Being a god was a lot.

That was Erick’s first real thought after leaving Xoat and Nothanganathor behind.

And then he left that thought far, far behind, too.

Erick saw everything. He was everywhere. In the blades of grass under the Benevolent Sun of Margleknot. In the heart of his lead Valkyrie, Shivraa, who was in Margleknot for some reason, working with House Benevolence to fix up some housing projects here and there. Far away on the worlds of Abarial, where he had first culled corruption from the Fractal Cosmology, and revived a society from slavery and blood and tumor magics, but now there were gleaming towers and people walking around like normal, and individual choices given back to the people.

Erick flowed through the cosmos like a many-colored light, visiting lands he had saved from corruption and seeing people rebuild with Benevolence.

Wherever he could, he lent a hand.

Veird and Fenrir were not a part of his journey, and he did not think that odd at all.

- -

A man was building a hospital in some small, nowhere-land, because none of the locals had healing magics and they needed spaces for doctors and otherwise. That’s why he was here, using his masonry skills to build. The man didn’t have healing magics either, so when he cleaved a rock with a hammer and the rock fell and crushed his foot, he was in trouble. The doctors were still three months from coming out here. He’d lose that foot in a few days, to infection and decay. He didn’t know that yet. All he knew was blinding, shooting pain.

The man called out to the uncaring gods, though it was more like a series of expletives than any real call.

Erick heard his call anyway, because the man wore a necklace of gold that was in the shape of a ring with a break in it; a [Renew] symbol. Erick offered a healing touch upon the man’s foot. A warmth flowed from his necklace in that action. The man gasped in sudden relief as he grasped his necklace. He was up and walking around in a day. The man knew he had been blessed, but he did not know how, or why. Not exactly. His necklace had never done that before. It had been a gift from his grandmother, who had grown up in Margleknot, in Tir Gael.

He carved a circle with a break in it on an unobtrusive part of the hospital, thanking Benevolence for healing him.

- -

Erick visited a warrior wearing steel and carrying a sword as he prayed at a white spike the size of a tree, deep in the woods of the deep mountains. That spike was actually one of Margleknot’s small universal connections, but he didn’t know that. No one in this land knew that. To everyone but those with a connection to Margleknot, this spike was just an odd, indestructible and unmovable object. People here had attributed some sort of malfeasance to the spike long ago, and so the town around it was abandoned.

People still came here sometimes, though.

The man kneeling at the spike was trying to make his kingdom better, and he had no idea how to do what he needed to do, so he was praying to the lesser gods because none of the larger ones knew how to help. He was actually going down a list, written down on parchment by a loremaster of his homeland. He had paid half of his life savings for that list, and now he was here in the woods, in what he called ‘the cursed land’.

It used to be a thriving hub of interstellar traffic, but that was eons ago.

The man went down the list of ancient names, listening to the maddening whispers on the air. Only some of them were the gods answering him. Most of the voices asked for churches in their names, or sapient sacrifices.

When he called upon Benevolence, Erick gave the man a vision of his kingdom between two rivers, lights everywhere, bread in every pantry, meat in every dry storage, and everyone working together. Erick was asking if this is what the man wanted, and the man was flabbergasted that he had chanced upon a name in his list that had actually worked. Tentatively, the man asked what he required for such a gift.

Erick gave him a 50 step plan.

The man accepted the plan, because unlike all of the other gods he had asked, Erick’s plan did not have ‘worship me’ in any of the steps.

- -

Something shifted on Erick’s shoulders.

He helped more. He felt more connected to everything.

The weight on his shoulders felt more his own.

- -

Erick felt a twist of something untoward. Something Unwelcome.

He followed the feeling to a land rife with Red. Mages stood upon hills and cast power into crowds, turning people into thralls, into mana batteries, or slaves, or whatever the casters wanted them to be.

Erick cast lightning down from the sky and burned the Malevolence out of every single person there. Those that died flowed into a Grand Reincarnation, to be spilled out on worlds where they needed to go to live better lives, to grow into better people, or to simply have another chance at it all. The mages casting the spells got the same treatment, but in conditions that would actually help them be less like they were.

People were basically good, if they were allowed to be good, if they weren’t unduly influenced by corruptive forces.

Erick allowed them to try again.

Erick did the same thing to a countless number of other Great Evils, many of which were nowhere near anyone who knew of him, and his Benevolence. That required going out of his way, though. That required power. Power required rest.

When he was weak from doing what no one asked him to do, he pulled back and held within Margleknot and other great sources of Benevolence, and even on Earth, where Personal Scripts had touched and spread, thanks to all the things that Erick had already done…

He vaguely realized something was missing, but he’d figure that out later.

When he was strong again, helping those who needed help, he cleared out more Unwelcome Malevolence.

- -

The Dragon God of Many Colors stood in judgment over a world that had fallen to a corporation that had fallen to civil war, far removed from everything the God had ever known, and yet, he had known this land for tens of thousands of years, too.

He was brilliant and glowing and black and white, with wings that shielded worlds and claws that tore at continents, ripping out corruption and the corrupt. A horde of Valkyries flowed around him, in orbit and in the sky of the world. Some Valkyries were from Margleknot and other strongholds of the Dragon’s. Most of them were taken from the planet itself. Most of them were not people. They were animals, and less, for the animals needed to be saved, too, for the world itself was doomed by the civil war.

Nuclear waste, continental destruction, viruses both artificial and incredibly virulent. A huge crack in the side of the world, where they had released a few antimatter bombs. All of that needed to be fixed, and it was not a small job at all. It required a complete reset.

The Dragon God coiled around the entire planet, touching, molding, fixing. He sent a million lives down the Lightning Path, casting them far and wide, into better places, for their place was no longer here. Most Valkyries remained. They held in orbit, waiting while he fixed their planet.

Some of them helped in the fixing. Most did not.

The boiled ocean returned, swelling and blue and deep.

The cratered mountains grew lush with many colors, but mostly green.

The toxic sky twisted with thick air, becoming mana that soaked into the world.

The deeper places, filled with wrongness, placed there for problems for future generations, turned to thick air. The Dragon God of Many Colors laid down hoards of wealth into the planet for them to find, for them to rebuild.

Little Benevolence ‘Dungeon’ Slimes grew fast under his touch, and then they burrowed into Benevolence Itself, to create Safeholds for those who needed such. Some people still called them dungeons, but the Dragon God called them Safeholds. They would create more slimes and more mana in a side reality next to this one, and that mana would replace what the Dragon God had stricken from this world, as soon as people learned how to use it. Those Safeholds would also allow these people afterlives, where their previous, small gods, had been claiming their souls for themselves, to consume and grow like pestilent diseases, because that’s what some gods did. They weren’t all like the Dragon God of Benevolence Itself. Not by a long tale.

This was a normal day for him.

For the people of this world, this was a day that would be written down in history books and preserved for all time...

What would these people call him, when they wrote his name down?

Erick grinned as he put the finishing touches on the world, as he thought of how the Valkyries had always called him ‘Apparent King’, because of some words that Teressa had said on a whim, so long ago…

… Oh.

Those were important names to him, weren’t they.

And just like that, the [Onward] broke.

Time settled.

Erick became all of his apparent self.

He was Benevolence Itself, wearing the Mantle of the Primal Dark. He was a god. A Prime God.

“Ah,” Erick said, “Yeah. So. That happened.”

About 15,000 years had happened, and yet, not really happened at all, because Erick had been ignoring the main problems of his life, way back there.

Back on Veird.

Back at Fenrir.

Erick finished up fixing the planet and released his grip on this world of the Infinite Cosmology, pulling back. With a command, he ushered the Valkyries back to their rebuilt homes, if they were people, or back to their pastures, if they were cows or sheep, or back to their forests and oceans and lakes and rivers and everywhere else, if they were animals of other sorts. Some of the Valkyries chose to move on, to an afterlife inside Benevolence Itself, inside the Safeholds of the world. From there, those people would be visited by their descendants.

Mostly, the dead would simply be at rest.

With a few last measures, Erick installed a Grand Personal Script within the core of the world, replacing the corrupted manaminer he had crushed. The Grand Personal Script did nothing except to keep itself going and hand out smaller Personal Scripts to those that needed one. Not many would need one, though.

But maybe, in the far future, the world would need to be saved by those who needed to save it, and Benevolence Itself and the ghosts of the afterlives of the people here would act, and crown a hero or ten. Those heroes would get a Personal Script.

Those were the choices Erick had made for this land. Not every land got the same treatment, but these were the choices Erick had made for this place.

Erick Flatt, Dragon God of Many Colors, Apparent King of Illuminated Crossroads, Grand Wizard of Benevolence Itself, The Light in the Dark, Commander of Valkyries, wanted to go home.

He had too many personal questions.

Where was his title of ‘Father of Jane, Abigail, Beth, Candice, Debby, and Evan’? What had happened to Yggdrasil? Or Ophiel? Where was Shadow? What about the Painted Cosmology, and Quilatalap, and Poi and Teressa? House Benevolence? Al and Mog and Savral? Spur? Candlepoint? What about Solomon and Destiny? What about Rozeta, Melemizargo, Kirginatharp, Koyabez, Nirzir, Zolan, Dariok, Rizala, Ascendant Prime? What happened to Fenrir—

Erick fell out of the bottom of a dream, through the diaphanous Dark, plunging through years and centuries. Land and times passed him by as he stretched and then folded in on himself, becoming smaller, leaving behind the majority of himself in order to inhabit—

- - - -

Erick fell out of the sky, leaving behind a cacophony of colors as he plunged, human, though an endless blue. Above lay the open sky. Sunmoons illuminated all, though the stars shone in the spaces between those glowing orbs.

Orange desert spread out in every direction below.

For a moment, Erick felt he was coming home, to a different age that no longer existed. Was he in the right time, the right place? Did his Lightning Path Status work anymore?

It did.

It looked different.

Erick Flatt, [Old] [Current Location: Layer 789; Fenrir, year 1453]

Soul: <∞; Mantle of the Benevolent Dark (Currently minimized)

Body: arbitrary

Mind: arbitrary

Mp, Hp, Pp: <∞

There were fewer infinities there than the last time he had looked, and yet these infinities were a lot larger.

It was fine. That ‘Mantle of the Benevolent Dark’ probably meant that he was Xoat’s… primary god, now, or something like that? Erick almost had time to think about the fate of Melemizargo, and to think about what had happened when Xoat had granted Nothanganathor the Mantle of the God of Magic briefly, before tearing it away, but then he realized that something was happening down below.

Erick’s current ‘arbitrary’ Body was set pretty low, so he pumped all of those numbers up to 10,000 and he gained a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the senses that he had had when he was inhabiting his Mantle.

A black dragon the size of a state was down below, ripping up the land and swiping at glinting white dots in the air. Silver dots held far away from the state-sized dragon, shooting magics at the dragon.

Melemizargo versus Sitnakov and Killzone, and what appeared to be many different wrought forces in the distance.

Melemizargo was bloody and wounded. Sitnakov dove into the dragon’s body again and then came out the other side, taking with him great gouts of flesh. Most of this battle seemed to be taking place internally, and Melemizargo was simply trying to survive, crashing his claws against one of the white wrought as they passed. Sometimes the wrought came out of his body missing body parts of their own, so it was dangerous to be inside of him, too. One of Melemizargo’s wings was gone and half his face was half melted.

Fallopolis fought Nirzir in the distance. Fallopolis threw out Black Annihilation zones and Nirzir sung, vibrating those zones with Void, breaking the containment on Annihilation. Fallopolis’s spellwork turned into dangers to both of them, exploding with inky Annihilation. The two of them flew around, trying to get the drop on each other.

Oozy, who was a Shade, fought with Tiza Nindi, the former Head Priestess of Sininindi, who was somehow a Champion of Sininindi? That part of the world was filled with oceanic storms materializing out of nothing and Oozy flying out of the storms, held aloft by black dragon wings, as he sent arrows made of burning wood Tiza’s way.

What the fuck was going on? Erick’s disbelief colored his own thoughts. For a moment, Erick was crushed. He had come back to himself, back to Fenrir, only to see a war happening.

The fight below was just the current warfront.

Parts of Fenrir had been blasted apart, great big holes in the dyson sphere looking like shrapnel-tinged bullet holes the size of the sun.

The sun itself was gone and a black hole held where once was light.

The Valkyries were nowhere to be seen… or felt? Erick could usually feel them wherever they were, see through their eyes if needed, but they weren’t here. The only thing here was...

Pain.

The dead cried out for vengeance against Melemizargo. The survivors demanded that vengeance and made it happen as best they could with their meager weapons.

Betrayal.

The gods had tried to take the Valkyries from Erick, after Erick had vanished in his fight with Nothanganathor, and thus, alliances died. Erick wasn’t sure how he knew that, but he knew that. He had seen Shivraa on Margleknot, hadn’t he? Yes, he had.

Hopelessness.

House Benevolence had retracted, pulling as many people away from the fronts of the war as they could, but the war happened inside their very own capital of Candlepoint. Candlepoint was gone, though, ruined and dead. Yggdrasil was dead, too, blackened and rotting in what remained of Candlepoint’s lake.

The other half of Candlepoint’s lake held out in the frozen void of space. Bodies spread in the chill of the void, frozen and inert.

Veird was worse than Candlepoint, by far. Candlepoint was visible from outside the world, because the world had been ripped apart. Veird was a half-exploded metal ball, with its shells of adamantium twisted outward. Something had ripped out of the center of Veird and caused untold death. Probably the Core. Rozeta had said that Melemizargo always could have done it, so maybe he had just up and done it. Considering how they were fighting right now, Erick could see that.

When he had left for the battle with Nothanganathor, everyone had been on the verge of fighting.

In his absence, they had fulfilled that promise ten thousand times over.

Erick could see exactly what had happened even without checking every part of the past.

Melemizargo had tried taking over the Valkyries and Rozeta hadn’t stopped him, for what could she have done except lean into his madness? Nothing. She could have done nothing. Melemizargo was losing his power as the God of Magic, but he was still the God of Magic for at least days or weeks, Erick wasn’t sure. Melemizargo had used that power disastrously.

Adding to this, the contained problems of Fenrir, the ones Erick hadn’t gotten to, had been released. Without the Valkyries there to hold them back, they had spread, and some had gone truly bad down there, too.

Fenrir floated in pieces. Very, very large pieces, but still pieces. Some of those pieces had fallen into the black hole that was the sun. The inside surface of Fenrir had been scoured of life. The exterior grew deadly mushrooms and fungus here and there, among vast, vast swaths of uninhabitable land, made that way because all of the containment magics were gone, and the atmosphere had evaporated—

Erick’s breath caught.

Quilatalap was mutilated and pinned to an adamantium spire on a crag overlooking the black hole sun. He was not just dead. He was cursed to death. Simple death would have been nothing to him; he had survived a [Chaining Soul Destruction] from a Champion of Melemizargo before. So whoever had done this had needed to get creative, and they had succeeded. Erick wasn’t sure how he knew what he knew when he looked upon Quilatalap’s corpse, but there was no coming back from this for him. He was frozen due to the cold of the void. He was ripped apart due to some sort of divine curse.

He was beyond dead.

