I found myself standing in an empty expanse of grass. I’m embarrassed to admit it made me nervous. I was exposed. Unprotected by a roof and visible to anything who might want to take a bite of me. The ground below me was solid, the air around was crisp and fresh tasting. Above the sun shone brightly – at first glance everything was as it should be. A normal everyday environment with everything in its right place. The more I looked, however, the more I began to notice something wrong. My uneasy feeling had something to latch onto – it might be dumb but finally spotting the weirdness made me relax somehow.

I was more afraid of some unknown weirdness than a weirdness I could see.

The ground looked flat and ‘normal’ – short slightly wild looking green grass…nothing out of the ordinary here – but as I tracked my eyes around the edge of my vision twisted slightly. It was only when I stared at the horizon and moved that it really became apparent that something weird was happening. The farther away things were the more distances warped and made my eyes hurt to stare at.

Trying to figure out what was wrong with the horizon, I began to walk, staring carefully as I moved.

Step step steppity st- Is that?

Was that the same post I was just standing at?

Staring down at an iPad on a stick and then at the surroundings, my mind raced through the possibilities. Was it following me? Teleporting after me somehow? Or was I coming back to it? Am I being teleported from one side to the other?

Picking a new direction perpendicular to the last, I carefully timed my steps.

“One, two, three…”

…

“…thirty-eight, thirty-nine.” I stopped once I reached the sign once more. I relax slightly – it's weird but I feel safer all of a sudden. I’m not in the middle of nowhere I’m enclosed in an area. I don’t think anything is hiding in here with me.

To get to the same spot on the other side of the sign was maybe forty steps, give or take? What was that in meters? Thirty meters or so? What was that in feet? Ninety something? Ninety-eight or so? Let’s say it’s 100ft to reach this post again. Is it the same in all directions?

Hmmm.

At a new angle once more, I walk and count the steps. Thirty-seven that time, I think I took slightly longer steps but that’s fine, it’s always a rough estimate.

It’s fineeeee. I don’t wish I had a ruler right now – nope I don’t. I wouldn’t measure my land anyways, its not like I need to know the exact dimensions…

Trying a final test, I walk 20 steps in one direction and then turn myself sideways then walk as perpendicular as I can. Its for science! I hafta know. Just gotta – you understand right?

….where’s the sign?

20 steps up, twenty steps left…I should have been back at the sign if this is a sphere like I thought it was….

20 steps left again…and again. I’m starting to get worried I’ll never find the sign again.

After roughly 20 more steps I reach the sign once more – this time from the side. The sign looks like it rotated in my experiment.

I wanted to say maybe I eyeballed my ninety degree turn but…no I can’t have messed up this much.

My brain doesn’t understand. It won’t let go of this weirdness. It doesn’t understand how it didn’t reach this spot after two turns – even pretending this space was actually flat I should have gotten here with 4 turns and it took 5.

Finally I move on. I don’t drop the weirdness – if I had my phone I would have started googling – but there’s more to the world then strange dimensions.

My world is smaller than I thought. I don’t like using feet for distance – eww, gross, imperial units – but it seems like the most accurate measurement in this case. Sigh….but it is a round number. I’ll allow it.

In every direction away from the sign there is 100 feet of room.

And it really is ‘my world’. I’d asked for safety expecting a magic barrier or something around a patch of land – not my own miniature world!

Damn goddess you outdid yourself!

Considering its “every direction” I wouldn’t call my world square. My first guess was that this world was a planet – a toy planet with some weird stretching and shrinking on it to make me feel more flat.

…but my test showed there’s some strangeness. It's like… it's like there’s more space in the space. Instead of a sphere with a circumference of 100ft and a surface area of 4 pi times 100ft.

It’s like this world is a Mcdonald's fries and the goddess added more space to it like McDonalds adds more fries to it. Yes that extra space is the bag fries.

Still, even with the bag fry space its not…its not that big.

There’s some strange stuff going on with the geometry here let me tell you. I’ve already spent too much time trying to figure out the mystery.

