Gods Aren't Perfect - OFFICIAL

Chapter Four: The (Side) Quest Begins

While the second party had just entered the magical fridge portal to nobody knows where, Ophelia and her group were already at their destination. A canopy of leaves surrounded them, the ground underfoot was grass - not the scorched type, and various other forms of vegetation surrounded them. Colorful blooms whose colors defied logic and reason, trees that floated because they could bushes that rustled in time, almost as if in conversation, several species of trees that could never grow in the same climate, but grew together anyway; all these different types of questionable plants grew about. Midnight the raven cawed and flew off, Calandra yelping as he suddenly sprung off her shoulder. Sketchy Grass just fell asleep on the floor.

"I'm guessing this is a Nature world?" Faceless was the first to speak up. "Looks... stereotypical."

"Ophelia, take a good look around. How does it look?" Lizzy asked the spectacled girl next to her.

"It's... give me a moment to see it all first. Oh gosh, finally someplace nice after the literal dump and the fire world," she breathed.

Tronso and Koumei had already moved on to checking out the strange life. The blond boy, being much shorter than the other one, had to stretch up to poke a strange flower vine. With the toot of a party horn, it promptly exploded into confetti-like petals. His mute companion, on the other hand, was busy watching some strange birds. A sun conure fluttered by and perched on a tree. It picked up a plastic cup and suddenly began to vibrate violently, making squeaky dolphin noises as it slid from branch to branch. This behavior was so fascinating that even Calandra came over to take notes on its strange actions. That was until Midnight returned to his owner and scared the little conure away.

"This place has its charm." Lizzy commented. "I might draw the scenery at some point."

"We don't have time for that. We have to keep moving." the masked man countered. "There's gonna be someone here needing us to do their stuff. I don't really know. This is my first time here."

Ophelia sighed. "I understand, but we've been rushing through the past two worlds. We should really take it in for a minute. Breathe. Get to know the worlds we're going to be the gods of. Or, well, goddesses."

"You're only saying that because it's your world, isn't it?" Faceless replied.

She let out an iguana screech, waking Sketchy.

"Please never do that again," Calandra sighed.

"Can we compromise?" Lizzy asked, picking up her fox from the grass. "We can start going, but go slowly." Behind her, Koumei gave both of them a "please" look, his hands over his ears. The two sighed, but went along with the rest of the group.

Before long, they found their first roadblock. Literally. A giant bunch of strange vines was in the way of their little grassy path. Frustrated, Lizzy pulled out her pencil and poked the vines, which suddenly came alive and sprang at her. Ophelia drew her crystalline longsword, Leafblade, and slashed at the vines. Sketchy Grass leapt from the floor and chewed on them. Tronso finished off the combo attack by pulling the vines off.

"Not bad," stated Faceless. "But why aren't you using your powers or anything?"

"What if we have something like a Mana system where all our powers take up energy? I mean, we really can't tell right now, but better safe than sorry," the Nature Goddess replied. "I don't wanna run out of magic when we run into the boss or something."

They continued forwards in silence, the cliché forest all around them. A squirrel trotted over and was immediately scared away by Midnight screeching about his feathers. More questionable plants grew about, but none of them felt curious enough to mess with them lest they turn out to be piranhas.