Ok, this idea came to me in a dream so please understand it might be a little... off. Anyways, if u want to have a sequel to one of these one-shots go ahead and put your desired one down below in the reviews. Other than that, I guess I should warn you that this one isn't wholly about Jaune.
XOXOXO
CoffeyJoe
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Adventures in Godhood: The world is a strange and mysterious place, with beings of unimaginable power ruling over the humans that populate the planet. Some of these beings strive for justice, honor, peace, and prosperity while others yearn for chaos, destruction, death, and general mayhem. These forces contend with eachother for control over Remnant, but among these two factions there exists a third, the neutrals who desire nothing but what they personally want. With the next Divine Summit being held, ideals clash and sparks are bound to fly.
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"Order! Order, I say!" an authoritative voice demanded to the crowd of teeming deities. "The 189th Divine Summit will now be underway, please fine your designated seat within your faction. If you have a claim you would like to make, please, first, list your name, jurisdiction, faction, and pantheon for the hearing. We will now begin with opening statements from the faction representatives."
The grizzled man who was speaking nodded to the figure to his left, a young man with a wave of flowing blue hair and wearing a perfectly red jacket that highlighted his dreamy eyes. The man nodded back and cleared his throat to speak-
"Thank you Lord Ironwood," he began. "I am Neptune, Mistrali God of the Sea and a member of the Order faction. We would like to begin by demanding suitable compensation for the recent loss of the Ellipses Peninsula that was destroyed in a recent skirmish between Tyrian of the Chaos Faction and Qrow of the Order Faction."
A round of murmurs erupted between the three dominant parties, the order faction, chaos faction, and neutral faction respectively, as they all discussed the matter in depth between eachother. Eventually, after a moment of heated argument between the members of the Chaos Faction, their representative cleared his throat and answered.
"Watts, Atlesian God of Technology and member of the Chaos Faction." he introduced himself, speaking with a regal air. "We of the Chaos Faction deny such a request, on the grounds that Tyrian did not initiate the fight."
Another round of murmurs, though much shorter as it was cut off.
"Inconceivable, Qrow had no reason to engage with Tyrian and, furthermore, given the man's occupation as the Vacuan God of Battle and Mayhem, we are inclined to believe otherwise." Neptune argued back, pointing an accusing finger at the man in question.
"We have multiple sources stating otherwise, claiming that Qrow initiated the fight in a drunken stupor." Watts dismissed with a wave of his hand.
"No doubt more of your underhanded tricks." snickered a voice from the other side of the speaker who turned red.
"I will not have my party's name slandered by the wretched drunk!" Watts howled in anger. "Your people have done nothing but antagonize my faction in an attempt to goad us into war!"
"Do you have any claims for that?" Ironwood, the elected speaker for the assembly and Atlesian God of War, asked.
Watts sneered at the man. "The writing is on the wall Ironwood, do not attempt to say otherwise."
The proceedings were cut off as a rumble shook the very walls of the building. Many of the assembled Gods and Goddesses heaving a collective sigh as they all awaited for the figure to undoubtedly enter in a raucous and interrupting fashion. As if on cue, the doors slammed open and a young blonde man wearing a brown jacket and green flannel shirt, a double sided axe slung over his shoulder.
"Jaune!" a graying man with a lion's tale demanded as he slammed his hand down on his desk. "Where have you been!? The proceedings have already started!"
Jaune Paul of the neutral faction rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Yes, well, I had been spending my week in the mountains and it had totally slipped my mind that the Summit was today. So when I found out I raced over here as fast as possible!"
Leonardo, Mistrali God of Diplomacy and Art, sighed, his tail going limp, and motioned for the young man to join his respective faction. Jaune saluted him and bounded over to his assigned seat next to an equally blonde man with a monkey tale whose name was listed as: "Sun Wukong, Mistrali Monkey King of the North".
"Hello old friend!" Sun whispered excitedly to his cohort with a fist bump. "Proceedings have been quite stuffy without you. I swear, this Watts guy is stuffier than Ren!"
"A feat that alone should earn him the title of God!" Jaune snickered back, the two losing interest in the quarrels of the two factions. "How goes the North old friend?"
Sun shrugged. "Eh, not much happening when all you have is mountains and forests. I swear, Yang got the coolest direction, what with being the Southern Aspect and getting to at least fight wayward monsters now and then."
