The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox

arianedartagnan · Aug 5, 2021

Bureau of Reincarnation
Hall of Vermilion Clouds, Heaven

"These are the true confessions of a nine-tailed fox."

"No, they're not," Flicker said without thinking.

At the words, Piri's eyes narrowed. She straightened her back, lifted her chin, and gave him the sort of look that could freeze an emperor.

That had frozen an emperor.

Late at night, in Flicker's cubbyhole office in the Bureau of Reincarnation, she'd reverted to her favorite form: a graceful human female with ivory skin, teak-brown eyes, camellia-red lips, and ink-black hair. Plus nine bushy, auburn tails.

"And why are they not?" she asked. Draped over the back and sides of her chair, her tails swished with displeasure. Or curiosity. Or amusement. With her, it was hard to tell.

Dropping his eyes, Flicker got back to grinding his inkstick. Goodness knew he was going to need a lot of ink if she wanted him to write down her confessions. True or otherwise. "Well…you're a fox spirit. You…edit. And embellish. And I'm fairly certain you intend to leave out all the important details."

She let her shoulders slump a little: enough to convey pathos, not enough to spoil her silhouette. "Well, of course," she said, pushing her lips out in a pout. "And I never said these were going to be my complete confessions, just my true ones."

"Uh…." Flicker was about to point out the holes in her logic when she dimpled at him. Gold sparks flitted across her irises, and he blinked, unsure what they were arguing about or why anyone would ever argue with her in the first place.

"Don't worry about it. You're just a clerk," she soothed, and somehow, coming from her, it sounded like high praise. "Focus on your paperwork. Leave the rest to me."

The gold sparks flared, and he blinked again, trying to clear away an impression of fireflies and tranquil summer nights and sitting by the Jade Pool while the star children played….

"Have I mentioned how much I hate it when you charm me?" he asked. But there was no real heat in the complaint.

"Maybe once every century?" She twisted her lips into a wry smile, then noticed what his hands had been doing. "Don't add too much water to your ink," she reminded him. "You know you hate it when it's too light. And then I'll have to listen to you grumble about poetry and art and poets who take art too far."

It was true, though, thought Flicker as he set down his pitcher. Certain of his colleagues favored faint, running calligraphy that faded even as you viewed it – something about capturing the experience of mortal ephemerality – which he found frankly absurd. If they really wanted to experience the ephemeral nature of mortal existence, they could enter the cycle of reincarnation themselves. Or, as a starting point, not write down their tired, hackneyed poems. But no one ever listened to him.

Except Piri. Sometimes.

With a sigh, he picked up his brush. "Let's get started, shall we? Before the Bureau opens?"

She straightened, imperious again. "I already told you how to start. Write it down this time." Staring past his shoulder, she recited, "These are the true confessions of a nine-tailed fox. At least, as true as I know how to make them. So take them as you will…."

arianedartagnan · Aug 11, 2021

Chapter 1: Trial Day in Heaven

"But it's true, Heavenly Majesty. I was ordered to do it."

The guards had shackled my wrists in front of me and chained them to my ankles, making my shoulders hunch in a most unattractive manner, but I could work with that. I dipped my head so my hair tumbled over my cheeks and pulled my most piteous face. Given what I was, it was pretty piteous indeed.

Emphasis on the pretty.

And it worked: The Jade Emperor, who'd honored me by presiding over my trial in person, let me keep talking.

"Lady Fate, the Director of Allotted Lifespans, summoned me to tell me that the Lang Dynasty's time had come," I explained in my sweetest voice. "She ordered me to pave the way for a new dynasty. I'm just a lowly nine-tailed fox. How could I disobey?"

I peeked up at the throne, then darted a fake-timid glance at the crowd behind me. That earned me a cuff from one of the guards, but not before I got an impression of silk robes, decked with gems and embroidered sashes – and topped by contemptuous faces. Seemingly every god and goddess in existence had packed themselves into the Hall of Purple Mists, from the Duke of Thunder in the front row to the star sprite clerks squinting through the doorway at the back. Even the Dragon Kings of the Four Seas had flown up from their watery palaces and coiled around the columns for a better view. Trial day in Heaven was a flamboyant affair.

And, like everything else here, it was a sham.

Before me stood Lady Fate, her Three Cadavers arrayed at her back. One passed her a sheath of transcripts, which she made a show of flipping through until she came to a specific page. She pretended to reread it. "I did order you to 'pave the way for a new dynasty'," she announced at last, her eyes as black and blank as a corpse's. "However, I also ordered you not to interfere with the lifespans of any innocent bystanders."

I almost snorted, but changed it into a whimper at the last second. Blinking up at the Jade Emperor, I appealed, "But there were no innocent bystanders in that court."

"Not after you got through with it, there weren't," muttered the Duchess of Lightning, and murmurs of assent rose from the crowd.

Ha. That was true. Sort of. As Prime Minister, I had managed to, er, cleanse the government of any officials who might help it keep tottering along. All in the name of helping the dynasty reach its allotted lifespan, of course.

And because it was fun.

And tasty. I was a demon, after all.

Lady Fate pitched her voice to ring throughout the hall. "Your machinations also strangled the new dynasty in its cradle. Because of your treachery, the Son of Heaven murdered the man who was destined to found it."

Oh, yeah. That. But in my defense, she'd never told me which humans were important and should be left alive, no matter how annoyingly preachy they got.

"Your actions turned the shining Serican Empire, once a paragon of piety and grace, into a wasteland dominated by thieves, demons, and petty warlords."

Yeah, maybe…. Okay, not just maybe. Definitely. After the emperor's suicide, the surviving courtiers – the ones I'd let survive specifically for their corruption and incompetence, that was – had shredded the empire into feuding fiefdoms.

Angry mutters from the crowd. Ritual offerings to Heaven always decreased in quality and quantity during civil unrest. Doubtless the gods and goddesses were picturing lean decades ahead.

I bowed my head, pretending to feel shattered by remorse. "It is true that in my zeal to carry out your commands, I may have been too thorough, Lady," I confessed. "However, it was not I but the humans themselves who tore Serica apart – "

"Because you set us up for it!" exploded a voice, sounding as if its owner had been pushed past the limits of courtly protocol. "You, Piri!"

That voice. I knew that voice.

Oh, how I knew that voice.

I froze. Then I rotated slowly, and as I did, the courtiers parted to reveal the man at the heart of this mess. The one I'd last seen seated on his throne, preparing to burn down the palace around himself as rebel dukes attacked the gates, because if he couldn't have it, no one else could. Because that had always been his way.

I'd assumed that his soul had already been judged and reincarnated into a worm or something of that ilk, but here he stood. And not drowning in this white sackcloth of a prison uniform either, but resplendent in midnight-blue silk embroidered with constellations in silver thread.

"Cassius?"

The same guard cuffed me again. "That is the Star of Heavenly Joy, criminal."

Was I the only one who saw something wrong in making a god of the man whom Heaven had destroyed? I scanned the other Stars, searching for signs of shock, or disbelief, or outrage – but they all glared back at me. All except one. The Star of Reflected Brightness pinched her lips and averted her gaze from her ex-husband.

"Why does he get to be a god?" I demanded, dropping all pretense of meekness and whirling to face the Jade Emperor. "Why does he get rewarded for the same deeds I'm being tried for?"

The Jade Emperor simply creased his brow and stared off into the middle distance, and it was Lady Fate who replied, "Because our scholars have determined that he would have been a just ruler if you hadn't driven him to excess."

"Wait…wait…." My head was spinning. "But you told me to do it! You told me his dynasty was ending and that I was your tool for ending it! If he were such a great ruler – if he could have been such a great ruler – then why – why –"

She cut me off with an icy, "Because he defiled my temple. And my visions revealed that that act marked the beginning of the end for his dynasty."

My head ached. I wanted to rub it, but the chains kept me from lifting my hands, and I was done bowing my head. "That makes no sense, Lady. You're saying that a man who defiles temples can also be a just and great ruler?"

"That was what my visions revealed," she repeated, which didn't answer my question at all. But all the Heavenly courtiers were nodding along and murmuring about the awesome power of Fate.

Disgusted, I turned back to Cassius and studied him from head to toe. With his shimmering robes, glowing skin, and serene expression, he did look divine – I'd give him that much. But then again, he'd also looked like the very incarnation of regality as he watched his own family and allies tortured to death. In various slow, painful, and creative ways that I might or might not have suggested. But that was the point. Mine were only suggestions. His was the voice that ordered them. If he were rewarded for his crimes, then so should I. And if I were punished for them, then so should he. The Jade Emperor was the god of justice, the final arbiter of grievances and wronged souls. Surely he could see that no other outcome made sense.

But his face held no emotion as he regarded his newest god, then Lady Fate, and finally me. "We have heard all sides of the story," he intoned. "Flos Piri, We hereby pronounce you guilty of high crimes against the Heaven-ordained emperor of Serica and hence against Our own person. The sentence is death."

Before the crowd could burst into full-scale cheering, the Star of Heavenly Joy spoke up. "Perhaps, Heavenly Majesty, a poetic form of execution might be appropriate? One that she devised herself?"

Which one?

"The Burning Pillar, perhaps?"

Oh. That had been one of my more notorious inventions. First you filled a giant bronze cylinder with coals and lit them. Then you stripped your prisoner naked and chained him against the metal with as much flesh as possible pressed to the metal. (Always a him – we'd had other ways of killing women, Cassius and I.) After some length of time determined by how much said prisoner had annoyed you, you had him tossed into the cylinder to burn to death. Cassius had always been quite taken with the method.

He beamed at me.

The Star of Reflected Brightness flinched.

"Under the circumstances, that does seem fitting," pronounced the Jade Emperor.

"Hey!" I shouted as the guards grabbed my arms and started dragging me towards the doors. I thrashed and fought, yelling, "Hey! You call this justice? You call yourself the god of justice? This isn't fair! This isn't fair!"

Cassius' triumphant smile followed me all the way out of the Hall of Purple Mists to the execution plaza.

Forty-nine days later, the shreds of my soul finally recoalesced into me, and I woke to find myself inside a pure white glow. Beyond it, I made out flat surfaces and right angles. Was I inside a coffin? A box? Based on how my trial went, I hadn't expected the gods to keep my ashes long enough to put them into a box. More like dump them into the River of Silver the first chance they got. So where was I now?

