Past the Mountains, Among the Clouds

Their reactions spoke for themselves. Stupid. Downright insane, even. Utterly ridiculous. How dare you speak of such trash in the presence of gods! You think this is some sort of joke! Freya seemed stupefied by my expression. Bierra, as if she had transformed, appeared to have switched elements. Her fiery red eyes reflected the intent of scorching me, reducing me to ashes, had they had the ability to do so. Oh, that sounded rather arrogant. She definitely could reduce me to absolute dust if she had even the tiniest bit of desire to do so. 

Well, it's not like I said something outrageous. It has something to do we what we call as delivery. Yes.

"I have somewhat of a makeshift solution." I had said.

"Go ahead." Bierra had said with an intrigued look.

"Beat the heck out of me." I said.

Bad delivery. The text book definition of bad delivery. Now that I think about it, their reactions were completely justified. To any common person, how someone could reach such a conclusion in such a brief span of time is truly otherworldly. But, they weren't common people; they were the definition of otherworldly. They were gods. Perhaps my abrupt jump to such a conclusion was indeed something out of the ordinary for the out of the ordinary.

"You have a very weird fetish. Let alone your timing to confess the same." Bierra's icy words destroyed my character in mere seconds.

"Fetish? No! That's not what I mean!" I tried to defend myself from the accusations.

"Oh? Then what is it? Mr. Beat the heck out of me." Bierra sarcastically remarked.

"If you say it like that..." My mind tried to fill in the words to defend myself.

"If I say it like what? Mr. Beat the heck out of me."

She was ruthless.

"Alright, I got it." I remarked.

"You got what? Mr. Beat the heck out of me." 

She wasn't backing down.

Freya, who seemed to have gone into a trance from my sudden, albeit seems stupid on surface suggestion, chuckled a little. A chuckle. A genuine chuckle. Her expressions had been plagued by her past trauma for so long it felt refreshing to have bubbly marshmallow like personality once again come to surface. I couldn't help but smile.

"Oh, have you got any other fetishes to confess? Mr. Beat the heck out of me."

Catch me a break, would you? Can't I even smile in peace now?

"Bierra, you seemed to have got the wrong idea about me." I once again tried to tread on this fruitless endeavour to clear my image.

"No. I don't. An insensitive perv, who takes not a moment to let out the vile beast within himself as soon as he sees a defenseless woman."

She was on a rampage. But calling me a vile beast, that's seemed a bit too harsh. And the worst of all, they were not defenseless women; they were goddesses!

I digressed. There was no way I could change her perception now. And something much more important that my image was at stake. I had to take action soon.

"Okay. My bad if my solution seemed rather abrupt." I started.

"It did." Bierra responded as quick as she could. She wasn't letting me go off the hook.

"I think it would be better if I could explain my reasoning on how I reached the conclusion."

"Interesting. So you have a brain too. Well, you did deduce Freya's story, so it ain't a surprise."

"Yeah. I thank you for your compliment, Miss Bierra. Now, if I could complete my explanation, that'd be great." I tried to be as polite as possible. Though, Bierra's attitude was definitely putting up a challenge in my endeavour.

"Uh. Miss Bierra. I think we should let Eirik explain. I think he really believes he has a solution." Freya said.

A true goddess. Even after my abrupt suggestion, she was still defending me. How pure could a person be? I made sure to thank her properly after this ordeal is over.

"Even if it meant to satisfy his fetish in return." Freya concluded bashfully.

She also had the wrong idea! Was this another face of hers? Or does she really think I'm a perv too?

"You seem to overestimating the kid, but sure. Go ahead, I won't interrupt." Bierra obliged.

I took a deep breath.

"Alright, so from what I know of godkind- obviously most of it is me extrapolating on what Bierra told me last night, so it could be wrong but gods are just concepts." I started.

"No, a better way to say it would be they are the embodiment of concepts." I corrected myself.

Bierra's eyes widened. I took that as a yes.

"So, building on that, you two are also the embodiment of some concepts, namely, winter and autumn."

"Well, you guys are fragments of the being that is the embodiment of your respective concept, as Bierra mentioned yesternight. A false god to some. A fragment. A part of it."

Freya nodded at my comment.

I sighed in relief.

"Okay. So far, no errors made. While we are at it, I'd like to make another educated guess. The fragment thing, I believe the 'Archion' part of your surnames has something to do with it."

An amused expression conjured up on Bierra's face, while Freya looked at me with admiration.

"You really are something, kid." Bierra said with an amused expression. Her tone reflecting the same.

"Well, your reactions speak for themselves. Anyhow, that's not important for now. It was more of a hunch."

Well, everything I said has been a hunch, so I don't think it's right to call it out specifically, but I continued regardless.

