An old lady was rocking on her chair, sitting on a balcony within the trees. It had the view of an entire settlement, an elf village. From her appearance it is impossible to tell her age.

A tall man, a high elf wearing butler clothes joined her, but the elderly lady was too engrossed in her thoughts to notice.

“Milady?”

She turned around, gave the butler a warm smile before staring back into nothingness, deep in thought.

“Milady, please eat your dinner”

This time the woman didn’t even bother to turn around to answer.

“What is the point? I have already lived far too long, I even outlived your parents, elves”

“You are our hope, the symbol for our people, you are the reason other humans didn’t invade us yet”

She raised her hand, indicating the conversation was over. “Leave”

The butler stared at her back, the back of a living legend whom he served for almost a hundred years.

“I said leave”

Not disobeying his lady’s order, he pivoted on his heel and walked away.

Staring off into the distance, she sighed. “Perhaps I was too harsh back then. Where are you now, if you are alive”

A voice, young but rich with energy, sounded from behind her.

“Do you mean me?”

The elder turned around and saw a young blond man in a simple tunic. However with a glance you could tell the fabric of the tunic was exceptional material, the man himself looked in his twenties, on the skinny side, but a profound air hung around him, almost as if the atmosphere was bowing before his presence.

She blinked a couple of times, confirmed what she saw. She opened her mouth to speak, but her vocal chords refused to respond. After a few tries before she finally found her voice, she asked with a quivering voice.

“James?”

The man smiled and nodded as confirmation.

“You’ve grown.. no wait, how in the world do you look so young, teach this old hag your tricks”

James sat down, an elegant chair forming under him from the wooden planks.

“It is a long story, do you mind?”

Elenoire cackled, “Of course not”

Thus, I proceeded to talk, I said everything, from beginning to end, without leaving a single detail behind. Mother simply listened, without saying a single word, when I stopped to see if she had any questions she simply motioned to continue. I talked for the entire evening and night. When I was finally done I said to mother.

“Mother, I can revert your age, I can make you live forever!”

She shook her head.

“Being immortal isn’t a blessing. My time should have been a long time ago, perhaps I was hanging on for this moment”

She stood up, proudly. At this moment, she wasn’t a frail old lady on death’s doorstep. She was the Legendary Great Sage of Eternity, the living Myth, the mother of the renowned Genius Mage, the Undefeated Battlemage. Unrivaled by all. She stood tall.. for her height, and walked proudly towards the door, beyond which dinner awaited.

James watched, he simply watched. He sensed it, he also knew it, today was the last. He sank through the floor and dropped on the forest ground.

With each step he took, flowers bloomed. It was an unconscious action. A phenomenon caused by the grief of a supreme being, while the entire planet itself paid its respects.

I do not understand. Yet again, I failed to understand completely. I know the reasons, but I can’t understand it. A thousand years ago, she was angry, I couldn’t understand, but now she wishes for death, I understand even less. Is my ‘humanity’ still incomplete?

By the time James left the forest, it was filled with all kinds of flowers, all over the world, flowers bloomed grandly. Elves, who by instinct felt close to nature, threw a feast at this beautiful sight.

James created a pillar, reaching higher than the clouds and lay there watching the full moon. Even without his mana detection and skills, he could hear the elves clearly. They were dancing, singing and playing instruments. Birds chirped, woken up by the sound. Mother was breathing slowly, sound asleep.

You haven’t grown up at all have you?

Telepathy.

‘Mother? Are you awake? Is everything alright?’

Her breathing stopped.

Elenoire Signe. Titled the Mage of Eternity, holding the status of Great sage for 87 years consecutively before the tournament was abolished. She had over 200 theories and patents on her name. Called the strongest Battlemage to have ever existed, undefeated, unparalleled and unrivaled. Despite being a human, she persisted for over a thousand years, becoming one of the longest living human orthodox mages that will ever exist. A Myth, a person whose reputation equaled that of Dragons and Gods. On 32043  May 17th, 00:07 Jackson Calendar, she expended the last of her energy for a telepathic message.

