then it becomes, it becomes, it becomes a problem, then--

[monzun]

Monzun watches over their people. They teach their Creature. That was all they knew and all they really wanted initially, when they were freshly-created, and perhaps it ever would have been if another god's cruelty hadn't cut in.

Their goal had never been to be the only god. It was that, and then it had been surviving to oppose Nemesis, and now he was gone, and it seemed they were the only regardless.

("Eh, screw 'em! What've other gods been but trouble for us, huh?")

("Well...It is a bit lonely. And Khazar's actions are the only reason we're around today, isn't that right?")

The power of the Creeds trickle back alongside the power of the people. And then torrents, and a flood. The Miracles they use grow stronger beyond even Wonders' assistance.

Generations of their people live and proliferate and die, and Monzun's strength doesn't waver, but increases even as the populations settle lower than the war efforts and post-war burst their levels to being.

("Yeah! We're badass! Even if it could use a lil more fireballin' to make all this peace more exciting, Boss.")

 Their Creature and people are safe. They revel in being only gentle without consequence but worshippers' occasional disrespect, and they find they care little about that--unless they harm others in their village, and then Creature gentle scolding or abrupt relocation across the land tends to work nearly as well as lightning would have.

Their intervention is needed less even as they notice more. Little beacons where their people were, somewhere well beyond the seas, still worshipping where it once couldn't reach. 

And something else. A shard of something.

Another...another god? Near their people? The numbers waver, some converting to the other, fewer converting to Monzun, as reasonable without them there to demonstrate their power. 

They need to look. 

("Could be a fresh threat we need to squash.")

("Or they may be a new god in need of a Guide?")

A fragment of them even hopes...

...

...Nemesis' brutality means their consciences say nothing while their Teleports are slowly practiced until they look something closer to a Vortex the old gods used.

It's not quite as large. Redder. But far more than a simple Teleport.

The day comes where they reach across the Lands and place it where they sense their lingering people and that god.

("Let's go!")

("It's so exciting! But we don't need to rush quite yet--")

Monzun takes some time to look over their nearest people and discuss. Khazar brought them Disciples; they could bring some possibly willing to convert to another, although they seem confused by the conversation. Do any of theirs know Miracles? Oh? Yes? One of Sable's decedents picked up the Wood Miracle, they hadn't realized that was possible--

A part of them is distant, distant, distant.

Monzun reaches for their Creature and finds they stare down into the Vortex.

Ah. 

It seems their impatience was noticed and acted upon.





In another part of Eden, a Vortex opened on the side of a mountain that Monzun's old Temple still stands on. The air splits with a shocked bellow as a massive Leopard Creature steps onto nothing and tumbles down into the water.

Ouch.

Only a little ouch. It wasn't that far, but Sweetheart wasn't expecting it. She stands and shakes the water off a little--oooh, fish. Scoops up a handful of fresh fish to eat, and then turns around to claw up the mountain to peek over the edge.

There are a few people! Worshipping wrong, or maybe just frightened. That's okay. She's pretty different now. She doesn't mind when they take off running when they un-freeze.

...Most of the trees she grew are missing. She doesn't like that, she worked hard on those.

She climbs up all the way--oh, the Temple's smaller, or she's so big as to match?--and immediately gets to Miracle Watering the withered ones in the worship sites left.

Comments

[lethys]

Annoyingly, Lethys' response does not clear that up much.

"You may continue speaking for yourself," he states coldly.

They may needle all they like. Lightning is effective, and gets results fast. His decisions on where and how to use it are...

He has his reasons.

"I rebuild what I destroy, when I can. I am nothing without belief - the same as you. My worshippers will respect me or fear me. Either way they feel my presence. So long as I escape the Void, it is all the same. Do you feel otherwise?"

[monzun]

Hmm.

"It appears I do," Monzun says thoughtfully.

It scratches at them, but far more mildly than having him meteor across their territory and fling anxious accusations. Assuming he does not bluff, and truly uses Lightning carelessly.

They never enjoyed destruction-- (Ahahahaha keep tellin' yourself that boss!) --overmuch destruction, but their priority was protecting what they had left, their people, their home, not...them. Monzun had not even genuinely realized there was a risk to them until Khazar was gone.

"...Lethys, to clarify something. When you say 'the Void', do you mean where...where...where I..."

How do they even begin to make words for the space where they came from?

"...before the first prayer?" they finish roughly.

[lethys]

Sharply:

"What else?"

