Forging was one thing. Another thing was staying focused while an annoyed U.I. kept breathing down my neck. Especially one you know has about a thousand reasons to kill you. But sadly can't.
That was me. Barely able to get a seed of concentration as I unraveled the mystery that was world birth.
What had the devs hidden in this game? With the boy behind me, I was certainly more than sure that this game was worth every ounce of my minute.
Plus with him around I could get accustomed to males without the terrors or jitters. Only then would I let him off.
'A solid plan'
As a U.I. he most definitely could cooperate. He had to cooperate if he intended to be kept secret. In his story, I had grasped the part of the success but what I hadn't understood was the race for U.I creation when it was already done by the game company. Unless he was a secret.
This would explain Creator Online's closed lips and hush behavior about their game.
Probably.
But, it didn't explain one thing though. Who permanently puts themselves into a game? Was he paid or one of those tired-of-humanity folks? I mean I thought that way a lot but a game, seriously.
My head shook at regular intervals while sneaking peeks at the still-silent embodiment of unacceptance and anger behind me. His eyes were unmoving as I watched his gears spin from the various ideas he was manifesting to end me.
I took my mind off him and focused on the game. I still had a mission to finish and pretty boy wasn't going anywhere.
[WELCOME TO THE SPOT]
[INPUT WORLD CORE]
A large beam of light rose from one of the various crystals on the ground. It created a myriad of colors just like the key that brought me here. The core left my grasp the moment I brought it out. I had forgotten all about it with the Cole incident.
I watched the Core float into the light getting submerged till it was out of sight.
[CORE SCANNING]
[DAMAGED CORE RECEIVED]
[PURIFY CORE FROM COLD EMBER DIVINITY]
I was prompted to send a stream of divinity using Divine Purity. The stream flowed into the lights and then a new prompt appeared.
[Purifying Core]
A loading bar appeared in my mental eye slowly filling up. Turning as I waited I looked at Cole who still stood there. It seems I shocked him pretty hard with the blackmail.
[CORE RECEIVED]
[You have received Greater Shard]
[SCANNING CORE ]
[FORGE READY]
[FORGE]
[LOCAL TEMPLATE]
[FOREIGN TEMPLATE]
[CUSTOM TEMPLATE]
"Ah. Something familiar. And we can sell world designs too. Making Earth and putting in a game would be cool. Maybe a whole world based on an apocalypse, even a complete cultivator world. " I surfed through ideas.
I didn't even bother clicking open the foreign template since according to the U.I guy I was the first player here. I hesitated over Local but ignored it. I could get tempted and disheartened by a beautiful local template.
I would make mine first then check it out later.
The custom template diminished into nothing when I selected it. Then a chime like a bell's ringing played out. The ground rumbled as the crystal floor glowed brighter.
Bright enough to have me shield my eyes.
Behind my lids, I noted the light die out and opened them. Around me in a circle rose a table. It looked like a blacksmith table going around and joining up in a ring.
"Is this.."
"Your smith table". Cole replied standing right outside the ring. His eyes shone with a bit of joy and was that hope or nausea? My eyes narrowed.
"Been a very long time since I saw a Forging table," he murmured running his hand over the surface of my circular desk tenderly. He resembled a man with his newly bought car after a close brush with getting scratched. Obsessed.
"So what do I do now?" I asked watching him mindlessly pet the table.
"Forge " he waved me away like a disturbance while he cooed to the table.
"With what?". I shouted. The U.I jumped up fixing me a glare before looking to the center of my ring.
"The table projects your universe or atleast its basest of forms. Congratulations on a beautiful form "The last part felt forced like he didn't want to say it. Weirdly it made a smile stretch across my cheeks knowing it was said laboriously.
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At the center of my table was the little core glowing imperceptibly.
"Now unlike before while creating your administrators and universe. The world needs a more physical touch. Now get to molding. "
I had barely brought myself to question the words when I found myself midair. I was floating over the Lost World.
[STEP ONE - MOLD]
Luckily this wasn't one of the things that I had to figure out because there was no way I knew how to create a world. I knew the basics of what to do and what not to do. The rest though was all me.
Subatomic Manipulation and Earthen Grace showed their worth. With a wave of my hand, the terrain deformed. Rocks and stones rolled, the earth heaved and shook, cracks formed in the ground, and for miles, I could see nothing but a cataclysmic earthquake rolling in.m waves.
'Well, shit'.
