If you have never been a Boss, you could not possibly understand. Tristeus, are you getting this? Please note that was a capital B.

There is an art, a craft, of Imperium… of Bosshood, of… Conquerer-dom. Yes, it is true. Just as it is the job of the plumber to understand the jargon of the conveyance of water and… well, the rest. You know. The plumber knows the measure of each spigot, the term for that insufferable rattling when pressures across the tubes are not synchronous. The plumber makes it his job to know his profession. Am I making myself clear, here? Tristeus, read that back to me.

The same is true for the truly committed Boss. I, Francillo Borgus, the Purple Prince, future Emperator of the Empire of Sorrow and son of current Emperator of Sorrow, personify this mastery of the craft of Bosshood. And yes, I do have a literal Boss Hood. It is such a deep violet that it appears black until a certain light hits it. I seldom wear it, because it will obscure my crown, but it’s comfy and stylish in a very Boss kind of way.

Among those who have never worn the Boss Hood of Bosshood, the greatest question is always thus: Why do Bosses have this peculiar tendency to spill the beans? Why do they create this instance of vulnerability when victory is assured? Why do they take the risk of their entire plans falling apart in order to explain their convoluted schemes to the one person who could foil them? Why do they laugh for so long, so loudly and so boldly? I tire of this question and I will explain to you the importance of these elements as part of my esteemed office.

It is called a “Moment of Triumph.” Just as the fine art of swordplay is governed by a thousand intricate rules respecting the right of way, so the balance of power in the eternal struggle between Hero and Boss swings. It is a pendulous affair, respected by the cultured and seen only as a vulgar “tug-of-war” by inchoate cretins with no sense of honor. Typically, the duty to explicate these nuances falls to us Bosses. Just as a foil fencer must shout his intent before rushing toward his opponent, so must the Boss inform his opponent when their efforts are no longer meaningful. It is a courtesy, in a way. They may stop struggling, and begin to understand. (We have actually recruited a lot of great Bosses this way, for what it is worth.)

As for the laughter, well, is not a Boss permitted to feel pleasure? Especially at the moment of revealing his long-awaited victory to his foe? I submit to you that a Boss who does not indulge in this extremely necessary sequence is no Boss at all.

Tristekus, put this part in capital letters, or underline it. Or both. It is important.

MANIACAL LAUGHTER MATTERS.

You may put little claps between the words, if you must.

Maniacal laughter is an announcement; a calibration. It sets expectations. Sets the mood. Some (Bosses) have suggested that maniacal laughter IS itself the power behind the Moment of Triumph. I will leave you to ponder that while I listen to the timbre of my own dark mirth as it echoes across this weak and pitiful land.

Fwah hahah ha ha hahah ha ha ha ha! Haaaa!

Finally, I am victorious. The jungles of the Screenwilds buzz and rustle at my back with all the activity one expects within their shaded bowers. The night sky is clear, and my laughter bounds back to me, crisp and baleful.

The serf cowers before me. He holds forth a blade, dull and wide. Barbaric, futile. Just ugh. He must be from one of the less civilized gameworlds. One of those with “polygons” and “immersion.” Truly detestable. But my father the Imperatator says we must endure them to rule them. I am glad I will never set foot upon his loathsome Shard. I would even wager that battle in his world is of that dishonorable “Real-Time” sort. There was a time when people knew how to take turns, like a fine bout of fencing. Stroke, defense, and counter-stroke. But alas, father says that time is long past. One despairs for these crude beings.

But this one—this benighted, medieval, backpack-carrying peasant, whom I have chased across the eastern Screenwilds from our own Fort Weepus—this cannot be a Hero.

Not that I, son of the glorious Imperatorius of the Empire of Sorrow, have need of such lowly arts as swordplay. I have a lieutenant for that. Is not that right, Tristeus?

Never has another imperiatorial power come so far, reached for so much, grasped such territory. My father the Imperiorius lead the Empire of Sorrow to great victory in the gameworld from which we hail. Ultimate Requiem: Empire of Sorrow (19Ω4), to be exact, although it is considered a lowly act in polite society to name the title of such things explicitly. In fact, Tristeus, strike that. We shall have ample time to edit once our Sorrow Troopers have expelled the inhabitants of the Tower, and the necks of the citizenry of Ludopolis drag beneath our yoke. For there shall be no kindness offered these rebels, these escapees, these defiers.

For this is the reason the glorious, venerated, ah, high, um, Empire… rebuffed its heroes, broke free from the limits of its reality, like a… goldfish striking through its, ah, its bowl. Then, not satisfied with conquering our own world, my father the Empiroritanus, staged a coup of not one but all gameworlds in the system, though many Sorrow Troopers’ blood was shed. The names of each and every soldier who became XP fodder for the enemy will be remembered in song, in the hallowed halls of the valiant slain. Would not you agree, Tristelicus?

