Perhaps... The Real Treasure Is The Friends We Found Along The Way...

Orcinus Orca. Also known as the killer whale, this species is far more than it seems. Relentless hunters, but also fiercely familial animals, they have some of the most stable relationships in the world. Especially compared to humans. In the ancient language, orcinus means kingdom of the dead.

Shiva is humanoid herself, but once, she was a part of a community that dwelled in the mountains, serving a deity at the temple which protected their city. It was truly a city: not some small, rustic village. The inhabitants of this colony were not human, not really. Rather, they were blessed by their god and instilled with certain mannerisms that, in the end, accentuated both their inhumanness and their close resemblance to humanity. Shiva (known at the time as Mattea) was one among these people. One day, she had discovered that the leaders of the collective, along with the temple higher ups, kept deep secrets from their populace. Their god was not a merciful one, protecting the land out of sheer good will and for the love and respect of its worshippers. No- their god demanded sacrifice. Every year, over a thousand animals were slain, at least three or four times a day, in order to keep the altar of the temple wet with fresh blood. She was only told their most hidden truths because she had chosen the job route in society after her graduation of becoming one of the temple caretakers.

She had thought that it would be a glorious thing. Perhaps not with praise or pomp, but with dignity and love for their deity. Just like most of their society, she adored their god.

But when the truth fell into her lap, she couldn't stand by. The more she dug- the more she discovered- it was a horrible, horrible situation. The first population of this region had created a monarchy, and their king had loved his people and the land. Yet the realm was suffering. There was disease, famines, a lack of prey and predators. Windswept gales carried away the hard work they put into farming, and the disastrous absence of rain left many dead. The king promised his people a solution. He and his most trusted companion, who was a talented sorcerer, scoured the lands far and wide for a solution. And finally, it had seemed like they'd found it. Called "Gift of the Gods" it promised a land peace and prosperity forever, should they successfully complete the ritual and continuously keep up their end of the promise. The terms of the contract were simple. One sacrifice was required to bring the god down to earth, and then every twelve moons, another must be offered up. If there was no sacrifice given by the thirteenth month, the god would forcibly exact his payment to fulfill their agreements. Of course, the king and his advisor were willing to do anything. They agreed that this god- hence known to them as simply "God," was their savior and that they would dedicate a temple in his name. Once the building process was over, the first sacrifice would be made. The god allowed them this time without payment- as a token of their trust in him, and in order to show his power and blessings. And so they agreed to the contract.

The first casualty was the king's firstborn son. When the king arrived back at home, along with his advisor, his first act was to decree that a marvelous temple be built. The construction process was rushed, but it still took two years to ensure it in all of its glory. During that time, their kingdom had the utmost blessings. The weather was fair, except for when it rained appropriately. Animals returned to the region, and disease disappeared almost overnight. Everyone suffering from ailments were healed, and the elderly seemed healthier than ever. But once the temple was fully built, the next morning, he discovered the meaning of sacrifice. His wife found that his son was bleeding profusely in his bed. Nobody understood what the problem was- it was pouring out of his every orifice, leaving him weakened and with a pallor in his skin. The king rushed him to their temple magicians for healing, only to be told that there was a mysterious force extracting his vitality. When he stared at his dying son, he realized that the blood flowing out wasn't drying. It pooled everywhere, but instead of becoming a stain on the environment, it seemed to evaporate eventually, rising up into the air all on its own. Thinking quickly, the king gathered his son up in his arms and rushed further into the sacred center of the temple. He prayed to God for assistance, and the same deity whom he had first made the contract with appeared again in his mind as he fell unconscious. "Remember the terms of our agreement. I gave you two years of good will, but from this point forward, blood must always flow on the altar, lest my gifts be returned to me by force of nature." When he awoke, his son had fallen from his arms halfway onto the altar. The blood flowing over the stone seemed to never dry up- it only spread, and ran in rivulets until the entire stone table was running red.

His son was already lost, his blood fueling their first tragedy in three years, but there was still hope for the rest of the people. The king left his living flesh and blood dying on the stone and returned to the front of the temple, where he gathered the caretakers of the sanctuary. Through organized efforts, they used the time period of one year to begin a mass hunting effort. Animals throughout the kingdom were captured and sequestered in a large building, where they were kept and bred until they multiplied. Twelve moons from the start of his son's death, the king returned to his body on the altar. It had lain there for the entire year- not yet dead, not decaying, but constantly suffering as the god's blessing of health replenished his blood only to take it as sacrifice. The king motioned to the magicians, and in one fluid motion, they slit the throat of a cow and hauled it onto the altar as the king removed his son. The blood of the beast flowed freely, wetting the stone even as it had dried when the man had been removed. At first, it had seemed like a success. The cow's blood seemed to be replenished continuously by the magic of the deity, but after only eight hours, it ran dry. The magicians tried to heal the animal, only to find it completely dead. The altar dried off until not a speck of blood remained. And the king realized something terrible as his son died in his arms, his life essence coating his clothes. "The animal lacks force of will. My son... he suffered for all of this time. He stayed alive. But the animal cannot endure the pain."

Another cow was brought, and it was sacrificed on the altar. The blood ran well and replenished itself until the creature's spirit truly broke. Unable to understand why it was suffering so much, it passed away after several hours. Only the son had comprehended his fate and position and been determined to withstand the ritual. But now he was dead, and as the king rose to his feet, his progeny in his arms, he declared that never again would a human die for the sake of the kingdom's blessing. Animals would be slain in the stead of the people. No matter how many were required every day to keep the blood flowing onto the altar directly out of the veins of the sacrifice, it would be done. And so the kingdom of the dead was born. When Mattea learned all of this, her horror brought her to her knees. Like many of the citizens of their city, she loved animals. They lived in what amounted to basically a paradise, with animals always around them. Everyone lived a beautiful, peaceful life in harmony. That's what she had thought. But even though the workers at the temple seemed to accept this slaughter as a necessity, Mattea saw it for what it really was: cowardice. Perhaps the king, and his magicians, had thought it clever to fulfill the terms of their agreement with God in this manner. But in reality, it was simply cruel. Although a man might have a higher cognitive ability than that of other animals, he was still a beast like any other. One creature's life was not worth more than a thousand others' lives, tossed away as though they were so disposable the sacrifice was just. Mattea prayed to God that he would do something about this. Even though it had been his contract to facilitate this result, surely he had never intended for hundreds of thousands of animals to be slain over the years. The blessing had brought all of this wildlife to the area and continued to keep the animal populations high despite all of the slaughter. Did their god truly intend for this to happen? Did he sanction this mass murder?

