The atmosphere inside my castle home was average humidity and temperature. Well as far as I could tell it would be whatever I wanted it to be, and of course I wanted it to be as average as possible. It was called "room temperature" back where I came from and was about seventy degrees in fahrenheit. There were fireplaces of course inside the castle and the tiny house that I could light to heat the place up warmer if I really wanted to have the cozy feeling in winter.

This demiplane was one of the most fun things I'd had since coming to this world. I've gotten to decorate both the castle and house in whatever manner I wanted. Money was no object as everything was manifested with mana. It had been at least a week since I had first made this demiplane Goddess Domain and finally everything looked the way I wanted it.

There had been a couple parties here in which I invited people that were important to me. Basically it afforded me the chance to play house. Dinner parties. Having some guests over for an evening meal which I cooked for them and we all sat down and ate together. After which we played some party games like charades and the simplest card game I knew called Go Fish. The people of this world had quite the blast trying out these things and I feel it increased our friendship scores.

At the moment I was my normal size and in the middle of the castle at the garden. There were some specifically colored flowers I wanted to plant here and I was doing so now. With my ability to create items out of pure mana I could make the flowers and then using plant magic I could make them grow and bloom permanently.

"What kind of flower is that goddess?" Miya asked inside my head.

"It's called a petunia" I replied out loud. "See how they grow in bunches? I could make the flowers of each group their own color, but I like having several plants each with their own color."

"And what are the long ones called?"

"Tulips" I replied while finishing my planting.

After I was done with the petunias I stood up and sighed. As pretty as the garden was there was something very important missing. Right now I couldn't put my finger on it. Miya did it for me as I was pondering it.

She sighed. "It's so strange seeing all these plants without any insects around Jenna."

She was right of course. This was something I had noticed when I first created the place but had quickly forgotten about. The idea of having bugs around would necessitate a whole ecosystem and that seemed like more of a pain in the ass than I wanted, not to mention the implications on evolution.

"I suppose I could try creating insects for the garden. But the idea of creating life? Not something I want to mess with Miya. Not to mention they would be absolutely giant compared to humans and would endanger anyone that visited!"

Our conversation was interrupted by a particularly interesting incoming prayer. I had created I suppose a filter of sorts to bring prayers about life or death situations to my attention. This was one of those cases. It was a young boy around the age of seven who was praying to me and asking to be saved from the horrible darkness. He's hungry and scared.

"Hold that thought" I said.

Quickly I went down into the goddess zone and appeared next to Miya. The map in front of us was already shifting over to the location of the boy. It appeared to be a dungeon of some sort underneath a city. The city was actually the capital Norlov and it would make sense as the people there were most likely to become recent worshipers of mine. This boy would be one of those. Why was he locked in a dungeon though?

I turned and looked up at Miya.

"Alright lets go see what's going on here."

Going over and underground as my full size was out of the question so I jumped back up into my body and changed to my human size. Once that was done I opened a portal and warped over and into the dungeon. My castle was treated just like any other location when it came to the portals thankfully.

Once I had arrived in the dungeon my sight was quickly thrown into deep darkness. It was pitch as ink in here and my goddess eyes only allowed me to see in monochrome. The air was dank and smelled sour with an as yet unplaced odor and the stillness of the air could almost make you choke.

The place I ended up in seemed to be a large central room that was thirty by thirty, all made of solid stonework. Behind me was a staircase that went up and took a turn to the left while in front was just a blank wall. On each side however were a dozen simple cells with iron bars and doors. Initiating soul sight allowed me to see that several of these cells had human occupants. The prayer subject was in the second to last furthest cell from me on the left.

I wanted him to see me coming and the colorless view I was getting was starting to get annoying. My hair of course would dimly glow at all times and could be turned up or off whenever I felt like it. Back in my castle it had basically been turned completely off so now I turned it up to the light level of a lantern. My eyes were also glowing because of my concentration.

As I walked over to the cell where the boy was being held I noticed there were dead bodies in some of these cells. Some were in a more advanced state of decay than others but none were the classical skeletons chained to the wall or anything. They explained that weird funk smell though.

When I reached the correct cell I heard the frightened squeak of a young boy. To be honest seeing a little girl with brightly glowing hair and eyes appear in front of you out of nowhere would probably be pretty scary.

I looked into the cell and smiled warmly.

"Hey now. Don't be scared."

The boy did appear to be around the age of seven and had dark black hair and deep honey eyes. His skin was particularly pale and his cheeks were a bit sunken in. He was only wearing rags for clothing really and was curled up in the corner of the cell on the stone floor. When my light illuminated him he had lifted his hand to shield his eyes.