I moved forward, trying to get out of the light so I could see better, but it floated along with me. That was odd. I put out a hand to block the glare – only to find that I had no hands.

Or feet.

Or eyes, for that matter. I appeared to be…a ball of white light?

What in the – ?

My world grated sideways, and a square of open air appeared overhead. I shot free, then hovered, pulsing in confusion. Surrounding me was a vast space that resembled a library, except that instead of bookshelves, it was packed with rows and rows of racks that held hundreds of drawers each. Drawers like the one I'd just escaped. An archive, then? An archive of souls?

"If you will follow me, please," said a flat voice from below, and I looked down to see a human figure with glowing golden skin. Her plain, black, cotton robes told me that she was just a star sprite clerk.

"Where to?" I tried to demand, only it came out more like a cross between a thought and a chime of bells. Where are we going? I tried again.

"It is your turn for reincarnation. Congratulations." The clerk's monotone conveyed no sense of celebration whatsoever.

She led me out of the archive into a featureless hallway, lit only by her yellow and my white glows. At the far end, we turned into an equally dark and gloomy room where three balls of light, one yellow, one green, and one white like me, floated in different corners, revolving slowly. "Your number is 11270," she stated. "Please wait here until it is called." Turning on her heel, she stalked back out.

I drifted over to the closest soul, the white one. Hey, who are you?

Silence. It spun faster, warning me off.

A door on the far side of the room opened, and another black-clad star sprite called, "Number 11267."

The white soul zipped towards him, and he shut the door before I could see past him.

I tried the yellow soul next. Hey, what's going on here? What's in there?

It, too, refused to speak, but it did drift sideways until it illuminated a calligraphy scroll on the wall. Then it flared once to highlight the words: "Respectful silence is requested in the waiting area." What a goody two-shoes. I considered trying the green soul, but it didn't look any friendlier.

I found out what lay behind that door soon enough anyway: a dim, cramped office with a plain wooden desk, a single chair (for the clerk, not his visitors), and a bookshelf jammed with files. Next to the desk squatted a crude, ceramic vat full of brownish liquid that smelled like herbal tea. If these were what passed for "furnishings" in Heaven, then we'd developed far more advanced technology on Earth.

By the light of his own skin, the clerk skimmed a document, then droned, "Please state your name and nature for me."

Piri. Nine-tailed fox. Where am I? What's going on?

"This is the Bureau of Reincarnation. You have been assigned a Tier and a mortal form in accordance with your total karma, and you will be reincarnated shortly."

A Tier?

"Yes. As this is your first time here, I will provide a brief overview of the system. Souls are classified into five categories depending on the deeds they performed in life. The highest Tier is Red, indicating that the soul will be reincarnated as a human."

Somehow, I didn't think the powers-that-be had sorted me into that category, but that was all right. I'd rather be a fox anyway.

"The second Tier is Yellow, indicating that the soul will be reincarnated as a higher animal, such as a monkey or an ape."

No wonder that yellow soul in the waiting room had been so disgustingly rule-abiding.

"The third Tier is Black, indicating that the soul will be reincarnated as a bird or a four-legged mammal. The fourth Tier is Green, indicating that the soul will be reincarnated as an aquatic creature, a reptile, or an amphibian."

I didn't like where this was going. I glowed neither red nor yellow nor black nor green. And the last Tier?

"The lowest Tier is White. You will reincarnate as an insect or a worm."

What? Hey! That's not fair! I could have lived forever as a nine-tailed fox, you know! The only reason I died was because I obeyed Heaven! Is this how you reward people for obeying Heaven?

"I am merely a third-class clerk, and as such, I do not make decisions as to Tier." The clerk's rote reply suggested that he'd memorized that line.

There must be a mistake.

Once, my firm tone would have made ministers quake and Cassius cower. The clerk, however, merely rotated the document so I could read it for myself. It was a form, filled out with my name, nature, dates of birth and death, and a list of my deeds over the past thousand years. At the top, next to the words "Curriculum Vitae," was stamped the rune for "White."

Who makes these decisions? I want to talk to them.

"I'm afraid that is impossible," droned the clerk, with the apathy of one who'd heard every possible variant on that demand over the millennia. "All decisions in the Bureau of Reincarnation are final. Now, if you will please dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness – "

I want to talk to your supervisor, I snapped. There's been a mistake. Someone picked up the wrong seal and –

The clerk didn't speak. He didn't even sigh. He simply lifted a hand and pointed a finger in my direction, and I found myself swooshing towards the vat.

Hey! Hey! Stop! It wasn't my fault –

Splash.

arianedartagnan · Aug 18, 2021

Chapter 2: Worm

Cool moist darkness.

Soil. Long body. Burrow burrow burrow. Leaf piece. Eat. Burrow.

Thud. Thud thud above.

Water trickling down. Rain.

Thudthudthudthudthud. Hard rain.

Wet. Very wet. Burrow up. Burrow burrow burrow burrow burrow. Air. Fresh air.

Thump. Thump. THUMP.

Ground shaking. Something coming. Must escape. Must escape. Must esca–

Splat.

"Please state your name and nature for me."

I was back in the same cramped office in the Bureau of Reincarnation, with the same bored clerk skimming my paperwork. And I still shone with the same blinding whiteness.

Piri. Earthworm. Hey, why am I still White Tier?

There was no way I could have been an evil earthworm. For one thing, earthworms didn't have the mental capacity to comprehend concepts such as "good" and "evil." I floated higher so I could read my list of deeds – which consisted of a single item: "Renewed the soil." I was neither a farmer nor a natural philosopher, but soil renewal sounded like it should be good for agriculture.

Didn't I, I don't know, help the farmers?

"You did," replied the clerk without looking up. "And you earned positive karma for it. However, as you were stepped on and killed in a matter of days, your positive karma from this life is not nearly enough to compensate for the negative karma from your past life. Now, if you will dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness – "

Wait a second, I broke in. What am I getting reincarnated as this time?

"It is not customary for souls to be provided with this information beforehand – "

Seriously? Why? What are you afraid of? Hey, wait a minute. Don't tell me I'm going to be a worm again!

In answer, he raised a finger and pointed, and I sailed towards the vat, still yelling, Stop! Stop! I don't want to be a worm again!

Splash.

Cool moist darkness.

Soil. Long body. Burrow burrow burrow. Leaf piece. Eat. Burrow.

Burrow burrow burrow.

Lots of burrowing.

More burrowing.

So much burrowing.

Okay, how much positive karma did I earn this time? I lived longer this time, right?

"You did."

So can I move on to the next Tier now?

"I'm afraid not. Your total karma does not yet qualify you for Green. Now, if you will dip yourself in –"

Oh, no no no! You're not going to make me a worm again, are you? Stop making me a worm!

Splash.

Countless lives as an earthworm later, the clerk finally informed me that I had completed enough soil renewal to advance to a higher lifeform within White Tier.

He still wouldn't tell me what.

Sunshine. Fresh air. Breeze. Gentle swaying.

Crawling along leaf food-home. Hungry. Crunch. Mmmmm, tasty. Crunch crunch crunch.

Shadow.

Hide! Quick! Get under leaf! Crawl crawl crawl crawl crawl!

Leaf shaking. Pressure. Being picked up.

Squirm squirm squirm.

Pinching. Hurting.

Splat.

This time, when I woke in the drawer, I had a very pressing question on my mind – one that surpassed even how much positive karma I'd earned.

"Please have a seat and state your name and nature for me."

Piri. Caterpillar. Hey, what kind of caterpillar was I? What kind of butterfly was I going to turn into?

As previously stated, natural philosophy was no interest of mine, but I did know something about butterflies. During my stint as Prime Minister, a group of scholars had presented Cassius with a case of gem-like preserved butterflies that they'd spent decades collecting from every corner of Serica. They'd meant it as proof that they deserved Imperial patronage for their research, but what was I supposed to do with a box of dead bugs? I'd sent them packing – the scholars, not the bugs – and then ordered the Imperial jewelers to make me copies of the butterflies using actual gems.

What color butterfly was I going to be? I persisted. Was I going to be one of those iridescent blue ones?

That had been my favorite type, although the jewelers had done such an abysmal job at reproducing the sheen that I'd had to demote the Head Jeweler back down to apprentice. He'd been so ashamed that he'd committed suicide.

Come to think of it, that had probably gone on my curriculum vitae too. Oops.

The clerk sighed and didn't answer.

A terrible thought occurred to me. Hang on a sec. You didn't make me a moth, right? Right? I thought of those ugly, idiotic, brownish-beigish-greyish bugs that kept flying into lanterns and burning themselves to death. Tell me! I have to know!

In one sharp motion, the clerk spun the document around so I could read it right side up and stabbed a finger at my list of deeds. "You were the type of caterpillar that destroyed a poor farmer's cabbage crop," he hissed. "Without that crop, he will not be able to pay his rent to his landlord this fall, meaning that he and his family will be evicted this winter, meaning in turn that he will turn to banditry to feed his children. In two years, he will be caught and executed, and his children will starve to death."

Uh….

"So congratulations. The negative karma that you earned during this life means that you will reincarnate as an earthworm again next time."

What? Hey! That's not fair!

I flew at the document, trying to burn it, rip it, smudge it – anything to erase those lines. But my soft, glow-y edges bounced right off, and the paper stayed pristine.

I didn't choose where I reincarnated! And caterpillars don't choose what they eat, you know! They hatch, and then they eat! So if you didn't want me eating that specific farmer's cabbages, then you shouldn't have reincarnated me literally on top of them!

"As I have already explained to you, I am not responsible for these decisions," said the clerk through gritted teeth. "Now, if you will dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness – "

Oh, no no no. Oh, no, you don't. I'm not letting you do this to me. Where's your supervisor? I want to talk to your supervisor!

"Just be a good earthworm this time around, all right?"

A good earthworm? A good earthworm? What does that even mean? Earthworms are too dumb to have morals! They just are!

"Try not to scare any small children when you come to the surface."

I stopped yelling long enough to register that he'd actually given me a piece of advice, even if said advice were utterly useless for a creature with no eyes.

"Look," said the clerk, leaning forward to tap the paper. "You earn positive karma for deeds that help humankind, and negative karma for deeds that harm it."