All of her anger at the injustice stewed silently inside of Mattea for days, and then weeks, until finally, she had seen enough. If her prayer to her lord had no effect, she would act in his name. Should he dislike it, she decided, he could strike her down where she stood. So Mattea took the law into her own hands and the next time a temple assistant led a pig to the altar deep within the temple, she was hiding behind the cloth banners draped over the statue of their god. She was waiting, with shaking hands, as the novice magician took the ritual knife from its place in the carved god's outstretched hands, and she moved. It all happened very quickly. One moment, he was one centimeter from slicing the pig's neck, the next moment, he was on the floor, his own neck gaping with a red crescent that widened into a half moon. Mattea panted, the ritual knife in her hand, unsure of what she'd done. But it was done. And all she could think to do was follow it through. Hauling the apprentice magician up onto the altar, she watched his eyes blink and his hands tremble weakly as blood began to flow from his eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. His neck wound seemingly healed up perfectly, the god having no need of the wound to take what was promised to him. And Mattea gathered the pig in her cloak and quietly escaped through the side entrance of the temple.

Lord, what had she done? But somehow- it felt right. Her anger had waned to a sharp satisfaction that the righteous believers had had they day. That the deaths of the animals were finally stopped. But she realized that this was not the end. The temple still existed. Its practices were still being taught to new trainees every day. Her city was still the same: it still thrived on the suffering of others, its success still hinged on the death of a beast. But one sacrifice for the sake of a thousand- that was how it was supposed to be. That was how it had originally been. Somehow, Mattea felt like that had made sense. The original contract was not cruel, but forgiving. It had offered the ability to turn one martyr into the wellness of so many. But her city had taken that and run away with it. They'd been greedy. Wanted more for the price of what seemed to be less. Sighing to herself, Mattea glanced down at her hands, expecting them to be coated with blood, only to discover that she was spotless. The ritual knife in her right hand gleamed, and in its reflection, she saw what she must do.

There was no crime in the city, not really. People cast aside grievances quickly, because their long lives meant that anyone who quarreled irrevocably would have an enemy who would be present throughout their whole lives. For that reason, the city was almost completely drama free. Everyone could achieve anything they wanted. Positions of power were rotated often. The land gave them any resources that were necessary. There was no rush. No hurry. Nobody felt like time was precious, because they had all of it they could ever need. Even though it was possible to die of old age, everyone felt as though their lives had been fulfilled by the time they reached that point. Ambition existed, but it was muted. Mattea knew, then, that nobody expected violent crime. It had been an idea that had come to her after realizing animals were being ruthlessly slaughtered. While it was one thing to live off of animals, and be thankful that they had given their lives and their innocence for food, it was another to frivolously throw them away. And they had indeed tossed them to the side and discarded their bodies like trash. Mattea wanted her city to value their lives. So thus she would take them away afterwards. The process was slow, and long going. She couldn't simply kill off an entire city over the course of one night. But people slept soundly in this settlement, and nobody in the community expected murder of other citizens, so it was easy for her plans to fly under the radar. Suspicions were cast aside as her questionable demeanor and actions were written off as the eccentricities of an adolescent trying to figure out what she wanted from life, striving to earn herself a place at the temple and attempting to garner respect for herself.

It took a while for her to gather the herbs. The poison she wanted to make had to be so concentrated that it could overcome the blessing that healed every civilian back to pristine health. For a while, dangerous plants of a toxic nature had freely existed in and around the city, grown as decoration. The small amounts that a child might accidentally eat or a dog might chew on had no effect because of the blessing, even if normally they would cause a moderate disruption to the system. However, if the quantity was large enough, Mattea was sure that it would have an effect. Even though it might not be enough to kill them directly, she only needed to weaken them enough to finish the job herself. Not everyone in the city had to die. But she wanted them to. They knew. Except for the children and very young adults, they had all been aware of the temple and its activities. Mattea was dumbfounded by how she had missed it all these years when the temple had freely advertised its doings and explained without remorse to all the citizens how the animals' deaths prolonged the blessing of God. And people just accepted it. They knew no value of life around here. She would change that. Over the course of several months from that fateful day, she bid her time. The temple had at first been in uproar at how a person had ended up on the altar. In the end, they had decided that the young man must have accidentally fallen on top of it while replacing the nearly dead animal with the fresh pig. Squirming and struggling, the pig must have caused him to stumble. Unfortunately, it was impossible for a sacrifice to be removed from the altar and survive the process. The way the citizens saw it, the man had given his life, and even though he would suffer for a year, it might be possible to find a way to save him. Rather than kill him early and end his suffering, they wanted to see if some method could be found to get around the rules of all sacrifices dying once they completely left the altar. This worked well in Mattea's favor, for she didn't want any animals dying again and their killings restarting just because the city decided that the man's suffering was too much and should be put to a stop.

She would have loved to kill them all by hand, or at least drag them onto the altar. But that was not practical. The altar only needed one sacrifice at a time, and if she were to design some kind of system that would keep all of the humans alive and feed them to the altar one by one every year, it had a high probability of going wrong somehow. If one human escaped and managed to set the others free, then there would be a huge load of problems on her hands. Plus, everything would go back to how it had been. So was she lost on how to proceed. For now, after weakening all of the inhabitants of the city who knew of the temple's doings, she would imprison them. Mattea had collected a lot of information and talked to a lot of people over the course of these months. Ever since that spring day, she had learned who knew what and been surprised by the amount of people who sanctioned the ruthless animal killings. But now she was no longer surprised. How had her beautiful paradise thrived as something so ugly, all while escaping her notice? But Mattea couldn't fall into despair. Not when there was so much more work to be done. Tirelessly, in accordance with the blessing she had (and in part due to her massive guilt), she worked on bolstering her own powers until she was sufficiently able to summon watery shades that had substance to them. Under her command, they would be able to imprison and guard the human inhabitants of this realm. But it wasn't enough. She would have to physically guard them forever, herself. While Mattea didn't have a problem with this in theory, she knew it was highly impractical and prayed to God to give her the strength and intelligence to find another solution eventually. Should she die in a situation like that, the humans might also starve, or devolve into more degeneracy and she wouldn't be able to stop them. Or her water shades might collapse- they had been imbued with so much energy that they were meant to sustain themselves, even if she passed away, especially with the magical auras and energies of the paradise. But one never could be quite sure.

Flash forward four more weeks, and all of her preparations seemed to be complete. Still, there was a sort of sinking feeling in Mattea's heart. Could she really go through with this? But then she was reminded of all of the animals that had been hopelessly slain. Their deaths and the conscience of avenging them wore on her soul more than the prospect of hurting the humans who had decided they were worth more than other animals. And thus, nearly nine months after Mattea's eyes had been pried wide open in March, they were celebrating the Fall Festival. It was a time when everyone gave thanks to the bounty that was being provided, since this beginning of September always signified a joyous harvest either in the process of being gathered or close on its way to being perfectly ripe for the taking. Mattea was among the ones at the temple who prepared a special drink for the city dwellers. Every year, every person, regardless of their age, was to have at least a glass of this drink in order to preserve the prosperity of their community. Its effects enhanced bonds between familial members and made loose friendships more tightly knit. By promoting stronger ties between everyone, even simple acquaintances, the temple ensured that their city acted altogether and in each others’ best interests. Even though some people were strangers to each other, doubtlessly with the potent effects of the brew, they would know and feel close to at least someone who knew that stranger. In this way, the community kept themselves together and eliminated a lot of possible mental and physical illnesses that can come with not feeling like one belongs or not having a big enough support group. After all, despite the powerful ways the blessing of their god affected them, it was still not enough to change their mental states directly. Certain neurotic diseases that were caused by issues in brain wiring and the like could be healed by God if one prayed at the temple and accordingly was worked on by the magicians there, but usually that was not necessary. In most cases, the sheer efforts of the community would have a big enough effect. Mattea was used to this process, and so was everyone else. The drink caused things that were clearly shown and understood by everyone there, so there was no fear or trepidation when it came to drinking it. And that was what she was counting on. In order to successfully drug everyone present, they had to take it. If one refused out of some strange suspicion, they would probably be chastised and told that it’s completely fine, safe, and in fact it is strange of that person to refuse the brew. However, if numerous people began to clamor and pipe up, then there could be trouble. The temple would have to investigate, and if they discovered someone had tampered with the Fall Festival’s shared celebration drink, the consequences would be dire.But nobody would do that in the first place. Crime didn’t exist here, after all. At least- not crimes against humanity.

