“Time traveler… yeah sure,” she scoffed with a sardonic expression. “Come on Mr. Fancy Clothes… what do you do for a living?”

“That’s a secret,” I replied. I couldn’t just tell her that I spent my days on my couch doing nothing productive with my life.

“So, how come you don’t know about neither the Clone Games nor the Semwick Games?”

“I only started living in the present recently. I haven’t paid too much attention to things before that. But why are we talking about me? I thought you would enlighten me about these so-called games.”

“Well, as I said, I’m a C ranked Clone Fighter. I fight in Games with my clone as a proxy. They are the biggest shows across the Empire. I know it’s bragging, but I’m C ranked! That’s pretty big you know. I’m famous,” she said with a sly smile.

“Erm... I don’t know you,” I laughed.

“That’s your loss!” she huffed back.

“What do you do then as a Clone Fighter?”

“Depends on the Game setting. They change them around all the time. Sometimes it’s a simple fight between two clones or dozens fighting until the last clone standing. Other times they drop you into a jungle, a moon’s underground cave system or a spaceship and give you objectives. Other players get different objectives, and they have to compete with each other. You could be a solo player in a match but put into a group in the next one. The Game Masters always switch around the rules and settings to keep the games entertaining and unpredictable. If you haven’t watched them before it’s high time you started it.”

“You fight other clones with your clone to the death?”

“What?! No! It's not something savage like that. Keeping the other's clones in one piece is customary. You never go too far and beat them to scrap. Especially at higher levels. Paying for your clone’s BioEnhancements is no joke. If the others pummeled yours into a pulp every match, nobody would play at high levels.”

“You guys give BioEnhancements to clones?” I asked slack-jawed.

“Below rank C it’s rare and starting from B it’s a must if you want to stay competitive.”

“Do you get paid for playing in these games or it’s just a stupidly expensive hobby?”

“Oh, yeah! I do this for a living. You get rewards depending on your performance.”

“Did you lose out on a lot of credits last time?”

“Huh?” she said and furrowed her brows.

“I’m sorry, I overheard your conversation from earlier.”

“You mean Maralain… Yeah, you could say he took a bunch of credits from me. However, I’m not mad about that… I’m mad because if I had won, I could have applied for a promo game. I wouldn’t have much chance of getting the promotion to B rank, but it’s a chance! Ugh!!” she raged and slammed her empty glass down on the table. “Damn cheater!”

“You clearly aren’t fond of the guy, and the other one you were talking with before didn’t seem like a close friend either.”

“Ah… He was just making fun of me,” she said and looked down to the dance floor.

“Because you want to join the other games?”

“Pretty much yeah. It’s not something that normal people do. You just don’t hear anybody you know joining the Semwick Games. It’s not for small people living on small stations.”

“But you want to?”

“I was planning it, yeah. I wanted to rank up to B first, but I couldn’t get into the promos. I’m not sure about it anymore,” she told me while visibly chewing on the inside of her mouth.

“I’m don’t want to sound rude, but you seem like a girl with balls to spare. So, why are you afraid? Why are these games so special?”

“I’m not afraid!” she snapped back. “I’m just not sure I could perform well. The Clone Games are a cheap copy of the Semwick Games. There’s only one game every cycle, and you participate with your own body.”

“Oh?” I added and leaned forward.

“Yeah! It’s the real deal. You put your own well-being on the line. Countless participants suffer serious injuries or even worse, die. The players go through several rounds until the next champion can be declared. I heard that if you manage to win, Emperor Semwick will meet you in person,” she said with sparkling eyes.

“Wait, wait, wait! People die?”

“Yes! Nobody tries to kill the other players on purpose, but you can’t be completely safe during fights. Accidents happen. Everybody who joins knows about the risks.”

“You are indeed a brave one if you want to join,” I nodded.

“Are you mocking me?” she glared back.

“I’m not mocking you! I was just honest. Don’t be so insecure! If you want to join have some confidence in yourself. Others can mock you, but if even you can’t believe in yourself there’s really not much reason for you to join.”