After a moment of consideration, I said in a calmer tone, That seems…subjective. Who decides what helps and what harms humans? And which humans?

But the clerk was done talking. "Now, I have a long line of other souls to process, so if you will please just go dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness…."

All right, all right.

He had provided semi-helpful information this time around. Couldn't hurt to reward him with my cooperation. I floated across the room and sank towards the surface of the tea. The brownish liquid roiled, stretching up tentacles to wrap around me and pull me in. Closing my nonexistent eyes, I let it take me.

Soil renewal and not traumatizing small children. I could do that.

Waaaaay too many lives later, I finally accrued enough positive karma to get promoted back to caterpillar.

The clerk still wouldn't tell me what kind.

Fresh air. Sunshine. Fluttering from blossom to blossom.

Others of my kind. Flying together. Flying alone.

Soaring.

Dancing.

Movement! Something swooping! Like a giant flower center, but rounder. And empty. No, not empty.

Soft mesh against wings. Change direction! Fly faster!

More mesh.

Trapped! Panicking. Can't escape! Can't escape!

Being lifted. Tipped upside down. Sliding. Hitting something hard and clear. Can see flowers through it. Sunshine. Sky.

Must get out must get out must get out. Fly up!

Something dark coming down.

Fly faster! Faster faster faster!

Slam.

Hitting dark thing. Beating at dark thing. Wings hurting.

Can't get out.

Tired.

No fresh air. No wind. No flying.

Just darkness.

This time, when the clerk called me into his office, I didn't pester him with questions. I didn't demand to talk to his supervisor. I just hovered across the desk from him and waited for him to send me on to my next life. My broken, phantom wings still ached.

"To answer your question from last time," he informed me in a matter-of-fact voice, "you were reincarnated as a butterfly. A rare and beautiful species prized by collectors."

I know. I'd figured out that much while my soul rested in its drawer for forty-nine days, healing and regaining strength.

Something about my dead tone made the clerk look up. "If it's any consolation, you brought the collector much joy. A young boy on a fief in Northern Serica. Your preserved body is one of the centerpieces of his collection and will inspire him to take up natural philosophy. He will become a renowned scholar and travel from court to court, respected by nobles and honored by petty kings. In the end, he will starve to death during the siege of a castle he had the misfortune of visiting at the wrong time. But that has nothing to do with you." The clerk tapped my curriculum vitae.

I didn't bother to read it for myself. That's nice.

"You earned significant positive karma this time. Provided that nothing goes catastrophically wrong in your next life, you should be able to advance to Green Tier soon."

That's nice.

The clerk stared at me for a long moment, seeming to want to add something. But when he spoke, it was the familiar, "Dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness, please."

And I did.

Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, BananaBobert and Charlotte! And thanks to all of you for reading!

arianedartagnan · Aug 25, 2021

Chapter 3: Bee

My next stints in White Tier were all as bees. Honey bees, to be precise. I devoted my lives to making honey for human beekeepers and pollinating orchards for human farmers, earning the final karma that I needed to move up. After one long, full life as a queen, I was balled and killed by my workers to make way for my successor, and when I woke, my drawer was glowing with bluish-green light.

I'd done it. I'd made it to Green Tier. And it only taken two hundred years to get here.

Even the clerk celebrated my achievement to the extent of droning, "Congratulations on your advancement to Green Tier. Starting with your next life, you will be reincarnated as various types of sea creatures, reptiles, and amphibians."

To be honest, none of those options sounded particularly appealing, but hey, frog was better than worm…right? So what am I going to be this time?

He gave me a prissy look, reminding me of all the times he'd told me that protocol prohibited him from divulging such details beforehand. "It is not customary – " But before he could finish the formula, the door banged open and a man – no, a god now – strode in.

Scrambling out of his chair, the clerk dropped to the floor and prostrated himself. I buzzed, rotating slowly as I considered whether and how Heavenly etiquette applied to squishy balls of light.

"My lord. Forgive me. I was not aware that we had an appointment." Despite the clerk's posture, his tone conveyed definite disapproval, warning Heaven's newest appointee that even gods were expected to follow proper bureaucratic procedure and schedule meetings in advance.

"We don't have an appointment."

Cassius brushed past me to take the room's lone chair. Leaving the clerk groveling at his feet, he rifled through the tidy stacks of documents on the desk, then tossed the papers aside. A couple whooshed onto the floor.

"We happened to be inspecting this subdivision and heard it was Piri's turn for reincarnation, so of course we had to come see her."

He leveled a smile at me across the desk, that warm, broad smile I remembered so well. It was the one he always faked when he opened palace banquets. Including the one where he poisoned four dukes. (Which hadn't even been my idea, although I'd been plotting to remove them anyway.)

"Of course, my lord," murmured the clerk, his forehead still pressed to the floor. It might have been my imagination, but I thought he was gritting his teeth.

Cassius ignored him. "Piri, you remember us, right? Here and now, in this place?"

Seriously – did he really think there was more than one correct answer? Of course I do, Imperial Majesty, I chimed, sounding like the peal of bells on New Year's Eve. How could I possibly forget you? In any time or place?

Ugh. A terrible line. Stale. Trite. Just another uninspired variant on all the terrible, stale, trite lines I'd used on him in the past. He chuckled, as he always had, to warn, I know what you're doing. You can't fool me, Piri.

But his eyes, as they always had, betrayed his pleasure. He'd always been too easy to handle.

"We could never forget you either, Piri. In any time or place." His hands clenched on the armrests until the wood creaked (the clerk winced), and his voice went hard. "Including the throne room as it went up in flames around us."

Flames he'd ordered himself, set by the last manservant still loyal to him, as the dukes and their army surrounded the great hall. (I hadn't been there, of course. I'd fled as soon as they closed in on the palace, knowing that my job was done.)

Here Cassius paused for dramatic effect, leaving me an opening to murmur something seductive, to charm him into believing that my betrayal had somehow been for his own good. Two hundred years ago, I could have done it – but now nothing came to mind. I'd spent far too long as simple creatures with no capacity for social manipulation. Just another reason to accumulate positive karma as fast as possible.

As the silence dragged on, Cassius rummaged through the documents (the clerk was definitely grinding his teeth now) in a show of examining my curriculum vitae. His gaze hesitated over the stamp that read "Green," then roved down to the record of my deeds as a bee. His expression turned regretful. "Piri, we are sorry to inform you that there has been an accounting error."

An accounting error? I cast a glance at the clerk, whose shoulders had gone stiff, either from guilt or anger, I couldn't tell.

"Yes. One of the apprentice accountants made an arithmetic mistake." Cassius quirked his lips, as if to shrug, Apprentices and their abacuses – what can you do? "Once she corrected her calculation, she discovered that you are one point shy of Green Tier."

One point? I want to see the math. As Cassius knew, I was actually pretty experienced at interpreting account books. Generally to my own advantage.

He fixed me with a stern scowl. "Piri, you of all…people should understand that government records are classified."

As if he'd ever cared what I did with government records! But fighting over the past wasn't going to get me any results, at least, not the ones I wanted. Instead, I floated forward to caress his arm with my soft, glow-y, and definitely-blue-green edges. But it's just one point, Majesty…, I wheedled. Surely, as the Star of Heavenly Joy – I injected awe into my tone, and was pleased at how realistic it sounded – you possess the authority to let the original calculation stand….

He let me snuggle into the crook of his arm and even petted me a couple times. Then he yanked away so I tumbled to the floor. From inside his wide sleeve, he produced a bronze seal and slammed it down on my curriculum vitae, right over the rune for "Green." The original seal stamp evaporated into nothingness, leaving only a sloppy, smudged "White."

Hey! Wait!

Cassius tossed the seal back into his oversized sleeve, rose, and strode towards the door. "See to it," he ordered over his shoulder.

Still crouched on the floor, the clerk asked, "What shall she be reincarnated as, my lord?"

Cassius hesitated. "What was her last life again – ah yes, a honey bee. Make her a bee again. In a pear orchard." His lips twitched.

How…poetic? My name did mean "pear blossom." I supposed I should feel grateful that Casisus hadn't tried to reincarnate me as a pear tree, although I'd bet that if plants weren't on some bureaucratically-approved list, not even the Jade Emperor Himself could turn me into one.

"It will be done," murmured the clerk.

After the door banged shut, he hauled himself to his feet with a long sigh, clutching the edge of his desk for support. His joints creaked.

Getting stiff there? I wasn't in a sympathetic mood.

Neither was he. He scowled. "Let's get this over with. I have a whole waiting room of other souls to process."

Not my fault, not my problem. Plopping down on my curriculum vitae, I flattened myself across the "White" stamp. You do realize Cassius was lying, right?

The clerk's scowl deepened until he resembled a minor demon. "That's the Star of Heavenly Joy, soul."

Are you really going to do this? You don't have to obey him, you know. Maybe a star god outranks a star sprite, but it's not like he works here. As far as I could tell, reincarnation had nothing to do with heavenly joy. Or joy in any form whatsoever.

"As a matter of fact," grated the clerk, "he was recently reassigned to this Bureau from his original position at the Ministry of Fate."

The Ministry of Fate? That sounded like an appointment I'd have made – because I had a twisted sense of humor. What was he doing there?

"He was overseeing the happiness of human marriages."

Wow. Given what Cassius had done to his own empress, the Heavenly bureaucracy had an even more twisted sense of humor than I did. Huh. That's clever.

At the admiration in my voice, the clerk's mouth turned upside down, but he refrained from commenting on his superiors' decisions. "Please dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness."

I didn't budge. No. I refuse to let Cassius mess with me.

"Piri," he warned, tapping his index finger on the desk and then aiming the tip at me, "I don't have time for this."

Okay, okay, fine, fine! But we're going to talk about this next time!

The last thing I saw before the tea sucked me in was his face. It was filled with deep disgust.

Buzz buzz buzz.

Flower flower flower.

Hive. Family. Queen.

Honey.

I glowed blue-green again when I woke in my drawer, but this time I felt no excitement. What was the point of achieving anything if a god could annul it on a whim?

"Congratulations on achieving Green Tier," intoned the clerk.

I pulsed resentfully. "Only until Cassius drops by."

