Everyone has had the dream where they are floating in a star-filled void at least once in their life, right?  

What not everyone - quite probably hardly anyone, though if you did, I just want you to know, no judging, but dayum do you have some bizarre imagination or what, amirite? - had experienced is having that very dream accompanied by a sparkly emerald-mystique purple-gleaming silver dream-cloud with the face of Danny Devito and voice of Tim Curry doing Ben Stein telling them that they are going to be a part-time protogod somewhere out in the far-flung multiverse.

Well, either that, or welcome to the club, I guess?

Now, I know what you – or at least the "you" not in the same or similar boat to myself - are thinking.

“What the [insert personally favoured expletive] trippy lil’ bullshit you say?”  

Let’s back up a bit, try for some context.  

Mind you, I make absolutely no promises that it will, at any point whatsoever, start making any more sense.  

I’m living it, and it is just as preposterous to me…

So, it all began as I crashed after my dinner of heated over takeout (curry-chicken-risotto if you must know). After the day I was having all I expected was to black out, and then wake up in the morning feeling somewhat more like something in the ape family (as anyone can tell you, college students, especially those who also work part-time to support themselves, do not merit being considered as human beings under even the most generous of definitions).

Lucid dreaming? Nope, would not have expected it even if I were to get as old as Methuselah. That, however, was exactly what I got.

An endless, breathtaking, description-defying, transcendental, and an all-around absolutely gorgeous diorama of the life, the universe and everything surrounding me (and no, 42 was nowhere in evidence. I might be a two-bit, down an’ dirty geek, but even I would not go for fruit hanging that low).  

And I was fully aware that I was dreaming the whole time.

And that, of course, is when things started going off the rails straight into wierdsburg, population cream puff cucumber.

A nebula started wriggling and sparking like low budget demonstrations of the effects of LSD.  

I did the only reasonable thing there was to do.  

I observed the happening with bated breath in an honest, trouser-browning, horrified, morbid fascination.

And the nebula continued to wriggle and shudder and about a dozen synonyms. And let me tell you, there was a lot about it to justify the fascination.

That thing was on fire! (well to be pedantic, and seeing as it was a star-filled nebula, it was on incandescent plasma! But that just lacks the necessary pizzazz)

There was more rumba, samba and cha-cha-cha going there than in the complete run of “Dancing with the stars” international editions included.

And it kept on going…

Until finally it settled down… into a, and I kid you not, … Danny Devito face.

Yeah, I know.

What am I even supposed to think?!?

It was a total paradox.

Simultaneously a bigger letdown then Justice League movie, ME Andromeda and Disney’s treatment of Star Wars combined, and the single awesomest, most mindboggling, bestest thing of mad-genius ingenuity to ever be contemplated during the height of a raging thunderstorm coinciding with a blood moon.

And then it had to go one better in total absurdity quotient. It started speaking to me.

I already described what it (he) sounded like, so we can skip that part, I just want you all to understand that it in-f.c.k.ing-deed sounded even more comical then you would expect at first from the given description and exactly as comical as you would figure it should sound once you took a long, hard, thesis depth, analysis of all the implications the description actually contains.

And it doth speaketh:

“Welcome user Mathew. I am Zacheus, your personally assigned oneiros. I am here to give any assistance that I might in your divinely ordained mission.”

I could claim that my racing thoughts came to a screeching halt, but that would be a bald-faced lie, probably of the first water appended there at the end. My brain just does not work like that. Nothing stops my inane stream of consciousness

I could claim that I started the freak out to end all freakouts. Bald-faced lie numero dos. Again, not how my mushy mess of grey matter ticks. I just get too wrapped into whatever was happening to freak out until a heckuva lot later.

I could claim that I just went straight to nopesville and just tried to pretend that all it was, was a weird-ass dream. Hat-trick on bald-faced lie department. For the third time, not my cerebrum modus operandi.  

“So…” I can hear you asking “...How exactly does your mind function then?”

Why I’m glad you asked. Really, I am. Why I am so glad as to…  

Yeah, not fooling you…  

That’s OK, didn’t expect it to work anyway, to be frank.

So, my brain-a-mundo processing schematic....

Well, it went something like this:

I seriously lack the capacity to come up with even a tiny portion of shit like this. ⭢ Even if I did not lack the imaginative capacity, my absurdist tier is still way too low for anything as outré as what was going on. ⭢ Ergo, me simply imagining all of this is quite impossible. ⭢  Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable must be the truth.

⮡  Truth is mostly subjective. ⭢ While beauty, just as the truth, is in the eye of the beholder, that has no bearing on the current situation, shelve for later consideration.

