Chapter 420: The Goddess Trial

Ezdolo's descent came faster than Ambrose had expected. He put Aiolos out of his mind entirely.

Aige moved quickly, sending word to everyone in the Silent Sea Pirate Company to fan out and find the missing man. She herself stayed with Ambrose and approached the high priestess, who now shone with the Goddess' presence.

All the merfolk who had taken part in the ritual had withdrawn. Only the breathtaking sea-conch altar remained.

Ezdolo, speaking through the high priestess, turned to Ambrose with a look of quiet contemplation. "Even in the depths of the sea, your story has been spreading. What shall I call you, lich of many names?"

Ambrose bowed respectfully. "Any name will do. My teacher once said he gave everything to me. If you'd like, you may even call me Old Pete."

Old Pete was the name the God of Alchemy had used when he was still mortal. In those days, people had called him Blind Pete. It wasn't until Ambrose became his apprentice that the old man had finally stopped being pushed around.

Ezdolo seemed mildly surprised by Ambrose's lack of ceremony, and a smile crossed the high priestess's features. "I have heard of your unusual bond with the God of Alchemy, but it seems the story has lost something in its telling. Now, you sought this meeting. What is it you wish to discuss?"

Ezdolo went straight to the heart of the matter.

"My friend Aige," Ambrose said without preamble, "is a ghost ship, and she is on the verge of divinity. Goddess Ezdolo, I ask for your permission to make use of your faithful so that my friend may become a true deity."

Ezdolo looked at Aige for a long moment. "After all these years," she said quietly, "you have finally walked this far."

Aige blinked. "Have you been watching over me, Goddess?"

"From the day you were born," Ezdolo said. "Did you not know? Your father, the old shipwright, was one of my faithful. He was one of the most gifted craftsmen I have ever had the pleasure of watching. Every vessel he built was unlike any other in the world. When he fell into danger, I sent word to him through the dolphins, hoping he would come to the plane of elemental water and enter my divine realm."

Aige's composure cracked. "My father is in your divine realm?!"

Ezdolo's expression turned sorrowful. "Sadly, he refused. You were the last ship he ever built—his greatest work, every ounce of his being poured into your hull. But your first sinking broke something in him. Perhaps that breaking was what allowed you to be born. He watered the seed of your soul with everything he had left, and from that, you came into being."

For a moment, disappointment crossed Aige's face, but she calmed down quickly. This was an answer she had long since prepared herself for.

"I could never find any of this in his notes," she said with a rueful half-smile. "He didn't seem particularly devout."

The old shipwright's sailing journals had been filled, cover to cover, with ships. The gods barely merited a mention.

"That matters little," Ezdolo said. "What I admired was his gift. Those who open their mouths to pray to the gods at every turn are common enough, but a mortal who hones a single craft to its limit, the way your father did, remains rare beyond measure."

Creation was among Ezdolo's domains. Of course she would cherish someone like the old shipwright.

Ambrose seized the opening. "It seems, Goddess Ezdolo, that you have no particular objection to helping?"

Given this connection between the two of them, wouldn't the negotiation be simpler still? He was starting to wonder whether the Goddess of Fate had been winking at him rather too frequently of late. His luck felt almost excessive.

But Ezdolo did not answer. Instead, she turned to Aige and asked, "Have you already decided what kind of deity you wish to become?"

Aige nodded. A faint, trembling light kindled at the center of her brow. Ezdolo studied it at length before saying, "A domain tied to the sea and sailing... You're nearly there. Perhaps, with a little more time, you wouldn't even need outside help."

Aige shook her head. "No. I know myself clearly. If I rely on my own strength alone, I might not take that final step for several millennia. I have walked this road as far as my will can carry me. Now I stand before the last bottleneck."

There were several ways for a mortal to ascend to godhood. The path Aige had chosen was the most orthodox. As a ghost ship, she had sailed to every corner of the sea, and had walked that road to its very end.

At this stage, a mortal of exceptional talent would come to comprehend the laws of the world, accept the baptism of those laws, and receive the corresponding divine domain the instant Aion assented.

But Aige fell short of that final step, not in power, but in wisdom.

She had accumulated enough strength many times over. Yet she had spent long years brushing against the related laws of this world without ever truly grasping them, let alone absorbing them into herself.

There was no way around it. It was like a mage attempting a Wish spell: you either understood how to do it or you didn't. In the entire world, only a lunatic like Gary Watts had ever found a way to cast Wish without limit. Other mages spent lifetimes on the problem, and those who didn't understand it simply never would.