He continues in an adamant tone, like they ought to know...

"The Void. Beyond the Veil, the long, dark sleep of the gods - you may call it whatever thing you please!"

...But maybe they don't.

He relents a little. And paints, quickly - in glimmering reams of blue, directly against the cliff face: little figures, people, arms raised.

"Before the first prayer --"

A light above them, like the sun.

Then a vertical line, to separate all this from whatever sits beyond it. Another light. Dimmer. The ripple of Gesture lines slowly settles the spiky glow-outline into something much duller, until it's a meaningless circle.

"--and after the last."

The Gesture resembles something little more delicate than cave paintings, but he is in an exasperated hurry. Apparently he is capable of a touch finer detail than they're used to.

It fades the same as ever, a little while after he finishes.

He waits, looking for any sign of recognition or understanding from Monzun. Surely?

[monzun]

Monzun slides away from the stalking Sweetheart to more closely observe Lethys' motion, enraptured. They do not know the details, nor did they realize a god could make...this. A story, almost, in Gesture.

"I suspected that is what you meant. Khazar did not have time to teach me such things before he was killed--returned there," they answer quietly.

Their Hand hovers over the cliff, long after the blue light has vanished.

"Is it the same for Creatures? When they are gone?" Monzun asks, a strained note to their words.

[lethys]

"That is your concern?" he asks in disbelief.

But it is not so surprising that Monzun might wonder. Certainly gods can become quite attached to their Creatures. It is not as if Lethys himself has never wondered even once, when it comes to Laetes...

"I cannot answer that question. I have never lost a Creature, nor known any god who..." ...outlived theirs.

And a few things are now becoming clear that Lethys overlooked.

Khazar didn't have time to teach them, no, but surely someone must have told them, or let slip...

"From where did you hail," he begins carefully, "before you came to my-- the realm in which we battled?"

Further ahead of the drifting gods, Laetes is trotting faithfully in front, pleased to at last have a clear task. He is to mind Sweetheart, and to keep her from trouble, he has decided that he will do the directing of where and what to eat. As the plains open out in front of them, Laetes is heedless of the gigantic Leopard's attempts to be a stealthy hunter. He merely beelines for one of the herds the villagers keep.

(Hearing the pounding of paws, a nearby shepherd braces herself for a day of rounding up scattered horses.)

[monzun]

Sweetheart is letting Laetes go ahead, but she takes a moment to stand and speed up until she's nearly at his side again. "Laetes!" she hisses excitedly, in word and between fangs. She dips down again. "...Chase it!"

"It is. We have many differing priorities," Monzun says flatly.

An odd question he gives in response, and reluctant to answer, but--had they not asked him the same back on their very first meeting? It is their home. They are still lingering in his home. Or had to chase him from his, although they cannot regret it properly.

"A far warmer Land--you know of it," they interrupt themselves. "You opened a Vortex there from here, to find the Creed that yet rested in a different Creature's bones."

Their tone re-warms, albeit briefly. "That was a Creature we found when we were very young...The Guide, we called him. He taught us much! Of Miracles and what Creatures can do and other such secrets of godliness. Before, of course," they Gesture again, the lines of a five-pointed shape they dissipate before it could potentially become something, "Nemesis killed him."

[lethys]

Laetes makes a disgruntled noise and glances over his shoulder at her, lip curled. Chase? It is bad enough she made him spend effort on Healing for no apparent reason! What is the point in wasting his energy?

A smarter Wolf might suspect this was her plan all along, in some sinister game to catch him exhausted. Luckily, Laetes has not been taught to question things all that much. He just points and makes a toothy face at her. He is getting one. Don't rush him!

...He breaks into a slow trot. He is not running. He is wandering into a larder and taking things.

The horses begin to scatter, though with the stride of a Creature - even one smaller than Sweetheart - it doesn't look like they'll get far. This is not exactly how "real" wolves hunt...

"You are from there?" clarifies Lethys. "You travelled no other Lands before that one?"

He had begun to suspect. And wiping out Monzun - if he'd managed - would have been no different to any other young god he or Nemesis may have conquered.

And yet. If he had managed... Gods do not feel the cold as men do, but a chill touches Lethys nonetheless. His symbol jerks oddly to the side, like a flinch, as they begin to trace a star. It is enough to change his train of thought before it holds fast, which may be a good thing.

"I know of that Creature," he says. "I do not know if he was Nemesis' first. But he was old." A very slight pause. "Wise," he admits, too. "Much knowledge will have followed him to the grave."

