I yawn as my eyes flutter. My mind wakes up as my body stretches. I feel good. Great. I can feel the divinity flow through me. Fundamentally I am no different. I’m still a vampire, still not alive, yet I’m living. I’m just, more. Whole.

Spending a few seconds to take in the new sight, it’s dimmer, duller than it was during my ascension, no doubt thanks to Athena’s divinity still remaining in my body. Now it’s all me. I let my eyes follow the specs of life force floating around in the air, dancing, like invisible spirits interacting with each other.

Getting out of bed I can feel my golden blood seep through my body and form itself into clothes, a process that once required focus, is now automatic. Like how the heart beats on it’s own in mortals. Instead of my blood being something to use, enforce, an ability. It’s now so much more, like a limb I always had. Familiar.

Walking into the living room, Faith turns around and looks at me.

“Good morning.”

I can see her wince, but I don’t understand why.

“Um, Good morning. Nia can you turn that off? Or at least, tone it down?”

“What?”

“Oh no. Not again. Darling, your aura is emanating divinity, and your voice is commanding, forcing me to submit to you. While you know I don’t mind, it’s a little hard to breathe. Your presence is a tiny bit suffocating.”

Oh. No, I didn’t notice, much like my aura. I close my eyes and let my senses wander, exploring every part of my body, until I find it. Before I couldn’t feel my aura, but now I can. I still can’t turn it off, but at least I can tell it to not emanate divinity. Focusing on my newfound ability, I try to change it.

“Better?”

Faith walks up to me, ladle in her hand and donning an apron as I interrupted her making breakfast, I assume. Giving me a kiss before she lets out a content sigh.

“Much.”

“How long was I asleep?”

“Two weeks. If I didn’t know any better I would have thought you were dead. You weren’t breathing, your heart wasn’t beating, you were just like a corpse, a very beautiful one. Except your divinity has sort of been leaking out into the house since you went into slumber, I had to sleep on the couch.”

Oh. 

“Sorry.”

Faith lets out a giggle as she tries to pull me into her embrace, only to fail.

“You’re heavy.”

I raise an eyebrow, causing her to slightly panic before I elicit a low chuckle. I know what she meant, I can feel it. It’s like I’m denser, but at the same time not. I don’t think I am technically heavier, just, unmovable.

“So? Anything my new goddess girlfriend wants to tell me?”

Where do I even start.

“One thing I’ve realized. I was always a vampire. Even before the shift. I don’t know how, or why, but I know all I needed to do was die, for my vampiric self to manifest. I did both. The shift brought forth the change in an unnatural way, as the connection to the divine realm was re-established, and my body thought it was time. Only a few minutes after I died, completing my transformation, but due to the assimilation not happening as it should, my soul was weakened. When those insects kept dealing mortal damage to my body, my soul couldn’t keep up, as it was not yet completely re-awakened. So it was broken, battered, bruised, until Athena fixed me.

I will need time to become strong. My body is converting life force into god essence, but the ratios are so extremely different that it will take a while. I am as of now, only a bit stronger than I previously was in my vampire form. Well, I guess not the vampire form, but my original form.”

“Wait, how is that possible?”

“I’m not completely sure, but I might somehow be older than I think. I understand why I was an orphan, as I was never born like the way mortals are. I was created by a being called Life, she imparted a tiny bit of her into me when she created my soul, affixing it into my previous body, a gift, if you will. She gave me a domain as she knew I was going to gain divinity sometime. I don’t know why she created me, or what I’m supposed to do, but I’m not going to think too hard about it.”

“Domain? She? I’m assuming this Life is the same thing you previously mentioned when researching vampires?”

“Yes. She is my creator, my mother. I can’t tell you anything else, but I can feel a connection to her, except I don’t know where it leads, I only know she imparted her language to me with her gift. I’m assuming that’s why almost no divine beings have ever spoken to her.”

“Mother huh, I guess that makes her my mother-in-law. I have a goddess for a girlfriend, and an even higher being is her mother. Yeah I could never see this coming. I guess that explains that weird language you spoke when you subdued Helena.”

I let out another chuckle as I contemplate on my life. I never felt like I truly belonged, now I guess I understand why. I need to talk to Athena soon. I’ll try to contact her if she doesn’t contact me first.

“Already wanting to marry me? I don't know how divine weddings are though." I give her a wink as her cheeks take on a tinge of red. I love it when she's embarrassed.

"Anyways, domains. They are hard to explain, but they are sort of professions given to gods upon their ascension, often tied to their previous path of life. I have two. Life and Death. Life was given to me by my mother by the same name, and Death is probably due to me being a god killer, as well as a vampire.”

“Goddess of Life and Death. Wow, just, wow. I really don’t know what else to say.”

“Um, Faith. I have something to tell you. I did something to you before I went to sleep. I didn’t really think much about it at the time, but I know I was selfish.”

Faith raises an eyebrow at me as she puts down her food on the table and sits down across me.

“What did you do?”

“You know how we discussed that I was immortal, and would probably live forever? That is especially the case now, as it’s even harder to kill me due to my divinity being mixed in with immortality.”