“Waaah,” she buried her face in her hands and growled while pounding her feet against the floor. “I don’t know what got into me. I shouldn’t be like this… Even worse a stranger has to tell me that I’m acting weak.”

“You should beat up a few Z ranked players to get back your confidence.”

In response, she lifted up her head and gave me a death stare.

“Just joking! Just joking!” I laughed while holding up my hands. “You sounded like a big fan of the Emperor,” I tried switching topic.

“Who isn't?!”

“I bet some people don't like him. By the way, does every Emperor have the same name?”

“What?” she leaned forward and stared at me with round eyes.

[Did I say something bad?] I asked Genna quickly

[YES!]

“Just kidding! Just kidding!” I replied immediately.

“You are a weird person.”

[What was wrong?]

[There are no other Emperors!] Genna answered.

[I’m not stupid enough to think that there are more than one Emperor, I meant the previous ones.]

[There are no previous ones. Only Emperor Semwick!]

[Woah! Something’s getting lost in our communication. You told me the Empire was founded thousands of cycles ago. Did the name change?]

[No. Emperor Semwick founded the Empire 6256 cycles ago.]

[Are you casually telling me that there’s a dude who’s more than 6000 cycles old?!]

[He’s the oldest living sentient being in the Empire. The Beholder race has the unique ability to transfer their consciousness into their husks. Emperor Semwick is the only known member of his race that can transfer indefinitely.]

[Holy shit! Is he immortal?! How old is he? Is it possible that he was alive when I was in the past?!]

[He can be considered an immortal, as for how old he actually is, I have no information. In theory, he might have been alive when you were still on Earth.]

[Isn’t he going insane after living for so lo-]

“Hello?!” the clone fighter girl called for my attention.

“Oh, sorry! I had business-related stuff to take care of.”

“Well, I’ll better get going. I should find that moron. I need to work out some stress from my system,” she added, standing up and stretching her neck in a circle.

“You want to beat him up for making fun of you?” I asked with a chuckle.

“What? No! I’m not a savage… I meant sex if it weren’t clear to you,” she scowled and walked away. I could hear her mumbling something about me being a weirdo.

[Looks like we didn’t make a good first impression.]

[What's this 'we' I'm hearing? It’s all on you.]

“Whatever...” I said and gulped down the rest of my second drink.

The colors started to vibrate around me, so I decided that it was enough clubbing for me for the first time.

I wasn't in a hurry so as I walked slowly towards the entrance I watched the various professional dancer on the stages down below. I particularly liked one of the human females, but a commotion in front of me disturbed my entertainment. Two mushroom people were in a heated tentacle wiggle competition while one of those red dressed distortions tried to calm them down.

[Your helmet should protect you but to be absolutely safe, don’t get too close to the one with the black spore cloud.]

I looked at the two mushrooms. One was covered in a black cloud while the other one’s was light blue. [What’s the matter with the black cloud?]

[Fungari display emotions with their spore cloud’s color. The black one shows anger, and it’s harmful to human respiratory systems. The staff shouldn’t allow this...] said Genna discontentedly.

I thought for a moment about what she said and then with a loud groan I slapped my palm onto my helmet.

[Did I say something bad?] she asked.

[Yes and no! I finally understood your joke, and it’s baaaaaad!]

[Which joke?]

[The one you said a long time ago in the elevator.]

[What does the flirting human say to the angry fungar?] she asked.

[You take my breath away. I finally understood the punch line, and it’s horrible,] I complained with a strained chuckle.

[Well… I like it!] she huffed.

[You have a weird taste for jokes then. Tell me one that I’d like too.]

[What does the brain slug do in your room?]

[Trying to get into my head? I dunno...]

[Starving to death!]

…

[You’re banned from telling jokes...]

[Ahahaha,] she just laughed at me like a lunatic.

The colors were jumping at me too much, and my head was swimming so I headed home straight away.

