Chapter 117: Nothing Cosmic Can Stay
🕑 Added 2024-10-26 21:25:19 +0000 UTCAuthor's note:
Howdy folks!
Have you noticed the chapters are shorter? I'm trying to get into a mode where I'm still writing self-contained chapters that are less 4k words each and more of the standard 2-3k. It makes it so I can bounce around subjects a little more, which is necessary with how many plans I have for the final book. I really, REALLY, don't want this to be 5 books long. It's time to get to the meat of things and allow Symphony to continue forward.
On the first, we'll be seeing our normal monthly interaction. Polling, Authors notes, and a newsletter. Hopefully. Be on the lookout.
Also, and lastly, November 1st you're going to be charged. I can understand if you want to cancel your membership, but I wanted to give a heads up. I've also decided not to increase the payment charges. 3$ is still money in my pocket, and I don't feel you should have to pay more than that. I know a lot of big authors do 10$ each and yada yada, but the most I'd raise the lowest tier would likely be to 5$ with the same rewards. It just doesn't feel right to charge more than I'd likely charge for a digital book.
Thanks!
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On a planet built to perfectly resemble a sphere, two titanic figures swung great weapons at one another.
One Titan leaned towards speed, with a thin body, and even thinner blade. It whipped it back and forth with great precision, finding the smallest parts to stab in the fastest ways.
The other had gone a different route. Built like a great tower of meat, it swung a well-shaped sword with extra weight on the flat slide of the blade. Though the hits kept coming, it ignored the smaller punctures in favor of striking much harder, with devastating effect.
On a bright blue moon floating overhead, a creature of ice and space scoffed to his assistant, “Why do they always fight this way? I designed them to be perfect from the start. I gave them great technologies, of the kind rarely seen across the Multiverse. And yet, this is how they perform. Idiots!” He turned on the Broadcasting ability, “Idiots!”
Neither paused in their combat as the tremendous booming voice spread across the planet.
“Query response: I do not know, Creator.” His assistant replied.
The Creator pressed both hands against the sides of his head, “I know, fool, I know.”
The muscled Titan caught a lucky break as they watched, cutting down its much speedier opponent with a bestial roar. Raising its heavy sword in victory, it offered praise to its god.
The Creator sighed, “Another failure.” He pushed an ability in his overlay. A moment later, a large gleaming canister flew from the moon on a direct path with the surviving titan. As the Creator turned away, having seen it enough times in the past, the monitor showed a large cyan explosion briefly blocking its view.
As the area calmed down, the monitor showed nothing but a light dusting of magic.
The Creator sat down on a throne made from the Royal Ice of his line. Snapping his fingers, the assistant came closer, kneeling down on hands and knees so he could place his feet upon him.
“I just don’t understand them. My ancestors said the Alpha Protocol was simple. Modify the Creation Instrument. Spawn colossi from our perfected genetic material, seed them, improve them as you move. It's all so simple. And yet-” He waved a hand and a new monitor appeared, showing a shining city filled with beings who looked like him, “My progeny are failures.”
The Creator sighed to himself. Nothing was going exactly the way he’d thought it would. Looking at his Creation Instrument, he gave it a sharp glare. He’d almost lost the first battle since it’d taken so long to modify. Now, covered in the frozen space of his kind, it awaited its next use with something almost like eagerness.
The Creator dug his heels into the automaton body of his assistant, “What do you think, fool? What’s wrong with my plans?”
“Query response: I am unallowed to provide-”
“Advice, yes, I know. It was rhetorical.” He ran a long, glowing white finger against his chin. Looking back at monitor, he changed his Broadcasting ability as the view shifted to show a lab deep beneath the substructures of the city, “Scientists, report.”
A creature looking similar to the Creator turned around from his station. Where the Creator’s body was filled with a white glow, leaking through the interconnected pieces of cosmic ice, the scientist and his fellows were orange, showing their lower ranking as was only proper. After turning around, it dropped to its knees, not deigning to look up lest it cause offense.
