For the next month or so, all was calm. The demon race made no major moves, as if they had forgotten about the world of Olympus.
The gods under Russell's management made no major moves either, though their little schemes never stopped. Regarding faith, quite a few gods slipped down to the human world one after another, revealing their divine presence before mortals and fiercely boosting their own visibility.
Russell watched it all and called out several of them by name, applying a little pressure to keep the trend from growing into something bigger.
He did not directly stop or punish them because he wanted to know how the demon race would respond if the gods resumed competing for faith.
The result left Russell deeply embarrassed. Humanity had been disappointed in the gods for far too long and had long since run out of patience. The gods would reveal themselves and harvest believers one moment, only for those believers to spit on the ground and scatter cleanly the next.
The demon race had not even made a move, yet the gods had already collapsed on their own.
As the King of Gods, Russell felt utterly humiliated. Mud could not be plastered onto a wall; this was the worst batch of underlings he had ever led.
Of course, there were still a few gods with excellent reputations among them. They were few enough to count on one hand, but they did exist.
For example, Hestia, Demeter, Athena, Prometheus, and Hephaestus.
The first two were the goddess of hearth and home, and the goddess of agriculture and harvest. The latter three spread knowledge and crafts, affecting every aspect of human life. They had always had many supporters and generally stayed out of trouble, making them the conscience of the gods.
But all