The boggy glade was deceptively quiet after the thrashing of the swamp monster had died down. The lush and overgrown underbrush surrounding us had turned into steaming mud. No insects chirping, no screeching or panicked croaking and hissing, no desperate last-minute rescue attempts. It almost seemed like the whole forest was holding its breath.
The hostile elemental had shrunk by quite a bit during our fight, having thrown most of its mass at our defences while getting clobbered, broiled and singed by Vigil. Now it resembled a tangled mess of mud and vines small enough for me to carry on my back if I’d wanted to.
It slowly pulled itself together, forming a larger-than-life replica of a tiny lizard, took position between its smouldering opponent and the island in the centre of the lake, and glared up at the volcano spirit. It didn’t try to flee but also wouldn’t let us pass. It seemed prepared to receive a final blow. Beaten, but defiant in the face of its demise.
Well, probably. I had no idea if elementals actually could die.
The kids and I kept up our defensive perimeter in any case.
Vigil slowly cooled down. He didn’t approach the vine lizard any further but solidified and raised the ground beneath him to get his body out of the muddy water. Eventually, the lake around the volcano scalamander stopped steaming.
Pyra grumbled next to me. ‘[Why doesn’t he finish it?]’
I shot her a look. I didn’t need to answer that. Vigil simply kept to the initial plan.
The Swamp appeared to be confused as well, its stare of defiance gradually turning into one of incomprehension. At least that was my interpretation. Elementals didn’t exactly possess the most expressive faces. Vigil’s was a bit easier to read since he became a full Spirit, but I had a lot of practice over the years. Perhaps I just got better at reading him specifically.
Vigil still refused to approach. Instead, he began to form a blur of earthen symbols together with moving models as we had used all that time ago when we first met. I didn’t catch most of it, but I noticed Junior following attentively.
What followed was a painstakingly slow conversation between Vigil and Swamp. Or, the establishing of a code to talk in, I supposed. Interestingly enough, the plant elemental also knew a sparse few symbols of my language. [Sweetie], again, was among them.
It stopped surprising me after my encounters with all those gossipy water elementals. It still annoyed me to no end. It was nice to get credit for being a genius creator of language, but why couldn’t they put a little bit more effort into learning said language instead of running their mouths off about me?
I decided that I didn’t have the patience right now to wait for Vigil to establish a proper communication protocol. Especially not as I watched the other inhabitants of this glade slowly slinking away one by one. This wouldn’t do at all.
So I took my children with me and made my way to the centre of the lake. The Swamp didn’t like that at all and attempted to intercept us. Vigil was having none of that, of course. He wrestled the stubborn elemental down again. Afterwards, Junior ended up staying behind as support while we swam onwards.
To reach the actual island through all those intertwined roots, we had to resort to a bit of clear-cutting again. There weren’t any openings remotely large enough for us to pass through. One would almost think someone had tried to build a fortress and keep creatures our size out. But why ever would they have done something like that? Considering how Trigger had described this nest from when it had stumbled into it, there must have been loads of construction going on since then. Either they had dug out a whole lake or they had moved here from wherever they had lived before.
Hacking our way inwards naturally encouraged most of the tiny lizards to make a run for it. So I sent everyone but Pyra, Ash and Iris out in pairs to set up a guarded perimeter around the little grove. I didn’t quite trust Pyra to not attack someone if left unsupervised after her earlier demeanour and I wanted Iris close to me just in case one of the other nature proto-spirits stayed behind. She was the best with magic between my children and - without help - I had neither fire nor ice at my disposal.
The nesting site in the middle of the island appeared to be… ‘Well used’ would have been an understatement. Broken white, semisoft shards of eggshells were everywhere on the loosely packed earth and I was pretty sure I spotted at least a handful of buried clutches where the ground was suspiciously churned.
I noticed a few tiny lizards rustling around in the underbrush and roots, hiding and watching us. Only one brave specimen had stayed out in the open and positioned itself between the intruders and the nearest spot where I suspected a nest. It looked painfully bloated, incredibly haggard, and horribly exhausted.
