There is Divinity within the universes. Reality itself is Divinity, being made of and shaped by the True Gods. The Tree is the truest of all Divinity, being the conglomerate essences of all the Divinity of reality. The Gods are unlike anything mortal minds can comprehend, as they exist outside the physical universes. Despite that, attempts are made. The closest that humanity has come to comparing the True Gods to any living creature is to view them as a slime mold. Beyond the True Gods are other Divinities, the Divine Incarnate and the Divine Constant, which are mere echoes of power from the True Gods. Attempts to classify the Gods as individual entities have resulted in a common list of seven deities, though these lists are inevitably flawed misunderstandings of entities that cannot fully enter a universe, let alone be comprehended by beings whose senses are limited by the laws of that universe.
The True Gods
The True Gods are the pseudo-sapient barriers between universes. They are the Tree, they are the branch, they are the background that makes reality possible. The True Gods are beyond mortal minds. They are infinite and unknowable and exist outside of reality itself. The True Gods cannot be squeezed down into finite mortal vessels, and cannot be found within any individual reality. They cannot be known, they cannot be spoken with, they cannot be bargained with, they cannot be manipulated. They are one, they are seven, they are endless and they are the end. The True Gods are all of reality, and they are not part of reality. They enable life, but they are not life. Those touched by them are annihilated by that touch, and in the process become the most powerful entities within their reality. Even an echo of a pattern of Divinity is sufficient to create new Gods that overwhelm all other powers within a universe.
All these things are true, and despite the Gods being beyond knowing mortals still yearn to understand them. Some few mortal cultures are able to comprehend that the True Gods exist, and have attempted to catalogue and understand the Divinities as best they can. These understandings are simple, flawed, the way a blind child might attempt to understand a vast tree by touching its bark, its leaves, its roots.
The Laughing God
One of the Masked Gods. The Laughing God is seen as a God that teaches mortals to transcend their limited states and to join the Gods in Divinity. Worshipers of the God are called Laughing Cultists. The Laughing God’s lessons focus on the experiences of pain and suffering, and how these sensations are not to be feared or avoided, but embraced. Laughing Cultists are said to be nearing transcendence when they can laugh while the flesh is stripped from their bones. The God and its cult are popular with those individuals who live with conditions that cause inescapable pain. Some criticize the cult as an excuse to inflict pain on others.
The Weeping God
One of the Masked Gods. The Weeping God, like its brethren in the Masked Gods, teaches mortals to transcend their limited states and join the Gods in Divinity. Worshipers are called Weeping Cultists. The Weeping God’s lessons focus on the fear and decay of reality; the entropy that slowly claims all. Weeping Cultists are taught to embrace their fears, and the final end that comes for all things, and to pass through so that they are no longer fettered by the mind-numbing horror of oblivion. The Weeping Cult focuses on death and disease as the most manifest aspects of entropy accessible to civilized life, and a true Weeping Cultist is said to be able to infect themselves with horrendous diseases without flinching. The Cult is popular with the sick and elderly, and those whose fear of death claws at the back of the mind unceasingly.
The Screaming God
One of the three Masked Gods. The Screaming God is thought to teach mortals to transcend their existence and become Divine. Worshipers are called Screaming Cultists. The Screaming God’s lessons focus on the fettered nature of mortal existence, and ways to break free from these chains. The most common method used by Screaming Cultists to liberate themselves is to embrace their passions and use them to fuel their efforts. Rage, hatred, terror, joy, are all valid fuels to the Screaming Cult. Whatever the origin of their passion, a Cultist can use it to drive themselves beyond their perceived limits and achieve feats no others could. The cult is popular with the oppressed and downtrodden, and with all those who feel they could be something of value if only they could shatter their own limits.
The Winged God
One of the twinned Gods. The Winged God is the God of Chaos and Change. The Winged God and its cult, the Winged Cult, doesn’t attempt to teach any particular lesson to mortals. The focus of its worshipers, the Winged Cultists, is on promoting the Divine Change. Where they see stagnation, they attempt to induce chaos. Chaos, in their eyes, is a Divine act. The True Gods create Chaos in the Burning Times, and even more so when the Divine Singularity explodes to create new realities. The Winged Cult is popular with revolutionaries and rebels, artists, musicians, and any individual looking to alter and change the circumstances around them. Detractors view it as change for the sake of change, anarchy, and an excuse to destroy what others have built.
The Martyr God
One of the twinned Gods. The Martyr God is the God of Order and Stability. The Martyr God does not have a singular cult, and instead has an army of followers, the Martyrs. The Martyrs view themselves as wrongly oppressed and mistreated by others, and believe that only by imparting their own vision of Order can reality be best guided toward prosperity. Order is Divine, after all, with the Golden Ages being periods of stability, and the culmination of the Ceaseless Cycle. Martyrs, despite championing Order, recognize the need for change, so long as that change is controlled. They are dedicated and relentless individuals whose vision of society brooks no interference. Martyrs are nearly universally feared for their willingness to kill and destroy in order to reach their Divine Order.
The Burning God
One half of the Gods of Creation. The Burning God is the herald of destruction. It manifests during the Burning Times, the end of the Ceaseless Cycle. The Burning God appears as the Tree engulfed in flames. Wherever the Burning God manifests, worlds are Overlayed. The Burning God has no formal cult and teaches no lessons. It is instead worshipped sporadically as a harbinger of the end, and of the beginning. It is the symbol of the death of civilizations, and the impending birth of new realities. When the Burning God appears, all know that their world is about to be torn apart in a cosmically violent event. But just as that death comes, the seed of new life is planted. The Burning God, more than any other Divinity, is the symbol of abject terror for all life. It is the ultimate symbol of the inevitable death that claims all life. But just as much as it signals the end, the Burning God is the symbol of new life, of new generations, coming into being and continuing the cycle.
The Silent God
One half of the Gods of Creation. The Silent God is the lynchpin of reality. It is manifest at all times, though none may see it. The Silent God is the Tree. It is the Gods made amalgam. The Silent God comes into being after the Divine Singularity has exploded and new universes have been birthed. It is the needle and the thread and the fabric of all existence. It dreams of the worlds, and the worlds exist. It is the sum total of all Divinity and all potentials. The Silent God offers no lessons and has no cults. Its very existence is enough. Its unspoken words are enough. It speaks no words, it has no voice, and yet it whispers all of existence into being. Only the most educated of scholars know of the Silent God’s existence, and all those who know hold it in utter reverence as the only True God.