The clerk's fingers drummed on the desk. Without meeting my eyes, he confessed, "I filed a formal complaint about the irregularity last time. However, as the Director of Reincarnation is away, it will be some time before it is processed."

Ah, bureaucracy at its inefficient best. I was surprised that the clerk had cared enough to file a complaint – although, on a second thought, he'd probably done it less out of concern for my personal welfare and more to prevent future "irregularities" that would result in work pileups for him.

When do you expect the Director to return?

"In half a year. On the twenty-third day of the Bitter Moon."

In half a – year? Your Director leaves for half a year at a time?

"The Director of Reincarnation is the Kitchen God," the clerk snapped, as if I should have known already. Which was semi-fair (by Heavenly standards) – I probably could have guessed as soon as I heard the date. "As such, he dwells in human homes and observes human lives for all but the final week of the year, when he returns to compile his observations and report to the Jade Emperor on the state of affairs on Earth."

That I had known. Cassius' palace, like every household in Serica down to the meanest hovel, sent off the Kitchen God with great fanfare every year. The ceremony typically included the offering of bribes – er, desserts – to sweeten his mood and hence his reports, and commoners who could afford to keep a statuette of him above their stoves smeared honey across his lips to seal them shut. (Cassius hadn't, since all actions of the Son of Heaven were supposedly sanctified by Heaven anyway.)

Isn't there an Assistant Director or something to handle departmental affairs for the rest of the year?

"Yes. The Goddess of Life. But she submitted an application to create a department of her own, which is on the verge of approval, so she's been extremely busy."

So who's actually in charge, then? Cassius?

"No!" answered the clerk at once. "No. We have a well-defined set of regulations for conducting reincarnations. As long as all the clerks are properly trained and issued a copy of the manual to consult in the trickier cases, the system functions without much need for oversight."

Functioned, you mean, I needled him, stressing the past tense. If Cassius isn't in charge, how did he get the White seal?

The clerk's lips pressed into a thin, straight line. "I am sure the Director will launch an inquiry when he returns."

In half a year. By which point, Cassius would probably have installed himself as Director. Isn't there someone who oversees all the departments and who's actually here? Can't you go talk to them?

"That's the Evening Star, Director of Heavenly Affairs. His office is in the Hall of Purple Mists itself." From his tone, I gathered that all the most important gods and goddesses worked there. "As you can imagine, obtaining an appointment with him is impossible."

Unless you were Cassius and just breezed right in. But this mousy little clerk would never dare. Well, does this Evening Star have an Assistant Director?

"Two, in fact. She Who Hears the Cries of the World and She Who Sees the Suffering of the World. But they, too, travel frequently between Heaven and Earth. And before you ask, no, their subordinates are not authorized to issue judgments on their behalf."

Wow. Even my efforts to "modernize" the bureaucracy on Earth hadn't produced such a labyrinth. I felt frankly jealous.

"Look," counseled the clerk. "Be patient. Go live your next life. The Kitchen God will return soon."

And process all complaints in the order in which they were received? I asked, sarcastically.

"Of course," replied the clerk with all seriousness. "Now, please dip yourself in the Tea of Forgetfulness. Enjoy your next life."

Yeah, yeah, sure.

A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon supporters, BananaBobert, Charlotte, and Hookshyu! And thanks to everyone for reading!

arianedartagnan · Sep 1, 2021

Chapter 4: Oyster

As it turned out, the clerk's bosses hadn't deemed me worthy of becoming a frog. Reincarnate Piri the former fox spirit as something with four legs and a brain? Heaven forbid!

Literally.

Thus, I spent my first life in Green Tier as…an oyster. Not a pearl oyster. Just a regular oyster in an oyster reef off the eastern coast of Serica. I didn't even end up on any human's plate. No, I was spawned; I drifted with the ocean currents until I came to what my oyster senses told me was an acceptable permanent home (on top of another oyster's shell); I glued myself to it; and then I lived on it for the remainder of my twenty-odd years. Needless to say, my list of deeds was very short. However, according to the clerk, even if I didn't benefit any humans directly, I did earn a token amount of positive karma for being an "ingeniator oecosystematis."

"Oysters are natural engineers of the ecosystem," he lectured as I pulsed in dismay at my half-page curriculum vitae. "One subgroup in the Bureau of Academia studies these creatures, which have a significant impact on their habitat…."

Funny, in my thousand years as a fox, I'd had a pretty significant impact on the world I inhabited, but no one had ever praised me for being an "engineer of the ecosystem."

So then why did I get negative karma for bringing down the Lang Dynasty? Didn't that make a significant impact on Serica? I'd feel pretty insulted if Heaven claimed it hadn't – although, to be honest, not as insulted as Cassius.

The clerk cut off with a sigh. "It did – "

In fact, at my trial, didn't Lady Fate claim that I had personally converted Serica into a "wasteland dominated by thieves, demons, and petty warlords"?

"She did. But that's not the type of impact the scholars were referring to when they coined the term." The clerk bit out his words, annoyed that I was taking the definition so literally. "They meant creatures that act in ways that increase the number of other types of plants, animals, etc. that can live in that environment."

I took a moment to parse that sentence. Then I protested, Hey, I did do that. Look at all the new types of humans that sprang up after the fall of the Lang Dynasty! Thieves –

"Piri," pointed out the clerk with some asperity, "if you check the annals of history, you will find that thieves have existed throughout human existence. I wouldn't call them new. Just more numerous now."

True, but I wasn't done. Petty warlords. Don't try to tell me those existed under the Lang Dynasty. After the founder had proclaimed himself Son of Heaven, he and his successors had made sure to execute anyone with delusions of regality. Mimicking the clerk's speech style, I declared, My actions have created a habitat where entire new breeds of warlords and petty kings can flourish!

"Uh…." He looked as if he wanted to disagree but couldn't.

And don't forget the demons! The Imperial Mages used to engage in practices of – what did the scholars call it again? – severe overhunting. They completely depleted the demonic population of Serica.

In his driest tone, the clerk said, "Demonic diversity was very much not a consideration when the Bureau of Academia defined the ingeniator oecosystematis."

Then what kind of diversity are we talking about here? I demanded. (I knew the answer, of course, but I wanted to force him to admit it. Yes, my soul was just that sweet and kind and pure and gentle. There might have been a reason I'd spent two centuries in White Tier.)

Releasing the same kind of long, weary sigh that Cassius' accountants gave when they heard I was throwing another party – er, hosting another state banquet for the more dissolute elements of noble society in order to impress Imperial might upon them and reform them into honest and upstanding subjects of the throne – the clerk massaged his temples. "In the Bureau of Academia's definition of diversity, there is the implicit assumption that it benefits humans, because human prosperity generates a more stable and higher-quality supply of ritual offerings to Heaven, which in turn benefits the gods and goddesses. Happy now?"

Not really. Yes.

"Good. Now, if we're done quibbling over terminology, we have a drop-in appointment with – "

A drop-in appointment? Is that more Heavenly terminology I'm not aware of?

" – with the Assistant Director of Reincarnation," he finished with a glare. "While you were filtering water and cycling nutrients, I received a reply to the complaint I filed. We have been invited to attend the Goddess of Life's weekly office hours. As she is an extremely busy individual and does not, in fact, have the time to hold office hours every week, I suggest we go now. Unless, of course, you'd prefer not to discuss your grievance with her in person?"

I launched myself straight into the air. Why didn't you lead with that? Let's go!

In all my lives so far, I hadn't seen much of the building that housed the Bureau of Reincarnation. It was called the Hall of Vermillion Clouds, but as far as I knew, it was windowless, utilitarian, and had nothing to do with clouds of any sort, vermillion or otherwise. Now the clerk led me out through the waiting room (completely empty, suggesting that his boss had cleared his schedule for this definitely-not-scheduled meeting) and into the hallway. Turning the opposite direction from the archive, he opened a door to reveal a dark, narrow stairwell.

In near silence, two endless lines of clerks were crawling up and down the steps, all dressed in the same black cotton robes and moving with the same stiff gait as my clerk. Noticing our open door, the line traveling up slowed, and we merged into it smoothly. Red-clad star children trotted past, clutching message scrolls and weaving around the adults' legs with ease.

As we approached one level, a door opened and a star sprite dressed in white entered the stairwell. At the sight, all the clerks and couriers pressed themselves to the walls to let her pass.

Who was that? I asked once she was several floors down and we were moving again. My voice echoed around the stairwell, earning us scowls.

With a wince, my clerk bobbed his head at his colleagues. Then, before I could repeat my question, he murmured, "One of the apprentice accountants."

Huh. An apprentice accountant. In deference to the other clerks' sensitive hearing, I floated right next to my clerk's ear and buzzed into it, Do accountants outrank clerks by a lot?

"They undergo years of special training," he whispered back. "Also, they're not part of our Bureau. Accounting is technically a subdivision of the Ministry of Wealth, although it's been applying for centuries to split off and form its own department."

That did seem to be a popular pastime around here. In that case, I'd bet the accountants weren't too happy about Cassius waltzing in and "correcting" their math. I filed that away for future use. Why does Accounting want to split off? After all, wealth and the accruement thereof should appeal to it.

But my clerk replied, "The primary mandate of the Ministry of Wealth is to oversee the financial situation on Earth. However, Accounting divides its attention between the financial situations both on Earth and in Heaven. As such, it believes that its mission is fundamentally misaligned with that of the larger department."

I couldn't suppress a wistful sigh. I'm impressed.

"You? By Accounting?" My clerk looked puzzled by the envy in my tone.

Yes. Well, more generally too. He still looked confused, so I explained, I thought I was good creating bureaucratic labyrinths, but obviously Heaven mastered that eons ago.

His only response was a glare.

After an interminably long and boring climb, we finally reached the top of the stairs. The clerk pushed open the final door and led me into – an ambush. On the senses, that was.

