Chaos waved her arm and the world around us changed. This entire time, I had been in a black void, totally naked, with just Chaos and whatever she decided to have appear in front of me. Now the sheets of screen paper were gone, the beanbag was gone, and we were standing in what felt like a forge? No, not quite. More like a waiting area of a forge.

“Where are we now?”

“I am having us move closer towards the other Godly domains while we begin the process. You’ll be meeting my sister Order after this and then a host of other Gods. Each will help you along the way. Order would normally be the one you would talk to if you selected the Human Hero System but instead she’ll fill you in on information that may prove important.”

I just nodded along. This was a far more involved process than I had expected or normally read about in my books. I guess it made sense, I didn’t get the sense the Gods wanted me to fail. No, quite the opposite really. I’d have to ask about that later.

Suddenly, with a wave of her hand, there was power. Separated on two sides were glowing, things. Boxes but they definitely weren’t boxes. Containers came to mind. Containers holding stuff of immense power.

On the left, I could feel Command. Authority, implied by the name.

On the right, I could feel what felt like, Gentle power. Like a piece of clothing going around something. Attached but also not you. These were probably the Crown types by process of elimination.

“You will be able to choose 3 Authorities and 2 crown types. You can only use your Authorities when your crown is out and the passive effects from the Crown Types only apply while your crown is out. It costs Crown Time, which generates well, over time, to use your Authority. As a Gen 0, you would get 1 hour for every 24 hours. There is a mathematical formula for it, if you’d like to know. At Gen 19, you would generate a little over 25 hours of time every 24 hours.”

So, I’d need to reach Gen 19 before I could manifest my crown permanently all the time. Well, that’s good to know if I ever reach that far. It had occurred to me that I could just, go and become a bunch of low requirement monsters but that came with it’s own problems. Take Prince slime for example. It requires Core Slime to control slime. If I became a Core slime and then into something else, I wouldn’t be able to control any slime and wouldn’t be able to go back to slime. Maybe I could become a different slime, but would I keep the skills I had as a core? If I wasn’t careful, and even if I was, transitioning into different monster lines could permanently lock me out of certain evolutions. It would royally suck to be 1000 years into this and realize my earlier choices on day 1 meant I’d never become a God. No, the risk was too stupidly high for that quick gain of power.

“Crown Types don’t require time, beyond the time spent out. It’s important to remind you that Crown Time and how long you can have your crown out, are different things. You should be able to have your crown out full for a full 24 hours at Gen 10 and able to keep it permanently going at Gen 19.”

“You can gain 2 more Authorities if you manage to slay a Hero and more Crown Types depending on the amount of creatures you rule over. If you lose too many minions you will lose additional Crown Typings.”

That splashed some cold water on me. I was a target already. Hero’s were going to be a thing where I was going and there’s no way that they got nothing for killing me if I got something for killing them. I was going to be a special monster or a boss monster or something. If I played my cards wrong, they were going to annihilate me. The idea of going up against a monster or Hero who was also going through this entire process sent shivers up my spine. It was one thing to know you might not be as good as others were, it’s another to think you’d have to fight that someone.

“Are there other Godlings where I’m going?”

“Ah, no. We don’t put Godlings together in their challenges.”

“Then, can anyone just become a hero or a Crowned Monster?”

She nodded at me.

“There is a summoning ritual for Heros and an incredibly rare spawn for Crowned Monsters. Typically, only 3 each will be on a world at any given time. While they won’t select most of their abilities or have memories of their past life, they will still gain access to the systems and naturally come by many of the same skills.”

So I have a build while they have RNG? That somehow doesn’t make me feel much better…

Instead of worrying about running into 5 people on a whole planet, I walked over to the authorities.

And had to pick my jaw off the floor.

Being a God was abstract. The abilities in front of me were anything but.

[True form Authority:

Time consumption: 60 minutes

Duration: 1 minute

You are now able to temporarily change your form into your True Form. This increases your overall stats by 150%. Increases your mana regeneration by 1000% and health regeneration by 500%.

What your True Form looks like is based on your personality and history. An evil creature with a history of murder and rape would have a Demonic and Infernal form. While a kind creature with a history of generosity would look Angelic and Gold. You won’t know what your True Form looks like until you use it, but it is a form that best suits you, for it is your True Inner Self made manifest.]

A 150% increase in all my stats? On top of a 10x mana and 5x health regeneration? This is a boss form. That’s amazing. And not what had really caught my eye. While impressive, I still won most of those fights in video games. If someone can kick my ass, somehow, I don’t feel becoming 2.5x as strong would be enough. No, it was the next thing that had flabbergasted me.

