POV Yamaal
“Finally, this damn Tutorial is over. Yamaal is everything ready?”
“Yes, Lord Raeyon, everything has been prepared accordingly.”
“Good, now we just need that brat to make the right choice. That woman better not interfere and allow him to choose for himself. Are the contingencies ready as well?”
“Yes, Lord Raeyon.”
“Good.”
…..
POV Elder Zal
“Are you two ready?”
“Yes, Elder Zal.”
“Yes, Elder Zal.”
“Good, it is imperative that you both do not make a poor showing out of yourselves. A new Patriarch has risen, and with it a new Conflagration must rise alongside him. Both of you have the opportunity to be the first members of the First Conflagration of this new Patriarch. Do not waste the opportunity given to you.
“Now, there will be many other people who will likely try to curry favor with the new Patriarch, there will be many enemies, there will be many battles, many schemes, many situations in which there will be danger abound. Remember your teachings. Infernals do not cower, nor do we ever beg for mercy. We simply wet our spears with the blood of our enemies and lay their bodies down at the feet of the Eternal Flame. Prepare for departure, it is time to meet the Patriarch.
….
POV Raizen
“Congratulations on surviving the Tutorial.”
Surviving the Tutorial huh…I suppose the very first thing it told us was to survive.
“Using the measurements of your planet. Roughly 8.2 billion members of your race entered this Tutorial, and as of right now that number is down to just under a billion survivors. That is excellent. It is not uncommon for an entire planet to not survive and its inhabitants to be extinct.
“Now, what’s next for you? You all will soon be returned to your planet, but it will be the same as the one you left behind.
“Firstly, only your race, humans were to a Tutorial. Everything else remained on the planet, and everything went through an evolution of sorts to match the new environment around them. Whether it was an entire species that went through the same evolution, or something evolved independently from its counterparts, the fact remains there are now potentially dangerous beats roaming your planet. The planet itself is now approximately 3x larger than it is was previously. It will be up to you all to navigate through that.
“Secondly, Qi is now abundant throughout the entire planet and anything that couldn’t handle the influx of Qi was destroyed. Nature adjusted and evolved on its own, but anything that was manmade could not handle the surge in Qi that an evolving planet would be met with.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“This means you all would need to rebuild from the ground up. Which brings me to third point. Outpost Leaders were chosen for a reason. Those of you who were chosen will now have a decision to make. Making a deal with the Managers of your respective Outposts. The number one benefit of this deal is that those managers will essentially build you a sprawling city where you will be the sole Lord of the City initially.
“But nothing is truly free in this world. As mentioned previously, this is a deal. One of the guaranteed stipulations if this deal, is that should you choose to adhere to this deal, the Managers of that Outpost will be allowed to return from the Tutorial world with you, take residence on your planet alongside you. It is up to you all to decide whether or not this tradeoff is worth it. I suggest having a discussion with the Mangers of your Outposts before making a decision.
“Fourthly, everyone else in the Tutorial will now have the option to choose a few things. You can return by yourself significantly away from anyone else, or and this is only for people who lived in an Outpost, you can return with members of the Outpost.
“Now there is a small twist to that. If an Outpost Leader made the choice to have a city constructed, then along with the residents of the Outpost, anyone in the Tutorial can choose to be returned to the nearest city location, or a specific city. All Outposts and Leaders of their Outpost will be displayed for you to see if they decide to make the deal to build the city.
“Lastly, everything you earned in the Tutorial and is on your person, will return with you. And of course, although it wasn’t earned, that includes The System. A System that will play a bigger part of your lives from this point forward.
“You all may now initiate the return to your planet at any time, for those who need time to get your affairs in order, you have three hours. Everyone will be returned to the planet once those three hours have expired. That is all.”
And with that the holographic projection and big white dome disappeared as if they were never there.
Hm, the metal man dropped a whole of information on us, so let’s focus on the things I need to think about right now. Making a deal with the Outpost Leader so they can build us a city, the entire group can return together, if I do indeed make that deal, then thousands of people could potentially be teleported to the city with us. If I don’t make the deal, we can all still return together but will have to make our shelter, which will 100% not be a city of any kind. Meaning it will take a while before something like that is made…and we would be very exposed to the new dangers of the planet. Okay we’re making a city. So, let’s go talk to the Outpost Leader.
Hm...?
Why is everyone looking at me?
“Richard?”
“We’re waiting on you.”
Okay, I knew I was already seen in some type of leadership position beforehand but isn’t this a step above that? The entire Outpost is just silently waiting on me? Sigh Whatever I guess I did do this to myself. Fine.
“I’m going to have a talk with the Outpost Leader. Everyone else uses this time to make sure we have everything we need from the Tutorial. Will all return together.”
After a series of ‘got its’ and a few ‘understoods’ I walked off in the direction of the direction of the Outpost Leader’s office, and quickly found myself in front of his desk once more.
Usually he would remain seated, but he was standing as if waiting for me to arrive.
“I greet the Infernal.”
He said that as he bowed his head slightly.
Now what the hell…
“What’s with the change in attitude?”
“The status of Infernals is higher than you understand. You will understand in time that this type of greeting is something to be expected as you begin traversing and interacting with the wider Multiverse.
“Do not take it for granted.
“Now the deal that was mentioned. I will first explain some things then I will tell you what our conditions are to accept that deal.”
“Got it.”
“Good, now first and foremost. The deals Yamaal mentioned are many things and can take on different forms and mean many different possibilities. There are two things to remember, one, this deal is binding, and you should consider it a contract. A contract that is signed with The System bearing witness, meaning breaking the contract could have severe consequences.
“Now the most important thing to remember. These Tutorial deals are largely a scam.”
Wait what? Did he just say all of that just to call the deals a scam?