The top floor of the Hall of Vermillion Clouds, where the Goddess of Life held court when she wasn't off agitating for her own bureaucratic fiefdom, was a vast, hexagonal space. On three sides, it was enclosed by screens of fragrant cypress wood pierced with latticework. The other three sides were open to the bright blue sky. Borne on a gentle breeze, gauzy vermillion clouds drifted in and twined around columns that soared up to support a ceiling carved with scenes of life on Earth. Figures of peasants, no more than an inch tall, waded through rice paddies behind their water buffalo; women tended to silkworms on mulberry leaves; and servants staggered under the weight of poles balanced over their shoulders, with boxes hanging from both ends. As the scenes spiraled in towards the center, the setting shifted from the countryside to the city, where people jostled in the streets, cheered at weddings, hawked goods in the open-air market, and crowded around makeshift stages to watch street performers. At the very apex of the ceiling was a palace complex with intricate halls and pavilions and gardens. As I stared up at it, I began to make out familiar buildings: the main palace, where the emperor held court and conducted official business. The empress' hall, the private quarters of the Imperial family. And there, next to a cool green pond that overflowed with lotus blossoms in the summer, my pagoda.

It had been a wonderful pagoda. With its gold roofs and jade walls, it had towered over the capital, visible for miles in all directions. I'd designed it myself – "as a symbol of the splendor of the Serican Empire" – and it had been my favorite place on Earth. When I wasn't busy advising Cassius, I'd spent as much time there as I could. Sometimes I'd "invited" the empress, who'd gritted her teeth but come anyway. Sometimes I'd brought the little princes and princesses, on whom I was impressing the importance of luxury in all its forms. But other times I'd gone by myself at night, to admire it in peace. I'd kicked off my shoes and ascended the stairs in my bare feet, feeling the pearls set into the steps. I'd trailed my fingers along the sleek coral railings, imagining all the divers who'd drowned to harvest them. Finally, when I reached the top, I'd undone my hair and let the breeze whip through it as I gazed out upon the world I was destroying….

A fat orange cloud plowed into me, jolting me back to the present.

My clerk had left me behind. He was approaching a desk facing the stairwell. An imperious, white-haired clerk sat behind it, scrutinizing him as if she were a stone lion guarding a temple. Her robes, like his, were black, but they shone like silk and had embroidered silver bands along the hem and around the wide sleeves.

My clerk bowed deeply and held the pose.

She inclined her head the slightest bit, more of a chin bob than anything else. "Name?"

"My name is Flicker, honored one."

Another clerk (in plain silk robes) proffered a list of names to her in both hands. She flicked a glance at it, and he hastened to remove it. "Ah yes," she pronounced. "Flicker. Clerk, third class. Here regarding a complaint against the Star of Heavenly Joy for unsanctioned interference in the reincarnation process."

Unsanctioned interference? Did that mean there was sanctioned interference?

A different subordinate presented her with a strip of paper that had "Goddess of Life" written on it in elegant calligraphy. She picked up a seal and banged it on the bottom, leaving a red stamp that said "Approved." I edged forward to peer over my clerk's shoulder and look for a second stamp that said "Rejected," but she only had the one stamp. Interesting.

The subordinate waited a moment for the seal paste to dry, then passed the paper to my clerk. "Please wait until you are called," he instructed, and gestured towards a horde of clerks, each of whom clutched an identical strip of paper.

Which meant that if you didn't pass inspection here, you weren't allowed into the audience chamber at all, which in turn meant that possession of that strip of paper was redundant. Ah, marvelous busywork.

Feeling cheerful, I followed my clerk across the room. Your name is Flicker? Really? Why?

He was skirting along the edge of the crowd, hunting for the perfect waiting spot. "Yes. Really. Because it is my name."

But…is it because you flicker? Do you actually flicker?

He gritted his teeth, planted himself next to a column, and scowled into the middle distance.

With a mental shrug, I settled down on his shoulder, making him stiffen and clench his jaw, and studied the room. Between the clerks' heads, I glimpsed a gold dais and a gold throne with a red, yellow, black, green, and white cushion. Atop that garish monstrosity reclined a goddess with luminous porcelain skin, jet-black locks arranged in an elaborate bun, and a headdress of lotuses and willow leaves. She wore the same style of dress that we had in Cassius' court, a wrap blouse over a long, flowing skirt, with a shorter skirt tied around her waist. But where we'd favored contrasting colors and patterns, everything on her was a pure, shimmering white, making her stand out from the throne like a pearl in a brooch. I'd bet she'd done that on purpose. Clerks buzzed around her, presenting her with an endless stream of documents to read or stamp or simply nod or frown at.

As I continued to observe, I realized that only her own people were allowed near the dais. Supplicants waited until one of the silk-clad clerks at the foot of the steps called their name. Then they'd bow deeply and offer the slip of paper. A clerk would take it, glance at it too fast to verify whether it were real or forged, and wave the supplicants forward. They'd then prostrate themselves, wait for the Goddess of Life to grant them permission to raise their heads, and explain their business. If they needed to show her anything, a clerk at the foot of the dais would pass it to a clerk on the steps, who'd pass it to the clerk on the dais itself, who'd finally present it to the goddess. The sheer, ritualistic inefficiency of it all took my breath away.

Most of the proceedings must have been routine, because the Goddess of Life's serene, distant expression never wavered. But then a man in blue silk robes stepped out of the crowd and knelt, and her eyes snapped into focus. Her clerks tensed. The room went silent.

Who's that? Who's that? I bounced on Flicker's shoulder.

"The Star of Scholarly Song. You don't recognize him?" he muttered without turning his head.

No. Should I?

I floated forward a couple inches for a closer look. Let's see…if I removed the glowing aura, added thick eyebrows and a sententious frown –

Oh, it's Marcius! He's a Star too?

Back on Earth, Marcius had been particularly annoying: courageous and incorruptible and Cassius' most trusted adviser. He'd been one of the few officials who'd dared to keep challenging me as I consolidated my hold over the emperor, alienated the nobles, and drained the treasury. Such was the general respect for the man that it had taken years to get rid of him. What was he doing at the Goddess of Life's office hours? Petitioning for a job in her new department? Like everyone else in the room, I strained to hear.

" – humbly beseech you to reconsider this decision," Marcius was saying, in that firm tone I remembered so well, that had nothing to do with humility or pleading.

Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, BananaBobert, Charlotte, Hookshyu, and Anonymous! And thanks to everyone for reading!

arianedartagnan · Sep 5, 2021

I was in a drawing mood and decided to do a "Chinese paper cutting" version of Piri. This is how she wants you to see her. Do not be fooled by the fluffiness!

arianedartagnan · Sep 8, 2021

Chapter 5: The Goddess of Life

"Such a decision would only reinforce the perception of Heavenly governance as arbitrary and corrupt," continued Marcius.

Reinforce whose perception of Heavenly governance as arbitrary and corrupt? I'd never heard any humans suggest that the gods were anything less than perfect. Not Cassius, who claimed the Jade Emperor's mandate for all his actions, or his courtiers, who claimed divine guidance for theirs, of course – but not even the poorest, hungriest peasant tilling the rockiest patch of mountain soil, whose children had all just died from a plague. No, instead of blaming the gods for their misfortunes, the humans just bowed their heads and murmured about karma from past lives.

The Goddess of Life hadn't uttered a word yet, which Marcius took as permission to keep expounding on all the problems in Heaven that needed fixing. The man had never known when to stop and neither, apparently, did the Star.

Fascinated, I edged through the crowd until I had a clear view of the Goddess of Life. Her face was as hard and cold as the two white jade vases that flanked her throne. Out of one rose a single pink lotus blossom, and out of the other, a branch of willow. Both swayed gently in the breeze, but that was the only motion on the dais. Down on the floor, the clerks' eyes swiveled between her and Marcius.

Since no one was stopping me, I kept weaving forward until I reached the front row of clerks. They'd all pulled back from the dais, leaving a good ten feet between them and Marcius.

What's going on? I chimed into one star sprite's ear.

She flinched but kept her face pointed forward. Sliding her eyes sideways, she breathed, "The Star of Scholarly Song is appealing the decree that he re-enter the cycle of reincarnation."

I must have misheard. That he do what? Why?

In front of us, Marcius was declaring, "Although the criteria for full membership in the Bureau of Academia as written are clear enough, in practice obtaining a permanent position is much more about whom you know and whose work you champion. Or oppose." He shook his head, a deliberate, disapproving motion that I was all too familiar with. "That is wrong. The goal of academic research is the pursuit of knowledge. It must remain above petty politics and closed-door decisions. It must be based on merit – and merit alone."

The clerk I was talking to tipped her head towards him. "That's why," she whispered.

Did he not get a permanent position at the Bureau of Academia or something?

"No. He had one already, due to his courageous defense of integrity on Earth. But he...disagreed with some...long-established practices in the department."

"Shhh!" hissed the clerks around her, and she snapped her mouth shut.

With supreme confidence, Marcius concluded his speech with, "Hence I believe that the most appropriate course of action would be to restore me to the Bureau of Academia and to accept my proposals for its reform."

The Goddess of Life moved at last. One slender forefinger lifted, and the clerk on the dais rushed to heave the willow branch out of its vase. Kneeling before the throne, he presented it to her with both arms trembling under its weight. She plucked it up and held it as easily as a sprig of wildflowers. Water droplets beaded on the leaves and rolled down the branch, falling to her feet, where they shattered and transformed into a fragrant, pale-green mist.

"Enough." The word floated through the room like birdsong and butterfly wings.

"My lady – " protested Marcius, exactly as he used to when Cassius cut him off.

She didn't raise her voice, but something about her manner silenced him. "The decision that you re-enter the cycle of reincarnation was made by the God of Culture. As the head of a different department, I do not possess the authority to countermand his decrees."

Marcius, naturally, couldn't let her go on any longer without interrupting. "With all due respect, the God of Culture may have made that decision, but whether or not you implement it is within your authority – "

She spoke over him, still without raising her voice but somehow drowning him out. "In addition, She Who Hears the Cries of the World has upheld your punishment." She flipped her free hand palm up, as if to say, "And that is final."

Marcius, as I knew, was not so easily deterred. His mouth set into a stern line. "Then I request an audience with the Jade Emperor. I will explain the situation to Him and – "

One graceful eyebrow arched, the only part of her face that moved. "And do what? I can tell you already that He will uphold the decision of His officials. When He tells you that Himself – when He returns a decision that you disagree with – would you school His Heavenly Majesty Himself on how to govern Heaven?"

Even Marcius could tell that he'd pushed too hard. Bowing his head, he softened his tone. "Regardless, my lady, I would greatly appreciate an opportunity to discuss the matter with Him in person."