⮡  I want the truth! ⭢ I can’t handle the truth! ⭢ What exactly my truth-handling capacity might realistically amount to is an interesting philosophical conundrum whose consideration would undoubtedly lead to greater spiritual, mental and emotional growth, and improve me as a person overall…

⮡  Error #### limits to the processing power reached ⭢ Analysing ⭢ Too many tangents running at once ⭢ Solution! Initializing soft reboot to eliminate superfluous thought trains and return back to the pertinent issues at hand.

⮡ No! Wait! Abort! Abort! My shiny bright enligh...te...m@CadfWTV...

⮡ Soft reboot successful, thoughts back on track!

⮡ So, yes, truth. ⭢ No matter how fantastical this might seem, the best course of action would be to treat it all dead-serious like, it will hurt less in the long run.

“Ok,” I told the nebulous Nebula Devito

“Before we proceed any further, I have three crucial questions. Which gods. What mission. And, what do I get out of this?”

“Sensible, and to the point. That bodes excellently for you and your further functioning user Mathew. In order of the questions given: Overdieties of creation and existence. Even most of the outer divinities struggle and oft fail in attempts at comprehending them. A mortal would have below zero chance at doing such and would face fatal consequences upon attempt. We advise that you content yourself with the simplest definition we have already given to you.”

“Well, that sounds promising,” I grumbled underneath my breath, but the onerios appeared not to have heard me. That, or it (he?) was just ignoring me in favour of continuing with its (his?) lecture.

“As for the mission, you are one of 75,000 subjects from your world chosen to be imbued by divine powers so as to act as genius loci seeded upon fledgling worlds across the multiverse, for the duration of your sleep cycle. Please take note that you have already been imbued with the power and that attempts to resist, deny or refuse to participate would only result in you denying yourself the opportunity for adaptation, optimization, and configuration of your situation.”

“Getting better and better all the time…” my grumbling proceeded apace, and was once again completely disregarded…

“As for the positive benefits, they are myriad. You will get to leave a lasting and significant mark upon a world; you will get to wield powers impossible for your mortal form; you have been granted an excellent temporal awareness both in physical state and as a genius locus; you have been granted the ability to instantly transition between your new states of existence, which for your physical form means you can instantly fall asleep and wake up on command; as your time acting as a genius locus counts as a form of lucid dreaming, during that time you do not accrue mental fatigue; despite you being spiritually and mentally engaged during your times asleep, all the benefits of the highest sleep quality, proportional to the total sleep time experienced, would be applied to you upon awakening; due to not undergoing the break in higher mental functions normally mandated during sleeptime, and in addition to time dilation effect, the amount of time available for any form of mental pursuits is expended significantly, resulting in an overall improvement to your intellectual capabilities; there are many other less apparent and more subtle benefits to your situation, but listing them all is determined to be inefficient usage of time, especially considering that the amount of time made available to you for customization is limited and fast approaching one remaining hour mark.”  

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“That’s… Yeah, no. Those actually sound like pretty awesome perks. So, if we only have a bit over an hour for customization, how do we proceed from here?” While a badass might go busting through the walls, I decided to tread upon the path of a wise, or at least the sensible, man and use the doors.

“Acknowledged user Mathew. Proceeding to the customization. Would you prefer having some visual aids?”

“Would they cost me anything?”

“Negative.”

“Then go ahead and bust out all the bells and whistles.”

“Acknowledged, please stand by.”  

Bells and whistles indeed were what I’d gotten. The starfields around us swirled around and around until they settled into three distinct clusters in front of me, each with a distinctive constellation at the center spelling, respectfully, δ, ξ and ψ.

As the ‘visual aids’ settled into their forms, Zacheus took up his (Heck it all, Zacheus sounds like a masculine name, and the voice is masculine. I’m calling the oneiros he from now on. Anyone displeased by the decision can send their complaints to the following address: 999 Nosuch boulevard, Northern Neverthere, Dominion of Zilch) narration again.

“The first thing for you to choose, user Mathew, is what class of world you will operate upon. The classes available to subject from your world are: δ - worlds with the moderately high density of mana quarks; ξ - worlds with the moderate density of qi quarks and medium low density of mana quarks; and ψ - worlds with the superior density of qi quarks and mana antiquarks. What that means in practical terms for you…”

“Actually…” I interrupted “...I would prefer if you did not give me detailed breakdowns on what everything means. If I am going to do this, might as well make an adventure out of it, and having to guess, and eventually make blunders, is part of what makes adventures fun. And anyway, if I want to learn the nitty-gritty bits, I can just ask you at that time, right?”  

