The Archivists
Welcome to Divine Tyranny! In a world where all-powerful gods live among mortals and play with their life for their own entertainment, Archivist Cécile is doing her best to go unnoticed. Unfortunately, the warring water and forging gods are now interested in the archives... Come read about Cécile and the world in which she lives!
Introduction to the story | Cécile | The Archivists | Novel upcoming
Introduction to the story | Cécile | The Archivists | Novel upcoming
Table of Contents
We, archivists, are the only people holding the country—even the whole world—together. Saying this is only common sense, and anyone who has any of it will agree with this assessment!
Who
Highly educated and skilled people working at the royal archives.
Highly educated and skilled people working at the royal archives.
What
Advise people on how to deal with the gods and survive the encounter.
Advise people on how to deal with the gods and survive the encounter.
Customers
Everyone dealing with a god, from the king to the poorest commoner.
Everyone dealing with a god, from the king to the poorest commoner.
TestimonyLéonie P: The archivists told me that having green ribbons at my wedding was an especially bad idea when invoking the blessing of Q! I was able to change them to red at the last minute and adverted any disasters! Q has blessed us for sure, because my marriage has been very successful and I immediately got pregnant! Nathan G: For months, all my sacrifices to our Lord Lydien were unsuccessful! I consulted the archivists, and they told me it was because I was using the coal of his rival to burn them! I change it to straw and my prayers were finally answered! It has now rained over my field and I won't starve to death!
The archivists and their job
Role
The archivists are the people collecting all the information related in some ways to the gods, writing it down, and taking care of the records. But most crucially, we are the ones having to comb through millennia of records, analyse their contents, and draw some recommendations from them. And then, we have to go see the patron who gave us that task—most often a high priest, noble, or the king himself—and somehow convince them to actually follow our advice, and that, no, the gods won't be satisfied with some half-assed measures...
Senior archivists having to deal with nobles' complaints by stokkete on DeponsitPhotos
Information collected
The kind of information collected in the archives is very broad-ranging and not always reliable. This means that we need to have an education that is just as broad, so that we can at least understand what the writings are talking about, as well as critically judge them. The archives cover basic information about the gods, of course, but even that is more complicated that it seems.Questions we have to ask ourselves
Did this god tell us that themselves?
Were they actually truthful, boasting, or completely rewriting history?
Was it a rival god smearing their reputation?
Was it reported by priests who might have forgotten some details of what was said to them or who might have had their own agenda?
Was it instead an information that was slowly pieced together by someone who didn't completely understand what was going on?
Locations
Each city in the country—even each village—has its own small archives, recording their local history. However, in less important places, the recruitment and training of archivists is not very rigorous. Very often, it is the local priest or the patriarch or matriarch of the most important local family who hold the role in addition to their own duties.The royal archives
The royal archives in the capital are the most important and extensive, and the archivists working there are the only one with direct contact with the king. The physical building hosting the archives was even erected with help from several gods, not only the architecture god, but also our Lord the water god and the forging god.
Selection
What we look for in new recruits
Intelligence and a broad education to understand what they read.
Cunning and shrewdness to parse what is reliable information and read between the lines.
Good organisation and research skills to be able to find anything in the archives.
The ability to synthesise information and draw advice from it.
Good writing skills to create new archives entry.
Basic magical talents to make use of the magic that is keeping the archives together.
Optional: the ability to deal with people and to convince them to part with information and to actually follow the advice they have been asking for.
The tests
A series of oral examinations with established archivists and a practical test among a small made-up version of the archives.
A senior archivist has to vouch for the recruit and agree to take them under their wing to train them—this is to avoid spoilt brats from noble families that nobody wanted to offend but who nobody wanted to deal with personally either!
An archivist working by kosoff on DepositPhotos
Sadistic archivist examiner coming with a test by kues on DepositPhotos
Training
Training lasts 5-10 years after recruitment. During that time, they slowly gain more independence in their research skills and get the joy of learning to deal with the public—a task senior archivists are only too happy to delegate as soon as they can. What takes the most time is learning proper writing skills and synthesising abilities, as well as judging the reliability of sources. Not the least trouble is the need to beat any prejudice away from the recruits' mind!The final trial
The most difficult task is to actually formulate accurate advice from all of that. Because of the impacts of any such decisions, recruits are not allowed to attempt it before their final year of training. Even once they officially graduate from training, senior archivists are still going to look over the advice section of their reports for a few years to come. It's a hassle for everyone involved, but the survival of the country is well worth the price...
The most difficult task is to actually formulate accurate advice from all of that. Because of the impacts of any such decisions, recruits are not allowed to attempt it before their final year of training. Even once they officially graduate from training, senior archivists are still going to look over the advice section of their reports for a few years to come. It's a hassle for everyone involved, but the survival of the country is well worth the price...
A very enthusiastic archivist trainee by TheVisualsYouNeed on DepositPhotos
Opinion from the archives
Respected individuals
Dealing with annoying people
Yet, quite a few people still fail to treat us with the proper respect that we are due. Especially all those politicians and nobles at court who think that we could somehow give them the opinion they wish for if we put just a little more effort into it. As if we could change the character of the gods themselves as easily as paper records can be altered! However, if the task they wish to accomplish with our advice is not going to have wide-ranging consequences, we can sometimes just tell them what they insist we should, and then stand back and enjoy the resulting anger and punishment from the gods. So long as we don't do it too often and offend those gods ourselves... Court archivists vs other (cleverer) archivists
Archivists are respected and admired throughout the kingdom, as everyone realises what a crucial role we play in keeping us all alive. Everyone also understands that we could very easily fail to find one small piece of relevant information about the ritual they are about to conduct because we were slightly distracted by our anger at the insult that was thrown our way...
Yet, quite a few people still fail to treat us with the proper respect that we are due. Especially all those politicians and nobles at court who think that we could somehow give them the opinion they wish for if we put just a little more effort into it. As if we could change the character of the gods themselves as easily as paper records can be altered! However, if the task they wish to accomplish with our advice is not going to have wide-ranging consequences, we can sometimes just tell them what they insist we should, and then stand back and enjoy the resulting anger and punishment from the gods. So long as we don't do it too often and offend those gods ourselves... Court archivists vs other (cleverer) archivists
Being an archivist can be an ingrate job when those pesky nobles are involved. Thankfully, not all of us have to deal with the court. Better to leave that to those who think themselves to be the only ones high minded enough to face such tasks properly, and let them have their delusions of grandeurs.
The rest of us are often left to our own devices, and so long as we're still being productive and answer to requests for information, nobody pays attention to what other ancient knowledge we look at in the archives and to what we do with it... There is a reason why most archivists are excellent mages, and this is not all due to selecting for natural talents during recruitment!
Being an archivist is really the best job around. Respect, money, secret knowledge... And so long as we don't make egregious mistakes, even the gods leave us well enough alone! It's really the perfect place from where to observe the new royal heir selection and the upcoming carnage...
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Cool idea! I like how you wrote it in a distant first person, which gives us a sense of the characters and the culture of the archives. It made the setting come to life! Is there a code that archivists have to follow? Like restrictions or taboos on how they use the knowledge they safe keep/collect? Can an archivist be fired or kicked out and has that ever happened?
Thanks :D I write all articles in this world from the POV of my main character to make them more fun. Regarding an archivist code, the only important thing is that they actually do their job (collect information + give advice when people request it). They don't have a specific code to follow, the only thing is that it's understood that it's super important that they don't lie or collect false information. Doing so is most likely to result in them getting killed in revenge, provided that they are caught and that the victim survived the lie :p