The infinite void surrounded my vision. Just vast emptiness. Wait, not emptiness, nothingness. It was almost suffocating. Just nothing. However, my eyes saw an empty canvas. It's been like this for eternity. How long ago was that? 2 seconds ago? No, maybe a few trillion years? It's hard to tell. I can't tell if seconds are passing by or millions of years. Technically, years don't exist yet. Nothing exists yet. Let's change that.
A blinding light filled up the empty world. I created a universe in an instant. Next, worlds. Infinite worlds. The myriad galaxies. Slowly, everything built itself up together.
It's like I knew how to do everything. Well, I sort of did. The only thing I remember since being born was a voice.
"Create. Always create. When you are ready, you will be tested."
What does that even mean? How will I get tested? And what will that mean? Bah, it doesn't matter. Let me look at this pretty planet. I decided to make this one WAY bigger than the others. It's supermassive. Based on how I made the universe, this planet shouldn't even be possible. But I just added a special energy that made it possible.
Um... I'll call it mana! Weird, why did that name pop up first? Nevermind. I move my thoughts on perfecting this planet. I make a little dude. He's like me. But little. Now what should I do? Hmmm...
Maybe I should make more big planets and mess around with them first.
----------------------------------------
I popped into existence. I was in a large plain. I looked up into the starry night sky. My creator was watching. I felt safe, but then his gaze turned somewhere else. A pain struck my heart. Has my creator abandoned me? I screamed. Nothing happened.
I look towards the empty world before me. It was just empty. I felt alone. I desperately wished for some sort of salvation. But of course, nothing appeared. Nothing except this strange energy. It filled the land. It made me feel great. I thrived on it. Maybe this was a gift left behind by my creator.
As the thousands of years passed, more life appeared on this desolate planet. It was huge, and even after walking for so many years I still hadn't covered a quarter of its distance. Mostly because of the oceans which started to rapidly form sometime last year. Luckily, this strange energy allowed me to traverse them quickly and easily.
I encountered more life forms, though extremely primitive. They couldn't even absorb this special energy correctly. I showed them unimaginable tricks to gain their trust and attention. Some seemed to be afraid of me, however, it all changed when I injected the energy within them. They got stronger, faster, smarter. Evolution soared.
Their descendants followed me, and their descendants carried on their role. I was surrounded by a group of thousands who all hailed me as their leader. I was called "The First of Man".
----------------------------------------
Man, those experiments with those planets were crazy. Remind me not to ever make a donut-shaped planet. Speaking of which, I kept noticing activity on my original big planet. It seems the little me that I planted had caused life to flourish. I guess it was beneficial after all. Honestly, I didn't really know. For some reason, I don't have an omniscience of the future. It's almost as if something is blocking my vision. It's annoying.
I look towards the people developing on the planet. It's kind of cute in a way. I started to speed up the planet more. By that time, the guy I made who was titled "The First of Man" had achieved some sort of special transcendence. That was quick. Jeez. I sped up the planet a bit more. I discovered more types of life forms being created. The First Guy was still reigning supreme and somehow jumpstarted agriculture, basic society, and infrastructure quite early. He even founded his own empire. He was now called the "Emperor" by everybody since his title was lengthy.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
I started developing beasts. Beasts that were very good at absorbing mana. They could evolve quickly and they'll be varied strongly in strength. It should be good for my race of humans, or whatever they call themselves, to have some adversaries. Especially since the Emperor is just giving them power boost over power boost.
After speeding it up again and letting the beasts develop I quickly found that my people were all... massacred?
Fuck, a lot of them just died. Except for those who align themselves with the empire, basically everybody died. Now even though a large part of the human population is with the empire, the majority still wandered the planet. Now, with these strange beasts appearing out of nowhere, their weak feeble bodies were ripped apart. If I only I had that omniscience of the future then I could've predicted this.
I sighed and was thinking of starting anew. I had some adjustments I wanted to make to this planet and I couldn't do it without potentially killing all living lifeforms. However, a strange feeling pulled at my heart. It was the intuition of a creator. How did I know that? Well... I didn't actually. I'm just bullshitting. But maybe it was indeed the intuition of a creator. I felt like I would heavily regret it.
I sped up the time a little bit in hopes of a brighter future. Maybe the Emperor pulled through...
----------------------------------------
I clutched my left arm which was mangled and broken. Blood was leaking from every hole in my head. And yes, every hole. As an emperor, I tried to always have a dignified look, but fighting these beasts took everything inside me. Nowadays, I feel like age is starting to catch up to me. My creator had returned a long time ago. Its gaze now focusing on this planet. I feel warm. Comfortable. I can only thank my creator for this lengthy lifespan. But I know I am not immortal. I feel as if one day I will perish.
Especially with these dangerous beasts wandering around. At first, it was just stronger animals. Grapplers had stronger strength, Diminchings had faster feet, and Monlings had clever traps. But then, they soon became very different from the animals I knew. They were fierce. They were deadly.
Our elite warriors could take on these beasts but the common citizen would be defenseless, just sitting there waiting to be slaughtered. They were creatures that only served to kill, kill, and kill. They were demonic beasts. They hunted us for sport. A lot of them could actually just survive on plants, but of course, we were infinitely tastier. So we fought back. I assisted them in building large walls to block them off. Some winged demonic beasts could fly into the fortress but we shot them down.
I wish I could show the others how to utilize mana properly. They've gotten more adept at handling it within their body, but they're only using 5% of the mana and wasting the rest. They're mostly using it for reinforcement of the body which is what I wanted them to do.
Though, now I wish I could have them cast spells and magic. I could summon a ball of fire to burn enemies, or a bolt of darkness to piece and curse them. Though, it was very draining. I'm jealous of the human body, their body is so well made for mana that even with 5% efficiency they're already doing so much. I'm using 110% efficiency and I'm struggling to cast these simple spells.
Oh well, I can only continue to fight against these beasts. I used healing magic to repair my arm as I glared at the remaining four demonic beasts who were hesitating to fight me, especially after witnessing the brutal murder of their brethren.
----------------------------------------
Seems like everything is actually going pretty fine. Maybe I can tweak the mana efficiency of humans?
Nah, my creator intuition is telling me not to "interfere".
...
Okay, well, maybe I'll interfere a little bit.
Just add a tiny bit of mana here and there. Add some blessings, annnnd, done!
----------------------------------------
Somewhere in a snowy mountain. A woman was giving birth. A couple of villagers are helping her. She wanted to give birth in the empire but beasts blocked the path so they took a longer route around. Unfortunately, they couldn't make it in time.
After intense labor, a healthy baby saw the world for the first time. Then, a small flame appeared on its fingertips. The first human to appear with 100% mana efficiency. His name was Nigret Jullander.