Prayer & Direction

Underneath the Rodan forest, a pair of goblins were having a quiet conversation. They were both seated on the floor and they were the two most devoted followers of the strange nature god who identified itself as Cosecha.

"Why don't you pray? Cosecha itself told me that prayer is the path to get to know it." One of the two goblins said to her neighbor. She had bright yellow skin and was dressed in roughly fashioned animal armor.

Her companion and the person she was politely chiding was the first cleric of the master of the Rodan forest. Xiax looked at her and sighed. When he didn't articulate a response, his neighbor looked up at him sympathetically.

"Xiax... Cosecha is an accepting god. It is a kind god. It healed us. It healed you most of all. What are you afraid will happen?" Mawby asked, curiously and sincerely. She found the goblin's behavior beyond strange and somewhat maddening.

Mawby was a pious follower of Cosecha. She believed in the god whole-heartedly. In her mind, she fed the savior of her people daily. This belief hailed from a conversation the two of them had had when they first met, wherein the god told her that it fed on belief. Admittedly, she received regular responses from the strange deity but in her mind, Xiax had received the real reward.

Mawby was the only person aside from Althos that knew that Xiax had been awarded a class. Xiax had approached her when night fell over the encampment and told her of the award the system had bestowed upon him. The system was vague, but it told him that he was now a cleric, a devoted follower of a god who was gifted magical power by either the system or the god itself.

Xiax's gaze met Mawby's. He studied her for a moment and he was able to detect what she felt. He detected the corruption in her heart that twisted how she felt about him. Mawby was envious that either the system or Cosecha itself recognized the piety that the odd god had inspired in Xiax and saw fit to reward him for this powerful emotion.

The goblin cleric quietly considered how to proceed from here. He recognized the pain that was eating away at Mawby. And he recognized the fear that gripped his heart. After thinking for a few seconds he figured that speaking honestly to Mawby might help her deal with the jealous that was eating at her.

"Mawby, I... Listen I didn't choose this. And neither did Cosecha. The system did. It was explicit about that. I was told by it that it chose me to be a Cosechian cleric." Xiax explained, telling her the truth. This caught Mawby off guard, and her eyes softened further.

"Oh... Well still, our savior feeds off of belief and faith. It told me so! Your prayers might help sustain it." Mawby told her companion, her voice soft and filled with a renewed hope. It appeared, to Xiax anyway, that learning that Cosecha didn't choose him over her but that the system had made the decision to transform him into a cleric was positive for Mawby.

The tiny yellow goblin had an envious heart. One could even say that that was her greatest flaw.

The idea that Cosecha chose someone who wasn't even Troik over her to be its first cleric was deeply frustrating. Mawby could even accept the presence of Raiz, a creature literally created by Cosecha who was its self-proclaimed high-priestess and had escorted Troik back to the encampment, but the idea that Cosecha had chosen Xiax over her had been too much for her to endure much longer.

Mawby, calmer now than she had felt in days, was able to snap herself back to the restorative and helpful person she wanted to be. She was now truly sympathetic and the next words she said were surprisingly helpful to Xiax.

"Maybe I should pray out loud. So you can hear how someone else does it. Would that help you begin to understand the power of prayer?" Mawby asked, smiling serenely at Xiax. The Cosechian cleric looked at Mawby and smiled. He nodded at her, eager to see how she did it. Mawby smiled back at him, eager to teach him how she approached prayer.

When the cleric nodded at Mawby, the goblin momentarily wondered how to best teach her new student. The truth was that the system had been coaching her over the last few days, teaching her different approaches to prayer.

She had taken notes about the advice that the system had taught her and so far the prayers that were the most likely to receive responses were conversational prayers. In fairness, Cosecha frequently replied to Mawby's prayers and Mawby was grateful for this, it just so happened that the prayers that were the most likely to garner direct responses were conversational prayers.

Mawby grinned after contemplating how to teach Xiax. And then she began to speak.

"Prayer is important to me. Prayer is how I know Cosecha's will. I pray more than once per day, though I don't always get a direct, audible response from Cosecha." Mawby informed her ally, happy to have a chance to spread her own particular beliefs to someone else.

"I pray by directing my thoughts to Cosecha. When I do, the system asks me if I'd like to make my thoughts a prayer. After I inform it that I would, I begin to share my thoughts with Cosecha. From time to time I've gotten direct responses, but otherwise, I get responses from the system that inform me as to how my prayers make Cosecha feel." Mawby revealed, explaining something that was unknown even to Cosecha itself.

This revelation caused Xiax's eyes to go wide. And it pleased the cleric. It gave him the assurance that he had needed to be able to muster the courage required to pray to his divine master.

The source of the goblin's fear had been that after he prayed he wouldn't know what his master wanted, or if the god was pleased by the prayer. It wasn't so much that the goblin wouldn't know precisely how to pray, it was that he would pray and not know how his prayers made his god feel or if his god had some tasks he needed to complete in the name of the master of the forest.

His fears assuaged, the goblin immediately began to pray. He was eager to do so and thankful for Mawby's intentional and unintentional assurances. Mawby herself was unaware of Xiax's newfound courage and continued to attempt to indoctrinate her companion.