Erick floated down to Quilatalap and pulled his corpse off of the spire, using magic to break the spire but his hands to hold Quilatalap. Erick tried a simple [Resurrection] first, and of course that failed. He already knew it was going to fail.

He could fix this, but...

Erick sighed, and said, “I guess I’m a pretty terrible god, Quilatalap, because I was negligent enough to not save you, and I’m selfish enough to bring you back, out of any peaceful afterlife you might be in right now. I hope you don’t hate me for it.”

Erick kissed Quilatalap.

Many colors descended upon the corpse, and then the corpse became a man that became blood that then splattered across the frozen void and multiplied a hundred times. And then once more, into Erick’s arms, Quilatalap’s eyes went wide—

He gasped.

Did he hate? Did he forgive, or condemn? Erick was worried for a brief moment—

And then Quilatalap hugged Erick, laughing happily. Tiny blackgold wings floated behind him. “You’re back. You’re back.”

A great tension left Erick’s shoulders as he hugged Quilatalap. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Quilatalap said, holding him tighter, pressing their foreheads together. He chuckled, flexing his wings as he looked in a hundred directions at once with his other Valkyrie bodies, and also deep into Erick’s eyes. He kissed Erick for a long moment, and then he simply relaxed. With eyes of bright blackgold, and a hundred bodies that he was rapidly learning how to work, and all of that, Quilatalap hovered in the void, holding Erick’s hands, saying, “So things deteriorated when you failed to reappear.”

Erick smiled sadly. “That appears to be an understatement.” He looked around to all the Quilatalaps in the void, most of them looking everywhere but here, while the Quilatalap here only had eyes for Erick. “This was the only way I could bring you back, so sorry about that. Do you want to remain a Valkyrie?”

“I don’t want to be here at all, Erick. Everything is gone and nothing is right and there’s no fixing this, and almost all of me was Ended, but I managed to hold onto hope for you. I am not Quilatalap anymore. I am a husk, and you need to go back in time and unmake this future.”

Erick breathed, and then he nodded.

Quilatalap sighed a little bit, even as he smiled. “Do you know what happened? That and my love of you is all I remember.”

“I’ll take the short version, but I’m rather sure that Melemizargo descended into madness in his loss of power, broke Veird and much of Fenrir, and killed at least a few gods. He tried to take over the Valkyrie magic somewhere in there.”

Not-Quilatalap nodded. “That attempted takeover happened at the very beginning. A minute after Fallopolis rescued Shade Oozy and Shivraa and Everbless from the final battle, Melemizargo tried to corrupt the Valkyries into his worshipers in order to stave off destruction. Rozeta agreed with his choice to do that, for she had no choice, and she tried to give over the Valkyrie Weavers in the Script to the other gods, in order to parcel out those worshipers. Melemizargo managed to do something to Shivraa, but then the Fractal Fairy descended and took all Valkyries back to Margleknot.” Quilatalap said, “Everyone expected Nothanganathor to show up after that, or for you to show up and be mad, and then neither of you did. The Red continued to blast Fenrir and everywhere else it could, though; the war never stopped. This entire land was set up to go out of control with people next to people that would cause wars. That’s what killed most people.

“Melemizargo still continued to lose power, and people broke Fenrir. That’s when things really got out of control. Stuff thought obliterated started reappearing and spreading and Melemizargo started taking everyone’s Mantles back to stave off his death and… Most people died. If anyone is still alive out there then I would be surprised.”

Erick sighed at that.

Quilatalap said, “It was bad. The first to fall was Rozeta. After Melemizargo tried to take the Valkyries, Rozeta told him that it was over. About four days later he killed her for that. The next to fall were Atunir, Aloethag, and Zephyrspray. Koyabez managed to last a while, but even he died. That was a single month since the battle ended. Sininindi fell in line with Melemizargo. Sumtir did, too. Melemizargo himself killed me, Erick.” Quilatalap shook his head. “I don’t know who is alive or not…” He paused in worry, and then he simply said, “He killed Benevolence Itself. Your spaces were strong for a while and it rescued a lot of people, but in Melemizargo’s last act he… He killed everyone that managed to survive. I was there, and then I was out here, dead. I don’t know what happened to the others.” Quilatalap looked outward and at Erick at the same time, saying, “From what I’m seeing, it appears he did further devastation to Fenrir, but it’s only a little bit worse than it was when he killed me. He must have lost his Mantle when I was dead.”

Ah.

So that’s what had happened.

Ah.

As anger rose within him, Erick felt a weird realization.

He could still feel immense, incredible anger, even as a God of Benevolence.

Quilatalap wasn’t angry at all, though.

Quilatlalap smiled softly, and said, “I love you, Erick. Go into the past and make this never have happened. I am not Quilatalap. I am a message from Quilatalap. If not for your Valkyrie magic, I think I already would have died. Don’t let me stay this way, though. Okay? End this magic before you go.”

Erick breathed, and then he took Quilatalap back in his arms, holding him for a long moment. Quilatalap held him back. He was warm.

“I love you,” Erick said.

And then he ended Not-Quilatalap’s Valkyrie self and folded Infinity in on itself, turning back the clock, leaving before he could see Not-Quilatalap fade away.

Not-Quilatalap smiled, though, at the End.

- - - -

Back, back, to the moment of change, and then, to right afterward.

- - - -

“What happens now?” Oozy asked, under a cracked sky, where illusions of sunlight and blue had been broken in the touch of the Fractal.

“I don’t know,” Fallopolis said, on her knees, on the white stone pillar that was Ascendant Mountain.

Rozeta’s white wrought human body lay scattered in white chunks upon the ground.

Melemizargo lay broken and bleeding on the ground north of the mountain, taking up a whole mountain-sized bit of land with his bleeding draconic body.

This was after the Valkyries had been taken from Fenrir and Veird.

This was a good time to appear. It wouldn’t make sense if Erick were to appear later, for he would be punishing people for things they had not done, and that was not who he was.

Erick had no problems doing what he did next.

Erick descended, as a person, and in one quick move he removed the lingering Mantle of the God of Magic from Melemizargo’s shoulders, rendering him a simple black dragon. He also shrunk the guy down and healed him and set him upon the white pillar like a flop of a sleeping, half-comatose dragon. It would be a minute before he woke up enough to react to anything.

Fallopolis reacted faster than her former god, yelping and standing upright, launching backward, and then, blessedly, wonderfully, she cried out, “Oh thank My God! You’re back!”

Erick had allowed her to keep her Championship, but it was almost nothing right now, since the Mantle of Magic was inactive.

Erick smiled at her. “I am. Took me a few thousand years, but yup. I’m back. I heard most of what happened already. It got really bad, but now that future never happens. Not even in the multiverse—”

“Wh—” Melemizargo came to, rapidly righting himself and looking around, and looking scared. His eyes did not glow; they were simply white, with slitted pupils. His claws did not shine; they were simply white, like normal claws. He was a black dragon, about 50 meters long, which was rather normal for a dragon. He wasn’t even a Wizard, let alone a god. He realized this fast, and then he realized the source of his current reality, too. He narrowed his eyes at Erick, yelling, “You did this?!”

A gold-rimmed spear of adamantium came out of the sky and tried to kill Melemizargo, but Erick caught it about a meter from Melemizargo’s neck, rapidly moving the attack from Sininindi back and away. Erick glowed a bit gold in that action.

Erick could have heard voices praying to him from far, far away, if he listened. He would get to those later. Erick unlinked Time from this space, giving him all the time he could ever want, and stopping the flow of prayers. He had stuff to do here, and now. Every single god of the Painted Cosmology was losing power in the transition, which had happened 38 days from now and also hours ago and also 10,000 years ago.

He called up to the sky, “Sininindi. Please come down here. Everyone else, too.”

They all appeared as fast as they could, which was appreciated.

Phagar, Rozeta, Koyabez, were the main gods in attendance.

Koyabez looked Melemizargo over, and was a little sad.

Rozeta frowned at her father, and then the bags under her eyes got deeper as she looked at Erick, and Knew everything.

Phagar knew everything, too. “Unexpected. I was prepared to walk into my own End when I felt my Mantle fade… But that has been undone. Hmm.”

Aloethag, Atunir, Sininindi, Sumtir, and the others just watched.

Oozy and Fallopolis stood back, also watching, not sure what was happening. They were the only mortals in attendance, and that was fine. Mortals needed to be present for this sort of thing, just as much as the gods needed to be present.

Erick spoke, “I’m rather new at this, but with my presence here, the Red out there in Fenrir should start dying on its own. Is that correct?”

Rozeta said, “Yes. It’s failing everywhere. My son is also… he’ll be fine.”

“Good! Problem One solved. Nothanganathor is no more. The problem of outside forces turning us all against each other is done. Let us forgive most all transgressions and move on to a better future.”

They all Knew what Erick knew, in a basic sort of way; that Melemizargo had been replaced as the Prime God of the Painted Cosmology and the Dark. But they still had a lot of questions. Concerns, really.

“My father?” Rozeta asked.

Erick said, “Sure. Let’s get to that.”

Melemizargo stared. He was the biggest one here, but he was also perhaps the smallest. He didn’t mist around like he usually did, either. He simply stood there.

Erick began, “The Painted Cosmology still needs a God of Magic—”

Tension filled the air, so Erick stopped talking.

“No,” Rozeta said. “I see what he did in the future you made never-was, and no.”

Phagar said, “I agree with Rozeta.”

Sininindi said, “We should kill him now for what he has done to use throughout the centuries.”

Perhaps Erick was a bit too mortal right now, because he had been interrupted, though he had a lot more words to say about Melemizargo than simply giving him back the Mantle.

Erick said, “I agree that Melemizargo has made some missteps, but I ask you now to stand in judgment of the whole person.” That’s what he was getting to; a Pantheon consensus was necessary for this sort of forgiveness, and this sort of forgiveness did not come with no strings attached. Erick said, “Melemizargo went insane from the loss of power, and also from knowing he and everyone else was in a trap. He didn’t actually break the trap or break the world, when he could have, and no, I don’t expect you to respect someone who decided not to kill you, because it would have killed him, too. I do expect you to look upon his otherwise mostly-normal stint as the God of Magic before Nothanganathor came along and Sundered the Painted Cosmology.

“I was there for a while, looking through Xoat’s eyes, through the eyes of many different Wizards, and what I saw was a pretty normal era.

“Melemizargo definitely got too personally involved and that gave him blind spots, and that cursing he did at the beginning doomed him to a downfall, and the universe went to shit while he was in charge. But we need a God of Magic, and he’s a good God of Magic, and the God of Magic isn’t the biggest god in the Painted Cosmology anymore.

“I am.”

Melemizargo couldn’t feel that particular Truth right now, surrounded as he was by all the other gods, so he bristled a little. Fallopolis and Oozy had similar reactions. The other gods, except for Rozeta, were still kind of unsure.

And so Erick pulled Mantle on a little bit tighter, instead of having it float all the way off of him—

- -

Erick stepped into a conversation of gods, spanning eons and blinks at the same time, along different vectors of argument and counterargument. They were all harboring very, very large doubts, about all of this, whatever this was, but Erick went through each of them, set them down without setting them down, and had a long chat about all of their various concerns.

When it became evident that Erick was exactly what he said, they wanted to talk about moving forward, and what to expect, and Erick gave them general ideas.

He ended by saying, “I don’t really want to be the biggest power around, so with regard to the Pantheon and the Universe, I’ll appoint lower gods and step in to prevent catastrophe, and that’s about it.”

- -

Erick continued, back in the real world, “So we still need a God of Magic, and Melemizargo is good at the job, even though it will be a lesser job these days.” As Erick let those words hang, Melemizargo breathed deep, likely realizing much of what had happened.

The gods had concerns, but not too many; Erick had already spoken to all of them about this, just now.

Erick continued, “Melemizargo. I want to make you God of Magic again, on probation, because we have a lot of work to do, and yet you did fuck up a whole lot in the past, and when you rapidly declined in power you spiraled into a danger to everyone. That won’t be happening again, now, or ever. Details to follow. Do you still want the job?”

Melemizargo made a rapid decision of his own, then asked, almost for clarification, “Are you the new Prime God of the Painted Cosmology?”

“I will be soon enough. I need to go visit Xoat and his family and talk to them. I’m reasonably sure that Xoat thinks that I’ll have this job for however long I want it and then pass it on to someone else…” Erick’s thoughts drifted back to when Xoat had been him, and he had been a mote in Xoat’s existence, watching the Painted Cosmology through memories. He said, “I think we need to remake the whole Cosmology, and things are going to be different this time. My main duty is going to be appointing new gods and ensuring that the Painted Cosmology is never broken again, and that Xoat is never again reconstructed. He and the Dark are as one, and they like it that way. I’m rather sure that if we get creation wrong that they’d both be fine with Xoat coming back out for a while, for us to try again. I would rather not try again, though.

“I want to get it right the first time.

“You’d be the God of Magic again, Melemizargo, and it would be a smaller role. You’d basically be helping people learn magic, and you wouldn’t be appointing gods. You would be the ‘God of Magic’. Not ‘Dark God of Magic’.” Erick said, “I’m the God of Benevolent Dark, or however people end up calling me.”

Melemizargo didn’t get a chance to speak because the fae started to appear, like people stepping out of reality to stand upon the stone—

Xoat stepped into the area, instantly drawing everyone’s attention. The world was dark and full of visions in his presence, and Erick had to support Oozy and Fallopolis’s existences before they were obliterated at the mere sight of Xoat. As Erick saw Melemizargo start to disintegrate, too, Erick helped support his body, and Melemizargo had a lot of emotions at that rescue.

And then Xoat spoke, and Erick needed to separate space from him to not overwhelm the mortals.

“Are you ready to be my carving knife, Erick?”

Erick said, “I’d like a few more minutes to sort out some back end work, please. Get everyone on board that I can. That sort of thing. See you in a better location for it, too.”

“Sure. I should talk to you about some of this Margleknot business, too. I’ll be in Ar’Cosmos.”

Xoat stepped away, and the fae left with him.

Reality returned to something more normal, but it was still full of gods.

Melemizargo instantly said, “Give me a quest to fulfill while I am on probation.”

“I object,” Sininindi said, “On principle. He lost power and he killed because of it. He will seek to gain more power, too, as is his nature as a dragon. He will cause problems no matter where he is in the hierarchy. AND HE TOOK EVERBLESS.”

Erick would speak to Sininindi about Everbless, personally, soon enough. But for now he sent a few thoughts her way that contained multitudes of information which boiled down to the news that Everbless was in Margleknot right now, living with about ten thousand other world trees that did not become Margleknot. That whole situation was kinda complicated, but not really. It was like Treehome, but for world trees who were problematic and needed to learn how to live again. It was a halfway house for wayward World Trees, and it would be good for Everbless.

Melemizargo had changed him, though, into something Dark and Radiant, and he needed to learn how to deal with that, too.

Sininindi still had her objections after that silent sharing of information, but she was a lot calmer.

Others still had problems.

Atunir said, “I object to Melemizargo’s reappointment. We had millions of years as a universe before Melemziargo fucked it all up in his first 10,000 years as God of Magic.”

Aloethag said, “He killed my elves.”

“He did a lot more than that,” Rozeta said.

Melemziargo declared, “It can be a big quest.”

He got some looks for that.

Rozeta spoke up, “Ten million worlds and the True Wizards to guard them.”

