Mystryl's world was actually a multiverse.
An interconnected web of different campaign worlds, elemental forces, and moral planes bound together by a central cosmological framework.
That world was also better known by another name: D&D, or Dungeons & Dragons.
And Mystryl wasn't some simple lesser deity whose exact rank Tom could easily explain.
Honestly, Tom himself couldn't quite say what level she was. All he knew was that he'd hit the jackpot this time, and somehow managed to send that jackpot straight into another world.
In the D&D world, magic had long since been clearly defined.
It was a fundamental cosmic force permeating the multiverse, while spells were specific ways of shaping and dispersing that magical energy.
At the dawn of time, legend says that Lord Ao created the universe, and from the primordial chaos emerged two twin deities: Shar, the goddess of darkness, and Selûne, the goddess of light.
The sisters eventually clashed over control of the universe. Shar, the goddess of darkness, gradually gained the upper hand. In her desperation, Selûne tore away a portion of her own magical essence and hurled it at Shar. When that energy struck Shar, it also tore away a portion of Shar's essence.
From the blending of dark and light energies, Mystryl was born as a being of pure magic inextricably tied to the Weave
She was the embodiment of magic, the very manifestation of miracles, and the Goddess of the Weave, the one who shaped the laws governing magic throughout the world.
In that world, divine ranks were divided into clear levels. In theory, the highest divine rank any god could possess was twentieth level.
In practice, aside from Lord Ao, the Overgod, the ultimate creator and administrator of the universe, the strongest gods were only at the level of greater gods, somewhere between sixteenth and twentieth rank.
Mystryl's divine rank was an astonishing eighteen, putting her on the same level as Shar. Selûne, meanwhile, had fallen from the ranks of greater deities after suffering severe injuries, becoming a lesser deity.
By the time Tom finished explaining Mystryl's origins, everyone present was completely dumbfounded.
A goddess born from the clash between light and darkness at the dawn of the universe.
A being who controlled the magical power of countless worlds.
The one who created the structured network connecting primordial magical energy to the material world.
Every single one of those descriptions sounded like something straight out of a divine scripture, far beyond anything they could comprehend.
And yet every word was true.
Just what kind of monster had Tom summoned?
"Wait." Morgan had finally spotted the crucial point. "You said you saved Mystryl's life. She's that powerful, so unless that Ao god you mentioned personally stepped in, nobody else should have been able to kill her, right?"
"Could she have been surrounded by a group of greater gods?" Ravenclaw guessed.
Tom's expression became increasingly strange. He looked like he was desperately trying to hold back his laughter, caught somewhere between barely keeping himself together and completely losing it.
Mystryl sighed. "Forget it. I'll tell them myself."
"My death was indeed rather ridiculous. You could even call it humiliating. The truth is, I died at the hands of a mortal."
Mystryl let out a slow sigh. "I'll admit that mortal was an extraordinary genius, perhaps the most talented mage the Netherese Empire had produced in thousands of years."
"According to the classification Tom taught me, his power would probably be considered demigod-level. But a pure mage doesn't possess divine power in the conventional sense, so you could also regard him as an exceptionally powerful Wizard King."
"Of course, his actual strength was far beyond that level. He was capable of killing a weaker deity."
"A mortal killed a god?" Morgan's eyes widened in disbelief. "Can something like that really happen?"
The man didn't possess divine power to begin with, yet he'd continued breaking through at his own level. Morgan could barely imagine how difficult that must have been.
Mystryl explained, "Every world is different in how much freedom it grants mortals. It depends on the world's laws and the divine authorities controlled by its gods."
"I created the Weave, which greatly reduced the difficulty of learning magic for mortal spellcasters. That gave them more time and energy to devote to studying the deeper nature of magic and developing more powerful spells."
"Because I took such an open approach to magic, an incredibly glorious magical empire eventually emerged in my world: the Netherese Empire. At its peak, that empire was comparable to a lesser deity. Within the mortal world, they were virtually invincible."
"Karsus was a member of that empire. He was the youngest archmage in its history, particularly gifted in psychic and epic magic. He developed a 12th-level spell that he called Karsus's Avatar."
Even now, there was unmistakable awe in Mystryl's eyes as she spoke of him.
"That spell had only one purpose: temporarily rob a deity of their power and grant it instead to the spellcaster."
"And the target he chose was me. The source of all magic."
"What he didn't know was that I was also the Weave itself."
"He succeeded?" Grindelwald asked in shock.
He'd always prided himself on being rebellious and doing whatever he pleased. But after hearing about Karsus's feat, he suddenly realized that everything he'd ever done amounted to little more than child's play.
'This guy really went all in. He actually targeted the strongest god there was.'
Mystryl nodded. "Yes. He succeeded, but he also failed."
"The spell itself worked. My divinity began to drain away, and my divine rank began to tear apart. Everything that was transferred entered Karsus's body."
"Then what do you mean when you say he failed?" Ariana had been completely captivated by the story.
"The reason he failed was simple." Mystryl's eyes held a faint trace of mockery. "He was a mortal."
"A mortal's mind and soul simply cannot withstand an energy and information flow of that magnitude. Three seconds after absorbing my godly essence, Karsus entered a state of complete mental blankness."
"At the fifth second, the divinity he'd acquired began to clash with his humanity. His thoughts nearly ground to a complete halt."
"This continued for a full ninety seconds. Karsus was still alive at that point, but he'd effectively become a statue. He was nothing more than a vessel containing the transferred divine rank and divinity."
"...I tried to sever the spell, but because the power involved was fundamentally the same as my own, I couldn't."
"So, to ensure the survival of the Weave and the stability of the world, I chose to destroy myself. Once I died, Karsus's spell would lose its target. Naturally, the spell would then terminate."
Ravenclaw pieced together the rest of the story. "So after you died, Tom summoned you here?"
Mystryl shot Tom an exasperated look. "This child completely ruined my plan."
"My original plan was to resurrect immediately after my death and take control of the Weave again as the second Goddess of Magic. The entire process should have taken less than a thousandth of an instant. Yet even in that infinitesimal window, he somehow seized the opportunity. I still have no idea how he managed it."
"Honestly, I don't know either." Tom was grinning from ear to ear.
He was clearly the one who'd benefited the most from this whole situation.
The system actually classified the weakened Mystryl as a lesser god (demigod). What a jackpot.
"Mystryl, didn't we just agree that there are other gods in your world who can clean up the mess you left behind? Maybe the consciousness you were in was simply pulled out of that particular timeline."
"Maybe there is another Goddess of Magic on the continent of Faerûn right now."
"There's an old saying in our world: When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Since you're here, you might as well make the best of it. Don't worry about things you can't see or deal with for now."
"..."
Mystryl sighed. "What else can I do? At this point, I've basically become your subordinate deity. Even if I wanted to go back, I couldn't."
Despite saying that, the expression on Mystryl's face didn't exactly suggest that she was as reluctant as her words made her sound.
Mages pursued the mysteries of the unknown. Their ultimate goal was to grasp every form of magic in existence as the God of Magic.
Gods were no different.
After all, once you became a god, there weren't many secrets left in your own world.
But arriving in an entirely new world was another matter altogether.
Especially when the magical system of this world differed so greatly from her own.
Forget about not being able to return right now. Even if she could immediately go back to the Multiverse, Mystryl had no intention of leaving.
At the very least, she wanted to uncover every magical mystery this world had to offer first.
That was what she and Tom had been discussing outside earlier.
Only after they'd settled everything between them did Tom finally dare bring Mystryl over to meet everyone.
.
.
.