I Have Come
A tall, clean-lined man was tapping at the barrier. His was a face that a hundred people out of a hundred would have called handsome. The affable eyes, the decadent smile tracing its slow arc, held force enough to stop a woman's heart.
And the air about him? He made no secret of being a bad man, a dangerous one, and he looked as though he carried some heartbreaking history locked away inside. A man of fatal charm, the sort who could bewitch anyone no matter their sex. A beauty so complete he might have been painted.
Which was precisely why no one here could be bewitched.
The man was perfect. Excessively so. No human being could ever be like that. They felt, at once, that he was not their kind. He was another species. A dog playing at personhood, a cat walking on two legs—either would have been less repulsive than this.
"Mm... Was the greeting too cultish? Cold reception."
Even the way he set a hand to his chin and tilted his head was sculptural. A want rose, sharp and stupid, to run to him at once and ease whatever was puzzling him.
"...Given the situation, who would greet you any other way?"
Mi Soryeong put herself between the man and Pele, hiding her trembling hands against San-gun's body.
"Oh... Brave."
The man rounded his mouth in open admiration. For a moment Mi Soryeong's heart wavered. She bit her tongue and rode it out.
"And the willpower's first-rate. Where has a woman of this caliber been hiding until now?"
His eyes narrowed.
Mi Soryeong's skin crawled. The instant she met those eyes she was a mouse set before a snake—a tongue flicking as it judged whether the prey was worth eating, saliva stringing down in greed while it climbed her skin, weighing whether to finish her in a single bite or keep her close and use her for a long, long time.
"For someone who isn't even a fighter to be this much... This trial was far too difficult for our child."
Crackle. The man reached out, and the barrier recoiled in fury. His hand turned to ash as if it had burned, and vanished.
"Whoa. Nearly died."
He waved the hand that was no longer there, wiping his brow and playing at a scare, though there was neither sweat on him nor any hint of urgency.
"Still no good, huh? Shame. I gave away too much power."
He clicked his tongue. Regret dripped from his eyes.
"To have to walk away and leave a feast like this. How am I supposed to live with the injustice?"
"You raving piece of shit..."
Pele's hair stood on end. Before her was a sinner she could neither stomach nor forgive, and it felt as if one side of her heart were about to rot.
"I swear on my divine life, I will chew you up alive and burn you in magma."
"Scary. When your own kids were dying in tears and snot and shit, you couldn't do a thing."
The man sneered at Pele. It was a laugh that asked what the likes of her could possibly do.
"You—!!!"
At the taunt, Pele's hair turned to magma and ran. Rage in molten form streamed along the floor toward him.
"Pretty magma. Just the thing to give our children so they won't be cold at night."
"You trash!!!"
The magma heaved and boiled. Bubbles rose and burst, and every bubble that burst birthed more magma in its place. In a breath it had swelled. At this rate the cavern would fill.
"No! Pele!"
Mi Soryeong caught her.
"Move! I'm settling it with that fucker, to the death!"
"And if you take the bait, then what?! Are you going to walk straight into that bastard's trap?!"
"If I leave it like this I'll burst and die!!!"
Rumble.
As if answering the goddess's heart, Kilauea gave a small shudder. The ceiling shook, and shards of stone came down.
"Pele! Our child will die faster than you burst!!!"
Even in the face of a god's wrath, Mi Soryeong screamed what had to be said.
Pele flinched.
"Guhhh..."
A dying sound came from beside them.
The fire Pele had flung out in her failure to master herself fell, entire, on Dan Chuyeon. He was already a human mediating two divine powers, and when one of them ran wild the shock passed straight through him. Blood poured from his mouth like water, soaking his clothes through until his whole body was going scarlet. The only reason he had not died of the hemorrhage was that he was indirectly in contact with Life.
"Kyaaa! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"
Pele screamed. Lost in her feelings, she had very nearly made an actual corpse of someone.
"Hahaha!!! Now this is a show! Can't protect your own children, so now you're trying to kill someone else's!"
The man clutched his stomach and laughed. His wings shivered, and the feathers caught, burning up into black flame.
"You be quiet!!!"
Mi Soryeong turned a look of pure hatred on the man who had made all of this.
"All right, all right. I won't laugh. Aigoo, would you look at those murderous eyes."
He wiped the tears from them.
"Haah. The more I look, the more she grows on me. A human who shouts in a god's face... and not even a demigod. A pure human. Dig through all of history and you'd be hard-pressed to find another."
He held out his hand.
"Why don't you join our Ilshikgyo? Someone like you, I'll install as an elder on the spot. Bishop is possible too. This isn't an easy offer, you know. A god himself is scouting you."
"Help yourself to this."
Mi Soryeong answered with her middle finger. The sheer force of it sent the man into a clap of roaring laughter.
"Kiiing..."
San-gun found Mi Soryeong a stranger. Had she always been like this? At home she was forever the gentle mother. Now she looked ready to spit on the pavement.
"Haha! I don't think I've laughed this hard in a few hundred years. This is going in our scriptures."
