[CONGRATULATIONS: YOU HAVE MADE A VIABLE LIFEFORM TO COMPETE FOR CONTROL OF THIS PLANET. THE ABILITIES CELLULAR CONTROL AND SOUL CONTROL AND THE KNOWLEDGE OF THEM WILL NOW BE TAKEN. THE ABILITY MAGIC CONTROL WILL NOW BE REDUCED TO MANA MANIPULATION. OMNISENSE WILL BE RAISED TO HALF ITS VALUE FOR DURATION OF THE SECOND PART OF QUEST FROM SMALL BEGINNINGS.

ALERT: YOUR CREATION WAS DEEMED A FAILURE. INTERVENTION OF A BLESSING FROM HIGHER BEING HAS PREVENTED THIS, REJOICE! DUE TO HIGH AMBIENT MAGIC A MONSTROSITY WILL STILL BE FORMED.]

Rapidly power and knowledge are sucked out of me, I cried out in spiritual pain and sorrow at the loss of power. Even knowing they were only temporary, the knowledge leaving my mind still created a hollow mourning in me. Understanding that seemed trivial for me to know now escaped me. Pulling on what remained of my grand power, mana manipulation responded. Hermetic magic symbols and formulas flashed in my mind. They were exceedingly simple compared to what I could do moments ago. The basics were there though and I was confident I could still imprint the knowledge of hermetic magic on my people. When the sensation of loss finally abated I felt great. I was stunned. The pressure of all the power stuffed in my being had disappeared. I had grown accustomed to the pain but now I could see I was slowly dying from the overload. I doubt I was close to death but with closer inspection of myself I could feel the cracks in my being. What was a brilliant cascade of known and unknown colors, whirling around each other in an endless dance of eldritch knowledge. Now it was noticeably dimmer, the colors more recognizable, and the dance random with only hints of arcane meaning. I gave myself a moment to mourn. I was lesser now. The power was never mine and it would have killed me, but I had the power of creation in my metaphysical hands. Be it moments like I suspected or the millenniums it felt I had already lived in this new form the power was mine and then stripped from me with ease. A shudder ran through me at the reminder of HIM. I quickly shifted my thinking from that topic and focused more on the damage done to me. It felt like nothing was permanent and if I focused on the edges of the cracks I could see mending already taking place. I resolved to wait for it to heal. Even with it not being a great amount of damage I could still feel I would be slightly impaired from it. Before I resolved to just wait, a thought struck me. I have magic now and I know the way to use it. Shifting through the limited knowledge left to me from mana manipulation I cobbled together a simple healing spell to accelerate the natural healing of the target. Stunned again, I now knew the function of the ring around me. When I activated my spell the ring began to break apart and move into the spell shape. Simple geometric shapes overlaid into a pattern followed by arcane symbols in their own pattern. With it being a simple and low power spell the symbols and pattern were simple. A circle encompassing two triangles flipped and laid on top of each other. An arcane symbol, placed on the inside of the six points, each one with a slightly different meaning. Healing, self, isolation, and time were the meanings I felt from them. Even accelerated it took time and I felt the drain on what little reserves I had left. After I was healed the magical construction broke apart and reformed the ring floating around me. I was tired from the extended healing but I could feel my full strength had returned. Notifications pulled at my attention.

[CONGRATULATIONS: DUE TO ATTENTION TO YOURSELF FROM THE AFTERMATHS OF POWER OVERLOAD AND THE ACTIONS TAKEN TO ALLEVIATE THE DAMAGE YOU HAVE BEEN AWARDED +1 PRESENCE AND +1 MANA. CONTINUE TO PUSH YOUR LIMITS FOR MORE STAT INCREASES.

CONGRATULATIONS: YOU HAVE CRAFTED YOUR FIRST SPELL.

SIMPLE NATURAL HEALING - As long as the caster focuses on a wound and the target has natural healing capabilities then they will heal at an accelerated rate. COST: Small and slow drain of mana, miniscule drain on will.

NOTICE: PLEASE NAME BASE SPECIES. NAME CAN NOT BE CHANGED LATER.]

A new box appeared in front of me asking for their name. I had nothing. Zilch. Nada. It's not like I didn't see it coming. I was thinking about a name the entire time I was creating them. I still had nothing. Names are hard and seriously how do you come up with a name for a species. I didn't want to keep taking time on it though. “Fuck it,” I say to the void. Closing off my perception I summoned the image of a keyboard from earth and did the equivalent of slamming my hands on the keys at random. When I looked at what came up I knew there was no way that it was actually random. Zōin̈. Trying not to ponder too hard on how mentally pressing random keys on an imagined keyboard gave me a four letter word, with accents on some letters, I quickly gave a mental nod for the system to accept the name.

