The Hundred-Handed Ones, born of the oldest hatred from the dawn of the world.
This was the consensus of all Coriel's gods.
Though almost none of them had ever directly clashed with these ancient godspawn, who had suddenly emerged during the pantheon war and vanished alongside an alien pantheon, they had watched from afar, just as they did today.
They had witnessed the terrifying sight of them devouring stars together, tearing apart Divine Kingdoms, and crushing those unfamiliar gods into stardust like helpless infants.
Thus, when this "Hundred-Handed Abomination" broke free from its seal in the Evermoors, nearly every god reacted just as the Goddess of Magic had instinctively done, seized by an inexplicable palpitation from the depths of their hearts.
For dreadful creatures like the Hundred-Handed Ones had never existed alone. Though mad and brutal, they were like soldiers on a battlefield—once their assault was hindered, they would instinctively summon their kind to join the fight.
If she had still harbored the slightest urge to risk the enmity of the Dead Three, set aside the arduous task of weaving the Weave, and save the last sparks of civilization in the Northlands, then the appearance of the "Hundred-Handed Abomination" had made the "naturally weak-willed" her shrink back on instinct.
Strip away the mighty mantle of the Goddess of Magic, and she was still no more than that ordinary farm girl who, when Netheril collapsed, had accepted that heavy duty and legacy from the first Goddess of Magic.
And afterward, she had paid a price beyond ordinary imagination for that weakness of hers.
Having likewise inherited part of the first goddess's memories, she knew even more about these beings "born of ancient hatred."
And the more she knew, the more she understood just how ignorant and insane the Dead Three had