A hunter spoke up, his tone sharp with caution.
"Well, we can't just pack up and leave. Someone is watching us now. That god, or whatever it was. We don't know His will. Perhaps He wants us to stay here."
Jermal's father, Jermalin, an elder, nodded firmly, echoing his son's vision. The god had blessed their food. Surely, that meant He wished to speak with them.
But His words had been vague, cryptic. Something about an army. Nothing about moving. Nothing about leaving the sacred lands that had sustained them for a few years now.
The elders and hunters stared at Jermal's crude etching on the wall. A bird that walked like a man. Feathers on his limbs. A crow's face. Eyes like the abyss.
They shuddered. None had seen anything like it before. But one thing was certain—he needed a name.
"How about the Crow God?" one hunter offered.
"Or the God of Shadows," an elder countered. "Did Jermal not say he commanded darkness?"
Another spat on the floor. "Too simple. Too soft. Look at him. He's no ordinary bird." His finger tapped the crude drawing. "Those eyes… empty as the void. I say we call him the Hollow Eye god."
The cave fell silent. The name lingered, sharp and dreadful, and slowly, heads began to nod.
"Then it's decided," Jermalin declared. "From now on, this god shall be known as the Hollow Eye."
He reached for the stone Jermal had used to etch the figure on the wall, and pressed it against the rough surface to draw a dark eye—an emblem of the name they had chosen.
But the stone quivered in his grasp.
A low hum echoed through the cave as the crude tool began to glow with an eerie crimson light.
"EEK!"
The elders and hunters recoiled in terror as the stone slipped from Jermalin's hand and hovered in midair, spinning slowly. His face blanched, his body trembling.
The glow intensified, burning their eyes until they shielded their faces. The stone stretched and warped, reshaping itself before their horrified gazes.
When the blinding light finally dimmed, the object that remained was no longer a crude rock, but a strange tool none of them had ever seen: a brush, its handle smooth, its bristles faintly steaming with red sparks.
The cave wall itself had changed. Where Jermalin had begun scratching the outline of an eye, the crude mark was gone. In its place were symbols. Strange, deliberate shapes etched with a precision no mortal hand could achieve.
Yet the Kramlins understood. Not with thought, but instinct. Each mark carried meaning. Each line and curve whispered sound into their minds, guiding them to speak what was written.
And in that instant, the tribe realized the scope of the gift that had been placed before them.
Just minutes after their first encounter with a god, they had been given something new. Something greater than stone or spear, greater even than fire or the wheel.
They had been given writing.
High above, Exile rejoiced. His followers had been granted a gift, one he hadn't even meant to give.
Writing.
It was fundamental to any civilization. Achieving it this early was nearly impossible, yet somehow, he had made it happen.
As he watched the tribe marvel at the glowing symbols, he also began to understand more about his own nature, and his power.
Divinity.
It could be obtained in one of two ways.
The first was through faith. His followers could pray in his name, each method offering different rewards.
The simplest was prayer of the mind: quiet devotion, a fleeting thought whispered to the heavens. It granted only a small amount of Divinity, but anyone could do it, anywhere, anytime.
The second was prayer through creation: building a temple in his honor. A place of worship, where walls stood firm and corners were sealed with a drop of the First's blood, sanctifying it in his name. Temples produced a steady flow of Divinity, a bond between god and follower made manifest in stone.
And lastly, there was the darkest form of faith: blood offerings.
The greater the creature's intellect, the greater the return. From beasts to Kramlins themselves, the sacrifice of life poured vast quantities of Divinity into his being. But such rituals demanded precision, blood, and secrecy, which risked twisting faith into fanaticism.
The second path to power was far simpler.
The elimination of other gods.
When a god fell, their Divinity scattered, waiting to be absorbed by the one strong enough to claim it.
But gods themselves weren't the only ones capable of cultivating such power. Beasts blessed by them could too. Like Umbra, for example.
On a smaller scale, Kramlins and regular animals also had their own power system.
Mana.