CHAPTER SIX
HIDDEN SECRETS OF ELIAS' DIARY
DEEP within the heart of a fiery volcano- or, Mount Flaemindoom, for those of you who are hell-bent on using proper-nouns- Elias, the God of Fire sat on his brimstone throne. Or didn't sit, as the great God of Fire was far too evil, badass and omnipotent to merely sit on his throne. Sitting was for mere mortals. His posture was straight and strong as he held his head up high, gazing across the room with a sense of importance and might. He rapped his fingers on the armrest, tapping, as he tried to enforce an intimidating aura over the room. Not that there was anyone in the room for him to intimidate- just Dragon.
"Master, why are you looking around the room like that?" Dragon asked, while using a scaly foot to scratch his ear.
"Because," said Elias, sighing, "I am trying to give the readers the impression that I am a really-evil god, who is not only determined to destroy the world, but also to instill fear, and, while I am at it, make his name known as the bringer of all chaos to the masses. Soon, I will get up, find some skulls in my supply-cupboard to dramatically smash under my feet and kick into lava, before finding a suitable-sized village to burn and wreak havoc upon."
"Readers?" Dragon asked, confused. "What readers?"
"Nevermind."
"Okay." Dragon decided that life would probably be a lot easier if he just wrote Elias off as crazy. What else did he say? Something about burning down villages? Dragon's eyes lit up like the sun. "Can I help?"
"No," said Elias as he leaped down from his overly-high throne.
"Why not?" Dragon pouted at him.
"I said no."
"But I'm a dragon. I'm good at burning and destroying villages." Dragon gave him his best puppy-dog face, while Elias grabbed his red sword from its stand.
"Other dragons, that might be their forte. But you. No." Elias scoffed at Dragon's pathetic look.
Dragon lowered his head, feeling hurt. "Then what can I do, ma-master?" He almost burst into tears at the end. Why was Elias so mean to him! He didn't do anything to deserve this. Why wasn't he useful to him?
"You can go clean up my office," ordered Elias, while looking through a cupboard for some skulls. He found a troll's skull and figured it would suffice for now.
"But I'm a dragon," sniffed Dragon.
"You said that before." Elias' voice was thick and monotone with boredom.
"I have claws, and talons. I sneeze up fire," Dragon explained, "I'm no good at cleaning."
"All my stuff is fire-proof," said Elias, kicking the last shards of troll-skull into a lava-pit. "I don't care about your claws and stuff. Go clean. I'll be back in a few hours. If you haven't cleaned that office..."
"Yes, master." Dragon slumped his figure and dragged his tail all the way to Elias' office, where he slammed the door behind him. He didn't understand why Elias always made an effort to be so unkind to him. There was nothing wrong with him. He was a dragon. Maybe a little bit frightened of swords and arrows, but that was understandable, right? They were sharp and pointy, after all.
Looking around, Dragon could see that Elias' office was a total mess. A brimstone desk accompanied by a matching stool lay in the centre of the room, but this could barely be seen under the hordes of papers, scrolls and thick leather-tomes, which took up most of the space. Wild tablets and ink-pots had made a roost in the room's corners, while a herd of dusty-books patrolled a bookshelf to his left. Dragon didn't know where to begin. Actually, Dragon didn't even know if it was logically possible to clean such a place. He could sort the scrolls into the drawers, but they looked like they would just leap back out as soon as his back was turned. Oh well. He had to try, right?
Dragon reached for a scroll on the far end of the desk, but in the process accidentally knocked a tome off the shelf with his wing. It fell on the floor, and the cover sighed as it flipped open, landing on a yellowed page with thin, slanted handwriting. Dragon picked up the book, seeing the heading at the top of the page. 'One-Hundred and Eighty-First Entry'.
Confused, he kept a talon on the page while flipping it semi-closed to read the cover. Dragon gasped. "Diary of Elias?" He quickly looked behind him to check that Elias wasn't watching. He probably shouldn't read it. Master might get really mad at him...
