He felt surprise course through him as Thera said it and he gently pulled away, reaching into his bag to get a small white mana crystal to hold up to his eye. What little reflection he saw was crude, nothing compared to the mirror he’d have liked to have, but it was enough to see that Thera was right. Neither the whites nor the pupil were different, but his iris had changed to a vibrant violet, the same as any demon.

…So I definitely need to make sure I haven’t sprouted any scales anywhere later. He thought to himself, turning quickly to Anailia who wore a small, worried look, not having noticed the minor detail until it was pointed out.

“Uh, so how worried should I be about this?”

“You’re asking about an experience nobody else has gone through,” The goddess pointed out. “I don’t believe it's bad, but I can’t exactly say it’s nothing either.”

“...Well, I guess I’ll just keep an eye on things and hope for the best. In the meantime, I can’t help but remember being told that bodies possessed by gods were good for both potions and materials, if only you knew somebody with an awakened crafting skill who could handle both,” He said, fluttering his eyes at the goddess and getting a small laugh.

“As charming as it is to watch you try and get all you can from this, the bodies will be taken to an awakened alchemist to brew potions with and we’ll decide how the bones and skins will be divided later. Considering what a limited number of people there are who can do anything with them I’m sure you and your teacher will find yourselves with something to play with,” She said, smiling at his obvious disappointment before turning to Thera. “We’ll be leaving shortly, as I’m sure you can imagine there’s plenty to deal with from all of this but would you like to come back with us or stay here with your lover?”

“Why is Ben staying here?” She asked, turning to him as he thought of all he’d have to do now that the exciting bit was over.

“Myriad is taking in all of these people so I at least need to stay for a bit to help get them set up and put them on the path to being good little members of his faith. It might be a couple weeks,” He explained as just how monumental a task that would be set in. “Oh god, I need to explain the state of the world and the invasion and try to properly motivate them all to convert and look at how they’re living, they’re sleeping in tents and it doesn’t seem like they do any agriculture I’ll at least need to build them houses…” He felt a migraine forming as he looked around, seeing more and more that would be good to do while he was there. And I don’t even have any tools with me! Damn it, this is going to be the dryad village all over again!

They’d left their cart at the church of Anailia, but at the very least he had his bag with him that contained all of the rings he’d brought for the contest, as well as a few books, and most important of all, he’d have Thera.

“I’ll stay,” She told her goddess. “He’s far too likely to be murdered when nobody’s watching him.”

“Very well, in that case we should be off. Thera, it’s always lovely, I’ll check in on you while you’re here. Contender Ben, do try to keep out of trouble.”

With that, the three god’s picked up the bodies the forbidden gods died in as a portal was opened and they all stepped through.

“Uh, what did she mean when she called me that?” He asked, getting an uncertain look as he did.

“I don’t know, but I heard Vasta call uncle that as well while you were in the trial.”

Interesting. Myriad, want to chime in?

Fine, fine, but before you go, I think you know exactly what quest I want.

With that out of the way and seeing that he wouldn’t immediately get any answers he pushed the matter of whatever it meant to be a contender to the side, instead looking at the crowd behind him, all shocked and stunned by what they witnessed, with the priest Caz wailing as two others cried as well. They could feel whatever connection they’d had with their gods breaking as they died, now it was up to him to pick up the pieces.

Great.

“I’m sure you all have a lot of complicated feelings about what happened, and honestly, that’s okay,” He began. “You’ve been through a lot, and if you want to mourn their loss then neither I nor Myriad will try to stop you, but as we’ve already explained, those gods weren’t treating you well. They weren’t letting you live real lives. The faith you gave wouldn’t maintain the world like they said, all it did was make them stronger for their own benefit. Now you’ll have plenty of time to enjoy your time in this world, not needing to give every spare minute to work and prayer. Hell, as an apostle, I only give a couple minutes a day and it’s more than enough for Myriad, but I won’t even ask you to give that much if you don’t want to. Of course, there’s plenty of benefits. You’re honestly all pretty lucky to have him take you in. He gives all of his believers his blessing after a day or two, and you’ll receive his skill after a few months of prayer. Well, there’s plenty of good points about him but he’ll be visiting you all in your dreams to talk for a while to come, you’ll get to discover all of those yourself eventually.”

He saw looks of confusion from the ones who had themselves together as Toltho spoke up, hesitant but wanting answers.

“If you don’t mind…”

“Ask away.”

“What exactly is an apostle?”

Yeah, fair enough. It was surprising to learn that the village only had the five priests, no other pillars for each of the five, but it seemed it was another way that those gods had skimped out on spending faith.

“An excellent question. It’s one of the pillars of faith for a god, with the other two being the head priest and the oracle. You can basically just think of me as Myriad’s priest though. Anything else? I’ll be here for a while to help try and raise your quality of life so don’t be afraid to ask anything you want to know. Eventually, the goal would be to have you all interact with the world as a whole if you want to.”

Toltho had many questions, endless questions after his world had all but shattered, but for the time being he stuck to basing them on what Ben had said.

“In that case, you mentioned your god could give us skills, the same way the voice does, but what exactly is a blessing?”

“Wait, what?” Ben asked back, confusion on his face. “It’s something gods can give to their believers that can help them raise their skill levels and jobs. Admittedly, most of them are pretty stingy with them, Myriad’s best point is the fact that he gives them to all of his believers, he’s an incredibly generous god like that and all of you will be able to grow stronger as a result if you accept him.”

“And how exactly does that help us with our work?” Another asked, seeing that Ben seemed agreeable enough to answer them.

“What? No, I’m talking about… Oh my god you guys don’t have a job crystal, do you? And the fact that you haven’t heard of them means you don’t have cards either. I mean, of course you don’t have cards, how would you have gotten them, but still.”

He tried not to think about how much they didn’t know. In a lot of ways, despite all of them being born on the world they were like him when he’d first arrived, they just need to learn.

He took his personal job crystal out of his pocket, holding it up for them to see. “Okay, this here is a job crystal, it lets you access a benefit of the system where you select an area you want to grow. To put it simply, it can help you become stronger, faster, smarter, healthier, and better at magic, and if you’re lucky you might get a new skill or a level to one you already have. I can check what skills you have for you so if you all come up one by one we can discuss the options you have as well as how you want to grow. While that’s happening, well I’m not sure how you all treat your dead, but I think it would be best to handle it.”

The bodies from just before they’d arrived were still left in the open and a few of the people took their eyes off of him to begin dealing with that, though nobody stepped up to take a job, at least not right away.

Eventually, it was Toltho who left the group and walked towards him, acting as the leader he was by being brave enough to risk learning from the man before him he’d been taught all of his life to fear.