Wilona stared at the quest. A shrine? How does she make something like that? She read it again and frowned. Is a mound of dirt even gonna get accepted by a Goddess? That feels like the biggest disrespect she can give to a deity, honestly. What the hell is her system thinking?

  She decided to trust what the quest was saying anyway. Like, it isn't going to hurt her or anything. She knows that. But maybe a bit of distrust is needed for the damn thing. Seriously, a mound of dirt? Wilona can read between the lines and find the implication that the seed she'll plant will magically sprout or whatever, but seriously! Why does she have to work with dirt?!

  Wilona took a deep breath. "It's fine, you've been swimming through mud anyway," she said while squaring her shoulders. "Okay—okay. It's just dirt under my nails, even though I don't have a damn nail cutter or a cuticle pusher." Wilona gritted her teeth. "It's fine! Really!"

  Wait, maybe using Purify on them would work? Huh. Wilona placed her hand on top of her other one and used the spell. Sure enough, she felt the accumulated dust on her skin wash away under some unseen pressure.

  Glad that she didn't actually have to spend a lot of time cleaning her nails after the task—but then again, a pedicure would be nice—Wilona left her tree stump to make a dirt mound somewhere around her home. She picked a place that had way too much sun and made a dirt mound there. It was around two feet tall or something. She's not good at eyeing these kinds of things, honestly.

  Instead of planting the seed right away, Wilona decided to add a bit of flair to the would-be shrine because goddamn it, she couldn't stand looking at a dirt mound every single morning! She grabbed some branches and gave the mound some horns. The smaller ones became a crown around the head. A pile of wet leaves she gathered became a carpet around the mound as well as a dress for it.

  In the end, it looked more like some weird horned blob with a crown made of sticks and a leafy dress, which went past its feet and touched the ground.

  To finish it all off, Wilona brought one of the magical seeds over to the mound and planted it on its head, right at the center of the crown.

  Dirt moved on its own to bury the seed, which got buried deeper into the shrine's head. Vine-like roots emerged from the spot where the seed was planted and started to crawl along the mound. They coiled around the horns, infested the crown, and grew over the leaves. After reaching the earth surrounding the mound, the roots began to grow leaves of their own. A form-fitting dress grew over the one Wilona made, and thorns populated the crown she had placed, but it strangely did not take over the entire thing.

  Two glowing fruits emerged from where the face of the mound would be, as well as the horns, which now sported fruits hanging from twirling vines growing along the surface of the wood.

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  The shrine was now finished, and Wilona waited for something to talk to her, but... nothing came? Wilona frowned. She thought she was more special than to get ghosted by one of this world's goddesses.

  Damn.

  Instead of sulking on it—why does she care about some random goddess anyway?—Wilona opened her status screen and waited for the reward of the quest to pop up. Lesser Emissary of the Goddess of Fertility and Rebirth is what it said. Well, if she can't talk to the goddess directly, then maybe an emissary can?

  Something fell from the skies; a clump of... something fuzzy. Wilona thought it was some kind of dog at first, but then she saw long tendrils pop out of the fur. The worms? started to penetrate the ground, and the soil quickly loosened from their efforts. The ball of fuzz fell into a miniature sinkhole and got consumed by mud moments later.

  What? What just happened?

  Wilona rubbed her arms. She could still feel the goosebumps growing on her skin at the sight of the damn thing. What was it anyway? Some kind of creature?

  "Hello?" Wilona placed her hand behind her back in a nervous habit. She looked around with apprehension, searching for the emissary. Maybe she didn't want to talk to this thing's boss after all. Wilona's first impression of the goddess was a bit... creepy. She got the ick from it, honestly. Whatever that ball was.

  "Hello!"

  Wilona flinched and instinctively formed a ball of light on top of her hand. She was ready to throw this thing if it came down to it! "Where are you?!"

  "Well, I'm everywhere, or at least I'd prefer that to be the case." Did the voice sound girly, or were Wilona's ears tricking her right now? "I'm a mushroom, see, and I'm setting up my mycelium. Uhm, I'm a Myceloid, nice to meet you."

  "That's your name?" Wilona thought it was ugly. "Really?"

  "I'm a Myceloid," the mushroom? She guessed? Emphasized. A huff came out of nowhere, and Wilona wondered how the thing could have done it. "As for names... Hm, my goddess is about to give me one, so if you just wait a little while longer, I'll introduce myself to you."

  "How about Fuzz?" Wilona blurted out. She heard a girlish giggle come out of the sky.

  "Yes... Fuzz, that's my name now, I guess." The Myceloid said with another mysterious sigh. Seriously, how is it doing that? "Nice to meet you?..."

  "Wilona," replied the girl. She reached a hand out but quickly pulled it back. Wilona let out a breath of relief. "I'm glad to finally have someone to talk to, you know? So what do you do?"

  "I'm here to help," answered Fuzz. "However you need me, I'm here. And no, just because I don't have arms doesn't mean I can't help you. Uh... Just wait until I set up my shrooms, yeah? I'll be able to go around and do things..."

  "How long will that take?" Wilona asked, genuinely curious how this alien would do things biologically. Like, this is an alien though, right? That's kinda tight. "You're kinda tight."

  "What?"

  "It means you're cool." Wilona nodded. She was willing to teach her new friend new words, honestly. "Do you need me to, like, put some leaves around you or something? That's what mushrooms eat, right? Rotting stuff?"

  "Yes...? But I don't see how you can possibly help me out right now," Fuzz answered. "I am still spreading my mycelium, and I cannot realistically produce spores which will help in digesting the stuff you will give me. You need to wait for me to start growing along the surface of the earth; otherwise, I won't be able to reach the things you'll give me."

  "Eh, fair enough," Wilona shrugged. "Wanna talk about things while I wait for another quest? I'm sure we both have something interesting to tell each other, right? I'm kinda interested in knowing what heaven's like. I'll tell you about Earth in exchange!"

  "Okay."

  "Great!" Wilona grinned. "So what's it like up there? Is it cool? Is it hot? Maybe something in between? I'm guessing you're probably not some kind of demon since you seem kinda chill, so, like, the place you came from isn't so bad, right? Everyone's in a good mood?"

  "You're asking this because you're curious if you made the wrong choice by coming here," Fuzz said with a deadpan tone.

  "Spot on!" Wilona shamelessly replied with a snap of her fingers. "So, what's it like?"

  Fuzz sighed.