Debris ricocheted across the terrain, tearing through abandoned buildings or blasting upwards into the atmosphere, followed by clouds of choking ash. The city had been derelict for decades, a vast, ancient expanse that had once been a Temthan paradise, only to be consumed by dust storms and floods. Arkadin had originally planned to have this former glory be slowly condemned to death, but right now, the Lord of Decay was not feeling well and desperately wanted something to distract himself with. The demolition of this old city would have to do.
A second building exploded violently, collapsing in on itself, smothering the surrounding area with puffs of dirty grey mud and smoke. Arkadin cared little about how important this place was. While the city was a former proud gem in the Temthan empire, it had been fueled by slavery and drug feuds, controlled by cartels and traffickers. Really, Arkadin should have brought this place down centuries ago.
As a third building shattered, a voice echoed across the city ruins, marveling at Arkadin’s destruction.
“That was a good one!”
Arkadin stopped what he was doing and turned to the smaller, already demolished buildings, clearing up the rubble.
“Go away, Kinisis.”
It was rare to see the Allmaker Herself outside of the hidden realm of Kinigi. In fact, she wasn’t actually there at all, as Arkadin realized when he saw debris bouncing through her elegant, female form.
Kinisis vanished in a whimsical pink puff of smoke and reappeared, miniaturized, on Arkadin’s left shoulder, perching contently on a piece of armour. Now that she was up close and personal with her youngest kid, Kinisis could see that, underneath his thick chitin plating, Arkadin still looked a lot like her. All her children did, they were all gem-scaled beings, but the Thantophor had always tried to hide his relationship with the Allmaker.
“You alright, kiddo?”
“No. I’m busy.”
Kinisis tutted, surveying the landscape. “You’re not busy.”
“I am. I am busy distracting myself because you’re putting thoughts of drastic change in my head!”
The Allmaker blinked, then hovered up in front of Arkadin’s field of view. “Uh, I’m not doing anything to you. I’ve been rather hands-off with you for a while. Have you been doing as I asked of you?”
“I have! I made my bed every day, I go for my walks, I am trying!” Arkadin sneered as he angrily crossed his arms. “There are horrible desires in my head.”
“Do you want to talk about them?”
“I… I do.”
Kinisis perched back on Arkadin’s shoulder. “Well, go on then. I can sit here and listen while you talk and destroy this city. What are the desires in your head?”
“Well…” Arkadin hesitated as he landed down on a pile of rubble and started waving a hand around, flattening the rubble down. “There’s… like, three or four main desires. The big one is the one that makes me want to just go to sleep all the time. I like sleeping in a nice, warm bed and I don’t like waking up in the morning. That’s the hardest, getting out of bed. And then there’s the desire to just ditch everything and give up and wander off and be on my own, but that’s unrealistic because there are things I need to do and other beings are relying on me and my work. The loneliness is honestly not that bad at all, I can deal with that, but sometimes I get horrible sexual desires and have to fight the temptation of downloading a Skyan dating app and finding someone desperate enough to lie with me. But at the same damn time, I’m actually kinda terrified of that sort of thing because it’s dirty and icky and messy. So I consider going out and making friends. But things like making friends requires that I step out of my comfort zone, which is hard as heck for me to actually do.”
The Allmaker remained silent, listening intently to Arkadin’s ramblings. Once Arkadin has stopped, she remained silent for a bit longer, before finally speaking.
“Those are all pretty normal thoughts, Arkadin.”
“They are?”
“Yeah. They’re rather mortal-ish thoughts, but they’re normal. Thinking about work and love and stress and all that, they’re normal things. It’s what you do about them that makes you abnormal. You… haven’t murdered anyone you shouldn’t have, have you?”
Arkadin shook his head. “No. I’ve been good. I’ve been eating too much, but I’m trying.”
“Then just keep on trying!” Kinisis smiled. “You are doing well so far!”
“But what about the burning desire to, uh, burn everything and start again?”
Kinisis shrugged. “Do you mean that literally or metaphorically?”
“Both.”
“Well…” Kinisis shrugged once more, before patting Arkadini gently on the head. “Try to hold off on that thought for now. There’s better things that need doing…”
“I know…”
Kinisis paused again, then turned to the desolate city. “You want to blow more things up?”
“Yeah, definitely!” Arkadin smiled a little, feeling a bit better. “Blowing stuff up is ALWAYS fun!”