Once he’d calmed the puffin folks down, the old elven priest led us up towards the winding mountainous path towards the temple. The architecture sort of reminded me of… maybe a mix between Greek or Roman stuff and a Hindu temple? At least the ones in India I had seen pictures of. The ones in Canada seemed to be generally less intricate. While this temple… this temple was decorated. Nearly every corner of the stone was ornately carved.

“I had never thought I would see your return, Vazehr,” the priest said. “Well… after hearing what the Lady of Surgess has done, I wondered if I would ever see any of the gods again, but seeing you seemed the least likely of all.”

“I wasn’t expecting to be brought back either,” I replied, in a bit of rather exceptional understatement.

“What has brought you and your companions to this humble island, though, your divinity?” the old priest asked.

“Um… well… I’ve been living through human reincarnations in another world for thousands of years, so… I don’t quite remember all the things I’d like to,” I said, as a step towards explaining why I didn’t know the ritual that needed doing.

Instead, however, the priest seemed to have other ideas. “Ah. Yes. We have a tome or two pertaining to your time. While your original journal was lost long ago, and the best copies likely destroyed with the Holy City, there are still extracts to be found.”

Stopping in my tracks, I blinked. I kept a journal? Well… Vazehr kept a journal? That was—I had to read it. Whatever there was. I needed to know if I would recognise myself on those pages. Hundreds of lifetimes seemed more than long enough to change completely as a person, but was it really that long for the spirit of a Goddess?

“That is very good to hear about,” Uké’el said, apparently realising I had grown distracted, “but we are also interested in the ceremony to become divine champions.”

“Oh!” the priest replied, nodding a few times. “I always have liked doing weddings.”

“So it is like a marriage?” Aara asked.

“On your side it is identical to a marriage,” he explained. “Rather less of a commitment for the deity involved, but that comes with the power differential.”

That made me squirm. A feeling I was glad to still have, and hoped never to lose. Yet, also, one I hoped I wouldn’t have to have, if I could just get people to treat me as an equal who happened to have extra powers, rather than some superior super being.

Entering the temple, however, distracted me from any thoughts. The interior was just as decorated as the exterior. Only now there were also glowing crystals floating about, also carved into the forms of mythical beings. The gods, I realised, when I saw one that looked just like Loj. The big ol’ jerk. 

The priest led us over to a library that smelled of old paper and… other things. Maybe old parchment? Or papyrus? There were several shelves full of large and intricately decorated books to be found, as well as other shelves holding rolled up scrolls. Overall it felt rather small as libraries went, but I supposed the books here were rare and valuable. Quality over quantity.

The priest wandered about, before pulling out two books from rather different ends of the library.

“These are the best works to cover your time with us,” he said. “Though, all of you, do feel free to peruse the library. Just be careful. If you do too much damage the repair charms may be overwhelmed.”

Uké’el and Ne’avo both seemed to light up with joy at the offer, though the latter quickly switched to an attempted indifference. The former, however, had already hurried off to read the spines of various tomes.

“Um, thank you,” Aara said, “but what about the ceremony?”

“Ah. That must wait until the new moon,” the old elf said. “All the modern gods are tied to the cycles of the moon, after all.”

“How long of a wait is that?” I asked, having not paid the most attention to the moon and, also, not learned how long the lunar cycles lasted here.

“Eight days,” the priest replied. “Now, do excuse me, I must make the guest chambers ready for your divinity and the champions.”

He hurried off towards another part of the temple, leaving us alone in the small library. By the time I turned around, ready to see what everyone thought we should do, it turned out Uké’el had already loaded her arms up with books and was ready to go sit down and read. 

Aara, meanwhile, excused herself to go out and try to find a tree. I wished her luck with that. Which then left Ne’avo and Sukura. 

“Well, what do you say we go get some fresh air and get back to bladework, eh, Sukura?” Ne’avo said, int a strange voice. “Before the smell of all these books turns us into nerds or something.”

Sukura stared at her, clearly also thinking she was being weird, but then shrugged. “Alright. You need the practice.”

