Prologue – A Joke called Creation
“Mercer.”
My eyelids felt heavy as I forced them open. I turned my head about as I tried to clear my head, but felt pain in my neck and the back of my head.
“Mercer.”
I turned my head towards the voice. I couldn’t see anything past a light that was being shone in my eyes. I blinked against it, my eyes attempting to adjust, but adjusting unsuccessfully.
“I’ve waited Mercer, I wanted you to be awake for your execution. So that you could look into the eyes of the people who shot you. It’ll be good practice for the young cadets, get them used to killing people. Killing war criminals won’t prepare them completely, but it’s better than nothing. Don’t you agree Mercer?”
I didn’t give him the pleasure of a reply. I’m no war criminal and I refuse to inadvertently admit to that by replying to him. This bastard, I learned his name was Howard Guldo. This bastard. I’m not a killer, but I’d kill him if I got the chance.
I saved humanity from it destruction. The Arruana an alien race we’d picked a fight with. Because of course we would. Was going to destroy us, they had us back into a corner. Uthals 9, was one of the last 19 human colonies on their list. I grew up there, my parents lived in a retirement home there. So when the Arruana came to our system to wipe us from the face of the galaxy, I stuck a deal. I had something they wanted, access to our entire species combined knowledge. I gave them access to our empires information network. They set up a base on the planet and with that they pretty much ensured that they won. What I didn’t expect was that the remnants of the United Republic of Humanity (UROH) would track me down.
I’ve been tortured, mentally and physically. They’ve broken me over and over. I’ve told them everything I learned about the Arruana. Anything they shared with me the UROH now know it. You might think me weak for spilling the beans. But when most sickness and injuries can be healed without any consequences. Torture gets even more creative.
I struggled uselessly against my bond as I had so many times before. I didn’t even know how long I’d been here, it feels like a long time. It must be a long time. They’re going to kill me. There’s nothing I can do about that. They’re gonna take me out to the firing range and use me for target practice. I’m dead, so dead. I saved our species, but I’m going to die now. Shit.
“Take him to the firing grounds.”
They grabbed me and dragged me to my feet. I was carried through a dark hall and then out into the light. My eyes stung as I blinked against the light, but now my eyes adjusted and I was outside. I didn’t want to go. No I can’t go out there. I can’t die!
“No… No, No, No… please… no…” I begged them, tears blurring my vision.
They ignored me and brought me to a pole sticking out of the ground and linked my restraints to it. The two men that dragged me out of my cell walked away. One lagged behind however.
“Bark Mercer, call for your pretty alien friends now.” Before spitting at the ground by my feet.
When they’d cleared the firing range of everyone but me. A man to the side of the firing squad that was already standing in. He began shouting my charges.
“Daniel Mercer. To be killed by firing squad for 13 accounts of murder. And Treason against the United Republic of Humanity.”
“I did what I had to. To save humanity. These people, the Arruana they didn’t want to destroy us. But you forced their hands!” I yelled back at him, unable to restrain my anger.
“Shut up! We’ve heard enough of your treasonous speech Mercer.” One of the men that dragged me to the polls yelled back, spitting on the ground in my direction.
After that there was little pause as the commanding officer shouted.
“FIRE!”
Coil rifles fired and my life ended, just like that. My last view was of the Arruana Galaxy ship Berthath. High in the sky as it entered the planets lower atmosphere behind them. In all its colossal planet cracking glory. They didn’t notice and the rifles fired. I’d thought things would fade into blackness, nothingness. But that’s not what happened at all, instead, I was blinded by a light. Most likely the planet exploding.
The light blinded me, it drew closer until the only thing visible was white. Symbols flashed through my vision. They flashed by fast I couldn’t make sense of them. When I began to feel I had some understand of them a burning pain spread through my body. I fell on my side and clutched myself. Attempting to brace against the pain but it didn’t help. The pain subsided soon enough. Getting back to my feet I brought my hands up before my face. They had turned grey and insubstantial. It was hard to recognise them as my hands anymore.
A jingle played and a transparent screen appeared before my eyes. It flicked for a time before displaying,
‘Welcome dear soul of the deceived. Please stand by.’
I waited, not that I had a choice.
The jingle played again and the screen changed.
‘Thank you for waiting. The reviewing process has been completed.’
The screen changed again.
‘Congratulations you have been awarded with the position of ‘Creator’. Oh good, god wannabe. At least you didn’t become one of those cretin gods. Though it’s not like that’s possible. Besides I hate those… things?’
The screen flickered and changed again.
‘I’m you by the by. You if you were let in on the big joke we call creation. So I’m kind of not you as well, it’s hard to explain. You can think of me as your manager. I sell you to all creation in the form of quantifying your currently minuscule existence. Doing so in an orderly stats screen so that it’s easy for your tiny brain. As well as the tiny brains of other equally tiny brained people to understand. I’m a pretty cool guy right?’
