CODEX OMNIVERSA

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The Godwave made its first pass…

…struck a cluster of islands then no more than savage outcroppings from the hostile sea. And places within those rocks, those shores, a shimmering nexus of divinity. A seed which would, in the long passage of years, bear a most remarkable fruit…

After waiting centuries for humankind to reach an appropriate level of understanding, The Gods of Olympus, or Olympians, came to power in the ancient world. They manifested to mortal man when the great civilization of Greece was barely more than “a cluster of mud huts.”

Since their power could be greatly increased by the devotion of mortals, the Gods taught them the proper forms of worship and, in return, guided them in the development of their culture.

Drawn by this power, a being from another world arrived on Earth and sought to control it. He crossed the Mediterranean to a village founded by a man called Romulus and enacted a scheme…

We’ve already met this being, the young Uxas from Apokolips, who would eventually claim the name of… Darkseid.

As a result of Uxas’s plan, mortals were eager to worship the Gods, which further empowered them. After a thousand years, they had twice as many worshippers, but also twice as many demands. They grew tired and their solution was to create avatars…

The Gods could now be literally in two places at one time. However, by dividing themselves between the Greeks and Romans, their avatars grew apart and eventually became completely separate entities.

Uxas knew if they were split into two pantheons, each would be less powerful than the whole…

Mount Olympus

The Gods reside on Mount Olympus, located in the  metaphysical reality known as the Sphere of the Gods, specifically in a dimension called Skyland, or Hightower. Skyland is home to all the Gods and pantheons worshipped by the ancient cultures of Earth.

12 Gods live on Mount Olympus:

• Zeus, the ruler of Mount Olympus and the father of most of the Gods
• Hera, the goddess of marriage and women
• Poseidon, the god of the sea, earthquakes, horses and storms
• Demeter, the goddess of the harvest
• Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty
• Hephaestus, the god of fire, smithing, and metallurgy
• Apollo, the god of light
• Artemis, the goddess of the hunt
• Ares, the god of war
• Hermes, the messenger of the Gods
• Athena, the goddess of wisdom and defensive war
• Hestia, the virgin goddess of the hearth

The Underworld

Like all realms in the Sphere of the Gods, Skyland has a companion realm that serves as its polar opposite. In Skyland’s case, its companion is the Underworld. The Underworld includes all the lands of the dead and prison dimensions in which the ancient cultures of Earth believe.

Hades, the god of the dead, is a thirteenth God. He dwells in the Underworld.

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