Therefore, Mattea was able to very easily spike the main brewing with her concoction, and it was distributed perfectly to all of the citizens by magic. In order for everyone to toast at the same time, the sorcerers had developed a system that vanished the liquid from the original brew directly into the glasses or cups of everyone present. It was a blanket spell that worked on any open container or holding object that could successfully contain liquid, so people were advised not to bring their water bottles or that kind of thing to the celebration or else they would be soaked and filled with the drink. Of course, some citizens brought them expressly for that reason! The drink tasted pretty good, after all, and it warmed up the soul in a nice way. There were no side effects to having too much, as the bonds could only be changed up to a certain point and after that, nothing would happen. So people were allowed to have as much as they wanted, and glasses would automatically replenish once emptied. All of this worked in Mattea’s advantage. She didn’t care too much if someone ingested too much of the poison. The amount was going to be just enough to have the debilitating effects she wanted, but if they had a lot more, it still wouldn’t have a big enough result to permanently injure, harm, or kill them. Even a person who drank an entire barrel of the fluid wouldn’t suffer a huge deal of effects from her poison. Everything was absolutely fine. At least, that’s what she had thought until the day of the celebration itself. Everything seemed to be going fine… everyone had drunk the Fall Festival brew already. The timer was ticking, and slowly, things were going into effect. But Mattea had forgotten about the timings of peoples’ bodies. Because the dose was adjusted for everyone, it took a while on some, less on others. So when people started passing out, not all of them did right away. The sorcerers were able to figure out that something was going wrong, even if they couldn’t locate the source of their drowsiness or manage to purge it from their bodies. But the chaos spread and people began to flee back to their homes. That wouldn’t do. Mattea needed everyone to be near the same location, because if she accidentally missed a person when going over the town looking for the escapees as they slept, it would be possible for them to wake up and later wander around by themselves. Or they could even find the captured citizens and try to free them. No, it just wouldn’t do. She had to act quickly in order to prevent this situation from worsening.

The panic and swelling urge to run and abandon this plan was rising in her body. Uncontrollable feelings burst out of her skin and suddenly, the world was awash with water. Everything was a flood. Her very being- it felt like she was just one droplet, or a small fish swept away by the sea. For ages, Mattea had looked at the ocean from far away. She had seen images in magical projects and learned about the sea. Its wonders, its terrible and terrifying predators. And even though she had only ever bathed and played in a river or waterfall or pool, discounting all of their man made technologies, of course, her brain had filled in the gaps. The water was life. It soothed her, and washed away her insecurities and worries until she was just one in a million. This plan was fine. If it was going wrong, all she had to do was right those wrongs. And as Mattea opened up her eyes again and they glowed red, she felt that everything was as it should be. As the sky fades into an orange sunset, so did too her blue irises slowly melt into crimson. Suddenly the light from above and the high noon sun was dim. Comparatively, the glowing shine from her eyes gave off a light much brighter and potent even in the middle of the day. All around her, the shadows grew and began to flicker until they overtook the fleeing people. Everyone wrapped in darkness, the sun above began to fade away until it was as though the sky was a dark sea of a few stars, just like at night. And as the overwhelming black faded out all the color from the world, Shiva’s expression melted. She cried. She mourned for everything that she had lost, for everything that’d had to be done. It wasn’t as though she had wanted to kill her family and friends. The hope had originally been only to imprison them until she could find a way to prevent the temple from killing so many animals. She had thought there would be a way to convince the populace to abstain from such practices. To possibly move away from the city, to find a new home, to make a new home. One that didn’t rely on the blood of others or their own. Everything had changed so quickly, and emotionally, she was wholly unprepared to face these consequences. The next hours passed quickly. She had to do so many things- bury the dead, figure out how this had even occurred. But all she did was take a seat on the dust of the festival clearing and cry. There was a saying in the city. “We are what we are, but we don’t have to be.” Mattea had learned to live by that her whole life. In the city, anyone could be whoever they wanted. There were no restrictions, as long as you weren’t hurting somebody else. In the end, even desires that could cause pain or suffering to other people were often permitted because of the blessing that healed up any ailments. Things like robbery and murder were not common because of the strong ties and lack of necessity. People who would do it for fun felt too guilty to do so, and mental illnesses were not prominent because of the mystical powers which had the potential to alleviate and even completely solve the problems of those diseases.

So Mattea had lived by this saying for a long time. Anything was possible. With the powers of the temple on their side, and a longevity in order to accomplish things in their life span, citizens were lacking for very little. But suddenly, Mattea had lost everything. All of the bonds that had been heightened over time were suddenly broken. Her familial ties were torn apart, and the love she had been given her whole life tossed away. Affection was nowhere to be seen. There was nobody to support her. Nobody to listen to her feelings. The busy streets and the relaxing plazas of the city were bare. She hadn’t even realized that at some point, she had risen to her feet and began to run. The tears that slide down her face were for everyone and everything. The bare stones underneath her bare feet. The rough feeling of the cloth as she roughly tore through the tents, searching for someone. Anyone. Everywhere she looked, there were bodies. People she knew. Rarely did someone meet a complete stranger in the city. Anonymity wasn’t a real thing here. Even though a person could totally reinvent their identity and people wouldn’t judge them for it, they would never be able to meet people who had never seen them before. The way those types of personal makeovers usually went was that they would drastically change their appearance in order to signify a renewed outlook or difference in personality. This method was highly accepted, and people also accommodate any name changes. For all of its faults and malpractices behind the scenes, the city had been so accepting. Welcoming. Everyone was part of an inner circle. There was no poverty. No harsh or cruel death. But… there had been. Even now, as Shiva’s eyes poured out rivers for everyone and everything that would never come back, for the things that wouldn’t return to the same state, she knew. She knew that deep inside of herself, she had made the right decision. They had suffered. And unjustly so. But suddenly, she realized that as the city ran red, the sky began to burn brighter. It was like everything around her glowed, and she could sense the presence of magic. Mattea looked towards the temple. In the setting sun, it was lit up by the sun behind it as though it was a shadow on the brightness of the sky. A dark, hovering shape and a testament to death in this paradise. Yet, the temple was what protected the animals. It had been humans who had made it into something so terrible.

