October 19, 2022
Day 0
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The emergence of the pillar immediately led to the leadership setting up a war room again. Rahul, like everyone else, was very exhausted and quite content sitting with his team, but Daniel called him over.
Once Rahul was close, Mark, looking in his direction, enthusiastically said.
“Come on here Rahul. It won’t be an exaggeration to say that we are all standing here on our own two feet only because you spotted the island, and then took initiative and stepped up at the right time. You too Daniel. Excellent work organizing such a massive operation in a completely unknown domain. We are all safe and sound and have got a title or two, which I’m sure will be helpful in the future, even if I don’t understand much of what it says. Daniel got a third title as a nod of acknowledgment from the system itself for carrying 168 people. "
Mark concluded, "In that vein, we all thought it was a good idea to keep up with our existing customs and to publicly reward accomplishments. A familiar ceremony will go a long way to soothe everyone’s nerves too. “
That done, Daniel patted Rahul on his back, and the entire leadership group started moving to where everyone else was idling around, getting a well-earned rest. Seeing something was up, all eyes moved towards them, and Mark started speaking again.
“A lot of you already know how we ended up here on this island, but some may be disoriented and missing a few details. We will soon go over the events of today and fill in the blanks. "
Taking a pause, Mark continued "But before that, let's keep up our tradition of recognizing our peers who did exceptional work. Let’s all give kudos to Rahul and Daniel. Cometh the hour, cometh the men. Today was the day of these two men who rose to the occasion and did a commendable job, not stopping till they got us all to safety. If not for them, we might still be literally floating in the air somewhere.”
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Half an hour later, Rahul was by himself again. He did not expect any cheer and applause from the haggard and exhausted group, but he got it nonetheless. He felt that this was all too much. While Daniel showed great expertise and skill in navigating everyone to the island, Rahul was more or less just awake and looking out of the window at the right time.
However, he knew all this was, as much for everyone else's benefit as his own. The choice of words ‘got us all to safety’ was quite deliberate too, emphasizing to everyone that they were now safe. Rahul noticed that the very act of cheering and celebrating had done wonders, and he even noticed a few smiles around their temporary camp.
Not that people forgot that the world as they knew it was no more. Some had gotten back to having small talk about the weather or sports, but it was just a flimsy facade. The worries and uncertainties were still there, but that little act of celebration had put everyone just a bit more at ease.
Rahul had barely relaxed with his team for an hour before the leadership met again and dealt with the bastion.
Yes, he was invited to the leadership discussions now. Apparently, not sleeping during the flight and noticing that island had gotten Rahul a seat at the table with the big boys. Well, not the actual big boys, no one here was a high-level executive or part of the actual leadership of the company. They were all either direct people managers or middle management. Still, for Rahul who just graduated college a few years back, this was not the crowd he pictured himself sitting with. At least not this soon.
When the ‘meeting’ convened, it was a guy named Frank who spoke. Rahul did not recognize him.
“The moment I first saw the prompt, I got a strong video game vibe from it. Every subsequent event continued to further confirm my suspicions. With the titles awarded to us giving percentage modifiers to our abilities, I’m all but certain of it. The system may not be a game AI or server, and we are likely not inside some game universe. "
Getting a few nods, he continued.
"Still, I believe treating the system as an omnipotent game AI and our life as a perma-death game is a reductionist model we should adopt for now. It'll turn the otherworldly concept of the system and integration into something familiar. It’ll mean our life is still governed by rules and procedures, ones that we don’t know yet, but that exist and will likely be revealed to us slowly. And if there is any order to the situation, we can work with the variables and optimize them towards the best outcome.”
This monologue was followed by a short discussion, and in typical corporate style, a lot of conversation happened with nothing truly being said. In the end, everyone was on the same page, and the conversation moved forward. Frank took the lead again.
“Since we are all stranded on an island and our fates are tied together, it’ll be best if, at least for now, we make our choices in the interest of the collective rather than the individual. Particularly, if the game-like trend continues, people will need to specialize in one direction or the other. There will be combat and its subpaths, as well as non-combat ones. I doubt that something related to technology will be available as a path right away, but even if it is, all of us going that way will probably have us starving or maimed in a few days, depending on what challenges the tutorial throws at us."
That led to some murmurs, and Frank quickly added.
"I know no one here wants to take away the freedom of choice from anyone. Still, we will need a way to ensure that we end up with a well-balanced settlement here on the island. I don't know exactly how it should be done, but I strongly believe it needs to be done. Particularly since we don’t know how long we’ll be here.”
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This was followed by a discussion that was a lot longer and quite heated. Even the idea of coercion was abhorrent to many, and eventually, it was decided that a gentle nudge may be given, but people will make their own choices. While Rahul was happy to see he was surrounded by morally upstanding people, he wondered how much like a game their lives were going to be.
