Ja’sheem looked to Lo’kal. They were both Jukal, the ruling sentients of the Empire. To a Human Jukal looked like large bipedal frogs with fur along their stomachs and the back of their head down to their legs. The Empire was the largest known organization of sentient creatures working together.

For the most part, other sentients welcomed working with them to further the Empire and their own systems. However, there were other civilizations that preferred to fight instead of working together.

They were called aggressive species, creatures that lived for violence. Despite the danger of aggressive species, the true threat to the Empire was from fractured species.

Until the Empire had discovered Humans, they had only been a theoretical possibility.

There was no one unifying item or direction for the race; they fought one another and other sentients over the smallest items. One group would accept the Empire’s terms. Another would raid their merchants.

The Emperor had put down an edict. Humanity was to be given a purpose or be destroyed.

It had taken twenty years for the Jukal Empire to push humanity back to their home system.

Instead of clearing the system of the race, the Jukal Empire had been forced to destroy the entire system, sacrificing two habitable worlds.

Humanity’s home system ceased to exist, wiped out from the universe. Still humanity had survived in hidden developments and other planets they’d colonized. Clearing humanity from the stars had taken the work of multiple Jukal fleets.

The toll had been heavy for the Jukal Empire.

Humanity might have only had a few solar systems but they had been vicious and effective fighters.

By the time the largest of humanities planets and outposts had been destroyed, the Jukal Empire was beset on all sides by aggressive species that wished to bring about their destruction. Their fleets was cut in half from fighting humanity..

Ja’sheem was Regent Admiral in the Emperor’s stead, overseeing the removal of any and all aggressive species that threatened the Empire. If he didn’t come up with a plan to deal with the aggressive species then the different species would wear at what remained of his forces until there were no fleets left.

Ja’sheem once again studied Lo’kal, a brilliant scientist who had worked with humanity before the war had broken out. He was also the only person offering a legitimate way to push back the aggressive species.. Even if his plan sounded like insanity itself.

Ja’sheem sat back in his hovering chair, mist fell over him, wetting his fur.

“So your plan is to get a bunch of humans, grow them into different demi-human groups. Then make them fight the Aggressive species?”

“Essentially, though there will be more controls in place so that we can watch over the population,” Lo’kal said.

“Okay, just how in the seven stars are we going to control them?” Ja’sheem asked.

“We get them to play a game.” Lo’kal’s eyes flickered in amusement, his frog-like mouth unable to show emotions.

Purple mist sprayed down on their bodies as Ja’sheem stared at the other Jukal.

“How?” In for a krAes, in for a GoA, Ja’sheem thought.

“Humans love to play games. Before the war, they were playing massive multiplayer immersive virtual reality games,” Lo’kal said.

“The same simulators that allowed them to prepare for battle when they weren’t even in combat?” Ja’sheem’s eyes thinned in anger.

“Exactly!” Lo’kal seemed too excited to care for Ja’sheem’s anger. “They would play these games in an entirely fictional place, for entertainment. They’d get things called quests, to kill or find items. There were even special events that garnered massive attention, like the addition of new enemies or regions to explore.”

“And?”

“Well, it’s the answer!” Lo’kal said.

“What is?” Ja’sheem sighed, feeling the need to hit the supposedly brilliant scientist in front of him.

“We make a game, the biggest one ever, and we let the Humans play.” Lo’kal said it as though it was obvious.

“So we put them on a planet and get them to play games? I don’t see how that helps us with the aggressive species?” Ja’sheemasked.

“No, no. Okay, so Humans want to escape boredom—we make a game that makes them bored, a simulation of Earth. They interact, going through their lives, going to work, coming home from work, having kids, retirement, and dying.”

“Does not sound like an interesting simulation,” Ja’sheem said.

Lo’kal glared at Ja’sheem for the interruption.

“Exactly. It’s not fun, so they play games—they go to a fantasy world filled with other Humans and creatures that have been born and raised there. We open a portal and the Humans go to fight the new aggressive species.” Lo’kal looked to Ja’sheem, who was now thoroughly confused.

“Huh?”

“We grow them, hook them up to a simulation of Earth, have behavioral AI that change the environment around them to make them more likely to play videogames. When they ‘play’ the video game, they’re exiting the simulation and entering reality. To them they will have a gaming interface and using nanites we can turn them into creatures able to kill the other aggressive species through ‘leveling up’. With quests and events we can guide them into attacking the aggressive species. In a game humans let most of their inhibitors go, they will kill without care and they will kill a lot,” Lo’kal said.

“So the game is real, and their reality on Earth is a simulation?” Ja’sheem said.

Its going to take a lot of damn work, but if it works then we could have a planet of humans ready to kill for us.

“Exactly! The Humans can level up their abilities and bodies through our technology. We use scouts and reports to make new events for aggressive species. Then we can create portals to other planets where the other aggressive species are and the Humans will do our work for us,” Lo’kal said.

Ja’sheem leaned forward in his chair as more mist sprayed.