"W-Who are you?" he asked in a panic.

"I'm Goddess Jenna" I replied in a soothing voice. "You called for me remember?"

He looked down at the stone floor, his hand still up to shade his face.

"O-Oh..."

It didn't seem like he had expected me to actually come. My light was also clearly too bright for his eyes so I dimmed it considerably. Once it was less intense he lowered his hand and was able to look at me better. I wanted to get closer to him to help him and simply pulled the metal bars of the cell door apart with a creak and walked through.

He looked on in awe. "Woah!"

I just smiled again and walked over to him until I was standing over him.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"W-Wilfor" he stammered.

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He was clearly still scared of me and to help ease his fear I crouched down so my face was on the same level his was. This seemed to help as his fear decreased into a straight nervousness instead. He kept himself curled up against the moldy stone wall. One of his legs was in a iron shackle.

"So how did you end up in here Wilfor? And how long have you been here?"

He looked down at the floor with some amount of shame.

"I was caught stealing food. I don't have parents you see. Its hard to tell time down here... But I think its been a few days." He clutched his stomach. "At least that's what it feels like."

So some orphaned kid steals food and is tossed in the dungeon to rot huh? I suppose it checks out for how people were treated back then. But that means this kid hasn't had anything to eat for three days. The dead bodies made sense and it was hard to believe the starve in the dungeon trope was being proven true here but here it was.

My smile remained on my face but my eyes unfocused and flames ignited inside them. At the same time my left fist burst into flames as my anger spiked.

Wilfor was surprised by the sudden anger but could tell by the way my eyes weren't focused on him that it wasn't directed at him. It still scared him a bit though and he tried to scoot further back away from me without saying anything.

Miya's voice pierced through my rage. "This is awful goddess! You have to save him!"

Her voice snapped me out of it and after a few moments my rage lowered enough for me to remember where I was and what I was doing. The flames went out and my eyes snapped back onto the boy.

"Oh I will" I thought back.

I then spoke aloud. "Lets get you out of here shall we?"

With a few swift movements I had reached out and snapped the shackle holding Wilfor's leg and helped him stand up. Once we were both standing I noticed he was actually a bit shorter than me.

He looked down at his leg and then back into my face. It was clear he didn't understand why I was doing this. When he spoke there was disbelief in his voice.

"You're really saving me?"

"Of course I am" I said my smile now warm again. "Come on now."

After helping him to his feet I stepped back and let go of him. To my surprise he started collapsing over immediately and I was forced to take a quick step forward and catch him.

Miya spoke up. "If he hasn't eaten in a few days it makes sense he'd be so weak."

"Yeah yeah" I thought back. "I hate this happened."

While keeping Wilfor standing up I stepped closer and turned around so he could fall over onto my back and support himself. He didn't seem to want to do it and just tried to stand there awkardly.

I sighed. "You can lean on me. Once we get you out of here I'll give you something tasty ok?"

He nodded. "Yes ma'am."

Now having permission he leaned into me and rested on my back with his chin over my right shoulder. I didn't bother correcting his ma'am to goddess either. For this situation it could slide.

Once he was fully settled in a sort of piggyback ride I began walking back to the door of the cell. My anger was rising again so I just reached out with my left hand a smashed the bars away with a swing of my fist. The metal squealed as it was bent out of shape and there were metallic clinks as pieces fell to the floor. We then walked through the opening and into the main room.

As we walked the light from my hair illuminated our surroundings which included the interior of the other cells. I noticed he was looking around in curiosity and wanted to prevent that. Someone his young shouldn't be seeing decaying bodies and so I whispered to him to catch his attention.

"I want you to look at me and not look away alright? When I find whoever put you in here I'm going to be very angry with them."

Wilfor was obedient and kept his gaze on my face close to his. He actually blushed a little red which was also understandable. Being this close to a girl was probably a new experience for him, much less one that was older than him. The thankfulness and relief was clear on his face that he was being saved. It was also clear he wasn't fully understanding that I was a goddess and its likely he didn't even know what that was. For his sake I'd allow him to continue be in ignorance of my true nature.

We walked across the large dungeon room and came to the staircase. My passenger would need help climbing the stairs and I let out a small sigh as we began climbing the first steps. I'd always found stairs to be annoying. These were cold stone with small bits of mold growing on them.