‘[This one is aggressive, right? Can I eat it?]’, Pyra threw in from the side.
I stared in her direction. Ash ducked out of my line of sight. Pyra simply returned my look as if she expected a genuine answer.
‘[No!]’, I replied curtly.
‘[What about all those eggshells?]’ Pyra followed up. ‘[Can I try to roast a co-]’
Iris smacked her sister over the back of the neck frill with the tip of her tail.
I gave her a nod as she took over in talking Pyra down and keeping her in check. Then, while the two of them argued silently behind me, I turned back around and continued to study the little lizard.
It looked absolutely petrified, staring up at me with eyes that I was sure weren’t supposed to be that large on this tiny body. I flicked my tongue, taking a better taste of the air around it. Female, fertile, terrified. That made her flinch, but she still stayed put.
I tried to imagine how I would feel in her position. Confronted with a giant whose forearm was longer than my whole body - tail included - who just waltzed in with a pack of other giants, beat up my guardian and hacked its way into my home. I probably would just run for it, so why didn’t she? She obviously had to keep herself from doing just that.
I slowly lowered my head to the ground so that we were on eye level. No sudden movements.
She relaxed barely noticeably, narrowing her eyes, stealing glances at the symbols Iris and Pyra used behind me to argue with each other, but flinched once more when I flicked my tongue again.
Fascinating.
I formed a couple of Symbols in front of her. My name and some nonsense that looked a bit similar but didn’t have any meaning right next to it.
Her eyes instantly locked onto my name. She was shaking now.
What have I ever done to deserve such a reaction? She was clearly intelligent. And considering her appearance and where I found her, I was convinced that I was looking at Fertility’s champion here.
She was supposed to be my enemy, but all I could see was a terrified soul lost in a world with monsters much bigger than her. Pumping out clutch after clutch to satisfy the only thing in existence that could truly communicate with her. Of course, that was all conjecture. I had no idea how the relationship between Fertility and her champion was, but I could empathise. I had been alone in the beginning too.
I slowly approached a bit further, moving my hand towards her.
She noticed it, glanced at my face, my hand, my face again. Then closed her eyes as if she had resigned to accept her fate. Only to open them widely the next moment, when I petted her.
I chuckle-huffed.
The tiny lizard simply gazed at me in utter befuddlement.
‘[Mom. Curiosity just sent me another Quest.]’, Iris interrupted my bonding moment. ‘[She asks when we ‘stop playing around with our food and finish them off.’]’
She couldn’t be serious. I glared towards the sky peeking through the canopy above us as I responded. ‘[We won’t. They’re not food.]’
Iris seemed confused. ‘[But we’re way stronger than them. We don’t have to compromise, right? Vigil completely owned that murdering Swamp monster.]’, she wrote indignantly. ‘[They killed my siblings! And they still are hurting us with that stupid curse!]’
Fertility’s champion hesitatingly looked back and forth between my daughter and me, while I continued to protectively pet her.
‘[Then we just have to teach them not to fear us.]’, I wrote calmly.
‘[But...]’ She shook her head, agitated.
‘[We also could just roast them and be done with it.]’, Pyra interjected. ‘[Finishing up what Trigger start-]’
‘[And where did that get us?!]’ I snapped at her. ‘[This whole stupid vendetta. Sure, scour the whole forest for every tiny lizard and hope you’ll find all of them!] [Oh! And don’t forget to get rid of all those plant elementals for good too while you’re at it. If that’s even possible! Otherwise, they could haunt us for generations!]’
Pyra shrunk backwards, retreating meekly. I must have looked pretty angry. Well, I was angry. At Trigger, at the Swamp, at Fertility, Memory and all the other stupid gods. Maybe not all of it was entirely justified, but at the moment, I didn’t particularly care.
‘[But it’s just her, isn’t it?]’ Iris pointed at the tiny lizard I was still petting. ‘[Fertility’s champion? If we get rid of her, the others shouldn’t be smart enough to keep this curse up by themselves.]’
