I rarely listen to a story podcasted twice. Usually I just skip to the outro the 2nd time and then move on to another episode. But since this is one of my favorites, I listened again. I really love this story.
The gods of this story just made me so angry. For the first story, the gods refuse to act. In the second story all the gods do is to pray to Agani for him to swoop in and save their sorry butts, and then to criticize him for the method which he used to save them. Perhaps this could be forgivable if the gods were simply impotent. But these gods are not powerless--the third story illustrated that they drive their peoples to war against each other, a war which none of the people care about in the slightest. The gods don't care who dies, they just require that blood be spilled on their behalf. They won't lift a finger to save their own people, but they have no problem expending effort to drive their people to die for reasons the people don't care about.
And keep in mind, too, that these stories are the stories told by the followers of those gods. If the stories have been skewed as stories typically are, they will skewed in favor of the storyteller. If the gods STILL come out looking so terrible in the result, consider how much worse the reality might have been!
This story, to me, is about the birth of a revolution. I think that the girl will work with Agani to drive the fat complacent gods from their thrones and raise Agani up as the new dominant religion. What gives these gods the right to rule? Even in their own stories they rule because it is right for them to rule, and there is no other justification. It brings to mind the French Revolution. The kings say "we rule because we are of noble blood and it is right for us to rule." The peasants say "Let's see what that blood looks like spilled on the streets."
It also brings to mind the question of true parentage. The gods claimed they formed the people (though we don't actually know if that's true) and therefore the gods are the ones to whom the people owe their allegiance. But they have apparently done nothing for the people in the meantime. It makes me think of a parent giving up their child for adoption for whatever reason, someone else adopts that child and raises them for 18 years. Who is the parent there? No matter whose loins the kid sprang from, that adoptive parent is the one who spent a couple decades of their life tending to the child's needs.
The stories specifically warned against Agani's anger, but anger is not always a negative emotion. Anger is the driving force behind much social change, civil rights movements in particular. And that's again why I believe this is the start of a revolution. There is anger in the people that has been suppressed even as they are bleeding for no reason on the battlefield. This girl has found her anger, and she has called up Agani from it. Others will follow her. The secret story of how Agani became a god is a great nod at further world that we don't see. It wouldn't surprise me if the girl herself became a god as part of the revolution, because she seems to be a born leader, and will find followers.
Perhaps this story speaks so much to me because I am a skeptic at heart. I see Agani, and I see the other gods, and only Agani has an obvious tangible effect on the world, and he is the only one who acts to protect those who pray to him. It's clear to me who, if anyone, deserves the prayers in that setting.