortals main blacksmith. Soon all their figures turned illusory and vanished out of thin air.
Prometheus who was left all alone gave an exasperated breath. Soon, he wiped the sweat off his forehead and opened a portal leading to the big blue star in the sky.
Day after day Prometheus, mainly creating tools as shovels, axes and many others. Days turned into weeks that turned into years.
Thomas who was experiencing everything from the point of view of Prometheus, he felt like watching a maraton of a 45 season tv show. He got to experience some of the ancient age even humans knew nothing of.
In this age, such things like date and year didn't exist, the first cities and large settlements weren't even built yet. But Prometheus met countless human tribes along the way and helped them, teaching to the plant and grow crops, hunt for food and even the ways of making weapons.
Some tribes when they got too big, then there would be a war. Once, many years later Prometheus helped build the first few cities among several islands. Wilding the fire of heavens and his titan body, he flattened whole mountains and paved the way.
It was among this period of time that the day of Zeus was approaching, and the city was filled with plague. People dying on the streets almost every few minutes, the crops didn't resist the sudden winter, the animals also got sick, only infecting the people even further.
Living so many years in this strange yet realistic dream, Thomas discovered from those mysterious gods, the true natives of mars that this planet used to be called Gaia. And that the entire planet was in fact made of the flesh of such a primordial being.
Earth or the mortal world as they like to call it was accidentally discovered by the Twelve Great and with their immense powers, they found ways to cross the void in order to reach that distant blue star.
With the passage of the years, Prometheus and Thomas got to see the change of the other gods after coming and going from Gaia to the mortal world and vice versa.
Even Zeus who despised this inferior race that habited this small blue sphere was now all over the place, sleeping with almost every female in both Gaia and the Mortal World. Prometheus even met some of his fellow god's children.
Ares grew even more fond of war and even got to have a few children of his own with a few mortal ladies.
"Lord Prometheus, please help us. Most of our people are sick and there is no meat or grain to feed them, Zeus is going to kill us all when he sees there is no sacrifice for him..." Before him, an old human male knelt on the ground, imploring for the help. Prometheus was left in a dilemma, he knew very well and agreed that Zeus would really wipe out the whole city if they didn't have anything for the sacrifice this night.
Especially when the laws for the banishing of human sacrifice was approved on the last meeting of the gods.
From this point forward the story followed the course Thomas and many others knew. Prometheus then helped trick Zeus into accepting the bones and fat as a sacrifice instead of the meat which made him furious.
Thunder and lightning overflowed the skies as a light red blur was seen running away from the source of the lightning.
This time, as he already accepted the sacrifice, Zeus knew he couldn't turn back on his words and kill the people of the city. However he didn't plan to let Prometheus escape this with any punishment.
He then stole all the fire and knowledge Prometheus and the other gods had bestowed upon the mortals, while all the people in the city recovered from their sickness.
Prometheus didn't accept such an end and invaded the vaults in mount olympus in order to steal back what belonged to them.
When he stopped in the corridor, he succeeded in stealing the fire from Zeus and immediately opened the gate back to earth.
The result for such actions? Thomas already knew and he braced himself, having an eagle eat your liver day after day for all eternity wasn't something a mortal like himself couldn't handle.
Yet this young and innocent mortal was still going to experience the same torture. With his body nailed onto a mountain, Thomas was horrified as he watched the eagle bite into his flesh and eat his liver.
Due to be only a reproduction of memories, the pain he felt wasn't even close to what Prometheus must have felt. But just the vision of such a demonic creature eating him alive was the source of many traumas.
The only thing he knew was that when he returned back to the real world, all species of birds will never be the same again. Luckily there weren't such things on Mars now. After experiencing this living hell for two entire weeks, the long awaited notification appeared before his eyes.
[You have completed the sequence of memories. Due to the amount of memories the user experiences at once. The synchronization the user has with Prometheus has risen to 10% and affinity rose to 10.]
[Alert: The remnant thoughts of Prometheus, the firegiver has detected the existence of the user.]
[Prometheus has seen the memories of the user and is highly proud of your actions. Affinity rose to 25.]
[Prometheus found you worthy and decided to offer one of his skills.]
[The user does not have the requirements for most skills. Selecting the skills that are compatible with the user.]
Prometheus skill list:
(1) Supreme Fire Manipulation.(System Notes: Due to the user's power level, this skill shall revert to the form of the skill [Lesser Fire Manipulation] )
(2) Titan God's Hand.
(3) Greater Teleportation. (System Notes: Due to the user's power level, this skill shall revert to the form of the skill [Blink] )
(4) Body Manipulation.
(5) Master Craftsmanship Knowledge.
[You have one minute to decide.]
Fuck! Thomas never felt such happiness. After so much suffering, the system finally was giving something useful where every single option was more amazing than the other.
The first one, just the name of the skill Lesser Fire Manipulation speaks for itself. There were some adept who specialized in elemental power, and fought similar to the mages and sorceress of fantasy games. Having this skill, he could probably be able to use fire as his weapon. Throwing fire balls and stuff.
The second option was a mystery. Titan God Hand was a powerful name but it didn't give many clues about its true effect.
As every civilized human, there was no need to mention the Blink skill. This sort of ability was truly amazing, it wasn't even closer to the greater teleportation Prometheus and the other gods used to travel between Earth and Mars.
But given the chance Blink evolves into its final form the power it has would be scary. He could be able to visit other worlds as simple as that, this skill also presented the chance for him to search for his father and brother.
The last two were all that surprising or mysterious. Being able to change his appearance or being a master craftsman wasn't all that useful for him at the moment. Maybe if he could choose two to three skills, in any case right now they would not offer much help to him.
Thomas got anxious seeing the timer, but the decision was too difficult to decide this quickly. He thought again and again, and was about to choose Blink when the timer was over.
[Ping! The time has ended and the user didn't choose in time.]
[The system randomly choose the skill. Congratulations, you have received the skill Titan God Hand.]
[Titan God's Hand (Divine Skill)
Description: Creates the manifestation of a titan's hand with energy. The skill may change a little depending on the energy used to cast it.
Cooldown: 10 minutes.]
"Oh no." Reading the description of the skill, Thomas nearly puked some blood. However the description also wasn't detailed so only when testing would he know how good it really is.
Other than that he also received another passive skill as a reward for seeing the memories.
[Passive Skill: Resistance Against Eagles.
Description: Eagles and other aerial creatures do less damage to you.]
This skill was going to forever be kept as a secret along with [Aura of Fertility].
After receiving all the rewards, Thomas returned to reality.