After day and night had turned ten times over, Lightbringer returned to the village, where a grand welcome awaited him.
No one had imagined that the chieftain, missing so long, could still come back alive. They had even made ready to move the whole tribe—but on the very day before the people were to leave, their chieftain returned to the village.
And he brought back excellent news besides.
"The God will not hold the Ignivas family's use of magic against us. The beast tide before was only a misunderstanding."
Before the assembled tribe, Lightbringer explained the cause of the beast tide in detail: it had not been the Snake God's reproach, only that the Snake God's passage had been so vast and tremendous that the beasts of the mountains were all thrown into panic.
As for the village's calamity, that had been no punishment from the Snake God, but simply that the village, as it now stood, was far too frail in the eyes of a god.
So frail it could not even withstand the backwash of the Snake God's passing.
This left the mages hanging their heads in shame; never had they imagined that the power they took such pride in could be frail to such a degree.
"On this point, I have spoken with the Snake God as well."
It was just then that Lightbringer went on.
"In His mercy, the Snake God had meant to stop making such vast and tremendous journeys—but I discussed it with Him, and we felt it better to keep a measure of the beast tide after all...... every so often, meeting a small-scale beast tide would give us more chances to hone our magic."
At these words, the mages' regard for Lightbringer grew more awed than ever.
To be able to commune with a god—and to commune to such a degree......
The Nineteenth chieftain was unfathomable beyond all measure!
"But we, too, must do some things for the Snake God."
When he'd finished, Lightbringer added one more line.
This, too, was part of what he'd agreed with the Snake God before returning: the Snake God would come out and stir about now and then, to let the tribe's mages drill their hands at regular intervals, while he himself would serve as the Snake God's eyes, going out to explore this world and bring the Snake God more tidings of these heavens and this earth.
A very fair bargain—fair, at least, in that Snake God's eyes.
But in Lightbringer's eyes, that alone wasn't quite enough.
"We must also present offerings to that Snake God on a regular basis."
Recalling the treatment he'd received over this time, Lightbringer said this.
When the Snake God had hosted him before, he'd eaten and drunk his fill for free, and even picked up no small number of cooking techniques for free besides. Now that he'd returned to the village, he ought, at the very least, to play host to the Snake God in turn—to express his thanks through food and ingredients was the best way Lightbringer could think of.
Though the Snake God had never once asked for it, Lightbringer always felt that he ought to do this.
After all, he had learned far, far too much from the Snake God.
And this learning bore fruit in the days that followed. What he'd learned from the Snake God—how to identify and prepare all manner of ingredients—made the tribe's choices of food far richer, while a few healing methods that to the Snake God were utterly simple far outstripped the level of the tribe's own witch doctors.
But the truly important thing was that, from the Snake God, he had come to understand the importance of communication.
Unlike the chieftains before him, who'd known only how to pioneer, Lightbringer set great store by listening to every one of his people. When disputes arose among them, he could swiftly find where the trouble lay and hand down a ruling that left all sides satisfied.
Under Lightbringer's constant mediation, the whole Ignivas family grew more and more united, and this made their pioneering ever smoother—simply because they could trust one another without the slightest reserve.
And so Lightbringer came, little by little, to be crowned with the title of Sage King.
But Lightbringer himself never felt he had the brilliance the people credited him with; he only felt how far short he still fell of that Snake God—a feeling that grew deeper with every audience he had with Him.
"You've got rose-tinted glass on, that's what this is."
During one such audience, Lightbringer heard the Snake God remark on his thinking, even as it roasted meat.
"What? You're asking me what rose-tinted glass is? It's a kind of clear crystal...... oh, you don't even know what crystal is—it's that sort of transparent stone...... and speaking of stone, didn't we talk before about making me a big stone pot? Is it done yet? Once it's done I can make you more good things to eat...... and be sure you eat properly, would you—look how much weight you've lost."
Hearing the Snake God ask after the progress of the cookware, Lightbringer had to admit that the tribe simply hadn't found a stone that big; as for the metal the Snake God spoke of, they'd never so much as heard of it.
But this, too, set Lightbringer marveling once more at the Snake God's wisdom. So many things that not even they knew, the Snake God before him knew clear as day—could even describe their exact look and shape, the better for them to go and find.
"The Snake God knows far more than we do, yet still has us explore the world...... could this be His way of cultivating us?"
For a while, that was how Lightbringer understood it.
But the answer he got was a familiar whack.
"Don't dream things up, and don't get the wrong idea. I do know some things, but there's plenty I don't know either...... if you're so set on thinking I know everything, then what am I supposed to say the day you ask me something I don't?"
The Snake God's words were, as ever, utterly frank.
Which set Lightbringer marveling, once more, at the Snake God's wisdom.
"Mustn't dream things up, and mustn't get the wrong idea."
Lightbringer committed this line deeply to memory. He took it not only as the rule for communing with the Snake God, but as the rule for his own dealings with others.
And when he returned to the village carrying such thoughts, the people praised his wisdom all the more.
Under Lightbringer's rule, the village soon grew into a city-state—and the very idea of the city-state was something Lightbringer had heard from the Snake God. By the Snake God's account, a relatively fine city-state for this age needed, on the one hand, walls to ward off fierce beasts and outside foes, and on the other, all manner of craftsmen and shops to process and sell raw materials...... in short, it ought to be a rather convenient place, and convenient for everyone alike.
But in the eyes of the people, all of this became Lightbringer's wisdom. Though Lightbringer stressed again and again that it had all been done under the Snake God's guidance, in the people's eyes, merely to realize a god's guidance was already a feat beyond reckoning.
"Don't dream things up, and don't get the wrong idea."
Faced with the people's talk, Lightbringer would say this without thinking.
It left Lightbringer in a bit of a daze.
But no matter what Lightbringer said, the people held firm that his wisdom was beyond compare. This was the finest of ages, a glory unmatched in all the past, and they wished with all their hearts that this Sage King would lead them onward, just so, forever.
Yet as time slipped by, Lightbringer—the one they hailed as Sage King—grew old in the end after all.
When he realized his days were numbered, the aged Lightbringer came once more into the sacred mountain.
And in the final moments of his life, he saw, once more, that Snake God.