Can't help but love them

[aestrix]

Raezenoth has sent his manifested form to sleep. He doesn't need it to sleep, it could (and has) gone years and years without such, but sometimes it's nice to not have a body. To go back to how he was in the beginning - a whisper on the wind, a swirl of desert sands, the rustle of the sparse grass. All of his domain, instead of split and splintered and crammed into flesh for the convenience of having hands. Anywhere in it, instead of forced to move at his (admittedly considerable, for a god) top speed. He isn't sorry to have a manifested form, isn't sorry to walk among mortals and call them friend. But he is a god. He doesn't always have to have a body. So he doesn't.

He tidies up his domain. He finds people who need things, who want things, and slips in items that would let them get what they need, and then what they want, by their own power. He's very accustomed to this, he's had a lot of practice, but he tries to outdo himself every chance he gets. Tries to inspire his followers to a little bit more of that stubborn brilliance he loves in mortals so. Tries to help them improve. The mortals make the god, after all. It is the greatest irony, he thinks.

He is the wind, and the ground, and the water beneath it, and he is all of the little things that help people without snatching away their ability to help themselves. It's nice. Quiet. Soothing, after his recent near-mistake involving deleting slavery from existence.

He'll have a visitor soon. He'll wake his body up for that, it's bound to be interesting if nothing else.

Comments

[greatcomposure]

"I'll make a note of it when I get home."

[aestrix]

"Thank you." Walk, walk.

There is a town, up ahead. It is set into one of the larger sandstone outcroppings, with little pleasant buildings outside in the open. There are fountains, and lots of little plants, and the place has a neat, if eclectic, layout. It is rather cute.

[greatcomposure]

"Very nice."

[aestrix]

"I like it," he agrees. "Though I am likely not the one to compliment. I didn't build it."

[greatcomposure]

"No, but I'm sure you'd know who to pass my compliments on to."

[aestrix]

"Yes. I will inform them."

He passes along compliments, to multiple people.

"They are all very flattered. One is giggling in an adorable fashion."

[greatcomposure]

"How delightful."

[aestrix]

"Yes."

Town! Cordelia looks Obviously Foreign. She gets several curious looks, and one small child that asks, "Did you dye your hair?"

[greatcomposure]

Finding out what the small child said to her is worth the trivial amount of MP it takes to cast comprehend language.

"No," she says, Raezenoth being presumably capable of translating her answer. "It grew that way."

[aestrix]

Raezenoth is kind enough to translate her answer. In her voice.

"Nuh-uh!" says the small child. "That's not fair, I want red hair!"

[greatcomposure]

"I can't help you if you want it to grow that way, but if your ambitions are more modest I think you can achieve them someday."

[aestrix]

The small child eyes her suspiciously.

"Okay. Or maybe I should have blue hair, I bet no one has blue hair naturally." She looks at Raezenoth. "Do people have blue hair naturally?"

"I have never known mortals to have such, but the world is a large place and it is always possible. Gods, of course, may have whatever hair color they like."

The small child wrinkles her nose. "You have boring hair!"

"I apologize," says Raezenoth, amused. "But I will not be changing it."

"Aw."

[greatcomposure]

"Not everyone has to have interesting hair," says Cordelia. "Some people have other interesting qualities. Being very good at games, for example."

[aestrix]

"Yeah but if you can have interesting hair why wouldn't you?"

"It would be distracting," muses Raezenoth, "to have, for example, lime green hair."

"But cool!"

[greatcomposure]

"It's polite to respect other people's aesthetic choices," says Cordelia. "Even when they are boring."

[aestrix]

The small child makes a face. "But he could have cool hair," she insists, petulantly.

Raezenoth is unmoved by this line of argument. He looks silently at the small child.

"... But I should not be telling other people what to do if they don't want to do it," she admits, surly.

"Yes," he agrees.

This incites a slightly apologetic pout.

[greatcomposure]

"A principle many people have trouble with," says Cordelia.

[mountains_themselves]

"I have every belief that they can learn," says Raezenoth. Only a little pointedly.

The little girl sniffs a, "Sorry," and then goes to not be judged by a god for her manners.

[greatcomposure]

"Good kid," says Cordelia.

[mountains_themselves]

"Brave, too."

[greatcomposure]

"An admirable quality."

[mountains_themselves]

"Yes."

They are out of small children to judge cosmetic decisions, but they are not out of town! Raezenoth walks to one civil-looking building that likely leads to the underground portions.

It does, in fact, lead to the underground portions.

The underground portions are very pretty. And surprisingly green.

[greatcomposure]

Cordelia is interested in local gardening practices!

[mountains_themselves]

Raezenoth knows a surprising amount of it! Or, maybe, an unsurprising amount of it, considering. He explains how it works, including little fiddly technical details about what crops work best in which areas, how they're rotated to keep the soil fertile, and the care involved with all of them.

[greatcomposure]

It's all very fascinating. Cordelia is impressed. She has some suggestions to offer based on otherworldly knowledge, too.