In a place beyond, between the between of a grey-green world, 5 gods sit around a table. One sat with the appearance of a large cat scales and fur in equal mix. One sat with the appearance of a normal human, except for his eyes, swirling with vast golden energy. One sat with bark skin and flowers in his hair. One sat more machine than man short stocky, gears and steam giving her life. Finally, one sat both there and not, ethereal and floating.

“How much longer do we have.” Asked the god of man.

“If things go well 10 years.” The ethereal god said.

The god of beasts roared indignantly, “HOW COULD IT GET THAT BAD?”

“If someone would stop killing anyone going into the woods, maybe we could muster a force?” The god of crafts tilted turned towards the nature god.

“What about your dwarves, hoarding all that weaponry, then giving them to the highest bidder. They’ve taken more lives than my woods.” The nature god yelled back.

The god of man interrupted, “Everyone please calm down. The void is encroaching on our world and it makes no difference whose fault it is.”

The two gods kept glaring at each other, a sense of impending violence building.

“Let's just focus on fixing it, then we can go back to killing each other.” The god of man pleaded.

The nature god turned towards the speaker, “How? There's an excess of mana, but not enough time to raise a champion. And that would just be a stop-gap.”

The rest of the table nodded in agreement, even the clockwork dwarf.

“We need a hero.” The human god said.

The entire table groaned., they had heard him pitch this before, but they were getting desperate. The beast god spoke, “You know how much of a coin toss that is. Besides it would drain us of most of our power to bless one.”

“I’m not thinking one. I was thinking of a group.”

The group looked on disbelieving before the clockwork dwarf commented, “First. where would we get a group? Second, where the fuck have you been storing all your power if you think you can bless that many?”

The god of man smiled. “Ah, there's the trick. We give each of them the same blessing, blessings of growth.”

They all leaned back silently thinking, realizing it could work, until nature pointed out the problem. “But that will take years, and we need it now.”

“As much as I hate to agree with him he's right, and how would we even get them, we'd have to transport them, none of us could remake that many bodies.” The god of crafts said, knowing the difficulty in such an endeavor.

“We do a hero summoning.”

The beast god narrowed his eyes, “The last time we did that, the people enslaved our hero before he could figure out he was even in another world.” The beast god snorted, adding “And when we tried a different hero, a warrior he killed half the court before they cut him down.”

“Ah! But this time, your people will do it.” The god of man said to the beast god.

“You know for a fact they have no idea how.” The lion beast said confused.

“Sorry I misspoke, the human living with your people will do it.”

The god thought about the single human living with the beast tribes, “He doesn't have that kind of power to open the portal to here.”

“He will for this.”

“Fine, but we need the hero's here yesterday.” The beast commented.

The whole table looked to reluctantly agree, they knew they had let everything escalate to a tipping point and the slightest breeze could tip their world over the edge.

The god of man let out a relieved sigh, “Oh I've already taken care of that.”

A loud air-horn sounded off as all 5 of the gods stood as the south wall fell and a semi-truck appeared, coming to a stop 30 ft from the table. The driverside door opened and a man jumped out. “Ok! I have your order.” The man held a clipboard as he walked toward the god of man. “Young, but not too young. Ready to fight, primed to accept all the craziness, and wanting to be heroes.” The man looked up from his clipboard. “Is that correct?”

“Who are you?” The clockwork dwarf asked.

“The delivery driver.”

“Bow, you are in the presence of gods.” The nature god sneered extending an aura of power towards the man.

“And you are in the presence of a truck driver.” The man casually shrugged off the aura.

“you...you…you”

“Can you confirm the order?”The man said impatiently.

The god of man held back a snicker seeing the nature god's reaction. "Yes, that's correct."

“And you have your entire pantheon behind this?” The man gestured towards the gods behind him.

“Yes. I just secured their agreement.”

“Cutting it close.”

“We know.” The god sighed.

“Well, come take a look in the back for your heroes.”

A man stands before a pantheon of gods, walking them around to the back of his truck, to show their order. The man opened his truck's double doors, revealing a platoon of freshly trained military men all sprawled along the back of the truck strapped down, so as not to move.

“They look about the right age. What is this uniform there wearing?” The Ethereal god asked.

“On earth, these are fighting men, I was able to catch them right before an IED took out the entire platoon.” The man commented.

“So they're already trained?” The beast god asked surprised.

“With earth weapons. You'll all need to do the explaining, about being in another world and all that.”