A unique description of my new space comes to mind – there’s been a trend of using a filter that’s sort of like a fish eye to turn your surroundings into a sphere. I haven’t done it but I’ve seen the filter and it seems to fit. My new world was a small sphere and then some magic is twisting it to look like a flat and like the earth I was used to while shoving extra space all over just for fun.

…there was also probably some magic to make gravity feel normal… or maybe I’m overthinking things and the teleportation theory is correct?

Well alright then. I’m happy enough with this theory. The goddess seems to have gone all out! Unless this is just the easiest option for her? I really don’t know how magic works.

Magic! Magic!!! I suddenly jump my eyes going wide. I can learn magic.

I don’t know how magic works yet but I can always learn. The secrets of this strange pocket world will be mine to crack open! Mwahahaha.

The ground doesn’t really bare mentioning at the moment. It’s dirt with rough grass and rocks. Magic!

Alright!

I’ve put it off long enough. I should check out the sign.

Stepping up to the tablet I reach out and tap the screen – annnnnd its loading. Annnnnnnnnd its loading. Boom! It lit up! Its black interface glows white for a second and then becomes blue and displays several buttons for me to press. We have buttons!

Self status (click to expand)

Tier 1.

Total skill level 0.

Status: Healthy.

Skills: 0/1

Space status (click to expand)

Tier 1.

Mana saturation: Tier 1.

Size 1 unit.

Environmental mana. 10,285m

Upkeep: 10,000m. Critical minimum 2000m.

Deficit. 41mana/day (leaking from atmosphere due to spatial location.)

Access inventory (5 unviewed items)

Access the divine personal shop.

Access the tier 1 interdimensional shop.

‘Quests’ (click to expand)

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Clicking both the status screens, I’m able to read incredibly limited information about…well I’m going to assume myself and my new land. You got no skills! No marketable ones at least. Doing me dirty the sign is.

I reach out and tap the blinking notification beside my space’s “inventory” – you know how annoying notifications are right? Well I personally find them incredibly incredibly annoying… always have to click them right away and always have. I had a friend once who let her inboxes fill up into the double digits and it always stressed me out…that’s normal right? We all hate unread notifications? We can all agree with this?

Inventory:

[‘Low danger magical “beast” that provides milk’ -> release]

[‘snowpea seeds’ -> obtain]

[‘sleeping bag’ -> obtain]

[‘bottle of water’ -> obtain]

[‘Nutrition bars’ -> obtain]

[‘ awakening stone’ -> obtain]

Reaching out I tap the release button and then flinch nearly jumping out of my skin. What was that? There was a light sort of pop…Just to my side what I first thought was a plate of white jello appeared. It sort of popped out when I pushed the release button…gosh I wasn’t expecting the noise.

Suddenly the jello wiggles. It wiggles…it jiggles. This plate of white jello is ready to mingle! With a particularly violent wobble it is off!

Faster than I would have thought a sentient blob of porridge could move, the white blob began to glob along – a dangerously lewd looking smear being left in its wake.

My poor innocent mind!

Watching the blob dash through the dirt and grass, it’s perfectly white body quickly becomes muddy and gross looking.

This is…this is something I can milk? It looks like it “is” milk…what had I even been given?

I continue to watch a happy feeling bubbling up as I do. It’s just so cute! I actually start laughing out loud as I watch the blob ‘blob’ around all over the place. There’s just something funny about the way it throws itself into every motion – it sort of picks itself up and tosses its body. The inertia stretches its mass with each jump. The white jello doesn’t have any features and yet it feels expressive – it’s so determined I can feel it. It’s hilarious how seriously it’s taking its exploration looking like that.

Heh. Silly slime.

My mind has caught up to my thoughts by now and I’ve gotten a pretty good idea of what this is. A milk slime. Name pending – not something I’ve ever heard of in fantasy but hey! The goddess has delivered on my milker request, that she has.

…okay I have no clue how I’m actually supposed to milk the thing if I’m being honest. It’s also so incredibly muddy from its romp I don’t…I don’t even know if I want to? If I do milk it, I don’t know if I want to drink milk this dirty. How do you clean milk? You don’t do you? You toss it out and buy another bag.