[monzun]

"I was called from the skies--and the Void on those very shores," they confirm. "And I destroyed its multitude of inflicted curses when I made my way back after Nemesis' incursion. It is my Land." Monzun is not terribly possessive over the rest they now rule, though they would prefer those people and lands to be well; but that place is different. It is home.

Monzun had not ever considered that the Guide could have been a different Creature than Nemesis' first. But it is true, he may not have been. Others may have been killed. That one, tossed aside, forgotten until Monzun called attention back...

("No, no, that wasn't our fault. He volunteered his knowledge to us. It was his choice to do so.")

Cold comfort, unlike the air, heavier and warmer than it should be so high above the earth.

"That almighty fool! Exiling such an ancient and noble beast, let alone killing--!" It is raining, suddenly. The skies were clear before, were they not?

[lethys]

That settles it. Young - younger than Lethys thought, or really considered. He hadn't given Monzun much thought back then - another light had simply appeared on the battlefield, and Lethys had his instructions, clear as day and simple enough. They made his work more difficult, but young gods were weaker and less defined. He should have been able to crush them both, allied or not.

He underestimated them. A new god is flexible; they have not yet settled into themselves. Their decisions are made reactively, and they learn fast. It was this that made Monzun unpredictable.

They remain so, he realises, as the air thickens. He looks nervously for a reddening sky and tries to mollify them.

"Nemesis is gone," he reminds them, quickly, boldly. "You might return to your birthplace. You may do anything you please," Lethys continues, a little more frantic, "and none would dare to stop you. Eden will -" bow? They haven't seemed like they would prefer that. "...flourish beneath you," he deftly finishes, eyeing the greenery in the distance by their Temple.

[monzun]

Nemesis is gone. The reminder strikes true as a hunter's arrow a bird from the sky. The symbol shudders and sinks.

"He killed what he killed, but the fool cannot destroy what remains! Eden will flourish," Monzun declares, but--what was that he said first? Anything they please? They only now see the clouds that gather thickly above, around, and they make a sound like rain hitting burning rocks.

They wildly pull away from Lethys and back towards the mountains, and fortunately the storm summoned lazily follows along their path.

[lethys]

How blunt. A god smites, or eradicates. Monzun prefers kill. It feels too personal for his liking - but perhaps Nemesis would have appreciated that wording. Between the two, it may well have been so personal, in the end. Lethys dares not imagine.

He is relieved when Monzun retreats. Their boiling temper sets him on edge, even if they're far from his Temple and his people.

"Eden is your playground," he confirms, reluctantly following a lagging distance behind. Whether it is his attempts at mollifying them, or not, Monzun's roiling temper seems to be simmering a little lower. "You may fear no other god now. Not I. Not Nemesis. None will challenge you."

If they do bring their anger further into his territory, Lethys is not certain what he'll do about it. Discreetly (or not so much) he traces and readies a Spiritual Shield.

Across the plains, Laetes plucks a horse from the grass and examines it, then turns to stare expectantly at Sweetheart.

He thinks for a moment. Then he hurls the panicking horse through the air towards the Leopard. Catch.

bullshitting these directions a little bit who caaaares

[monzun]

Sweetheart is slightly distracted by a distant whiff of ozone. Her God likes Storms, sometimes, but usually sticks to smaller, less dangerous ones. What's going on over there...?

But she's pulled back quickly. Laetes is playing!

The earth quakes as the Leopard launches herself forward, horse captured in her jaws rather than her paws. A flawless catch, if she does say so herself.

Monzun doesn't care for what Lethys is saying. He is correct. But they never wanted this. They are displeased by this--this--this way he is acting. They are not making him fear them and what they can do less by losing control in upset!

The storm isn't going away.

Right.

It is a problem. They are causing it. They can solve it regardless.

The red symbol veers over the mountains, but what has already built up strikes the mountain range, clouds moving around rather than climbing over as well. Towards the north, they slow to what Monzun knows will be a harmless stop. Towards the southeast, they continue on towards the villages. It weakens already, with only strong winds and mild lightning with its rain, but nevertheless, such can cause damage.

It is the village with the straw roofs in worst range, and Lethys is already prepared. The rest of what was said can be addressed another time.

"Protect your Village," they say intensely, going so far as to draw an arrow. It is crooked and messy compared to even his quick work before, but it gets the job done for indicating which they mean.