Koyabez added, “Peaceful, core worlds.”

Phagar added, “A new Radiant Depths.”

And that’s when the world started to turn upon their words.

Demon King Dinnamoth spoke up, “Incani, instead of Old Demons.”

Avandrasolaro said, “The return of the Alvani.”

“Okay okay!” Erick spoke up, breaking the ritual, saying, “Let’s pull it back. We’re getting into actual ritual, and we’re not doing that yet.” He looked to Melemizargo. “Do you agree to the spirit of these terms, if not the actual word?”

The world calmed down.

Melemizargo glanced to Rozeta as he said, “If the Painted Cosmology was already existent, then I could raise ten million worlds and the True Wizards to guard them in a single century. It will take longer to do that now.” He said to Erick, “If my Mantle still exists like it did. I doubt that anything will return to how it was with you in charge, or that you’re prepared to actually be a Prime God, no matter what future you experienced.”

Erick said, “Nothing will be the same, and yet everything will be the same, but angled slightly better. How does your mind feel, by the way? I did some resetting, so I expect perfect sanity.”

Fallopolis gasped a little.

Melemizargo said, “Mortal and clear.”

Erick nodded. He continued, “The only other big issue that I foresee, that I can’t actually fix, is the question of evil. I have been informed about the purpose of Evil Gods, which is mostly to keep the worst destructive impulses contained to singular entities and enable true Free Will, and… Well. We’ll have to have some of that, but hopefully not a lot.” Erick said, “I would prefer to discuss those things as gods, since these are godly matters. Are you ready, Melemizargo?”

Melemizargo breathed out, and then said, “I'd prefer to bow to you as you.”

Understandable.

Erick unfurled in black and white and gold of every color, wings spreading wide, legs the size of Ascendant Mountain, body ten times that size, with feathers and scales and blackgold swords on fire, floating everywhere. Erick’s Benevolence spread across Ascendant Mountain like auroras. With a casual thought Erick drew Shivraa back from Margleknot, to stand in recognition as his not-really-champion, to watch Melemizargo bow to him, as Erick lifted above the mountains like the Iridescent Dragon God that he was.

The world bloomed in growth. Not a single wound existed in Erick’s presence. Hearts healed, pain diminished, and Erick looked down upon Melemizargo and the gathered gods of the old, new, Painted Cosmology.

“Do you accept the spirit of the terms of your rise, Melemizargo?”

Melemizargo had no problem bowing deep, saying, “I will be the God of Magic of The Dark, accepting the duty which had been stricken from me due to my negligence, to ensure that such negligence will never happen again. I will teach magic to all. I will spread the Dark forevermore.”

“Then rise, Melemizargo. Claim your divinity, and your purpose.”

Darkness coiled around Melemizargo and then settled into his very soul. His white eyes, so like Erick’s, flickered and ignited and he glowed from within, restored. Dark coiled around him, and it was the same Black that had always surrounded him.

Tears streamed down Fallopolis’s face, first simple tears, and then turning into light, as her eyes returned to Shade-bright.

Erick shrunk back down to his human body, to look up at Melemizargo, and level with the others. Shivraa was behind him, bowed to one knee, fist pressed to her chest, quietly crying tears of joy. Oozy was on his ass, kinda just staring at everything. Fallopolis was quietly crying tears of joy, too, now that her god was back.

Erick said to Melemizargo, “Looks good on you, old man. I left it all as it was, yes?”

Melemizargo caught up quickly to many different things all at once. He looked down at Erick, surprised. “… You’re older than me, now.”

Erick angled a hand back and forth. “Eh! No. Most of that was [Onward]. Let’s just not talk about that stuff. My task is set as anti-corruption work, appointing and denying gods, and giving things the Unwelcome when they must be Unwelcomed. I won’t be Unwelcoming too often. Malevolence only came around once in a few million years, after all.” He asked, “We good, everyone?”

They were all less than impressed with Erick’s nonchalance but they got on board fast enough.

Erick said, “Let’s take the rest of this conversation upstairs.”

Erick vanished first. The others followed fast.

- - - -

Fallopolis watched as the man she had once helped, helped another, who happened to be Her God.

Much like her revelation that she shouldn’t have called for the Purge on Spur, she realized that all of life was just a chain of people helping each other in the ways that they could. Sometimes chains bound and tied, but most of the time they connected one thing to another.

Fallopolis didn’t understand much of what had just happened, but she knew that Nothanganathor had been the kind of guy to use chaining magic to control.

Erick made chains that connected.

Very similar people, but also completely different.

Like positive to negative particles, and lightning, and all of that.

If Jane would have died at the beginning, then Fallopolis was pretty sure that Erick would have gone down a wrong path. But Jane was fine, and Erick was here. Surely he had seen more pain than Fallopolis could conceive, and he had even killed fake Janes out there, if the rumors were to be believed, but that hadn’t broken him. Maybe, even if Jane had died in the beginning, then Erick still would have tried to be who he became in the here and now.

Erick reached out to help. Through the pain, through the sorrow and horror, he still helped.

Always.

Ah, Fallopolis thought, Do I have a little crush on him like I have on you, My Lord?

Probably. Don’t let it affect your work. We have a lot to do.

Of course...

Fallopolis rapidly, wonderfully thought, ‘I’m glad you’re back, My Lord.’

I did not expect it either!

… Uh.

Apologize to Shivraa for me.

Melemizargo pulled back from Fallopolis’s mind.

Fallopolis turned to Shivraa.

The woman was currently ice-elf-human shaped. She seemed truly surprised and elated and a whole bunch of other confusing emotions, all at the same time. Fallopolis didn’t blame her. She was feeling weird emotions right now, too.

Fallopolis pounced, saying, “We apologize for—”

“HMMM!” Shivraa announced, sounding both displeased and pleased at the same time. “I don’t want to hear it. Apologize by doing good deeds.”

“… Fair enough. We still apologize.”

Shivraa barely even looked at Fallopolis. Instead, she stared at the broken sky and land. The illusions on the sky were healing that very moment, while the land sprouted greenery of every hue, clearing up the vast destruction that Melemizargo’s fall had caused. And then Shivraa lost her smile, and looked at Oozy.

She seemed incapable of not glaring, but there wasn’t any heat in her voice as she asked Fallopolis, “You’re going to keep him?” She said, “You’re not going to torture him.”

She had said it almost as a question, but it was not a question at all. Partially, it was a request. Mostly, it was a demand.

Fallopolis didn’t have to think long before she said, “We were going to interrogate him about all the tricks that Nothanganathor had left behind, but it’s probably better if his mind is shared with the Valkyries. Melemizargo grants you this request.”

Shivraa’s pale violet skin turned dark in a second, becoming blood that then expanded upward and outward. The blood froze over and shattered into blackgold fire, revealing the Valkyrie underneath. Wings of pale violet ice coalesced behind Shivraa as she grabbed a sword of the same out of the air.

Oozy went wide-eyed and backed up, scuttling along the ground, his glowing white eyes going wide. “Wait wait wa—”

Shivraa declared, “We are still at war. The Valkyries had been containing a million threats that your god helped release when he sought to reach out and control what he should not have controlled. You will join us, and in doing so, give us insights into best containment procedures, and if you cannot, then you will still be redeemed through service to Benevolence.”

Oozy stopped trying to escape.

He centered himself, and righted himself upon the stone, kneeling before Shivraa. He closed his white eyes. “I accept.”

“I will make it painless,” Shivraa said, lifting her sword.

To her credit, Fallopolis thought, as she watched the execution, ten suddenly-materialized swords simply appearing from every direction and driving into Oozy was kinda quick. The swords cleaved into Oozy’s body, tearing through his new-Shade existence, twisting his very light and shadows back into flesh, into blood that then became life.

Oozy rose as a man of blood-red hair and white-lightning-filled eyes. He hadn’t been a Shade long, but it had marked him deeply.

Fallopolis was surprised that Shivraa hadn’t had any trouble doing that at all. Shades should not be able to be soul-captured like that, but Erick’s power was above Melemizargo’s in the hierarchy now.

That was the moment that Fallopolis truly started to believe that everything was truly different.

- - - -

“Overall, I like the shape of Veird,” Erick said, in ten million different ways, from the shape of the land itself to the people to the friends he had made, and also to the idea of a God Pact, and even Forgotten Campaigns, within reason. “I would like to keep that sort of thing happening, going forward.”

Rozeta spoke in ten thousand ways, “Without the whole memetic, unseen dangers of Nothanganathor, I assume.”

“Yes,” Erick said, regarding both Nothanganathor’s threat, and to a lesser extent, all of the other memetic hazards he had witnessed over the years. Putrescent slugs, mind control of all sorts, and even emotional control. “Though some of those things can be used for good, I would like to have it so the average person does not worry of mind control, or of being trapped in any sort of mental trap.”

Melemizargo countered, “Magic is the purest expression of freedom. We should not begrudge the mortals their choices. If we remove those powers, then we cannot use them, either. And if we don’t codify them, then they’ll simply come in from the outside and wreck what is built using outside strength.”

Erick said, disbelieving, “So the standard solution of Paladins really is the best?” And then, in a million ways, he considered the Dark Mark, and how a person made more mana if they knew more magic, and if they helped others to learn more magic, too. “I’ll just hand out Benevolence Marks, too, and hope for the best. They’re almost exactly the same as Dark Marks, but they’ll be more limited, as I am not going to be an all-powerful god at all. That should help curb excesses of the worst sorts of magics.”

Rozeta spoke, “In attempting to control how mortals act, you become the controller yourselves, and that threatens yourself with usurping. That is the true nature of the need for neutral magic. Give to all, and let them work out what they want for themselves.”

“A fair point,” Erick said.

The conversation of the gods rotated around that point for a few amount of years, and then came back around to a higher order of examination.

Phagar said, “I would like gods to be less powerful, individually.”

Erick spoke of his memories of being Xoat and watching gods and world-sized monsters duking it out in the mana ocean, destroying parts of the universe with their bodies, racking up collateral damage, as he said, “I also appreciate gods being smaller in this Godpact. So how about we establish that you can only have Avatars or Champions or similar powers, going forward, except in the case of averting major disasters?”

Melemizargo brought up Erick’s own fight with Nothanganathor, saying, “That does nothing to stop the excesses of mortals.”

“Mortals will learn as mortals,” Phagar said.

Rozeta nodded.

Erick agreed, as well.

Sumtir was war and righteousness and ten million battlefields, and of all the assorted details of that image of him fighting in the Painted Cosmology that had stuck out so much in Nothanganathor’s mind; of worlds being destroyed by his presence of War. He said, “The incident you saw was me stepping in, directly, to avert a much larger disaster. I could instead ask you to deal with it, but it was a personal thing that got far out of control.”

There was no solving the bigger issues except for tackling them when they came.

Erick moved on, “Let us speak of the Personal Script now, and of crafting a more inclusive power structure for the Pantheon in that infinity, within the mortals whom we all love.”

Erick gazed around beyond the mantles of the assembled gods, and saw within them the wholeness that made them people. Most of them had come from the Painted Cosmology, or, like Dinnamoth, had been raised up here in the Fractal Cosmology, but they still had roots in the Painted Cosmology, in the Dark. But Dinnamoth was a demon, imbued with Elemental Vile, which was a thing unto itself, separated from the Dark and claimed as his own, as Elemental Demon.

Avandrasolaro was an angel of Elemental Exalted, but again, his power was claimed and personal, in Elemental Angel.

Atunir was actually a fae, with power far deeper and more her own than what the Dark had crowned her with. Erick imagined it was Elemental Creation, but ‘Creation’ wasn’t an exact Element under the Dark. It still worked, though.

Atunir smiled as Erick Looked at her. She spoke with a hundred memories of past lives and different selves, “I am from the Painted Cosmology, but that Fae life of mine is far, far gone, and I never thought of myself as one of those anyway. Not in the classical sense, anyway. I have always been myself, sort of like you.”

Erick glanced around and saw Phagar was the same sort of ‘fae’. His Element was more Destruction, though that didn’t really exist as a proper Element, either.

Phagar said, “I started off as a Destruction Wizard wanting to destroy Death.”

Erick asked, “Did you all embody the trinity of Creation, Destruction, Paradox, or did you invent that?”

They looked to Melemizargo.

“Embodiments, one and all,” Melemizargo said. “Xoat was all three and he became the many, which became others. Shadow began as almost entirely Paradox, if you’re wondering, but in a much different way than Time Wizards are. Will we be staying with the trinity, or adding in a Benevolence?”

“Sticking with the same, I should wager,” Erick said, giving a thousand smaller answers to a thousand smaller questions that rushed through like a thousand underlying conversations all at once. “Xoat really wants to return to it, eh?”

Melemizargo said, “The Dark is the Beginning and End of All Things for a lot of the Truest Immortals. Most of the time they simply vanish into the Dark, never to be seen again. Xoat… I will not speak for Xoat’s motivations. I suggest we continue this conversation of Pantheon matters until satisfaction is reached on the major points of the new structure of the Painted Cosmology, and then go to him for final thoughts.” He looked at Erick from many directions, asking, “And then, I assume, that Xoat will have no input upon anything we do, but he will remain in the background? You will be more than a person who sometimes steps up into the role of the Prime God? The rest of us are left to our normal devices? Normal Pantheon functions, as they existed during your first [Onward] time, perhaps from 1445, to maybe 1447, as a rough estimate?”

There were a lot of small words there, and clarifications, and conversations.

But Koyabez summed it up well as he smiled beatifically, saying, “Those were good, peaceful years.”

The whole Pantheon had further things to say about the Pantheon structure, with concerns of Melemizargo being ‘first among equals’ and then ‘that title needs to belong to Erick, obviously’ followed by ‘Erick is the Prime, Melemizargo can be First among Equals’.

“Sure,” Erick said, in many different ways, and then he continued, “As for the Personal Script, I believe we should put one or two starter spells into the Personal Script, based on whatever inclinations the user has. I imagine Melemizargo would be of the opinion that even categorizing someone’s spellwork into a button in their soul is too much. In some ways, I agree with that.” Erick explained about some of the worlds he had changed through necessity, and through Benevolence. The Personal Script was good as it was, but starter help of various kinds proved to be necessary more often than not. And yet, oftentimes, simply making someone aware and able to control their mana was good enough for a start. With those thoughts filling the divine space all around, Erick said, “I would like the input of everyone here.”

Rozeta said, “I believe we are starting off too far into that conversation. We should discuss implementation first. Who gets it, and who does not, because even with the Script it was an opt-in sort of thing, but the only ones who didn’t opt-in were those who…” the disbelievers, the wary, the scared, the worried about being twisted, the scared of Melemizargo and the Dark forsaking them, the ones under the heels of the powerful, the ones who never got a chance, the ones who heard stories of people messing up their souls and their power and never recovering. “… and then there’s the whole ‘gods stepping on the toes of other gods’ aspect.”

It got complicated fast.

Erick discussed every point in detail, along a thousand different theoretical lifetimes, from a pauper to a king to the average person who experiences danger in their life and wants out, to the person who just wants to be able to work the world with tools larger than the physical tools given to them.

Melemizargo started tackling every life individually, and so did all the other gods.