Moving on! What else did she give me…Sleeping bag, bottle of water, food. All great but…really? That was all my supplies? I mean I was already excited to make my own house, but you’d think it would be cheap to send me in with a tent at least…

Quick! Hit the most exciting option!

I impulsively hit the awakening stone then turn to stare at the space beside the sign carefully. This time I hear a slight pop and can actually watch the process happen. The ‘stone’ – a slightly flat rock with some carvings on it – sort of squeezes into existence on my right. Like space folded and spat it out.

It’s about knee height and midair – the ‘warping’ takes less than a second and looks kind of similar to how the edge of my world looks all compressed the colors warping and overlapping. The rocks twists and then falls to the ground landing without a sound on the grass below.

Picking up the intricately carved stone I examine every nook and cranny of the thing. Reveal to me your secrets! You’ll give me magic right? I assume? And how will you manage that…

Where’s a bright lamp when you need it? I want to shine a light straight on this stone while I interrogate it. Where were you on the night of February thirteenth! If you confess your sentence will be softer…hardass didn’t crack. I swear the stone is making fun of me.

Ah well…

What am I supposed to do with this? There’s no instructions…

Slowly I bring the rock towards my mouth..

No!…bad Sam. Don’t be stupid – rocks aren’t food.

Do I crush it? What if I’m not supposed to crush it and that breaks it!

Oh no – now I’m shivering. I don’t want to ruin my chances of getting magic successfully. Where’s the instruction manual? I really do want to get this right the first time around – this is serious.

Fiddling about, I back out of the inventory and find the quests tab. Here we go! I click the button and open all the quests to review them.

Quests (click to expand)

[Understanding the system interface] [NEW]

Requirements: Understand status or follow the directed tutorial.

Reward: Knowledge

Failure: None

Time limit: None

Directed tutorial click here 👻<-

[Gain your first skill] [NEW]

Requirements: follow steps to internalize a skill.

Reward: skill

Failure: lack of ‘magic’

Time limit: None

Directed tutorial click here 👻<-

I look at the quests somewhat put off – why put the tutorial down at the bottom! Everyone knows if given a list of things you go down sequentially! It’s just common sense! If it was that important it should have been at the very top!

I’m tilted guys. Tilted!

I press the tutorial button harder than necessary. That’s what you get for being placed in the wrong area!

A spinning blob appears on the screen handy text beside it. It has the goddess’s glasses and begins clicking stuff as it shows off manipulating my screen without my input. Hey! It’s clippy! Goddess clippy. Glippy? Name pending. That sounds incredibly stupid.

To start off my tutorial, the little wisp ‘floats’ to the first panel. It pauses and then begins jumping between each line writing down some description and only continuing when I nod or touch it.

Line by line I follow the wisp down my status – step by step the words and numbers revealing themselves to me in helpful…glorious detail.

Self status (click to expand)

[This is the portion of the system dedicated to you. It shows off how your body and personal abilities have progressed.] ˿👻

Tier 1

[This is your current state of existence. Don’t worry about this number, it doesn’t need to change and is simply a standard value to display in analysis spells.]

Total Skill level 0.

[This is a sum of all your skill levels. It indicates what your current potential is, as well as showing off how close you are to gaining new skills.] ˿👻

Status: Healthy.

[This indicates the state of your body. It will include any abnormal effects for easy analysis and at such a (hopefully rare) time provide options for treatment. Currently you are ‘Healthy’ indicating nothing is wrong.] ˿👻

Skills: 0/1

[This indicates you have the potential for ‘one’ skill. Quantity of skills is related to tier which is related to your skill levels…and you can calculate your max number of skills with root of (Total skill level) plus one.

Currently you have the potential for one skill ->feel free to follow the skill tutorial for help with gaining your first skill] ˿👻

Space status (click to expand)

[This is the portion of the system dedicated to your personal space. It shows off how your body and personal abilities have progressed.] ˿👻

Tier 1.

[This shows the tier of existence of your space. Certain upgrades will require and automatically increase the space’s tier as well. Numerical representation of space’s tier has been adjusted to base scaling. Note: an increase in tier might indicate an increased cost to keep the space running] ˿👻

Mana saturation: Tier 1.