Not really? I thought to myself, needless to say confused by this entire happening.
The screen disappeared for a moment and then reappeared.
‘Speak the words ‘Personal Space’. Do so to enter your only personal little plane of existence that’s just for you and no one else.’
Still somewhat over whelmed I just did as it said.
“Personal Space”
As soon as I spoke the words I felt a powerful lurching that made me feel sick. I felt a feeling of motion that didn’t match what I was seeing. As the endless white didn’t give anything away. Then it felt like I stopped and my stomach flip-flopped. Which sent me dry heaving. Around me a room constructed itself from the white like a panel that was flipping over. To reveal that on the other side all along something was actually there. Which I couldn’t tell whether was actually the fact of the matter. Because it’s hard to tell what’s what when everything is a flat white as far as the eye can see.
I looked around to find that I was standing in the middle of my room back home on Uthals 9. The planet I grew up on. To be exact it looked exactly like my room in my parent’s house 20 years ago. Back when I was just some adolescent teen that felt he had a bleak future. A future that would mean little to nothing. Funny that I ended up being a wanted criminal for doing business with the enemy. In doing so I somehow convinced them that not all humans should be destroyed. Funny again on top of that how many problems are solved. Just by getting to know someone and speaking the same language always helps.
One thing I noticed that was out-of-place for being my room. Was that outside the window there was nothing but whiteness. Great a room with a view, just what I always wanted.
‘Welcome to your Personal Space dear Creator. I tried to make it feel like home, once again, I’m pretty great.’
The screen popped up in front of my face again and then quickly flickered. Changing the text.
‘You can access anything you need at your Personal Terminal. Extra-net, Inner/Outer-Channels, My World, Idea’s, Myself, Storage, Skill list, Transit, Options. And so on.’
The screen flicked again and for what seems like the last time. Though I’m not sure.
‘You can bring up your Options Menu by speaking ‘Open Menu’. It’s filled with lots of useful things. like your inventory, stats screen, and equipped skills. As well as the Remote World Access Menu or RWAM. I like to call it the RWHAM!!! But that’s just me. There are books in your inventory. Read up, learn about how you’ll need to live, or at least exist from now on. Good luck and don’t you dare thank anyone for all the fish on me. I’ll get angry.’
My mind was a muddled complex of confusion and suspicion. This is all so strange and impossible. There shouldn’t be any species capable of something like what I’ve seen so far. At least not in explored space.
I looked around my room from my childhood. It was 1.6 meters wide, 3.9 meters long and the ceiling extended up to 2.1 meters high. Compact, but more spacious than what most people had. Considering that most people’s houses on Uthals 9 where this size. Yet this was only one room of a three bedrooms, one living room, one kitchen, one toilet, family house. So it’s not an exaggeration to say my family was rich. At least compared to 40% of the population on Uthals 9. On the left of the door to my room was my bed, more of a bench really, but it went into the wall a bit. So there was plenty room to lay down, just don’t move around in your sleep. Or find something to strap yourself into the bed with with you roll around in your sleep. At the end of my room in front of the window that took but the whole of the 1.6 meter wide wall. On the other end of my room from the door. The window extended all the way up to the ceiling. But there was a half meter tall kind of fence at the bottom of the window by the ground. So I could lay on the floor and not be seen from the next building over. Then again I don’t need to worry about being seen changing by someone in the building across from mine. Because there just isn’t one now. Just the eerie, unsettling whiteness. Above and below my bed are storage areas, for clothes and other knickknacks. Of course they were empty.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
The first thing I did was sit down and open my menu, go into my inventory and read those books. I say those books, but actually it was only a single book titled ‘A joke called Creation’.
The first thing it explained was generally ways of earning MaP and what MaP was. MaP or Matter Pieces, was the currency in the boundless space of existence that creators. Pretty much anything that lives there. This boundless space often being called Infinite Space. MaP is not just a currency, it’s also the building blocks of everything according to the book. Not sure I believe it, but it’s essentially a cube made out of god particles on steroids. At least that’s the closest example I can imagine up. Because I have no idea and they don’t go into detail. Almost like I’m supposed to know this already.
I flicked through to the part of the book that mentioned various ways of earning MaP. Selling Idea’s was one thing. An idea essentially being the blueprint for something you made. Like a tree, or a rock, or a creature. An idea can be pretty much anything, like gravity. Of course you start with several Idea’s. They are defaults carried over from the world you came from. While reading this section I sat down on my bed and realized my old crummy laptop. From when I was a kid sat at the head of my bed on the pillow. I picked up my computer and turned it on. The words “Personal Space” showed up on the screen for a moment before changing to a desktop. My default ideas were things like. Gravity, Soil, Water, Air, Sky, Clouds, Sun, Moon, Stars, Various plants. As well as Various Periodic elements and so on. There were a lot of them. A lot of which I didn’t understand what they were because they were either too abstract or just didn’t elaborate. Most Ideas were labelled “Various things”. Without any further explanation of what those various things might be.