While all of that was true, up to a point, the real reason I decided to skip the infodump was that I was already growing exceedingly bored with all the exposition. Funny voice or not, Zacheus droned worse than any of my Professors… Well, maybe not Professor Chelick, but that old biddy was in a class all of her own. Suffice to say that her nickname among the student body (and not a few of her younger colleagues) was Professor Binns.

“Before I acknowledge that instruction user Mathew, I feel it would be prudent to inform you that, depending on the exact circumstances, it could, theoretically, be possible for you to be destroyed as a genius loci, and if such indeed happened, you would lose all the benefits imparted upon you. Do you still wish to proceed?”

Well now, wasn’t that interesting. There was a way out after all. He might get all mealy-mouthed over it, and throw enough sheet anchors to moor an entire regatta, but the implications were there, clear as day.  

Then again, getting destroyed would probably be pretty traumatic, all things considered…

I tried for my best somber face and voice as I answered.

“Ah, well. If it happens, it happens. I’ve lived without those benefits so far, I’m pretty sure I’d be able to learn to live without them again if worse comes to worst. So, taking everything into account… Yep, carry on my fine fellow, full speed ahead! Oh, and I guess I’ll be going with delta class world.” If nothing else, Qi sounded way too much like wuxia and I’m more than happy to stay clear away from that.

“...Acknowledged user Mathew. Proceeding on...” Zacheus droned on, but right there, so faint I wasn’t completely certain If I were imagining it or not, there was the briefest of hints of... Pleasure? Contentment? Joy? Something in that vein to be sure.  

The acknowledgment was followed by another swirl and reorganization of the star(universe?)scapes. But what emerged this time was decidedly not galaxical. Well, it was still the stars and nebulae and all that, but this time they formed actual, coherent images.

This time four choices faced me: A grouping of trees with some bushes, a rock wall with a thin crevasse, two beaten paths meeting and a sprout of water forming a shallow pool.

“... Your second decision, user Mathew, is what kind of genius loci will you start as. This is to be accomplished by a series of choices that will progressively narrow down and shape your starting point. The first of the choices now before you is: Grove, Cave, Crossroads or Spring?”

I freely admit that my understanding was extremely limited, and that I was quite probably shooting in the dark, but the way I figured it the choices boiled down to domains. Grove was almost certainly nature, and spring water, but the other two were not as clear cut. Crossroads was probably indicative of concepts heavily intertwined with civilization. That only left the cave. Underworld would be the obvious answer to my mythophyllia, but there were other concepts that made just as much sense - like home or earth.  

But the thing that struck me the most here was that, so far as I could see, none of these choices necessarily sounded mutually exclusive.

“If I were to say I chose all four what would happen?” I asked tentatively.

This time I was certain sure that Zacheus experienced pleasure! Yes! Score one for yours truly!

“The choice would be deemed acceptable, but due to the scarcity of options fitting those particular set of parameters, you would lose the opportunities for much more detailed customization. Do you want the choice to be acknowledged?”

So, a tradeoff. Fewer choices for a broader-based start.

Yano’ what? I was more than OK with that. Fine tuning all the little details always does take way more time than one would expect, and rarely if ever was an enjoyable endeavor for anyone but the most detail-obsessed control freaks.

“Yeah, sure.” I confirmed.

“Acknowledged user Mathew.”  

Images dissolved and the stars started their dance for the third time.

Encorement, imbuement, diffusion, avatarisation and incarnation. A crystalline structure that radiated something; a little, itty-bitty, ghostly dude flying from stone to a tree; lots of small ghostly dudes flying up and down and all around forming a bigger ghost; a ghostly dude within a hominid outline within a wavy aura within a blastfield; a dude made out of too many other things to count, much less name. That was my newest set of options.

And wasn’t that a dozy. Most of my guessing came from ‘visual aides’, and even I was not stupid enough to view them as anything of any real depth nor complexity. I could, and probably should, have asked for a bit more info on what the options entailed, but, dammit all, by that point my pride and selfimage were on the line, and people throughout history had gone to make important and impactful decisions with much less info than I was running with over those.

I ruled avatar right off. That just screamed noob’s shiny - for those unfamiliar with the term, it is a kind of option made to prey upon the greed and lack of forethought of the inexperienced, or just plain stupid, with extra fluff and glam, while in truth being useless, or at the most extremely niche. Looks and/or sounds awesome, but has no applicable advantages other than vanity.

After some consideration, I also decided against encorement, because between the name and the image, it seemed to me to be a rigid, boxed-in kind of option. I am a wriggly, screwy type of person, and proud of it, thank you very much.

