“Do me a solid and take the three of us safely to the dock at the west of Maior!”

This is it! With this, we won’t have to worry about traveling the entire length of the continent anymore! He’s a God, so surely he’ll just take us there easy-peasy! And come on, I deserve some praise for this play, no? I actually managed to trick a God into doing my bidding! Now if that isn’t for the history books, then I don’t know what is!

“And how, pray tell, do you expect me to do that?” Auros rested his cheek on his fist as he reclined in his seat, “I’m interested to hear just what exactly do you think the upper limits of the Gods’ powers are.”

“So you can’t do it?” I sighed disappointedly.

“Of course I can!” He got fired up, “I can do it in whatever way I want! I am one of the founding members of this world in which you were destined to be born in, as well as the world in which you are destined to die in! And just for your information, kid, if the others agreed to it as well, us Four Gods could destroy this world with a flick of the wrist!”

“…Please don’t do that, okay?” I tried to de-escalate the situation, “But that being said, what do you mean when you say “The Gods’ upper limits”? I mean, I’d assume you can do whatever you want.”

“Alright kid,” He lightly tapped his armrest with his fingers, “I wanna see something real quick. Think nothing of this, I just wanna see how a human imagines it’s like to have these powers. Please tell me, if you were a God, how do you imagine that’d feel like?”

That’s… an odd question. Certainly, I’d imagine I could fulfill any wish I could ever desire. I would be able to become omnipotent, travel and document the world within a flash, learn everything there is to know about it, meet and befriend every person ever, and probably see to it that their wishes get granted as well. In a way, it’s just like…

“A dream.” I explained, “I feel like a God is just experiencing a lucid dream that never ends.”

“A lucid dream?” Cecily turned to me.

“Basically, a lucid dream is when you realize you’re dreaming whilst you’re within a dream. This allows you to control your dreams to your hearts content, but such power is usually unyielding, so best be careful. I’ve experienced them a few times in my life myself, but no one believed me when I explained it to them after the fact. It was only after I had met a foreign friend who told me the actual name of the phenomenon.”

“So what can you do in this lucid dream?” Cecily asked.

“Everything.” I replied, “Fly around, teleport wherever you want to, shape and destroy the scenery around you as you see fit… It’s all there, you just gotta think it up. Oh, but your dream usually shows you the first thing that came to your mind in that moment, so you gotta stay focused unless you wanna get chased by your undead loved ones.”

“…Yeesh.” She replied. “So, Mister Fighting God, was Lune’s answer correct?”

Guffawing with all his might so hard that he actually cracked his armrest in half due to the excessive slapping, Auros had given me the thumbs up, “That’s the best answer I’ve heard so far! Yes, it’s exactly like a dream that you can control!”

“So can I assume that you and the other Gods are just sharing a lucid dream then?” My curiosity got the better of me as I pressed him for answers, “And if so, in what world do you wake up to when you do eventually wake up?”

Sitting still for a moment, you could tell he was a bit hesitant to answer. Before long, though, he gave out a sad response. “We’re trying to figure that out ourselves, kid. You see, we don’t remember where we come from. All we remember is just one day saying Hey, it’s boring to sit around all day in nothingness, let’s create a world or something, and presto.”

Hold on, was it really that simple? Is the world really just a byproduct of a bunch of bored Gods seeking relief from the monotony of the infinite vacuum? Well, putting it like that sort of sounds justifiable, so let’s leave the matter at that for now.

“And do you regret it?” I asked, “I mean, the world is at least a thousand years old, after all. I’m sure you’ve all accomplished all you’ve set out to do, and now you’re just spending your time in boredom again.”

“You’re really good at making educated guesses, kid.” Auros praised me, “But yeah, ignoring the fact that you’ve majorly underestimated the age of your world, you’re pretty much correct about the rest. It’s so freaking boring here now!”

“Wait, so how old is the world, really?” Cecily wanted to ask, “Like, two thousand years old?”

“Nah.”

“Five thousand?” I added.

“Nope, you guys need to think bigger.”

“Eleventy-one thousand quadwizillion bajillion?” Nelly gave her input.

“Hmm, yeah, something like that.” Auros smirked.

“Is that even a real number?” I asked.

“Well, no. But it’s an accurate representation of the world’s real age. To tell you the truth, though, none of us even know the exact age ourselves. Counting time in years is something you humans have invented just a couple dozen thousand years ago, after all.”

“Whoa, humans are that old?” I furrowed my brows, “And yet we’re still so unsophisticated? I mean, don’t get me wrong, but isn’t a couple dozen thousand years a really long time? I’d imagine the world to be at least a little bit more urbanized that it is now, no?”

“Ah, but you see,” Auros pointed out, “The only thing that seems to have surpassed even the sheer scale of the Gods’ powers is that of human stupidity. You guys are really, and I mean really, goddamn slow.”

Well, that answers my question at least. But I still feel kind of offended, being called stupid by this guy of all people. I mean, come on dude, you literally didn’t know milk only came out of women’s breasts after they get pregnant until just a minute ago. I really don’t wanna hear any insults regarding intelligence from you.