The conversation lasted an eternity and also for no time at all, and in the end nothing was decided except that everyone would go their own way, personally handing out Personal Scripts as they desired.

Erick expected them to come to some conclusions of their own in the next few millennia.

At the end of it, Erick said, “Before we move on to Xoat: My Unwelcoming has already rid this part of the universe of Malevolence, but we are still in the middle of a war due to the removal of the Valkyries. Does anyone have any suggestions? I can always put the Valkyries back, but they are an extension of me, and thus they take the dragon’s share of the worship generated in an area when they’re working.”

The gods of Veird spoke a little about divinity and the parceling of portfolios, but not too much. Things would stay more or less as they were.

In the Fractal Cosmology, gods were what their people thought they were, but for gods with Mantles, they were what they desired to be, and then they also got lumped in with whatever people thought of them. Sininindi was of the oceans and the storm, but people had recently come to believe she was a breaker of adamantium, thanks to what she had done against the undead forces of Quintlan, years ago in the middle of the Nothor Beast crisis.

Thanks to the crisis of multiversal life painted onto the surfaces of Fenrir, every god here was experiencing a twisting of portfolio. They were all still who they were, but they were also changing, and fast, hence all the infighting in that crisis.

As for Erick, he had been mutated a little bit, too. He was no longer just a black dragon, which was fine. Mostly, he was who he wanted to be, and the Valkyries wanted him to be strong, yet kind, and Erick was wholly on board with that.

“And yet, it is still enough of a change to cause a great confusion upon us all,” Rozeta said.

Melemeizargo stated, “I had a plan to fix all of that. It began with the Valkyries, though they were a new addition. It’s actually an exceedingly old plan, which started all the way with the shadelings. With some adjustments, I can still make it work.”

Erick said, “I would hear this full plan.”

A crash of power.

A seeping of Dark.

Xoat stepped into the conversation.

“Nope,” Xoat said, “I want to return to the Dark. I want to live again.”

-

- -

-

And just like that, Erick fell back down to being a person, at a fae party, among a forest full of colorful lights and deep shadows behind those lights. Mushrooms served as stools to sit upon around feasts piled high with every delicacy known to life. Some of the distant delicacies would have been considered wrong for many different cultures, but they were fae food, and not quite real. The nearer stuff was all normal fare, and all of it looked fit for a going away party for a god.

Erick was among all the other gods who had fallen back down to themselves, here at this party. They stood apart from everyone else, at a large open space in the middle of the festivities.

The party was entering its final moments, in a land that was larger than it appeared to be, where the shadows were Darkness and nothing existed beyond this space at all except for the incessant Dark.

Fairy Moon stood at the edge of the open space, looking resplendent in the absolutely most ornate dress that Erick had ever seen, with every inch decked out in spiraling flowers and vines made of lace. Her dress and body sparkled with white, while her green and pink eyes sparkled with tears at the torture of letting go of Xoat, yet again. The party had been going for a year and a day, but it was time for father to let go of son, once again.

Gregarious stood by his king’s side, looking beautiful in decorative silver armor that was more like a suit than real armor. He smiled softly, distantly. It was time for mother to let go of son, too.

Shadow stood nearby, looking demure in darkness and shadows. She had some deep emotions, but she was trying not to experience those emotions too much. She did smile at seeing Erick, though.

Gnowmi was over to the side, tiny and glittering in gold and jewels and all of half a meter tall, standing next to Ezekiel, whom Erick was surprised to see was a bruiser of a man. He wore a matching wedding ring with Gnowmi. A lot had happened there, for sure.

Cascadio, the god that Erick had put on the sun, was in attendance. He had provided much of the food, it seemed. To look at him from this angle made the god seem more of a vending machine than a real person. He certainly didn’t look that way, and in fact he looked big and brown and jolly, as usual. But that was just the front, and Erick could see from multiple directions at once, and behind the face there were ten million different interpretations of the god all inhabiting the same divine space. He was what his people made of him.

To a certain extent, even the gods with Mantles were the same, but there was a very present and definable core to every god of Veird’s Pantheon.

And then there was Xoat.

He looked like a young, androgynous man, wearing diaphanous black.

As though he was at the end of a conversation held outside of Erick’s sight, Xoat said, “So yeah. Aside from some last minute housekeeping, I’m ready to live again as a normal person. First thing: I like Cascadio. He knows how to party. Give him the Mantle of the Sun.”

Erick smiled as Xoat was already on his own wavelength. Erick happily approached Cascadio, the big not-man looking at Erick with ten million different eyes and then sensing that Erick would be asking a much bigger question than he knew how to deal with. Erick liked his approach to Cascadio as a person approaching an animal.

Erick said, “Long ago, you ascended to godhood and lost your sense of self. I would like to give you your sense of self back. Will you accept?”

Cascadio engaged his inner systems and the systems ground to a halt, as he said, “I don’t broker deals like that.”

Erick Looked deep inside Cascadio, past the fractal mess, past countless ages, millions of years falling away before an eye could blink. There, at the center of the man, was the idea of a star that had been embodied many, many times, over and over, because his world had worshiped that star as their sun for a long time. They even had a ritual to crown the sun onto a man, in order to bring about a Bountiful Era.

One man so adorned finally accomplished the task, becoming emperor in his life and then enshrined as the God Of Bountiful Radiance, the Evergiving Sun. This, then, was the Truth of Cascadio’s beginnings.

His soul was stretched far further than any soul should ever be stretched, with almost everything that wasn’t him becoming the new him, like pouring resons into an already-filled person. Erick had almost done that to himself, once upon a time. His resons had fallen out of him like golden amber.

Cascadio’s resons had become him.

Erick called to that soul, at the center of it all, “Do you want to become a person again?”

… yes ...

The answer was quiet, not even really there at all, and then came a cacophony of questions from all the rest of Cascadio, from all his other reson-filled self. Cascadio was a god to trillions, and he did not want to lose that. He wanted to help people. He wanted to party forever, bringing bounty to all.

Erick couldn’t, and wouldn’t, shove a Mantle onto him. What he could do, though, was what he did.

Erick grasped the sunlight in the sky and wove it into threads along with the Mantle of the Sun taken from his own, where all the other nascent Mantles lay, creating a half-cape that was more than a little bare. He held out the threadbare Mantle to the entirety of Cascadio, but mostly to his inner self, saying, “You’ll have to fill in those holes on your own.”

Fractal Cascadio retreated.

Inner Cascadio reached out…

And then both of them paused.

And then they took the Mantle and put it on their own shoulders. It settled down, and it didn’t settle at all. It became one with Cascadio… And not at all. But it was there. Nothing grand happened, but Erick could already feel Inner Cascadio waking up. The man who had become a god was once again becoming a man, and it would not happen in any short amount of time.

Xoat saw it all and said, “That’ll take a while. Too long for me to see the result. Now for some Other last measures.” He turned and looked upon the dragon in their midst. “Melemizargo. You are not forgiven for the hatred you sowed within Nothanganathor. Don’t do that. This is your second chance. You don’t get a third chance.” In an offhanded way, he added, “Unless Erick wishes to give you a third chance. I certainly didn’t foresee Nothanganathor using my power to start all this mess. Maybe a part of me wanted to come back so I could say hello to everyone, but I really doubt that. I much prefer a smaller sort of life than this one. Nothing seems real, here.”

Fairy Moon spoke through her tears, “You don’t have to leave so soon.”

Gregarious gently took Fairy Moon’s hand, saying nothing and just enough at the same time.

Fairy Moon squeezed Gregarious’s hand like it was a lifeline.

Shadow sighed a little.

Xoat smiled, and said, “I want to return to life, Father. This… This is but a dream. I want to leave before the dream becomes a nightmare.”

Fairy Moon gave a tiny, tight nod, as she had no doubt done many times already.

They had said all the words they needed to say, long before today.

Xoat said to Erick, “You’re the reason that this is turning out so well for everyone. So don’t forget that. I think the hatred between Melemizargo and Nothanganathor really got to my greater self in a way that I never expected. Wizard Wars tend to do that, and that one grew way too large. I think, if Nothanganathor would have won, then I would have chosen anger and rage, instead of loving understanding. Who knows how long I would have raged, with no one able to hand off my life to. Whatever universe he created would have been destroyed in a thousand years by people coming to kill me and return me to the Dark… But he was a good emperor, so maybe not. He probably had plans for everything. He certainly would have been putting down rebellions all the time, though, and some Wizard would have eventually overthrown him after we got fed up with his shit.

“Forgiveness is easier on the soul, and the future.”

Erick said nothing. This was the time for him to listen, and that is what he did.

Xoat said to everyone, “Erick here is the reason that the Primal Lightning you saw was White instead of Red. Everyone who saw the White had a chance to live, on Veird. Everyone who saw the Red perished, drawn into Nothanganathor’s Sign of Power.”

Some people’s eyes whipped around to Erick, to Rozeta, then to Melemizargo and back to Erick. Rozeta simply breathed in, as a piece of Knowledge she had not had, firmly set into space. There were gasps.

Rozeta looked up, at no one and everyone, as she confirmed for herself, “Everyone saw the White Lightning. It did not kill the Painted Cosmology. It led people to Veird, as the epicenter of the Sundering storm. But the actual center of that lightning was Erick. As Xoat.”

Everyone looked to Erick with new reverence.

Erick felt the Mantle around his shoulders grow heavier with purpose.

Ah.

Erick’s primacy had been questionable before, hadn’t it?

Now he felt what true power was.

Xoat said, “Erick. A final gift to you, to do with what you will. I suspect Melemizargo has plans for this, since he knows what lies inside, but you need to retain the actual item.”

Xoat, wrapped in Black and the Darkest thing in this space, held out a hand and curled it over. Like a coin trick, he revealed Nothanganathor’s Sign of Power, all colorless sharp edges, endlessly collapsing and expanding with Infinity. Both Erick and Xoat had been trapped in it for several thousand years, but only 1400-ish of that were truly lucid for Erick, and even that was a stretch. Looking back on that time spent in there, trapped as he had been, it all felt like an [Onward].

Xoat handed the Sign of Power to Erick, who took it.

Erick did a coin trick of his own to bring it into himself. Instantly, he knew another whole reality.

He would get to that later.

Xoat intoned, “My Carving Knife. Our Erick Flatt.”

The world washed away a little bit at that utterance. Many fae vanished. Some gods did, too. No one died, but everyone who needed to evacuate, evacuated.

“I want you to know what you are doing, so you do what I need you to do.

“Look upon me, and know that I am too much. You have seen the one you call the Fractal Fairy, and you know their strength. I am holding back a lot right now. I don’t want to hold back at all. I like people. I love life. But I am too strong to be around the people I love, to experience the lives full of people I will love. So I parcel myself out so that I don’t break the world.

“I don’t want that power.

“No one should have that much power.

“And so, as you carve, know that you are creating something that can experience life as a real person, once again. This is what I want. This is who I want to be. A Wizard in a tower, playing with magic. A baker with a side-gig as a farmer. A shipwright. A slave. A master. A killer, and the killed. All parts of me separated fully, expanded out to forever, to join with My Darkness and carve out life from my life well lived.

“That is what you are doing.

“This is not a death.

“Not for me.

“You should cherish life, for it is the best thing out there.”

Xoat stopped speaking and there was a simple knife sticking out of his chest, that was not simple at all, for Erick held the hilt and the knife glowed gold and black and white and rainbow.

Reality flowed out of Xoat’s wound, into the world, channeled along Erick’s axis of Benevolence.

In an offhanded sort of way, Erick noticed that the other people in the party were evacuating, as the very land itself turned to black rainbows, as power flowed out from where Erick held the knife. In another offhanded sort of way, Erick felt Xoat’s soft hands upon his forearm, gripping the knife in his chest. His touch was gentle, and so was the flood, at first.

And then he gripped Erick and a universe flood poured out of him, from the wound in the front, and in his back.

The world washed away in Black rainbows.

And then it was just Erick, floating in the Dark, with Xoat coming apart in an aurora of light that became Everything. The Dark grabbed at the Light, and pulled it into More. It drank the Light, it drank up everything that was Xoat, and worlds appeared through the twists of Dark, in the cracks between tendrils and claws and hands and everything else.

And then Fairy Moon was there, floating beside Erick, holding Erick’s free hand, her other hand on his shoulder, as she watched her son come apart in the Dark.

Shadow appeared next, a hand on Erick’s other shoulder.

Gregarious touched Erick’s outstretched arm where his hand still gripped the dagger in Prince Xoat’s heart.

The other fae appeared, as though stepping out from behind Erick, to take part in the sacrifice.

In the Creation.

Xoat smiled as he closed his eyes once again, his strong grip turning softer, holding Erick’s hand to the dagger in his chest.

A tidal wave of light and power rushed outward, streaming into the Dark.

A long, long time ago, Xoat and the Dark had been separate entities. And then Xoat got cast into the Dark by his Sister, upon Xoat’s own design, and he became One with Darkness. This body here? This temporary existence as the Prince, as Xoat? It was not the real him anymore. He had ascended and become something more when he joined the Darkness all those eons ago, and this here was just an embodiment, like pulling the mind out of a person.

The Dark called to Xoat, and Xoat rejoined himself in a flood, becoming the headwaters of a new mana ocean.

Xoat’s voice was a soft thing in the rush of power, “Consider your Mantle a test run for when you want to make your own universe, and know that sacrifice isn’t the only path. After you walk that path, wherever it might lead, send me some of yourself.”

Erick said, “Might be a long, long time.”

“As it should be.”

- - - -

Jane walked among a battlefield, under the bright sun inside Fenrir.

The fortifications of the refugee cities behind Jane and Candice were heavily damaged, and many undead had gotten through, but the lands of millions beyond had been spared. Jane and Candice had been the final line for a land completely unprepared for what was coming for them.

There had been several Red Archmages that were near enough to Wizards in certain ways.

It was a repeat of the Lich War of yesteryear, before they had to bomb all of Quintlan off of the map, blowing up the land and a few layers of shell overhead. The same enemies. The same dangers. But more in the open. More present; less subterfuge. They had built themselves up, a lot. The Valkyries helped, but they weren’t as strong as Jane expected them to be. Most of the truly strong Valkyries had been at the Last Battle, so that sort of made sense. Despite their hive minds, individuals were still individuals.

It had been a straight up brawl of monumental proportions.

For half an hour there, among the castles that walked on zombie legs, and in the mires of Blood, Gloom, and Decay that flew through the sky like city-sized undead oozes, things had been going well. Jane and Candice had been the only ones able to truly stand against the Red near-Wizardry of the liches, which was a big change from how it had been, while the Valkyries mostly kept Jane and Candice safe as they could, as the two of them advanced against the real threats, the liches.

And then the Valkyries had vanished.

For another half an hour, it had been near-death after near-death, with Jane and Candice struggling to kill the commanders while the undead forces rolled across the defenses of the refugees, tearing into their cities.

And then…

And then it all stopped.

It had been stopped for about 20 minutes now.

The air still smelled of blood and death, and Jane’s Status was running on empty, but it was filling up and there weren’t any threats on the horizon. People were cradling their dead, crying, or in shock. If the war hadn’t just stopped then Jane would have been furious with those people, because cradling the dead when necromancers were on the loose was a recipe for getting one’s throat bit out by grandma.