Aige's gifts in this area were genuinely limited, perhaps partly a consequence of her origins. Having had no one to guide her, she had spent a long stretch of her existence after awakening before she even learned language and writing, and since then, her wisdom had simply lagged behind.

There had been a moment, when Ambrose was selling divine domains, that Aige had been tempted. But she had come to understand that such a shortcut would mean nothing.

The old shipwright had wanted his daughter to become the legendary ship that sailed to every last corner of the sea. If Aige couldn't ascend to godhood in the way her father had dreamed, what right did she have to ask Aion to resurrect him?

Even if she managed to become a god through a shortcut, she would have become a weak deity forever frozen in place, probably beneath Aion's notice entirely.

So when Ambrose proposed the plan to ascend her through faith, Aige had agreed without hesitation.

It was still a shortcut, in its way. But she would remain a deity of the sea and sailing, and would still have room to grow afterward. Perhaps one day, when a great age of exploration arose, she would ascend to full divinity and earn Aion's attention at last.

Ezdolo listened to Aige's account and understood her reasoning. But rather than agreeing or refusing outright, she turned to Ambrose. "I understand what you are asking. If you can pass my trial, I will agree to use my faith to help her ascend."

Ambrose asked at once, "What does the trial involve? Helping deal with the ixiray?"

The merfolk's greatest enemy at the moment was the ixiray, and they were even organizing a great crusade against them. If Ezdolo was going to set a trial, surely it would involve that.

But Ambrose was wrong. "That conflict has nothing to do with it," Ezdolo said, shaking her head. "We are going to play a game. I will give you the chance to ask me ten yes-no questions. If you can identify the answer before your ten questions are up, I will grant your request."

Ambrose's spirits sank. The Goddess of Fate hadn't been winking at him. This was very much a raised eyebrow.

"Questions? Is there anything specific we should know? And what is this 'answer' we're looking for, exactly?"

Ezdolo offered no further explanation. "The game begins now. You may ask me anything, but I will only reply with a yes or no."

Aige looked at Ambrose. For a test of wit and intuition, only the lich would suffice.

Ambrose didn't speak immediately. He thought in silence for a long time, until Ezdolo warned, "The time I can maintain my descent is limited. Keep stalling, and you will forfeit by default."

Only then did Ambrose speak. "Goddess, you actually want to help us, don't you? This game of questions is simply a way of guiding us to clarity, to make us recognize something we need to understand before ascending to godhood. Is that right?"

Ezdolo's smile returned. "Yes. But don't try that trick twice. Bundling several questions into one only works once. A second attempt, and this will be your defeat."

Ambrose's first question, in fact, been three: whether Ezdolo herself was willing; whether the trial was about guiding their thinking; and whether these matters of thought had a direct bearing on ascension.

Ezdolo had acknowledged Ambrose's cleverness and permitted the maneuver once, but only once.

Ambrose clenched his fist quietly. He had gambled correctly.

Then, to Aige's complete surprise, he turned away from Ezdolo and said, "The remaining nine questions are yours."

Aige startled. "Mine? I have no idea what to ask!"

"This is your trial, Aige," Ambrose replied calmly. "You can do this. You only need to hold fast to your own convictions."

Suddenly thrust to the front, Aige's composure faltered.

She couldn't afford to be calm: her ascension rested on the results of this game. She opened her mouth several times, but each time, no words came.

There were no hints whatsoever. What was she supposed to ask? What answer would satisfy Ezdolo?

Ambrose merely stepped quietly to one side. Ezdolo glanced at him. Inwardly, she was moved. The God of Alchemy had truly found a remarkable student.

A single question had been enough for him to understand her intent.

Ezdolo was perfectly willing to help, but she wanted Aige to become a deity she would support.

It wasn't a matter of divine domain, but rather of alignment.

Ezdolo held to absolute neutrality. The undead, however, generally fell under the banner of evil, and that was what concerned Ezdolo most of all.

In this era, because of Ambrose's relentless interference, the power of the undead had swelled to a degree that was tilting the balance of the world.

And so Ambrose had very wisely stepped aside and, through his actions, made a statement: whatever Aige became, he would not exploit that relationship without restraint.

That was his alignment, expressed clearly.

With the question she was most worried about answered, everything now rested with Aige. Could she arrive at this conclusion on her own, and declare where she stood?

If Aige managed it, Ezdolo would be glad to help a new neutral deity come into the world. If she couldn't reason her way to it, it meant she had no true capacity for genuine neutrality. No matter how deep the connection between them, Ezdolo would not grant her assistance.

Now it was time for Aige to forge her own future, one way or another.