"Save the gilding, and would you just leave? We're a little busy."
Mi Soryeong lifted her chin, unbowed.
"I'd love to. Can't. They're having a grand old fight up above, so I can't go. I activated a sanctuary, which means I'm stuck here whether I like it or not."
He stuck out his tongue.
"Unexpectedly incompetent. Hardly fitting for the head of an international terrorist organization."
"Isn't that a harsh review? You try falling into hell sometime. The restrictions are no joke. That wretched fool over there is far better off than I am. At least he has a true body. I haven't a damn thing."
The man shrugged.
"Even this is me straining on an emergency transfusion of divine power I'd dumped somewhere. Without that, we wouldn't even have met."
At the voice protesting its own innocence, Pele ground her teeth.
"That bastard..."
"Pele."
"I know! I know!"
She shut it down.
"Come on, let's just talk. It's been a long time since I had a proper conversation with a human."
He came right up against the barrier. The innocent smile was bewitching enough to knead a mind in its hands.
"Hm? Hm? How about it—you like it too, don't you? Talking with a god on equal footing is something to boast about, no?"
"No."
Mi Soryeong's reply was ice.
"I have no wish to speak with a mad god, and even less wish to speak with a puppet draped in a human skin."
The man stopped dead.
"A puppet... a puppet, is it..."
He turned the word over a few times, then cut her a sidelong look.
"Did it show...?"
"How could it not?"
Mi Soryeong looked at him as if he were pathetic.
The man was humanlike. His actions, his gestures, the way he showed feeling—all of it. Even the tremor of his muscles was humanlike. And that was exactly why it could not be allowed. The man was a god. His grain was not theirs. However humanlike such a being acted, he could not act humanlike. The mouth smiled while the eyes did not. The voice was vigorous, and empty. Feeling came out like a pattern that had been entered in advance, and every motion of hand and foot moved exactly as intended.
"You may fool anyone else. You cannot fool me."
Perhaps even her husband, even her friend, might have been taken in by the way the man behaved. Mi Soryeong would not be. She could not be.
"How curious."
In an instant the man went blank of feeling.
"Whether your eye is simply that sharp, or you have some ability of your own... Or else."
The man—the Eclipse God—looked at Mi Soryeong.
"You, too, have lived a puppet's life."
"...Think whatever you like."
Mi Soryeong's breath caught hard.
This was different from before. The moment he abandoned being humanlike, the air itself changed. The cheapness left his face, and a majesty no one could follow came to rest there. A face fit for nothing but charming women remade itself into the face of one who could rule the world.
"Afraid, and still unbowed. Had I met you first, the Saint might have been otherwise."
"That will never happen."
Not now. Not ever.
"Who can say. The world does not turn as one wishes."
The Eclipse God shaped a chair from his wings and sat.
"I shall leave off imitating humankind here. Ill-fitting clothes. Wearing them has been nothing but stifling."
Pele snorted.
"Look at you, busy with nonsense like that. You're as good as dead. Why not become the god of clowns while you're at it?"
"Mm... Not a clown. I'll just be human."
The Eclipse God's body shuddered.
"Clowns are... rather..."
He seemed genuinely revolted, and doubt stirred in Pele. Was he scared?
"Are you sca—"
"We will end that talk there."
The Eclipse God opened his eyes wide. It was an extremely feeble divine avatar, so there was no real harm in it, but the pressure a god had piled up over ages did not simply go elsewhere.
"I would prefer you never again mention the word clown in front of me."
"......"
At the sight of him truly turning severe, Pele swallowed.
"Haah..."
He let out a sigh, and then he spoke in a grave voice.
"Goddess of Hawaii. I came here because I wished to hold a close exchange with you."
"Exchange? Is this fucker joking? You killed all my children, and now you want an exchange? Freeze and die. Just you wait till my seal comes off. Then it's war."
The Eclipse God turned it aside with ease.
"Do as you wish. If it means I may exchange with you, I will bear that much. I am, in my own way, serious."
"Scared I'll kill you?"
"I am serious because of the human above."
Pele's mouth stopped. Her face went cold.
"You're scared too, aren't you? The Saint..."
"Pele. You know it all. Do not turn the talk aside."
The Eclipse God's eyes grew sharp.
"Do you know why I resolved upon an exchange, knowing full well it would earn your hatred?"
He pointed upward.
"It is entirely because of the human above. A god would have seen it, would they not?"
"Ha! I haven't the faintest idea what you're saying."
The Eclipse God's voice rose.
"Pele! If you are a god, then look upon the greater board as a god ought! Is this a matter one may simply avoid?"
"I don't know a thing, and I don't intend to know going forward. Shut up."
"You truly—!"
The two gods went on quarreling.
Inside that quarrel, Mi Soryeong saw anxiety. It was large enough to be read even by a mere woman, and she felt fear.
What in the world is it, that even a god is afraid?
Knock, knock. A knock sounded then, and every gaze swung toward it.
The Phantom Thief had returned.
The mask was broken open around the eye, and what lay beneath was left bare.