For the gods the universe was their playground and earth, one of their many game consoles. Therefore, it was not a stretch for the mortals to follow in their creators footsteps and develop their own ways to have some harmless fun to fill their days. One such game made was Mancala. Derived from the Arabic word naqala meaning “to move”, this word was used to describe strategy turned based board games played with small round like objects such as stones, beans, or seeds with the use of .rows of holes dug into the earth, a board of some kind or any other surface they could rely on. No points in guessing who was ecstatic about this news.
“Athena, what are you doing to your character?” Nuwa asked curiously as she watched Athena bring up the character customization screen, changing its hair, colour of its skin and other parts of its physical feature until it completely changed from its original setting.
“Don’t worry about it” the goddess mumbled, eyes glued to the screen.
Nuwa placed her hands on her hips and staring in a reproaching manner at the other deity, “is this about the game the humans made.”
“It’s just so simple yet thought provoking !!” Athena exclaimed. “Besides i’m not the only one doing this” she stated pointing her finger towards Hector and John, who looked sheepishly at the other two immortals.
Nuwa pinched her nose bridge, exasperated “you all have so little self-control it's amazing this universe hasn’t imploded.”
“Well the ever expanding mechanism does help with the whole, crashing in on itself issue” Hector replied, smiling like a helpful A grade student in a science class…..
“That was a rhetorical statement.”
…...Only to realise that he was not in science class but in English, his worst subject as it required a lot of abstract thinking.
“And you John, you approved of this excursion” Nuwa said more than asked.
“Uh well, it would be good to have a record of the cognitive development of mortals” John explained , tapping his forefingers together as he pouted.
Suddenly Lucy popped out from behind Nuwa, “that’s John’s way of saying that he didn’t program them to do that so he wants to know why they are doing that because either it's a happy mistake or a very bad bug that could cause the humans to become living zombies.”
“Well that’s a very specific translation” John stated with a grimace.
“But am I wrong though,” Lucy said with an eyebrow quirked up in challenge.
“Well yes ….but actually no” he replied, shoulders dropped in relent.
“You know what, it's fine. Just go” Nuwa sighed tiredly.
“REALLY!!” Athena, Hector and John exclaimed happily, whilst Lucy echoed the answer bewildered at the sudden allowance given by the Goddess of Creation.
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“Yup, on one condition.”
The two gods and one goddess nodded their heads fervently.
“You three will be solely responsible for any issues that occur like what Lucy had raised, understood.”
Before she could even complete her sentence the three stooges comprising Athena, Hector and John were already relocating their avatars to the specific region where the game was created.
To this day the three regretted not properly listening to Nuwa’s condition as they were once again being called to oversee a board game gone wrong.
“I mean the deal is legally possible …..but morally speaking..”John trailed off unsure how to handle such fury between the two humans as his avatar looked back and forth between the two.
“There’s no such thing as morals in this transaction John, this is capitalism. She should just cut her losses and make the trade,” Athena stated looking on cooly.
“But think about integrity, is this how people should be conducting business. Everyone needs to live Athena.”
“If she was smarter with her finances then she won’t be in the position.”
Hector palmed his face, “it’s just a monopoly game can they chill.”
“YOU CAN’T EXPECT ME TO TRADE PARK LANE FOR FUCKING WHITEHALL” human A screamed to the person opposite him.
“I CAN TRADE HOWEVER I WANT. NOW TRADE IT WITH ME YOU BANKRUPT BITCH” human B retaliated in anger, as she threw her card onto the board in demand.
The three deities sighed tiredly as the argument continued in many houses and homes, destroying friendship and creating fondness between enemies.
A few years after Mancala was created Emperor Yao of what is now People's Republic of China created Weiqi also known as Go. The story told by the humans is that he dreamt about a fairy playing this game with someone. Personally, Brahma thought the Emperor had one too many sips of tea made with that funny yet suspicious looking leaf but hey at least he made Go, which made many many immortals very happy.
Somewhere on Earth a man dressed in elegant golden robes sat in a pavilion overlooking a large pond filled with water lilies floating on the water's surface. This was one of the few rare moments that Emperor Yao had to be by himself with just his thoughts. However, it was for this very reason that he did not realise a strange dark skinned person popping out of the waters behind him, throwing his tea out into the pond and putting a similar looking liquid into his teapot before disappearing back into the water without so much as a plop. The man then reached for his teapot to refill his cup and that as they say was history.
AL was trying his hands at using his own avatar to play Go until he decided he needed to stretch a bit because staying in one position for a few centuries does no good to one's immortal back. Upon pulling himself away from the system AL came face to face with the massive fights going on in Troy, which was supposed to only be one mock battle between Artemis and Athena. After some quick investigation he found out that said mock battle turned into a full-scale war because the goddesses were apparently having a cat fight over whose avatar was the best designed.
“Great drop Paris, you asshole” AL muttered as he put his hands together in a prayer willing himself to gain patience and not eradicate a mortal from the earth.
This is why you should never let middle management run a company when they are clearly not ready for the responsibility. AL held a meeting with the immortals and made it clear that they either fix the mess…
“or so help me, I will make it so that I delete your save point, and bring this earth back to when I last saw it.”
Considering all the centuries they spent building up the Greek and Roman civilization and creating a known image of their avatars there, it was safe to say the ultimatum AL gave them was like destroying part of their existence and let me tell you the void is a dark and cold place to be. And surely mortals would understand the emptiness of what it's like to have their save file filled with over 300 hours of gaming, deleted with just a push of a button.
Basically, games were a fabulous creation that humans developed because everyone loved it especially as it became more advanced and the graphics enhanced. For example, Artemis liked first person shooter games. Demeter loved farming games and Athena loved strategy and riddle games. So there’s something for everyone to enjoy.
In fact, it was so popular amongst the immortals that Odin wanted to make his own man cave, filled with his favourite tabletop games like D&D, which he called Asgard. But after he stood up Frigg one too many times for their usual date days, she forced him to let everyone in or else she would cut him off.
Yeah, I won’t give you the details but that's kind of what went down. Then Zeus was having daddy issues again about how his dad didn’t love him because he didn’t have his own room like Hades or Poseidon, and he had to share Mt Olympus with his sisters because he was the youngest. Rhea shut that petulance down real quick with a swift quick to his bottom which shot him through the galaxy and into the Messier 63 aka the sunflower galaxy located 27 million light years away. His booty had a foot mark in it for many years.
So there was a lot of family drama going on, which kinda made me appreciate the fact that I only had Lucy to deal with.
All because of games humans created, who would’ve thought !?!