Jaune cracked a toothy grin. "Aye, been spending my time fishing for good game or constructing homes for those frontier humans. I swear, without me they'd perish in an instant!"
"True that." the monkey king whispered back, both of them drawn by the sound of heated arguments.
"I will not stand for such blatant disrespect of my faction!" growled Watts, the aforementioned Tyrian and Qrow standing behind their respective representatives. "I demand the charges be dropped immediately or face threat of war!"
"I-" Neptune began before being cut off by the leader of the Valechan Pantheon and subsequent leader of the Order Faction, Ozpin.
"So be it, the charges shall be dropped." Ozpin nodded sagely, Watts exhaling before sitting down with a curt nod. "But, there are still many more issues to press forward. For instance, Pyrrha believes her followers, the Amazons, have been encroached upon by your god of the sea..."
Jaune began to zone out, not because he didn't care but... it was just so boring! Could they make these issues seem any drier? It turns out, being a God isn't as cool as it should have been, instead of feats of strength and divine intervention everything has devolved into a nonstop drive of bureaucracy. Ever since they "slayed" the primordials things have gotten so boring.
Nowadays everyone has to be in a faction and if you don't say you're in one the other just lump you into one even if you don't like it. Idly, Jaune wondered how Ren and Nora were doing as he eyed them from their stands on the Order Faction's side. As far back as he could remember they were his best friends, the Atlesian Goddess of Strength and the Mistrali Aspect of the West made an interesting pair and a surprising one as well. They had served to strengthen ties between the two with Jaune Paul, unintentionally, playing the third party of Vale in the pseudo-alliance.
Jaune thought back to his youth, when he was but a young god of the frontier who did what he wanted to as a free spirit. Stomping his way across the continent and occasionally visiting his old pal Neptune in the heart of the sea. He once created mountains out of piles of dirt and dug up massive reservoirs of water for the people of Vacuo who had been dying of thirst while their gods made "it's complicated" statements. He swore, if there was one thing he could not stand it was idle inaction while other suffered.
He remembered how they told him that the water was "too deep" or it would require "too much strength" when he had only needed to dig his massive hands into the scorching sand and created a massive oasis for the people of Vacuo. Those uptight prudes did not like him very much for that, giving him the cold shoulder and treat him harshly whenever he trekked to Vacuo. Hmph, let them be envious of his obvious refined intellect, it was nothing but pathetic for them. He caught Pyrrha's eye, the Mistrali Goddess of Victory and Battle, who gave a silent sighed and nodded her heads to the heated talks between the two factions.
I know right? Jaune mouthed back silently, staring amazed at how much these ancient windbags could say in a single moment. Pyrrha had been another childhood friend, in fact, she had been the one who discovered him lying asleep beneath the mountains when he was first found. They thought him an honest to god primordial at first before he convinced them otherwise with his labors and good deeds.
The primordials.
That was a way to kill the mood. Embodiments of destruction, more so than the entire Chaos Faction could ever hope to be, and creatures of unimaginable power who had been birthed by the swirling Chaos and Aether of beyond Remnant. They had once threatened to destroy the planet before the gods and goddesses of the world banded together and smote them down.
Or, at least, attempted too when they found out that primordials couldn't really be "killed" but instead reset to a base state. Fortunately, they could easily be bound in this state and so the most powerful gods and goddesses buried them beneath the planet where they stay to this day. Then of course there were peace talks and diplomacy and international issues and blah, blah, blah...
It was all dreadfully boring and it made Jaune release a stifled yawn that was mimicked by his partner next to him. For once, he just wished that something would happen at these godforsaken (hehe) meetings.
The entire building shook a lot more violently than before, desks even being sent off kilter and a few immortals being sent to the floor. There was a brief moment of calm before Watts turned to face Ozpin and, with a sneer on his face, sent a wave of blinding electricity at the man.
Then things all went to hell, the gods of both Chaos and Order launched themselves at eachother even as summoned minions of various other gods flooded the room in an attempt to protect their masters. Jaune smiled a completely surprised smile at his friend who mimicked it, finally something was happening and it was even a massive fight! Sun Wukong scanned the room to find their enemy before pointing at a cluster of Vacuan minor gods who were ganging up on Blake, Valechan Goddess of Thieves and Cats unsuprisingly.
