GODLY AUDIENCES: RAY

[divus]

Comments

[selfimmolates]

And it's not going to get any better, is it?

[divus]

Not as long as there are participants who won't tell certain gods to take a hike if they're asked to bump off some of the competition.

[selfimmolates]

[he sighs.]

And wishing for that would be naive. [a beat.] Well, congrats about Chuuya, at least.

[divus]

Chuuya - oh, man, that guy's a riot. I love his poems! [Sincerity, stop.] I guess I'm lucky he liked my name, though. He wrote me this great poem and decided to leave his god before he even met me.

I don't really feel like I did anything to earn it, but who's complaining? Not this boy!

[selfimmolates]

"Sincerity" is a sentiment with a lot of broad appeal, so I'm not surprised. Even Shiki and Senri wanted slash want to switch to you.

[...]

By the way, related to that, can I ask you a question?

[since somehow sincerity is always the god i'm threading with when suddenly things come up in pcs]

[divus]

You can ask me all the questions you want.

[A beat.]

It's just I might not be able to answer them all.

[selfimmolates]

[OH WAIT I THINK THIS WAS THE QUESTION JAN REMEMBERS]

I've heard that having zero followers makes you more vulnerable for elimination... but what exactly does that entail for the gods? For us participants, it means death, but...

[divus]

Well, this whole thing is about gathering the most followers. You stay at zero for too long, and how are you supposed to catch up? [Sincerity sounds - and looks - sort of tense.] I don't know all the details myself because it hasn't happened yet, but it's something we all want to avoid.

[selfimmolates]

[welp, senri's not going to be happy.]

... So is it death or not?

[divus]

Dude, I just told you I don't know all the details. All we know is it makes us a lot more vulnerable, and none of us want to be vulnerable. You can bet if any of us drops down to zero we're going to be begging you guys to defect to us right away.

[selfimmolates]

You guys made this system, didn't you? How do you not know the details?

[divus]

Look, there was a lot going on. We were all shouting at each other and everyone was making each other swear oaths to make thing fair, and that ended up in there somehow. I don't even remember who suggested the vulnerability thing.

[selfimmolates]

[he just facepalms and groans because WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS, GODS.]

[divus]

[look

if they were good at this there wouldn't be a murdergame to determine who the Zeus of their pantheon was gonna be in the first place]

[selfimmolates]

[fair]

... Okay, so who do you suspect might've suggested the vulnerability? Someone from the "gods everyone else is wary of" group?

[divus]

I mean, if I had to make a guess... probably one of them? But it could also have been someone else trying to make things fair. Like, if you have no one and you get voted for at trial, you're eliminated from the game, or whatever.

[selfimmolates]

[okay but i hope you know this vague answer means i have to HIT UP LITERALLY ALL THE GODS NOW]

... Makes sense. This is going to be fun to track down.

[divus]

[ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ]

I wouldn't worry about it too much if I were you. If none of us lose all our followers, what's the big deal?

[selfimmolates]

I don't operate assuming the ideal scenario.

[divus]

Which is why you've been going around talking to almost all of us, right?

[selfimmolates]

Yup. No issue with that, right?

[divus]

I don't have a problem with it. And your god's nice, so she probably doesn't, either. Some of the others, though? They might get annoyed if you make 'em think they might be able to sway you, and it turns out they can't.

So be careful.

[selfimmolates]

Well, at the moment, it's not insincere. I am sway-able.

But thanks. I'll keep that in mind.

[divus]

Don't worry, I won't tell Love that.

[selfimmolates]

Not like she doesn't already know. I haven't exactly been swearing my undying loyalty to her every time we talk.