Yale and Alrein could guess what happened after just hearing Kroh's words. That was a real tragedy.
"Although I was the first to advance, we all advanced without too much difference between each other, so when we, the three first one to advance, went outside the universes for a battle, the number of True Gods was already quite high."
All the original Gods were more or less balanced in innate talent, so it wasn't strange that they all managed to become True Gods at a similar time.
"The reason I went to battle with the Life Goddess and the Death God wasn't just because we were the three first, but because the Life Goddess and I were the only ones capable of surviving in front of the Death God, who was famous for nor knowing how to restrain himself properly."
Kroh was never hit in a battle, and the Life Goddess could heal herself no matter how serious the injuries were as long as she wasn't dead. Even if she died, they all knew that Kroh could use Time Rewind.
They were also the three that used their Divinities the most, which was the reason they were also the first ones in advance. Kroh couldn't count how many times used Time Rewind to help others, and the Life Goddess technically created all the life in the multiverse. As for the Death God, no one knew how many times he killed others by mistake.
"Although our personalities differed quite a bit, we were great friends. Among everyone in the group, calling them my best friends isn't wrong. They always argued a lot with each other due to their different points of view, but in the end, I know that they also thought like me."
Kroh was right in that the Life Goddess and the Death God considered themselves to be best friends despite their conflicts, but what Kroh didn't know was that they always lied about the true reasons for the conflicts after they created the universes.
The truth was that after the universes were created, some Gods became interested in love, and they even discovered the existence of the Lust Goddess outside the universes.
Although the Gods lacked gender and under normal conditions, they didn't have any carnal desires, they were still interested in experiencing some pure love.
The problem was that not all Gods were interested, and Kroh was one of them.
The Life Goddess and the Death God were both in love with Kroh, and they argued about if Kroh was male or female despite the truth that no naturally born God had gender. Others at least looked like one of the two created for mortals, but there was a small number, Kroh included, that remained in a gray area impossible to ascertain.
Once they asked Kroh for curiosity, but as they expected, the answer was that Kroh didn't mind about such things for mortals and that they weren't related to them at all, so thinking about it was a waste of time.
"When we started our battle, it was a great surprise that after the breakthrough, the Death God was better restraining himself. We all saw that our powers and our control of them had increased a lot, but at that time, we were just testing, so there hadn't been any attack that could kill a body."
Kroh sighed while remembering what happened after that.
"After that, the Death God said that he would use a new attack that could just destroy the body without harming the soul at all, which was quite strange for someone famous for harming the souls of others even if he didn't want. At the start, I did nothing to prevent him from attacking the Life Goddess. He knew that he wouldn't be able to hit me, so he always targeted her. However, at that moment, I had a bad premonition, and I shouted, asking him to stop, but since he didn't listen, I attacked him…"
Kroh didn't use any lethal force, just enough to destroy the Death God's body and make him stop being so rash even when others told him to stop.
"At the same time that the Death God destroyed the Life Goddess Body, I destroyed the Death God's body. If that time, I just froze the time and stopped the battle, nothing would have happened, but I was upset about the Death God not listening to me, and I decided to attack. It wasn't as if I thought that the consequences would be so serious."
Kroh regretted that instant more than anything else. If Kroh had been cautious, those two Gods wouldn't have died, but Kroh had been too confident in resurrecting anyone.
Kroh just asked to stop because of the bad premonition, but Kroh had bad premonitions before, and they were still undoable by altering the time later.
"I was a fool. When I noticed that they died after just losing their bodies, I was shocked, but I was just thinking about reporting that to the others while leisurely using Time Rewind to resurrect them. The possibility that they couldn't resurrect didn't even appear in my mind, and I attributed the bad premonition to death with just the destruction of the body. However, after a while, I noticed that Time Rewind wasn't resurrecting them, so I sent my mind to the past and prevented that we started the battle telling them what happened, but they died even if no one killed them at the same instant the died before I went to the past."
Kroh didn't know why it was impossible to prevent those deaths, but Kroh didn't give up that easily.
"I went even further into the past and reported everything that happened. Of course, I give everyone the memories of that timeline. I never dared to modify the past without letting everyone know what happened previously."
Kroh never told that he could change the past without anyone else noticing it, nor he planned to mention it to anyone unless that person could also do it.
"Of course, everyone was scared when they heard me. Since we usually battled with those closest to us, everyone had killed someone important to them, or they were the ones killed. They were alive for a while, but they died at the same time as they died previously, and that happened no matter how many times I went to the past."
Kroh tried everything, but nothing worked.
"Due to the despair they were feeling, some started to blame me for being useless. They said that they trusted that I could just undo any death, so they battled without worries, but that I had betrayed them. Some even said that I wasn't saving them on purpose and tried to kill me. Even some Gods who haven't died before died due to the internal conflict since some of them sided with me."
That was also the day that Kroh stopped caring about the original members of the group of Gods. Initially, Kroh felt that mortals weren't worthy of anything since they were too petty, but that time Kroh discovered that some Gods were the same.
Kroh was also suffering due to the unavoidable fate of others. Kroh was the one who had wanted to save them the most, but in the end, some even blamed Kroh for failing.
"A lot of universes started to decay with the deaths of their owners, but even if those inside left before they died, anyone who was in that universe any time that the True God died, would be affected by the decay, so even Gods that were born as mortals died tragically."
Although Kroh was disappointed with others, Kroh still tried to help those who sided with him and those he killed by mistake.
However, it didn't matter if it was the Gods or those in their universes, their fates were unavoidable.
"After failing for an unknown number of times, I decided to stop. Those who haven't blamed me remained in the Council of Gods and agreed with my decision. Even those fated to die agreed. Even the Life Goddess and the Death God supported my decision."
Although Kroh could have avoided their death, none of them blamed Kroh. Kroh had indeed told the Death God to stop, but the Death God refused to obey. Anyway, no one could have predicted that outcome, so those remaining didn't blame Kroh for failing in saving everyone.
"When they died, the only thing I managed to save was a tiny soul fragment created together by the Life Goddess, the Death God, and myself. That was the only way that some part of them remained, but there wasn't any trace of their consciousness left. At most, it was a memento they left for me."
Yale and Alrein could see the sadness of Kroh's eyes.
"After that, I started to live alone while observing people from universes. I stopped caring about the past and looking for people who could master at least the Minor Time Divinity. Creating a new objective to forget my failure. Meanwhile, the universes of the dead ones decayed until disappearing. I was observing when the last one was about to disappear, that was also the first one that was created. At that moment, there was only one intelligent living being left."
A faint smile appeared on Kroh's face.
"There was no way to survive, that mortal was doomed. That was what I thought, but something unexpected happened. Despite not being possible, a mere mortal traveled to the past, escaping from his fate. Right, Alrein?"