Both her eyebrows lifted now, incredulously. "Do you imagine that the Emperor of Heaven has time to discuss trivial quibbles with every newborn godling?" Sarcasm dripped off her tongue, tinkling like bells. "This is how we do things in Heaven. If you cannot accept that, as it is manifestly clear that you cannot, then you have no place here. You would do better on Earth. Which, I believe, is the gist of the God of Culture's decree."

Marcius gritted his teeth. "My lady – " he tried again, but she'd had enough.

Holding out the willow branch so it arched over the steps of her dais, she let three drops of water slide down the long leaves. "This soul will enter the cycle of reincarnation," she proclaimed, the words booming around the pillars and echoing off the ceiling. "Let it be done."

As the drops struck the crown of Marcius' head, they sizzled and turned into a golden mist that surrounded him completely. When it blew away, in his place was a glowing black ball that spun furiously. Her face serene again, the Goddess of Life passed the willow branch to her clerk.

"What are you doing?" hissed a voice next to me. Flicker had finally caught up. "Don't wander off by yourself."

I didn't wander off, I replied, still transfixed by the scene before me. On the dais, the clerk was straining to get the end of the branch over the lip of the vase. A couple times, he nearly dropped it and knocked over the vase, and I tensed in anticipation. But alas, he got it back in safely. With a disappointed sigh, I corrected Flicker, I floated off for a better view.

That distinction impressed him not one whit. "Come on, before – " He tried to melt back into the crowd, but it was too late. The Goddess of Life's dark eyes had turned our way. One porcelain-white forefinger curved up, beckoning.

His eyes flew wide, and he stared around wildly, as if to ask, "Me? You can't possibly mean me, right? Which one of my fellow clerks did you want?"

His fellow clerks (and I) pulled back at once. With a gulp, Flicker prostrated himself in front of the dais, under the spinning ball of Marcius' soul.

"What is your name, star sprite?" came the Goddess' cool voice.

He kept his forehead planted on the floor. "Flicker, my lady."

"Flicker. Good. You may look up." As he scrambled to obey, she smiled down at him, the impersonal smile of a statue that bore no resemblance to any Earthly emotion. "I hereby assign this soul to you."

Flicker nearly gasped. Then, collecting himself, he prostrated himself again. "I am honored, my lady."

She smiled that perfect, meaningless smile again. "Now, what did you come here for today?" A glance at her clerks sent one of them hurrying forward to take Flicker's slip of paper.

Since her office hours seemed to be returning to normal, I drifted forward until I was at the edge of the crowd of clerks. There I hovered, waiting until it was safe to rejoin Flicker.

"I am here on – " I was positive he planned to say, "the matter of a complaint against the Star of Heavenly Joy," but at the last minute he changed it to " – on behalf of one of the souls in my custody."

The clerk on the dais glided over to present the Goddess of Life with a scroll, which she skimmed. "Ah, I see," she said, her tone giving no hint of what she saw. I'd expected her to fly into a rage over Cassius usurping her power, but she simply handed the scroll back to her clerk. "Well, this seems to be a matter for Accounting to set right. Still.... Where is the soul in question?"

Floating into the open, I dipped in a graceful bow. I am here, my lady.

As soon as her gaze struck me, it pinned me in place. Then it started to vivisect me, peeling off my soul layer by layer, examining and discarding each in turn, all the way down to the core of who and what I was.

I was vibrating, trembling. Shivering.

From the spiritual equivalent of coldness, of course. Not from her dispassionate cruelty. Not because any god, no matter how powerful, could intimidate me. I am Piri, I chanted silently, clinging to my sense of self. Piri Piri Piri. I have dined with emperors. I have scorned kings. I will not bow to a god now.

Those cold, dark eyes blinked and I snapped back together. I clutched my layers around myself, the raw, naked sensation lingering.

"For the inconvenience, soul," said the impassive voice from above, "I will grant you one favor. Within reason."

For the inconvenience. The inconvenience. Was that what she called it when a soul in her care strove for centuries to earn the positive karma it needed to advance to the next Tier; and finally did advance, only to get kicked back down in an act of blatant malice; and then sought her out for help, only to get publicly vivisected for no apparent reason besides idle curiosity?

Fury surged, wiping out humiliation.

A favor, she said. Any favor. Within reason.

So what did I want most?

To hunt down Cassius and fling him into the cycle of reincarnation and keep him in White Tier, forcing him to live as a worm over and over and over until his soul was worn and mad and tattered, and then to rip it to shreds.

To lunge at the Goddess of Life and rake my claws across her perfect skin until I saw fear in her eyes, and then to gouge them out.

To – to destroy Heaven itself. The way I had Cassius' dynasty.

It wasn't even as crazy as it sounded. It had nearly been done once before, eons ago, by another wronged, angry animal spirit. It could be done again.

Heaven really needed to work on its public relations policy.

"Well?" asked the Goddess of Life's voice, tinged with impatience, shattering my fantasy and jerking me back to the present.

All right. I knew what I wanted in the end. But here and now, as a lowly Green-Tier soul in this audience chamber at the top of the Hall of Vermillion Clouds, what could I ask for that would be useful and that the goddess would grant? I glanced at Flicker for ideas, even if he were pretending that his forehead had been nailed to the floor. However, the sight reminded me of all our sessions in his office, reviewing my curricula vitae and going over the activities that had earned positive or negative karma.

If I'd known during my lives on Earth that my every deed was being recorded, categorized, and tallied up in Heaven based on how much they benefited humans, then I could have focused on activities that maximized karma. No more languishing life after life as an earthworm because I accidentally scared some small child. No more getting promoted at last, only to get demoted again for eating the wrong farmer's crop as a caterpillar. Better to starve to death in that situation, because at least I'd get zero karma instead of negative.

All right. I knew what to ask for.

My lady, I'd like to retain my memories when I reincarnate. In my lives on Earth, I wish to remember who I truly am.

"Ah." From the syllable, I couldn't tell if the Goddess of Life were surprised or displeased or simply acknowledging that I'd spoken. "Flicker, a soul in your custody has requested that it retain its memories when it reincarnates. What are your thoughts on the matter?"

From his stiffness, I could tell that his thoughts were something like, If she has her memories on Earth, how much damage can she do within the limits of mortal bodies and the karma system? How much damage can she do to me? Will she get me thrown out of Heaven too? "Well, ah, my lady in her infinite wisdom is much better able to judge than a lowly clerk...," he hedged.

She was having none of his wishy-washiness, probably because she wanted a ready-made scapegoat for later. "I asked for your thoughts on the matter."

I bumped his shoulder urgently. Say yes, say yes. Haven't I been good? When have I caused you any trouble? Then I remembered all the times I'd forced him to use magic to dunk me in the Tea of Forgetfulness. Recently, I mean? I've learned my lesson. I've been good. I'll be good. It's good for me to be good too, so I can earn positive karma.

That last point was what convinced him. He looked up and met the goddess' eyes. "My lady, this soul has committed morally reprehensible acts in its past, but I believe that it has the capacity to change and improve."

She liked that answer (which sounded like it came straight out of a training manual). "As the cycle of reincarnation is designed for. Very well, I shall grant that request." She motioned to her personal clerk.

This time, he offered her the lotus blossom. As she extended it out over me, three drops of golden nectar fell on me and flowed all over me, incredibly sweet and unbearably tender. They soaked into and permeated my entire being and wove my layers back together. I chimed in contentment, feeling whole again.

"It is done," proclaimed the Goddess of Life. "You may withdraw."

Flicker scrambled to his feet, bowed nearly to the floor, and then glared at Marcius and me until we both bobbed bows too. Then he led us back through the crowd of clerks, who parted for us, whispering as loudly as they dared about what had just happened.

Most of their speculation centered on what terrible mistake Accounting could possibly have made that would compel the Goddess of Life herself to recompense me for it.

A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, BananaBobert, Charlotte, Hookshyu, and Anonymous! And thanks to all of you for reading!

arianedartagnan · Sep 12, 2021

A drawing of a scene from chapter 5! Can you find poor Flicker?

arianedartagnan · Sep 15, 2021

Chapter 6: Clerks

As we descended the stairwell, I couldn't resist needling Marcius. I drifted sideways, bumped him, and sang, Guess you never learn, huh?

He recoiled. Do I know you? he demanded, his soul's chime as blunt and unmusical as his human voice.

Weeeeell, you miiiiight say that....

I was planning to drag it out for as long as I could, but Flicker hissed, "Shhh!" at the same time that the clerk ahead of us turned around to glare – at him. Presumably for not controlling us better. Flustered and guilty, Flicker muttered at us, "If you have to talk, do it after we get back to my office."

Pulsing his resentment, Marcius pointedly moved to the clerk's other side. I considered following him just to annoy him but got distracted when, one level down, a square grill that I'd thought was a ventilation grate swung open. Warm, yellow light spilled into the stairwell, and a pair of hands began handing a ceramic cup to each passing clerk.

What's that? I whispered into Flicker's ear. In case he couldn't figure out what I was looking at, which was a distinct possibility given that I was a smooth, featureless ball, I bounced once in the window's direction.

Marcius floated ahead of Flicker so he could radiate disapproval at me, but the clerk darted a nervous glance at the back of his colleague's head and mumbled, "'S lunchtime."

Lunchtime? Are you trying to tell me that this stairwell is your dining hall? And that all you have for lunch is tea?

"'S not tea," he answered, barely moving his lips. "Pill of Starlight dissolved in dew. Food for us."

That, of course, only raised more questions about how you could capture starlight in the first place, much less solidify it and turn it into a pill, but by then we'd reached the window. As he shuffled past, Flicker took his cup, nodded his thanks to the young female star sprite behind the window, and kept descending the stairs. His speed never slowed, which I found impressive. As for me, I'd fallen behind already and I hadn't even gotten a good look behind the server! When I zipped forward and caught up again, Flicker mutely held up the plain white cup for me to inspect.

Condensed, processed, and dissolved starlight looked exactly like green tea. How anticlimactic.

Let me guess, I said as Flicker lifted the cup to his lips and took a deep breath. I couldn't smell anything, but his face relaxed and his eyes drifted shut before he sipped. Let me guess: There's a special department that oversees the production and distribution of these pills to all the other departments.

Plus the reclamation of the cups. How do you return the cups? put in Marcius, curious enough to forget himself.