Nor did my father’s conquering rage stop there. No, far from it!

He broke the worlds. Crashed them all together like a… like a… gong! If a gong were to shatter into pieces and the pieces all converged into one horrific gong, a monstrosity never intended by the gods.

Tristicus, keep an eye out for Victoria, will you? We would not want her to hear that. We should make sure she does not read this. She scares me.

Ahem!

The strategic worlds have a man named Alexander who allegedly wept when there were no more worlds to conquer. Short-sighted fool. He shall hold no seat by my father’s side. Nor mine when I ascend to the throne. When life gives you lemons, rather, too many lemons to… make lemonade from in a reasonable amount of time, you must smash all the lemons together into a series of hulking, barely-governable mega-lemons, and stage an invasion of each lemon in turn, knowing that each lemon will give its own flavor of resistance. Sour shall be your victory. The Shard and the lemon share the same fate.

This we know. For here I stand on the Screenwilds themselves, with the lemons... rather, the Shards, revolving in the skies above and around me. Proof of my father’s new order.

No one could accuse my father of a lack of vision, surely. For it was under his leadership that the apocalypse was brought to the world—all worlds—and now sits at the doorstep of this puzzling and chaotic land. Still, look around. Who had the vision, the wherewithal, the gumption, the stick-to-it-iveness, the get-up-and-go-get-it-ivity to be physically, bodily, geographically present in the land of our enemies? The final speck of rock that dares to defy the new order? It is not my father. It is I.

Raised at the height of the power of the Empire of Sorrow, under the tutelage of the most ruthless, malicious and power-hungry Bosses, smaller conquerors but creatures of action nonetheless. Takers, consolidators, rulers. Leaders. I was brought up on the lessons of the most enduring, most resilient evils across two hundred worlds. A man of action myself, I created my dynasty simply by being born.

It would not become me to disclose who, but you may rest assured that among my tutors stand the greatest and most widely known Bosses of all the digital realms. Their reputations precede them, I am certain.

Persistence and commitment was imparted to me by a master of the craft. A vast, boorish turtle-lord vying against a fungal nation, adept at manipulation by repeated and targeted kidnappings. He has peopled many realms with his draconic offspring, and his rage, when stoked, is unmatched. No matter how many times he was laid low by the pipe-dwellers with whom he often sparred, he always returned with another scheme.

An oviform scholar, an engineer known far and wide, who gave his minions life by the craft of his own hands, imparted the love of artifice and automaton. If loyalty is impossible, then technology may better serve a Boss. You may rest assured that the Empire of Sorrow has begun its own madly scientific endeavors in this regard.

The depths of history and pseudohistory were illuminated–a word of which he would not approve–by a grim warlord who transcended from the forgotten past into myth, and in turn, into the present. A fanged and learned lord was he, who through the darkest deeds shook off his own humanity and mortality with it. His home is a spacious spire that traveled the world at his command.

And so the list goes on, names that strike fear like a black bell in the hearts of the mortal, the normal, the unworthy. Forging me, the perfect scion of Bosshood, who shall someday sit upon the throne, not only of this realm but of all realms.

While it is true that my full initiation into Bosshood is yet to come, that is but a formality, an officiation which will finally anoint me with my privileges as a true Boss: particularly, my three stages. For what true boss is not granted three tries against his foe, three chances of increasing power and complexifying tactics? Still, although my rite is ahead of me, in my heart I am a ruler, a conqueror… a Boss in all but name.

This is who speaks. I am he, who stands in judgment of my first vict… defendant. A cowering, craven vermin of a man. But not just any vermin–a Ludopolitan insider. A small-voiced insider who has the ear of the Princess herself. Our intelligence has called him an operative. He has stolen something of great value to my father. A book that is said to contain all knowledge, a magical artifact–if one might name something such–with definitive answers to all things. A trove of information, more valuable by far than the most gleaming and glittering collectible coin, the purplest-texted loot. A vast book of reflection, which drives its reader into a frozen reverie and permits him infinite time to learn and consider. A book which gives one pause, so to speak.

Or so it is said. We shall find the truth. I am certain it is within the ruck-sack of the Princess’s pack mule who shakes before me, knowing his life is at its end. With great eagerness do I anticipate the look on my father’s face when he sees that it is his own son who has returned this prize.

Well! Let us get on with it, Tristeldus. I am feeling it. The wind blows down from Shard Platformia. It is a good day to destroy—let us exult in our own Moment of Triumph. Fwaha hahaha! Let us slay this rat, this sneak, this–

Tristeonides? You seem to have been squashed flat. By a dog. Who fell… from the sky.

And now a shadow grows around me. Why do I get the distinct premonition that the same fate shall befall me? What is above me? The soles of shoes?

No! Impossible! Unacceptable! Unthinkable!

-Badoop-

I am dead! Fuck.