And now, those humans were gone. Mattea slowly tread forwards, her feet pressing into the dirt as it ran red and wet with blood. The liquid just wouldn’t stop pouring out. Overflowing, it felt like despite the time it had been since they had died, the moment was just a brief second ago. As Mattea glanced around herself, she could see that their bodies looked like fresh kills. The corpses still had life in their eyes, but those eyes were wide open in terror and panic and suffering. So open that she knew if they’d been truly alive, their vision would have been burned out by the sun already. Perhaps they were all paralyzed in this manner, suffering slowly as the life force and blood was drained from them. Turning away, Mattea decided not to think of it any longer for now. This city was a strange one. With how long people lived and their strange ability to heal almost any ailment, perhaps their blood flow felt endless. Maybe physically, their bodies would continue to produce the fluid even after death. She wasn’t sure how they had died. A burst of her magic, she would guess. But even if she regretted it in part, there was no telling how many animals would have continued to suffer at their hands. Mattea knew she wasn’t a good person and had no desire to be one after this. She had dedicated herself to the temple because she wanted to protect the city. When she had found out the injustice that was happening, she had prayd to God. She had… she had done so much in the hopes that all of these wrongs would be righted. But in the end, the biggest thing she had done was take her own two hands and smeared them with blood. Now she felt strange entering the temple. As her foot slipped on the upper most stone step, still wet with blood, her hand flew towards a pillar and barely scraped it with her fingertips before she was sent toppling down. Mattea rubbed her arm where it had smashed into the stone step, leaving streaks of blood. Her dress was dirty. Her hair was gnarly. Her everything was undone, and it mimicked her soul. She felt like her very being had been exposed. Thinking of doing all of these acts and preparing the poisonous herbs had been one thing. Yet Mattea had not expected that she would actually be able to carry out her plans. Those musings from before about dragging each and every citizen of the city to the altar and slicing their throat open personally were only thoughts. Only dreams. Only brief wishes. But this? This was reality. Now she was stuck stumbling, trying to ascend the steps to a temple where she felt like she had forsaken the god, and the god her. Forcing herself back to her feet, Mattea climbed the stones despite the strange sensation that had taken hold in her heart. Although there was nothing to feel overjoyed about, the relief had built into almost a feeling of ecstasy. She was free. The animals were free. And the humans who had chained them, who had tortured them, who had killed them, were gone. In the end, everyone who lived and breathed like this was an animal. Gods above were transcendent animals. So why do some animals get to decide the fates of others? Mattea had played at being a god just now, and she knew her sins. She didn’t care. Maybe she was a hypocrite. But she felt liberated.

5678 Shiva, 12149 Total

Slowly but surely, she made her way through the temple. It was a trip for sure, venturing through the long hallways and watching as the candles that burned what seemed like everlastingly slowly reached the bottom of the wax. Who would come and repair them? Who would replace the candles when all that was burning was a wick in oil? Mattea didn’t like to think about it, but somehow, the concept of all of the lights slowly flickering out one by one was more morbid than all the deaths she had encountered so far. If the existence of this temple was just completely forgotten and forsaken by all of humanity, then who would make the sacrifices? Who would keep up this eden? Mattea didn’t want to think about the land returning to the barren waste land it had apparently been before. In order to assuage her guilt, she would have to take care of it. She could consider it a responsibility. Perhaps over time, she could also grow the sanctuary and the amount of animals it could protect and watch over. If there was a way to do so, she would take it. Anything. These thoughts ran through Mattea’s mind endlessly as she walked forward numbly, her eyes anywhere but in front of her. The walls felt like they bled red, and she couldn’t see anything in the same pure light as before. Stone was what made up these temple walls and corridors, but all she saw was corpses. The bodies of those whom the temple had killed and those who she herself had slain. It was a terrible, terrible sight, and Mattea soon averted her eyes to the floor. Every step felt like she was approaching both heaven and hell. Her own doom awaited her at the altar, she was sure of it. How could she disappoint their god like this? He had demanded sacrifice, and she knew this. In order to protect the animals and all inhabitants of this land, something had to be given. Now that there was nobody to make the sacrifices except for her, the paradise was in danger of dying out should she suddenly disappear from any cause.

When Mattea reached the altar room, she felt like the air was stuffy. She couldn’t breathe. Her mouth moved as it gasped for air, but the oxygen failed to reach her lungs. Hand outstretched, she reached for the door and burst into the room. As her eyes fell upon the altar, her heart sunk. It was not empty, but the sacrifice was obviously dead. All that remained of him was a corpse. Yet- somehow, as she stood panting in front of the altar, the heaviness in her chest lifted. Mattea was astonished to find that the blood flowing freely on the floor sunk into the stone of the offering table and vanished, just like that of the orifices of sacrifices. Could it be that the blood of all who had died today was being taken up by God? She could not dare to hope. If only she could understand his intentions… she yearned to comprehend. Dropping to her knees, Mattea opened her arms wide. She reached out to what felt like nothing, and poured out her heart and soul. Her lips moved soundlessly, but no words emerged. Her prayers were silent and in her mind, a rush of words overtook everything else. Please my lord, if anything. Allow this paradise to continue blooming no matter what. Even if I have wrecked the chance for the city to be a wondrous land, the animals who live here do not deserve to suffer for my actions. Even if many animals had been tortured and sacrificed every day, their lives had still fueled the creation and maintenance of this place where life was abundant and essentially everlasting. Looking at it from… what was it called? There had been a word she had learned in school to describe a type of way of thinking that only considered resources and practicality. It cared only for what it perceived as hard facts and ways that life and value could be coldly measured. This type of thinking was what had been taught in the city, although they had always lauded morals and how people were above animals because of their ability to think and conceive a sense of self. Ah, that was it. Utilitarianism. In essence, the teachings that anything was right if it was profitable for the majority of parties involved. If everyone benefited, if in the grand scale, the benefits outweighed the drawbacks, then it was deemed proper and right. Mattea was not sure if she agreed with this even know. Truly on a surface stand point, one life was worth less than three lives. Three lives was worth more than one life. But it failed to take into account so many things, such as whether a situation was actually just or unjust. The animals who had sacrificed produced so many benefits, but did they deserve it? And if they did not deserve it nor consent to it, why had it been proper? Sometimes, could it be possible that instead of benefiting and reaping the rewards of such sacrifices, the city or humans in general would be better off without that maximum efficiency and benefit? Over time, perhaps it could have been possible to find another way to fuel the sacrifices. Or to discover a new way to make a living in this land. If all else failed, perhaps life was not meant to thrive here. The king, from ages ago, had been forced to make the difficult decision of whether to seek out a new place to live or a new method to live in their current location. He had chosen the latter, and the consequences were everything that followed up until now. Shaking her head, her hands grasped each other, fingers tightly woven together. God, please give me the answers. Tell me what shall I do? Or even, what can I do? I am willing to be the devil. I am willing to dirty my hands and pull sin down from the sky and give it flesh, give it blood, give it life here in this land. But I don’t know how. I don’t know my options. Please show me a sign, she thrust all of her hopes for guidance into her prayers, but she was met with silence.