Date of death, -1 of the Imperial Calendar, May 16-17. It became the date for a yearly festival across the entire Empire.

Immediately, the flowers wilted. Chaos swallowed the elves, but James ignored it.

“I can save her, I can resurrect Mother. I can… Why were you so unafraid of death, Mother? Why did you have to say, you wanted to die?”

He wept. He didn’t take any action to stop it. He was said to be emotionless, a pure rational and logical person. However it didn’t mean he was unaware of it. He too, wanted to experience emotion. Without feeling, he was nothing but a machine, he wouldn’t be ‘human’.

So, he let his tears flow freely, remembering every single sensation he felt.

After a few hours, James wandered. He had sealed all of his sensory abilities, meaning only things he physically saw would be what he knew. As such, he possessed near boundless knowledge, but knew close to nothing about the current culture, geography, kingdoms, empires, territories and so on.

It was interesting how of the species he released into the world, some had evolved, turning completely different, others died out, going extinct, while others dominated their territories.

James walked, unsure of what to do. He left the society a thousand years ago, the only attachment, his mother, died.

Then he remembered a village, a nameless one that he saved on a whim. Most of the inhabitants died, but others were captured, later released and returned to the village.

Immediately he teleported, levitating a few hundred meters in the air. Below him was a massive city, surrounded by colossal walls. Hundreds of roads entered the city, while an endless row of people were waiting outside the gates.

James slowly descended. A few children noticed but with a wave of his hand they forgot everything and began a game of tag.

He turned invisible, hovering a few centimeters above the ground, and began exploring.  Again the same principle applied, using magic and skills for everything was boring. Plus, James had a principle to not interfere with nature as much as possible. Of course, he sometimes broke it for his curiosity, otherwise, almost never.

He visited a few buildings, guilds and shops. Getting the general idea of the culture. In the distance, he saw a church, almost as big as the palance in the center of the city.

Interested in the theology of the present, given the fact he had met Gods personally, he entered the church.

As if the designers wanted to shove the visitor’s face with a gigantic painting, just after going through the doors, James came face to face with a painting, larger than several houses.

He even had to step back and expand his visual senses to clearly see the entire painting.

On it, there was a dazzling youth, drawn very large with only his upper body.in the action of embracing a city in which a ferocious beast was running rampant. The youth beamed with brilliance, as if he was the sun itself. Humans of all ages were kneeled, praying. Winged angels fluttered around.

James frowned, he didn’t recognise this God, none of the Gods he met or created looked like this, or had any events similar to what was depicted in the painting. Moving on, he observed the much smaller, but still large paintings on the sides.

It was the same youth, this time standing on the ground handing over an orb of light to an elderly. The one next to it was the youth beheading the beast. The last painting was the youth with his arms outstretched, as if holding up the entire sky.

‘This… don’t tell me…’

James immediately started to read the inscriptions on the walls. With each sentence he grew paler and paler.

In the end he didn’t even finish a quarter of the inscriptions.

In fact, he felt as if he had the biggest mental trauma he had ever received in his lifetime.

It was as he had thought. Although vastly exaggerated and glorified, the ‘God’ was him.

Even though he was greatly disgusted by the endless praises, strange titles and countless heroic deeds he never did. It was still part of the village he saved. His home Kingdom long vanished, while this small town grew into a large Kingdom, and the only reason it wasn’t called an Empire was due to the lack of territory. It’s economic and military strength was above most Empires.

After pondering for a while, James came to make a decision. I will be an advisor for this Kingdom for a few years and make some connections before moving on.

Some ignorant scholars of the present day would often ask historians. Why did Deus never take the position of a King or Emperor? Despite having sky high prestige and reputation, and being revered even more than the King himself, Deus never liked attention, he had an elusive nature. On top of that, due to his internal conflict of ‘humanity’ against ‘rationality and logic’ Deus couldn’t understand human emotions very well and instead spent his time immersing himself in knowledge, which is why he could easily stay secluded without any social contact and not go insane. Because of these reasons, James was used to attention, but preferred to be on the sidelines. Such as being an advisor, strategist, teacher etc.

