Was the Crystal Skull truly destroyed by its own backlash?

Not a single Maya god believed that.

A God-King needed to save face—

And so did they.

No matter how much they cursed their own God-King's incompetence, it couldn't hide the fact that they'd been beaten into stray dogs. Besides, this entire disaster was clearly Kumú's fault; it wasn't something Odin (formerly known as Lao) should take the blame for.

The fact that the so-called God of Wrath managed to escape with a group of them was already a miracle.

Losing a Crystal Skull that wasn't originally his was certainly unfortunate, but it wasn't a sin or even a failure. At most, it proved that Odin simply didn't have the talent for the \\[Prophecy] domain.

That page was turned.

Neither Odin nor Thalos ended up keeping the Crystal Skull, which under normal circumstances would have made this a simple case of mutual loss.

But then—

The moment Thalos shattered the god-king-level Crystal Skull that Kumú had become, a strange wave of insight surged through his mind.

It looked almost identical to the vision the Skull had shown him earlier—but the key difference was its origin: it came from the very core of the Ginnungagap World.

It was once again a vision of graceful goddesses, now set among massive floating continents built upon broader World Trees, and surrounded by throngs of new gods bowing in reverence.

The will of Ginnungagap clearly conveyed to him:

His domain of \\[Prophecy] had evolved into \\[Fate]!

At that same moment, by the sacred spring in Asgard, the two existing Fates widened their eyes in astonishment.

Back then, when the three Fates were supposed to be born, only Urðr (\\[Past]) and Verðandi (\\[Present]) had manifested. The third, \\[Future], had never appeared.

Yet now, at this very moment, Fate's \\[Future] had finally emerged.

Even more shocking—

It now belonged to His Majesty, the God-King!

The absurdity of it was staggering.

A God-King already powerful enough to upend an entire great world had now taken hold of the domain of Future Fate. It meant that anyone daring to defy his will could, without ever leaving a trace, be led into silent and total destruction—even a vassal-rank High God.

Urðr and Verðandi hurriedly covered their mouths, their first reaction being to suppress any divine secrets and avoid divine punishment.

Only after a long breath did they realize—

Thalos Borson was never a tyrant.

Nor was he the kind of ruler who sought divine domains through wanton plunder or senseless wars.

"Perhaps… His Majesty had a stroke of fate," Urðr whispered in awe.

And in a sense—they were right.

It had been a long time since Thalos acquired a new divine domain. In fact, when he slew the Wind God-King Enlil and gained \\[Wind], he hadn't truly wanted it.

But the Four Elemental Domains were too precious to simply hand off to unproven gods from other pantheons.

Sure, there were wind gods among the descended ones—but as always:

If you haven't shown loyalty to the Aesir, what gives you the right to ask the God-King for a powerful domain?

It takes decades, even centuries of hard work and valor in battle against enemies to earn such a reward.

Now holding the domain of \\[Fate], Thalos narrowed his eyes. His divine gaze flared, effortlessly piercing through the veil of space and landing directly on the battlefield.

And what he saw—was almost comical.

The so-called god of suicide had been the most valiant member of the Maya Ninefold Gods.

After Thalos casually one-shotted one of them, the rest of the Ninefold Gods were left speechless.

None dared avenge their fallen comrade.

None organized a real counterattack.

None tried to rally for a desperate final stand.

Bit by bit, the forces of the Maya and Inca pantheons lost cohesion in the fight.

Under the dual leadership of Pachacamac and Skel, they had barely managed to form two great battle formations to hold off the more than one hundred Aesir gods swarming them. But once Hel entered the fray atop Jörmungandr, the battle was over.

Thalos had been right about Hel all along. The Asgardian goddess of death had the strength and resolve to stand on her own.

Even without Thalos on the battlefield, Hel and her second brother executed a textbook central breakthrough.

Jörmungandr was never particularly fast—

But when you're over a kilometer long, you don't need to be. The enemy saw clouds shift in the sky—then suddenly, a massive tail came crashing down on their faces.

"Boom!"

The concentrated might of that one attack needed no explanation. The only one who even tried to stop it was Pachacamac.

The World Serpent had expended all its force in that blow—

But don't forget—

Hel was riding its head.

A spectral River of the Dead burst forth from her outstretched hand, hurling horrifying globules of underworld water in all directions. It was like someone had overturned a colossal vat of black ink. Countless streams of death poured down like a flood.

The river split around Pachacamac—but not because he dispersed it.

It was flowing around him.

And behind Pachacamac was a tightly packed square of divine guards.

Guards who lacked powerful divine shields.

Bad luck for them.

The deathly flood swept across their ranks, silencing them without even a scream. Their souls were torn away by Hel, their bodies fell cold to the ground.

Pachacamac's face turned beet red, his hands trembling violently.

This wasn't just an attack on his soldiers—

This was a slap in the face of a God-King!

In a rage, he hurled a spear of divine power across the sky, striking Jörmungandr's massive body.

The serpent trembled—hurt, but not dead.

And it didn't need to stay.

It had already completed its mission of splitting the battlefield.

On the other front, Skel once again failed to land a hit on Tyr.

He couldn't believe this hulking god was so damn agile.

Not far away, another of the Ninefold Gods—Chaac, the god of rain—was having a full-blown tantrum. He unleashed a storm of rain onto the battlefield, targeting the mortal soldiers of Ginnungagap.

A cowardly, disgraceful act.

Even among the gods, Chaac earned a reputation as the most shameful figure in Maya history.

One of a kind.

The rules had always been simple:

King vs. king.

General vs. general.

God vs. god.

And yet—he targeted mortals?

Seeing so many innocents cut down by the storm, Arthur, the god of chivalry, couldn't take it any longer. He joined forces with Enki, the god of wisdom and irrigation, to teach Chaac a lesson he wouldn't survive.

Chaac's torrential downpour was suddenly halted by a towering wall of water, redirecting the storm before it hit the troops.

Before he could react, the wall split open—

A dazzling golden light surged forth.

A brilliant sword—emitting radiant divine fire—burst from the gap, soaring forward under Arthur's battle cry. It streaked through the air like divine judgment, straight toward Chaac's neck.

Arthur's steed galloped past in a blur—

And the grotesque, masked head of the rain god flew skyward.

Chaac, god of rain—dead.

Slain by Arthur.

------------------

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Fairy Tail: Igneel's Eldest Son (Chapter 256)

I Am Thalos, Odin's Older Brother (Chapter 336)

Reborn in America's Anti-Terror Unit (Chapter 542)

Solomon in Marvel (Chapter 924)

Becoming the Wealthiest Tycoon on the Planet (Chapter 1284)

Surgical Fruit in the American Comics Universe (Chapter 1289)

American Detective: From TV Rookie to Seasoned Cop (Chapter 1316)

American TV Writer (Chapter 1402)

I Am Hades, The Supreme GOD of the Underworld! (Chapter 570)

Reborn as Humanity's Emperor Across the Multiverse (Chapter 660)

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