38. Unexpected Visitor

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38


For the first time in a while the God of War found himself in his own office within the War Department's administrative building actually doing his paperwork. Sure Elgaldir came and sat in here for at least an hour everyday when he wasn't needed elsewhere but he'd never really gotten used to the amount of clerical work that needed to be done here. His previous position had, had paperwork of course but it had been such higher stakes, cross referencing things, fact checking and ensuring both parties talked to one another civilly. Here there was a lot of ticking boxes on multipage, multiple choice questionnaires.

Everyone kept walking past his door and peeping, then questioning the staff that were taking papers in and out of it about what was going on.

It was very lucky that things in the human world were pretty peaceful right now so there weren't that many prayers crossing his desk. What prayers had come in were the result of relatively minor border skirmishes in the north west which could easily be handled by his juniors.

Despite that there wasn't anyone that could take on the administrative duties of the God of War and the pile had only grown larger in his absence. There was no rest for those who were behind on their paperwork unless they wanted to drown in it.

Office work wasn't the most glamorous part of being a God and no-one warned you about it. It snuck up on you like a curse where the more you filled out the more spawned leaving you trapped in an endless loop of opening envelopes and resealing them.

A mobius strip of paper based suffering.

It felt truly pointless but he wasn't the only one working today. The whole office was filled with people, the War Department was a popular place to work and there was always enough work to go around. Unlike the seasonal work of the botanical deities and the festival spirits the War Department only competed with the Deities of Death for the highest amount of overtime hours.

Elgaldir was slowly losing steam, taking longer and longer to fill out or sign the things placed on the desk in front of him. The initial flurry of work slowed to a trickle as his mind began to wander. He'd been so happy to come in today, to distract himself from yesterday.


~~~


Everyone had had the day off to attend the festival, he'd personally gone out to give his present to Drulvenus and collected some sweets for Dythos. He knew that the God of Wheat had not left his palace except to visit the Emperor's Palace yet, so would likely miss the festival.

He still needed to eat so the gesture didn't seem too intimate and Elgaldir knew what he liked to eat. Gathering his favourite treats wasn't hard work and any chance to do something nice for the other God was a blessing.

Seeing Dythos amidst the crush of the crowd had been shocking. His face bobbed among the mass of people in a way that made Elgaldir unable to see anyone else. He could still now several weeks on from the Wheat God's reappearance barely believe that he had been right all this time and Dythos was still alive.

It had taken him longer than he should have to notice the distress on that face and the shift in the crowd's sentiment. Hands grabbing at his arms and clothes he wasn't strong enough right now to remove, everyone's lack of respect towards a fellow citizen who very obviously didn't want to be touched both enraged him.

Elgaldir should have pulled him out immediately. Dythos was both physically and magically weaker now than before, despite knowing how fiercely independent he was and not wanting the Wheat God to feel any more disrespected Elgaldir should not have hesitated so much.

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