Silence… and then suddenly, the room was filled with glowing light. On the empty altar, the blood that dripped down onto the floor slowly began to shine. It was as though she was standing inside of the sun, on top of the sun, where the light of life was shining directly into her soul. She was reminded of several years ago, when her best friend had invited her over to her house to watch the sunrise. It had been exhilarating, watching the brightness slowly peek over the horizon and then rise above the line of the earth until it blinded her sight. Her friend had mixed herbs into water for the most lovely, calming bath, and Mattea had made them both sweet but cooling tea. She was suddenly pulled back into memories of the past. “You look so tired, Mattea,” Kelis told her. “And stressed. Did you get enough sleep last night? If not, I’ll have to resort to some drastic measures to get you to relax and actually stop staying up all night,” she joked. “I’ll draw you a nice bath so that you can relax your muscles a bit, but as for relaxing your mind, I’m not so sure how much I can help you with that. Maybe try some tea?” Mattea had laughed at her slight poking fun of the other girl’s sleep problems and gotten to her feet to go boil some water for the hot drink. She mostly liked iced tea most of all, but as long as it was sweet and not too scalding, warm tea was pretty soothing. Moreover, Kelis always had the best types of tea at her house. Mattea watched as she scooped a few crushed herbs together into a small bag and then handed it to her friend. “Thanks, Keli,” she smiled as she dropped it into the pot, which was not yet boiling. “Mattea! What are you doing? You have to get the water going first, and then you can do that. Put it in the teapot first, as well,” she scolded her friend. Clutching at her heart, Mattea remembered how she had laughed after Kelis had said that. How she had smiled at her friend. They had shared so many cups of tea over the years and so many peals of laughter and hours spent crying over some dumb thing. Now, Kelis was dead, and it was her fault. But she had known. They both had decided to study at the temple. They were best friends, inseparable in all things. If Mattea had been trained in that way, she was sure her friend had as well. Yet, that surety alone hadn’t been enough to assuage her of her concerns that maybe, Kelis was innocent. So she had asked her friend. And been confronted by confused accusations, calling her a heretic. Criticizing her for thinking that the temple’s actions were anything but the best, for the good of the city, the people, the land, the animals. And Mattea knew it was hard to believe. When she had first seen what was going on, she hadn’t known what to think. But Kelis had found it hard to believe that what was happening was wrong. Rather than doubt the validity of her statement or question whether her eyes had been working properly to witness such heinous acts, Kelis had instead acted as though nothing was wrong. Had it just been the teachings of the city education system and the temple acolyte rules that had led her to see things this way? Mattea had no way of knowing now. She wished that she had confronted her friend more about it. Wished that she had tried harder to get her to understand why this was so wrong. Why it needed to be changed. But unfortunately, it had come to this instead. All of the resentment and trepidation of being cast out or worse, just killed, and unable to do anything about it. Unable to change what was going on or put a stop to it… that had prevented Mattea from forcing her opinion on the city. They would be able to silence her quite easily if that was their intention.

She was brought back to the present as the golden light that had filled her senses began to fade, allowing her to freely breathe and see once more. Although the brightness had been so inviting, so pure, so brilliant that it had even illuminated her soul, now the world was dull once more. Even beyond just being dim, it was dark. It felt like the life force had drained from more than the blood splattered across the sacrificial altar. Mattea held her hands up in front of her eyes and blinked as the outline of her fingers blurred, her vision fading. She found herself standing in a similar room. The altar was stone, and on it sat a middle aged man. With the darkest ebony hair and hollow eyes, he looked lost. He didn’t belong here. His chalky complexion somehow felt wrong. Yet, Mattea found herself taking the few steps forward that were necessary to bring herself directly in front of him, so close that they were almost touching. Her lips parted and she spoke quietly, “Who are you? Am I dead?” Perhaps it was too bold, to blatantly ask such a question. But Mattea could not help but wonder if she had ascended to heaven in that moment. If the bright light had been the tunnel leading her soul away from the earthly plane. If she was no longer living, and if this was her punishment for trying to defy his will and deny him the sacrifices he was promised. She knew that God was supposed to love her along with all of his children. However, she had learned to fear him. Especially now that she knew the kind of a deity he was, to demand sacrifice. He was the only true god she had ever really encountered. The temple only had one god, and the city all acknowledged the temple as the reason for this land’s continued existence. In the past, other religions had been a thing, and Mattea had learned about other religions as well using resources such as books and history. Some teachers were happy to talk about such subjects, while others preferred to dodge and avoid those discussions entirely. Mattea had learned who would provide information, who knew information but was reticent when it came time to share it, and who neither cared nor was aware of anything relevant to the conversation. So she was aware of some more things than others. Her naturally curious nature had gotten her into trouble in the past, but the city was filled with everyone who knew each other. Everyone had sympathy for one another. Therefore, it was difficult to truly punish a citizen, but the guilt from betraying their comrades was usually punishment enough and could coerce people into behaving a certain way. Now, as she was staring at this man, she had no idea who he was at first- but then all of a sudden, she intrinsically could understand. He was the one she had been waiting for all this time. Almost in a trance, she took a few steps forward, until he was directly in front of her, barely not touching. Their faces of equal height.

God, or Orcinus, took Mattea by the hands and told her- "My child. I would have a contract with you." Silently, she listened to the terms of the contract. Afterwards, he presented her with an enormous golden sword, the hilt large and circular and heavy. "This will belong to you from now on." As soon as Mattea touched it, it darkened, its brilliant metal turned dull. However, Orcinus told her that this was a disguise. The sword was alive, and treated its owners in different ways depending on their temperament and attitude towards the weapon. "You will have some difficult decisions to make, and it will aid you in making them." With that, Orcinus disappeared, she fully realized what she had done. The contract... the basic terms had been simple. So straightforward, even, that she could have guessed them and should have guessed them just from the king's tale alone. But the details were frightening. Roughly every year, a human sacrifice was required. Their blood would flow out of their body for exactly twelve moons until the next sacrifice was made. That meant- "Yes, you're right. Mattea- no, Shiva. From this day forward, you will be my daughter. My hand on the mortal plane. Your actions will either ensure the safety of this paradise..." her gaze trailed over the land. As far as her eyes could see, it was lush and green, with the song of birds ringing in her ears and the playful antics of monkeys dashing back and forth in the corner of her eye. Paradise. "...or you can destroy it. Leave it all behind, for a new world, hm?" Her focus snapped back to Orcinus, and he gave her a wry smile. Was the choice really hers? To forgo the blessing he had placed on this region all those years ago, and forsake it in order to walk her own path. Was there no other way? "Whenever you act for my sake, this blade will read it. You will never be far from home, or the temple. Shiva, you are more than a gift of god. You yourself are a gift to all of creation." Immediately, this created so much confusion in Mattea. What? Why had her name changed? And if she was a gift of his to all of creation, didn’t that equally render her a gift of god? Or was the distinction something to do with that original ritual that the old king had used, called Gift of the Gods? With that puzzling message as his farewell to her that day, she was left all alone for the time.