As a minister, he used to blather on and on about logistics. Made sense if you were actually trying to make the empire function, I supposed, but it was so tedious that I'd nicknamed him Master Supply Chain. He hadn't appreciated it – although the other ministers had.

Flicker nodded at me. To Marcius, he murmured, "We leave them in our offices. The cleaning staff collects them every night."

The clerk ahead of us heaved a long-suffering sigh and clenched his fingers around his own cup, but I pretended not to notice. Cleaning staff...who serves as cleaning staff in Heaven?

"They're a mix," began Flicker, but his colleague had had enough.

Turning his head just far enough to let us see half of his scowl, he snapped, "Mostly goblins, a handful of star sprites with no aptitude for desk work, the like. Now, if you have no further questions?" Expecting that to silence us, he faced forward again.

I waited until he was looking straight ahead before I answered. I do, actually! I chirped, ignoring Flicker's cringe and Marcius' angry pulse. Why don't you guys talk on the stairs? Don't you get bored?

At that, the clerk whirled, his robes flying out and nearly brushing the woman who was on the same step in the ascending line. That clerk sidestepped, nearly banged into the wall, and gave him a murderous glare. She did not, however, utter a single word or slow her climb. But now every clerk behind her was making sure to glower at us as he or she passed. Ah, passive-aggressiveness at its best.

The clerk ahead of us flushed, his golden glow shading towards a very pretty cherry pink. "We do not, as you call it, 'get bored'," he bit out, stumbling down the next step sideways. "We think about our work and solve problems in our heads as we travel between floors. We are efficient. And you, soul, are disrupting the workday of everyone around you with your incessant chatter."

Oops. Sorry.

"Don't be sorry. Stop talking. Flicker, if you're going to bring souls into the stairwell, make sure they behave."

"Sorry, Wink," apologized Flicker, who was also shining bright pink now.

I had more questions and comments, this time regarding star sprite naming conventions, but I decided they could wait.

Back in the waiting room, Flicker apologized to Marcius, "My lord – I mean, soul, I'll have to wait for your paperwork to arrive before I can process you for reincarnation. Please make yourself comfortable."

Marcius' answer was to float around the room so deliberately that I could almost see his human form pacing with his hands clasped behind his back. He'd done a lot of that after I unveiled the plans for my pagoda. Mostly during council meetings as he tried to rally the other ministers to block me – good luck with that – but sometimes in private in front of Cassius too. The two were, after all, childhood playmates as well as cousins of some sort.

Although, honestly, that last bit wasn't saying much. Human nobility was so inbred that it would be harder to find someone who wasn't related to the emperor. Which then raised the interesting question of how you defined a dynasty. According to Lady Fate, Marcius had been destined to found a new one – but if he came from the same extended family as Cassius, then wasn't it just a continuation of the old one?

"Come on," Flicker ordered, breaking through my memories. "Let's get this over with."

Leaving Marcius to his pacing, I floated into the office and hovered in my usual spot. Everything was as we had left it, with my half-page oyster curriculum vitae positioned in the center of the desk, perfectly lined up with the edges. Flicker picked it up and reread it, even though I'd bet he remembered every word.

So, what am I going to be this time? Not an oyster again, right?

"You know it's against the rules to tell you."

But from now on I'm going to keep my memories when I reincarnate, I wheedled. The rules no longer apply to me.

He didn't quite slam the curriculum vitae back on the desk, but he did replace it with a little more force than was necessary. "One of these days, Piri," he informed me through gritted teeth, "you are going to push your luck too far – " He cut himself off as he remembered that I already had.

Which was why I was still languishing in Green Tier.

Been there, done that, got the bad karma, I shrugged. Soooo, are you going to tell me?

His jaw clenched. "No. You'll find out soon enough. And you'll also find out why we use the Tea of Forgetfulness."

Obviously so souls forgot about karma and Tiers while we were on Earth so we couldn't game the system, I thought, although I didn't say it out loud. Even if the Goddess of Life had approved my memory retention in front of an audience-chamber-ful of witnesses, who knew when another god might decide to meddle with, circumvent, or outright countermand her decision? No reason to give them extra incentive.

"All right. Are you ready for reincarnation?"

Yep.

Oddly, Flicker hesitated, pursed his lips, and seemed like he wanted to say something. Then he shook his head and stabbed his index finger at the air above me. Starlight streamed out of its tip, splitting into hundreds of silvery strands that started tying themselves into flat, square knots with loops around the sides.

Wow! That's so pretty! I didn't know you were an artist, Flicker.

I wasn't even mocking him. The knots resembled those ornaments tied from colored silk cords, except that the starlight was much more delicate. A long strand began to weave in and out of the loops, joining the knots into a lacy square that drifted down towards me.

It's kind of like a waist skirt, isn't it? Except that you can see through it.

Flicker made a noncommittal grunt.

I was still admiring the knotwork when the center of the skirt brushed against my top. As soon as it touched me, it stuck fast. It swooshed around me, knotted its edges together, and started to shrink.

Wait, what's happening? What's going on? I squirmed, straining to push back the strands. Is this normal? Flicker? Flicker!

He was frowning in concentration. "Yes. It's normal."

The strands were cutting into me now. Bits of me bulged out through those pretty loops. It's too tight! Take it off!

"Hold still. It will go faster if you don't fight it."

All of a sudden, the skirt tugged on me from opposite sides, stretching me out longer and longer and thinner and thinner until as much of me was in contact with the strands as possible. No matter how squishy and pliable I was, this was not comfortable.

Hey! It hurts!

The complaint was supposed to be preemptive, to warn him to back off, but even as I spoke, the pain began. At first it felt like claws raking naked skin, hard enough to raise welts but not enough to tear. I twisted and contorted, struggling to break the strands.

Are you sure it's working right – ow! Ow!

The claws had turned into razors, slicing cuts all over me.

Flicker, stop it!

He'd planted his palms on the edge of his desk and was leaning forward, breathing hard. "There's...a reason for...the Tea of Forgetfulness," he forced out.

Forget razors – they were daggers with jagged edges now, dragging back and forth and back and forth as they sawed me to shreds. Clinging to Flicker's voice, I gasped, The Tea – is it – painkiller, or – ow! – makes you forget pain?

His fingers clenched convulsively before he splayed them back out across the desk. "Both. Not...too late...to use it." He started to straighten and raise his arm.

No! I shrieked, before he could dunk me into the vat. No!

"Then stop – fighting – me!"

On the last word, the skirt jerked, yanked, and flew open, ripping me into green wisps that stuck to every inch of every strand.

I screamed – not a musical chime but a high-pitched note that rang around the room and vibrated the walls and bookshelves and papers and Tea of Forgetfulness and went on and on and on until Flicker clamped his hands to his ears and hunched over his desk to shield himself.

"Stop it!" he panted. "You wanted this. Pull yourself together!"

Somehow, the irony of that statement penetrated the pain and the panic, and I stopped screaming long enough to realize that, even torn to pieces, I could still see. Wait, I could still see? There was still a me to see? That was strange. And interesting.

Focusing on my curiosity, I forced myself to calm down. The skirt with all...the pieces of me were suspended over the desk, above Flicker, who had fallen back in his chair.

I considered apologizing. I didn't.

"Last part." Sucking in a deep breath, Flicker pointed at me again.

The skirt flew into motion, scrubbing against itself to scrape me off and roll me around and around like a ball of clay until it mashed all the bits of me back together into a rough clump that it tugged and pulled and stretched....

Compared to this, the pain just now was nothing. Nothing in my thousand years on Earth could compare. For an eternity, I couldn't find the words I needed. At last they came to me, and I howled, Make it stop! I'll take the Tea! I'll take the Tea! Just make it stop!

And, all of a sudden, it did.

I was floating. Floating inside the skirt, which was dissolving into silvery strands that flowed back into Flicker's palms. Floating as a long, green teardrop, trailing whiskers on my jaw and filmy fins on my sides....

Flicker was speaking. I latched onto his voice, struggling to parse his words. "It's done," I thought he was saying. He sounded ragged. "It's done, Piri. Now for the reincarnation itself...."

And then, blessedly, there was darkness.

Silence at last. Blessed silence. The silence of a starless night.

Alone in his office, Flicker massaged his temples, trying to relieve the splitting headache he got every time Piri showed up in his waiting room. True, many souls, especially the low-Tier ones, whined and grumbled and held up the reincarnation process – but none as much as Piri.

He groaned every time her name reappeared on the list of souls he was scheduled to reincarnate. Even though he'd explained the situation over and over to his supervisor, she refused to reduce his workload on those days, which meant that he had to work late to finish processing the souls behind her.

Straightening, he noticed that the cup had a few drops of liquid starlight left at the bottom. Piri would stick out her tongue (if she had a tongue) and lick them dry, came a stray thought. Not him, though. He picked up the cup and tilted it so the last drops ran into his mouth. As they slid down his throat, the headache eased a little.

Well, he comforted himself, she was out of his hair for now. With any luck, for a couple decades this time. Surely possessing her memories and her mind would help her survive longer on Earth. Please, Jade Emperor, let her survive longer this time.

Collecting her documents, he filed them back in their spot on the bookcase, lining them up just so with their neighbors. As he finished, a tap came from the grate behind his desk. He slid it open, and a star child passed him a file with the rune for "fox." Inside was Marcius' curriculum vitae, with a record of his deeds in Heaven as the Star of Scholarly Song. The post he had been granted after accumulating so much positive karma in his previous life by opposing a nine-tailed fox.

Well, Glitter, who oversaw the assignment of mortal forms, had always had a sense of humor.

He only hoped Marcius did too.

A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, BananaBobert, Charlotte, Hookshyu, and Anonymous! And thanks to everyone for reading!

arianedartagnan · Sep 22, 2021

Chapter 7: Catfish

Pain.

Echoes of pain.

The memory of pain.

Slowly, I came back to myself. I was floating in darkness, a bouncy, buoyant sort of darkness. I decided to start by opening my eyes. But they were already open. Huh. Did I have eyelids? I experimented, but the muscles of this body, whatever it was, didn't understand the command "blink." So no, then.

Next question. Where was I?

Tentatively, expecting another explosion of pain any second, I wriggled a little and found myself cocooned inside a cozy, translucent...bubble? Through its walls, I could see countless other bubbles everywhere around me, each containing a silvery, elongated teardrop curled around a large pillow.