With them leaving (as Ne’avo made strangely fake laughing noises), I sat down to go read one of the books the priest had set aside for me. Only to slowly realise that the most clear bits felt like reading Shakespeare, and a lot of the rest felt like a totally foreign language. Carefully turning the pages, trying to see if it got any better, I slowly realised the writings were centuries, if not millenia, old. It was no wonder there’d been enough linguistic drift to make them difficult to understand. Even with whatever magic was letting me understand the modern common tongue of this world.

Thankfully, Uké’el noticed my look of defeat, and brought her chair around beside me. Close enough her shoulder was brushing against my arm. She then began to read, stopping to either clarify the less divergent parts or translate the portions that had become another language through the flow of time.

The picture painted was not so wholly divergent from what the druid elder had told me. The champions who became the modern gods had been chosen by way of martial prowess more than noble spirits, Malu the Earth Goddess needing warriors at that time. It became clear that that had been a mistake. Being granted divine power had corrupted their already less than pure natures. They were innately less powerful than the Discordant Gods, and so, at least, had needed to play reasonably nicely with living beings. There was power in being worshipped, which helped to level the playing field.

But, once the forces of Discord had been broken and chased back to the edge of existence, the new deities had proven only mildly better. In place of chattel slavery for all came feudalism, Moon Elves and certain prominent heroic fighters elevated to the position of divinely ordained nobility while others were left with serfdom. An improvement, but far from what I considered acceptable.

In my current life or in my previous life as a newly minted goddess. I was glad to hear that I had fought for a return to the freedoms of the time before the war. The egalitarian society the Elves had started with. I had also, apparently, fought against the patriarchal and heteronormative standards the others had pushed. They had argued a nearly emptied world needed children. That population growth was key to rebuilding and defending Haquaria. And so alternatives were to be ‘discouraged’. 

Even with Uké’el translating, I could pick up that what the other deities had really been after was more worshippers. They’d felt the power of being prayed to, and wanted to increase the strength it gave them.

“I’m going to need to stay,” I muttered, while she paused from reading.

“Hm?”

“I had still wanted to go home… I didn’t want to leave all of you, obviously, but I thought I could take you all with me. We probably couldn’t live in Oakville, with GTA housing prices, but—right, that’s getting distracted,” I said, waving my hand quickly to dismiss the idea. “But, my family are back in Canada. And… there’s lots of good things about living in a modern society with electricity and pizza delivery options and all the rest. But… this world needs justice. And I’m supposed to be the one in charge of making that happen. So, therefore, I need to stay.”

Uké’el smiled softly, a sight always nice to see on her normally tired face. “I am glad to hear it. Though I am curious was pizza delivery is, to be such a leading reason to want to return home.”

“I—I should ask Sukura if she knows what pizza is. Chem had seemed vaguely Italian-like, and… hmm, I don’t know if tomatoes are easy to find here,” I said, growing lost in thought. “We’ve got a week, though. I could probably make a pizza in that time… if there’s tomatoes.”

---

Before pizza came further research and dinner that night. A very seafood heavy meal, and quite well cooked. It seemed the old priest had taken up cooking as a hobby with little else to do on the island. His only other tasks were to do his prayers and rehearse the more secretive ceremonies he knew. It seemed the temple was meant to serve exactly the purpose we were using it for: a secret repository to protect knowledge the temples couldn’t afford to lose.

After dinner, I tried to ask Aara about attempting to contact my mother again, but she shook her head. The area around temples was apparently not suited to anything other than prayer and religious ceremonies. The divine influence of worship tended to scare other spirits away. There were still some, but they were too small and weak to help us.

Nothing much else to do, I headed over to see the rooms prepared for us. It was two small rooms, carved out of the same dark volcanic stone as the rest of the temple. They were quite simple, reminding me of the dwarven tunnels under Guuji. Though they had higher ceilings and actual windows, looking out at the sea. There was no gclass in the windows, but that was pretty typical of this world. Instead, their small size and various pillars prevented any risk of someone falling out. 

I called dibs on the one hammock, since I needed it for my wings.

