Please select your capital planet.

I turned my head to the planes of glass and took in the sight of a solar system locked in an eternal dance. It was strange how they were far enough away that they were blips,yet close enough that I could count eight of them. Four rocks, and four gas giants, each beautiful in their own unique way. "Helios, which planet do you think would make a good capital?" He walked into the room behind me and stood next to me as I gazed into the depths of space.

"I'd recommend the third one in. It’s the perfect distance from the star and would easily support life. Not to mention, it would be a strategic spot once your peace treaty expires.” I could hear the confidence growing in his voice as he spoke. He seems to have finally balanced himself out a bit during our journey.

"Uhh Helios, how am I going to select it?" I asked him as I started at the faraway outline of the middle planet. He snapped his fingers, and a new screen appeared before me. This one showed a three-dimensional model of the four worlds closest to the star. I clicked the one in the middle, and a new screen appeared.

What would you like to name the planet?

I let out a dreamy sigh as I quickly racked through another list of names in my head. Perhaps it was time I paid homage to one of the sci-fi universes I made growing up. It was a special piece to me. One that I spent years laboring over as a child. Maybe with this new power, I might craft something just like it and turn my dreams into a reality. I quickly typed the name ‘Ouradia’ in and the screen faded away when I accepted the option.

"Now, before we create life, would you like to customize the planetary system?" Helios' deep voice tore me from my thoughts as I turned to look at him.

"What do you mean by customizing the planetary system?" I chuckled nervously, and rubbed the back of my head. While I was more or less stumbling my way through all of this, I still had no clue what I was doing.

He chuckled and waved his hand dismissively. “Just think about bringing up the creative menu."

I closed my eyes and envisioned a creative screen appearing, and upon opening my eyes, I saw a new menu. On this screen was a list of different options for customizing at different layers. The first significant layer was customization at planetary level.”

Planetary Customization

Satellite Creation

Planetary Merger

Orbital Realignment

Star transfusion

*Note* All manual options cost creation mana. Any functions done automatically require Creation Points.

"Helios, what’s creation mana?" I asked as I took stock of the screen and all the differing options. At this level alone, I could sculpt this system like play-doh like some kind of god.

"Creation mana is the game type variant of the fundamental forces that compose the universe." He told me as he sat against the wall and let out a yawn. Poor guy must be exhausted. It has been a long day for him, after all. One isn’t simply just born and gets to work after all.

I nodded my head in understanding. So essentially everything I learned in science class, from gravity to nuclear forces, compressed into one. That seemed a little mind-boggling, but honestly, at this point in my life, what wasn’t? It made me wonder what this system really was, and how did it have such fine control over reality? "Where can I access the bar that shows it?"

"Just tell the system to turn your HUD on. It should show everything, my lord."

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I mentally told the system to activate, and four bars appeared on the lower left-hand side of my vision. One was red signifying health, the other was green, showing my current stamina, and under that was my current mana, which glowed a faint blue. The final was a radiant yellow that was currently full. "Can we get any closer than we are now?"

Helios nodded his head. "Just imagine where you wish to go, and the structure will move according to your will."

I closed my eyes and imagined us floating above the third planet .When I opened them. The first thing I saw was a single large landmass encompassing my view. There were faint shades of green and specks of blue covering the planet’s landmass. There was also brown, and gray, and brilliant white as well. That didn't even mention the giant sea that circled around the rest of the planet. There were just so many colors it made my heart ache in wonder. Was this what it felt like as an astronaut who stood on the international space station?

Like a child, I pressed against the glass, staring at the planet. Suddenly my hands fell through, and I felt the cold outside of space kissing my flesh. After a moment of me being frozen, my curiosity won out, and I pressed the rest of my body through. All around me space stretched into infinity. Stars glimmered in the depths, and darkness filled the void in between. I turned to look at the structure I had just came out of, only to realize it had vanished. But I wasn’t worried. Here it felt like I was at home. So, I floated through the depths of space, unbothered by the lack of air.

I summoned my ever present screen into view and went through my creative screen. I didn’t want to screw with too much, so for now, I just selected the All-Seeing Eye option. That way, I could experience my entire planetary system. My vision lit up, showing me the orbits of the. Planets and a grid that was shifting as each planet moved..Numbers quickly ran through my view as trajectories were continually updated in real-time. I could see temperatures fluctuate on each planet, and that included the star and the steady hum of space. That didn’t even include the ambient heat of the planets, the micro collisions of particles that I couldn’t even see.

There was so much information coming in at the same time that I had to close my eyes as I felt the start of a headache coming in. As I felt the rays of light from the star bombard my flesh, and I basked in the glow for a few moments. The energy that came from the rays of light filled me with energy and helped me center my mind. In fact, it made me feel like I had just eaten a full meal. Was that my species passive coming into play here?

Once I felt better, I shifted my gaze back to my menu and looked through my options. Since I wanted to claim this planet, I wanted to spruce it up. For starters, I wanted to add rings! Why you may ask, well, why not? Rings were cool, and they added a sense of mystery to whatever they were attached to. But the question was, how?

I glanced at my creative menu and clicked planetary customization first and looked through the options.

Shatter

Drag

Pause

Mold

Flatten

Dig

The options here seemed bland, but very useful. I touched each option to get a better understanding of what each meant. Shatter was, as the name meant, a planet shattering option. Drag would move the continents around as I saw fit. Pause would stop the flow of time inside and around the planet, effectively freezing everything.

Mold would let me shape the planet's surface as I so desired, and flatten would let me destroy mountains and make everything level. The last and final option was dig and, as the name implied, it would let me dig into the planets. It would be all I ever needed at the moment.

But at the moment, that isn’t what I wanted to do just yet. So, I clicked on the satellite option and went through that. It had all the same functions. But there were a few new functions here as well!

Creation

Destruction

Ring Formation

The first two were pretty self explanatory, so I didn’t really need to do anything with that. In fact, the third one was too, and that was exactly what I wanted! With no hesitation, I selected the option.

Using this function will cost 15% of your creation mana. Do you accept the cost?

I selected yes and nothing happened at first. But then a brilliant yellow ray of energy encased the planet and shot into the depths of space. It fragmented into thousands of smaller rays that encased the solar system before quickly receding like a whirlpool.

A dust cloud followed it back in around the planet like fog, and the yellow energy sucked it around the planet’s central line. The entire process took only five minutes, and once it was done, five distinct rings adorned my planet like a halo. The entire time, I sat there in wonder as I watched something that would take lifetimes on earth happen in a literal blink of the eye.