All right. Most important question now. What was I?

Something long and skinny, inside an egg that swayed gently, sometimes side to side, sometimes up and down. That meant I was in...water? What creatures had Flicker said were Green Tier options? I couldn't close my eyes, but I could almost hear his voice droning, "Various types of sea creatures, reptiles, and amphibians." Unfortunately, so many of those hatched from translucent eggs laid in water that my current state didn't narrow it down at all. Well, I'd find out soon enough anyway. I could afford to be patient.

And so I waited and rested in my egg, watching the water grow lighter and darker and counting the passing days. Bit by bit, my soul forgot the agony of reincarnation until all that remained was the memory of the memory of pain, and the conviction that it had been worth it to keep my mind. At the same time, the pillow under me was shrinking and my body was growing larger and sprouting fins and tendrils near my mouth. Tendrils...tendrils.... Oh, whiskers! What kinds of fish had whiskers? Try as I might, the only one I could remember was the koi in the palace ponds. Providing visual pleasure was one way to benefit humans, I supposed, although nobles got bored so easily that I couldn't see them deriving sufficient enjoyment to win me much karma. If I were a koi, I'd have to learn some acrobatic tricks.

As I mulled over my options, seven dark-light cycles passed. One minute, I was bobbing up and down in my egg, trying to predict what color pattern I'd have when I grew up. The next, the water was seething with sleek, gleaming forms and I was plunging out to join them.

Swim! Swim!

We were in an underwater cave of some sort, waving our tails weakly and bumping into each other as we learned how to swim. Since fish skills seemed crucial to staying alive long enough to gain karma, I ceded control of my body to my fish brain. For another seven days, I stayed in the cave with my siblings, draining my yolk sac and building muscle strength and coordination.

Time to go! Swim!

My fish brain and my siblings were all saying that it was time to leave the cave. As they swarmed into open water, I trailed behind them, examining my surroundings. The water was a little murky, and the bottom was glittering black sand broken by rocks and water plants. None of them resembled seaweed, so we were probably in a river and not the sea. I had no idea whether my type of fish counted as an "ingeniator oecosystematis" like the oyster, which meant that I couldn't rely on living my life passively. I'd have to be proactive about getting caught by a human. Except...what if I weren't a beautiful koi? What if I'd reincarnated as an ugly fish?

Ugh.

Still, the answer was obvious: Get eaten. Offer up my mortal body on a human's dinner plate so that my soul could ascend.

A dinner plate....

Hungry! So hungry!

By now, my siblings and I had depleted our yolk sacs. We needed food – external food – now. A tiny, near-transparent bug floated by. On instinct, my head snapped around and I gulped it down. Mmmmm, tasty. All around me, my siblings were doing the same, snatching as many of the bugs as they could.

Hey! I yelled. Don't eat them all!

But of course none of them could understand me.

I dove into the fray, barreling into the others and slapping them away with my tail. They gave as good as they got, knocking me to and fro and churning the water until all the bugs were gone. Then one fish swung towards another and, instead of knocking it aside, tore a chunk out of its side. As I watched, horrified, the baby fish all dove at their injured sibling and devoured it to the bone. Only when its last shreds, too tiny to be worth chasing, were drifting to the bottom of the river did they resume their swim.

I watched them go, debating whether I'd be safer in a school or on my own. What was more likely to kill me: some unknown predator – or my own flesh and blood?

A wave crashed into me, tumbling me head over tail. When I'd righted myself and regained control of my fins, I screamed. Aaaaah!

A mountain had just erupted from the riverbed. It was muddy brown and had whiskers as long as a fishing boat. Slowly, it revolved until it could examine me out of one glassy eye the size of a shield.

I flinched back, trembling all over.

The monster opened its jaws in a silent laugh that revealed two rows of pointy white teeth. "What's the matter, little sibling?" it mocked. "Never knew you could grow so big?"

It could talk! Should I answer? I hesitated, wondering whether it was more likely to give me survival tips – or eat me itself. Without my realizing it, one of my fins had started to flap. An urgent, rhythmic clicking filled the water, and at the sound, my siblings jerked, panicked, and fled. My fish brain kicked in and sent me streaking after them.

As we zipped downstream, the monster called, "Come back and visit again sometime, little sibling."

Once we were a safe distance away, I edged to the outside of the school so I only had to monitor my cannibal siblings out of one eye. Then I returned to the karma problem. The most direct way to benefit humans as a fish, I decided, was to get eaten. Preferably by a starving peasant family. So then the crucial question was: Was I edible? How could I find out, short of swimming into a net, getting cooked, and either poisoning the humans or not? There had to be a better way.

Overhead, a dark form blocked the light, and I dove on instinct. Just in time too, because a giant, scissor-like beak stabbed through the surface of the water, snatched a mouthful of my siblings, and vanished again.

Forget identifying the maximally efficient way to gain karma! Staying alive long enough to gain any kind of karma was the challenge!

Giving up on long-term plans for now, I drifted back in my head and let my fish brain take over. Over the next period – of months? Years? I lost track of the days – my surviving siblings and I grew bigger and stronger. Little by little, our bodies widened and our backs darkened while our bellies stayed pale. The wispy tendrils thickened into long whiskers that trailed along the sides of our mouths.

One day, my Piri-self glanced out of my fish eyes and realized that I'd seen this kind of fish before. I'd eaten this kind of fish before. I was a catfish!

Naturally, such a common fish hadn't been nearly fancy enough to serve in the palace, but I'd eaten them earlier in my life as a fox. Mostly as leftovers that people tossed out their backdoors, but occasionally I'd run up to a fisherman's haul, snatched a fresh, flopping fish, and sprinted away with it. At the time, it had made a tremendous amount of sense – why bother catching dinner myself when someone else had already done it for me? But now that I knew how the karma system worked, I wanted to smack myself.

Oh wait, I could. I whacked my side with a fin, sending a click through the water and startling a pair of shrimp spirits on patrol. They tapped their legs, danced in place, and then sheepishly marched on. I ignored them.

As a catfish, what could I do to help humans?

Same answer as before: Get eaten.

Good. Okay. Fine. I could do that...or could I? The problem was that I had no idea which river I was in, or where the nearest village was – or even how to tell when I was swimming past a village.

Well, humans who lived near water tended to rely on fishing for their livelihoods, right? Although I hadn't interacted with them for centuries now, I assumed that modern-day Sericans still ate fish. Or, if they didn't, they might catch us for sport. Taking over my body from my fish brain, I started hunting for anything that resembled a fishhook or a net.

All of a sudden, a long, dark shape glided overhead, blocking the light. Shark! was my first thought. I dove for the riverbed – only to remember that I wasn't in the ocean and that while certain rivers did have sharks, I hadn't seen a single one here yet. So that dark shape was mostly likely a boat. A fishing boat, dared I hope...? Overriding my fish instincts, I swam back up as fast as I could and chased the shadow. I was so busy scanning the water for fishhooks that I never saw the net.

Rough ropes pressed against my sides and lifted me up. As they hauled me out of the water, I started to gasp and choke. Can't breathe! Can't breathe!

My fish brain panicked, thrashing my body in a wild attempt to escape.

It's okay, it's okay, panted my Piri-self, straining to suppress the fish brain before I flopped back into the water. This is what I want.

And indeed, as the net sailed through the air and dumped me onto something hard – Ow ow ow! – a blurry figure loomed overhead, raising a club.

My body convulsed. I felt it leap up and land, leap up and land, over and over, and I fought to hold it still. Dinner! Dinner! I chanted. I'll be dinner.

The club came down.

"That was an...interesting approach," commented Flicker, tapping a finger against my curriculum vitae.

I was back in his office in the Bureau of Reincarnation, conducting our usual post-mortem of my latest life. The stamp at the top of my document still read "Green." It was the first thing I'd checked.

"You swam straight into a fishing net so you could earn positive karma for providing nutrients to humans."

Did it work? Did it work? I bounced up and down.

He fixed me with a disapproving glare but admitted, "Yes. Unfortunately. Karma is awarded based on results, not intent. You're drawing the wrong lessons from the system, Piri. It's meant to help you improve and become a better person."

I am improving and becoming a better person. I sacrificed myself to feed a poor fisherman and his family. Would the Piri you knew before have done something that selfless?

He was too proper to snort. "About that. Next time, you might want to wait until you're bigger before you fling yourself into the net. You were too small to provide much in the way of sustenance. No one would buy you. The fisherman had to throw you in with a larger fish as part of a bargain."

I was stung. I was part of a bargain?

"Yes. Standard marketplace haggling technique. Customer wants lower price, seller resists lowering the price but throws in a bonus. In this case, you were the bonus."

I find that deeply offensive.

"Live with it. And I mean that, in fact. You're going to be a catfish again next life."

Really?

I was excited about getting a second try in the same form. This time, I could cut down the amount of time I'd wasted on figuring out what I was. This time, I'd keep careful track of the passage of days so I'd know exactly how old I was and when the optimum time to find a fishing boat was...except that I had no idea how fast catfish grew.

Hey, Flicker, how fast do catfish grow?

"I have no idea. I don't work in the Bureau of Academia."

Does it have a library? Can you look it up? Can you send a runner to look it up?

"Piri, do you think I have time? You've already taken up your appointment slot and the one after yours – and I haven't even started reincarnating you."

Oh. Sorry, I apologized automatically while wondering if I could convince him to look up the data before my next life. Assuming, of course, that the Bureau would reincarnate me as a catfish three times in a row. Maybe I should pretend that I hated being one.

"Now...." Flicker hesitated, looking between me and the Tea of Forgetfulness. "Did you want to use the Tea?" he asked, a note of hope in his voice.

My answer was immediate. No.

His jaw tightened. "Then don't fight me this time."

I won't, I promised. Last time, you caught me off guard. This time I'm prepared. I know what I'm getting into.

He just sighed.

It was true – I did know what to expect, from the starlight that shot from his fingertip, to the lacy skirt that wrapped around me, to the rending and the reshaping. I expected every last second of it.

But even so, it still went exactly as it had last time.

A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, BananaBobert, Charlotte, Hookshyu, and Anonymous! And thanks to everyone for reading!

The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox

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