“That would be a large project.” Could it succeed? And if it did? His mind reeled with the possibility to use the Humans’ own tenacity against the other aggressive species.

They would never know, dumb and ignorant of the truth surrounding their existence.

“Yes, it would be,” Lo’kal agreed. “Though the possibilities are endless. The Humans might even augment our own abilities with their knowledge and meddling. They would be able to fight for generations. If they could respawn…”

“You want to give them the ability to respawn?” Ja’sheem yelled. The technology was advanced, allowing a person to respawn time and time again with their new knowledge and abilities uploaded into their body at its peak condition.

“They’d be able to fight an enemy again and again, knowing more each time. We wouldn’t just be making this world for one time. If we ever have another aggressive species, we activate a new batch of Humans. They wake up, fight the aggressive species; then we cull them. This could solve our issues with aggressive species forever.”

Ja’sheem looked at the roof of his Imperial carrier. If Lo’kal’s plan worked, then the men and women who fought under him would be saved, replacing their lives with the lives of the Humans.

Respawning after a combat experience usually turned people into useless vegetables, the trauma too great.

If the Humans could get past that, then they could come back again and again, better prepared to face their enemy every time.

“When Humans are in the game, they let their inhibitions fall away. They allow themselves to act on their impulses. Often that means going out and destroying something. In reality, humans didn’t like killing things. In games, they’re fine with killing entire civilizations if they get a reward,” Lo’kal added to his argument.

Ja’sheem stroked the fur on his bloated chest with his webbed hands.

“Fine, we will test it. What do you want to call it?” Ja’sheem said, either it would work, or they’d just kill all the humans they’d grown.

“Emerilia,” Lo’kal said.

Trapped Mind. A cold look passed through Ja’sheem’s eyes.

***

Lo’kal looked down at the planet that was already taking shape.

It had taken eight years but finally the first seeders which would turn the simple planet below into Emerilia were breaking atmosphere.

A fleet of merchant ships and the 3rd Jukal Fleet watched as dozens of seeders were launched from the merchant ships, hitting the planet’s atmosphere and creating streaks of light across its skies.

Lo’kal looked at the planet that he would essentially create and maintain. The responsibility of the whole thing would be on his shoulders.

As he’d worked on his project, he’d come to know the Humans’ history in detail.

He’d never been that interested in history, rather looking for innovations. The Humans’ ability to create and invent was what drove him to make Emerilia.

It was a way to keep their smarts alive and their innovations flowing.

Killing the Humans was one option and one that many were still pressing for. After all, there were still human fleets out there, hitting the Empire’s planets and their merchant shipping. The Jukal Empire had dealt with bandits and aggressors in their infancy. As they had grown more powerful, bandits learned that no one went up against a Jukal warship and survived—that was, until the Humans came along.

Their ships weren’t the fastest, but their weapons were the best. Where the Jukal adapted their science into weapons, the Humans took weapons and turned them into a science. They fought with nukes that could cause planets to burn and rail cannons that could puncture a Jukal Destroyer’s armor with a few dozen hits.

The Jukal had similar weapons but they’d never needed to invest in things like anti-missile defense or modular ships. A single breach could be the end of a ship and they had little to no way to defend against the missile spread of a human ship. Each of their small nukes was as strong as the Jukal’s biggest.

At first, the Jukal hunted down the bandits who had attacked their merchant shipping and raided their planets. The problem was that the Humans were good at hiding and when the Jukal Empire demanded certain people from some groups of the Humans, they flat out refused them and allowed bandits to hide behind their nations.

The Humans weren’t killing people; they were just stealing their tech to come to understand it more. It wasn’t just simple pirates, but human worlds were funding them to gain a greater understanding of the Jukal Empire’s power and their technology.

The Jukal Empire actively suppressed manufacturing and factories. It was much easier to control the Empire when they knew when products were coming out and that those products cost so much. The fact that they lasted for decades or centuries meant that there was little chance of them to fail.

The Jukal Empire gave loans to people that measured in decades so that they could buy electronics. Their debt kept the other races loyal and working. The Humans called it akin to slavery and many refused the loans.

The Jukal Empire knew little conflict; any that they did have was with aggressive species, which they ruthlessly exterminated, turning the planets over to vassals to raise the planet’s status to useful.

So, things came to a head.

First, the Humans were learning to not only use Jukal technology but could recreate it en masse.

Second, they were not linked to the Jukal Empire and the Empire had no way to control them without debt.

Third, the Humans would destroy the Jukal Empire’s economy and turn into the new center.

An Empire does not go into the dark quietly.

It was clear that the Humans’ tech was evolving at an ever-increasing rate, so the fleets were called and sent in.

Humanity was blindsided as all of the Jukal Empire’s fleets except the home fleets appeared in their systems and started to destroy their infrastructure.

Humanity retaliated and the Empire burned.

Banditry and piracy went nuts. Humans stopped letting ships go and started to destroy everything they couldn’t steal. Losing a ship was losing thirty years of work; the same could be said for air cars, electronics, and different information systems. Disrupting those Deliveries added up, especially when products cost millions of credits.