Most people were furiously burning their dead. Those people were more sane.

And the war was over?

Just like that?

Huge abominations of flesh and dead magic lay everywhere. Some of them were the size of mountains. All of it was once again rotting, because the animating Death was gone.

Candice squelched through the blood and mud in front of Jane, looking around. Both of them were clothed in just some conjured underwear and a lot of blood. Both of them had dropped their [Polymorph]s. Candice frowned, looking at all the piled dead.

Jane was frowning with her.

Candice said, “What the fuck happened?”

Jane said, “It looked like the Red sort of… folded in on itself? All the liches had Red cores and they’re gone now… The dead are going to rise again, though, even if the main threat is gone. The Elemental Death is still here… kinda.”

Might be a few days before natural undead start to rise. They had time to burn… An entire continent’s worth of bodies? Maybe not that much time at all, really.

Candice’s frown intensified as she grumbled an angry, “mmmm,” followed by, “Something is wrong— OH! Wait a fucking second!” Her entire countenance changed to one of pure joy, as she said, “Dad must have—”

Jane cut her off, “Nothanganathor might have killed his people in order to facilitate a better transition to him having true power. We might need to go into hiding… Or it might be too late.”

Candice lost her joy. “… Oh shit.”

“Something big and Red happened, though,” Jane said, as she sent out a [Telepathy], trying to connect to whatever sort of Crossroads might be going up. She didn’t get any response, but she kept trying. She asked Candice, “Can you [Telepathy] any—”

The sky brightened, the sun in the center of Fenrir doubling in brightness.

Light flooded.

And then, out of the Light came the Dark.

Jane gasped.

- - - -

Power flowed from Xoat, joining to the Dark, becoming too much for any one person to handle. Chaos unfurled, stripping away everything, but Erick was still there. The fae were still there with him.

They went to work instantly.

Fairy Moon cradled Springtime like a prism, peeling off a flow of Xoat’s everything like sticking a colored rock into a river of light, and the river changed. Light turned pastel pink, green, and white, and flowed along her axis of existence, returning Elemental Fae to the Dark. The Dark reached wantingly, disastrously, pulling power wider, taking bits of Fairy Moon to color everything else that she already was. She was not hurt, but not diminished in this taking. She was made More. She became a Home for Everyone; the King of a new Nation In the Dark. Her tears became a flood. Her blood became nascent life. She set down a part of a foundation, so that others could join as they were wont.

The Dark ripped at her, perhaps unkindly, because it knew no other way to be.

At that same time, Shadow peeled off the light of Xoat and made it more of herself, filling the universe with half-light that stood between the Dark and everything else. She gave of herself so that the Dark could interact less painfully, and that is what it did. With Dark hands covered in Elemental Shadow, the Dark’s touch became an easier thing for everyone else to withstand.

That is when the Dark truly started helping everyone else in Creation. That was when its touch turned loving, caring, helpful, and full of life.

Life became more life.

Enchanter’s Guile was there, the little metal fox taking Xoat’s light and painting the universe in his own hues of Metal. Gnowmi stood in that same creation, adding more metal, and gems.

Fae of Water took Xoat’s light, which wasn’t really light at all, but a different sort of Darkness, and made water unending, filling the universe with flows and waves, and the Darkness made way for that creation, pulling oceans wider, as though it was ripping itself apart to reveal oceans already existing inside.

Fae of Stone sent sands into the waters that then became rocks and lands.

Fae of Fire sent animation into that crashing tumult, animating some of it to primitive life.

Fae of Air gave everyone room to breathe.

Fae of Blood granted holds for complex life. Fae of Body gave form out of the chaos to that life. Fae of Breath brought animation to that life. Souls took form out of the Dark; mana begetting mana.

Erick took the expanding Light of Xoat, raising it high in a draconic hand, and the light doubled; radiant and every color. With a deft hand Erick painted a universe of many colors, revealing the Dark for what it could be. What it would be.

Lands and people and a dream of peace, where everyone could grasp the Dark and know power. Where everyone would have the ability to become who they wanted to become, and make their realities into truth, to then share that truth with others and grow in the telling.

Erick became the Light and the Dark, reaching out to others, in Welcome, in Benevolence, dictating how the Foundation.

“Hello Darkness, my old friend, I’ve come to help you talk again~”

- - - -

Poi saw the event the best, though he did not know it at the time. He merely observed from inside the dungeon, and outside in the world, in both of his bodies. The former allowed him to know something big was happening, while the latter allowed him a grounding of a sort, since he was still all the way on Veird when it happened.

Inside the Dungeon of the Black Gate, near a facsimile of their old home in Spur, Poi was caught walking between rooms when the floor and everything else turned translucent, and then thinner than that. Poi was a soul in a body that was not really embodied at all, and the solidified nature of the dungeon became a figment of an imagination inside the Dark.

That’s all dungeons were, after all; imaginings in the Dark.

They could return to the Dark at any point in time, if Melemizargo desired such.

That’s not what was happening here, though. Poi understood that much.

Inside of his house on the Cloud Castle over Candlepoint, Poi felt the world turn solid. The usual way of experiencing life up here was to live among the dreamscape-overlapping-reality thought slimes that were the people around him. But now those thought slimes crackled with distinct borders, lined in Benevolent Lightning. The lightning borders of every single person linked with Benevolence Itself, and with each other, forming chains from one person to every other, no matter how far they were. Even the animals were linked. Poi saw ten million people linked to himself, and he knew what it meant to know others, in a whole different way.

Poi-in-the-dungeon stepped out of the Dark and into the light of the inside of Fenrir. He had moved to Fenrir.

Poi-in-the-castle rippled along with his entire existence, and then he settled back down. He stayed at the cloud castle over Candlepoint.

He looked up in the sky of Fenrir, and saw the Darkness reach out from the void, becoming a draconic hand that grasped the sun. Darkness spilled out of the hand’s entire shadow, falling across the interior of Fenrir. The grip around the sun rotated, bringing night and day to Fenrir like some god having too much fun making hand puppets with the entire sun.

Among the Dark Hand’s shadows, all across Fenrir, Poi watched as dots of light flowed up inside the shadows of the sun, linked by Benevolence. Perhaps it was a matter of distance that caused those dustings of light to seem smaller than they were, but Poi knew there were entire civilizations being pulled up and pushed down, getting rearranged across all of Fenrir, based on the declarations of a god.

Multiple gods, probably.

All of the gods, and maybe a few more, Poi decided, after not too much deliberation at all.

It was among the most magical things that he had ever seen, and it would leave an impression for the rest of his life, and far beyond.

- - - -

Teressa smiled as she stood with Ophiel inside Benevolence Itself, with Lenitha and Dariok. Her daughter and husband were a little scared, and Teressa couldn’t blame them for that. The sky was filled with White Chains that looked like Primal Lightning, or rather, Benevolent Lightning, so of course normal people would be freaked out. Teressa imagined that most people couldn’t see the chains, and all they saw were the bubbles of people, and perilously Dark spots invading Benevolence and then retreating like tides, rushing people across the cosmos at the command of someone far, far above everyone else.

People flowed from one side of Everything to the other side of Everything.

All the sky had been filled with Valkyries for a good hour, flowing on rainbow lights to battles and beyond, but then they had vanished and true danger had almost happened. And now, there was this. People, sleeping or maybe just insensate, being moved from one place in the universe to another.

This node of Benevolence itself was a thousand kilometers across, while the sky was much, much larger.

The chains of people filled up that entire sky. Even Yggdrasil, over on the side, was blocked from sight by the sheer number of people.

Lenitha tugged on Teressa’s robes. “Mommy? What’s happening?”

Teressa picked up Lenitha, smiling, holding her on her arm, as she looked up at the sky. Dariok held both of them, because he was worried, too. Dariok could probably see what was really happening, but even Teressa was having trouble truly understanding. Not many people had the Sight to see what this was, but Teressa had the Sight.

Teressa explained as best she could, “I think Erick won, and now he’s putting all of Fenrir to rights. You know how I explained how every people placed out there by Nothanganathor was placed to cause distress? Well now Erick’s putting people where they ought to go… Oh…” Teressa watched as Benevolence Itself twisted here and there, and people appeared from nowhere. Teressa gasped. “He’s reviving all the dead. A lot of the dead. Every single person who died on Veird in the wars—” Teressa smiled and pointed to a part of the sky. “There! Look!” Teressa couldn’t believe her eyes at all. “Clan Patriarch Xue!” Teressa gasped, “And Sikali?! She died years ago!”

Patriarch Xue Star Song had been taken by the Red in the Leviathan attack at the Songli Highlands. A lot of people had been taken in that attack. Erased. Sikali Star Song had died years ago, during the Terror Peaks Chelation War.

“Oh my gods how am I even seeing that,” Teressa whispered at herself, and then she spotted—

“I’m scared.” Lenitha held Teressa, pressing her face against Teressa’s neck. She whispered, “I’m scared.”

Teressa put all thoughts of others outside of her mind and held her daughter close. “It’s okay, honey. Erick won. It’s scary, but that’s what happens when big people move in big ways. I’m sure Erick will finish up whatever he’s doing now and then we’ll all have a good long talk, like we always do.” Teressa smiled enough to put Lenitha at ease, but it only really worked to chase away the terror because Teressa asked, “What kind of dessert do you want mommy to make? I’m sure Erick will want a lot of good, sweet things! How about those cinnamon rolls?”

Lethitha sniffled, eyeing the sky, and then she looked at her mother. “… I want apple tarts.”

Dariok got in on the action, too, saying, “Apple tarts and donuts and chocolate cake and—”

“Ice cream!” Lenitha said, and then she looked to Ophiel and her burgeoning smile faltered.

Ophiel was looking pretty serious right now, as he looked at the sky and the chains of people flowing where they needed to go, but Lenitha’s glance had the guy shaping up and putting on a happy face. He smiled. “I want cinnamon rolls.”

Lethitha made a face. “Why do you adults love those things!”

Ophiel scoffed, “I am not an adult!”

Lenitha stuck her tongue out at Ophiel. “You have the Script! Therefore adult!”

Ophiel said, “The real adults are working now and I’m not working so I’m not one of them, so I’m still a kid! Therefore I get to say what desserts are getting made!”

“Nuh uh!” Lenitha stuck out her tongue.

Ophiel complained.

Teressa smiled, and said that she’d get Quilatalap to make some purpleberry pie, and that made Ophiel incredibly happy and Lenitha saying that she’d eat a whole pie herself, which started a whole new round of spats.

Teressa felt at ease for the first time in way, way too long.

- - - -

Jane watched a giant black dragon claw encircle the sun, blocking the light, allowing night to return to the inside of Fenrir in the shadow of its loose grip. That dark allowed Jane to see across the full expanse of Fenrir for the first time.

It was fantastical.

Jane could see it now; how night and day worked in this land. The grip rotated, and the five fingers and palm of the encircling grip provided darkness… But the pure power needed to do such a thing was… it was crazy. That hand, ten times the size of the sun, felt like the Fenrir ritual itself. It made Jane feel something magnificent inside, like when she first saw the blue boxes for the Script, and the first time she conjured a sword out of Force, but writ large and oh so much better.

Because that was dad’s hand, for sure. She didn’t know what Nothanganathor’s hands looked like, and she was pretty sure Melemizargo’s hands were slightly different, so that was dad’s hand. It looked like Jane’s dragon hands, but black and thicker.

Candice whispered to herself, to the world, “Dad won.”

Jane smiled—

All around them, the corpses of the fallen undead army turned to motes of light that flew up into the sky, into the Dark, leaving behind lush grasses and wildflowers. Their departure was like fireflies, but better. Bigger and brighter.

Some of those lights got mere meters above the ground before they went right back down and popped, revealing people, healed and whole. Those people were still wearing the torn armor of the refugee cities, but they themselves were healed.

Oh, Jane thought. Dad is resurrecting everyone, too.

This is a lot.

This is more than a simple win.

Oh.

… Is the hand going to stay?

Candice asked, “Do you think the hand is permanent?”

- - - -

Yggdrasil watched Fenrir’s entire ecosystem be restructured into something more conducive to life and eternity. Checks and balances of ecosystems were instituted by way of creating continents and oceans and rivers, where once was simple chaos intended to cause conflict. The hand was also doing a lot more than just reshaping Fenrir. It was resurrecting everyone… too… Hmm.

“That hand is going to be so unwieldy, father,” Yggdrasil said, as he gazed through Benevolence Itself, to see it all. “The magical requirements alone to constantly compensate for gravity— It’s pissing off Cascadio now, too. You’re ripping at the functionality of the sun by just existing— Ah. You see it too, then… Er.”

Something changed in the sky.

“That’s not a fix, father. That’s the opposite of a fix.”

Yggdrasil watched as one dragon hand became two dragon hands that sort of reached for each other, as though to almost take each other’s wrists, with the sun between their fingers. It was less ‘gripping’, more ‘warming themselves’, or maybe ‘reaching out to each other’ and with the sun in the center as a point of brilliance between the Darkness. That seemed good, both in an artistic sense, and in an environmental control sense. The ripping sensations Cascadio was reporting on were gone, too, so they were probably hollow hands now, too. Or something. Yggdrasil would find out eventually, but right now they were too filled with Darkness to see clearly. But this was good!

It was too early for Fenrir to heat up to unimaginable degrees, but it would have happened in a few years, or maybe a few hundred, and whatever day/night thing father was trying to set up was very unbalanced with only two hands.

One was clearly Father’s hand, but the other one was Melemizargo’s, but only a very trained eye could tell the difference.

So two hands that acted like north/soul pole blockings with their palms, and ten fingers that rotated fast enough to provide enough shadow to mimic a rather normal day/night cycle for maybe… Yggdrasil did some fast math… for maybe 65% of the interior surface. 12 hour days, 12 hour nights. 35% of the land would be in perpetual twilight, or have longer days and nights that might last half of a year, before those lengths of days and nights switched in the other way.

There was also something going on with the poles of Fenrir, but it was too filled with Darkness to see clearly yet.

Yggdrasil admitted, “Okay. I like that idea. One of them should be a human hand, though, even if you are a dragon, father.”

Yggdrasil felt the barest brush of ‘bah!’ And also, ‘Dragon hands are cool!’

Yggdrasil laughed at that.

And then Erick stepped down into Benevolence with Yggdrasil, onto one of his bigger roots, looking like a normal person, but he was a lot more than that.

Yggdrasil appeared as a person next to him, smiling, saying, “Congrats on winning in more ways than I thought possible. All your divinity should be flowing to you now that you’ve actively claimed it. You okay with that?”

Erick waved a hand. “It’s what I needed to do. I’m good with it. Thanks for taking care of it while I didn’t want it.” He asked, “And what’s wrong with dragon hands! They could both be mine, you know!”

“They could both be Melemizargo’s, too,” Yggdrasil said, grinning. “Except they’re not. The first one was yours. The second one you added to make him feel better.”

“He needed a big win and this sort of reviving everyone was always his plan anyway. It’s what he started with the shadelings and how he wanted to bring the Painted Cosmology back, using the souls of those he had saved in Darkness.” Erick said, “Cascadio didn’t like the harsh grip, either, but he loves the hands-reaching-out design.”