If their life truly was going to be like an RPG, the path to leveling up would be littered with corpses. He could only hope that they were corpses of wild beasts. The thought made him shudder, but he steeled himself. While the effort to remain logical and rational ensured people didn't descend into a frenzy, everyone knew they weren't ready to handle whatever was coming. Rahul resolved to mentally prepare himself for the future, horrible as it may be.
After much discussion, which took what felt like forever, the final topic came up.
What to do about the bastion and the impending election of a representative. Since no one knew what kind of mechanic will be there for an election, it was decided that a consensus be sought even before claiming the bastion. People seemed afraid they might be pitted against each other if there was a divergence of opinion. So, the leadership agreed on proposing Mark as the representative and took the discussion to everyone else. It didn’t take long to reach a unanimous agreement, the pilot, air hostesses, and the other passengers included.
With all that done, Mark went to the bastion, and touched the top of the pillar. He stayed unmoving for a few seconds, and then Rahul, along with every other human on the island, got a prompt.
System Message
Mark Payne has petitioned to be representative of the Laysan Bastion. If elected, he will have the right to govern this bastion and choose a council to assist him. The representative along with his council will have absolute powers, including but not limited to - making decisions on behalf of the settlement, passing laws, and exiling anyone at will. At the same time, as your representative grows, your bastion will grow with him, acquiring traits and special bonuses. This is an important decision, choose wisely.
Accept Mark Payne as the representative of Laysan Bastion
Contest his petition to become the representative of Laysan Bastion
Refuse to align with the Laysan Bastion
The election of a representative turned out to be a decision of much more consequence than Rahul anticipated. Mark really was the best person for the job, and while Rahul had earlier felt the whole exercise of getting a consensus was unnecessary, he now felt happy that they did it. He didn’t know what would have happened if the pilot or someone else felt blindsided. Probably, it’d have just been a vote, but Rahul was glad he didn’t have to find out. Overall, he felt satisfied with the entire turn of events, and soon received a prompt.
System Message
Congratulations, you have aligned yourself with the Layson Bastion, and your chosen representative Mark Payne has been elected unopposed. Please wait for the tutorial to commence for further instructions.
Do you wish to check the settlement bonuses?
Yes, Rahul thought.
Settlement Bonuses
Expanded settlement domain III - A 1000 km radius around your island is devoid of human settlements.
+300% to settlement domain.
Dungeon Spawn II - Your settlement domain contains a moderate size underwater cavern.
0.2% yearly chance of a system dungeon spawning in the cavern.
Amphibious IV - 99.9999% non aerial volume of your settlement domain is water.
+40% cost to all land development.
-40% cost to all water development.
Rahul did not know how to feel about the bonuses. The expanded settlement domain was likely good, though Rahul had no idea what benefits the domain gave. The dungeon spawn might be incredibly good if it provided something equivalent to grinding and power-leveling spots in games, but with just a 0.2% chance, it wasn’t something to think much about.
Amphibious IV provided the most tangible bonuses, but at least in the short run, would probably be a burden rather than an asset. If there was a system store where some kind of magic points could be spent for buildings and other necessities, then the 40% extra cost would hurt. However, Rahul could see the insane long-term benefit of a 40% discount if it applied to ships, docks, and other useful assets.
The 99.9999% figure made Rahul wonder just how large the domain is. The land being only 0.0001% of the volume meant the total volume of the domain was a million times more than the land volume. That number was just too baffling to process, so he set that thought aside for later consideration.
Eventually, Rahul saw Daniel approaching, who asked him to think about getting a “Settlement overview”. Rahul tried, and a prompt appeared
Settlement Overview
Settlement Name
Settlement population
168/1000
Bastion
Laysan Bastion
Unique bastion bonus
Allows any humans within the domain of the colocated settlement to drink salt water without any adverse effects
Settlement bonuses
Expanded settlement domain III, Dungeon Spawn II, Amphibious IV
Settlement domain highlights
Unnamed inland hypersaline lake, unnamed cavern, unnamed coral reef formation
Other bastions within settlement domain
1 avian bastion, 2 shallow water bastions, 23 deep sea bastions
There was a lot to unpack here. Firstly, it looked like a settlement and bastion were different entities, though in this case, they were co-located. Perhaps settlements could be created without any associated bastions too.
Secondly, the elephant in the room everyone had avoided so far, the question of fresh water, was taken care of by the system. It seemed like quite an overpowered bonus to Rahul, but also one that was necessary if anyone were to survive.
Finally, as Rahul had somewhat expected, there were bastions created for all kinds of life on Earth. Instinct must have driven the animals towards those bastions, and many would survive. Noticing how much assistance the system had provided so far, Rahul started questioning his former morbid thoughts.
He couldn’t help but wonder, to hope. Is the system more akin to a benevolent God than a ruthless ringmaster?
Time would crush that hope quite thoroughly.