OK, in keeping with events that are pre-planned, I had been working on this particular post for a while now. After this, I'll give you one more day before update day.
This will be edited in at the exact, appropriate time, no sooner, no later. This is just a placeholder for now.
If it turns out I need multiple posts, it would behoove me to ask that you do not post until the entirety of this storypost is up.
It's been a good year, hasn't it?
Epilouge's Epilouge
Over Nine Thousand Trillion Years Older
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Another long day at the Battlefield. For some, its your first godmodding war, while for others, it was still considerably longer than the only war before it - and still others thought that the last war had made much more progress than this one in its time. Yet still, none could dare to say that this war was unimportant, except a certain few, all-too-knowledgeable about the outcome and what would come next.
Or so they thought.
At this time, a cackle was heard across the battlefield; rancorous and mildly insane, it continued in pitch until all things stopped, if but for a moment, to at least acknowledge the vile source. Yet it came from nowhere, seemingly, or rather everywhere at once. UserZero rolled her eyes, the only one to recognize it.
*UserZero: flumpty...what is it? why're you here?
No sooner had the question been asked than did the entity reveal itself in full. However, many recoiled in surprise at the sight they saw. This was not a perfectly white floating egg, but a perfectly
purple floating egg, empowered by forces they did not understand. The few who knew of the glow knew it as Waluigi Thyme: a spice with an extremely rare ability, the ability to manipulate the forces of plot. It was exceptionally mild compared to, say, the Agents, but the fact remained that very few things were like it, and across the Multiverse it was highly prized. Sadly, Waluigi was extremely secretive in how he created it, and his allegiances to either plot force were fabricated.
In any case, the floating egg and his hideous face - a face I
really should not describe - graced the battlefield with a font of knowledge. Or a lack thereof, rather.
Flumpty Bumpty: ehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe...
*UserZero:...ok i'm not going to question how you've gotten hold of thyme. it must have been a terrible mistake on some idiot's part.
Flumpty Bumpty: your mistake your mistake your misstakes H E R A a A a A a A a A a A a A
*UserZero: look what is it? we do still-
Flumpty promptly pulls a VCR, similar to the other two you have previously obtained, marked with a simple label in UserZero's red:
9,000,000,000,000,000.000+. it's promptly thrown into a random VCR recorder that was 'just lying there.'
Thanks, Flumpty.
Flumpty Bumpty: ehehehehehe it's JUST TO SCREW WITH HER OK i don't like you either so you're gonna HaVEt at the 4th gate like it or not
Flumpty Bumpty: i'd likeEeEeeeeeEEEEEEE to KEULLL YEW you all BUT THAT'S JUST NOT GONNA MAGICALLY POOF ITSELF INTO EXISTENCE but mark my words you lot
Flumpty Bumpty: I'EM FLUMPTY WALUMPTY, MYTHOLOGICALLY MAGNIFICENT, THE MASTERFUL MONSTROSITY, AND THE IMMUNE TO SPACE, TIME AND PLOT! I WILL HAVE YOUR HEADS and your eyes for cooking huehuehuehuewoohoohoowolololololotrolololololololololololoooo AHDIAAFIOHOAFHAAAAHAHAHAHAHAFIODHAFIHAD!@
Flumpty Walumpty promptly eggs off like the egglord he is. The Thyme has clearly unhinged him...Trust me-I didn't make any weird deals with him, just told him that those tapes existed and UserZero would
hate it if they were all found at once. It appears he's settled for...Whatever this one is. Please, no details.
UserZero looks absolutely shocked and red in the face. Richard looks rather smug, seeing her rage, but neither make any motion to stop the production. you all turn your attention to the VCR...but this time is different. Rather than just a VCR, you feel...Pulled to it. Magnetized. Like there isn't reality but the tape-
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0 9/0 9/2 0 1 5
ONE YEAR AGO
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UserZero was not now nor ever a happy woman, and had not been for the longest, longest time.
UserZero’s situation was disproportionate. She had morally dubious hobbies, sure, but ‘morally dubious’ didn’t deserve quite what she had to go through. Ironically, it was self-inflicted, partially. Some of it, the part she hated the most, was not her fault at all. However, the majority was self-inflicted. And yet it was an advantage, and thus she took it.