In another surprising turn of events the warm light of fire appeared on the walls of the stairwell where it turned to the left. The sounds of footsteps could also be heard echoing off the stone. Someone was coming! An adult at that. The sounds of jingling metal indicated chain mail. A quick look with goddess vision confirmed this all.

"Who's down there?" his voice echoed.

My eyes alighted with flame again which caused Wilfor to gulp nervously. I continued climbing up the stairs without saying anything in response to the guard. We both reached the flat area at the corner at the same time and we finally met eye to eye.

The guard was a dirty looking man in his thirties dressed in simple cloth clothing and plain chain mail. He was carrying a torch in his left hand and had a sword on his left hip. When he saw me carrying the boy up the stairs he got angry and stomped down towards me with his right hand out to grab me.

"Hey you! What're you think you're do-"

He never finished his sentence because as soon as he was within my reach I flicked him to the side with my free hand. The torch fell to the floor casting the stairwell in shadows that quickly were chased away by the glow of my hair. His body slumped down the wall until he was sort of crumpled up in the corner. At that point with the wind knocked out of him all he could utter was a groan of pain.

The fire in my eyes burned brightly before going out again. As I walked past the man I didn't even look his direction and just continued climbing the stairs in focused fury.

"I'll be back to deal with you later. But you best pray I forget."

We continued climbing the stairs and after another left turn light could be at the top of the stairs. My passenger was no problem for me to carry but it was clear he was getting weaker the longer we walked. So for the last leg of the journey I completely lifted him up on my back and kept his feet from touching the ground with a couple vines that originate from my body itself.

Once we reached the top I found myself standing in a pretty generic looking guardhouse. It was a twelve by twelve room with stone floors and walls, the area lit by several wall sconces. There was simple furniture in the room in the form of a large table and several chairs. On the walls were also racks for various armors and weapons. There was a wooden door flanked by open windows on the far wall. It seemed this place was in a side street of some kind.

Sitting at the table was another man who was eating what appeared to be a lunch of soup and bread. This guard recognized me and jumped to his feet in alarm.

"The goddess! W-What are you doing here?"

I shot the man a dangerous glare and walked over to the table. Then I pulled out a chair and deposited Wilfor in it and helped him sit up though he leaned onto the table from exhaustion.

Once he was seated I jumped into the air and lifted myself to lean over the table. Then as I was sliding back down I swiped the bowl and bread, dragging it over to where I was.

"I'll be taking that."

Because that all happened in a matter of seconds the guard took a moment to process it. When he finally snapped out of his shock he cried out.

"Hey!"

Without apologizing or validating his indignation in any way I moved over next to Wilfor. I then lifted his head and began helping him eat the soup. Additionally I tore off pieces of the bread and dunked it in the soup to soften it and fed it to him. As I did this I finally addressed the guard.

"As for why I'm here its for this boy obviously. Who the hell locks up a little kid in a dungeon to die?" I glared at the man which made him shut his mouth. "Don't answer that. Who's dungeon is this anyway?"

The man cleared his throat to try to calm his nerves. He seemed to understand the situation at least and was being very cooperative in fear of rousing a goddess's temper.

"This is the k-kings dungeon of course g-goddess. All the major prisons in the capital are."

I rolled my eyes. "Figures. So he approves of the death penalty for children then?"

"W-Well the laws don't-" he paused. "Um great goddess Jenna the law doesn't differentiate based on age. Please understand I have no control over the laws!"

"But you can choose how you enforce them" I replied with a deep sigh.

At this point I was more disappointed than angry. It was clear that the laws would need to be adjusted to account for children so they could be treated better. In fact everyone needed to be treated better. "Throw you in the dungeon to rot" isn't a good system. Those adults still down there were there for a reason but they weren't my concern at the moment. I cant just release everything imprisoned right now, there had to be order to these changes. As much as it pains me.

To my relief Wilfor was able to keep the food and fluids down and was starting to feed himself now. He was eating ravenously of course and soon was through all of the food. I then created a small glob of peanut butter on the spoon and had him eat it.

"After this just relax and digest" I instructed. "If you eat any more you're gunna throw up and be back at square one."

Wilfor nodded and looked into my eyes. There was a great relief in them and the light had already returned.

I then turned to the guard.

"I'll be taking him with me. I'm going to see the king now. What I want you to do is go down and feed whoever's still alive down there. Understood?"

The guard stood to attention and looked up to avoid meeting my gaze.

"Yes goddess! Thank you for mercy goddess!"

With a nod of my head I helped Wilfor stand up and draped him over my shoulders again. It was time for me to go visit the king again. My visits to him seemed to be happening more and more frequently as of late.