[Environmental mana is currently at the standardized tier 1 level on average across your space] ˿👻

Size 1 unit.

[Adjusted surface area of space] ˿👻

Environmental mana. 10,284m

[Exact environmental mana measured across entire space] ˿👻

Upkeep: 10,000. Critical minimum 2000.

[Upkeep. Requires 10,000 environmental mana to maintain optimal function. Stability becomes dangerous once environment approaches and drops below 2000 mana.] ˿👻

Deficit. 41mana/day (leaking from atmosphere due to spatial location.)

[Currently 41m environmental mana is lost every day due to space’s physical location in liminal void. Physical location was set due to perfect protection from external harm request, Physical location may be changed in the divine personal shop or manually using high levels of dimensional transportation if you desire decreased security.] ˿👻

Access inventory ->

Inventory:

[The inventory is an efficient personal storage providing semi stasis and room for a large amount of materials on demand. The inventory may be upgraded in the divine personal shop as desired] ˿👻

[‘snowpea seeds’ -> obtain]

The happy little wisp paused as if confused after reaching the first item in the inventory. It seems confused…and yep. Now its starting to spin in place with a panicked look. Initial analysis says its confused by my early removal of items. Hey! If she didn’t want me pulling them out yet she shouldn’t have made me look at the inventory first! All I’m saying. Tutorial goes on top so it’s the first I press. Not my fault.

…the wisp is kind of cute when its panicked. Like it was already cute but now it’s freaking adorable its little cheeby face is making a “XoX” face and the way its spinning around and around kind of reminds me of a loading screen. Who’s a good little glippy – you are!

Ehehe…I forgive you for putting yourself down near the bottom of my screen after everything else. Cute things can make mistakes.

Finally, the wisp seems to make up its mind. Its face returns to normal and it floats to the bottom of my inventory beginning to describe everything as a ‘whole’ versus doing the one by one it’s been doing up till now.

Glippy looks flustered – as if embarrassed it took so long to get here. Did the blob always have glasses? I like them. Sophisticated.

[Per your requests, your starting package consists of basic supplies as shown, a milk producing fantasy creature that can be milked by squishing it inside a bucket, additionally an awakening stone has been provided with a custom skill you could acquire specifically to make money with. This optional skill is called “mana crystal creation” and would aid you in compressing environmental mana to sell – a lengthy boring process but a guaranteed source of money when you are starting out and a semi-consistent way of obtaining “funds”. To remove stuff from your inventory simply press the name of the item you wish to remove. To add stuff back simply press items into this interface while in the inventory screen.] ˿👻

Yep! The wisp was definitely affected after going off script. It seemed to stumble over everything – they even had a hard time clicking the button to leave the inventory for the first time! The wisp just floated back embarrassed and pushed it to try again.

You got this! Go wisp!

Access the divine personal shop.

[This is a unique opportunity to trade favours, requests and commission rewards directly with the world’s best goddess. Access this shop if you wish to upgrade or alter parts of yourself, your space or even the functions offered by this comprehensive system. Cost varies wildly depending on how difficult or expensive it is for the goddess to do – and may be locked or refused depending on how high your current divine debt is.] ˿👻

Access the tier 1 interdimensional shop.

[This is the cheapest possible link to a specific easy to access but limited shop. It facilitates transfer of money, transfer of purchased goods into your inventory, and finally allows bulk transfer of items to an auction location at a fixed cost. Any of these capabilities may be expanded upon – including access to higher end shops or increased capacity to sell products. Some upgrades or expansions may have requirements you must negotiate directly.] ˿👻

‘Quests’ (click to expand)

[This is a list of optional and ‘required’ requests by the goddess. Some quests might be offered randomly depending on the goddesses need and others might be linked to divine shop requests.] ˿👻

The wisp floats up slightly and expands the quest tab before diving down to its original place at the bottom of the ‘tutorial quest’ area. It pauses just before disappearing as if it had just remembered something important then sent a final short message.

[It is recommended you complete the skill quest next at your earliest convenience] ˿👻

With a final spin the wisp was gone.

Well then. Glippy was helpful, wasn’t she? Guess I can finally do something fun and gain my first skill can’t I!