System – the big kahuna of the galaxy. System is unimaginably powerful and knowledgeable, but does not actually know everything nor is all powerful. Two have been mentioned. NIS (“new improved System”) is who we met in chapter 1. They have been in charge for 15 galactic years (approximately 30 Earth years), and when they took over, the galactic calendar base was reset to 0. Forrest is currently experiencing year 15.
The System prior to “NIS” (usually also referred to as “System”) was in charge for an unknown period of time, at least thousands of galactic years. They were the one that chose to put an end to normal interstellar travel by lowering maximum speed (what Earthings backwardly refer to as “the speed of light”). They also killed trillions of beings belonging to evil species intent on wiping out everyone but themselves. Those beings rejoined the cycle of reincarnation with markedly reduced karma.
Gods – extremely powerful beings with influence over just one world. They are very long lived but not immortal. Most possess their own interfaces. Like monsters, they do not possess classes and use aether directly, not needing to refine it first to mana or ki. They can learn skills and have inherent capabilities. The latter are of two types, those shared among all gods, and capabilities specialized for a given god or set of gods. If gods could be directly compared to mortals and immortals (they can’t), a god’s level could be said to be between 75 and 100.
Souls – immortal entities (?) possessed by all sentient and sapient beings (and perhaps more). All we know of them so far is that they accumulate or lose karma through their lives, and that they have quantum spiritual memory of every life they have ever had. This surpasses even System’s records, which only tracked the most recent life. They did, however, begin tracking all immortals’ lives in 0 NIS.
Mortals – the vast majority of beings in the galaxy. Some are sapient, some are sentient, and some (e.g. plants) not even that. Most sapient mortals possess interfaces, but sapience is not defined by the presence of an interface. Sapient mortals can be classified into two main groups. Mortals can advance to Level 50, but not beyond.
Standard mortal – lives one life, with no memory of a previous life. When they die, they re-enter the cycle of reincarnation, potentially becoming an awakened.
Awakened mortal – a sapient mortal who remembers their previous life These can be further sub-classified into two types. They only remember one previous life.
Born awakened – an awakened who was born normally. They begin to regain their past-life memory at about 2.5 years of age (on a Human scale). These possess interfaces no different than that of a standard mortal.
Unborn awakened – an awakened who appears on a planet as a mortal already at least 8 years old. Between their previous life and this one they were given the opportunity to choose who and what they would be.
One purpose of both types of awakeneds is to “cross-pollinate” the galaxy with experiences and capabilities from some other world than their current one. Because System does not wish to cross-pollinate with evil, Borns require at least 2000 karma, and Unborns at least 3000.
Monsters – beings of the aether who may be either sapient or sentient, and peaceful or violent. They are sexless and tend to have extended life spans. They do not have classes but instead native capabilities which use aether directly. Sapient monsters may learn skills, as well as common magic and common ki ones. To use those, they have to refine their aether appropriately, taking more time than flesh & blood beings. It is possible for monsters to be unborn awakeneds. When a monster dies, they return to the aether with their bodies dissipating. If killed, some sort of reward is left behind.
Immortals – sapient beings who will continue to exist forever, and who will have memories of multiple lives, but not every previous life as an immortal. One criterion for being offered immortality is a karma of at least 5000. Once chosen, after 100 lives, the immoral can once again choose mortality. Immortals have only existed for 15 galactic years, although their souls have quantum spiritual memory of every life prior to their base life. They can advance to Level 50 but not beyond. They are bi-immortal, in that if nothing kills them, they can remain immortal as a single life, with aging stopped at a modest level of maturity (eg 27 for a Human unless they chose to start older). If/when something does kill them, they get to choose their next character just as an unborn awakened does. In fact, their first life as an immortal is substantially similar to that of an unborn awakened. Besides immortality, two other factors differentiate them from awakeneds.
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Immortal Archetype – throughout all their lives, an immortal is bound to a certain archetype. As we have seen with Forrest, his is “tuesday’s wildcard”. They choose the archetype once, with very little prior information, after choosing immortality.
Karmic Choice – a few immortals are given a karmic choice to generally assist in bounding the type of society they begin their new life in, to a type the immortal chooses. An immortal can modify their Karmic Choice between lives. It is unknown why Forrest was given the Choice, but Interface speculated that it could be because of his abnormally high karma.
Server and the Database – every interfaced world has a Server, whose contents are cloned within System’s storehouses. It is a main repository for general, basic information of a world. The result of most Analyze queries originates in Server’s database, as well as a world’s geography as revealed by an interface's Map function. It has other basic information as well, such as the world’s languages. It doesn’t track history or culture, although it has a basic knowledge of geography. We have seen Interface twice update Server’s database, with that information instantly available to all other interfaces, whether a mortal’s or a god’s. All interfaces can, and are expected to, update the database when they encounter something new or changed.
Galaxy-net – housed in System’s storehouses. It is much like it sounds, an internet for the entire galaxy. How does it operate beyond maximum speed? It has something to do with the Void, and possibly smoke and mirrors. Only certain entities have access, and access is somewhat restricted in accordance with the type of entity. In general, mortals are not aware of Galaxy-net’s existence.
Wiki – much like the Wikipedia of Earth, but on a massively larger scale. Information from a world’s Server is not automatically shared with the Wiki; information must be hand- (well, appendage- ) transcribed in the appropriate Wiki format and style. It is maintained by interfaces throughout the galaxy with at least an AI level of capability. There are local librarians as well, never keeping up with constant updates from the Servers.
the Boards – like Reddit of Earth, a hierarchical set of forums
Interfaces – entities partnered with most sapient beings in the galaxy, providing some level of basic interfacing with System and Server, although mortals are generally unaware of the existence of either. They run many of the basic functions of interfaced life, such as access to classes and granted skills, party management, Analyze, Map, and Time, etc. Although asexual, an interface is referred to by pronouns of their host’s gender. “It” is acceptable for a Standard Interface There are two models of interfaces.
Standard Interface (with Interface Standard Mode (ISM) and Interface Advanced Mode (IAM)) – the only type of interface prior to the coming of immortals. Standard mortals and born awakeneds operate in ISM, i.e. a not-interactive level of functionality capable of responding to commands like “Time” and “Map”. It is also capable of guiding someone through the leveling process. IAM has a high degree of artificial intelligence, but it is not sapient. It can hold a conversation with their host, so long as the host is the one prompting for a response. The IAM-level of functionality allows them to edit Galaxy-net’s wiki. Since their next life will be a standard mortal one, an unborn awakened’s interface is restored to ISM functionality between lives.
Interface Immortal Model (IIM) – the new type of interface granted only to immortals. They are fully sapient and designed to operate forever. They support their host and are a permanent companion. They also are capable of everything an IAM is.
Interface-to-Interface Protocols – allows interfaces a very limited means to communicate and cooperate. Functions we know of include party management, XP distribution, and sharing of a certain degree of their host’s info when Analyzed. Forrest Rhode’s Interface has shown himself capable of sharing fonts.
Interface-to-Server Protocols – allows interfaces to obtain information from their world’s Server. All interfaces are expected to update Server when they know something has changed.
Four Pillars of Reality – the foundation of true science.
1. Infinite space
2. Infinite time
3. Infinite matter
4. Infinite energy
* Infinite aether
the Universe – big. Really big. Really f’ing big. An uncountable number of big bang’s worth, and more. This series will be limited to the trillions of habitable worlds within System’s galaxy.
the Void – when you aren’t any place else. It is not conducive to matter, nor probably energy either.