A Job for this Useless Goddess - Part 03 (Patreon)

Moving into the guildhall had an explosive effect on Aqua’s appetite as well as her figure. Without the already limited exercise she was getting waddling to and from the mansion, she had established a streamlined path towards ensuring her every calorie that went past her lips was also housed in more permanent quarters across her body’s real estate. 

Day in and day out, she ate, and cooked and ate some more. Her belly itself started to feel like it was almost as large as her room and yet she could feel it tingle for more. Her brain had started to associate the pain of overfullness with a sense of fulfillment and struggled to grasp the concept of being even only ‘partially’ full. In Spite of her best efforts, she began to understand how Darkness must feel, shuddering slightly at the thought of being in the same boat as the party’s resident masochist crusader. Thoughts of her friends and how they must be doing filled her mind as she drifted to sleep and awaited the next day’s stuffing.

The next day, Aqua woke up starving. She had decided that today was the day she would graduate from sweets onto savories and at least get a good, meaty stew under her culinary skills. In order to get there though, she would have to sample the restaurant's finest and made no small effort in selecting the largest helping of the most calorie laden cuisine they had. It was any wonder how she had managed to eat so much on top of her daily unsold offerings but somehow she managed and it felt incredibly fulfilling. 

Her food-induced comas were often dreamless but unfortunately carried the side effect of wiping the flavours from her mind’s eye. Aqua quickly found herself being locked into another pattern as she would have to sample the same dish over and over again just to try and identify one ingredient while promptly forgetting to write down her latest insight. Several more weeks of this would come to pass before she decided that she had what she needed to finally make her own attempt, spurred on only by a familiar tingly feeling  of  satisfaction and enjoyment as she waddled her way to the kitchen.

Aqua’s belly sloshed with liquid meals as she gathered up the ingredients. A simple meat and vegetable stew however was quickly waylaid by unopened bags of sweet frosting and caramelized sugar that she ran into as she poked a pudgy finger through the cupboard. There was no question as to what she should do here as she dug in and gobbled it down until she again almost felt like she would explode. Passing out and waking up intermittently meant that a 20 minute meal to make stretched on for most of the day with frequent abandoning and restarting over the days that were still to come.

By the time Aqua had finally gotten everything boiling away in the pot, she had swollen to an incredible size. The staff of the restaurant had been keeping an eye out for her efforts and in spite of all her failures, were genuinely thrilled by signs of her finally starting to succeed at something. Their prayers had been answered by the very goddess they had been hoping would help herself. 

The goddess of ironies however was not a fan of such avantgard practices however and saw it fit to ensure that just enough of a loose cobblestone was poking up through the ground that she would catch her foot on it as she moved in to deliver the final taste test. With much of it on the ground and entirely unsaleable, the remnants of the large cast iron pot would soon find its way into the swelling water goddess’ ravenous belly like a rising tide of food and fantasy.