Chilis for Two

Hello my Juicy little Jelly-Babies:
Maddy’s back for more!

The Devota live in sandy huts, worshipping their God— a large triangular crystal prism floating in the sky above their settlement. They are a peaceful people, and have lived their quiet, humble, and pious lifestyle for centuries.

This is completely unacceptable! Centuries before, they were some of the Manifold’s premier producers of hot sauce! They toiled endlessly to provide a truly remarkable product. It would never expire and was simply delectable. My stores have almost run dry— can you imagine the shame and horror if I invited the other Goddesses over for dinner and they had nothing to season their corpses with? I shudder to think.

Your little job-job:

-Convince the Devota to forsake their belief in their God.

Enjoy your mortality, Empress Madrigal, Goddess of Nebula 6 and a Half

PS: I’ve been told that Devota customs forbid verbal communication, and my sources tell me they possess no written language either. Best of luck with your negotiations!

The agents, Koko the Hotshot and Sir William the Charlatan, arrived in a plaza at the heart of the Devota's settlement. Most of them were silently praying, staring up off towards a triangular prism in the sky. The agents approached the elder leading the ceremony. He gave them a glass piece cut in the shape of a triangular crystal and dabbed some hot sauce onto it. Through some tricky nonverbal negotiation, he gestured towards himself and pointed towards a temple in the distance. He then gestured towards the hot sauce and pointed towards an abandoned factory. William ordered in some spice products of his own to distribute and Koko conjured a dune buggy. They drove towards the temple.

There they found some elders mourning. William approached the main elder, who told them through gesture the history of the Devota (in less detail than I show here but bear with me):

Most of the Devota have forgotten that their religion is a defense mechanism. A couple centuries ago, a high-tech asshole named Chaz came flying in on a crystal ship and killed a whole swath of the Devota. He would punish them for speaking out of turn, and demanded that they pray to him, as his crystal ran on the emotional devotion of servants. In an effort to preserve what was left of their people, the remaining Devota acquiesced, building a tradition of silent devotion and abandoning their hot sauce production. (Chaz meanwhile would leech eternal life and watch TV in his crystal all day) Centuries later, only the eldest remembered this history. One secret the elders held is that their hot sauce is actually able to break through the crystal, they just have no means to get it up there. They carried on this knowledge in their greeting ritual: rubbing a dab of hot sauce on glass facsimile crystals and present it to those they meet in hopes that one day, someone will be able to break through

It turned out that combining William's mixture with the hot sauce made it even more potent for cutting through! This was tested on a shard from the large crystal that the elder had stowed away. With this knowledge, the agents departed for the factory.

Arriving there, they found it in shambles, but there was still a giant container of the hot sauce. Combining Hit the Road and Suspicious Crate in a game of energywork patty-cake, the two joint-summoned a large firefighting helicopter. They loaded it up with hot sauce and flew to dump it on the diamond.

Inside they found Chaz the asshole. He was a wimpy horrible little man and Koko threw him off the side of the crystal. He died.

Back on the ground, the Devota were convening, shocked at their "God's" defeat. The first to spoke was the elder, who told his people of their history that they'd forgotten. Slowly, they all gained the courage to speak again.

Badges pinged.

• Koko "The fang"

• Sir William unregistered