“Yes?”

“I. Might have created a seed inside you, made from a mix of my blood and god essence.”

It takes Faith a few seconds to understand what I just said. Her expression turning from deadpan, to surprised, to slack jawed.”

“Did you do what I think you did?”

“Yes. I gave you a divine seed. It’s not going to be forced like mine was, you have the choice. For now it will probably keep your body at your current age, and give you an increased life span, giving you time to think. I will need to refill the seed every now and then, and we have to figure out how you can become a goddess if you ever want to, but it’s for now a solution to our problem.”

“You know you just keep throwing impossible things at me today? I really don’t know what to say.”

“You’re not mad at me?”

“Mad? No. I’m slightly annoyed you didn’t ask me first, but I mean, it’s sort of what I wanted, and I’ve noticed you’ve been different since the hearing. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but whenever you’re speaking to anyone but me, it’s like you’re speaking to someone lesser, an insect.”

Have I? I mean I’ve never cared for mortals, oh. Mortals. I see. Is this how Athena views humans and the changed? Faith is right, I don’t care for others but those I love. For now that’s only Athena and Faith.

“I promise I’ll talk to you about things like this. I think you might be right, that my mental state was affected, but it was still me. It was still something I wanted to do, that I forced upon you. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. We can talk about it later, I think we have a problem to address before that.”

“You’re right. I don’t have separate forms anymore, this is who I am.”

“I mean, I’m not complaining. You were hot before, now you’re even hotter. It’s like, well, you feel divine, which I guess makes sense.”

I give Faith a small giggle, and play with a lock of my hair. Red and gold. That reminds me. I stand up and walk towards the mirror. It was as I expected. My previous white tree shaped pupils are now golden. At least I know why they’re tree shaped, my mother, Life. I need to find a way to contact her, or at least know more about her. While it doesn’t feel wrong that an unknown being is my mother, I don’t like the fact that I don’t know what she wants to do with me. I don’t want to play to her tune if she has a plan for me, I just want to live.

I close my eyes and tune out the world around me. Letting my divinity flare up before I calm it down, I need to get better at that. I focus on my soul, the bond between me and my sister, and I let out a string of divinity, letting it follow its path and hopefully let it arrive where I want it to.

“Ethenia?”

“Hi sis.”

“Oh wow that’s different. I’m glad you figured it out, I was just about to ask Sigyn or Khione if they could check if you’re awake.”

“You said something about feeding divinity into this link. I think currently we’re on a time schedule, is there a way to make this permanent? I miss you already.”

“We can. Due to our bond we can create a permanent link that will be even better than the previous one. It was a bit one-sided, with me getting more information than you did. This one will be two-way, letting you connect more to me.”

“Nia?”

“Hm? Oh sorry, I was talking to Athena.”

“Wait, talking to Athena? I thought the contract was broken when you ascended?”

“It was, we’re currently communicating with, I don’t know. A divine telephone?”

I can hear her mutter “divine telephone” and shaking her head. I’m guessing this is a lot to take in. I would probably be panicking slightly if it didn’t feel so correct, so me.

I feel Athena’s divinity reaching out, asking for permission to connect, forming a link to my own soul. I can feel her familiar touch, her warmth, and comfort. I let it in and in the blink of an eye a connection forms between our souls. Oh this is nice.

“Thank you sis.”

“No problem. Though I can see you have an issue at your hand, I might have a solution for it.”

“Oh I would love to, I had a few ideas but I’d rather hear yours.”

“So you know how you do your wardrobe thing? I think you can apply that to your entire body, sort of like a tangible illusion. It will use divinity, so I don’t think even avatars can tell the difference.”

Letting my imagination create my previous goddess form, I go through the familiar motion that I use when I change my clothes. My blood encompassing my body in a golden cocoon, I can hear Faith let out a yelp of surprise in the background, as I feed the image in my mind with my divinity.

“Athena?”

I turn around and look at Faith. “Please? I want to so badly.”

I can hear Athena giggle on her end, that’s new. I can feel her mischievous side through our link, and I realize I can finally feel her emotions, as she used to feel mine.

“Yes Faith. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“How? How are you here? Where is Nia?”

“Ethenia, I think you should drop the act, she’s obviously starting to panic.”

I guess she’s right. I let my illusion fade and revealing my body. At least the illusion works on Faith, if it works on her, an avatar with two goddesses, and that she is my girlfriend. If she can’t tell the difference, nobody can.

“Sorry, I just had to go along with it when you thought I was my sister.”

“Sorry? You’re not getting away with a simple sorry.”

I can see Faith’s lips arching into a mischievous grin. Oh no. Well, I brought this upon myself. Faith walks up to me with a fox-like gait. Swaying her hips as tail after tail manifests itself into existence, swaying along with the motion of her body. She arrives in front of me and look at me with her blue, snowflake eyes. Transmitting her hunger through them. At least she’s not mad.

“Well then Nia. You’ll have to pay for that, and what better way than to take my new goddess girlfriend’s body for a test drive.”