I huffed at that. ‘[Is Pyra a champion? Or Ash?]’ I nudged my head in their direction. ‘[Or any of your other siblings?]’
Iris shook her head, contemplative.
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‘[And what would keep Fertility from just sending her Champion Soul right back down to us?]’, I continued. ‘[Somewhere we won’t expect them until they strike, raised on stupid propaganda and hate?]’
‘[But Curiosity says it’s for the best and] [it’s a Quest...]’ Iris replied tentatively.
‘[Maybe from her perspective. Did she ever tell you how your last life ended during one of her little Quests?]’ I hadn’t planned to go there, but now it was too late.
Iris only stared at me in open-eyed shock, frozen in her reply.
‘[I was there, you know. I didn’t want to tell you because you were a different person then, but blindly following every little Quest Curiosity gave you led you straight into the maw of a boulder toad. I couldn’t even hold you back. You were older, stronger and faster than me. I was only just starting to learn magic. You’d been the only friend I had. And because of some stupid Quest...]’ I paused. She was still too stunned to move. ‘[No more. Think about it for yourself. Give me a compelling reason why it would be better to kill this little one here and I’ll consider it, but don’t run blindly after those Quests! Please?]’
Of course, I also had other reasons. But I doubted that Iris would sympathise with the tiny lizard just because she was a champion as well. A human soul, stripped of its memories, to play after the tune of a god in their endless games.
‘[You knew me before?]’ Iris finally responded.
‘[Not you. I knew Curiosity’s champion. You are Iris, my lovely daughter. You might have a few of the same quirks, but you are not the same person. I doubt you’ll ever really be the same person twice.]’
‘[But you will be? With Memory?]’ Did she look hopeful here?
‘[I’m not sure.]’ I don’t think so. Not if this time was any indicator. ‘[But this isn’t exactly the best situation for discussing that particular topic. We can talk about this later.]’
She deflated a little but nodded slightly.
‘[Now tell me, why would it be better to kill this little one?]’, I asked.
Before I could get an answer, I heard a little ‘ding’.
[Your Patron wishes to grant you a Quest. Would you like to view it now?]
Oh no, Memory, you didn’t.
But she totally did, didn’t she? I affirmed and the new message appeared.
[Divine Quest: Just do it
Hi again, Sweetie! Miss me?
You did such a good job until now. Why don’t you quickly kill that little runt so that we can set Fertility back a bit, hmm? It’s not that complicated, right? I’m sure they taste delicious. So why not also hunt them all down while you’re at it? You always enjoyed their eggs. Why hesitate?
I mean, do you really want to adopt another pet? Aren’t your children already enough of a bother? You still have to finish establishing and codifying our little cult. Having a common enemy will surely help with that, you see? It’s fairly straightforward.
What exactly do you expect to achieve here anyway? Keep her locked up to prevent Fertility from using her somewhere else? You can’t seriously expect that little critter to learn to trust you enough to go against Fertility’s wishes, do you?
Pro-tip: That species is much less intelligent than your own.
I’ll be very disappointed in you if you fuck this up for me, should you insist on doing it your way. And don’t expect me to give you any new shiny toys in that case either!
Hunger and Curiosity bet on scalamanders too, you know? If the species goes extinct because my champion was too flimsy, they won’t let me live it down for aeons!
So just do it, please?
Love, Memory]
I knew it! It’s not like I couldn’t comprehend where she was coming from, but I wouldn’t budge on that. What did it matter if it didn’t work out in the end? That didn’t mean I shouldn’t even try!
So what if the tiny lizards were dumber than us? This female here had a formerly human intellect inside of it. Hell, I was a genius! I’d figure something out. I was sure the swamp scalamanders would be fine for at least a couple of years to let me attempt to find another solution, right?
And I had been done with blindly doing everything Memory wanted from me a long time ago.
