Dahoqu

Now he's acting pretty creepy in my eyes. I don't have any other choice in this situation, and he knows that, but even I know that this is what he wanted; then there are no choices for me.

Toki sighed out before clearing his mind, his grey eyes opening and closing slowly before looking towards Dahoqu, who was waiting for a reply. He wasn't even trying to hide anything anymore; it didn't matter after all if he knew.

“Tell me what you want then,” he replied.

Dahoqu takes steps away from the group towards the edges of the elevated platform that Ayuri made, dismissing his teammates who didn't even bother looking towards him. Following close by him, they make their way to a secluded corner of the platform away from everyone else.

To no surprise, Shina was listening in closely while Ayuri had her stick ready for anything suspicious. They wanted the best, but it doesn't matter when just a little hourglass flipping means a reset of the entire conversation for them anyway.

“What do you know about Falsity?” Dahoqu asked.

Toki raised his eyebrow before thinking about her and how to reply, “She's tricky, manipulative and definitely has ulterior motives for all of us.”

“Do you know about her banishment? I'm assuming she never told you that much.” Dahoqu didn't change his expression; he was impossible to read after all this time still.

How does a deity like Falsity manage to get banished? Is he trying to trick me, or perhaps bait me into something?

Toki shook his head despite questions concerning where he had the information from and why he would even tell him about such a detail.

“She tried to take control of the god games one time.”

“Is there someone overlooking god games?” Toki lacked the knowledge that Dahoqu had, the knowledge which is starting to get on his curious side.

Dahoqu shook his head. "Let's say a world. Where all deities that participate in this game gather and live, including your goddess, and I'm part of that.”

“What did she do? I doubt many people could actually beat, let alone banish, a goddess like Falsity.” He knew that Falsity wasn’t a pushover; the idea of her getting banished is quite unlikely in his view, especially hearing it from Dahoqu.

Before he replied, he flipped the hourglass again, resetting time backwards. Shina was listening in on the conversation, and Ayuri was going back to their orb watching while they both walked back towards the corner, the only ones aware of what was happening.

“She and her division tried to kill the deity, the one in charge of god games currently, the one assigned to keep over this world that you got transported to.” His words were like poison; they made no sense, yet Toki could definitely see something like that happening due to Falsity’s nature.

"So then she didn't manage to do it; she got banished and somehow returned. Now, exactly why and how is someone like you talking to a mortal about this?”

Dahoqu didn't reply at all; he just waited for the perfect moment as Toki blinked to show him the truth. His face, once plain and human, turned into a faceless entity; a pure grey colour took his face, where there were no eyes or facial features except the general shape of his head.

“What even are you?” Toki tightened his grip on the spear. Having someone reveal themselves as a grey, faceless being wasn’t something he was too used to.

Dahoqu replied to his inquiry, “I am part of the management team, like I said before, under the deity's right-hand man; you could call it that in your terms. Seeing Silas as a new and smart deity, we used him to get access to god games; it was logical to make a spy within."

This is getting more complicated by the second, but I'm in a world where deities watch down at us for entertainment, so what can I say?

Toki is trying to wrap his head around the facts. Dahoqu started blankly with his eerie, faceless head towards him, giving him a moment to take it in before continuing.

"I'm sent here to get rid of your group and prevent you from winning. Not against you but against falsity. I understand as a mortal you must be confused at our inner conflict, but the reason you need to know this is because of your unique nature.”

He also knows about my lack of magic? That's definitely something I should ask about.

Toki is reminiscent of the two contracts he made with Falsity, the first being to get rid of any magic potential he has forever and the other being to limit his emotions until the end of the god games and to keep Ayuri safe. His mind zones in on that both had that pillar-shaped symbol with a star and twirls around it; his memory wasn’t failing him despite it being a couple of days.

“Explain to me how those contracts can override everything and the other powers I encountered and how it makes me needed by you.” Toki gave a grim face towards Dahoqu before seeing him flip the hourglass again, resetting their position once more.

They realign back before continuing again. The fight against Silas and Falsity seems to never end, as the conclusion is unsatisfactory towards Dahoqu.

“To answer that, I need you to understand the symbol, the idea that surpasses mine and all the deities' power in a sense.”

Toki nodded.

“Our presence comes from your real world, which is why you could tell that deities are made out of things that already exist from your world, like falsity, love or science.”

That explains the mechanics behind why it works, but it doesn't explain where it originates from entirely, even if it's from my world.

“The contract she did is something rivalling the deity of the god game world due to another deity of that same power, which in turn created your predicament.”