It slowly made sense in a way. Using the view I got I could make the world into the way I desired. Subatomic Manipulation and Earthen grace as beginner skills and insight were accurate. Without those, no Creator would have it easy while they forged their worlds.
"I bet the system would find a way to grant them the insight unless their other skills and abilities would solve that issue". I shrugged. 'Not my problem'. I began with an excited smile.
First, I checked my mobility since I couldn't access the entire world from one side. It was nice to know my mobility wasn't an issue as I could grant the world mobility. "I guess all those skills I find useless are coming together eh". Astronomical Object Manipulation lets me manipulate the entire planet. Spinning it like a ball or glove in any direction I wished.
I began with molding. "How many continents?". I used Subatomic Manipulation which let me sense and feel deep into the world. It was not passive which meant I actively had to use it to get the sensing part.
It helped my Abstract in a careful and precise splitting of the ground. The world was a perfect ball of earth. No holes no craters. Nothing. Just jagged and misshapen.
"Let's change that". I felt deep into the very earth where the tunnels of the worm were. From there I tugged. I didn't even realize my eyes were glowing green as were my palms. My face was wrinkled with concentration and focus.
It was not easy. It was equivalent to prying metal bars apart. I would know cause this shit was hard. Still, somehow the earth parted. The noise was loud and the shaking was intense. It took a long time of world spinning and ground parting to make nine continents.
"Something's missing. " I murmured looking up at Cole, the very intentionally making the world I was carving fade away and revealing the boy. He glanced at me, at my table, and made a shrug with a mopers face. Frowning I looked back to my work the world fading back to sight.
The information said to shape it into something appropriate for me and my denizens. Appropriate means comfortable and suitable right. So what was I missing? Looking through myself I found something. The world was too small for me. How the system or even I connected that feeling was wierd but I just moved on.
I began stretching it out. Making the world expand more and more. At a point, I found out how dangerous this was as the ground began to cave in as it lost its foundation.
I focused on filling back those parts and got a ding.
[GENERAL SKILL - Astronomical Matter Creation - gained]
Create matter out of universal forces currently available to you.
[GENERAL SKILL - Nothingness Removal - gained]
Form matter and then remove the nothingness in it to grant it physicality. Matter formed as such has a natural perk and attributes of increasing physicality due to lacking the very essence of nothingness and inexistence other matter inherently has.
I blinked at the two skills gained. The words were bland but I got the gist of it all. Anything I made with nothingness removal would be indestructible simply because the aspect of nothingness has been removed.
When matter had no strand of nothingness in it then inexistence didn't affect said matter. Erasure had no hold over it as the matter was beyond its jurisdiction.
"Well, shit". I felt shock at the effects but shook myself out of it. For now, I controlled said matter into the spaces in the earth.
I began filling the spaces with more of this matter till the shaking halted and the world now had 10x its previous mass. 6x larger than the Earth. Forming more matter I ignored the prompt of my skill attaining another percentile controlled the rocks to form a thin ring of asteroids around it making it look like a belt rolling around the world.
I took in my work. Nine continents. Each one either bordered another or was far off. With the space it was doable. The grand canyons and large Rifts were positions for my seas and a large body of interconnected water. Knowing mortals it would all be named according to localization.
I felt this was it. I had done the best for this right. I hoped.
[MOLD AFFIRMED]
[STEP 2 - CARVING]
Here I realized that Earthen Grace was even more useful. It seemed Earthen Grace was gifted for this very reason. I wondered how the other creators would adjust to not having it when they arrived here. While for me, Subatomic Manipulation would have worked it would have lacked the finesse and guiding hand Earthen Grace's insight offered. Sure, Subatomic Manipulation lets me see and sense the atoms of the earth and perceive them within. But it didn't let me know exactly how to shape and move a rock with precision and the best way to get the earth to move without losing some or all of your rocks.
It was maddening.
I wasn't floating over the world this time. I was on a continent. My task was simple. I used my knowledge of earthen grace to mold mountains, shape hills, and create Continental craters for little Rivers, lakes, or oceans in each continent making towering monoliths for aesthetics. On each continent, I made a little turn-up. In some spaces, I didn't touch anything I upheaved like nothing.
[STEP 3 - HEMISPHERE]
The prompt was sudden and immediate. But I went with it. Creating the hemispheres wasn't easy especially since I lacked any skill for it. So I decided to go with matter creation. It didn't work out as thought.
All this while using each insight and skill I had been able to glean out some things. One was Abstract. The abstract was infinite and uncontested. It was the middleman you couldn't do without.
