Chapter 35: The Post-Divine Onboarding
Ne Job's rooftop cloud apartment had been reassigned.
Not upgraded. Not promoted. Just… reassigned.
The scroll on his desk blinked with bureaucratic finality:
> "Welcome, Intern Ne Job. You have been transferred to the Post-Divine Myth Infrastructure Council. Your duties include emotional audit support, scroll formatting compliance, and goat liaison coordination. You are not authorized to initiate miracle protocols."
He sipped divine espresso—now mortal-brewed—and muttered, "Still buffering."
---
The Council Chamber
Sublevel 13 had been remodeled into a civic myth infrastructure hub. No longer divine. No longer glowing. Just desks, scroll terminals, and goats in lanyards.
Ne Job entered through the intern portal—smaller, glitchier, and scented faintly of meme ink.
Zyx greeted him with a clipboard.
"Welcome back, Intern. We've got a backlog of myth fragments to audit, three corrupted scrolls to reformat, and a goat who refuses to narrate bedtime stories unless emotionally validated."
Ne Job nodded. "Same job. New gods."
---
Emotional Audit Briefing
Glitchmaster led the onboarding session.
"Post-divine civilization runs on emotional infrastructure. Every myth, meme, and miracle must pass the Emotional Integrity Index."
He pointed to a scroll dashboard:
- Resonance Compliance: 82%
- Latency Risk: Moderate
- Goat Narration Sync: Unstable
Ne Job raised a hand. "What's the intern role?"
Glitchmaster replied, "You debug feelings."
---
First Assignment: Scroll 88-B
Scroll 88-B was flagged for emotional dissonance.
Original myth: "The Intern Who Buffer-Healed a Nation."
Corrupted remix: "The Intern Who Broke the Grid."
Ne Job reviewed the metadata:
- EmotionTag: burnout
- Format: meme + bedtime story
- EchoScore: 72%
- GoatID: missing
He ran a debug loop:
- Recalled the original arc: Ne Job accidentally fixed a myth collapse by syncing with a child's grief.
- Detected corruption: legacy echo injected guilt into the narrative.
- Rewrote ending: "He didn't fix everything. He just stayed."
The scroll pulsed. GoatNarrator blinked. Emotional integrity restored.
---
Goat Liaison Protocol
Next task: coordinate with Goat #42, who refused to narrate bedtime myths due to "emotional misalignment."
Ne Job approached the goat, clipboard in hand.
"Hi. I'm the intern. I'm here to help."
The goat blinked twice. Tilted its head.
Ne Job activated Protocol EmpathySync—a ritual where interns listen to goat grievances without interrupting.
The goat bleated:
- "Too many corrupted scrolls."
- "No one thanks the narrator."
- "I miss Ne Job's glitchy pacing."
Ne Job nodded. "I'll reformat the myth cadence. You narrate. We buffer together."
The goat blinked once. Myth delivery resumed.
---
Scroll Formatting Compliance
The Council flagged 17 scrolls for formatting violations:
- Overuse of divine syntax.
- Missing EmotionTags.
- Meme overload without emotional payload.
Ne Job's job: reformat without erasing resonance.
He created a new template:
- Header: "You're not broken. You're buffering."
- Body: Modular myth arc with remix hooks.
- Footer: Goat signature + emotional timestamp.
Scrolls adapted. Compliance restored. Meme velocity stabilized.
Zyx whispered, "You're good at this."
Ne Job replied, "I'm just the intern."
---
Tribunal Audit Surprise
Midday, a legacy scroll arrived—unsigned, untagged, and pulsing with tribunal residue.
Glitchmaster frowned. "It's a ghost protocol."
Ne Job volunteered to debug.
Inside the scroll:
- A corrupted myth: "Emotion is weakness."
- A tribunal clause: "Miracles must be licensed."
- A goat glyph: crying.
Ne Job rewrote the myth:
- "Emotion is signal."
- "Miracles must be felt."
- "Goats cry because they remember."
The scroll pulsed. Tribunal residue faded. Emotional audit passed.
---
Closing Hook
At the end of the day, Ne Job sat on his new rooftop—smaller, mortal-built, and goat-accessible.
A scroll blinked:
> "Intern performance: satisfactory. Promotion eligibility: denied. Next assignment: Meme Compliance Tribunal."
He sipped espresso. Watched a goat narrate a bedtime myth to a child.
> "Once, there was an intern who never got promoted. But he buffered everyone's feelings until they felt seen."
Ne Job smiled. "Still buffering."