《Into the void》Chapter 4: Adjustments were made.
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Yesterday had been another interesting day. I had started to experiment with my powers and started the process of creation, something that deeply excited me.
I just wanted to jump right back in, I couldn't wait. My mind was currently nagging me to go back again, but I needed self-control. I still had responsibilities, things to do, and places to be. While I no longer had my company nor was I directly managing my properties, there were still things that required my attention.
Firstly, I was not going to be staying here, no way in hell. I was going to be moving to a different country. American cities had their upsides and all that, but right now I feel like the countryside might be the best place for me and no way in hell was I going to move to the Midwest. Not to say that I had something against the Midwest, but it just wasn't my scene.
I was going to move to Switzerland, I had lived there before. In fact, that was where I did high school and university. Plus, I spoke French so living there wouldn't be that hard.
When I first became successful, the first thing I bought was a little chalet in the mountains. It was close to a nice little tourist town and there weren't that many people so I could easily live there and not have to interact with others. Though there was still enough interaction just in case, interaction is after all good for us humans. We are social animals; it would be dumb to deny our instincts.
So today there would be no more experimentation with my powers, not until I got to Switzerland at least. Then I could go as deep as I wanted, no holds barred just whatever I pleased. So, I started to pack up, the furniture didn't need to be moved since they came with the penthouse. If guests wanted to add their furniture, they could ask the reception, and the furniture would be moved, for a little fee of course.
A Little dush baggy? Yeah, but hey if they were staying up in PH fucking 40 then they had enough money.
I just grabbed some essentials for my bag, the rest I would buy over in Switzerland. My ticket had been bought like a week ago, first-class of course. We travel in style over here.
Looking out my bedroom window to the skyline of New York City. I felt kind of sad, New York had taken a vital part in raising me. This is where my success started, that hustle and bustle mentality of America was amplified tenfold in New York. It was an I don't give a fuck mentality mixed with a go-getter attitude.
That had been one of the most vital contributions that led me to my success.
So, I was a bit sentimental about leaving, but hey new powers. There wasn't anything else to do, my taxes were filed by a company that I paid monthly. They took a fixed amount of money every time they filed the taxes. I still held a huge number of stocks in my company and other companies. They generally earned me a nice 70,000 every year from investments.
Yeah, money-wise I was good.
Now I'm just repeating myself, I'm stalling for time. Damn, this city really grew on me.
My luggage was already leaning against the door fully packed and ready to move out. Martin had already left for his business trip, so there was no saying goodbye there. I walked out the front doors of the apartment complex still a little saddened by the move. The driver was ready, and he helped me load my luggage in the car. The drive to the airport was quiet, and the flight was as well.
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Now, that didn't take away from the fact that it was a long five-hour flight. To think that back in the day it used to take 11-12 hours to fly from New York to Switzerland.
So, I had decided to not go to the fulcrum or try to edit my universe on the plane. Even though I knew that I wouldn't be caught it wasn't something I was comfortable with. However, I couldn't help myself and I did mess around with the titles and the concept systems.
It wasn't a system like in the lit RPG sense, it was just a system of power like democracy is a system of government or chakra was the power system of Naruto. While exploring the knowledge that had apparently been inserted into my mind, I came to the conclusion that learning concepts were not going to be easy.
This universe I lived in was not owned by me, so the systems of power that I had been gifted didn't exist. The entity solved that problem by making me the anchor of the concepts system. Which just meant that my existence allowed for the concepts to be learned. Once someone learned a concept though the burden of maintaining that concept within this universe was on them.
Since the power system wasn't native to this universe and came from the entity, it wasn't powered by anything within this universe. At least that's how I interpreted the knowledge in my mind.
To my understanding, when one understood a concept a fragment of that concept would be transferred through me to the user where it would embed itself into their soul. The user would then cultivate that fragment by furthering their understanding of the concept and using it more in their life. However, the amount of growth that could happen at any singular time was limited by the soul. Unfortunately, the human soul wasn't all that powerful.
Though that had to do with the fact that this universe is a low universe. The name itself isn't to say that the low universes are necessarily lesser than other universes, simply that low universes had very strict laws of physics.
A lot of them didn't have any kind of supernatural energies or anything of that sort, so the myths and legends of humanity had no chance of being true. Nothing of that sort existed in this universe.
This means something like the human soul had very little chance of being nourished and strengthened, if at all.
In order to learn a concept, you would have to obtain deep insight into that concept either through meditation or any sort of eureka moment. Then the practitioner would have to be adept enough to immediately record that insight unto their soul without destroying it or falling out of the trance-like state brought by such a thing.
My power allowed for the writing on the soul part to be effective, without it that process would straight up just not be possible.
The cultivation of that fragment, however, could take anywhere from a couple of decades to a couple of centuries. That was if the universe was neutral to the power, in a hostile universe that timeframe would be greatly expanded. All that time for only one major jump in power.
Here I thought I just got a cheat that could help me extend my life and then I find out that it was practically useless in that situation. It has immense long-term usability but that was potentially centuries away.
Then an idea came to me. What if I learn the concept inside my universe and then came out, wouldn't that power transfer over?
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Even if that wouldn't allow the full transfer of power because of the weakening effect. It would still allow for some small transfer of understanding.
