Tithing Their Manna to Their Masters

He strides, sneering, past the corporate temples, companion at his heels. He has nothing but contempt for those inside, tithing their Manna to their masters. The street is darkened by the floating office blocks overhead—pure vanity, proof their owners have enough Indentureds that the masters can waste their Manna on frivolities like flying buildings.

He spends his own Manna like a miser, save in one aspect only: A spider-thing trots after him, alive because he thinks it is.

It chuffs impatiently, and he pauses, and pats it gently. “Not yet, my friend,” he says. 

Too sudden a change in faith would be cataclysmic, bringing the buildings crashing down. They will wait, spider-patient, for people to come to them, and then show them the power of each one's belief.

And then the towers will be brought back down to earth, and the temples will be emptied.