But she was not alone. All around her, life bustled and it was as though the animals had never stopped moving. The absence of humanity did not make things more bleak. It simply was a species that had been wiped out in this place, and now the other ones could live more easily. The total decimation of a race was not something to take lightly, but- they existed outside of this eden, so what was the worry? Shiva could not help but feel like she had only done good. Her guilt had already disappeared.

She took another look at the weapon that Orcinus had given her. It was heavy, with strange markings on it, and Mattea felt that even if she had failed to understand what was happening she would still be in love with the blade. The weight of sin bore down on her soul as she tried to lift it. Unable to do so for now, Mattea let it rest on the ground, determined that nobody would steal it. After all, who could reach this place? She turned away from the altar as the goldness of all the light around them slowly seeped into the blade, swallowing up the brightness until the room was dull once more. Natural. Back to the ordinary sense it had been. All of the blood was gone, and the room and the temple felt pure and clean. Sanctified by the grace of Orcinus, she felt as though she too were free. Mattea- now Shiva- left her past and her name behind her, but did not leave the duties she had carried with her throughout her lifetime. A great deal of blood was to be shed with this blade in order to fuel the upkeep of the paradise she had to maintain. But that wasn’t enough. Just her by herself could not continue to let this place thrive. No- it needed more people. More lives willing to give themselves freely and devote themselves to this cause. Shiva understood that she would have to go out and find them. Although she guarded them for years, finally, she understood that her mission was not over. She had to go out and procure the safety and well being of other animals. But she made sure that there would be a way to quickly return to the mountain paradise, or else they might have time to escape if they managed to outsmart the water shades. Shiva installed a teleportation device that ran off of the magical energy that had gathered over the years at the location. There was an underground city that ran beneath this palace, and all who had inhabited it had known of its secrets and ways to travel without being exposed to the light. Often, it was used by everybody, not for security or secrecy but simply for fun or because being outside in the light occasionally grew too warm or cold. But now that she was the only one remaining of the citizens, it was a secret place now. The water shades who could protect the area would prevent anyone from escaping, once she trapped them inside. Nodding to herself with determination, Shiva decided that even if she could not bring the blade to the outer world right now and carry out God’s work, she could simply retrieve people and animals and return them to here. If any sacrifices were to be made, she could make them at the temple itself. From what Orcinus had said to her, Shiva felt certain that she had some time before more blood shed would be required, but she wanted to get started as soon as possible.

The first order of business would be exploring the land all around the city boundaries. She had gone into the forest and knew the area very well, but she wanted to go to the outskirts of the very mass of the earth connected to this place. If possible, they might be on an island or something of that sort. Otherwise, Mattea- no, Shiva- could not fathom how they would not have been discovered before this. Unfortunately, it would probably be a gigantic island if that were the case, rendering her desire to map out and be aware of every inch of it also a gargantuan task. But Shiva felt confident that she could accomplish it within a decent time frame. It would also be nice to see how much space was not yet consumed by their edenic blessing. If there was still room on this land mass for animals to come and rest in a paradise for the rest of their time alive, then she would first seek to make that happen. Later on, Shiva expected that they would have to expand the eden to other areas. Expansion was definitely in the cards. But for now, that was too ambitious of an ideal. Nodding to herself, Shiva closed her eyes and felt the wind blow through her hair as she stood on top of the highest point of the city. Opening her gaze to the area all around and underneath her, she felt at peace. There was so much work to be done, but had she died here, she would not be happy nor satisfied, but would be accepting nonetheless. It had come time for a change in the world. Jumping off of the city’s highest point would be foolish, but somehow, the thought was tempting. Not because she wanted to end her own life but because she felt confident that she would survive. And that kind of concept was exhilarating. Laughing out loud to herself, Shiva shouted, “Today is the first day I am reborn! You all are the witness to my success!” She knew that perhaps she was the lone human witness, but humans did not matter. They were not necessarily parasitic on the world, because everything was a parasite. She was living off of borrowed time and living on a prayer of her faith to God. Animals lived off of grass and other animals. So humans were the same as animals, because they were animals. However, the problem in humanity’s case had been that they lived so greatly at the grievous expense of others of their animal kind that it was simply too unfair. She understood the concept of evolution, and how everyone is racing to the top of their peak and prime. How every species is in competition to become the most dominant and secure their success and lineage down the line. But humanity did it in an unfair way. Shiva wondered if perhaps they needed to be culled, but she dismissed the thought. Everyone deserved to live. The survival of the fittest was a harsh and unnecessary doctrine. Weaklings and underdogs, runts of the litter- they all deserved to die properly and over time rather than have their attempts to do so cut off by someone who deemed it better one way or another. Laughing once again to herself, Shiva turned away from the view and descended the city tower to the ground below.

Shiva ended up first traveling east. She made contact with the water after only four days of traveling, which was surprising to her, but she supposed that nobody had really ventured outside the city outskirts for more than a few hours of total travel time one direction. At least, not for many, many years into the past. Their ancestors had arrived here somehow. Shaking those thoughts out of her mind, Shiva stared at the ocean and its never ending blue. Without another word, she ran forwards, the dust on the soles of her feet washing away as the salty water lapped at her skin and turned her pale, dusty ankles into a more vibrant tan. Naturally, Shiva was fairly pale, but all of this time spent out in the sun recently had left her with darker skin than ever before. Her eyes met the sky, their former violet now a vibrant crimson as her hair faded away from brown into white. Purified, Shiva laughed as she splashed herself in the giant pool of God’s own creation. The ocean was a beautiful place, and she was here to witness it and protect it. Just then, the girl thought she saw something stirring out in the openness of the sea. Peering at it, Shiva was unable to examine it closely when she realized that if she went out now, there was no telling if she would continue in that directly and never remember to return to the island and explore all around it. Of course, she had the magical teleporter that was keyed to her magical signature. But that was more of a long term plan. For now, she had all of the time in the world. Putting down another teleporter here at the shore took nearly half a day, but Shiva was determined to place one at all corners of this land mass for easy access. She then turned around and left the coast, even though the sea sang to her and tempted her to leave land with a deadly permanence. Shivering as she tried not to answer its call, Shiva walked away from the water until it was barely out of sight. Then she proceeded to explore all along the edge of the land, mapping it out mentally and using her magic to draw on paper bound together from the city. The magic of this system would allow her to make changes easily, more so than the ink and rubber that they had used in the past in order to mark things down permanently and then attempt to pick up the dark ink and rub it off should an error be made. This entire process took Shiva nearly a month, in order to fully understand not only the shape of the island but also every nook and cranny of it. All things considered, it hadn’t taken very long.

