44  Interlude - A stolen world?

El Shaddai is sitting in front of me and looks very displeased at some documents. "Seria, Do you have any idea why I invited you into my office?" 

It's not really an office. Just a white room inside a dimensional pocket. There is a desk and two chairs. That's all. It's located at an important cross-way of paths inside the river of souls. 

"No?" I smile at him while playing with my long golden hair. 

"So you don't know what happened to a certain world?" He lifts an eyebrow and looks at me accusingly. 

"What have I done now? First Tjenemit with all those strange accusations and now you. I neither have an idea what you are talking about, nor a clue to guess anything." I shrug my shoulders and pout. 

El Shaddai sighs. "I am talking about the world of those two gods, who killed each other. The two, we gave to you, to supervise their punishment. By your wish. It was a big favour by the Council. But I am beginning to believe that you have a little too much freedom." 

I frown and arch my eyebrows. "What about that world? I haven't been there in years. Wasn't it destroyed?" 

El Shaddai scratches his long earlobe and strokes his bald head. He looks like he is thinking hard about something. His golden skin reflects the light in painful way. If I wasn't a god, I would probably go blind just by looking at him. 

I often try to imagine what would happen if he just sat down and stopped moving. Most people would think of him as some Buddha statue. 

He leans back into his seat. "It wasn't really destroyed. Just a little damaged. But when a god of nature was tasked by the administration department to repair it... Guess what he reported." 

"What?" -Me 

"Gone!" -El Shaddai 

"Gone?" -Me 

*Wham!* 

"The world is gone!" El Shaddai hits the desk with his fist and I flinch out of surprise. 

"I hope you don't want to imply that I am stealing worlds now. First I am accused of stealing gods and now I steal whole worlds?" I ask him like I am insulted. 

"Not just the world! The whole solar system just disappeared!" He screams at me. I guess he had a bad day. He is always a little itchy, but it's particularly bad today. 

"Oh, that's fine then." I let out a sigh of relief. 

"F.... F... FINE!?" He looks seriously angry now. He doesn't like it when something happens inside -his- multiverse, that he doesn't know about. 

"Oh you see. If the whole solar system is gone, it proves that I am not guilty for sure. I may be one of the mightier gods, but even I couldn't just grab a solar system, put it into my pocket and walk off with it." I nod and smile, while looking relieved. Even if El Shaddai is a tyrant with dangerous mood swings, He is always logical. 

"You -may- not have enough power for a stunt like this. But you are the only one who has access to a place where a whole solar system could be hidden. I ordered a little search for the system in question and there was no result for two months now!" -El Shaddai 

"Oh, please.... there are a thousand other possibilities!" -Me 

"Like?" -El Shaddai 

"It could be destroyed. Ascathon was a god of magic and change with serious powers. The whole world was littered with his divine artefacts. I am sure he had some kind of doomsday device, which activated by default." I smile at El Shaddai, who just gives me another suspicious look. 

After a few seconds he waves to signal that I am dismissed. I bow and leave his office by directly using a path through the river of souls. 

Everything is starting to move. I wonder if my house of cards will crumble above me or above the Council? I know of many rebellions which failed in the end. 

The problem lies with power. The Council governs hundred thousands of gods. Those in turn have control over several smaller gods and deities. If some of them show too much resistance, they are hunted and dealt with by armies of loyal servants to the Council. 

This system worked for an eternity till now. It became bigger and bigger over time. But this works in my favour. Bigger also means harder to control. That they found out about the missing world so late is proof that they aren't really in control any more. 

The gears of their machine are becoming old and worn. So it takes them much longer to find out about the really important issues. 

Somehow they can sense and find every god in the multiverse. So none of the rebellions until now had a chance to succeed. They were already doomed before they started. 

Oh, I just remembered that I have to make an important call!