[Creation Authority:

Time consumption: 20 minutes per 4 cubic feet of material

Duration: Instant

You are now able to create up to 4 cubic feet of copper, sand, dirt, rock, wood, obsidian, or clay. You can freely shape the material when you create it. You will be able to create other material types with enough practice, eventually being able to create and manipulate any material. The Earth and all things of it will bend to your will.]

Just, just pure matter creation? I could just make things, anything, out of thin air? Imagine if I got good enough to make multiple things at once and shape them. I could just spawn any item or creation I wanted. A 1000 years from now I could just wave my hand and boom, a whole computer could just be made or something. It was the most god like thing I had seen yet and it floored me with the idea that I could just make stuff if I selected it. The only reason I wasn’t immediately picking it as one of my 3 is because I wasn’t insane. This was only the second option out of nine.

[Destruction Authority:

Time consumption: 20 minutes per 4 cubic feet of material

Duration: instant

You are now able to destroy 4 cubic feet of copper, sand, dirt, rock, wood, obsidian, or clay. You will be able to annihilate more material types with enough practice, eventually no material will go unharmed from this authority. You can only destroy materials that aren’t alive. Even the Earth will make way for you.]

I felt bitter. Of course this existed but it just wasn’t as, godly. Sure, instant destruction of anything was amazing and a godly power but it just wasn’t as amazing. Humans can destroy, anything can destroy, it was creation where things got really amazing. I had always held a personal belief in my heart that I wasn’t able to share with anyone. That humans were above most gods in literature and religions. You don’t see the Christian god making vaccines or the steel industry. You don’t see Zeus coming down and creating concrete or glass. Humans have far outpaced the Gods in most ways. Well, that was until I realized gods are a real thing. I wonder what the other gods have made besides worlds… but still, this was a great Authority. It didn’t really resonate with me but the ability to just remove 4 cubic feet of anything at all was undoubtedly useful.

[Sustenance Authority:

Time consumption: 45 minutes per 2 pounds of food or drink.

Duration: Instant.

You are able to create any food or drink that you have eaten or drank before. You will eat like how a true lord should.]

Well there’s one of my three for sure. I had to choose this. I was going to be a slime and the first word that had come to my mind when reading this was “Shortcut.” Imagine if I ate a bit of steel. I could then just, make 2 pounds of steel. Of anything. I didn’t think it had to be human food. After all, I remembered one of the things Chaos had mentioned. That food was odd in this world because for example, skeletons could eat. They just put it near their mouth, bit down, and there you go. It counted and nourished them, as weird as that sounded. Ghosts draining stuff counted as eating for them. So I was fairly sure, as a monster, and an Authority at that, that inorganic material was fair game.

The options were crazy. Because it didn’t say only 2 pounds, it said 45 minutes per 2 pounds. If I saved up a whole day, and had eaten an anvil before, could I create an anvil because it was food? A sword? But more than all of that, the requirements for Core Slime came back to me.

‘60 astra

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Absorb 30 creatures

Absorb 5 human hearts’

I didn’t want to kill people, not even if they really came after me. It wasn’t because I was too kind or anything like that, it just seemed, I didn’t want to kill people. And yet I needed human hearts. With this ability, would it let me count that? Absorb, for a slime, meant eat. Eat 5 human hearts. This Authority could make anything I had eaten before. If it could make a slab of roast beef or a burger, which was the meat of a cow, it can make a heart, that’s for sure. I couldn’t see any reason it wouldn’t count it.

So with this, I might need to only eat 1 human heart. And if I played my cards right, I might be able to rob a graveyard or something. Find someone that had recently died somehow.

Yeah, this had to be one of my choices because it just had too much potential and was just too useful as a slime.

[Space Authority:

Time Consumption: 10 minutes per 10 miles

Duration: 10 minutes

You can now create portals to locations that you have seen or know sufficient information about, such as seeing a building's blueprint. The portal’s max size is 30ftx30ft. You and your minions can go through this portal, and you can close the portal early or increase the duration by using the same Authority on the portals. It’s best not to keep the Lord waiting.]

Simple, effective, and amazing. But also, lame? Like the previous Authorities either had growth or allowed me to do something amazing. If I wasn’t a slime, sustenance would have been, odd, but I could still see its use in a variety of ways if you were particularly creative. This? There’s no way Space Magic doesn’t exist and there’s no way I couldn’t eventually do this and more with it over the course of thousands of years and unlimited potential monster evolutions. Pass. A passage from a book I had read came to my mind.

