isleofavalon | [OPEN][May Catch-all]

[Calling it a challenge had been a kindness that Avalon, perhaps, did not really deserve. Still, he couldn't think of another word to use that would be more fitting. A trial? Yes, but he had people he cared for here to make it far easier to bear.]

As often as any mortal does. The act of sleeping was something I had to become used to... and not one I'd indulged in before.

[He glances down as they walk, watching as the grass bends beneath his feet.]

My twin brother is the god of sleep, so I don't lack familiarity with the concept. I simply never had the time.

[Set has never had very many people he cares about him nor anybody that care about him. Being without people like that isn't much different to Set but there is a certain loneliness in being from a place that nobody knows of. Being a god that nobody knows of. Thanatos is the closest thing to that, for Set.]

Your brother is the god of sleep? [There is no such god for that where Set is from. Tutu hasn't been born yet.] Where I came from, we still slept. But it didn't feel like such a necessity. Like eating and drinking. We did it because we enjoyed it.

Here, if I don't eat then I am in pain or I'm tired. And the food here isn't anything I really like. Have you had tea?

Tea? Yes, I've had it. It's... interesting.

[Though steeping herbs in water wasn't unknown, the delights of Asia hadn't reached Ancient Greece and much less the underworld. Thanatos likely wouldn't have drank tea even if he'd had access to it, but he's had the time and opportunity to try and great deal of different foods while he's been here.

Not that he's terribly adventurous. He knows what he likes and tends to eat the same things day to day.]

I never had the time to indulge in anything unnecessary. My work kept me busy. [And he does, understandably, still feel at a loss without it.]

What would you like, if you could find it?

[Before Set had been killed in his first timeline, he had been bored. Every day had been miserable, monotonous. Never had he been busy because his role had been deemed useless the day that Osiris said his would be a reign of peace.

Strange how Set misses it now...those days where he'd only had his brother and training to occupy his time...]

Date wine. I'm sure I could find it but alcohol here is...different. [It isn't the alcohol that is different but himself. He'd gotten drunk for the first time and he definitely was not interested in doing so again.]

Different? [It takes him a moment, but--] Ah.

[Yes. The effect it has. He's been mildly intoxicated once while here, and though he'd been in good company he hadn't much enjoyed most of the effects it had had on him. Particularly the morning after.]

Hm.

[Thanatos looks up at the sky as they walk.]

Perhaps in moderation. Though I know of many gods who have little concept of the word.

[Set had had to rely on a complete stranger when he had been drunk and it was something that he very much did not prefer to relive. While the person had been nice to him, the entire thing was humiliating, to say the least.

And Set knows very little about moderation. He's not the kind of god to understand this word.]

Are there a lot of gods in your world? [Set's world is really rather new, all things considered and there will be plenty of other gods later but right now the god thing is very much just a family tree with some others around.]

The twelve Olympians are the most powerful. [Or so they are seen to be. Thanatos has opinions about that, but he keeps them to himself - as is the wise thing to do when it comes to such capricious and vengeful beings as the Olympians.]

Outside of that, around four hundred minor gods and chthonic deities like myself. Don't expect me to name them all.

[Thanatos isn't even sure he could name them all, at least not without some paper and a pen. The affairs of other gods has never been his concern.]

There are also demi-gods, titans, nymphs and other beings that are not human, but not gods.

You have so many beings that are not gods but considered not human, it sounds like. Where I am from, you are either human or god. [Ancient Egyptian gods were really particular about what they did with humans.]

We don't have as many gods. There is my great grandfather, Ra, the creator of all. [Though that's not actually the truth but Set doesn't think he's supposed to share that.] But between Ra and his children and their children, there are only fifteen of us that I know of. Not that the line will not keep growing. Children are still being born.

It was much the same for us in the beginning, but things change.

[In the beginning, when it was just Chaos, the first primordial deities and the earliest gods. He knows about it, but his mother - as she is with many things - has always remained fairly close-lipped about that time.]

My mother, Nyx, stood close to the beginning of creation. She is the goddess of the night.

[He quiets for a few moments then, as he doesn't often speak of his mother.]

We don't have the opportunities to be a close family, but I have many siblings aside from Hypnos.

[For Set, there wasn't really a god that was in charge of the night. It came and Ra had to come bring the sun forth. That was simply that. It's interesting how different things are.]