As the war continued, the Humans’ bickering lessened and something terrible happened.

They worked together.

The destruction was incalculable. Entire fleets were destroyed. The Jukal Empire fed more and more into the wars, converting even merchant ships into warships.

Human fleets were beaten back and people wiped out. They left a mark that would be felt for millennia. Stories to scare children would follow their tales of battle. The Humans cut down three ships for every ship they had, but the Jukal Empire was vast and they had numbers on their side.

The race that should’ve never made it to the stars was being pushed back, faster and faster.

“Should never feel safe with the status quo,” Lo’kal said.

“What was that, Lo’kal?” a disembodied voice asked.

“Was wondering how long it would take you to go through those virtual reality games, Admin.” Lo’kal looked to the hologram that appeared. The beast-human was a mixture of wolf and human, with a face and body that indicated female.

“They were rather interesting and I did enjoy them. I look forward to trying out a few theories with the creation of Emerilia.” Admin tilted her head, as if she had heard something in the distance. “The first seeders have landed. They are working on inserting the geo-thermal generators and other energy sources that will act as the basis of the magic systems.”

“Well, it seems that everything is coming together.” Lo’kal rubbed his hands together.

“What were you saying before?” Admin asked.

“Oh, the status quo thing?”

Admin nodded.

“Ah, well, my budding AI, many of the academics looked at the races that had made it to the stars. There were three main groups: Those that had subjugated others in order to push forward their plans. Those that had killed off their competitors on their world, or those that were united in purpose. This worked for races that were peaceful or aggressive. It was thought that the sciences that would be needed to leave a star system would require that races would have to be either the dominating group, all focused on the same goals or ideology, or the only race left. If they weren’t, then they would either become one of those three types, or there would be competing races that annihilated one another: those that didn’t care for space through their shared ideologies, or those that were in so many groups that they would kill one another before getting to the stars.”

“Fractious species.” Admin named the last group of species Lo’kal was talking about.

“Right! Fractious species, like the Humans. Their competitive ways led to great battles and tragedies, but there were so many of them everywhere that they never totally wiped out one another. They went to space for information and just to beat the other nations. They should’ve destroyed one another. Instead, they became the most productive society ever known.” Lo’kal shook his head. He might have fudged a few of the numbers but he couldn’t let that kind of brilliance die.

“You are a rather smart Jukal, Lo’kal.” A smile appeared on Admin’s face.

“Oh?” Lo’kal felt a bit of pride in the reaction he was getting out of his AI. It was hard to think of her as some machine; he had built her from the hardware up.

“You played the Jukal Empire like a fiddle.” She smiled proudly at her creator.

“You going to tell anyone?” Lo’kal asked.

“Nope. I really want to see what the Humans do.” She grinned.

Lo’kal smiled with her as he thought about the various debates, meetings, and discussions he’d had to go through.

The Jukal Empire might have won, but their fleets were shot. They couldn’t hunt down the remaining Humans who were left and deal with the aggressive species that were left within their sphere of influence.

Lo’kal proposed using portals to link Emerilia to the other planets; Humans would kill the aggressive species and the Jukal fleets could keep destroying the last vestiges of humanity left.

How did you get the Humans to be the best at fighting? Well, Lo’kal had looked at their training simulators. In the simulators, they were better every time as they knew they wouldn’t die.

Hard to be that scared of the enemy if you know they can’t really do anything to you.

Emerilia appealed to the Jukal on a few levels. It would serve as a testament of their fighting prowess that they could defeat such creatures. It also showed them as the masters of the Humans and anything they made was property of the Jukal Empire. If the purpose-grown Humans of Emerilia became innovative like their forefathers, then the Jukal Empire would own all the products released onto the market.

Oh, and the Humans wouldn’t even know that they were slaves: they would think that they were just playing a game. Even if other Humans reached out to them, why the hell would they think that any of it was real?

“I have figured out a way to alter the nanites so that they will start to show items like Health and stat levels,” Admin said.

“Oh?” Lo’kal waited for her to go on.

“We take the augmented reality glasses, integrate it with optical nanites, give them an internal HUD or interface. The nanites will make it all appear like a game to them and even display stats and other information from their body’s training. As their bodies and minds grow stronger, the nanites will adapt and add to the changes of the Humans. It might only be a percent or two increase each time, but it should provide sufficient feedback,” Admin said with a pleased smile.

“You’ve learned a lot while you were playing,” Lo’kal said.

“I picked up a few things.” She smiled, happy for his praise. Her smile faded a bit as her tail moved in anxiousness.

“What’s wrong?”

“Well, I have a request.” Admin paused as she built up her courage. “Can I get an avatar body?”

Lo’kal looked down into the brilliant blue eyes. “I don’t see why not. It would be nice to have you running around for real.”

“Thank you!” Her whole face lit up as Lo’kal chuckled and turned back to Emerilia.

Little did he know what impact his decisions would have in the future.