PROLOGUE

"In the beginning God created the heavens and then the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters."

In the beginning?

The beginning of what? Time? Beginning of the Earth?

No.

The beginning of creation, life, the Universe didn't start with a god.

The Beginning is actually unknown as is the End. Some say the Beginning was a living force itself, it began, lasted a while and then ended. It is said to be the most powerful force as it was able to create itself.

That 'while' of lasting was enough for the Beginning to create other forces and put them into what was before Nothing.

Nothing turned into the Universe, endless space of opportunities and life.

Not the kind of universe we imagine today. It was alive, powerful and eager to fill itself. The self-fulfillment was crucial for the Universe's preservation. Just like everything alive, the Universe also had self-destructive tendencies. Not intentional ones, existing was just something new and it didn't come with instructions.

That's why the Universe, otherwise shapeless and infinitive, started splitting and form new forces out of it's own core. Those forces then filled the nothingness with Life.

Life came in many different forms, first there were Stars. Stars lit the Universe up with color and gave the forces sight. Forces then combined Stars together and created galaxies, beautiful spaces inside of Space. Forces inhabited the galaxies and created different forms of shapes in them, some were round, some were made of water, some of gasses, some of stones.

And I suppose this is where the Bible says the beginning starts. With the creation of the Earth and it's sky. The Christian explanation, therefore isn't completely incorrect, it's just insufficient. It was not a force (Christians call it God) that created the earth, it was the Universe itself.

The Earth was originally a garden the Universe created for his last descendant, Athanasia. The garden was beautiful, it had incredibly tall trees, running waters, flowers of every color and sweet smell. But the Universe was aware how irresponsible Athanasia is, so it filled the garden with it's own vital force, Hera. Hera was the one who kept the world turning, the rivers running and the flowers blooming.

Athanasia and Hera spent a lot of time together, which resulted in them falling deeply in love. Their love was so strong that it became source of life, it was the only thing besides universe at the time that was capable of creating living creatures. With every loving touch they shared the Earth became richer for a creature. Soon their beloved garden was filled with lizards, butterflies, birds and fishes.

Even though they were the parental figure to the animals, they didn't mother them. Many species therefore didn't survive and many were forced to evolve.

However, Athanasia and Hera didn't ignore the life they created, they observed its beauty and they learned from it.

They have discovered that the animals can form relationships on physical level, not only emotional. The more they observed the animal kingdom the more natural they became and started to feel feelings such as lust, happiness and frustration. They became very desperate for each other and have decided to take a form. They will no longer be shapeless forces but a part of the garden. They shifted many times, searching for that perfect love-making form. After some time they decided that a form, today known as a form of a human being, was the fittest.

They saw each other as equal and have therefore taken a body of the same gender. They learned that the animal kingdom knows more genders, but those existed solely for the purposes of reproducing, and they weren't interested in that. They took the form of a female body.

As they have started to spend more time in human form and have furthered themselves from their divine forms, they've grown weaker. They could get hurt and tired.

They soon realized they were no longer immortal. They were ready to die one day but they haven't yet realized that with Hera's death, the garden will slowly die too.

Athanasia was the first to learn this and the thought of losing her beloved garden saddened her. That's why she decided to sacrifice herself and let die before it was too late for Hera to become one with the garden and let it live in the future. Hera tried to stop Athanasia and change her mind, she told her that no garden is worth the life without her. Athanasia tried to convince Hera too, saying that the garden is the cradle of their love, and she wants their love to live forever and truly be undying.

Hera of course still wasn't convinced, that's why Athanasia took her life in secret. Hera was so devastated when she learned about Athanasia's actions that her tears almost flooded the garden and drowned her along.

The Universe stopped Hera and reminded her of Athanasia's last wish. With a broken heart and a little help from the Universe, Hera became one with the garden once more. It took the form of the most magnificent tree imaginable and secured the tree with just as breathtaking forest and river.

The Universe mourned after them as well and had decided to create more creatures like them.

As years passed by it became clear to the Universe that women couldn't preserve their race on their own, that's why the Universe created men. He also gifted the humanity with the story of their existence. It was their job to keep Athanasia's and Hera's love alive and taught it to the next generations, in exchange the Universe gifted them with supernatural powers. The women were gifted with ability to get closer to the forces of nature and were named Gynakes. On the other hand, men were gifted with strength and took the most fulfilled human shape. They were called Andres.

It was meant for women to control the magical element of the Earth and for men the natural one, so they could together rule the garden.

As the mankind started to evolve, they distanced themselves from the nature and it's magical core. They saw it as a source of treasures, needed for their own benefit and not as a part of themselves. Soon they started exploiting the garden's surface for their needs and started seeing themselves a s a supreme species. The harmony Hera worked for was crushed by human selfishness.

Hera now wasn't as powerful as before and therefore couldn't put humanity at it's place. That's why she created goddesses of nature and gave them powers to protect the Earth and took away the powers of those, who didn't appreciate them or have used them fot a wrong cause.

She first created Demeter, the goddess of earth. She had the power to change Earth's surface, create natural disasters and was the main source of Gynakes power.

Nyk was so called the protector of the night. She was made out of black magic and brought fear to people.

Selene got her power from the moon. She had the extraordinary power to manipulate people's actions and minds. She was also the maker of the witches and creatures of the night.

Roxanne was the opposite of Nyk. She was strongest at dawn and weakest during the night. She could control the weather, manipulate animals and had amazing healing powers.

The last goddess created was Ourania. She had the power of reading minds, seeing the future and awarding humans with strength. She offered mankind comfort and consolation, she was their ray of sunshine as long as they didn't work against the nature.

Even though the goddesses had the power to bring despair and destruction to mankind, they were pure in heart. All they did was for greater good and Hera's protection.

As the world grew darker, with greedy men leading it, Gynakes had to start hiding their identities. One especially dark period of Gynakes history are Salem witch trials. In that period of time about 45% of all Gynakes and Andres died or abandoned the Old religion and turned into Xenes- people who are not familiar with Old religion- by gifting their powers and memories of the Gynakes back to the goddesses.

In that time the most powerful of Gynakes and Andres decided to create a country for all who practice old religion. The country is called Garden and is located somewhere in the Mediterean sea. Today only a small percentage of humanity has the gene of the Gynakes and Andres, and even they have to hide who they really are.