How many siblings do you have? I have--[He almost says three but...] I have two. Two sisters.

[Thanatos pauses in visible thought. Naming all of the gods is one thing, and something he isn't willing to attempt, but can he even list all of his siblings? Most of them, he never speaks to.]

Ah... My younger twin brother Hypnos, elder brother Charon, and then...

[He sighs lightly and ticks them off, muttering names under his breath while he uses his fingers to count them up.]

My other brothers Geras, Dolos, Ponos, and Epiphron. Then there are my sisters Moros, Momus, Oizys, Nemesis, Apate, Philotes, Eris, Styx, Euphrosyne, Sophrosyne, Hybris, and Elos. [He thinks he remembered them all.]

The three Moirai - the Fates - are my sisters also. Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos. Then there are the Keres, the Oneiroi and the Hesperides. I can't tell you how many of them there are. [Thanatos pauses and then lets out a chuckle.] I have a great many sisters.

[That's...so many???]

Do all gods in your world just keep having children? Is that all they do?

[He doesn't even mean it as an insult but damn?]

[Thanatos actually cracks a smile. It's a small one, but it's visible enough on his usually stoic face.]

I suppose in the early days they had little else to do other than create children, and bicker amongst themselves.

[And... really, if he's honest, most of them don't do a good deal now either.]

In my world, we focused on our lands to expand them. Although Ra, my great great grandfather, has plenty of children. I suppose that does stand true.

[And he also doesn't know just how Horny Ra actually is.]

[He gives a small shake of his head.]

The current gods have fewer children. My mother Nyx is... more of a primordial force. She was born of Chaos.

[Back then, things must have been very different. He and Nyx don't have the close relationship needed to sit down and reminisce on such times.]

My twin brother and I, and many of our siblings, were created by her. We existed only as abstractions before she drew us forth.

Then you were created like my grandparents. Ra simply made them be while the rest of us were born from our mothers.

[But mentioning chaos, Set finds it interesting because:] In my world, I had defeated the being of chaos. [Not really but for the sake of the story they have, for nobody to know what is actually happening, he has to keep that story going.

It doesn't change that he is stronger than Apophis in many ways.]

He had kidnapped my brother and I killed him.

[That's interesting. It sounds like Chaos is a lesser entity in Set's world. Or perhaps, it simply became diminished?]

I don't believe the one I know of could be defeated. [He muses aloud.]

But they do nothing to attract ire, and I doubt anyone could find where they were if they did.

[Set can't talk about how Apophis did not actually die. He was defeated but only for a short time. He seemingly cannot die. But if people know this, anybody, then it ruins everything people know and disrupts the balance.]

In our world, he lives in the Underworld. That is his domain. That is your domain in your world, right?

[Set has at least learned that it isn't a bad thing coming from there. It's where his brother is and rules over now.]

Not mine, specifically. It is where I reside, while I'm not working.

[But Thanatos is almost always working and especially lately, thanks to the war raging on the surface. He gives a small shake of his head.]

The underworld was the realm of my mother, until she gave it over to Hades.

She just...gave it? Who is this Hades that he was just given the underworld?

[Set can't understand doing that. He doesn't think that would happen in his world. Although in the case of the throne, it is usually a case of being tired of ruling and giving the throne to the next.]

The brother of the king of the gods.

[And not a person much liked by Thanatos, though he respects his position.]

The underworld under my mother was a realm of chaos. Hades brought it to order.

[...Oh. Makes sense then. He nods.]

You only have one king? For us, it changes. Right now, I am the king of all and before that, it was my brother.

Three kings, in fact... but Zeus places himself over the other two due to his victory in a conflict with those who ruled before him.

[He does wonder if Zeus would ever hand that power off to someone else. Would he be able to let go of his arrogance?]

He has sons, as do the other two. But the power isn't necessarily hereditary.

How do you get anything done with three kings?

[He imagines his own family...if it had been him and Osiris ruling together then he doesn't think he would have ever agreed about anything back then.]

[Thanatos chuckles. It's not a sound often heard from him, but the question is so... fitting that he can't help but be amused.]

The Olympians rarely get anything done at all. They fight amongst themselves and occasionally turn their attention towards mortals, normally in order to torment them.

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