---

When I remembered to ask, it turned out Sukura was indeed aware of something similar to ‘pizza’, that Chem used to cook for her, and lit up at the idea of trying to make some. 

Tragically, however, it turned out there weren’t any tomatoes on the island. There was a sauce made from red peppers and oil that seemed a good enough substitute, though. I wasn’t sure about the pizza dough, but the puffin folks had something sitting between naan and pitas that proved workable. Then it was just a matter of getting cheese (from some adorably tiny goats the puffin folks seemed to consider mighty beasts) and then assorted toppings. All the ingredients together, we then borrowed the oven of the town baker (which was barely big enough for our needs) and got Uké’el to use fire magic to heat it enough for a pizza.

In the end it was a passable approximation of a pizza. Or the zappazo that Chem used to cook. The others all seemed to enjoy it, at least. Which proved it hadn’t been a total waste of a day. Not that that mattered, with a week of thumb twiddling left. 

Uké’el had switched over to doing her own research, as all reading the old journals did was make me annoyed about the injustices of this world. Not that the Earth was lacking injustices of its own, but at least I didn’t know about any actual deities there who could be fixing things. 

Not that I could say for sure they didn’t exist. I just couldn’t say for sure they did.

But, whatever the case, that led to me focusing on swordwork with Sukura and Ne’avo whenever Uké’el called my magic lessons over. 

---

On the third day of that routine, Sukura had called the lessons over for the day and I had decided to head off to find Aara. She’d found only a few small and twisted trees growing on the cliffs, which made it easy to figure out where she’d be. When I arrived, she was meditating, so I sat down to wait. 

It proved a short wait, as she opened her eyes with a look of concern barely a minute later. 

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“There’s something in the ocean,” she said, eyes drifting out to the calm seas around us. “The sea creatures are panicking, and that has the birds spooked. I don’t know what it is, though.”

“Is it a threat?”

She bit her lip for a moment, before letting out one of her nervous laughs. “I think it just might be.”

“Well, let’s tell the villagers,” I said, getting to my feet. “If it’s nothing, they’ll probably complain about a false alarm, but if it’s something, I’d rather they be safe.”

Aara gave a slow nod, before hurrying off. We weren’t quite running, but we were still pushing the upper bounds of briskly walking. It seemed best to keep the villagers from panicking. We wanted an orderly evacuation.

The puffin folks, however, proved to be reluctant to listen to outsiders about their ocean. Even if one of us was a goddess. They squawked angrily at Aara as she tried to explain things to them. The noise of it drew Ne’avo down, unsheathed greatsword resting on her shoulder as she strolled over.

“What’s got the villagers in an uproar?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Solar eclipse?”

“Sola—no,” I said, wondering how that was her first guess. She’d said it with such confidence I found myself briefly looking up at the sun to make sure it was normal. “Aara’s heard from the sea birds that there’s something coming our way, but the villagers won’t listen.”

“Oh… should I go get the others?” she asked.

“Mhm, that will probably be best. Maybe the priest, too. Since they actually listen to him,” I replied.

Ne’avo gave a nod, slipping her sword back into its sheath before jogging off, up the rocky stairwell. I turned back to Aara, who was crouched down and having a chirpy shouting match with what I was fairly certain was the mayor of the village. It still didn’t seem to be going well, however. 

I was trying to think of something I could do when something out in the ocean caught my eye.

Turning, to get a better look, I swore I saw another island out there. Low, more of a sand bar at low tide than anything else, but still. It was definitely sticking out of the water. With someone standing on top of it.

Somehow my vision seemed to shift, like a camera zooming in, and I could make out the figure was another elven lich. Another servant of Nemza.

Just as I realised it, whatever he was riding rose further from the sea, revealing it to be a massive octopus-like beast. It was still some distance away, but, it was close enough to easily make out as the focus in my eyes returned to normal.

“Aara,” I said, shaking her shoulder.

“What?” she asked, looking up at me.

I pointed. Aara turned her head to follow, and also saw it. She let out a laugh that moved past nervous and into terrified.