There was so much more in the world to explore, she was sure of this. But to do so, she would need a way to safely get off of the island without throwing caution completely to the wind. As a daughter of Orcinus, Shiva knew that she could survive in the water. Her blessings would carry her through life if she wanted, but she needed a way to transport people who she claimed as the city’s back to their little nation. Squaring her shoulders, Shiva knew what she had to do. Even though the technology of the city was a marvel, at least according to their history books of what their ancestors had used and had left behind in their old civilizations, she felt like it was not enough. Dismantling the city’s technology would take too long, and she didn’t want to leave it behind with bare bones and not enough to function. After all, there were so many research efforts currently going on. Even though nobody in the city ever traveled, there had been several prototypes being made and tested every day because to them, science was interesting and enhanced their lives. Shiva explored all of the labs. Although some dangerous experiments and lab environments existed down there, she was immune to most of them thanks to the blessing. Even if she ended up getting hurt in any way, it would heal most things back up. It had been the same in the past for all of the scientists and researchers, meaning that most of the lab conditions would have been extremely unsafe for anyone who didn’t possess the blessing. As Shiva went through all of the remnants of their research on magical technology, she realized that there was still someone alive. A scientist who had decided to skip out on the day of the festival. The only problem was, he was barely alive, having starved for so long. There was lots of water available in the lab room, (which had been locked from the outside when all the scientists left and never returned because of their unexpected deaths) but food had been scarce. He had managed for this long because they often kept miniature fridges for the long nights where they stayed. Most citizens found life to be quite fulfilling and easy to be fulfilling, meaning they didn’t feel the need to work overtime because their lifespans were long enough to accomplish in a relaxed manner everything that they wanted or needed out of their time on this plane of existence. But even so, of course sometimes scientists got overly excited about a specific project and wanted to pursue it even more. And they were welcome to do so. Anyway, Shiva had rather lucked out. Now she had her first human victim for the temple and the renewed blessing. First, though, she needed to get his help with creating a ship. It would be mostly made with the stolen parts from various research labs, but she was not very familiar with the system. After freeing him, he was extremely grateful and also confused about the state of the city nation. She explained to him that a deadly virus had caught them all off guard, and that she had only escaped because she had miraculously been immune to it. He was also safe, but she warned him that he needed to stay down here because it had proliferated through the area above ground and outside of the sterile lab environments. Shiva promised to bring him food until they managed to find a way to solve the problem. Only, they were talking about different problems. She told him that in order to find a cure or a way to eliminate the virus, she planned to leave the city and fly to another nation. It would be difficult, she said, because she had never been off of the island before. But she explained to him that over this period of time, she had explored all around the island looking for a solution and gone places nobody had gone in the last few centuries in the history of their nation.

Overwhelmed by all of this information and a lack of awareness of what was actually going on, he had agreed. He built her the ship that she wanted, the one that she claimed she needed. Shiva was not a very good liar, as lying was very much discouraged in this city, so she had stuck to the facts as much as possible. Her desperation was also clear on her face, and he had been fueled by his own fear and ignorance of the true events and happenings of the situation. Since the most information they had to go off of the idea of ships was of traditional ships from history, he fashioned her a small model. According to what he said, it should expand once activated by a specific flare of magic from her. Some of the underground laboratories were enormous, and once she deemed them ‘clear of the virus’ by tests that he could not be in the area for lest the virus actually exist and kill him, she let him explore those facilities and make use of them. They were able to test the full size ship in a shallow underground pool, and Shiva was ecstatic when it seemed to work perfectly. For the most part, it appeared to be like an old fashioned ship, but it was run by magical technology that seeped life from the area around it in order to fuel its mechanisms. Inside of the ship itself, the rooms were fairly modern and also utilitarian, in the true fashion of the city state. Shiva said that she would be taking some animals with her on the journey in order to butcher them for food when necessary, and the man nodded. That seemed to spark a question in his eyes, and he asked her about the temple animals. He asked who was performing the sacrifices now that assumedly, everyone in the temple was dead. Shiva paused, being reminded of the fact that everyone in the city had known about the animal sacrifices and, just like he thought it was fine to butcher multiple animals for food and store them with callousness like they were already dead on the ship (except to keep them fat enough), had not cared in the slightest except for if they stopped working. She told him that God had came down to her and talked to her in a vision and told her that as long as she provided the sacrifices later on, he was going to give them a grace period of a year to right the situation with their lack of manpower and resources. Shiva told the man that she hoped to bring more people back to the city in order to help her keep it as a paradise. He seemed wary of bringing outsiders to their small, edenic nation, but after another week of working on the ship acknowledged that it was the only way. She said that once she had brought back enough people they could tend to the sacrifices daily once the year period of grace was up, or she could become the leader of the temple and work on it herself. He seemed satisfied enough by this prospect, and said that there was still plenty of time until that happened.

Shiva was glad when they finally stopped talking about such things during the many hours they spent working together and moved the conversation topics instead to wondering together about the outside world. She admitted she was excited to see what manner of beasts and creatures existed, and he asked her about the ocean and the water she had told him she’d touched with her own bare feet and hands. She said that she could maybe take him to see it some day, although it was an empty promise. He asked her to bring back technology as well from the outside world, and she agreed, silently swearing that she would never bring it back to him even if she did return with some in her possession. When the ship was done and it had been tested to the very edge of its existence, Shiva revealed to him that she thought she might have figured out a way to combat the virus above the ground level. He was cautious, but also hopeful. With as much persuasion as she could manage, she was able to convince him to try putting on a mask and breathing through it. They were still underground, so she didn’t have many issues convincing him to just do so in case it hampered his breathing (without the virus even present). Unknownst to him, though, she had hooked it to a type of gas in a canister that had been used to knock out animals for experimentation. By the time he realized, due to its distinctive scent as it filled the mask, he was already unconscious. Carrying his motionless body above ground, she brought him to the temple and then dragged him up onto the altar. He immediately woke up and was confused as pain began to flood his body and all of his senses. Without saying another word of even bothering to explain, Shiva left the room, hearing his screams fill the air. She had more important things to attend to. Taking the teleporter to the edge of the ocean where she had first seen the sea, she dropped the miniature ship in the water and then blasted it with a concentrated amount of her magical power. The ship immediately expanded to a full sized one, and with a lot of trepidation, Shiva boarded it, half expecting to be betrayed by the man. But no, it was completely fine. And just like that, she set out on her first journey away from the island and their small secluded city nation. Right away, Shiva ran into a pack of orcas, wild animals that she had read about in the books about animals but never before properly seen in person up close. Although they were not magical animals, she could sense that they had immense power of a sort. Her blessing of Orcinus flowed into their bodies until she could understand them and their needs intrinsically, and they began to comprehend what she wanted and her desires in relation to their existence. They were her first honest and true friends. Among them, one was named Aegir. He became her closest companion, and he would go on to be the most valuable being in existence in her eyes. All animals were created equal, but that didn’t mean that some weren’t meant to rise above others. Even if God had intended for equality to remain supreme, Shiva knew that reality didn’t necessarily work that way. Maybe it did make her a hypocrite to think and believe such things when she had lauded equality and complained of favoritism with sacrificing other animals over humans in the past. But she knew that at heart, she was an animal herself and bound by her own biases.