While I was reading, Iris had come closer to me and little Liza here - Hmm… ‘Liza’. I think I like that name - and started to examine her carefully.
‘[You got a Quest too, right? You spaced out again as you read through it.]’, my daughter wrote as she slowly extended one of her claws to lightly drag along the green-brown tiny scales. ‘[The scales are harder than ours.]’, she assessed.
Liza tried to jerk away at the new touch but didn’t get very far between my slow strokes.
‘[Yes]’, I affirmed. ‘[They don’t need to stay moist either. But that shouldn’t be anything new to you. I’m pretty sure we ate some lizards together before.]’
If little Liza had any idea what we were talking about, I’m sure she wouldn’t start to relax again as she did now. I couldn’t imagine what she was thinking of this situation, though.
‘[Yeah, we did. But I never really stopped to think about it.] [They are too thin to be hard to bite through and the crunching was kind of interesting, I guess?]’, Iris mused before she shook her head. ‘[Anyhow, why are they suddenly not food anymore?]’ She looked away from the little lizard and into my eyes. ‘[Curiosity will be real mad if I don’t kill her. And if I interpreted your reaction to your own Quest right, so will Memory?]’
I only huffed at her. ‘[Is that ‘thinking for yourself’?]’ I looked away and towards Pyra who was chatting with Ash at the moment, making sure she didn’t start to make trouble.
Iris took a while to come up with an answer. ‘[No? But why is it so important to try and keep them alive?]’ She nodded at Liza. ‘[She’ll come back, right?] [Like me?] [She won’t be…] [the same.] [Fertility would have to start from scratch again. And we’d have time to finish the job.]’
‘[And why should we want to ‘finish the job’?] [If we help them as I helped you and your siblings, I’m sure we can come to a solution that is best for all. Heck, even Fertility]’
Iris looked at me uncomprehendingly.
‘[You might not care for anything past your current life, but I don’t want to fight with Fertility’s worshippers for all of eternity. She doesn’t have to see me as an enemy only because she competed with Memory over a stupid ‘first’-achievement.]’
Now Iris looked even more confused.
‘[You have no idea what I’m talking about.]’
She slowly shook her head.
‘[Why do you think Fertility cursed us in this way? We didn’t go after her followers. We didn’t...]’ I swallowed. I didn’t like that part but it had been for the best. ‘[We didn’t retaliate after all.]’
‘[I don’t know. Because she is evil?] [Curiosity doesn’t like her very much.]’, Iris answered.
‘[I don’t know about evil.]’ At least not any more than all the other gods up there using us as their entertainment. ‘[She was probably just pissed off at Memory.]’
‘[I don’t think I understand.]’
‘[They both are competing to get something at the moment. And it looks like Memory will be the first to achieve it. They both will still be able to get it in the end but I have no idea how valuable it is to be the one who gets it first. If there is an extra reward or just bragging rights. Maybe you could try asking your Patron if you’re curious. Mine never responds to me as yours does.]’ I wasn’t salty. Not a bit.
Iris seemed sceptical.
‘[It’s like getting angry at your sibling because they ate all the crayfish. Of course, there are more crayfish in the river but now you have to get up and go out again to get more.]’, I tried.
She huffed amused. ‘[I don’t like crayfish all that much. That’s more your thing, mom.]’
Oh. Yeah, I supposed she had me there
‘[But I understand, I think.]’ She contemplated for a few moments before she continued, taking over to stroke poor haggard Liza. ‘[So Fertility isn’t evil. But why does that change anything? She did evil stuff to us. And this little bugger here helped her.]’
I sighed. ‘[Do you want my help with your Quest about the air affinity?]’
Iris stopped the stroking motions and stared up at me, writing tentatively. ‘[Yes? You promised.]’
‘[Then trust me on this. I won’t help you if you cross me here.]’ Why did I feel as if I sounded like Memory now?
‘[But! You promised!]’ Iris jumped up from her crouch next to me, outraged.
‘[And I still intend to help you. But this is something I won’t budge on. What would you get out of this newest Quest of yours anyway?]’, I retorted calmly.