He flipped back to the page, the words distracting him.
One-Hundred and Eighty-First Entry
I haven't been able to write in this or do anything actually, for a long time. Just finished a thousand-years of meditation - but it wasn't on purpose. Who would be lame-enough to meditate for a thousand-freaking-years? It was a curse, placed on both me and Menkalinan, after our latest prank.
The God of Meditation was being incredibly boring and lame, more so than usual. Given his name, he likes to meditate a lot. But this loser had been meditating for over ten-thousand-years straight! I know: lame as. But during the dark of the night (because Menkalinan refuses to do anything at any other time), Menkalinan and I hatched a plan- to trick him into stopping his meditation.
We planned a hilarious joke for him. See, this fool had been floating there in the air with his arms out and his legs crossed for so long, he must be feeling lonely. I mean, when was the last time this loser had lain with a woman? I know- probably never. So that is exactly what Menkalinan and I figured he needed - a woman.
We were gonna hire some of those succubi, or maybe grab a virgin-maiden from a mortal-village, but Menkalinan argued that if we did that it might backfire on us, as the God of Meditation might end up enjoying himself. That couldn't happen. We needed to trick him into stopping his meditation because he thought he was going to 'get some', but then after he had stopped, have him realize that he had been tricked- so we could laugh at him behind some bushes while he got really mad.
So Menkalinan had the brilliant idea of disguising himself as a maiden, to entice the God of Meditation that way. I wondered how we were gonna get that to work. I mean - no offense - but he looked about as far from feminine as you could get. Even his hair would be a problem, because even though it probably reached his ears- when down, it was never down; it never did anything but stick straight up and to the side.
But then Menkalinan did some of his shadow-control magic-stuff and morphed into a woman - granted, a woman that looked pretty Menkalinan-ish, with the black hair (at least it was long and flowed downwards, though) black eyes and white skin. But a woman nonetheless. He (she?) even had huge melons and everything. Menkalinan even called himself 'Menka', as he said it was a more feminine- and not-quite-as-obvious- version of his name. That was when I knew our plan was gonna work.
In retrospect, it did work. It worked well. That was the issue. It worked waaaaay too well. All 'Menka' had to do was pronounce her name as Menka and dance around the God of Meditation a few times in tight black-leather. Then the God of Meditation came down from his floating and stood up, obviously interested in this 'new arrival'. 'Menka' played along at first, going along with him, but it only took a minute or so for the excited bugger to ask her if she wanted to 'play with him'. 'Menka' freaked-out and turned back into Menkalinan, the God of Shadows, saying how 'it was a joke' and he 'most definitely wasn't interested in any of that kind of funny business'.
Oh man, the God of Meditation was pissed. To be honest, I'm not sure if that guy was mad because his meditation had been interrupted, or because we had gotten him 'excited' over nothing. At that point I stepped out from behind the rock I was watching from and laughed at him with Menkalinan, which certainly didn't help matters. Furious, he started ranting on, saying, 'how would we feel if he interrupted us doing something important', but I didn't listen or care, because it was boring. But then I did care, when he cursed me and Menkalinan both to a thousand-years of solid meditating, saying that it would teach us some respect.
Whatever. It didn't teach me any respect. That guy is still a loser, and meditating is still the dumbest thing ever. However, I think it did something weird to Menkalinan. Not only does he find the whole instance- including the meditating bit- hilarious, he has also started demanding that I call him 'Menka' when he isn't on official god-business. I don't see why. It's a woman's name, and a reminder of a failed joke. I refused, called him lame, and he walked off in a huff, saying I was the 'lame, humourless one'. He will be back in the morning, though. Menkalinan never holds a grudge for too long.
DRAGON, having reached the end of that entry, quickly closed the diary and placed it back on the shelf where it had come from. He felt guilty. It was interesting, though. Elias talked about hating Menkalinan or 'Menka' so much, so it was surprising that they used to be friends. He dwelled on what he had read as he set to work tidying the office, the job taking him until early in the morning.
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