After confirming his decision multiple times, he immediately teleported directly to the royal chambers. A fraction of a second later, he teleported right outside of the chambers.

‘Even if it is just a normal person with no magical prowess or skills, it is still the King of the nation, the representative and ruler of everyone living in this Kingdom. I should at least give some amount of respect’

As he finished the thought, James switched off his invisibility and pushed the doors.

This action immediately alerted the guards, raising their spears, blocking James.

A few people in lavish clothing frowned. “Get this intruder out at once, lock him up in the prisons”

James was a bit displeased but tolerated it, since it was true he was still being disrespectful to the King.

While the guards struggled to move James even an inch, a plump man, presumably the King, stood up, enraged.

“Why haven’t you taken him away already? A trash is staining my castle and you leave him be?”

This time James frowned with disdain, but hid it well, perhaps he shouldn't have sealed his prophetic abilities, a human garbage.

Knowing it is just bothersome to deal with corrupt nobles, James simply took a deep bow.

“Very well, as per your request. I shall take my leave”

The guards who were trying to push him out stumbled, falling down. James was long gone.

I guess you could say I was severely disappointed in human nature. But back then I was at a loss. Because I had truly, completely lost all ties to society. I’m still reluctant to use Ruler to change my psychology, would I still be me after it? So I had decided to solve my personality disorder without using skills.

For once, James could understand. The reason Mother said death was simply part of the cycle of life. Why immortality was a curse instead of a blessing. To be completely isolated. For a normal person, they would have all the time to fulfill their desires and wishes, but afterwards they would be empty, without a goal. For James, he didn’t have such things in the first place, he already knew all there was to know except for things influenced by intelligent lifeforms. Without desire, goal or wishes, there was nothing to do, nothing to use his abilities. There was no reason to continue existing then. However he couldn’t even die. There wasn’t a single person or God, much less a weapon, even his own, that could hurt him, much less kill him. Even if he did somehow die, he would simply be resurrected due to a passive effect of Ruler, on top of that, he couldn’t remove or change this passive even with the ability of Ruler. It was one of the only things that he couldn’t influence.

He could truly be called pitiful. Despite reaching the pinnacle, he both had everything and nothing.

Aimless, James did what he had done repeatedly, roaming the world.

6 months passed in a flash, it isn’t a long time, but still considerably long, 2 seasons passing by, but for James, an Immortal, his perception of time was slightly different.

He was currently deeply in trance, thinking of other possible reasons for existing, other places in which he might have ties to, perhaps even leaving this universe and starting to learn more about dimensional laws. All of a sudden something completely destroyed his train of thought. Everything in his mind tangled and turned chaotic. There was an external force.

Sorting his mind again and leaving the trance, James turned his focus back on the physical realm.

As an instinct he had cast several defensive spells the moment he was touched while in a trance. The figure who had reached out to him was flung back by the repulsive force.

He was slightly intrigued by the person's appearance. First of all, it was a she, secondly the fact she could even see him and touch him while he was in a semi invisible, partially in a spatial gap meant she was quite capable as a mortal. Thirdly, she was a vampire, a very pureblooded one too, given how she was so resistant to the sun.

Vampires were a species he created, however the current vampires weren’t direct creations of him, they evolved slightly, and generations had passed. Inwardly he thought a bit like such: ‘So, this is how it feels when a creation becomes free from the shackles of the creator?’

She was of similar height as himself, slender but clearly well trained. She had silvery white hair and deep crimson irises which had indicated she was indeed a vampire. She emenated an aura of elegance and pride.

James couldn’t help but notice her clothing, completely dark blue, the fabric seemed to have a protective feature against the sunlight, with a glance you could tell it was made for combat. Tight jacket covered in near invisible runes, on the sleeves were 3 buttons, each in a slightly different color, with James’ extreme sense of smell, he could sense the herbs and poison contained within. Her belt had 3 daggers strapped to it and 2 pockets with who knew what.

As for her facial features, she could be described as devilishly angelic. The sharpness and alure of a demoness and the pureness and the demeanor of a goddess.