To the majority of mortals, the God of Reincarnation’s divine plane was simply a featureless white plain under against a white sky. To the eye of a mortal with a powerful soul, or that of a lesser deity, some detail would become visible: white grass on a white ground under a white sun through the occasional gaps in the white clouds. A mid ranking deity might even be able to see the white mountains in the distance. To the God of Reincarnation however, his world was place of rugged, untamed beauty.

The God himself was sunk to his hips in the ground, carefully tending to a patch of grass. It was slightly too perfect, too manicured, lacking the wildness of the rest of the plain. The divine plane slowly and continually brought the plain towards perfection, which was irritating to the God of Reincarnation. A few moments later and the grass was adjusted to his liking; he rose up out of the ground and looked around. There was still much work to do.

He glanced over at the Wheel of Reincarnation, spinning slowly in the air just off the ground, focusing his attention on a particular black and white dot. Earth hadn’t developed another fault yet, but he was highly expecting it to do so again soon. He spent almost all of his time just patching that world’s micro-Wheel of Reincarnation, it was why his divine plane was so untended. He’d even asked his Lord for assistance in restoring it to full functionality, and had been shocked when he’d replied that it was beyond his ability to repair, being the result of the action of an entity beyond his level of strength. It was almost inconceivable. His Lord was the master and absolute controller of the universe, whatever damaged Earth’s micro-Wheel would have to be on a similar level for him to be unable to reverse it, perhaps even beyond.

The God of Reincarnation’s imagination was far beyond any mortal’s comprehension, but contemplating such an entity wasn’t easy even for him.

At least it explained just why Earth’s micro-Wheel was constantly generating so many gods-damned thrice-accursed nightmarishly nonsensical glitches. At least he’d finally emptied out his collection of lost souls it’d spat out and refused to reintegrate. He’d reincarnated the last one, a young Japanese man, onto Reyath shortly before his gardening break.

Though judging by the propensity of the Earth Wheel to throw out souls, he’d probably have another dozen by next month.

The God of Reincarnation sighed, and phased into the ground beside a different patch of overly perfect grass. His divine plane seemed determined for the plain to be perfect in all aspects, and he just couldn’t manage to convince it to display the untamed beauty of wild lands, so he was stuck with un-perfecting it occasionally. He didn’t mind too much, it was his favourite pastime and he seized every spare moment not working on maintaining the smooth operation of the universe’s Wheel of Reincarnation to tend his ‘garden’.

It was calming. His constant fight to bring imperfection to his world distracted him from his constant fight to bring perfection to the Wheel of Reincarnation.

He stroked his long white beard with one hand as he worked.

“Why did the Lord want me to reincarnate all those lost souls anyway?” he wondered aloud to himself.

“Because I thought it would be fun,” the voice of a young man answered unexpectedly.

A portal had opened up in the air of the divine plane, the rhythmic sound of gently swashing waves emanating through into the God of Reincarnation’s rugged land of mountains and grass.

“My lord.” The God of Reincarnation rose out of the ground hurriedly and bowed deeply, deferentially.

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“I’ve told you before, just call me The Cycle, and please don’t bow, just be casual,” the voice requested with mild exasperation.

“I couldn’t possibly my Lord, I wouldn’t dare disrespect you in such a manner,” the subordinate deity declined firmly with earnest sincerity.

The Cycle sighed.

“What might I have done to deserve the honour of hearing your voice my Lord?” the God of Reincarnation inquired.

“I just wanted to thank you for putting up with my selfish request to reincarnate Earth’s lost souls. I know it’s not been easy for you dealing with that world. Is there anything you’d like me to do for you in return?”

“I couldn’t possibly ask anything of you my Lord! You brought me into existence, asking anything more would be too audacious!”

The Cycle sighed again. “Are you sure you have nothing you desire?”

The God of Reincarnation seemed to hesitate for a mere moment, an age of indecision for a deity of his level, then a small gemstone appeared in the air in front of him. The perfectly spherical gem was badly cracked; some fragments had even separated from its surface and were floating just above it.

“The soul of a galactic level God of Destruction? You would like me to repair it for you?”

“It is as you guessed my Lord. I am unable to repair it, and without the steadying guidance of its God of Destruction, destruction is running rampant across its home galaxy. If nothing is done, the imbalance in souls to vessels will cause the galaxy’s micro-Wheel of Reincarnation to shatter. I am… incapable of restoring the soul with only my power, but I also cannot combine my efforts with another high level god without them entering my divine plane, which might cause discrepancies in the Universe’s Wheel of Reincarnation,” the God of Reincarnation sheepishly explained.

“I see. It should be simple enough for me.” Even as the Cycle spoke, the floating fragments of the soul were starting to merge back into their places. “Is there anything else you would like for me to do while I’m doing this?”

“No, no! I couldn’t possibly take up any more of your time!”

There was a silence that lasted several long seconds before the Cycle spoke again. “Have you been keeping track of the reincarnated Earth souls? Any worlds or individuals of interest to you?”

“12.2% of the souls displayed a high affinity for reincarnating onto Reyath,” the God of Reincarnation replied instantly.

“That’s not quite what I meant, but whatever. I rather enjoy watching Reyath too, especially that Terrarian. It was quite an interesting choice of ability to request. Good job sealing those Titles by the way; wouldn’t want a Slayer of Worlds running around down there do we?” the Cycle asked rhetorically with a chuckle.

God of Reincarnation winced inside, carefully keeping his expression neutral in front of his Lord. He hadn’t been expecting the Administrator, the Title Granter, to recognise all of the Terrarian’s achievements in the game as valid for completing Title requirements. He’d been so rushed to shut down the Titles that he’d completely missed his mistake in scaling the Terrarian’s resources. And he hadn’t managed to completely eliminate the Titles before they’d connected to the outer regions of the Terrarian’s soul. After that, removing them would require his death, which, being at the hands of a high level deity would likely lead to either soul annihilation or a complete rejection from the world’s micro-Wheel of Reincarnation and a violation of the promise to reincarnate him to Reyath. Neither option was acceptable.

“Though if he earns it, I suppose it would be acceptable,” the Cycle continued, having paused for a brief instant to let his subordinate think. “I like seeing what the Terrarian will do next, though it’s quite boring at the moment, what with all the rain. Hmm… Oh, and an author from a neighbouring universe seems to agree that the Terrarian is interesting. Hopefully they can nudge the Terrarian towards more interesting choices.”

There was a small click and accompanying flash of light as the final crack in the God of Destruction’s soul sealed.

“Thank you my Lord,” the God of Reincarnation bowed.

“No problem at all! Hmm?” the Cycle hummed distractedly. “Well, it looks like you’ll be busy in a moment, so I’ll leave you to get on with that. Please don’t hesitate to talk to me whenever you feel like it. I enjoy it when my Aspects talk to me.” The portal hanging in the air of the God of Reincarnation’s divine plane began to shrink.

“I couldn’t possibly take up any of my lord’s precious time!” the God of Reincarnation objected.

The final sound as the portal closed was the Cycle’s sigh, which was mirrored a moment later by the God of Reincarnation as an overly problematic point on the Wheel of Reincarnation turned red once again.

“What’s wrong with Earth this time?”