A realistic reason for gods to be incapable of meddling with mortal affairs?

So, gods. What are they. Gods are a race of various creatures that share a two important characteristics:

1. They're connected to The Source.
2. They can successfully produce offspring (though without god powers) with any animal (including humans and dragons) how that happens isn't clear, but it has something to do with retroviruses and pollens.

The Source controls the behavior of micro machines found throughout the world. Gods have a hefty grant from The Source, also, when a god's body is destroyed, The Source makes them a new one, except when it doesn't (see Kratos). Each god can screw around and experiment with their own "grant", for example:

• Enki: Summon a several-hundred-meter-range danmaku, it's as damaging as pure vaporized hydrochloric acid.
• Bahamut, Tiamat: They're dragons, plus they can do the fusion dance and become an even bigger and scarier dragon, not to Erek, though.
• Erek Shus: You can make an axe, he's also scary, but not to...
• Devil-of-All-Earth: Turn into a 15-meter naked Ken doll, punch people real hard and real fast, plus supreme regeneration. After mauling and eating Erek (yuck) he can now make giant scythes for himself.
• Zeus: Become Chancellor Palpatine and summon bass-boosted lightnings. like several hundred at once.
• Kratos: Permakill gods until you can't and die.
• Kronos: Limited foresight (only show predictable events, but shows all of them in a 50 km radius) plus a weapon that can increase the time it takes for gods to respawn/regenerate.
• Athena: Direct neural interface to the Encyclopedia Britannica and Fandom wikis.
• Artemis, Apollo: Aimbot

So, they're within the limits of physics and are basically one-man armies who watched too much magical-girl anime.

I want them to influence the story to a certain point, after which they can't anymore.

So, the entire god society decides to cease activity and the use of their powers for a reason that's tied to their very existence and remains immutable, regardless of the god's personality, whether they hate mortals or don't, they can't use their power.

This reason isn't an unknown force either, somehow, the described elements and science works together to create a reason that, after a certain point in time, makes practically impossible for gods to use their power. What could that reason be?

posted over 4 years ago

Mephistopheles‭

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