Alliana moved to sit beside her child, silently pulling him into a hug against her. She still had no words for him yet, no thoughts beyond shock, but she hated to see him cry.

“Can I know why you hate Iker?” Wisteria spoke up again, lips pursed, “I know some gods suck. I know that. I’ve had some not-so-nice times with them. But I can’t imagine hating them so much you wanted to kill them. That’s what I’m stuck on. Even so, I still don’t hate you either way. Your past is your past.”

Alister sniffled and nodded weakly, “Yeah… I… Iker was the worst of the big gods because he was in charge. I don’t know how you deal with hearing their stupid voices so much.”

“Please don’t call them stupid… I’m trying really really hard to be calm and not be… um… biased to you? But it’s hard because this is really shocking and I… I mean it’s so much about my life,” Wisteria asked, frowning.

“Yeah… sorry. Thank you for being calm. I was the most scared to tell you. Ode and Jacob, I wanted to tell you two because you’re scholars and I felt you’d be genuinely interested, but I also didn’t know how you would react. Morgan… Neth… honestly you two just kind of ended up getting dragged into this because you saw that goddess’s reaction. And mom… I… was scared to tell you because you’re fairly religious. I didn’t want to garner attention,” Alister wiped his face on his sleeves, trying his best not to hiccup.

He steadied himself, “Now then… Iker. He’s in charge, and he acts like it. He had the power to change everything that was wrong but perpetuated it instead. When I was young as Raalin I was a starving orphan that landed in the hands of the church. We were beaten often. Iker and the other gods didn’t care. Even though it was happening in their churches, they didn’t care. It was never important enough. They didn’t even have doctrines on it. Not one bit of religious law said beatings and abuse were bad but many about how to keep people in line. So I didn’t have a great start with the gods and religion, but I made the mistake of trying to fix it. Going to war with how the church did things. Trying to make things more fair and even. I wanted my friend to be able to live how she wanted, not dictated by men’s desires. I wanted to change how the churches and temples saw the poorest folk. But change was seen as an act of terrorism. It made everything go downhill. A speeding boulder, one thing led to another and before I knew it I was an adventurer that had a bounty from most major religious centers in the area. Even then I didn’t want to fight the gods. Really, I didn’t. They were this unknowable figure until I was much older.”

He tensed his jaw, not enjoying the recollection, “But then one killed a close friend of mine. They took our aggressive closing of a church very personally and made an example of them. I understand why. I understand their reasoning. But that was the point of no return. I knew nothing but hatred for them and those that defended them. I became a nightmare for the gods with my closest of friends. At first out of vengeance. Then out of a desire to change how things worked, to take fate out of their hands. And near the end… out of necessity. I was running for my life for the last five years straight. I hated the bigotry of the gods, the unfairness of them. So often the big ones… they care about no one but the rich and well-off. Those that can give the most in return. Or they claim people to work for them, spreading their word, gaining them more popularity, more prayer. But even then they barely cared about what their apostles or even their saints were doing! They could be razing a village in the name of their lord - and yes I’ve seen it - and as long as the bottom line checks out the god doesn’t care. Iker didn’t care. Either himself or his subordinates.”

“A kill order was sent out for me and my friends and students, eventually. I was never good with social things. I was not a scalpel. I was a hammer. Powerful and good at magic but not exactly a grand strategist,” he continued, having calmed himself enough that he was no longer hiccuping, “I didn’t hate all gods and goddesses. That Advera woman, she was around back then. She was a decent lady, a pain to be sure, but she’s much more about doing what’s right and all that. She doesn’t let her worshipers do as they please, or at least she didn’t use to. If they broke her trust, it was simple, she wouldn’t give them her strength. I respect divines like her. I don’t trust her, but she has my respect.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Wisteria muttered, roughly running her fingers through her hair, “It doesn’t feel real. I’ve been wondering what your past life was like but you were so secretive about it. I didn’t want to bother you… but then the goddess was so adamant… Do you really think they’d still hate you? It’s been five thousand years like you said. A lot has happened since then.”

“I don’t know but it’s hardly something I wanted to risk. I don’t want my family getting hurt because of me.”

“…Yeah. Iker’s not that bad… and Vera’s really nice and helpful… maybe we can just… have you start new with them all? It’s a new life. You don’t have to hate them.”

Alister sighed, “You make it sound so easy. If they’re still horrible people then I certainly won’t like them… but I have more pressing things to deal with in this life anyhow.”

“You could try changing things socially instead of being a hammer?”

He smirked softly, “Yes I suppose I could. You know if that’s the case I’d need your help, right? You’d be stuck with me.”

“I mean… I am already, right?”

This got a blush and laugh from Alister. “I guess so… though there is a little bit more context that most of you probably can’t really imagine easily,” Alister said thoughtfully, “What I did sounds harsh, and it was, but things were… very different, then. There were no nations as you think of them today… honestly, the idea of such a thing was pretty well inconceivable. You’d be mad for even considering controlling a nation as large as the Severin territory, nevermind all of Mare. The only people with power even remotely like that of our King would be… well, literal gods. Even then, almost all of them had much smaller territories than Mare. The amount of land you control, father, would be more like the burden of a god than one of a man. You could control a city-state and surrounding county… MAYBE have a large influence over a council of other city-states. But a nation like Mare would be truly unfathomable. There was no position I could take peaceably to see any kind of large-scale change. I could save a few people… but the idea that I will eventually be Duke means a level of power I never would have thought possible. Even having a little idea of how it works now, the idea is a bit dizzying.”

The group chuckled softly, some of the tension lifting, slowly. They were still tense, looking at this child that claimed to have killed gods. It was so unthinkable. Alliana rested a hand atop his head, “You’re my child, and nothing will change that. If you go around like that in this life though, so help me I will make you regret it. Your family comes first. Do you understand?”

“Hah. Yes, mother. I understand. The family will come first. I won’t go fighting any gods unprovoked. Don’t worry,” he said, meekly smiling up at her, “Honestly I expected a worse response…”

Morgan spoke up, her voice cracking at first, “Oh no. No. I feel like we’re definitely shocked and kind of horrified. Who fights GODS!? They can’t be FOUGHT! Why is everyone so calm about this! We DO realize how powerful he would have had to be, right?!”

“Well I worried I would be crucified so… this is far better.”

“We aren’t going to crucify you for your past life, Alister,” Jacob said, “We may be stunned, but even if we didn’t care about you - which we do - the law of the land states one may not be convicted for crimes of your past lives.”