[BASE RACE ACCEPTED.NAME ACCEPTED. THE ZŌIN̈ WILL NOW BE REGRESSED TO A PRIMEVAL FORM. YOU WILL WATCH AND GUIDE YOUR CREATION AT PIVOTAL MOMENTS. IF YOUR CREATION SURVIVES TO BASE RACE THEN YOU WILL HAVE COMPLETED QUEST FROM SMALL BEGINNINGS.

NOTE: YOU ARE PLACED IN A TEMPORALLY ISOLATED DIMENSION DURING THIS TRIAL. WHEN YOU EXIT THE DIMENSION LITTLE TIME WILL HAVE PASSED. MORE INFORMATION UPON COMPLETION OF QUEST.]

I watched as my Zōin̈ began to regress. A light over took them and beyond the first glimpse of the regression I couldn't tell the changes they were going through. I was more interested in the shift to my perspective. The planet had returned. It looked slightly different, the island I saw being turned into an ice cap from the magic storms was back to being a tropical jungle. There was also a continent where I thought I had seen an island chain. My vision descended to a large crescent shaped Island hugging a large continent. It reminded me of a longer Madagascar if it was half again as wide, the tips of both ends twisted in and almost touched the mainland. A mountain hugged the outer coast at the zenith of the curve. A great jungle covered the island and miles inland on the continent. My vision finally finished its descent at the base of the mountain. Near a cave where a river of fresh water flowed out and into the vast jungle, the light that held my people settled at the entrance to the cave. Without the perspective of other objects, I didn't notice how large the light had become. It covered the rather large and oddly smooth entrance.

[ALERT: THERE ARE CURRENTLY FOUR OTHER FORMLESS IN THIS TEMPORAL DIMENSION. HARM TOWARDS ANOTHER FORMLESS IN THIS DIMENSION IS PROHIBITED.

WARNING: YOU HAVE NOW BECOME AN OVERSEER FOR THE ZŌIN̈. YOU ARE BOUND TO THEM AND WILL ONLY GROW IN POWER AS THEY DO. ALL SYSTEM INTERACTION, ABILITIES/SKILLS, MAGIC, CLASSES, AND STATS WILL BE RELAYED THROUGH YOU TO THE ZŌIN̈. ACHIEVEMENTS WILL NOT. ALL DECISIONS ARE BASED OFF OF YOUR PREDILECTION, BIASES, UNDERSTANDING, AND ACTIVE CULTIVATION OF UNDERSTANDING THE GREATER TRUTHS. AS THE ZŌIN̈ GROW IN POWER THEY WILL INFLUENCE THEIR SYSTEM IN THE SAME WAY TO A LESSER DEGREE. THIS DECISIONS CAN NOT BE UNDONE AND YOU WILL DIE WITHOUT DIVINE HELP IF THE ZŌIN̈ CEASE TO EXIST. YOU ARE A CHILD, THEY WILL CALL YOU A GOD.]

A chill ran through my core as the Warning promised power if I helped my people grow, but death to them and me if we failed. I couldn't help but feel a little like the titan Atlas who held up the heavens. The weight of the responsibility I now had to the Zōin̈ fell on me. A new notification appeared as I was still trying to come to terms with it.

[CONGRATULATIONS: OMNISENSE (CONCEPTUAL) HAS UPGRADED TO OMNISENSE (SENSES): You will be able to see through the senses of your species as well as the omnisense radius in distance from the core of your people's lands. OMNISENSE RADIUS: 9.]

The light fades from the entrance and my being is overcome with the senses of a thousand odd creatures. Smells assault me, feeling strange without a nose. Noises are equally as strange as I hear again. The overview of the planet and the nebulous omnisense (Conceptual) sight I had didn't have these senses in the same way a normal person would. I could hear my people's hearts in the metaphysical sense and physical. The same with their soul. I could even smell in a way if it invoked a feeling or meaning. Vision was even different in more subtle ways, though I suspected that most of that was due to my abilities then an inherent difference in how we viewed reality. Colors were definitely muted without a magical sense and only having eyeballs to see. I still had an overview of the area the system said was the core of my species. Most of it was the cave system that ran throughout the mountain. It followed the river for roughly 300 meters before the river disappeared into a low tunnel of jagged rocks. A bioluminescent fungus growing everywhere in the caves casts a variety of colors about its caverns and tunnels. The various tunnels extended far past my overview. Outside the mountain my overview only extended to the edge of the jungle in a small radius around the mouth of this entrance. Only about 100 meters. A part of my mind registers in the chaos of attempting to adjust to all my new senses, that a notification appears in front of my people.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

