The Earth died painfully. Its lapis seas turned red with lava. Its emerald forest crashed, fell, and burned. The golden savannahs blackened and bubbled. New mountain ranges rose fell and rose again. The world became oval and oddly distended. Irrevocably broken.
Kyrie watched in silence as his home was lost. Gone forever. Then his status screen pinged.
Congratulations on making it to a teleportation base. In two hours, your new home will be created and everyone in this teleportation base will be moved to the same location.
It is necessary to inform you about certain aspects of your new home.
1. You are no longer the only sapient beings.
2. New dangers lurk in this world, you are no longer top of the food chain.
3. Things you once thought impossible are possible, do not let primitive thoughts constrict you.
To acclimatise all humans have been granted certain boons for the first year.
1. System - this will guide you through all hidden dangers of the new world.
2. Increased experience gains – lots of humans have dedicated their lives to useless jobs so doing different actions will now quickly increase your proficiency.
3. Safe starting locations – only weak monsters will attack you.
Your world has been granted entry into that of a system. Do not waster your chance. Grow and become stronger and excel at whatever you choose to do. Good Luck.
Reading it Kyrie felt an intense thrill. What new possibilities and dangers was the system talking about. One of his guilty pleasures was fantasy books and as much as the too-righteous heroes amused him, he knew he always secretly wanted to be one of them.
Is there magic in this new world? Please let there be magic.
It sounded like a joke but after everything he’d just been through, he was seriously considering it. Was it now possible. What monsters would there be waiting for him to slay on this new world? What new intelligent creatures would he meet? Would he even live to be able to do any of this? Even as he watched Earth crumble, he could already feel the melancholy being shrugged off and replaced by childish excitement.
Earth had become but a molten ball now glowing angrily in space. What now?
Are we meant to live on that hellscape? Surely not.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Seconds later light blinded him. Red fire exploded into the darkness of space. Explosions of such ferocity the embers came close enough Kyrie could almost reach out and touch them. Looking back at the source, he realised two planets of earth’s size had come together.
The collision of the two terrestrial objects was stunning in both its magnificence and its destruction. Moon sized chunks of rock and magma spun off and were pulled back in by the force of gravity to collide again. Watching through the still cloudy floor he stood shocked, as more and more planets appeared from space and crashed into Earth. Molten balls of all different shapes and size, yet all similar in the fact they had been completely and utterly destroyed.
Are those scarred planets all like Earth? How many other sapient beings like us lived on them, he thought.
This experience, if anything, made him believe in the omnipotence of the system. What type of being was capable of destruction on such a level? Mastery of such forces that they could fling planet’s together like balls of dough.
It took a good 45 minutes but gradually a gigantic globe of liquid fire formed. It had two moons and orbited a star much brighter and larger than the sun. However, he was not sure when exactly the star appeared - he was too focused on the planetary destruction. The planet was at least ten times as large as old Earth but still thoroughly uninhabitable.
Soon after multiple miniscule shining specks began to rain onto it. They seemed to explode in brightness as they fell, bursting through the planet’s atmosphere. Fallen stars.
They must be the meteors, like the ones that brought water to Earth. . .
It seemed he was right, as after 40 minutes of this streaking planetfall blue started to cover the planet interspersed with the molten black rock. Spreading to cover it in deep and glorious ocean.
. . .and water is the precursor to life so. . .
Minutes later an explosion of green from the underside of the planet which spread like a plague all over it. Vegetation had appeared from the deep sea and spread to grow on its rocky surfaces. It brought a smile to his face.
I should probably say something philosophical now. Like “Destruction and creation – an endless and beautiful cycle.”
It took two hours, but Kyrie knew billions of years had passed outside the cloud. In front of him stood a glorious planet, teeming with lush green life. The once solitary marble had been replaced by a bowling ball.
He didn’t know what to think. Kyrie wondered if his ancestors had watched the same thing happen. Transported from their old world to Earth but it didn’t seem likely.
Earth had to reach the initiation stage. Maybe the system has growth worlds where sapient life is produced and then brings us into the true universe when we reach sufficient intelligence.
Damian’s voice shocked him out of his reverie. He realised he had been standing around for two hours in silence, just watching the planets.
“Well, that truly was something,” Damian gasped, wide-eyed, “It’s made me reconsider my life choices, maybe I should have chosen biology, not engineering.”
“Five minutes and we’ll be on that planet Dame. It might look pretty from up here but who knows what’s waiting for us on the surface. You heard the system talking about ‘new dangers’ right.” he shook his head, “How are we even going to eat? None of us know a thing about surviving in the wild.”
Dame frowned, determination bringing his brows together, “I’m scared too but we’ll handle it. We always do. The system talked about new dangers, but it also talked about new possibilities. You know what they say, ‘no risk, no reward’.”
“I hope so Dame, I truly do hope so.”
Then a notification pinged.
Your body will now be reforged so you can survive the new conditions. Welcome to your new world.
And everything went black.