Banished Divinity: Learning to be Human

"I get things," I said defensively. "I get many things. I get the fundamental nature of reality. I get the weight of souls. I get why mortals find amusement in small, flat breads topped with cheese. What I do not get is why a curve has to shift. Can it not simply be? Must it always move? It seems very dramatic for a line."

"It's a supply curve, Sera. It shifts when—"

"If it wanted to shift, it should have been born a variable. It chose to be a curve. It should commit to its identity."

Human Sera buried her face in her ghostly hands. "You are impossible."

"I am celestial. There is a difference."

But Moo Moo understood.

He uncurled from his ball on my desk. He stretched his tiny legs. He fluttered his wings—those small, almost invisible wings—toward my textbook.

It was a short flight. From my thumb to my textbook. He landed on the open page, his small feet sinking into the binding, his antennae quivering. He looked at the words. He looked at the diagrams. He looked at the equations that had tormented me for weeks.

And then he did something I had never seen him do before.

He created a replica.

The book glowed. Just for a moment—a soft, green light that pulsed from Moo Moo's antennae and spread across the pages like water seeping into sand. And then, where there had been one textbook, there were two. Identical. Indistinguishable. One on my desk, and one floating in the air, held by nothing, glowing with the same soft green light.

Moo Moo opened his mouth. His tiny mouth, which had only ever said "Moo," which had only ever expressed fear and joy and sadness and love in that single, simple word. He opened it wide. And he ate the floating book.

Page by page. Word by word. He consumed it. The equations disappeared into his small body. The diagrams dissolved on his tongue. The concepts that had eluded me for weeks vanished into the green fur of a creature who had always been more than he seemed.

When he was finished, the floating book was gone. Moo Moo hovered in the air for a moment, his belly round, his eyes bright, his antennae crackling with energy. And then he flew to me.

He landed on my shoulder. His tiny feet gripped my shirt. His antennae touched my temple.

And then—

Zap.

Knowledge flooded into me.

It was not like learning. It was not like remembering. It was like knowing. Like the information had always been there, somewhere in the depths of my mind, and Moo Moo had simply unlocked the door and let it out.

The supply curves curved. The demand curves straightened. The equilibrium point was not a point but a balance, a dance, a negotiation between people who wanted things and people who had things. Monopolistic competition was not just a concept—it was Mum and Dad's restaurant, it was the reason people chose it over the place down the street, it was the meaning that Human Sera had been trying to explain for weeks.

I looked at my textbook. The words that had been nonsense were now clear. The diagrams that had been chaos were now order. The equations that had been walls were now doors.

I looked at Moo Moo. He was trembling on my shoulder, his antennae smoking slightly, his eyes half-closed with exhaustion.

"Moo," he said weakly. Did it work?

I picked him up. I held him in my palm. I looked at his small, tired face, his matted fur, his swollen eyes that had cried for Lily and for me and for all the things in this world that were too big for a creature his size to carry alone.

"It worked," I said.

He smiled. It was a small smile, a tired smile, but it was there. And then he closed his eyes and fell asleep in my hand.

---

Human Sera stared at the scene with her mouth open. Her ghostly form flickered. Her hands were pressed to her cheeks.

"I would not count that as cheating," she said slowly. "Because cheating implies there are rules, and I'm pretty sure there are no rules for what Moo Moo just did. But also—" She paused. "—that was amazing. That was the most amazing thing I've ever seen. And I've seen a lot of amazing things. I've seen Mum cook for fifty people with one working stove. I've seen Dad build a table from scratch using only a hand saw and determination. I've seen Mina finish a webtoon chapter in three hours while crying the entire time. But that—" She pointed at Moo Moo, who was now snoring softly in my hand. "—that was something else."

I looked at the textbook. At the clear, understandable words. At the diagrams that made sense. At the equations that were no longer enemies but tools.

"He can do it for the other subjects too," I said.

Human Sera blinked. "What?"

"Moo Moo. He can do the same thing for sociology. For cultural anthropology. For all of it." I looked at the sleeping creature in my hand. "He just needs to rest first."

Human Sera stared at me. Then her face split into a grin that was, frankly, terrifying. It was the grin of someone who had been waiting for a victory and could already taste it.

"Someone," she said, "is going to pay for that abalone."

I nodded slowly. "Yes," I said, with the quiet satisfaction of a celestial being who had finally, finally understood something mortal. "Yes, they are."

And somewhere in her room, Mina sneezed, as though the universe had just whispered her name in warning.

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