“That's fine. Anything else we should know.” The god of man asked.

The man scratched his head before looking at the nature god, remembering his outburst,

“These are Americans, bowing and scraping to a king, let alone a god is anathema to them. So try to cut them some slack with blasphemy.”

All 5 gods balked at that.

“Should we really do this?” The god of crafts asked.

“It's our last chance.” The god of man said sadly.

The man handed the clipboard over to the gods. “Please sign here.”

Each god took a moment to sign their consent, as soon as they did the military men teleported outside the truck.

----

In an empty room, of complete white a group of military me groggily wake up.

‘The last thing I remember was someone yelling bomb then a semi-truck ramming into our transport truck.’ One of the men think. The man looks around finding himself, and his entire platoon in a massive empty room. Everyone was in pristine condition and slowly starting to wake.

"So did we all die, or are we, prisoners." One of the men asked as he sat against the wall.

The others started to look around. “I feel like I was hit by a truck. So juries still out.”

“You are neither dead nor prisoners.” A majestic voice coming from everywhere spoke.

The men jumped at the sound but kept their composure as the highest-ranking member answered the voice. “Then where the hell are we?”

The god of men appeared at the front with the rest of the god standing quietly behind him. The god of man spoke, “We plucked you all out of your world the moment before death.”

“Why?”

“Our world needs heroes.” The god said calmly.

“And what you'll give us superpowers.” The commander asked sarcastically.

“Yes.”

“Wait really? Is this an isekai thing?” The commander asked surprised.

The god looked confused, “I'm not familiar with the term, but you will be sent to a mana rich world with the blessings of the gods. You will learn magic and grow strong, hopefully saving our world from the void.”

“And why can't you just wave it away? You are gods.” A short woman asked.

“The void can only be fought when order is imposed on it, and once is in our world rules govern them.”

“So no then.”

“You insulate.” Waves of power rolled of the god of nature, “You should be bowing before us and thanking us for giving you this honor.”

The eyes of all the men hardened at the provocation.

“We bow before no one.” The commander said with venom.

The god of man tried to placate the groups, “Let's all calm down. If you accept you will be sent down to our world with a blessing granting you all the ability to grow at an unrivaled pace. If you don't we can send you into the cycle of reincarnation.”

“So you'll kill us out f we don't obey?” The commander’s hand twitched towards his leg like he was looking for a weapon.

“You would have died, and we can't send you back.” The god reasoned.

“Is there a way back?”

“If you grow strong enough, and can fight back the void, then we should then have enough power to send you back. For now, much of our power is tied up in holding these monsters back.

The entire platoon. Looked to one another before they all stood.

“This will save people?”

“Millions”

The commander turned towards his men, “Men you will all need to make your choice. I can not decide for you on this. But I for one am in.” A resounding cheer of confirmation from the group was heard.

“I think we're in.”

“Great! You will get a translation skill and the growth skill. You will appear in the city of beasts, do not be alarmed by their appearance. They will guide and teach you all.”

The men and gods smiled, as the men were pulled through to another world.

——

Men and women are pulled to another plane, as a man and a woman standing by a truck are ignored by all. The only witness to a farce.

“They know there's no reincarnation cycle right?” The woman calmly asked.

“Who knows.” The man said, not liking how the gods played these people.

“Wait, is there?”

The man shrugged, “No one really knows.”

“But, you do...this.” The woman gestured to the place where the gods had stood.

“Yup, and I have no idea what lies beyond.”

“Then what is all this?”

The man turned towards the girl, “You’ve been riding with me, you should know.”

“I'm new.” She said shortly.

The man sighed, looking for the right words, “Think of it as a weigh station where souls gather.”

The girl thought for a time before hesitantly asking, “Like a purgatory?”

“For some.”

“What would happen if they had refused?”

“Probably still sent them to the world. They're desperate, and would hope they would still fight.” The man answered.

This surprised the woman, “Why the choice then?”

The man looked annoyed as he answered. “To give them a sense of control. I mean I would have been shocked if they said no though.”

“Why?”

“People like to think they're grander than they are. That they are the main heroes of their own story. And these men want to make a real difference, and now they can.”

“Has anyone ever made it back?”

“A few.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, but the return is usually dangled as a false hope and some Gods are cruel, erasing the memory before sending them back, and sometimes it’s worse when they don’t.” The man spat, “Let's go.” The two entered the truck and drove off to other worlds.