Divine Administration - 1.4 Prev
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After several hours of planning, I went home and left Tu Yu in the office room. Which was apparently called a Sanctum and not at all appropriate to a goddess of my status. According to him, most of it was yet unused potential and he almost begged me to implement the plans he had for it.
I had no reason not to agree to that, and so I had written a note decreeing that his new title was "Most Excellent Designer and Curator of Celestial Abodes; Tu Yu, the Heavenly Majordomo." Apparently I had gotten lucky with the pomposity of my title.
As soon as I had finished writing the note - with an ink brush on a paper scroll - Tu Yu burst into flames. It only took a few seconds until the bright-golden flames had consumed him and left nothing at all behind.
Telling myself that he had to know this would have happened was actually enough to keep myself from panicking at having killed the only person who had any idea what was going on with me. Well, almost. At least it stalled the panic until he walked back into my office with a mischievous smile and clad in new golden robes.
"Well, that was most bracing. I trust your Excellency had no reason to worry?"
I...he...how could….he knew I had not been prepared for that!
I just couldn't help it, after a minute the seething anger was dissolved by my laughter.
My father had prepared dinner by the time I came home. That was when I noticed that I wasn't even the least bit hungry, or thirsty for that matter. I ate anyway, enjoyed the taste and talking with my father.
Going to sleep presented itself with a similar problem. I had slept last night, but apparently only out of habit. I wasn't tired now, and thinking back I had not been tired then either. Was that a part of my powers Tu Yu had not mentioned?
Fortunately, we had agreed to only meet again on Monday, when I would be going back to school, And since I still had homework to do and couldn't think of anything else to do in the middle of the night, I fetched my school bag.
Damn, that was fast. I had finished all my homework assignments in less than half the time I had estimated. And I had only taken so long because my handwriting had improved so much that it took conscious effort to make it look like my old writing.
Math problems just felt as easy as simple addition. I could write out essays in my mind faster than I could write them down, paying attention to stylistic details and greater composition I was certain we had never touched upon in school. The only issue had been that sometimes a sentence formed into a language that wasn't english, but just as familiar to me.
Everything else was just as easy. I never had to double check anything. Looking things up was unnecessary too, I just remembered.
Okay, that had to be another aspect of my powers. Had I just gotten smarter, or did homework somehow count as Bureaucracy? It was close enough to filling out paperwork, maybe.
After a bit of thinking, I figured out how to test that. We had a rubik's cube somewhere, I'd just have to be careful not wake up dad.
That actually turned out not be an issue - he was sitting in the kitchen, bowed over a stack of papers. I knew his work at the Dockworkers Association had taken up more and more time, but this was the first time I had seen him working in the middle of the night.
I could help him with that now! I was ashamed that it had taken me so long to realize this.
Tu Yu had explained that becoming material - apparently my natural state was now immaterial - took a lot of energy - what he had called "Essence". So I fetched the rubik's cube first, easily sneaking past my dad. Easier than it would have been for me before all of this happened - another thing to test. And so was solving the rubik's cube. Improved Intelligence: Confirmed!
Turning immaterial felt just like relaxing a muscle. I went down into the kitchen, hugging my dad without him noticing my untouchable, invisible form.
Tu Yu had told me about two powers - he called them Charms - that I was almost guaranteed to have.
I could bless others. Each gods blessing was different. Some just enhanced natural abilities, others gave supernatural abilities. A few would change the recipients appearance, a forest gods blessing might bestow bark-like skin. Fortunately that seemed unlikely to be the case for my blessing, but how much would Dad notice if I blessed him?
If he just got smarter and more adept with forms and numbers, he might shrug it off as sudden insight or overcoming the fatigue he had to feel at this point. But if it was a clearly supernatural power, he would notice. Could I explain to him what happened, that I was responsible? That his daughter had superpowers? Powers I didn't even understand myself.
It was a blessing. It would not harm him, and he could use it. More, he deserved it - Dad expressed all the virtues I would promote in my domain. Honest, hard-working, abiding by the rules - but not putting the rules about the people affected by them.
A rich melodious choir welled up from deep within me. An infinite number of voices praised all the aspects of proper administration. One voice took the lead, sounding just like my father.
Who had perked up from his stooped posture, clearly hearing something as well.
Then he went back to work, looking just as tired as before but now working much faster. Not like someone had pushed fast-forward on a video. Instead his movements now had greater certainty. No time was wasted searching for the right form or checking how often something had to be signed. While he had probably filled out half of this paperwork a hundred times before, it now looked like he had done it for an entire lifetime.
I stood there watching my dad work until he finished and went to bed. I was actually quite proud of his work, I realized. I knew some of his co-workers, and they all looked up to him. Despite the hard times the dockworkers were in, he had never given up on making their lives better.
Yes, I often felt like he had neglected me after mom's death. But it was clear that he cared, even if he couldn't show it. Somebody who put in so much work to improve the lives of others clearly cared.
I was tearing up a little at that realization when I decided to use my second power. As my dad headed to bed, I sent a dream towards him. About a hard days work he could be proud off, and then coming home to a family that was just as proud of him. I would try to make that more than a dream.
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