“Well, you really aren’t the sharpest tool in the shed, either.” Cecily said what I thought.

“Think of it this way, then.” He glared at her, “The world is so old that I completely forgot everything I’ve learned since my inception. With everyone around you living short, fickle lives before ultimately passing, you really stop trying to build strong bonds with any of them. Same goes for knowledge. I only know what I need to know, knowing any more would only cause me to confuse what I already knew with what I’m about to know, you know?”

“I know.” I answered without actually knowing.

***

“So that’s it then?” Auros got up from his seat, finally revealing his amazing stature, “All out of questions to ask?”

“Um!” Nelly raised her hand, “Mistew God, why awe you the God of Fighting if fighting is bad? Awe you an evil God?”

“Heh, yeah!” He chuckled maliciously, “I kill and thrive off of the blood of others. The battlefield is the only place that lets me relieve any and all stress that I’ve built up over the years, so I don’t plan on changing that any time soon. Better watch your back too, because if you don’t, I might just go ahead and eatcha’ too!”

Gnawing his teeth at her, Auros appeared to have tried making Nelly cry once again, but was surprised after seeing her smile just as she usually does. “But you’we helping us get back home, so you can’t be an evil God.”

“…” He turned to us with a concerned face, “The heck’s wrong with this kid?”

“She’s showing kindness.” Cecily donned a proud motherly smile.

“When…?” He asked.

“Just now she-”

“…Did I ask?” He finished his sentence with an annoying grin, “Y’all are way too boring. Get outta’ my face before I decide to ignore that little solid or whatever.”

“Oh, one more question!” I decided it was the right time to ask, “Does Heaven exist?”

“Lune…” Cecily gave me a worried expression.

“Cecily, I gotta know. I gotta know if Carter and Marina are up there somewhere…”

“…” She stayed quiet as we both turned to him.

“Heaven?” Auros ruined the mood by nonchalantly revealing, “Yeah, it’s a pretty new thing, we’re still working out all the kinks, but it’s pretty cool so far. I’m not the one you should be asking though, as I said Pry and Selz are the guys you should be asking when it comes to Heaven, since it was their idea and all.”

Ah, I see! That makes me happy then… Carter, and Marina too, I wonder if you can see us from up above? Just how does Heaven look like? I’m sure you guys are having tons of fun up there! Well, here’s to hoping that you are forever in the Gods’ care…

“Alright! Let’s go then!” I changed topics before we got too sentimental, “But first, how do we even do that?”

“You’re talking about the method?” He asked, “It’s as you said, just like a lucid dream. Pick whichever way you find to be the most suitable, and I’ll make it into a reality.”

“O-Oh, alright then.” I thought for a moment, “Create a platform wide enough to fit all three of us right in this chamber that magically teleports us directly to the west of Maior and make it permanently stay there for any future lost explorers.”

“Well, if that’s what you want…” Auros snapped his fingers, and in the next moment the very stone platform I had envisioned in my head came to be right in front of us.

“Whoa!” Nelly’s eyes shone, “Can you make me a cake too?”

“Just get on the damned platform.” He quickly shot her idea down.

Hurriedly standing atop the platform, we were instructed to close our eyes, because the Iro’s power apparently interfered with that of the Gods’ very own power. I had found it to be a bit strange how that worked, so I tried asking about it a bit more, but he didn’t at all wanna deal with us anymore, so he just shut me up and told me to do as I am instructed.

“So, this platform really leads to the west of Maior?” Cecily double-checked, as she was still a bit skeptical.

“Pfft, yeah!” Auros barely held it together, “It definitely leads to the west of Maior.”

I don’t like how he’s chuckling to himself. He’s also being too kind, which is something that I can ascertain even from this very small timeframe since we’ve met. This guy’s definitely plotting something heinous, but it’s not like we have any other choice. This is our best bet, and if anyone can take us home, it’d be him. Wait, home?

“Hold on, could I change the destination to like, Cardina or something, since that’s our actual destination?”

“Lune!” Cecily punched me for not thinking about this sooner.

“Hehe, see what I mean when I said that you humans are all way too slow?” Auros chuckled, “Can’t change it though, I mean, you asked for a platform that takes you west, right?”

“Damn my stupid brain!” I still held my eyes tightly shut as I lamented.

“Oh right,” Auros threw me something circular that resembled a medal, “Keep this with you at all times. When the time calls for it, call me over with it. I’ve grown quite interested in you, Lune Grimheart.”

“Wait, I never told you my last name!” I shouted, but the words couldn’t reach him as we were already getting teleported.

“Never mind that, Lune Grimheart.” His voice echoed in my brain, “For now, just try not to end your story prematurely.”

All sorts of colors flashed through my vision, despite me continuing to keep my eyes closed during the teleportation process. After a nauseating couple minutes of this, the colors had finally stopped, and we had all felt deep within our hearts that the process was over. Slowly and carefully opening our eyes, we finally realize why it was that Auros had been laughing to himself so much.

“Halt!” A voice shouted at us in Aurolian, “Wer seit ihr leute?!”

Ah, I see now, this prick teleported us to the west of Maior. In other words, right in the middle of the enemy base…