The prayer was a detailed accounting of the past few days and contained some sections of interest to the opportunistic deity the goblin served and worshipped.

"Cosecha, I sincerely apologize for taking so long to pray to you. I beg your forgiveness and mercy, as I was too afraid that you may not reply to me if I prayed. It is only because of my fellow goblin, Mawby, that I now know better than to be afraid of that." The prayer began.

The middle of the prayer was little more than accounting for the past few days. It was a detailed and thoughtful accounting, that would inform the deity to whom it was sent of events that would definitely intrigue him, including the arrival of the first lifeform he created: Raiz.

"Cosecha, in order to atone for my hesitation please give me a quest or a task for me to accomplish. I will do my best to make up for the fear I wrongly and ignorantly showed. Allow me to do something that strengthens you in some way." Xiax offered, hoping that this would convince his divine master of his usefulness.

The goblin had no idea how intriguing this would be to the deity he served. Nor did he imagine that the offer would be the cause of a conversation the deity would have a few minutes after the prayer was transmitted to its recipient.

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A few minutes after Xiax finished and transmitted his prayer to his god, Althos's body was carefully following the instructions of the alchemical expert named Dr. Cortes. He expertly handled ingredients and showcased a natural skill at brewing potions owned more to his infinite dexterity than anything else.

The good doctor was showing him how to brew a handy potion: one that restored magical energy. The particular recipe the young god was being taught was a specialty of Dr. Cortes'.

The god memorized the recipe quickly and the first of the potions he'd finish brewing in the next few minutes would be an excellent one. But his mind was elsewhere. In fact, his mind was partaking in an active conversation with the system.

"So about this prayer..." The deity's mind wondered, directing a question to two separate entities. One of them was the domain of faith, and the other was the system.

The contents of the prayer were all intriguing to the young god to whom the prayer was directed towards. But it was the ending that was the most curious to the god, who sensed an opportunity in it.

Mentally Althos was all smiles as he reread the prayer. He confirmed that it said what he thought it said, and chuckled in the confines of his own mind.

[Yes Althos? What about this prayer?] The system asked, curious as to what was on the god's mind.

"Yes, Althos... What about the prayer? It seems pretty straightforward to me." The domain of faith replied, also intrigued by the god's response to it.

"Well you see... I was just wondering if there was a particular way I could capitalize on it. I still need to complete the quest of the domain of souls. And the life domain. I think there might be a way for me to use Xiax to do just that." Althos replied, transmitting the message to both the domain he was speaking to and the system once more.

The domain of faith listened to the message but didn't reply, though it was intrigued by what Althos had just said. Althos could sense the abject interest and chuckled.

[What do you have in mind Althos? Especially because those quests are very different ones.] The system replied, keenly aware of the differences between devouring three souls and being responsible for three pregnancies. They were very different quests and everyone, Althos included, recognized that. But that didn't stop the wheels in Althos' mind from turning and scheming.

"Well, I was thinking of giving the goblin a quest. And the more I think about it, the more balanced it feels. Because I'd like for him to take three lives and then create three more." Althos explained, a confident grin etched on his mental face.

The two entities that were conversing with him silently considered what he was saying for a moment. After a few moments, a new and sinister voice chimed in with an intelligent counterproposal.

"Althos, your undead servants hunger. Why not use them instead? Because sooner or later their minds will begin to degrade if they are not properly used to either fulfill your will or take lives. They thirst for combat. They want to be unleashed. They are clamoring for it. You can be kind to your goblin and in doing so keep up your image as a kind and loving god, while encouraging him to create new life. And you can use the dead to inflict death." The voice said. It was the smug and powerful voice of the subdomain of necromancy.

Althos mulled over this idea. He was quiet as he did so, as he was reaching out to the minds of his undead minions. He didn't converse with them, instead, he scanned their minds and studied what he found.

Much to his annoyance, the subdomain of necromancy was correct. He was unsurprised by this, but he had hoped it wouldn't be the case. Althos quickly conceded that the subdomain had a point and readjusted his plans. This was a silent process but at the end of it the god had a new and improved plan. And he eagerly shared it with the entities that resided within his mind.

"I will meet the requirements for the death domain, and use undead creatures to meet the requirements of the soul domain." The deity eagerly explained, beginning the process of mentally readying himself for the labor he'd need to do over the next few hours.

There was a sinister part of him that was quite excited at the prospect of battle. A part of him that looked forward to seeing the blood of his enemies splatter across the floor, and also relished the idea of vanquishing his foes himself. Wielding the weapons that stole their lives away.

Althos did his best to ignore this part of himself. Instead, he focused on the subjective and objective good that could come of this. The subjective good that could come from this was him acquiring more power. The objective good was that in doing this he could free people from the shackles of slavery.

The moment he wisely accepted that it was better for him to use his undead servants to attack his enemies he had begun to recalculate his targets. He had switched from preparing to opportunistically direct Xiax to any injured animals, to instead focusing his desire for souls and a bit of murder on the areas with the most slaves.

A quick analysis of the not-so-mini-map revealed that the place containing the most slaves happened to be an encampment of reptilefolk located underground but not deep underground. Althos felt a wave of certainty wash over him as he began his preparations for what was to come.

And within him, numerous domains began to wait with bated breath to see what would happen next.