Down below, Jan saw many humans making the trek up to the temple, and he asked Galatea, "Are you allowing them to come up?"

Galatea nodded. "Of course. They deserve to pray. But don't worry, we will hide them from you, and tell them you made your way back up to Paradise, unless you would like to offer them your blessings."

Jan swallowed. "I would prefer you tell them that, yes."

Galatea nodded. "Then we will. We are compelled to still offer them access to the goddess though."

"Wait… Are you saying I can contact my ma through prayer?" Jan said excitedly. 

"You may. But the goddess does not listen to all prayers, and grants even fewer. We will let you pray to her after our guest is done." Galatea said. "Since she is your mother, I'm sure she will hear you."

Jan grinned, elated that he might go home soon enough. 

Galatea showed him the master bedroom, a large space with a big bed, and little else. He realized that Galatea and her husband were people of few wants and needs. But he heard grunting in the room, and Galatea opened the door to a spacious closeted area where her husband was practicing swordplay. 

He saw them and inclined his head slightly, sheathing his sword. "It is good to meet you, My Lord. My name is Shiske. I am the priest of this temple, and you have already met my wife, Galatea."

Jan nodded slowly. "I have… and I must ask you, what is a priest, and why does a priest have such amazing swordplay?"

"A priest is someone who facilitates worship of a god. As for how I learned swordplay… the god of war taught me." Shiske explained.

Jan sat cross-legged on Galatea's hand. "The god of war..?" that sounded so familiar, but he couldn’t think of why. It reminded him of his twin, Kaz, but he seemed to have a huge blindspot in his memory after Kaz had defeated him in battle. 

“Yes. His name was Raksja. He was tired of living amongst the gods, and came down here to live with the humans for a time instead. That’s when I bumped into him. I was fighting in a war against the elves who were encroaching on human territory, and I found him, standing in the battlefield between our armies. Everyone was shocked to have seen a god on the battlefield. Both armies paused for a long time, but the elves began launching arrows at the god. I charged onto the battlefield, not knowing if this god was on our side or theirs, but if he was on ours, I wanted him to be safe.” Shiske explained. 

“Do gods often participate in wars like that?” Jan asked.

“Sometimes, yes. Most of the time, they only send resources or words of encouragement. They rarely come down in person to aid us in wars. At any rate, I dashed onto the battlefield to help him, and he was pierced by a dozen arrows at once. I’m not sure how I evaded all of the arrows, but I did. I think the goddess of love was aiding me. I got to his side, and he had already fallen down. He wasn’t bleeding, as gods don’t bleed, but he seemed paralyzed. The rest of the army had followed bheind me and quickly overtook me, protecting me as I hauled the god to safety. He seemed to snap out of his paralyzation once he had a minute or two to rest. Once he did, he hopped to his feet and introduced himself, saying he was the son of the god of light and the goddess of hunting. Those two are neutral gods, and I was terrified he would smite everyone, since he was supposed to not take sides. But then, he thanked me for rescuing him and told me he would train me up in the art of war as thanks for helping him.” Shiske said. 

Jan was highly confused by all of this, and his mind tried to regulate the information in a way that made sense so he could ask appropriate questions. “A neutral god?”

“Yes. The god of light, the maker of the rest of the gods, and the goddess of hunting, are both neutral, meaning they do not interfere in mortal affairs. It was because of this that they eventually had to come back down to earth to get their son…” Shiske trailed off, and then turned away. 

“What happened to him?” Jan asked, swallowing audibly. 

“He died. His parents ended up having to kill him. You see… the longer a god spends on earth, the more of his mind he loses. I kept him under control for as long as I could, but…” Shiske’s eyes were shiny with tears, and he wiped them away. “Well, it doesn’t matter. He trained me well, and I use his training to honor our patron goddess, who he happened to worship as well.”

Jan was shaking with terror. “Do demigods go mad the longer they are on earth, too?” 

Shiske shrugged. “I am unsure. But since your mother is the goddess of love, I am sure she will come for you soon. And we will try to contact her through prayer later on. In the meantime, would you like to help me with the gardening?” 

Jan’s immediate instinct was to say no, but because his human wards were being hospitable, he reluctantly agreed. Shiske led the way to the back of the building, where an open door revealed a large swathe of green land spreading out for miles in front of him. There was fields of corn, tomatoes, potatoes, and many others. Jan gulped, unsure how he was supposed to help with all this. 

Shiske cleared his throat. “I know there is a lot, but Galatea tells me you have powers to control clothes and fabric? I assume you can use that to help us.” 

Jan pursed his lips, not liking the sound of it. Galatea added, “I’m sure he can, darling. He’s so strong! A god worthy of his mother.” 

He remembered his mother having him clean his castle before he was thrown into that awful fight with his twin, and his chin wobbled. He burst into tears, knowing he had failed his mother. The only thing she had ever asked was for him to clean, and he never did it.

“I’ll never see her again, and I disappointed her so much…” he said aloud. 

Shiske cleared his throat, and lowered his rice hat, not knowing what to say. Galatea’s face creased into a frown of compassion. “It’s not too late. You can still impress you, and I’m sure you’ll see her again. Why don’t you show her how grown up you are, and help us harvest some of these?”

Jan sobbed and wailed until he ran out of tears and his eyes and nose hurt from crying. He had a few more sobs, and hasty breaths, and then he calmed down. He said, “I’ll try to help.” 

Galatea placed Jan on the ground, and bright out old clothes she stopped wearing for him to use to harvest the crops. She and her husband went by the crops and began pulling them up by hand. He saw that Galatea’s hands were quite red and raw, and was impressed by how often she probably did this hard labor. 

If she can do it, I can. Jan thought to himself. He raised his arms and the pile of clothes Galatea had placed next to him floated into the air. They fluttered in the breeze and Jan disassembled them until most of them were in threads, which he then used to pull up tomatoes. Jan wrapped the threads around the stems of the tomatoes holding them in place, and then used one of the shirts he hadn't disassembled to catch the tomatoes. He easily harvested twenty tomatoes using this method, but began sweating with exertion, despite the cool weather. He looked over at Galatea, and saw that she was still relentlessly harvesting potatoes. Not wanting to lose to her, he sped up his pace, but his arms began to hurt from having to lift them consistently. He managed to finish harvesting the tamtoes (no small feat), and then collapsed on his back, his chest heaving. 

Galatea stood over him, holding a basket of potatoes. She said, “I’ll get some water for you."

Jan looked up at the sky. The sun, previously hidden by clouds and a murky, gray sky, was peering out. Jan felt his breathing evening out as he gazed at the sky. The sun blazed down at him, and the imagery of it bursting forth from the clouds soothed him. 

Galatea reappeared and blocked his view of the sun. She brought with her a little thimble filled with water, and kneeled to hand it to him. He sat up and took the thimble from her. It was very heavy, and he nearly fell over, he held it up–the water nearly spilling out–and gently tilted it toward him. 

Galatea rubbed her chin. “I think I will have to make you a lot of things your size…” 

Jan glared at her. “You think? This world is too big and too mean to small-sized people..."