Still abstract was as useless in most cases when the receiver was not around. Which brought it the now. I had come to realize from creating this world that my Abstract or Will needed something to act with depending on the situation.
Nothingness, divinity, or plain Phys-Abstract. All of these letters were receivers for abstract. Which begged the question of what happened at the Dawn of Time.
"I was confused and the notifications confused me more". I knew I made Sol with Abstract. But then my notification came late. 'See that should not have happened since notifications don't come late. But it did.
It came late after I defeated the Void Wolf'. Thinking back It should have made no sense. True I had used Aether in a fight to stop the destruction of space which would or could have been why I gained the Aether creation Abstract.
'What I didn't calculate was that on using each abstract you gain it for the first time. The next time you gain a percentage or 5%. This means the fifth percentile I received was for stopping the destruction wave while I gained it when I made Sol '. I sighed.
'Of course, I could be wrong. No way the game would make such a mistake. Only one way to find out'.
"Let there be rain, a storm to fill my canyons, a deluge to enrich my soils".
[Abstract Calculated]
[Abstract Complete]
Aether rushed out of me like a wave of white mist. Rising to the top and forming rain clouds. Dark rain clouds. A clap of thunder heralded the first drops of rain. I wouldn't wait for the rain to be complete though so I moved on to complete the hemisphere.
"In the North let winter have hold, forever a tundra of ice and white snow. To the south may thy suns burn and boil thy lands. Winter will come but even she will flee after a hard try. To the West and East, the suns and the rain will love and show love. And here in the Heart Plains will all thrive, seasons of their own ".
The world, no, reality shuddered. The aether charging the storm seemed to pause for a second then churned on. Water droplets dropped down her face and body yet she felt neither cold nor the liquid. Her attires remained untouched and unsoaked.
I stood there for an unknown duration of time watching as the water filled the canyons and rifts. Formed seas, oceans, streams, lakes, and rivers. Then the storm abated, it's work done.
With clear skies came the application of the hemispheres. The north becoming a world of blistering ice, with frozen icebergs in cold oceans and blistering islands. Snow-capped mountains, forests, and plains. It covered two entire continents and half of two other ones.
The southern hemisphere was the hottest with one completely desertified continent. Luckily even it bore streams and some water streams underground that forged various oases in various corners of the desert.
The Western and Eastern hemispheres were filled with good lands, green forests, and plains. Beautiful mountains and amazing waterfalls.
The system affirmed my design before another prompt appeared.
[STEP 4 - WORLD ENERGY]
I had to set what the world could grant its people access to. I could cut off access to magic making it a normal boring land like Earth. Or grant them access to Abstract and the 9 Realities.
The options rolled out in a list making it even harder to decide.
[ENERGIES]
[None]
There were no options. It affirmed my theory on Tora having no mystical energy to use. With what I'd deduced on Aether it stood to ponder if maybe mystical energy needed to be connected to with the abstract.
'Atleast for those who can't inherently use it.
But, for now, I had to start slow. Since there was no energy I couldn't choose any option.
'A world without magic would be boring'. I thought of connecting the world to Abstract and in turn having them connected to magic when available.
[STEP 5 - LEVEL UP SYSTEM]
"Oh my" If the players figured out each planet leveling up was determined by the creator players then we'd get hounded. This was bound to cause problems but what the f*ck.
[Essence]
The life force of a slain creature.
[Experience points]
Gotten from performing tasks and also various activities like fighting, killing, crafts, and professions.
[Soul]
Absorbing soul energy. (Most popular with the demon races)
As much as I wanted to pick essence I didn't want mass genocides in my world. So experience points it was. I didn't have thoughts of demons yet. The fact that I didn't want angels didn't mean demons were it. Sure my Freyr was cute but still he was my Freyr.
[STEP 6 - NAME]
I barely spoke, the system plucking my mental words.
[NAME - VAUSTARIS AFFIRMED]
[YOU HAVE REFORGED THE EMBERS OF A DYING WORLD CORE]
[YOU HAVE CREATED A NEW WORLD - VAUSTARIS]
[OPTIONS]
[Toss]
[Sell]
[Keep]
"Keep!"
There was silence as I watched the floating ball of what was a miniature world vanish. Then the Forge Table crumbled to nothing and dissipated into the crystal floor.
[MISSION COMPlETE]
[YOUR STARTER/TUTORIAL WORLD HAS BEEN SET]
[PARAMETERS UNLOCKED]