“My God, the trial successfully-”
“It was a failure, idiot!” The Creator yelled back harshly, “They’re meant to be using techniques! What was the point of imprinting genetic memories into their synaptic fibers if they’re only going to attack each other bluntly!”
The orange scientist cowered further into the ground, prostrating itself fully. The Creator didn’t care.
“Do it again. You have permission, this one time, to obtain extra resources from my Seneschal for the colossi’s creation. However, if they fail me again…”
The scientists didn’t need that explained, “I understand my God. We will see to it at once. Please allow-”
The Creator moved the monitor, not needing to hear anything else the dumb creature might say. Another piece of advice his ancestors had provided was to create clones at a lower threshold of intelligence than himself. It made them much easier to control and allowed him to keep an eye on the eventual rebellion and uprising that came with managing a superior species. However, the headaches of dealing with such faulty creations were constant and blinding.
The monitor shifted over to another lab. Within, several scientists, their bodies emitting a red glow, moved around the chamber. In three different areas, objects could be seen floating in space. In the first area, the object was dropping at a rate barely noticeable to the eye. In the second, it dropped a little faster, and in the third, it dropped at almost the same speed gravity would normally assert.
He spoke up, “Scientists, report.”
The room turned toward the center, and fell to their knees. One with filigree across its shoulders spoke up for the rest, “My God, the Temporal energy you have provided for us is a wonder. We believe if used correctly, you can apply it to your celestial object. It could allow you to have more time to prepare for each corresponding battle with the pretenders across the Multiverse, and guarantee your victory within the Alpha Protocol.”
The Creator snorted, “As if I would ever use this junk on myself. I hold more than a hundred times your intelligence, and even I don’t truly know how this all works. That’s why I have you morons doing the research. Now,” he keyed a few commands into his overlay, and two scientists exploded while one stumbled forward drunkenly, “-I’ve created three rapid chronal zones for you to test next. Write a report and upload it to the planetary register. You may have-”, He pulled up his timer, “Three cycles for completion before I become displeased.”
“So generous,” The lead scientist commented from the ground, “We will begin at once.”
The Creator shut off the monitor and leaned back, staring up at a sky filled with lesser beings-ones who didn't belong there.
Digging his feet again, he asked a question he already knew the answer to, "How many Creators remain within the Alpha Protocol."
"Query response: There are two-hundred thousand, eight-"
"Enough," He said with a cutting motion. Two hundred thousand still remaining. How would the Alpha Protocol cut that number down? On average, most protocols end with only a few handfuls of victors. If the next battle was similar to the last two, there'd still be around a hundred thousand Creators remaining. And the prize?
The winners would gain total control of their planets as well as access to many systems reserved only for those who had survived the gauntlet. Perform well enough, and you not only gain a seat on the Protocol Council, but a patent of nobility as well. As for the winners who chose to go back to their homeworlds. They were always very few, as, after all, who wouldn't want to be a Master of a solar system?
Of course, he already had a noble title. Just to reassure himself of his position, he pulled up his identity using the new system that had sprung up only recently.
Mirail: Scion of the Cerulean Rendition
Faction: The Evolvers: Branch C
Naturally, he hadn't changed his name when entering the protocol. Only the weak felt the need to hide themselves, which brought up another pointed reminder in his mind.
Who was the new System Administrator and what power did they hold? It was a constant debate topic on the Creator chat boards, in particular, just how fucked over anyone who had displeased them in the past was. Still, he wasn’t as worried as the others.
The fact that the Administrator had gifted the lesser populace access to their chat system was consistently spoken of with anger and disdain, but it put him at ease. If the new Administrator was focusing on those who never grasp their ambition, then they weren’t focused on True Nobles of the Multiverse. Ther was one large problem, though. The new system had changed things.
How were the Nobles of the multiverse to control the natural springing flow of rebellion if the laborers could easily change their identities and communicate within a closed system. It had to be pure chaos outside of rendition 4AA. Maybe even within the sector of his homeworld.
No, while everything wasn’t right with the multiverse, his small corner of the rendition was moving along. While many things were straying from the right path, he would succeed in this Protocol.
It was guaranteed.