“I do, too,” Yggdrasil said, still grinning. And then he tentatively asked, “Are you still a hugger? Or has your time away—”

Erick rushed his son, and Yggdrasil was glad that he was allowed to have tears of joy, instead of the possible tears of sorrow of what could have been. Father was still father, no matter what new office he inhabited.

Erick said, “I’m still a hugger.”

“I’m glad.” Yggdrasil held Erick tighter, saying, “Very glad.”

“I have a gift for you—”

“I don’t want the Sign. It’s not my sign, and I don’t even think it’s Margleknot’s, either. Give it to Margleknot next time you’re back, or don’t. Use it until you don’t need it anymore.”

Erick simply said, “How about your memories, then?”

Yggdrasil laughed. “Oh yeah! I do want those. Gimme gimme!” He paused. “But not to me. Not directly. You should give those to Margleknot. I don’t want to touch them.”

Erick chuckled. “You’re giving me mixed messages here, Yggdrasil.”

“I’m sure it’ll be a quick trip to Margleknot, and then you can come back and be a good Tyrant Dragon God King to everyone,” Yggdrasil said, smirking.

Erick paused as he couldn’t believe that Yggdrasil would say that to him…

Oh.

AH.

Speaking softly to himself, Erick said, “… Oh my gods, have I lost my sense of sarcasm? I think I have.”

Yggdrasil nodded. “Time for a break, Father.”

“Okay. Vacation time this time, and for real.”

“Yes, for real vacation time,” Yggdrasil said. “If the Fae Council bullies you into doing stuff then tell them you’re on a doctor-prescribed vacation and you’re not allowed to do any heavy lifting for a while. You won your war, and now you get to be the Arbiter of Veird, first and foremost.”

Erick grinned.

- - - -

“Oh. Hello, I guess,” Erick said to the Fae Council. “I was coming your way soon enough.”

Erick stood underneath Margleknot in Margleknot, and though the big guy looked like Yggdrasil right now, he wasn’t Yggdrasil at all. Not really. Not anymore than Erick was Xoat, anyway. Yggdrasil was a glowing white tree, with flaming green leaves and a rainbow aurora crown. His roots were shaped like roots that twined up and down into the land below, while his branches kinda looked like Primal Lightning frozen in time. Margleknot had been gold, with roots that formed geometric shapes that spiraled, fractally, down into infinity, while his branches were looping, tendrils of gold, that also curled through impossible geometry.

Yggdrasil in Margleknot had roots that curled in geometric shapes and lightning-like branches that were way too fractal to be normal branches, like Yggdrasil’s branches back on Veird, and now Fenrir.

Also, this land’s surface was glass and see-through, so all of Margleknot was visible at the same time.

The Fae Council of Aelorika, Eldraki, Seraphaka, and Dakka, all stood upon that clear surface with Erick. Margleknot’s golden-eyed orcol-avatar stood closer to Erick, though.

Margleknot said, “I told them not to take too long.” He looked at Erick again, and with a faint sadness in his voice, he said, “Thanks for the Memories, Father. Yggdrasil is right, though, I don’t want the actual Sign of Power. I replaced it a long time ago, and that Sign of Power isn’t something I want to use.”

Erick was surprised at that. “Are you sure? I’m not sure what I’ll do with it, but… Yeah. I can use it.”

The Sign of Power sat inside Erick’s divine soul like a small universe waiting to be filled; completely empty, completely unutilized. He’d figure out something to do with it, he was sure.

“Good. You can use it well, I am sure. Nothanganathor...” With a far-off sense of loss, Margleknot said, “Nothanganathor… I still can’t believe the full extent of what he did. He was like a surrogate father to me. He didn’t make a World Tree that connected to me, but I enjoyed being a family with him. My memories confirmed what I already knew to be true; yes, he was evil, but… He was a good person… And yet…” Margleknot deflated. “He wasn’t a good person at all.”

Erick simply nodded. Even the worst people in existence were still just people, no matter how much power they acquired… But Erick supposed that thinking that way was a luxury for the strong. Nothanganathor was truly evil, and yet…

Nothanganathor was denied power for most of his life, which is what turned him evil enough to want to Sunder a universe. Thinking about it that way… No.

Nothanganathor still made bad decisions, and those decisions were reason enough to hate the man he had become, but before that fall, he had been different. The Curse of Obscurity had twisted him into something he didn’t want to be, for he wanted to be, and was, a strong emperor to billions. He knew how to create stability and prosperity. That much was never in doubt.

And then he was twisted into creating Malevolence in order to take back what was taken from him.

Erick said, “It’s unforgivable what happened, and yet the evil is gone, and so we must forgive if only for our own sanity. But at the same time, we must never allow evils like that to flourish ever again. It’s a paradox that we must navigate all the time, because the problem of evil is one of selfishness, and we’re all just people trying to make the best of our situations. Selfishness is inevitable, my son.”

Margleknot looked upon Erick with golden eyes, and he saw many other people at that same time, deep in memory. He smiled softly, “Nothanganathor said something like that a few different times.”

“Sounds like a smart man who ended up going down the wrong path.”

“Aye,” Margleknot said. “He did.”

The Fae Council watched as Erick and Margleknot had their moment, silence filling the air.

The moment passed.

Lady Aelorika stepped forward. “The Fae Council recognizes the sovereign nation of Fenrir, Dark Benevolence, Erick Flatt of Veird. We are interested in contracting services for Corruption cleanup, and also thank you for both destroying Malevolence, and also coming back and keeping Margleknot from falling apart in Malevolence’s absence.”

“Ah. Shit.” Erick said, “Yeah. That. I need to, uh, come back and do that, eh?”

Lady Aelorika grinned a little. “If you haven’t already. It took you a good 29 years of work, if we’re counting all your appearances and the time you spent in each location. It was quite a lot of work!”

Lady Seraphaka said, “Billions of lives saved.”

Lord Dakka said, “Started and ended a few wars, which is fun!”

Lord Eldraki grinned as he said, “We simply couldn’t get you to speak to us though, which was quite frustrating. It’s almost like you weren’t even there.”

Erick grumbled. “… Okay. Let’s get through the big points: The Dark wishes to be friendly, so I’ll be planting Yggdrasil there soon enough. I’m going to help with corruption here in this universe. And I’m not going to have your big tasks looming over my head. Let’s just [Onward] through all of these Margleknot-centric tasks right now, and deal with the rest later.”

And that is what he did.

He didn’t remember any of it, and that was by design.

He did not want to leave his family behind any longer than he already had.

- - - -

Erick stepped away from Margleknot, to a different sort of knot of time and space, where three different lives were all tangling together, back on Fenrir. Erick had many other places he wanted to be, but he went here, first, because as soon as he went back to the Cloud Castle over Candlepoint he’d be settled in for the long haul, whatever that might mean.

In Solomon’s Black Castle of Dungeon Island, south of Ascendant Mountain, Erick stepped into the family gathering room on the upper floor.

Solomon stood gathering Genesis and Divinity, arms raised wide, eyes focused forward, gold and silver melding into a large red crystal that was not really Red anymore. It contained the sleeping soul of Debby, or at least what remained of her. Solomon had not been able to bring her back through his [Silver Heart] rituals because she had been trapped inside implacable Malevolence, inside Nothanganathor’s Sign of Power.

But now Debby was here, waiting to be born again.

Destiny lay on the ground, spent. She had been helping until she couldn’t help anymore. All of her attempts to help Solomon bring Debby back had been ruined, and her failure and Solomon’s similar inability, and even Rozeta’s unwillingness to help more than she already had, was threatening to shatter a family-that-could-be.

Erick had stepped into a knot of Benevolence; a black tangle in the Benevolent Sky.

Solomon hadn’t even considered calling out to Erick for help, for to do so would be to admit that he could not do this himself, which would have ruined the ritual in a whole different direction. Wizardry worked best when the caster believed, after all, and Solomon had the beliefs of countless Ericks-that-failed working with him to help him complete this magic already. He was set with help.

But there was a fly in the ointment. Solomon considered himself the ‘Ericks that failed’.

In another, grander and more understandable sort of way, Solomon was trying to do too much. He was trying to bring back every Jane-that-died. That was what was going to ruin the ritual. Solomon’s grand cooperative cultivation had created Fenrir, and he could do a lot in that sort of direction, but that was easy compared to this. The creation of Fenrir was one person using a bunch of other people to make an object in the sky. What Solomon was doing now was trying to do the [Silver Heart] ritual across an infinity of slices of this Layer, bringing back every Jane that ever died. No matter how impressive Fenrir was, it was still just a single object. An infinity of lives was still an infinity of lives.

And then there was another problem. He believed it was his fault that Fenrir failed to trap Nothanganathor.

Those thoughts were poison.

Solomon looked at Erick as he cast, as mana charged the air and flowed into Debby in an endless tide. He gave Erick a look of utter dismay, and sadness, that Erick was going to step in and take over. That once again, Erick would be the one that would succeed, and he would fail, yet again.

Erick didn’t do that, though.

Erick simply said, “You’ve already succeeded, Solomon. You have to let her be born as who she is. You can’t make her everything. She has to do that herself. And she will.”

Destiny propped herself up on her arms, coughing, “You’ve done enou— enough, Solomon.”

Erick had done no magic, and neither had Destiny.

That was why Solomon believed them.

He had done enough.

Solomon’s dismayed gaze turned softer.

He gazed upon Debby, and then he tied up his spellwork, completing the working, cutting off countless other dead Janes that had yet to become part of Debby. He let his magic happen, as it was.

Gold directed silver and Genesis blossomed inside the not-Red crystal, crackling the surface as Debby once again took form, her body materializing in a flashing instant.

Things happened fast from there.

Debby coughed. Destiny said small expletives of thanks to various gods. Solomon fell to his knees, before his daughter. Debby had been changed by the Red, her irises crimson, her hair fire-red, her nails the color of blood. But she was Debby. She was a Jane from another multiverse, taken out of so many different Red Deaths and then brought forth into this life, but mostly she was the Debby that had been born of a dungeon slime, who had decided to become daughter of Solomon, who had died trying to get them all information about Nothanganathor, to wake them all up to the real threat of the Red.

Debby glanced at Erick, but then dismissed him as not her father.

Solomon, though, she stared at, because she could not believe who she was seeing.

Tears of blood rolled down Debby’s stoic face. Those tears rapidly became normal tears, as she whispered, “Dad?”

Solomon went to his daughter and took her into his arms, hugging her tight, “I’m here, Jane. I’m here.”

Debby-Jane held her father, and both of them cried out at the reunion.

Eventually, they would speak about Nothanganathor, multiverses, dungeon slimes becoming people, and all of that. But for now, Father held daughter, and all was good.

Destiny smiled from the sidelines alongside Erick.

Before all the multiverse stuff, and after all the crying yet to come, Solomon introduced Debby to Destiny, saying, “You know Destiny. It’s been a few years and… many different lives since you were here. Destiny is my wife, now.”

A moment of tension snapped.

Debby frowned. “I’m not ready to have a mother yet.”

Destiny laughed, Erick smiled, and Solomon began backpedaling, starting to talk about the multiverse and all of the big topics—

“Before all of that!” Debby looked at Erick, now, saying, “So you’re the uber-god, now? That’s the sense I’m getting from a lingering connection to Melemizargo.”

Erick said. “Right now I’m just an uncle who is very glad to see you— Oh yeah! You didn’t get to be a dragon yet. All your siblings are dragons now. You want to be a Benevolence Dragon? Or you could ask your dad about being a Genesis dragon! Or just a normal dragon; the Dragon Curse is gone.”

Debby’s eyebrows rose as she was left speechless.

Solomon grinned at his daughter as he asked Erick, “Will anyone want to be a normal dragon, if something like the Dragon Curse was even possible?”

“A Dragon Curse can only ever go so far. It only worked on Veird because Veird was so small, and Nothanganathor disrupted all the timelines where the Curse was broken. Veird would have broken out so many different ways if not for Nothanganathor’s various tricks.”

Debby was a little lost, so before she got more lost, she spoke up, “Okay! I want to be a dragon, yes. I want to learn magic now, too, from…” She looked at her father and uncle. “From someone. I want to know everything that happened after I died, too, so that I can make sure it never happens again, and I need phenomenal magic to do that.”

Solomon and Erick looked at each other and made a cooperative choice.

Solomon tried to be unexcited and kinda failed, as he casually said, “I’m sure I have some things I could teach you, if you want to learn.”

Erick added, “Maybe I have some useful magics, too.”

Debby smiled.

- - - -

Erick stepped into the cloud castle carrying a case of beer in cans from Margleknot. The castle was empty and the beer was the good stuff.

He sat down next to Poi, who was watching the false sun set on the horizon, painting the world in oranges and reds. He already had some beer, but Erick set a can down next to him.

Poi did not notice Erick right away, because Poi was in two very different places right now. Here, and also on the inner surface of Fenrir, more than a million kilometers away. He was currently creating a Crossroads with the help of Ascendant Prime and his sister Rizala, who were both in the Mind Mage city of Cerebrum on the second sphere, up above this Former Surface. To say that they were ‘in Cerebrum’ was a small lie, though. They were mostly spread out all over the place, just like Poi was right now.

Poi eventually noticed Erick, though. He blinked a few times, the pale blue light in his eyes returning, and then he gasped a little, before chuckling. “I can see your mind again.”

Erick had opened up his mind once again. It was easy when one was a god, to do many impossible things at once. Using Erick’s memories, Poi cracked open the beer can as though he had been using them all his life, and yet there had never been beer cans on Veird until this moment.

Poi said, “But that’s not all of you?”

Erick smiled. “I’ve got it set up to show you all the normal things I’m thinking, and I can even use normal Mind Magic, too. So there’s no real hiding trick, except for hiding the god stuff. And now you can know how to open a beer can without being told! It’s amazing, all around.” He smirked. “I might even be vulnerable to Mind Magic.”

Poi snorted. “Pity the fools that try that on you.”

Erick chuckled.

After a moment of comfortable silence, Poi said, “I’m glad, Erick. Really happy. Everything worked out.”

“Were there ever any doubts?”

With a small joy in his voice, Poi said, “Soooo many doubts. Everywhere! All the time!”

Erick laughed.

- - - -

Erick lay in bed with Quilatalap, both of them just breathing, holding onto each other, enjoying the moment.

“I love you. I missed you a lot,” Erick said.

“I love you, too. Do you want to talk about where you went?”

“Not really. Not yet. I mostly [Onward]ed it, anyway.” Erick smiled and said, “So about me needing to give you lots of reasons to still love me as you work through your trauma: How about some god sex?”

Quilatalap paused as Erick’s words actually sunk in, and then he started chuckling, his chest heaving under Erick’s arms. “You mean that wasn’t god sex? You’re holding out on me!”

Erick laughed.

It was a good day.

- - - -

The next day, Teressa and Rizala and Dariok held a party at the Cloud Castle for the extended family.

It was a barbecue in big pits with smoke and beer, and bonfires and small talks, and lots of desserts and lots of good times, getting together with everyone.

Everywhere, all across Veird and Fenrir, the same sort of thing was happening, as it could. People met with family. They reconnected in their new lives. They made bread from wheat [Grow]n in fields. They ate monsters grown in dungeon spaces, or out in the wilds. They built cities and made babies. They sailed boats across oceans the sizes of several planets, and hiked up mountains even larger.