However, I still didn't know if that would be fast enough, though it should be. I could still see multiple ways in which this could be limited, I wouldn't be surprised if it was limited in some form.
So, I can't give myself titles directly or indirectly, which forces me to not focus on that aspect since any deliberate action to gain a title wouldn't work. Learning concepts would potentially take ages and solutions to circumvent that would rely on beings with souls.
Why the hell did I include that in my power set, come on younger me what were you thinking. The difficulty of growing powerful just went from easy to nightmare.
I spent the rest of my flight sulking and being slightly annoyed. I couldn't stay mad though as the challenge kind of got me excited. I was looking forward to it even.
My arrival in Geneva was a quiet one, the drive to the chalet did take two hours but that was due to the inner-city traffic.
Once I arrived, I immediately got to work unpacking my bags before heading out to get some groceries. Then I quickly rushed back and started to put everything in place. I cleaned the house, rearranged the furniture, and generally just altered the decorations to my liking.
Then I took a quick shower filled my stomach up with some food before decided that now would be as good of a time as any to jump right back in this shit.
As I got ready to enter the Fulcrum, I could feel my mind already racing ahead trying to guess the possible effects of my plan.
While I was brooding on the plane, I realized that even though my universe was fantastical it didn't have many sources of power. If we went simply by what I wrote then the only options were deals with eldritch beings, high technology, divinity, and of course the concepts and titles system. Most of those options couldn't be used by me and the others would take much too long.
What I needed was some form of mystical energy or energies that could be used by normal beings.
I could then learn whatever techniques that had been invented through the use of those energies. However, the energies had to be similar to something that existed in reality. That would reduce my cultivation time by a lot.
As I reappeared back at the Fulcrum, I was greeted to the mental equivalent of a puppy wagging its tail. Iz was transmitting his happiness to see me and it was honestly kind of adorable.
I projected back my feelings of happiness before teleporting to the howling room. Immediately their whispers and murmurings entered my ears. It was easy to ignore as I approached the book and got ready to write. The universe hadn't been "completed" yet so I could edit as much I wanted; I just couldn't enter the universe. Once the universe was completed then the one edit rule of the book should kick into place.
I wasn't going to add anything directly to the origin story of the universe, but the origins of the new energies would perhaps change some things. Then of course I would add the villains of the universe, the undeniable bad guys.
The Yinnesin weren't active threats anymore and Vh'iggi didn't want the destruction of reality. He was if anything more of a force of nature type villain. Though what constitutes villainy depends on one's perspective.
As a player of Stellaris VI, the idea of not having a massive endgame threat was weird to me. The Celestials where the undeniable good guys as their role was just to protect the universe. They still existed they just had to be pulled out of their space-time prisons.
I planned to create two races that were linked to the new mystical energy I was going to create. The first of those energies would of course be Qi. While it was a very basic choice the energy, I had intended to create had been so similar that it would be sort of disrespectful to call it anything else.
The other would be called ether which was of a more European origin. The main difference between those two energies were their properties and usage.
Qi was the more structured and straightforward of the two and had a clearer method of utilization. Though all that meant was that even when initially absorbed and it would still be effective with comparatively minimal training. Plus, its nature as the vital energy of the universe should allow me to just at some point use regular energy and convert it to qi.
Ether was more esoteric because it interacted with the concept and title systems. It was required that one either had a fragment of a concept or a title before it could be used. This was to potentially speed up my growth in those two aspects.
As for their origins, they were not native to the universe. While qi was just the vital energy of the universe, there had been too little to ever have been discovered by those who weren't actively aware of its existence.
The increase in qi is the Herald of an up-and-coming danger of the Valarr or the bird folk. They were humanoid birds; their feet were clawed, and their heads had beaks. They were completely covered in feathers and had both hands and wings.
These beings had somehow found a method of creating Qi in their home dimension that had been created when Vh'iggi entered. So, in a way, they were the children of Vh'iggi though they weren't aware of that.
Over time the universe had started to absorb their produced qi, this is what angered them. Their initial reason for universal destruction would be the theft of their qi.
The other race was the Fey, they lived in the conceptual form of the universe. This is where ether was created before being sent to the main universe. They weren't trying to destroy the universe, simply to enslave it.
Both of these two species would be like the Yinnesin, soulless.
That should hopefully add another interesting dynamic between them and the universe's future inhabitants.
The importance of souls comes from their immense potential and adaptability. My creations were powerful because they were made to be powerful. Their growth while not limited was not the same as that of living beings. That's not to say that any child with a soul would reach the power of [The Never-Ending Ones]. It was just more bang for your buck with extra sauces in the form of different abilities.
If [The Never-Ending Ones] had souls, they would be that much more powerful.
As I finished the creation of the two energies and the two races, I felt the universe shift once again. This time it had shifted quite a bit which meant that my additions had more of an effect than I thought they would.
The only other thing missing was true life. I would take some germ, plants, and other living things without a soul and add them to the universe. Once I added them and finalized my universe, hopefully, I could adjust the flow of time and let things play out.
The only issue was guaranteeing the evolution of humanity. While I would let evolution do its thing, I still needed humans in there. Not to say I would give humanity advantages over other races, but I needed them to survive since I needed to learn from them. It would also be easier for whoever I decide to reincarnate in the future if they were in human bodies.
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