Herod nods. "Thanks again," says Herod inspecting the place in his hand where a scar vanished.

Sky smiles. "Once again, no problem." Then it walks off.

"How much credibility there is to the afterlife thing?" Herod once Sky is sufficiently away.

"Depends who you ask, really. There's evidence that the religion is based on real magical concepts and that Jesus Christ was a historical figure with powers we can't currently explain. But that doesn't mean everything he said was true. For example, he claimed that other gods were all fake, which is empirically false. So the afterlife thing could be bullshit too. But if it isn't, Sky's got good reason to avoid reincarnating; by all accounts, Heaven's pretty nice."

"Fair enough," Herod yawns. "Sorry, it was night in Tartarus."

"We should eat something and then crash."

"Oh, sure. I'll show you the Crystal Hall, it's great."

Ariel leads them to a large geodesic dome made of some unfamiliar crystal. The dome, once entered, reveals itself to have three levels, the upper level containing a fountain with waterfalls down to the ground floor. There are several different food lines, each delineated with a unique legend. "The carrot," Ariel explains, "is for vegan fare. The cheese is for vegetarians. The steak is for meat-eaters, not to be confused with the cow, which is for obligate carnivores. The geode is for people who eat rocks and minerals, the baguette with a line through it is gluten free, the banana is various fruits, and the cake is for desserts. You must try the desserts. Also, there's the specialty kiosk, which is for people with specific dietary needs, like blood, insects, or live prey. If you have such needs, you can inform the administration and they will be provided. I am going to go to the obligate carnivore line to get an entire rack of lamb, then to the dessert line to get some pie, and I'll be available on the first floor when you're ready. Okay?"

The two stare at it all for a long moment.

Then Herod notices that they have been addressed and nods.

They are still staring at it all. You can almost hear the awe inducing background music they must be experiencing.

"Cool." Ariel zooms off.

They still stare for a bit longer. The tyranny of choice that they never had to suffer through in this life because they had to face tyranny of, like, actual tyranny.

"Okay, I know you're going to say not to exaggerate-"

"Actually, we should try a bit of everything. Because, I have a spell to figure out if food is bad for us and it works by on anything in a given volume."

Pause.

"And yeah, I do want to enjoy something other than military gruel."

"That's my boy." Gav kisses Herod on the cheek before departing to the meat-eater line.

Herod follows him after a second.

There is an incredible variety of food! It’s kind of untenable for them to take some of everything, but the trays are large and no one seems to be judging.

This place is so... rich that Herod is vaguely wondering if he is going to find out that it runs on slave labor or something.

But since he can't run a slave rebellion on an empty stomach. He and Gabe can pick a wide variety of things. A fraction is what they could reasonable eat in one sitting and another is thing that they could take back to their room and eat later. So they don't waste anything-

"Pfft, they are probably to rich to care about wasted fooded." Gavriel says this while picking ten varieties of soda.

"Likely, but still... at least I have a preserving spell."

Herod eyes the dessert line and picks four kinds of pie.

They go to the first floor to find Ariel.

Ariel is sitting at a table on the first floor, as promised. She has a tray piled high with meats and, separately, an entire pecan pie. She is currently efficiently stripping the meat from the bone with her teeth and a creative application of her personal force field.

They take seats in front of her. "I was worried that we got too much food. Not anymore."

In contrast, their trays have been completely covered with food, but not piled high.

"I love the visual of the tiny piece of pie for dessert next to the carnivorous feast."

“Mutant powers have a tendency to make your metabolism go kind of crazy. Mine do so more than most." She cracks one of the bones lengthwise and licks out the marrow, leaving faint scratches in the bone itself with her tongue. "Which is to say: Meat. Good."

"Meat good," Gavriel agrees sagely, lifting a chicken wing.

Snort. "Meat good." Herod says, though he lifts a mozzarella stick.

Ariel returns to her feast.

Before either demon actually starts eating, Herod casts Lesser Detect Food and then he stares at their trays for a bit. He removes a few of items from the tray (some heavily processed snacks) and then they start digging in.

Well, it's a good thing that large appetites are commonplace in this cafeteria. They probably need better table manners. They eat with their hands and feed each other with their hands as well. "Why is your world so wonderful?"