The Divergence

Description

The moment at the end of the Calamity when the Prime Deities and Betrayer Gods alike sealed themselves behind the Divine Gate — a metaphysical barrier preventing gods from manifesting physically on the Material Plane. The Divergence is year zero of the Post-Divergence (P.D.) dating system used throughout Exandria.

The Divine Gate does not prevent divine power from reaching the Material Plane entirely — clerics, paladins, and divine magic still function — but it prevents the gods themselves from walking the world. This is why the Calamity could not repeat: gods can influence events but cannot directly participate in them.

Relationship to the Exodus: The gods chose to abandon the Divine Gate’s protection at the Exodus, either departing entirely or choosing mortality. Whether this was voluntary, forced by Predathos’s influence, or something else is the theological fault line underlying every faction in HotOG.