Another way of earning MaP is to sell produce from your world. Also having sentient creatures on your world will generate MaP. Generally MaP generated by sentient creatures has various spikes in the amount you receive. For example when they gather and create civilizations and big events occur. Like the end of a war, or the invention of something new. There is generally a payout equal to how major that event was to their civilization. It’s also possible to earn MaP by having someone act as your representative. These representatives are called a Creator’s Hero. MaP is earned on how well a Creators subconscious evaluated their Hero’s progress. Things like fulfilling given missions and doing tasks. A side note in the book about Hero’s says that a Hero. While hired and on the job, can ask changes to be made to the world. If the Creator approves this change then the cost will be calculated. The required MaP will be displayed to the Hero for them to agree upon the estimated cost. The Hero must then reimburse the Creator that amount. Working for free until it is payed off. There were some examples of earning MaP. But I skipped them because I didn’t feel I needed to know that at the moment. I could come back to this if I end up having trouble earning income.
Reading further I found examples of costs. For making your world and making changes in your world. The creation of a world costs 1000MaP and takes 10million years. There are ways to speed that up, but an example of speeding up the materialization. One I found said, “Creating anything other than gases and light in a short amount of time increases the cost exponentially. Creating one gram of iron in one-hundred and twenty seconds costs 37800000MaP. The cost increases exponentially again each second you further reduce the materialization time by 1294%.”
It listed the equation for calculation the cost of materializing matter. It was something like, 1 gram = material value x Amount x Speed tax x Universal Fine. So 1 gram of Iron in one-hundred and twenty seconds was, 9 x 0.01 x 10000000 x 42.
I thought about writing these number down somewhere because it seemed the cost wasn’t situational. But then decided not to bother. Generally I decided that materializing something instantly was probably a big no. Or at least a bad idea. Since I was curious I used my computers calculator to check how much it would cost to make 1 metric ton of iron instantly. 58695840000000000MaP was my answer, the more you know?
I then stumbled on a brief listing of Creator Ranks. Ranks being, G, G+, F-, F, F+, E-, E, E+, D-, D, D+, C-, C, C+, B-, B, B+, A-, A, A+, S-, S, S+, SS-, SS, SS+, SS++, SSS-, SSS, SSS+, SSS++ and SSS+++. Not to mention that the book hinted of further ranks that weren’t listed. The book said that a SSS+++ rank Creator was as powerful as a lesser god. Though I’m not exactly sure what that actually means.
After reading through the book. I realized that it spoke about things I could do ‘latter’. But nothing much I could do now. The book commented on a lot of things that Creators are capable of and their limitations. It also stated with a great deal of contempt. That Creators were abominable creatures that bent the multiverse to their sick will and did as they liked. There was an entire chapter on it. I mostly skipped over that chapter.
I opened my menu and took note that I have 1000MaP. I opened the My World program on my computer. I found that with that much I could have the basics of a world created in a "short" period of 10million years. Oh joy.
It was good that the book mentioned that the Creators, being higher beings. Are creatures separate from the standard branching paths of time that most creatures are bound to. A Creator has a linear time-line that can move to any point in the standard timeline. So I could begin the world materializing now and just skip forwards. The My World window had a time-line tab that I could bring up and skip to or come back to any point on that time-line. There was also I note that while a Creator has a Hero employed. On their world they lose control of the time-line and can’t skip forwards or go backwards. I clicked the help prompt and it also states that once I Hero’s job is complete. Be it a failure or success, the Creator can no long go back on the time-line to a time before that point. Unless the Hero is a resident of that world. Because of this a Creator will generally push to have their employed Hero be born in the world. As well as stay there until their mortal avatar dies of old age. This Normalizes the World Time-line and keeps it unmolested from a foreign entities time-line.
So technically. While working as a Hero it’s possible to run into yourself. But at any other time it’s impossible.
I spent the 1000MaP I’d started out with and began materialization of my world. I would have waited but then again that would be stupid. So I skipped ahead 10million years. The overview of my world went from nothing but darkness. To various gases and minerals floating in space to a rough glowing red ball of molten minerals. After a few moments it cooled and water formed on the entire surface.
Then everything stopped and the user interface indicated that it was back in real-time. A sea planet, nice. It seems if I want land I’ll have to add that in manually. One thing that concerned me though was that parts of the sea were still boiling. So I guess I have to deal with that manually as well.
None the less I couldn’t do anything more with this without more MaP…
I guess that means it’s time to look for work.
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Authors Notes,
Hey it's Arukorstza.
I figured I'd release the prologue early since it's short and I'm going to need some more time on Chapter one since I changed some things again. But yeah I hope you enjoyed the chapter.