She didn’t answer, reading through her interface again instead.
‘[Well?]’, I asked when she focused on me again.
‘[She didn’t say anything specific.]’, Iris pouted. ‘[But she’s always been good to me!]’
‘[And I haven’t?]’ I was slowly getting pissed off now.
‘[I didn’t mean to say that, mom! I’m sorry. It’s just.]’ She paused.
I waited.
‘[I always did what Curiosity asked me to. And it always turned out good for me. But now you told me about ‘before’ and]’ She nuzzled her face against mine. ‘[I don’t know what to do anymore, mom!]’
I hugged her close, awkward as the movement was. ‘[Then trust me.]’
She snuggled into me for quite a while before finally responding. ‘[Okay]’
When we left the mangrove island, my children who had kept watch outside showed obvious signs of relief. They still shot agitated glances towards the tree line now and again.
‘[What’s wrong?]’, I asked Verdan who had approached to meet us first.
‘[The forest elementals were watching us. Nothing dangerous. But…]’, he hesitated.
‘[It was totally creepy how they blended in and out of the vegetation.]’ Garnet finished his sentence when she reached us moments later. ‘[How was it in there?]’ She nodded towards the island.
Instead of answering, I produced little Liza from behind my neck shield. She was resting on a thin sheet of tightly packed dirt, having fallen into a deep sleep after the fear for her life and the shock over not getting killed after all probably left her entirely exhausted.
In the meantime, Vigil and Junior made it over with Swamp in tow. The vine lizard went rigid and stopped in its tracks when it saw the still breathing champion Fertility’s floating in front of me.
Once everyone arrived, I explained the situation and my decision to keep her. It was met with mixed reactions. Most of the boys seemed more or less indifferent. Well, they seemed. Spruce grumbled and turned away. Cinder eyed the Swamp with hostile glances. Ruby complained that we should take at least a little revenge. Garnet agreed quietly. Pyra still wanted to take ‘a little taste’, but kept quiet after Vigil declared his support for my choice.
Junior was strangely ecstatic about the whole situation. I’d expected him to be upset since I defied Memory’s wishes but that wasn’t the case at all. When I asked him about it, he just spouted some cryptic nonsense. ‘[Keeping the fires burning for a long time requires lots of plants and ash is a good fertiliser .]’ I wasn’t sure if he himself knew entirely what he meant by this.
It wasn’t a big surprise that Swamp followed us on our journey home. It never took its eyes from Liza for long. I trusted Vigil to keep it in check. He seemed to enjoy its company and teaching it more of my language, maybe a little bit too much. But I couldn’t deny that they had quite a bit in common, having both bonded with intelligent animals independently of each other and an invested interest in their continued well-being.
All throughout our voyage, I kept nursing Liza back to health. Well, at least some semblance of it. She was rather distressed when she woke up in an unfamiliar environment with nobody around she knew. She calmed down somewhat after I pointed out Swamp and the not-so-sneaky plant elementals and tiny lizards that followed our little trek from a distance.
Yeah, I purposefully slowed our return trip down to a crawl so that whoever wanted to keep up with us could do so. Of course, my more impatient children went ahead on their own as soon as they noticed. I didn’t mind. They were adults and I had a new project to keep me occupied, regardless.
So far I found out that she preferred maggots and earthworms over the more crunchy shelled kind of bugs. She also took remarkably well to the concept of writing. Sadly, the little lizard had no magic to speak off and her memory was a bit lacking. But I was confident that I’d succeed in time.
I’d show those fickle gods. The most effective solution wasn’t always the best. Well, I was sure they knew that - being all ‘infinite and eternal’ and stuff - but simply didn’t care much about all the casualties their preferred strategy would cause. It was just one big game for them, after all.
Well, not this time. We’d play this my way for now. They could return to their usual mess when I took my time out in Memory’s soul jar for all I cared.
I’d just make one big religion for all four of them.
And if they couldn’t live with that, they could smite me!