Never take powers or abilities you can do yourself.

[Life Authority:

Time consumption: 360 minutes

Duration: Instant

You are now able to resurrect the recently slain or can heal any and all wounds and illness in the blink of an eye. What is life if not another thing for a True King to Rule over.]

Oh my god. Resurrection? I had the sinking feeling that I would need this. Even if I learned healing magic, could I really resurrect people? Probably not. That seemed like, the realm of the gods or at least the truly strong.

Something was brewing in me. A realization. I felt my knees go weak and had to sit down. Chaos was looking at me with worry but I couldn’t focus on her. Everything was just happening too much and too fast but I wasn’t that weak. I was adjusting fast I felt but that just meant that there was more room for my future to roll out in front of me. Dying, becoming a God, becoming a monster, getting hunted, probably dying, magic, etc etc etc etc etc. Now a new one was starting to sink in.

I was going to be a King. Not just a monster called a King. I was truly going to be a King. A leader. A, a Ruler. I was going to have people underneath me. Sure, they might be monsters, but clearly monsters were just as much as capable of being people as anyone else.

I grit my teeth and stared at Life Authority. I didn’t care what others existed. I grabbed it. None of my people would die like I had. I’d not allow it. I’d break the world before I let people suffer for me like that. I may be trying to become a God but I didn’t care anymore. I wasn’t going to let myself evolve off the backs of my people. We’d all go up together or not at all. If I was to be a King, I was going to be the best I could be or, or I’d die trying.

That was, hefty. The weight was hefty. I had been subtly ignoring it along with a million other things but…

‘Crowned Ability, let’s you command other creatures.’

‘Princess/prince slime. Royal core - You now have command over lesser slimes and are able to command them.’

‘Crowned Monster.’

It was there, staring me right in the face. Chaos had been right, it was the most important choice I would make. I had made a choice to be a King. A ruler, a leader. The Hero system was the vanguard and safekeeper. The hope in the darkness or the darkness that overwhelmed. The Crowned system was to be a King. An Emperor. I could feel now, especially as my Authority settled in me, how both led to Godhood. One would allow you to reach the height of an ideal. The one who can do the impossible, who could overcome the world. A Hero represented a God like Hercules. Mighty, great, powerful. Able to break reality, able to overcome obstacles not capable by mortal men, A Legend and Epic in the making. Their story of struggle would lead them to Godhood. Not because they reached for it, but because they would become so great the universe would bow before their might and Story and acknowledge them as a God. For what else could they be?

A Crowned Monster wasn’t the same. Where as a Hero was an Ideal, an all mighty existence by virtue of their Story, their Legend, their Epic and Might, a Crowned monster was a King. An Emperor and Ruler. They would Ascend to Godhood by pure virtue of their existence simply being at a higher level than any other. They were a God the same way the Christian god was a god or Odin was a God. No Feats were necessary, no great Epics. They would happen, as was only natural for any Great Being. But they were merely simply a higher existence than any other. As their Empire grew, as they became more, they would Ascend to Godhood.

The Authority finished settling in me and I blinked at my own introspection. That had been, weird was a word but enlightening was another. A hero and king were diametrically opposed. They could kill one another. A Hero, defeated by a higher existence, like Hercules brought low by Zeus. Or a King, defeated by a Hero, like Loki killing Odin.

Neither were necessarily enemies, but both were each other’s bane.

I shook it all off and got back to looking at the rest of the Authorities. I had only looked through 6 before my mind or soul had been integrated with that strange form of innate knowledge.

[Dominate Authority:

Time consumption: 80 minutes

Duration: Varies

You are now able to dominate a creature by looking into their eyes. They will become perfect slaves to you and your will. Weaker creatures can be Dominated forever while strong willed creatures can break out of it or outright resist the effect. Bow to your new overlord.]

I spit on the ground.

“Mark?”

Chaos was glaring at me.

“Ah, sorry.”

