What happened to deities above, and so too frequently happened, only reinforced Ljóseoree’s reputation for neutrality. No god, however mighty, held greater legal weight than any other creature within the city’s walls. For the vigilantes of Ljóseoree, an amber eye marked deceit, a forehead sigil marked fraud, and the presence of both could only mean a seasoned charlatan.Their pleas, no matter how divine or desperate, only confirmed suspicions.
To avoid being mistaken for imposters, celestial officials wear enchanted pendants —each bearing a deity's official seal.
Still, for all the indignities, the gods refrained from declaring war on Ljóseoree. Some held out hope that, in time, public opinion might shift. Others simply couldn’t be bothered—especially given the bureaucratic labyrinth now required to initiate warfare. According to the divine laws still recognized by the city, both parties must first acknowledge the “possibility of war.” Several divine messengers dispatched to broach the matter were immediately imprisoned for twenty mortal years, charged under an ancient decree—ironically issued by the gods themselves centuries prior—stating that anyone within the city claiming divine status was to be treated as suspicious by default.
This, at least, was the explanation most agreeable to mortal minds about what constituted genuine divinity. It passed from tongue to tongue, generation to generation. The gods changed faces, names, and heavens mattered little.
The vigilantes—mostly unpaid and largely composed of retired men, women, some former library-imps full of detective fantasies and a handful of weather-worn gargoyles—had committed this ancient decree to memory. All shared a fondness for gossip and a remarkable surplus of time.
They first crossed paths at a gathering meant for those newly retired, seeking fresh purpose in their twilight years. This took place in a modest hall, where the gargoyles, once perched high, now stood sentinel over the idle chatter and quiet companionship within.
Over the years, amid the comfort of tea and biscuits, they devised an endless array of clever tricks and schemes aimed at exposing false gods, often with great ceremony and no small amount of personal satisfaction. Though a few had been firmly corrected by genuine deities, the senior governors of Ljóseoree made no effort to rein them in. On paper, the group was labeled a “civil integrity corps,” and as long as their actions could be loosely interpreted as a public initiative, no one in office dared question them.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
However, this did not discourage celestial activity and duties in the city. There existed, tucked away in one of Ljóseoree’s more forgettable lanes, a passage so obscure that even the city’s most fastidious cartographers left it conveniently unmarked—a modest office maintained by the gods. Modest not in purpose but in appearance. The building itself was a squat block of weathered concrete, its wooden doors and windows worn thin and splintered by time and neglect.
No property dealer in Ljóseoree would willingly handle a lease involving divine tenancy, of course. But the gods required no signature nor stamp—only the proper pendant, which granted its bearer quiet passage through the otherwise unyielding threshold.
Rumour had it that a daring rogue once forged a pendant and slipped inside, expecting heavenly riches, only to find nothing but overstuffed filing cabinets and unfinished forms.
Another whisper, equally persistent, claimed that no pendant was needed at all –anyone can waltz through the doors unchallenged. For the divine officials within were said to be locked in the performance of an especially strenuous kind of nothing: the sort that required full days and half the night to complete, and was never, in any measurable sense, done.
In any case, the modest little office soon faded from public memory. As anything with a heartbeat was preoccupied with its own troubles. And if not with worries, then with the ever-churning mill of local gossip—gossip about peculiar neighbours, secret affairs, or petty scandals. Some even lived their entire lives for the fleeting hope of being talked about. Most of them, of course, died without being remembered at all.
And as the history of deities and Ljóseoree was recounted till now, it was merely a pause to observe how long the beggarly scholar took to scrutinize his eye colors.
"Not bad" , his face nearly pressed against the mirror mirror, oblivious to the few thin strands of hair clinging to his cheek.
With a final glance at his reflection, he turned and headed out of the washroom.
