Chapter Text
No one had contacted the watchers in hundreds of years. It was a banned practice almost across the entire land they ruled. When the Dog Dynasty rose to power, they outlawed the practice of contacting the watchers, making it illegal to worship them at all.
The imperial family called it blasphemous for only they had the right to connect with gods. No singular person should have the right to hold the presence with a watcher.
Many tried to keep the common practice alive.
All who did were burned at the stake.
The watchers were not pleased with this development.
They never have been.
As the belief in them dwindled, the disasters rose. The natural disasters caused by an unhappy watcher. The third watcher; the watcher of man, to be exact.
The third watcher took the development the worst. He would cause storms that tore through the sky, he would burn and boil the earth until he got what he wanted. He wanted to hear their praise, directly. The watcher of man wouldn’t stand for the neglect he felt from his own people.
It made sense for him to take it so poorly, because at some point in time, he was too a mere mortal, but his rise to godhood is another story.
The mortal realm was his home much more than the heavenly court would ever be. Maybe that’s why he was selected for the mission.
Maybe it was the fact that his fellow watchers knew that deep down he longed for home.
Or maybe it was all the disasters he caused.
Maybe it was the amount of subjects he struck with lightning when they would challenge the watchers.
Maybe it was the chaos he released upon the land uncontested for his years of reigning over the earth.
Maybe he was never fit to go back to earth, and the “he missed his home” was merely a justification that the watchers used to justify them sending him back to earth.
Whatever the reason was, the other watchers were through with the third watcher’s behavior.
“Excuse me!?” the watcher of man demanded.
The first watcher, the watcher of reality met his energy.
“You’re going to earth, we aren’t going to negotiate this.”
“I’m sorry! But you can’t just—!”
“We can. You’ve devastated the land since the dog dynasty has come into power.”
“So you’re stripping me of my titles?! I have been at your service for my entire mortal life! You even said it yourself! This was your gift!”
The second watcher, the watcher of earth tried their best to reassure the watcher of man.
“We’re not stripping you of any title.”
The former mortal backed away.
“No! I might’ve been born below you, but I have worked for my ranks! If you didn’t want my input, you shouldn’t have made me your equal!”
The watcher of reality snapped.
“ SILENCE!”
Without warning, the world around the third watcher turned to white, sending him into a disoriented panic. His soul was whisked up, and back down again. When the white mist had cleared, he was still above in the heavens. He frantically looked between his other two watchers. He stayed silent, panting, gazing between both of the celestial figures that he had called his accolades for hundreds of years.
He blinked.
He waited for further admonishment.
He waited for more demands.
He waited.
He waited until he noticed the massive weight taken off of his back.
His back truly never felt that light before.
The third watcher looked behind him and the once mighty wings that defined his silhouette were gone. His wings were the only things that connected them to his mortal life. Not even the bitterest of men would’ve taken them, for they knew what those wings represented for him. Those wings are a part of him! They were a part of him.
After a mortal and immortal life of service, they took away his most important possession.
He wanted to scream, to shout, and resist.
But he couldn’t, for he couldn’t find it in him, not this time.
“What… what did you do?”
His voice was higher than it usually was, but at the same time it was deep in stunned shock, horror, he was met with silence.
That’s when the dread began to well up inside of him.
“What did you do!?” he yelled, more desperate than angry.
“You seem to have forgotten your wings were a gift from us, we reserve the right to take them if we think you’ve forfeited your right to have them.”
“What?! What do you mean?! I’ve spent my whole mortal and immortal life at your service! You can’t do this to me!”
“We can. You’ve devastated the lands we’ve created since the Dog dynasty came into power!”
“They deserve it! They suddenly think they can change the way our people talk to us because ‘it’s improper!’ according to them! Of course I’m frustrated! Give me my wings back and we’ll get some other mortal to deal with this king if you want!”
The first watcher sighed.
“No! You’ve abused your power! And after putting you to a position that no mortal soul has seen before! The least you can do is this one last mission!”
For the first time in hundreds of years, the third watcher’s mortality caught up to him, enveloping him whole. He dropped to his knees, letting his old cloak fall behind him.
“What can I do to get my wings back? I’ll do whatever you say.”
The first watcher let a large, globe like, crystal orb appear from the floor of the heavenly court as they instructed their mortal to rise.
The crystal showed one middle aged man. He was tall, he wore clothes almost as tattered, potion covered, and dirty as he was. He held a cane and some mask that was held to his face.
“Who is that?” The third watcher asked.
“This is GoodTimesWithScar.”
“Oh my goodness! That’s his name?!”
The first watcher was silent, but the mortal man felt all of the watchful eyes of the world fall onto him.
“What? I know I can’t be the only one weirded out by that. That’s his name, for crying out loud!”
The deity before the orb looked down at the former mortal in disgust while he continued to ramble.
“Imagine making a person , adding a person to the planet, and after months of time to come up with a name you go with GoodTimesWithScar!”
“Your mortal name was the word ‘Grain’ spelled incorrectly, you have no right to talk,” The first watcher responded coldly.
The mortal laughed.
“That’s different from GoodTimesWithScar!”
“Do you want your wings back, or not?”
“Yeah, I would like them back, go on with the quest.”
“Fine, Mr. GoodTimesWithScar is trying to revive our worship, he’s trying to get the people to worship us again.”
The third watcher smiled.
“That’s good, so what do you need me for?”
“The Dog Dynasty is trying to have him executed.”
“Of course they are… why don’t we just smite these people?”
The head watcher sighed.
“You tried, remember? 1,002 years ago?”
“Really? It’s been that long?”
“You’re losing focus again,” the first watcher reminded.
“Yeah, yeah that’s right, go on.”
Without hesitating to even sigh, the first watcher continued.
“You are going to earth and protect him. You are going to be his guardian angel.”
“Excuse me?”
“Until he gets a substantial following, until we’re sure that the Dog Dynasty is no longer a threat, you are not returning to the heavenly court.”
“You can’t do that! Wait a minute—!”
With those words, a quest for his wings, a quest for Mr. Goodtimeswithscar, and a mission to end the Dog Dynasty’s tyranny, once mortal third watcher turned mortality once more.