They made houses, and they made those houses into homes.

Back at the cloud castle, Teressa and Dariok introduced a new puppy to everyone, because Lenitha wanted a dog and it seemed like a good time to get one. It was a cute puppy that was already 50 kilos, because they were orcols. Eventually the dog would become the size of a human. Her name was Rex, because Teressa had asked Erick for dog names and that was what he had given her.

The cute little (really very big) puppy bounded everywhere, trying to get everyone’s food, but Lenitha was charged with teaching the puppy how to behave, and she was doing a great job. It helped that the dog was already super smart. Red was a mixed breed that was part wardog, of the famous Wardogs of Nelboor, and part dober, of the much smaller, but no less famous form of dog that Erick had made out of some [Reincarnation]d shadowolves, down in Candlepoint well over 15 years ago by now. Dobers had become a truly prolific breed, being smart and loving, but able to fend off shadowolves all on their own. There were only about 50 pure dobers right now, but there would be a lot more in the future, for sure. Crossbreeding with [Husbandry] was where most people got their dobers, though, and that’s where Rex had come from.

Rex tried to eat Kiri’s [Familiar] off of her nearby perch.

Sunny was covered in bits of barbecue that she couldn’t really eat, but she really wanted to try, anyway, so Erick couldn’t really blame Rex for wanting to nibble. But Sunny flew away fast and Rex barked and gave chase. Lenitha gave chase, too, trying to get Rex to slow down. Everyone else laughed.

In a quiet way so Lenitha couldn’t hear, Teressa asked Kiri, “Is Sunny becoming herself? Or is that you playing with them?”

Kiri smiled as she leaned back in her lawn chair like a particularly proud almost-parent, saying, “She’s getting more independent. Normally she’d fly up, but she’s staying low enough so that she can still play. It’s not like Rex can hurt her, though. She just puffs away into light and reforms elsewhere.”

Teressa nodded, smiling a little. “Good.”

Kiri asked Erick, sitting beside her, “You’ll be Sunny’s godparent when she’s born, right?”

Erick grinned. “Yeah. I will.”

Kiri smiled. “Good.” And then she asked, “Are you the one I should pray to for matchmaking services? Because I think I want a husband.”

Erick laughed. “You can certainly ask! But no. Try Atunir. She loves that. She’d love to match the Gatemaster of Veird to some power out there in Fenrir.”

“Ah, passing the charge,” Kiri said, nodding. “Just like a good boss to delegate the hard tasks.”

Erick smiled at the many layered meanings to that. “There was that boy about 7 years ago that you had that fling with. He was a prince, wasn’t he?”

Kiri got a disgusted look on her face, sticking her tongue out a little… And then she paused. She wondered. She asked, “Him?” She shook her head and clicked her tongue. “No.”

Erick hid his grin behind his beer.

Somehow Jane and Debby got into a hot-wing eating contest, using what was considered 14 Star hot sauce. The sauce was deeply maroon and flickered with divinity, and the air was hot for ten meters around the sauce, even before the container was opened. When they opened the container some people had to put up shields. That hot sauce was practically Elemental Fire, and parts of it actually were.

The family cheered on Jane and Debby, while the kids and even some of the adults stood as far back as they could.

Both of the girls ate till they puked and needed healing, neither willing to concede defeat.

The new dog approached the puke and everyone tried to stop her, but she stopped herself when she got within a meter of the red stuff. She yelped and ran away, tucking her tail between her legs. Lenitha went chasing after her, calling out for her to come back.

It was another good day.

At the end of it, Erick hugged every person in his family, which was awkward for some of them, but it was what it was. 

Jane hugged him back especially hard, though, saying to his shoulder, “I love you, Dad.”

Erick smiled and hugged her back. “I love you too, Jane.”

- - - -

A week passed fast.

A month soon followed.

Emergencies rose and were put to rest, but they were nothing that Erick couldn’t handle, and if not him, then one of the other gods could handle it. Melemizargo, primarily. Not much of that happened, though. Mostly, the problems were simple normal problems. Food, shelter, safety from confusion and danger. Erick worked tirelessly to ensure that everything returned to as much normalcy as he could.

Mostly, people just lived their lives, figuring out their new world.

Erick and the Pantheon worked tirelessly and quickly to sculpt Fenrir into something that would last. The hands in the center rapidly became a major source of worship, mainly through the awe of it all. From the interior surface, the sun was still just the size of a thumbprint, but the hands reaching to the sun were both the size of the hands of that thumbprint. As they spun, they brought light and shadow in 12 hour increments for the vast majority of the interior.

They set up the exterior moonsuns to shine or dim based on the shadows cast by the hands around the sun, so even from the outside, you could see the shadows cast by the Dark, and people had normal day/night cycles.

In the deepest parts of the Dark, at the poles of the sphere, that is where they made the Gates to Darkness. For tens thousand kilometers, around sunmoons that never dimmed and shone the brightest they could, the world was Dark. One pole for going, the other for coming, though Erick suspected that controlling traffic would be an exercise in futility. Rather, it would be easier to set up shipping lanes with guides that knew how to get back and forth easily, because it wasn’t so easy to get into the New Painted Cosmology if you didn’t know the trick.

It wasn’t a blackhole problem, though, like with some universes.

The exact delineation between the Dark and the Fractal was difficult for a mortal to parse, but easy to understand, because in most ways, there was no delineation. One merely had to go through the Dark land, hoping to reach the Darkness, and you would emerge in the Painted Cosmology. The same was true for leaving the Painted Cosmology, to head back to the Fractal.

Erick had just stepped through that delineation again, and for the hundredth time.

It had only been a month since they had put Fenrir to rights, but the work of putting the entire Painted Cosmology to rights would take the rest of Erick’s life, and further beyond that, because there was no end to that task, that joy, at all. It was just life, and it was a good one.

The Painted Cosmology was a land of sprawling elements, pure in their creation. Particles had no place here, except for what people brought into this land.

Elemental Stone became Elemental Mountain and then Elemental Continent when stung together large enough.

Elemental Water became Elemental lake, and then Ocean if there was enough of it.

Elemental Air became Wind, became Atmosphere.

Fire became Blaze, became Conflagration and more.

Put them together and you got a world running on physics which Erick had never seen before, but which seemed simple enough to understand, especially when some of those Elements got up and started walking around, laying down more of themselves, all of it fueled by Dark Marks in every soul, carving the Dark into what they wanted it to be.

Among the Grand Creation were the fae of Fairy Moon’s court. They were the ones doing the major lifting, making worlds out of mana, turning a lot of Darkness into stable land.

Erick crafted a few sunstars while he stood there, at the Edge, setting them adrift and glowing with Benevolence, brighter than the other Light-based sunstars. Where they flowed, life came into being. Elemental Stone and Water spontaneously grew into Plant, crowding out oceans and mountains. Soon slimes took to life. Benevolence Sprites flickered out of the Benevolence stars to coax life into more complex forms.

Erick was a little surprised at that, but he had seen it many times already, and he would probably continue to be surprised at it for a while. It was nice, though, to see Benevolence so easily becoming life, all on its own, and then more than that.

For a while, Erick just watched it all.

And then Rozeta floated beside him, in the space just inside the Dark, watching worlds with him. She held out a muffin, reminiscent of so long ago, except wholly different. Back in the Grand Wizard’s Tower in the Outer Core of Veird, Rozeta had spoken to Erick about Wizards and the Painted Cosmology, and she had spoken of how particle-based muffins were 90% the same as Old Cosmology muffins, but they were, in truth, completely different. Those muffins in that Grand Wizard’s Tower had been made of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and other trace elements. This one was made of Elemental Plant, which was a combination of Light, Stone, Water, and even a bit of Benevolence for this particular muffin. That was just the main plant-based material, though. There was also Elemental—

Rozeta couldn’t help herself any longer. She laughed, bright and happy, and then she picked up Erick’s hand and put the muffin in his hand, saying, “I like that when you’re dressed like a human you still think like a Wizard trying to figure it all out.”

Erick grinned, and then he bit into the muffin, and it tasted… quite normal, really. “I expected something amazing?”

Rozeta laughed again, free and happy. “I stole that one from Kromolok’s kitchen, so I’ll let him know you were disappointed.”

Erick changed his tune, “It’s a wonderful muffin. Best I ever ate.” He took another bite. “… Maybe my taste buds are set up for particles, though.”

“That’s the general problem, yes. That’s what I told Kromolok, too. I’m sure people will develop taste buds for Elements eventually, and then we can copy that and truly enjoy a good muffin.”

Erick smiled at that thought, and a comfortable silence enveloped them.

Rozeta looked out across the worlds with Erick, as a mortal.

Rozeta said, “You know… it’s been so long since I’ve been here. It’s all different. I’d say the bones were the same and the house is renovated, but it’s more like the world has been removed, and then we’re building a new one and starting with particles which are really Elements.”

“The fae are doing most of the work,” Erick said, not quite sure what he meant by that.

“Did you want to do some creation?”

Erick made another Benevolent sunstone and set it adrift into the Dark. It pushed back the grasping, clawing, beckoning cacophony of the Dark, making way for the light. The Dark welcomed the light, really, and the light created every other basic Element out of the retreating Dark. But it was a cacophony of creation. Completely disarrayed, with Stone and Wind and Water and all the rest appearing like auroras that lost cohesion as Benevolence and became smaller things.

Some of the fae working where Erick had sent the sunlight gave Erick some bad looks, as their stone got water all over it, or their fire got light all in it. They grumbled, and told him to send the lights further into the Dark, and to leave their parts of creation alone.

Erick sent out another Benevolent sunlight, far away from the current areas, saying, “I’m not that great at creation. Melemizargo is loving it, though.”

Melemizargo was a Creation Wizard, after all. Or at least he had been, and now he was again, of a sort.

Erick watched him now, beyond the Dark, inside the Black, like a flow moving under an ocean’s surface, unseen except in the barest of ways, and only through inference.

And then Melemizargo surfaced and grabbed Erick’s sunlight and sent it spinning deep into the Dark, like a spear cast from a god, which is what it became. The sunlight spear crashed through the Dark, parting the Black, and the Black seemed to clap at its passing. It went far, far beyond sight, trailing a bit of creation with it as it went, leaving a mana river in its wake. It would probably keep going forever. Melemizargo had already done similar acts of Creation with other things the fae had created.

Rozeta frowned a little, saying, “I think you gave him too much power.”

Erick shrugged. “I don’t think I did.”

Erick made another sunlight, the crystal of Benevolence forming in front of him like a radiant prism, cascading in every direction with creation. He imbued this one with a [Silver Heart] of Elemental Genesis, and the whole thing started to glow like the Lifeblood Heart of so long ago. The universe turned into an aurora, that then began to grow all on its own.

Erick gave the light a flick, sending it careening into creation, passing by every single fae’s work and doubling what they already had going on.

There were many, many complaints about that, but they were trying to make sandcastles when the beach was the size of a small house. Erick thought they should just be trying to make more and more and not focus so much on the small right now, but he was clearly outvoted.

He was having fun anyway.

Erick smiled and pulled back from creating, saying, “I’ve got a party to attend and be back here later. Want to come?”

“I might show up, but have fun with your family, Erick. I do want to know when I can plan on speaking with you regarding godly manners, though. Do you have…” she smirked. “Office hours?”

Erick chuckled. “Well… I used a method a few times when I was realizing myself under the Mantle, and it seemed to work well enough. I’ll probably pull the Mantle on tight every time I sleep, and that should be good enough since I’m not very linear. Other than that, I’ll be more or less this guy you see before you, going forward, in the waking hours.”

Rozeta smiled softly, as emotions came and stayed, and then moved on slowly, but not really. “I’m really glad you won, Erick. Thanks… Thanks for everything. And for my sons. Both of them. Kirginatharp is doing well now, and Idyrvamikor is… adjusting. I had never thought Idyrvamikor could have been changed like that, but he had been. And now he’s back. Thank you.”

Erick smiled. “Those two back to fighting, yet?”

“Ha!” Rozeta got a far-off look on her face as she gazed upon the Painted Cosmology, saying, “I’ll give it a few hundred years before they find something to fight about again, but maybe not? They only fought because Nothanganathor was twisting them to fight… Mostly. Idyrvamikor achieved Wizardry the very second he realized he was without it, of course. That boy was always bright. But Kirginatharp is the older brother now, by a lot, and he Ignited to Wizardry just the other day, so that’s done a lot of good to their dynamic.”

Erick nodded. “I wish them good luck, then, and you, too. You sure you don’t want to come to the big party? It’s not just family at this one.”

“I’ll see you soon, Erick.

“See you soon, then.”

Erick departed.

- - - -

Rozeta watched Erick return through the portal, which was half of the current size of the Painted Cosmology universe, and thought it all quite amazing.

Everything had all worked out perfectly.

Rozeta chuckled to herself, as she watched the Painted Cosmology grow, as she thought back, years and years ago, to when she first saw Erick and Jane pop into the world, their little blue boxes appearing as a notification on the Core of Veird. They had almost gotten themselves killed right off the starting line, due to her father, and then again due to them possibly messing with the Script, which was a paladinable offense. But then she saw his mana generation was Wizard-level, and she chose to do what gods usually did.

She waited, and she saw.

And then Erick connected positive particles to negative particles in several kilometers-worth of sky and caused lightning to strike a tower in Spur.

A lot had happened since then.

A lot more would happen from now until Eternity.

- - - -

Jane sat at the party, sipping sunset wine. It was really pink, almost like a crystal pink, and a little sparkly. It was fantastic. Surprisingly good, really. It was ‘the good stuff’ from Cascadio’s personal stash, and that guy had been partying nonstop at his Cavalcade, and that’s where Jane was right now, though she wasn’t quite sure where ‘here’ really was. All one had to do to get an invite to the party was pray to Cascadio, and then bam! You turned a corner and there was a big grass field under the open sky, filled with tables of food and music and a whole lot of people. The specific people you managed to walk into were different every time you got here, unless you were part of a specific party. Jane was part of a specific party. Or at least she would be, when the guest of honor arrived.

Right now she was sitting with Sitnakov, just enjoying a break from all the chaos that was the world now.

Up above, the sun shone down from between a dad’s draconic thumb and pointer finger, and the party was a subdued, sort of get-together, more than a real party. It also had hundreds of people in every direction.

Sitnakov sparkled a beautiful white in the sun, as he sipped his own wine next to Jane, though he sputtered a little bit when dad stepped into the party, half a kilometer away. Sitnakov breathed deep and then smiled serenely, as dad started walking Jane’s way.

Dad was rapidly swamped with people who wanted to talk to him, so he stopped and talked.

Jane wasn’t sure what to make of her father, so she was glad for another moment of breathing room.

Erick had been a Wizard, who then became a crystal who was also a person, while also becoming a dragon somewhere in all that, and then he became fae, through a trip to Earth and then back again, before promptly, not even 10 days later, he went on to fight Nothanganathor. And then he was Xoat, or at least a part of Xoat. Jane wasn’t quite sure what all that meant. And then he ritualistically sacrificed Xoat, because Xoat never wanted to come back together and he wanted to go back to the Dark…

It was a lot.

Jane was still processing it.

Her siblings were all still processing it, too.