"Since you both have also ascended to godhood, although it's a fragment. You also take on the aspects of the concept you embody. Like Bierra has this cold and distant personality, while Freya's personality is layered like the earth tapestry of an autumn forest covered in dead leaves."

"However, while you embody the concept, the concept embodies you, too. More aptly, it amplifies you. Like Freya's faces, which before she became a god had only sheltered her from completely breaking down. But after becoming a god, they were amplified. They became her people pleasing tools. Something which was considered jarring and otherworldly by the surrounding people became natural and accepted. It became normal the moment she became the abnormal in the equation. Nature likes to keep balance. So when she became god, her faces' positive traits were amplified making her personalities appear normal to the people."

Nature's balance isn't just about maintaining the status quo. It's about adapting, smoothing over irregularities in ways that redefine what normal means. Freya's faces didn't just hide her pain; they became essential to her godhood.

Freya looked at me, her admiration still evident, though her gaze flickered with something deeper—maybe a hint of understanding, or even gratitude. Bierra, meanwhile, crossed her arms, the amusement in her expression giving way to something more thoughtful.

"Not bad, kid," she said finally, her voice tinged with a begrudging respect.

"But you're still leaving something out. Go on. Finish your thought."

"Yeah, which brings me to our my solution. A way to help Freya. A method which'll prevent her from disappearing."

"And that is?" Bierra enquired.

Freya looked at me with hope. I couldn't let her down.

"Freya's true personality is laid buried within her layers. No. It is hidden within her faces."

I turned my face to Freya.

"Freya."

"Y-Yes?" She almost fumbled a single word. My direct address must've caught her off-guard.

"How many?" I asked.

"What?"

"How many faces you've built since you became a god?"

No response.

"Oh, my bad. I forgot about your nature. I forgot you didn't do well with questions. Let me reiterate myself."

"You must've constructed a lot of faces since you became a god."

"Yeah. About seven."

"Seven? That's quite low."

"Seven billion."

I had underestimated her scale as a goddess. Even as a fragment, she had a one-to-one correspondence to fit with every person on the entire planet.

"Alright. That is just up-scaling the duration of the plan. Nothing else." I sighed.

I turned to Bierra.

"Within those seven billion faces, the true Freya exists somewhere. If we could, by some means, reduce the number of those faces, Freya could identify herself from among the rest."

"And the best way you could come up with was for her to beat the heck out of you?" Bierra asked.

"Well, if you think about it, personalities, in a way, are complex emotions. And the best way to get rid of pent-up emotions is to let it all out. Punching bag seems to work the best in such cases. So I thought, given my divine reconstruction, if you could amp it up enough for me to withstand Freya's blows, maybe I could be the punching bag. It's kind of like relieving her stress, or so I thought."

"I won't lie, kid. Can't say what I'm more? Impressed by your sudden jump in intellect or appalled by the stupidity of your suggestion knowing your intellect."

"Well, I commend you for finding most of the stuff correctly from our small last night exchange. However, it seems you've forgotten to consider two things." Bierra said while pointing her index and middle finger at Freya making a two.

"What?" I asked.

"The first thing is, how are you going to make that girl attack you?"

She was right. I had overlooked that fact. How am I ever going to convince Freya to attack me? Then it hit me.

"You seemed to have found a solution right away." Bierra commented.

"It's simple. I'll have her fixate all her anger from the seven billion faces."

Right. Even if they are seven billion of them, there's no need for them to differ completely from one another. In a way, you could think of them as micro emotions. So, if that were the case, Freya could easily take up all the anger from them and make them into a new face. That gives us a starting point for her to attack.

"Oh, and how are you going to make sure she keeps attacking you?"

"Frustration." Bierra's eyes widened.

"The frustration from her past still lingers in her. It'll be inhumane, but if she's unable to dish out any serious damage to me, then I'm sure her past trauma will make her try to do manifest as a weapon for her victory. Simply said, if she couldn't beat me, she'll continue to fight, which will reduce the faces as soon as they get resolved."

"You really appear to have thought this through." She remarked.

"About as much as one could on his way from one end of the hall to the other." I replied.

"Alright, I'll help you out." 

"You would? That's a surprise."

"Aren't you the one who demanded my help at the start of this ordeal?" She said with a sarcastic tone.

"I did? Man, it feels it has been ages since then." I replied. Of course, I remembered it. Though seeing Bierra in such a supportive light was a refreshing experience. Freya had been listening to our conversation all this time.

Her expression seemed to convey -"You don't have to do this."

But this time, I wasn't going to oblige.

As we began our preparations to finally end this once and for all, I remembered something.

"Hey, Bierra. What was the other thing?"

"What other thing?"

"You said I had failed to consider two things, but you mentioned just one."

"Oh, don't mind it. It's already been taken care of now." Bierra said.