"I call dibs!" Jaune shouted, momentarily cutting off Sun who grumbled in response. Jaune Paul leaped from his spot, axe in hand, over to the young cat goddess who stood backed into a corner.
She hissed lowly. "I should have known your people would betray us, it was only a matter of time."
One of the bigger gods assembled before her laughed heartily. "Don't take it personally kiddo, your faction was going to do the same to us. Think of this as a preemptive strike, chaos style."
Blake would have rebutted that claim until they were both stopped short by the sound of a man's roaring coming towards them. Blake turned to see her fellow Valechan god charging the group of enemies, his axe gleaming brightly in the light that came through the room. The leader of the small band of chaos agents barely had time to call out before the large axe sunk into his shoulder, mortally wounding him.
"Have at you!" the blonde man shouted, cleaving the nearest goddess next to him in two.
"Holy shit!" one of them, a god named Lobos, shouted as he reared back for a punch.
It connected and Jaune was sent rocketing back into the wall, a few of the group fighting Blake breaking off to deal with this new adversary. Blake watched out of the corner of her eye as the young god effortlessly trumped the battle-hardened gods with his monumental strength.
Huh, I guess he's good for more than sitting around and making craters. Blake thought to herself as she drove a dagger into the heart of her enemy. Meanwhile, Jaune held the broken remains of a god in his right hand, the two remaining opting to fall back to a safer place.
"Haha! This is the most fun I have had in awhile!" Jaune cheered happily, observing the raging battle around him.
He watched Sun Wukong strike a line of enemies with his extending staff as Lie Ren blew a wave of green fire that gave off such intense heat it singed Jaune's eyebrows. However, something did not seem right, the gods and goddesses of order were winning almost too easily, so easy that it would be an embarrassment to call it a fight. No, something was not right here at all.
Jaune swung his axe in a wide arc and split a small squad of summoned minions that attempted to rush him, all the time chewing on his lip in deep thought. If Watts and the others had connived to stage a coup, why here? While it was true that all the gods and goddesses would be here, it did not seem that they had cut down on the security nor did they set an accurate ambush.
"Pyrrha," he asked idly, the goddess landing beside him gracefully. "Does this not seem too easy?"
The Goddess of Victory nodded. "Aye, this seems much too simple for what they call a coup."
Then, as if on cue, the building gave another violent shake, throwing everyone off balance and making whatever walls that remained crumble to pieces. Staring through a hole in the wall, Jaune felt his blood go cold for the first time in centuries. There, standing in the plains just beyond the summit place, was Watts himself, holding a swirling cloud of black and red that seemed almost grainy in appearance.
"He has the aether!" Jaune boomed with enough force to rattle the foundations.
The assembled immortals whipped their heads in the direction of the man who sneered victoriously. The cloud warped and coiled around the man's hands as hey swayed them around, beginning to perform an incantation.
"Stop him!" Neptune shouted, throwing his spear at the man.
Jaune watched as it sailed towards the Atlesian before a tendril of the aether whipped outwards, snapping the divine weapon in half before it fell into dust. Pyrrha stood dumbfounded at the magical substance that Watts wielded with almost ease, but already some gods and goddesses had begun to escape. Creating portals through magical circles while others transformed and moved to safety.
"Don't let him complete the spell!" shouted Ironwood, dressed in his battle robes and wielding his mighty spear Gungnir.
Ironwood pointed the spear at the man who cocked an eyebrow in challenge, there was a flash of light and suddenly a torrent of destructive energy burst forth from the tip of the spear. It roared its way towards the man who still had not paused in his incantation before it collided with seemingly nothing, moving around the dastardly god in almost a bubble. It was too late, Watts had finished his spell and the aether exploded from his hands, growing into a cloud the size of a mountain as it raged towards the assembled divines.
Jaune watched as the substance began to blanket the meeting house, unable to tear his eyes away from it.
The aether. The substance made by primordials that was destined to annihilate the world...
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Woah, what a strange chapter right? Honestly this was just me spit balling ideas here, got this one in a dream like I said. As you can see I had some liberties with the gods, some of whom you may know the inspiration.
Oh, and Jaune is supposed to be an expy of Paul Bunyan because I think that Paul doesn't get enough love for being the first American God.