[SYSTEM ACTIVED. WELCOME TO THE MULTIVERSE. INTEGRATION IN PROCESS…]

My awareness slips away as it all becomes too much. I spend the next couple of hours sorting out the perceptions of nearly a thousand creatures. I focus on the changes I can see my people went through. They were now slightly hunched over, about a forty degree angle. Their face elongated, still shorter then we believe raptors snouts were, but it is still at least half a foot now. The horns, feather hairs, and eyes still remind mostly the same. Slightly bent arms but again mostly the same. It was the tail that stood out. Resembling a more traditional raptor tail with the hand I made looking more like small protrusions than an extra hand and fingers. Observing them for a bit I figured out they used it mostly as a scoop. A few even used it as a way to mask their tracks by sweeping it along the ground. I could even see some small natural magic occurring and helping obscure the scent. I made a note to keep an eye out for the ones that used it that way. Coming fully back to myself my view had slightly changed. In one of the corners a saw a display that gave a breakdown of the Zōin̈. Just over a third were adolescents and of those a large portion are just born. A couple hundred caught my attention as I became accustomed to seeing out of the Zōin̈ eyes and my overview. They weren't part of my people. They were all old too, some still seemed to be at their prime or just after it, the majority of the couple hundred though I could see the signs of aging. Their eyes still glowed but it was now dull and reeking of the flavor of death. Most of the feather-like hairs were gone or bleached of color. Even with the supernatural grace I observe from the species as a whole, the old move noticeably slower and more carefully. I feel a connection to them but I know they aren't mine. Yet? I see most of the creatures surrounding one of the oldest ones. A strange funeral takes place before my eyes. The one dying is sniffed and inspected by several members, many of the young are guided by older members of the species to the dying elder. Through the senses of the Zōin̈ I feel pain. She was the oldest of them, the last of those that never saw the overwater nor felt the heat of the great fire. When they finally found the exit and made it to the opening tunnel she was blind and couldn't move. I see the memories of the ones that dragged her to the mouth of the cave. Just so she could die with the warmth of the sun, what they called the great fire. With a last gasp the eldest shuts her eyes and breathers her last. A wailing call grows from the throats of the closest, more take up the mournful call, soon all have joined. As the call grows, I see the memories of my people. They are thinking of moments with her. She was their leader, she knew there was a surface. She never explained how she knew, but she convinced them all to leave the underworld and follow her on a journey to the unknown. Well not all came, the oldest have memories of a large group refusing to leave and staying behind. I feel my own mourning. Those are the ones I failed, the ones that were made because of my failure. The cry ends just as suddenly as it started. A haunting echo and quiet descends. Then those closest to the elder begin to rip her apart. Each one taking a bite before moving on. The parts ripped off were given to the young and carried back to those too young to move far from a nest. To my horror this continued till all that was left were broken bones, the marrow sucked out by the stragglers. I felt everything they did and not one took a bite from hunger. It felt like a duty, the strength and wisdom passed to all the tribe. Only the old didn't participate. Staying back with reverence. I felt a connection to me grow. The elders' senses came to me and I could feel the dissipation of their soul. “That wasn't how I designed them!” I shouted in a panic. I knew they couldn't hear me but the Zōin̈ looked up.

[INTEGRATION COMPLETE. PLEASE CHOOSE A STARTING CLASS. HALLELUJAH: A HIGHER BEING HAS CHOSEN YOUR SPECIES TO WATCH OVER AND HELP GROW.

CONGRATULATIONS: YOUR CONNECTION TO THIS HIGHER BEING HAS RESULTED IN A NEW RACIAL ABILITY, EARTH BOUND SPIRIT.