That still left me with three equally viable options, so I did what any self-respecting geek would do - I Eny miny moe’d the shit out of it. Four different versions, including Billie Holiday.  

“It was a difficult choice, but... I have to go with imbuement, just seems to be what would suit me the best.” I tried to go for gravely serious, as if I did not just use nursery rhymes to half-ass through it. 

Preeety sure Zachy thing did not buy it. Still, in the end, he did not comment, so I took it as a win.

"Acknowledged user Mathew. With that, we move to the penultimate selection for you. I am afraid that no visual aid is available for this one. We need to determine your user interface...”

For the first time in this entire ordeal, I felt lock, stock and however many smoking barrels you are comfortable with about my choice.

“Menu driven!” I posited, without needing to wait to even hear the options. I mean, yes, sure there might have been a more precise, versatile and/or comfortable choice in the offering, based on something-something heretofore undreamt of and thusly totally irreplicable solely by human tech. Or even something more prosaic, like maybe something thought or instinct based, for which we can theorize but cannot produce viable means. On the whole, though, I figured it would be best to stick with simple and familiar - thus ‘Menu driven’ interface.

Zacheus remained mute for a few seconds, as if he was having trouble processing my swift response.

Finally, he repeated his ubiquitous:

“Acknowledged, user Mathew.” though his tone seemed just a touch hesitant.  

Ha! Score one more for me! I’m doing really great at this thing (for an idiot playing around blindly with things beyond his meager comprehension, that is)!

Not a moment later I had every reason to condemn my hastiness, and cocksure attitude thrice more.

You have to understand this.  

I...Am...A...Verbose...Bastard. I have a tongue a mile long, and a mouth on me that a hippo would envy. I comment on everything and anything and derive intense, almost ecstatic, pleasure out of arguing and getting into the nitty-gritty of a debate. So rarely, that it literally counts as statistically insignificant have I ever been at a loss for words.

So, when I tell you, dead serious, that there was no conceivable way to describe what ‘installing’ Menu Driven User Interface into my Astral self felt like, it means exactly what it says on the tin.  

One thing I can say it wasn’t though, was pleasant. Not painful, mind, nor as if it were some kind of irritant. Just… unpleasant. Supremely so. And, as I already indicated, completely indescribably so.

Luckily, it did not even take ten seconds. Those were the longest, most eminently uncomfortable seconds of my life, but still, under ten seconds all told.

“Menu Driven UI successfully applied, user Mathew. In a few moments you will be presented with your final choice through it. With that, my primary purpose is finished. I will, however, remain here with you, until you finalize your set-up process, and in the future, if you ever feel the need to receive my assistance, you will find an easily accessible option within your menu to require such out of me.”

I started to open my metaphysical mouth to thank the oneiros, but at that exact moment the menu kicked in with my final choice.

It was… well, kinda underwhelming to tell you the truth, especially after the spectacle of starfield imagings I experienced earlier, but in the end, I went with the menu for its simplicity and ease of use, so no use complaining over lack of glam and pomp I suppose.

Across the top of my view, cheery bright letters spelled:

“Please select the powers you wish to possess and their level - currently available 3800 customization points to purchase and upgrade with”

And beneath that 50 ‘cards’ appeared each baring the name of the power, a short description thereof and a cost - ranging from many cards costing 100 CP all the way up to two cards worth 2000 points each.

At the very bottom of my field of view was a long bar stating “Blind selection. 11 powers for 2250 points.”

Huh... gambling...  

On the surface it looked like a good deal, seeing as, in theory, it made every single power cost just under 205 points and a quick count gave 21 powers priced at 200 or lower. The law of averages almost guaranteed you’d hit at least 4 powers more expensive than the line at which point you have gotten a better deal than buying piecemeal.

A few problems spring to mind about that.  

A) Anyone who has ever stood at the non-existent mercies of RNG can tell you with absolute certainty that the law of averages is for chumps and those credulous babes who believe in the tooth fairy.  

B) Even if your luck held and you did get the better end of the trade, there was no guarantee whatsoever that the powers you got would be an optimal spread/balance.  

And C) It is not about the rarity of your powers, but how you use them - or more succinctly put, for one who knows what he is doing two or three cheap powers would definitely beat out a single expensive one. Munchkining might be annoying as all heck, but, at the end of the day, what it boils down to is that it works. Unequivocally and unquestionably so.

All that said and reasoned, I was still going to gamble. Going blind has worked for me so far, so why break what, if not winning, is at least a consistent and entertaining formula.

I hit that Blind selection bar and held my metaphorical breath.