But seriously, what the fuck. This pissed me off in a way I couldn’t explain. Yes, my crown and other abilities allowed me to command or control others. No, I wasn’t going to abuse that. This was completely different, it was a total enslavement, erasing the will of another. I wanted to rip the Authority to shred on principle. I knew it wasn’t just me and my own emotions, it went deeper than that. The second I had selected the Crowned Monster System, it had become a part of me. Seeing this was like looking at a piece of shit that was moving around to me. Absolutely disgusting. If I took this Authority I’d probably explode. It was that repulsive to me on a base level. It went against everything I stood for. Slavery was, abhorrent but it wasn’t just that. This Violated what it meant to be a Ruler to me. There can be no King, without subjects. And a Slave was a dead subject. This was killing your own people and pretending you hadn’t done so. No, perhaps even that could be reasoned away in my head more than this. A slave was at least still a person with free will, even if all their options were hell. This was to remove even that. It was unnecessarily cruel. I couldn’t even say or think Pass, because that assumed it had ever been an option. I’d rather kill myself and die, again, than ever have this piece of utter garbage be a part of me.

[Magic Authority:

Time Consumption: 25 minutes per Tier level

Duration: 25 minutes

You are now able to temporarily form a 5 foot bubble that will cancel out all magic skills and mana activated skills of those Tiers and lower. You will still be able to use magic skills and mana activations. Tier 1 would cost 25 minutes, Tier 2 would 50 minutes and so on. Magic is but another form of your will and can be taken away from those unworthy.]

Huh. Hmm. Protection from magic sounds great and it’s something that I could probably never, ever do with another ability. It doesn’t necessarily have growth and a 5 foot bubble isn’t a lot of space. I’d basically have to be on top of someone for it to matter and nothing in their right mind would ever get that close to me if they knew about the ability. Most Magic would be range anyway. Somehow I doubt canceling out magic skills means that if someone shoots a fireball from a mile away, the fireball just disappears. Even if it did, I’m sure dropping a meteor on my head would have plenty of non-magical ways of killing me after it went off or landed.

So, it would be best used for assassination or the like. A surprise attack. I’d have preferred an active offense or defense but I can work with this if push comes to shove.

[Minion Authority:

Time Consumption: 30 minutes + 30 minutes per minions Generation

Duration: 60 minutes

You are now able to temporarily summon minions from Forms that you already were. For example, if you were imps once before, you can now summon imps to do your bidding. A True King has plenty of minions fully willing to carry out whatever their Lord desires.]

I was stumped on this one. It resonated with me and my goals and desires. The ones I was rapidly forming the longer I spent here. But it was also clear. I put my hand near it to get a better ‘feel’ for the Authority. It truly meant temporary summoning.

As in, I’d create people out of nothing and then they would cease to exist afterwards.

They’d last an hour and then be gone. I focused, hard.

They wouldn’t be technically alive. They wouldn’t have souls. They would be simulations more or less. Powerful, capable, alive to an outside observer but without an inner world. Disturbing but useful. I could have an instant army or powerful monsters on hand within moments. The temporary nature of them, of having truly dead and false servants, rankled me something fierce. But the resonation was strong. It was like having to swallow bitter medicine. You knew you weren’t going to actually like it in any way, but you knew you needed it.

I tried to pull on that Authority enlightenment I had received earlier to understand what the hell was going on here.

And to my surprise, it worked.

I was going to be a King, but a King needed minions. Simple, but what if it wasn’t easy? How long would it take to build a kingdom? How hard would it be to defend your land? What if you didn’t have enough people to build walls? Enough caretakers for your people? A kingdom was built off the backs of others. That was a necessary part of any place of rule, of any place where there was at least 1 thing alive.

Yes, the false subjects would only last an hour, but with enough time saved up, that could translate to hundreds of minions in an instant. Enough to build a city practically overnight. False minions to have real subjects.

I sighed and grabbed the authority. I didn’t really want it, but I needed it. I also seriously needed to get the fuck away from wherever the hell we actually were because I was basing that entirely off the feeling my soul was feeling from these Authorities. My mind was very confused why I wasn’t excited for instantly having a god damn army that could be any monster I had been before. Just imagining having a bunch of Prince Slimes all making their own little armies was incredible to me. And going even further…? Despite the cold dread of “someone has probably tried this, done this, and failed.” I was pretty happy with my choices so far.

The last one, I naturally grabbed sustenance authority. The tipping scale was definitely metal. Being able to produce infinite amounts of metal just was way too good, let alone the human heart issue.

After I had selected them all, I had expected a kind of sense of completion. Instead, I felt like I was still missing something really important.

I turned my head slightly to the right. Ah. Right. That.

“Are you ready to select your Crown Typing?”

I sighed and nodded.

“Yeah.”

Today was gonna be a really, really long day. I was actually starting to be annoyed. Cool abilities or not… how long was it going to take till I became a slime?!