The Challenge

In many faiths, the gods, deliberately or not, visit a challenge on the humans.

One of the commonest challenges involves the afterlife. In many faiths, the better one lives one's life, the better the afterlife to which he progresses. The usual sorts of afterlives tend to fall into one of the following categories; in some faiths, a character might face the possibility of reaching more than one of these choices, depending on his actions in life.

Oblivion: No afterlife at all, this is when the human's spirit perishes and becomes nothingness.

Torture: An afterlife where torture, either permanent or temporary (until the spirit repents, recants, or otherwise improves) is the order of the day.

Boredom: An afterlife where there's nothing to do, nothing to see, nothing to entertain.

Rebirth: An afterlife which involves rebirth in the physical world and the living of a new mortal life.

Pleasure: An afterlife where the things man most loves in life are visited upon him in abundance.

Ascension: An afterlife where the best of the best are granted great powers, making them heralds and messengers of the gods . . . or even gods themselves.

In such faiths, humans usually have a good idea of what it takes to get into these specific afterlives. To get into the "good" ones may require strict adherence to a certain life-style, or may require that the human somehow impress the gods with his deeds or personality, or may merely require that the gods like the character . . .which is not something the character can necessarily bring about deliberately.

Other challenges are possible: Humankind as a whole might be challenged to achieve a certain level of civilization by a certain time, to achieve a certain level of artistic or philosophic ability, to defeat a certain spirit of evil, to evolve to a certain enlightened state, etc.

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