So, now I’m sitting in a waiting room. Alone. Of course, I’m alone on this difficulty, so I hadn’t exactly expected any different. But it still feels a bit weird. Must be the decor.

I’m not sure why, but for some reason, I can tell that I’m not about to meet with Pain.

The waiting room I’m sitting in contains a couple of wooden chairs, an exceedingly simple-looking sofa of the same material, and a few fancy rugs—the hand-made kind—hung on the wall. These things aren’t too strange in and of themselves, but considering that they’re placed in a room that more-so calls for sterile plastic furniture and bland abstract paintings, it feels weird. It clashes in a way Pain wouldn’t let it. He’s more of a… simple kind of guy.

The most obvious clue, though, has to be the door itself. The waiting room is small, with only a single door connecting to it. A hand-carved wooden door that looks rustic beyond measure. Again, when contrasted by the plain white walls, it looks unreal. The whole place feels like a minimalist and a farmer got married, but they couldn’t agree on the decor, so she got to paint everything with her white mop, while keeping his furniture and doors normal.

And the rugs on the wall, of course. Very nice rugs, mind you. Woven out of… some kind of hair, it looks like? No idea what kind of creature might have supplied it.

I twiddle my thumbs and toes. So, now… I just… wait, I guess.

I glance over at the door. I wonder if they know I’m here. They should, right? Whoever’s in there, they have to be divine, somehow. I’m sure of it. In other words, they have to know I’m out here. Why, I’m sure they’re anxiously cleaning their office, making it nice and presentable for me! That’s it.

I click my claws against each other. Maybe I should tell them that I don’t mind any supposed mess. Heh, back home, my house… It was quite the mess! Especially my room. Always stuff lying everywhere. So, really… I don’t mind a mess. No need to clean anything. Maybe I should just give the door a knock, and tell them. If nothing else, if they don’t know I’m here, then…

Ah, another piece of hate-mail. No need to mind that—

{::w::}!

Hm? What’s that, Simon? You think this is…?

Oh, yeah, you haven’t—right, right. See, Simon, sometimes, people send mean things to me, because I was mean to them, directly or indirectly. I usually ignore it because it makes me feel bad, but since you should know about these things, I’ll open this one. Just for you!

Let’s see here, first into messages, and then…

how you doin im waiting in some dumb waiting

room waiting for the hard difficulty admin

to talk to me just wanted to check in

and see if youre doing ok? i dont think

i ever heard which god the hell admin is

so i got kinda curious what typa dude is he?

mean or? cuz the hard admin is kind of a

hardass no pun intended lol nah but hes

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the god of will which sounds cooler than he

really is i mean hes kind of cool i guess

but usually he just gets on my nerves telling

me what to do and what not to do and whatever

so i kind of ignore him is the hell admin the same?

again just wanted to check in if youre busy thats

cool too no need to reply straight away ill be hanging

out anyways yeah anyways have a good one

see you in purgatory! -gecko>

I read the message. I rub my chin. Square in the right side of my vision, Simon smiles at me, innocent as always. Well, well, well. You’re quite the sneak, huh?

Anyways… I put my fingers to the keyboard.

cool 2 c u 2 i wuz gettin pretty bored

cuz like an i dunno y bt they arent sending me

2 da normal hell admin guy? which is the God of Pain

btw he’s honestly a prtty chill guy. like cool n all

bt dont tell him i said so cuz he’s a bit wierd abt stuff

like that. anyways yeh how r u? //GG>

Aaaaaand send. Phew. Been a while since I wrote that much. And now… we wait.

A few minutes later, another message drops in. Since we’re both just waiting, bored out of our minds, we chat back and forth for a while. It’s nice! So nice, in fact, that I fail to notice the door at the far end of the room sliding open.

Hmm, alright, let me think here… How do you spell exceed? One or two c’s? I think it’s two. Two feels right. But it doesn’t look right. Which is…

clears His throat-equivalent.>

Huh? What in the—

I look up. The door is open. There’s a goblin standing in the doorway, looking at me with mild disappointment.

“Ah—I, uh,” I start, but he doesn’t let me finish. Instead, he waves for me to enter, and turns around, walking back into the room.

Shoot. Shoot. Heck. Damn it. Quickly adding ‘srygtgbrbbye’ to my message, I send it off before jumping to my feet and scrambling after him.

The inside of the room matches the door more than it does the waiting room, and by all accounts, I would consider it to be an office, which is in line with everything else. As I enter, I watch him take a seat on the opposite side of a well-made wooden desk. The walls are made of wood, and decorated with rugs, tapestries, and a few painted clay tablets. There’s a window behind him, though I can’t really tell what it’s overlooking. Some kind of forest, I think? Honestly, I’m more focused on the curtains, which are fully embroidered and tied up to the sides. All and all, the whole office feels very homely and rural, not at all like what I’d expect from a typical god. Then again, this god—because that is what he is—doesn’t seem to be the type to brood in cold white walls.

He gestures at the wooden chair facing his desk, and I take a seat. Across the desk sits the god of harvest. His expression is severe, and he’s dressed in simple clothes—woolen, brown trousers; woolen, white shirt. More impressively though, even if I look at him through Simon, he looks the same. He has a firmly static sense of self.

Glancing away from me, he grabs a clay tablet, one of many littering his desk—all in tidy piles. In the same move, he grabs a pair of round glasses from inside his shirt pocket, putting them on with little effort. With his vision secured, he looks over the tablet, as gravely as though my entire life depended on it.

And, strangely enough… I don’t feel nervous.

It’s been a while since I last had a grade talk with any teacher, and I can remember being far more anxious about them back then. I’d get all worked up days in advance, read through my grades a dozen times, think up a million excuses for why my grades were so poor… And then, of course, once I got there, I’d sit as stiff as a marble statue, only moving to defend myself and explain that since I wanted to be a pro gamer, I totally didn’t care about my grades, so all of this was irrelevant and we didn’t need to discuss it at all, not the least, nope.

…That was pretty dumb of me.

I lean back in my chair, watching Harvest coolly.

After a few seconds, he puts the tablet back down, removing his glasses as well. “You don’t seem too anxious to know your final grade.”

I shrug at him. “I don’t mind whatever I get, so I don’t really care.”

Although he quickly hides it again, I think I noticed just the shadow of a smile, wrinkling his eye. “Before we discuss your grade, would you like to know why you aren’t meeting with the God of Pain?”

I hum. “I am a bit curious,” I say. “Though, I have a feeling it might have to do with this.” Without explaining any further, I point one big finger at my right eyeball.

{::w::}/

Simon, being a good boy, waves in greeting.

And Harvest, boring old tub of lard he is, merely nods. “It is. I wouldn’t worry, though—you’ll meet with Him in a moment. Before that, your grade…” He glances back down at the clay tablet, not bothering to put his glasses back on. “Would you be surprised if I said you got an A?”

“No,” I say, arms crossed. “I got an automatic A in the first three trials, so it probably lifted up the tottery teamwork one.”

Now, the smile is even more obvious. “I wasn’t talking about your overall grade.”