Looking at the Creation Instrument a second time, he experienced a small dose of nostalgia. It had originally come at the maximum allowable level, his guide knowing better than not to provide such accommodation. But through the experience and further guidance of his ancestors, he’d managed to imprint his own genetic baseline into the stupid thing, imprinting many advanced systems that should have been outside of his reach. Pulling up his abilities, he looked again at what he’d earned since beginning the Protocol.
Altered Creation Instrument
Broadcast
Copy
Growth
Identify (Modified)
Implosion (Modified)
Monitor
Recovery
Resourceful
Standard Assistant (Unnamed)
When first entering the Protocol, he received not only Recovery, his people's standard ability, but also Resourceful. While Resourceful forced all of his Creation Material rewards to increase at an exponential rate, it also affected his genetic ability. One thing his Ancestors had left out of the conversation was that the Protocol could connect his genetic ability directly to the greater system, creating an affinity with him.
Before the Protocol, recovery allowed his race to remove parts of themselves and, with the right knowledge, reprogram them for different purposes. By connecting those parts directly with the Protocol, completing it to the end wasn’t a possibility but a surety, as he’d used his ancestral gift to the utmost.
The Protocol had even noticed that he’d altered the Creation Instrument, giving him a special ability to tap into his modifications further. It was a great boon, as it allowed him to work without the plainer restrictions other Creators were forced to deal with. Not that they could do much with their limitations.
Tapping into his ability, he checked on the progress of his most recent personal project.
A screen lit up, extending beyond his overlay and allowing him to look at the different pieces coming together. Soon, he’d have the first completed Dalminian cruiser in the fourth rendition. Then, his plan could come together. Who said you had to play fair in the Protocol? Why not just build a space-faring ship, plant a few idiots with basic training upon it, and throw it at the worthless Creators across the universe? The odds of them being prepared for a series of Implosion canisters were close to nil. Sure, something had gone through already and destroyed a few Creator planets around him, but that had been some time ago and he felt secure in his mission.
While the Protocol would come to an end in time, the sooner the final battles of the Creator Wars played out, the sooner he could begin his true work.
Building a better Rendition. One that connected his Noble Branch closer to the Center, elevating them from those without the ambition to see what matters most.
Destroying the Awakened.
But Mirail knew he wasn’t there yet. There was still work to do and battles to be won. He just hoped that the next battle would allow him to select a single participant. Big and dumb as his Colossi were, they would certainly succeed in destroying the competition.
He looked at the timer in the corner of his vision; he found that there was still plenty left for him to move through two to three more generations before settling on a choice.
Who would he face in the next battle? He already had an idea. Councilmember One, an old friend of the family, had sent a warning earlier. But it didn’t make sense. He pulled up the record to read it again.
Private message from an Alpha Protocol Council Member detected.
...Retrieving…
Mirail, you must be careful in your next battle. Yes, he has an Advanced Assistant, but there’s something strange about him. Councilmember Five, in particular, is very excited by the things he is showing us.
Be wary child. Something is not quite right with him.
But why would he need to be afraid of a Creator who required an Advanced Assistant? They’re all fools who no-one expects to succeed. Why the Council even allowed them to participate was beyond him.
Still, Council Member One was no fool. He’d been a part of the Alpha Protocol since the beginning of the Second Rendition, having succeeded himself. His palace, just outside of the Center, was something of great envy within the noble multiverse. If he was the one to give warning, Mirail knew he should accede to his wisdom.
Looking down at his assistant again, he sighed. He’d been hoping to upgrade the worthless creature with his reward from the second battle, but alas, that was not to be. Finishing in the first one-thousand had only given him a basic ability choice, although he wasn’t going to complain about Implosion. It was simply too useful.
Looking back at his overlay, he focused his attention on the engine. Creating a zero-gravity engine wasn’t simple, even for someone like him. He’d have to do some of the work manually. An action he was loathe to perform.
Maybe, after the third battle, he can take the losing Creator back with him. He could always use a weak-minded simpleton to do the manual labor around here.
Yes…yes that could work.
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Jeremy Young
TFTC