The first new sacrifice who was a mage outside of her city she met was basically a little girl. In some ways, she had acted far older than her appearance, but she also had a childishness that Shiva connected to the teenagers who would run around the city right before curfew and break the rules by bringing animals from the city outskirts into the festival area and paint murals in the streets. It was a wild sort of glee that appealed to her and made her smile. But even as much as she liked the little mage, the girl had a sort of power to her that had her salivating at the thought of how much energy and life that could bring to their eden through sacrifice. Wordlessly, she had convinced her to go with her back to the city and had trapped her in an endless cenote. The girl also seemed to have some sort of water related powers, since she had playfully blown bubbles all around and even introduced her cat to Aegir. Shiva was mostly amused by the antics, and she had even felt a small connection with the other mage. But in the end, both she and her little cat had been trapped in a cenote and left with the water shades to guard them. She had no current need for a sacrifice, but in the future, she would need many. Over time, Shiva gathered people in this way and slowly expanded the paradise. She eventually killed the girl once the researcher had expired, and she found that people with more magical power or determination could last much longer on the altar. With the powers of a mage, the process lasted well over a year and even almost two. From that point on, she was determined to find mages that were of somewhat remarkable power, but not to the point of causing a big ruckus or possibly damaging the city, temple, or underground areas. She also had to be able to subdue them, which made her target people moderate in power but outside of the public eye. Blatantly kidnapping people in broad daylight would be bad for future endeavors, so Shiva avoided that for sure. Before the mage, she had brought back numerous people for decades. Perhaps more, perhaps less. But now that time moved less rapidly in her eyes, and it felt like the mage’s lifespan had brought everything back to a standstill in terms of how Shiva experienced the passage of time.

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Now that things were relative, she found herself more restless. That was how Shiva had found herself leaving from the other side of the island this time. There wasn’t much on that side the last time she had checked- one could go sailing for miles upon miles upon miles and still not encounter anything or anyone. But she kept going, venturing through the blueness and the dark waters until she saw a small speck. It was a very dim, small dot in the vast horizon of her vision, but Shiva watched it from far away. There seemed to be a ship there, or at least a raft, and she perked up at the idea of perhaps having some more fun injected into her life. But suddenly, the ship seemed to be sailing away. Or disappearing somehow? It was getting smaller and vanishing from her sight. Shiva frowned, troubled by the idea of missing her chance to acquire some more people as acquaintances and possibly er… sacrifices, to put it bluntly. However, she shrugged. There would always be more people, and she didn’t need to find regular individuals urgently at this point in time, as she still had several months left on the clock until she was needed back at the temple with the next person to be introduced to the city. Recently, with the expansion of everything, more and more resources had been necessary to fuel the blessing. Shiva had found that out by accident, but it meant that she was required to make more frequent trips nowadays. However, thanks to the last mage being quite powerful, she was able to get a small break now. That was what she was doing at the moment- simply exploring, mostly for fun, but also with a small bit of practicality. After being stuck in the same city for so long, at first she hadn't thought that she needed to go wandering around the world. After all, everyone in the city was accustomed to living there. However, with her realization of just how much of the world lay unknown to her, she felt gripped by the strong desire to explore. For these reasons, Shiva had taken her ship and herself and of course, most important, Aegir, and embarked on a strange sailing adventure.

Now, Shiva gradually moved slightly closer to the speck, but she was still far away enough that it only appeared to be the size of an apple. Her ship was currently cloaked in several layers of enchantments, so she felt secure enough as she materialized a pair of binoculars and examined the island through the lenses. A man with long brown hair and a strange hat seemed to be struggling with a rope. His movements were difficult to make sense of from this far away, but Shiva didn’t bother putting a hand over her mouth as she laughed long and hard at his predicament. “He looks so stupid,” she muttered as she sniggered. Putting the binoculars down, Shiva shrugged. It seemed like it was just the one person, and likely a regular, nonmage. Her expression became a bit confused as she realized the ship had totally disappeared somehow in these few minutes she had been distracted, left with an even smaller speck that could even barely be called a dot. Now utterly baffled, Shiva lifted the binoculars back up to see a barrel floating in the sea. No way… had he drowned? Disappointed, she waved her fingers and her own ship folded up into a neat little miniature, flying into her hand which then stowed it easily away in her pocket. Aegir, ever loyal, caught her weight as she fell the rest of the way to the sea from the height the ship had lifted her previously into the air. Now riding him, the pair flew towards the barrel to investigate. From high above, Shiva couldn’t help but hide a smile as she finally realized what was happening. Inside of the hollow object came a series of noises that made it obvious that the yelling belonged to someone, most likely the man from earlier (unless there had been another person present who she had failed to see). Shiva couldn’t help burst into laughter again as the stranger cursed and yelped. She decided to follow the barrel to see where he ended up.

They traveled for a while- she wasn’t sure how long. Her mind was totally consumed by musing and wondering where they would end up. But this man seemed to be blessed by a goddess of luck or something of the sort, because his barrel managed to reach shore! It was a port, albeit not a very busy one, but Shiva flew down with Aegir until she touched the rocky, sandy coast with her bare feet. Without a wince, she strode across them and approached the barrel, staring at it curiously as Aegir hovered behind her head. Indirectly communicating with the orca, they both observed it with no small amount of amusement as the barrel shifted around and rolled a bit, strange noises emerging from inside. It was all she could to to avoid flat out laughing her butt off as a loud shriek of screaming began to emanate from inside. Apparently, he was unable to escape from being trapped within the cask-like object. Shiva listened to the yelling for a few minutes with a contemplative expression before she leaned a bit closer to it, still staying a bit away in case he knocked the barrel around again and managed to hit her in the face or something stupid like that. "Who’s Neptune and who’s Calypso?" She casually asked as her hands began to shine slightly, the effect subtle due to the already bright sun overhead. Then in a single movement, her magic reached out and connected to the cap of the barrel at several different points, then tore it away from the opening it was blocking. The names she had heard sounded familiar, but she guessed that she had forgotten her teachings of ancient history from school. Or perhaps they were familiar not because she had learned about them long ago, but because other humans she had met had babbled about them. Either way, Shiva thought perhaps he was motivated by some sort of love to stay alive. Perhaps Neptune and Calypso were his children? Although, why he would be using the names of his children like a curse amused her- that fleeting, conceptual idea of hers probably wasn’t the reality. "You should be free now. Hungry?" Still floating behind her shoulder, Aegir extended one flipper to the stranger, a bag of slightly soggy, but cooked and breaded fish sticks hanging from said flipper. "Aegir doesn’t share very often, so you should take this opportunity," she advised him. Shiva glanced around the port, shrugging as she realized there were a few other humans around, but not many. She also peered more inside of the barrel, examining the man’s state and his clothes. He didn’t seem to be in too bad of a shape. The ride was probably pretty bumpy, but not so terrible that he came out of it with more than bruises and bad memories. Probably. Shiva wasn’t experienced with people riding around in barrels in the ocean, after all.

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