Ophiel was currently walking hand in hand with dad, and he looked very happy. Ophiel seemed to be processing all of this rather easily and wonderfully. He was also pretending to be more of a kid than he was, and Jane was pretty sure he shrunk himself some, too, but that was fine.

Dad looked happy. He was smiling. He also looked fully human, or as much of a human as a god could be, which turned out to be pretty close to human. He didn’t even mana sense everything around him anymore unless he wanted to, and usually he didn’t want to. He saw enough already.

Quilatalap walked on Dad’s other side, grinning a lot. Jane wondered if he worshiped dad now, too, in addition to his other three gods, of Koyabez, Phagar, and Melemizargo. She didn’t want to think too deeply about all that, though.

Jane said to Sitnakov, “I’m gonna talk to him. Come over soon, but not right away.”

Sitnakov nodded.

Jane got up and went across the party to her father. She took her time getting there, and he was also half a kilometer away, so there was plenty of ground to cover between here and there. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say, and dad was busy with all the other people at the party, anyway.

Eventually, she reached him.

Erick was talking to some elves from the Blood Enclave out there on Fenrir, and that was a bit of a thorny situation.

At the very beginning of Veird here in the Fractal Cosmology, Melemizargo had gone ‘insane’ and killed 90% of all the people under the Surface, in the tunnels of Veird, and also all of the elves. That had been an incomplete truth. Melemizargo had gone insane and killed people, but some people simply vanished. Those people had been drawn into Nothanganathor’s Sign of Power and locked into Red stasis crystals. The elves of the Blood Enclave were the ‘bad elves’ that everyone feared from the Old Cosmology, who used Blood Magic to enslave and control.

Nothanganathor had put them out on Fenrir in order to sow chaos, or left them in his Sign; Jane was sure both were true.

In the Great Resurrection, Erick had [Reincarnation]ed them all and then set them down nearby some orcol priests of Aloethag—

Jane banished her descent into a thought hole. Sometimes Intelligence was overactive.

The three elves and the two orcols standing with father and Quilatalap and Ophiel weren’t a threat. They were all talking quietly and asking dad if their plans were acceptable.

Erick smiled gently throughout a whole spiel from the elves, and said, “I’m sure it will work out fine. Aloethag is glad to have you all back.”

“But we need to atone, yes?” said the lead elf, a little mad and getting madder. “We had entered into some plans to do just that in order to be accepted into the Grand Councils of Quintlan, but then we were somehow captured for 1400 years and none of our plans make any sense anymore.”

Erick softly said, “I’m just a mortal right now, Occultist Shev. I can give you some general advice, but if you’re looking for divine guidance then you should speak to Aloethag.”

Occultist Shev’s face did a weird little twitch. He was furious at not being taken seriously.

And then the man rapidly moved up in Jane’s threat assessment rankings, because a spear made of blood simply appeared all the way through Erick’s chest, fountaining out of his back.

Jane went through several reactions, none of which were concerned for her father’s safety, which was a big surprise for her and she would be evaluating again, later. Mostly, she mentally marked down that Occultist Shev and his people were probably going to have some difficult times ahead of them. The orcols with the blood elves looked ashamed. Other nearby party goers were stuck between disbelief and quiet fury, with most of them stuck on disbelief.

Occultist Shev sneered, “Gods who can be struck so easily do not deserve the title!”

Erick wiped off his shirt, as though he was wiping off a bit of dirt and not a thigh-thick spear of blood, in the process breaking what looked to be a phenomenal working of magic into a thick wind that ruffled hair and dresses. His shirt was unmarred, his body was unharmed, and no one was hurt, so Erick wasn’t even mad.

Occultist Shev and his two cronies looked a little worried now. They expected that magic to work more than it had.

Erick said, “You wanted advice for living in this new world? Here is some advice: I’m glad you spoke about striking gods, because sure, strike a god if you want. Gods are all fair game, I guess, because mortals can’t really hurt a god with normal attacks. Still kinda stupid to strike me. Not only are we at Cascadio’s Cavalcade, and he’s asking me right now if I wish to pursue vengeance and I am saying no, but gods are a lot more normal than I am. They’d probably follow through with some sort of curse, but I can’t be bothered with that when talking might clear up your issues.

“I’m glad you didn’t follow the normal precedent of your clan to strike first, and then demand a slave contract to heal the wound. That would have gotten you a smiting. Still not sure how I want to do smites these days, or even if I want to at all. I’m leaning toward ‘no’, except for big offenses, and trying to hurt me isn’t a big offense. It’s probably the least offensive offense you could have tried.

“Anyway!

“You should go back to the Enclave and tell them that you should follow Aloethag’s recommendations for living in this new world. No slavery. No Contract Magic. Maybe cosmetic magic would work out well for you? People are always looking to look better. Might want to rethink that impetus to use violence, though.

“Byebye.”

And then Erick swept a portal across the three blood elves, and they were gone.

Erick smiled and turned toward the orcols. “Aloethag is having trouble with them, I take it?”

“Yes, sir. That display might have helped start to turn minds, though. Thank you.”

“Glad to help!” Erick asked, “You want a portal back there, too?”

“Please.”

Erick obliged.

And then he turned— And jolted a little bit as he saw Jane. He grinned, and the world seemed brighter. It might have literally been brighter, too. And then he realized it was brighter and he calmed all of that. He cleared his throat, then asked, “Hey, Jane. I got stuck walking toward you.”

Jane just shook her head a little bit, not sure what to say.

Ophiel spoke up, “I can’t survive a spear through the chest yet, but I’m still trying!”

Erick happily said, “You’ll get there soon enough.”

Jane had kinda forgotten what she had come over here for, and really, she didn’t have any plan for talking at all except to figure a plan out by the time she got here. Now she was here, she had nothing. So she said, “I truly never have to worry about your safety at all, do I?”

Erick said, “You should have had a better childhood with a mom and a dad who wasn’t doing crazy stuff, Jane, but we both turned out okay, and we’re nowhere near the end of anything anymore.”

Jane’s breath caught. Trying not to be embarrassed, she said, “I loved growing up with you, Dad. You’re… You’re great.”

Erick took Jane into his arms and hugged her tight.

Jane breathed out, glad that dad still felt like dad to hold. It was a weird thing to think about, but she was glad it still felt the same to hug him.

Erick patted her on the back and smiled as he stepped back, letting the serious moment turn playful as he asked, “So you once spoke about being a teleporting paladin? Still interested? If you don’t pick it, Debby is gonna!”

Jane chuckled, feeling something like joyful tears gather at the corners of her eyes. She teased back, “Solomon isn’t mad at you for taking his daughter?”

“Bah! No one wants to be the paladin of their dad!”

“Ah, so I should be a paladin of Solomon, then?”

“No no no. Benevolence is different. A lot better than Wisdom.”

Solomon stepped up to the gathering of father and daughter, saying, “What’s this disparaging comment I hear about Wisdom?”

Debby was right next to him, wearing a soft red dress, saying, “That it’s not as good as Benevolence, dad.”

Erick laughed—

Ophiel tugged on his robes. “I want to be your paladin.”

Erick happily picked up Ophiel, smiling wide, as he put Ophiel onto his arm, easily holding him, saying, “I’m glad to have you, Paladin Ophiel.”

Ophiel giggled happily as he hugged dad, saying, “Yay!”

“I know just what you can do, too,” Erick said, as others began to join the little gathering.

Poi walked up with a drink in his hand. Teressa was there with her daughter, who was holding hands with a different Ophiel while Dariok had a big pulled pork sandwich in his hands, and Jane felt a little hungry seeing that. There was pulled pork? Where? Somehow Overseer Aisha of House Benevolence walked up with Evan at exactly that right time, with Castellan Zolan and his grandson close behind. Jane expected other people to pop out of the woodwork, too, since that was what happened at Cascadio’s Cavalcade; you met who you needed to meet at the exact right time.

Right on cue, Fallopolis stepped out from behind a tower of donuts on a nearby table, with four big donuts on her plate. One of them almost fell off as she spotted Erick and company. She startled. “Oh my! What’s this?”

Erick smiled and said, “Right on time, Fallopolis.”

“I decided on Opal, by the way,” Fallopolis said, easily slotting into the group.

Erick grinned. “A fine name.”

Opal, eh? Jane supposed. Did it have any significance? Do I know any ‘Opal’s? Well. There was that one…

There was that one ‘Opal’.

Uhhhhhh.

A wave of recollection hit most people in the group at almost the exact same time.

Poi was the first to speak up, “Wait a FUCKING second! Archmage Opal? Of Spur?”

Teressa glared hard. “No. I’ve seen Archmage Opal in perso—”

“She taught me… in… person...” Poi had started hard, but then his voice withered.

Erick said, “She taught me, too. [Ward Destruction] and a bunch of other stuff.”

“Yup!” Fallopolis said, happily. “You were all very good students, and—”

Poi frowned. “How long have you been Archmage Opal?”

Teressa asked anyone who could answer, “Opal has been around for 80 years?”

“All 80 of those years, but also that’s how I started life. I was even Shade Opal for a time, at the beginning. She died in the Great Purge of Spur, though, and was only reborn later, when I needed to help Spur come back together. It was only ever meant to be a small subterfuge, but then it sort of just kept going on,” Fallopolis said, grinning. “I don’t think even Silverite knows— Well. She’s sure to know, now. I bet she tries to kill me next time we meet.”

“She knew,” Erick said, surprising Fallopolis and everyone else except Quilatalap.

“No way!” Poi said, disbelieving.

Teressa frowned. “She knew?!”

Fallopolis frowned. “When did she know?”

Quilatalap spoke up, “When I told her about 20 years after the Purge, when you first tried to pull that shit.”

Fallopolis gasped, and it might have even been a real reaction. “You didn’t.”

“I did,” Quilatalap said. “You weren’t the only one that thought that you went too far with Spur. Also, you were ‘Shade Opal’ for a while and even if you were 1 out of 500, you were still known.”

Fallopolis flustered a little. “I had always assumed that she forgot!”

Quilatalap said, “She is just as much a High Priest in Koyabez’s church as I am. Sure, she disliked me for teaching necromancy to others, but we still talked about the big things.”

Poi relaxed, and so did Teressa. Their worlds were still a little shattered, though, and Jane could relate.

Jane had too many feelings to really consider how she felt about Fallopolis being Archmage Opal. Except for those she personally taught, Opal was always using her [Familiar] to speak with others, so it would have been easy for Fallopolis to fool everyone… Right?

Jane did wonder, though, “What about Archmage Obsidian and Wave?”

Fallopolis easily said, “Obsidian is actually a Necromancer of Quilatalap’s that got in good with Spur. Wave is just another Stone Mage, so not really a ‘Wave Mage’ at all.”

That led to thoughtful silence.

Erick spoke up, “So I’m glad you showed up for this, Fallopolis— Or do you prefer Opal?”

“Fallopolis has been a fine name for me for many good years.”

Erick continued, “So, with regard to why I need some paladins, and why Ophiel is going to be a good one, and a general overview of what I’m doing as a god: It all has to do with the afterlife of Benevolence, and how I don’t have a traditional one, don’t want a traditional one, and how I’m going to need people to help with the afterlife I do have planned.

“I took some of Melemizargo’s dungeon slimes but reincarnated them into something a lot more Benevolent, changing how they work completely. I used those dungeon slimes to make Benevolent gate spaces that I spread out across the universe. I even put a few on Earth. I call them safeholds; not dungeons. I’ll skip the nuances of that to a minimum and get to the good stuff.

“Those dungeons naturally collect the souls of those who die anywhere nearby, if they’re not slated for other directions, and give them choices.

“The most popular choice, by far, is to be [Reincarnation]d in a new world, with a bit of power to help them along the way, in the shape of a [Personal Script] and one spell of their choice.

“I figure that I benefited greatly from the whole planar experience, so I’m giving that experience to as many people as I can.

“So? What do you think?”

First, came silence.

And then everyone wanted to start talking at once.

“Will people be able to return to life where they were?” Poi asked. “Free resurrections?”

“Sometimes people will be brought back where they already were, but I imagine the vast majority will be moved on, far, far away from where they started. Wherever they need to be. Infinity is a very large place, with a lot of problems, and this is a good systemic solution.”

“Are there dead people inside Benevolence right now?” Teressa asked.

“Only about a million. The number is rising daily, but you can’t even see them most of the time. They’re in the fog.”

Fallopolis was a little offended as she asked, “You’re just... letting people into… into heaven? Just like that?”

“Of course!” Erick said.

“Is it a shitty heaven,” Fallopolis deadpanned.

“Admittedly, it is a shitty heaven. No everlasting joy for most people, though I am giving that to a few people who truly do want it. I want people to move on to new lives, though, so that’s the goal there.”

Conversation turned weird, honing in on religion and worship and the nature of divinity itself. Dariok asked about other gods, and if Erick was taking all of their worshipers. Erick spoke of how the options after death covered that, with boons gifted from the gods Erick allowed into his system, which was all of the current ones. One could always pick up other gods and other universal Marks, outside of his system, though. Castellan Zolan asked about abuses of magic in new worlds, and power gained through causing death and chaos. Erick replied about Personal Scripts only incentivizing the helping of others, or personally bettering yourself, and while the second was rife for abuse, it was also the right thing to do, for you can’t help others if you need all your help for yourself. Evan asked about choices of bodies. Erick said that body choice was among the options, but in a limited sort of way, for the system would throw the person into a world where they needed to be, so that they could be their best person, both for them, and for others. If someone wanted to learn body changing magics, then they could do that, though.

“Got a space set up for a presentation, like we did with the dungeons?” Fallopolis asked, with a sly little smile, as though she already knew the answer.

Erick chuckled. “Maybe! Let’s finish up here, though.”

He had a space set up for it, Jane knew. Maybe he hadn’t had one at the start of this conversation, but he had one out there, now.

Shadow was somehow present, as though she had always been there. She asked, “What about second and third deaths?”

Erick smiled. “There’s gonna be a checking system to see if a person deserves a third or fourth chance at life. Right now, that check involves the judgments of the Benevolence safeholds on worlds that have one, but that’s getting into the nuance of it all, and is better saved for the presentations.

“Ideally, this whole thing will allow for a form of eternal life for most good people, well past their second, third, and many other deaths. You might consider it a different form of Koyabez’s Peace Corps, that Quilatalap used to be a part of, where they sent out people to solve conflicts and then resurrected them if they failed, so they could try again.

“The End is always there for a person if they want it, of course, but ideally, every person who goes through the reincarnation planar system will be able to make their own heavens, in whatever lives they can make, wherever they happen to be, and if they want to go again at the end, then they can.”

The group went silent, though there were a few gasps from the newcomers in the crowd. There was Silverite, and Killzone and Chernom. There was Al and Mog and Savral. The Regent and Archmage of Storm’s Edge, which had been Erased and then Restored. A lot of people who had been thought lost forever, but they were back. Rats even stood beside Life Binder Messalina, though they were both far away from the group, not wanting to intrude too much. Sitnakov was beside Jane, and Jane…

Jane was silent as she listened, but she already knew how she felt the very second Dad had mentioned [Reincarnation]s in a new world as an ‘afterlife’.

Jane’s voice cut through the silence, “I love it.”

Erick grinned.

~ ~ ~ ~

THE END

~ ~ ~ ~