After opening up the bridge-gate to my room, I didn’t step through immediately. I picked up the monster stun rod from my belt and threw it into the room at head level. There was no response, so I entered. I did the same with every room and looked around carefully, but everything seemed fine. No paralyzing gas this time.

While I was undressing I asked Genna, [What’s up with those girls in red dresses? Why do they look like a bad VHS tape?]

[They are of the Mythoc race. We are in their original territory now. They can shift out their bodies to some extent, that’s why they look so strange to you. Fun fact: The Bend-Phase technology was based on this ability. They are all females and rarely ever show their bodies.]

[All females? How do they hump then?]

[They don’t… hump. They reproduce with parthenogenesis, birth without fertilization.]

[If they are fine with it… Why the red dresses though?]

[Tradition. Not much to explain there.]

I sat down on my couch in my underwear with a spinning head.

[Can we have another serious talk?] I asked.

[Anytime.]

[I have an idea. A short-term activity. I’d like to talk to you about it but I need you to hear me out before freaking out.]

[Do you want to be a Clone Fighter?]

[Hell no… There’s no way I would spend so much cash on a stupid clone. I have something entirely different in mind. We talked about how I wanted to travel around on my own ship. I can only imagine the cost of a proper ship I could use as a home and to be honest,] I paused and with a quick motion I grabbed at the air in front of me. [I wouldn’t mind a few more upgrades either,] I said looking at my palm. [I need credits… a lot. I have an idea how to make some in a short time but I need your approval first dear Overlord.]

[I’m not your overlord...]

[The idea goes like this: I want to approach wealthy people with an investment offer. The details aren’t fleshed out yet but in essence, I would ask credits from them with the promise of paying it back with a high-interest margin in a short time.]

[What kind of investment did you come up with? Can you really guarantee a payback with high interests?]

[Hear me out please,] I paused for a moment to gather my next sentences. [I would approach as many people as I can. The more interested in my offer the better. As I collect more credits from the new investors I would start paying back the first ones with their interests. I would keep approaching new investors and paying back the old ones with the fresh credits. Hopefully, the first ones would be happy enough to invest their credits again. Preferably even more of it. Happy people spread the word around so later I would be able to approach people easier to get them to invest.]

[Sounds interesting but how do you generate credits? What’s the business behind the investment?]

[There is no business. I don’t generate income, I just collect the investors' money. I keep rolling the whole thing forward as it grows in size.]

[Isn’t this just stealing from people?]

[I would pay them back. They not only wouldn’t lose money, they would earn a lot! But in the end, I would have to stop the rolling boulder at some point. I thought a lot about it and I need a few conditions in order to quit the scheme with as many credits as possible and the least people screwed.]

[Scheme? Screwed?!]

[When the whole thing is big enough I would have to find a really big fish. The fish can’t be any kind. I need a fish that’s ugly, disgusting and ill-mannered. I need a person that’s a scum of the universe with so much money he can hardly spend it. I would have to convince this person to invest enough credits so I would be able to pay back all previous investors while I still get to keep enough for myself. As the last act I would disappear in a ninja smoke bomb.]

[You want to steal credits…]

[Don’t oversimplify it. I would help a lot of people earn money while I would only take from a single bad person. And to be perfectly clear he would give me the credits on his own technically,] I said. I was fiddling with my fingers nervously. I didn’t know how she would react to another crazy idea. “What do you think?” I asked loudly.

[Stealing is bad… simple as that,] she started and I was already sighing inside. [But if you help out people and organizations that do good and deserve good while only taking from one person in the end who deserves bad things it’s not so clear-cut anymore.]

[What if I make extra effort during the first phase to reach out to as many good people and organizations as I can to help them out in the end while we look for someone really evil for phase two?]

…

[It would be really hard to find someone I would consider bad enough to deserve something you proposed.]

[But it’s possible, right?]

[There is a possibility, yes.]

[Does this mean that you are in?] I asked with anticipation as I leaned forward on the couch.

[Only if we do this properly. Only one person loses at the end of it and you need my absolute approval for the choice. Also, properly covering our tracks is must!]

“YES!!!!!!!”