EARTH BOUND SPIRIT: WHEN YOU DIE YOUR SPIRIT LINGERS IN THIS WORLD. FOR A DURATION OF YEARS (LEVEL UPON DEATH × 10) YOUR SOUL WILL GAIN A SPIRITUAL FORM IN WHICH YOU CAN USE TO INTERACT WITH THIS REALITY. ALL ABILITIES COMPATIBLE WITH NEW FORM ARE RETAINED AND ANY ABILITIES THAT RELYS ON A STAT THAT ISN'T PRESENT IN NEW FORM WILL BE CHANGED. YOUR CLASS WILL BE UPGRADED TO FIT SPIRIT FORM OR A NEW CLASS ALLOWED TO BE PICKED IF OLD CLASS CAN NOT BE UPGRADED. YOU MAY INCREASE THE YEARS ALLOWED TO REMAIN BY LEVELING IN NEW CLASS AND NORMAL CULTIVATION METHODS, OR BY HAVING MEMBERS OF YOUR SPECIES DONATE MANA TO YOU. THIS METHOD MAY ALSO COME WITH ADDITIONAL BENEFITS]

The notification appeared in front of the tribe. I suspect even those I couldn't share the sense of, as I felt the connections from them strengthen. Another notification appeared.

[CHOOSE A STARTING CLASS]

I'm amazed at all the information the system is able to feed my people with the primitive language they have. Equally amazed at the fact I can understand everything it is telling them as up until this point I hadn't even realized I could speak and understand their language like I grew up with it. A quick glance at my own screens confirmed a suspicion I just had

[SKILL: ZŌIN̈ LANGUAGE - 100/100]

it seemed like the system snuck that one in on me while I was out of it. I am pleased to see many pick a mage class or a magical class. This also made me realize I couldn't see their soul arms. Not that it mattered but I was worried that the regression had taken them away and I would only get them back if I played it right. I didn't think the system would do that to me. So far it acted as an impartial arbiter and regulator of everything. I was still worried and resolved to make a soul seeing spell soon. My worries were quickly swept away as I see some of the ones that chose a magic class begin pumping mana through them and the spirit hands form from the channeled power. I let out a little laugh as I see them trying to twist their fingers and arms into the shapes and symbols needed to cast. The unfamiliar movements cause many to make a misstep and the spell fizzles out. One unlucky person is able to make the correct movements but falters with their mana channeling and causes a spell backlash. It screeches in pain as the spell which looked like one designed to make him faster collapses and his leg muscles cramp from the messed up injection of mana. A few of those closest to the failed caster make a throaty sound that I recognize as laughter. My attention is drawn to my first spirit Zōin̈. The elder reforms above her body into the spirit form I designed but with the changes made from regression. Those closest to her bow and the living elders present their necks in subservience. She looked up to me as if she could see me. She couldn't of course. They didn't have that kind of power and even if her class was good …. “Damn, a really good class.” I excitedly say as with a touch of effort her status screen appears before me. Her class First Ancestral Faithful. A bit of a mouthful but undeniably good for them and me. I was right and it didn't give her a way to see me but it did give her a vague understanding of what I was focusing on or doing. I also noticed that some didn't have a normal status page and didn't pick a class. The ones that didn't get to pick their class were those too young. With the screen displaying an individual's age I could see the cut off was around 10 years old. With those above 10 all being able to pick classes while those 10 and lower told that their class options will appear upon puberty and be based off of an individuals aptitude, fostered skills, and achievements (both individual and those made by the tribe) The word in the Zōin̈ language was more akin to quickening then puberty and I made another note to pay attention the next time one of them aged up. On the subject of language I watched as the ghostly elder was using their limited speech, which consisted of chirps, growls, rumbles and throat sounds. Her head and neck twitched and angled as she spoke. The position or timing of a movement conveying meaning as much as the sounds did. I was amused and a little embarrassed as she told them of me. She told them of a giant orb like the great fire. Instead of exuding heat and light the orb's lights twisted in on itself and colors appeared and disappeared at random. She likened it to the lights of the bioluminescent fungus in the cave. She told of a great band of magic encircling the orb. She talked of shapes and symbols flashing in the band. She even gave me credit for her new form and her return to lead them again. Now that is technically a lie. I never spoke to her. Feeling my disapproval and amusement I see her stutter over her words a bit. Through the shared sense I could tell she was embarrassed but wouldn't correct it. With the influence of the system and increases from class she believes she is the smartest of her people. She wants to guide them to me. One glimpse of a god and she was a diehard convert. Not exactly sure if i should encourage this type of fervor I hide my apprehension as this would help me as long as I kept it in check. I didn't want a race of fanatics. Shivering at the memories I had at what humans would do in the name of their religions. I gave a feeling of assent to her ideas. I pull up my full status screen for the first time since my rebirth.