UserZero occupied her time with irrelevant questions as she waited. This location was as generic as it got; some kind of pub in the middle of nowhere. It was one she got an Omega to create as a ‘neutral ground’ for her meeting with an inferior Godmodder. There was nothing to do there but ask irrelevant questions to herself and see if she couldn’t answer. Today’s question was whether or not she should humor the thought of giving the Descendants a visit.
The idea of any one of the Descendants being ‘safe’ since their visitation to the Zeroth Server was laughable at best. If they were not as unkillable in the ‘real world’ as they were in the ‘game’, then she’d have killed them before the fight between her and Richard broke out. They had pseudo-Veils, yes, but those could be broken given time and preparation - and UserZero had well prepared the Zeroth Server long ago. She knew where they were.
And yet, she couldn’t really threaten anything. Any damage she could do could be undone by them just by her presence. If she started a fight, the others would come and it would be another Godmodding War, and she didn’t want that. She needed the time to do other things, like arrange this meeting. Yes, it was all a pointless affair altogether, and yet again the urge to strangle them was drowned out by the cry for practicality.
UserZero’s hatred for Richard was a different sort. It was perhaps more explicit and more personal than her hatred of the Descendants. But overall it was weaker. The Descendants she could no longer stand. Even the word ‘Anti-Godmodders’ got under her skin. There was great reasoning behind the creation of the Umbral One: her feelings of hatred and anger threatened to consume her if left unchecked and her emotional state prevented her from just bottling it up
or just doing her inner tranquility act. Ergo, she shifted it all to another being - rather formless, but substantial and powerful enough. Sure, it was a small sink of power, but who cared. Her rational thought was overall more important. Even then, her rage still burned like unholy fire. Her veins pulsed with the desire to see them die in the most excruciatingly cruel ways possible... Aware that only they could kill themselves. The reality of the situation was that any death they may suffer must be a suicide and they’d probably make it quick, leaving her only with their corpse to toy with.
UserZero shook the idea out of her head altogether. Thinking about them for too long made her blood boil, literally, and having your blood literally boil was actually very painful. She took a long sip of her ambiguously alcoholic drink that was probably beer and just imagined herself bathing in blood. That always calmed her.
UserZero was knocked out of her imaginary-yet-literal bloodbath by the sound of doors opening and the sound of boots brushing against the floor. She looked up and saw a rather... indeterminate figure, blurry around the edges, with only a fogged glass mask and blonde hair distinct. Today, it seemed, he wore his fancy glass circlet too. Pane. He was encircled by a host of his elite guards, all his creations. Pawns, he called them. They were entirely made of this fogged glass, multi-armed and shaped so perfectly as to be able to adapt to every situation - and if their forms could not do it as-is, the flexibility of their material, beyond mere glass, would do it for them. A fearsome fighting force if ever it was seen - but UserZero was assured she could destroy every last one of them in nine seconds and deal with Pane in three months in direct combat.
UserZero looked at the time. Time, she
hated that construct. It was currently September 9th, 2015, 9:09 PM, 27 seconds, 9 deciseconds, 36 centiseconds, and 45 milliseconds into the next minute. In other words, Pane had arrived right on time. Thank goodness; she hated waiting.
“Hello,” UserZero said, neutral as possible. Her ‘neutrality’ as it could be called was a complete façade. In all reality this was the most excited she had ever been in her life. Perhaps, not enthusiastic, but excited.
“UserZero. Defecating and vandalizing the walls of my property is not a threat enough - now you seek to drag me into the same room as you? What is it that you want of me?”
“Ohohoh, right into it?” UserZero chuckled.
“Well, honestly if I wanted you dead I wouldn’t be so around-the-bush and I’d have had your head on a pike already. Come on, sit down. We have much to discuss, and a deal to be made,” UserZero said.
The new figure stood absolutely still, unwilling to approach UserZero.
“...Pane, please. I don’t hate you at all. Indeed, quite admirable to have kept hidden from Richard all this time during his... rampages, am I right?” UserZero said.
“I mean, being the new Omega Plus, certainly he’d have the ability to sniff you out like a bloodhound-”
“You’re going to clean it up.”
“Oh, of course, of course-”
“Right now.”
“Mmm, impatient, aren’t we? Unfortunately, we both know that if I did that you’d just leave, because all you care about is that all your precious glass remains spotless...” UserZero said.
“...With that said, until this is sorted out that’s not happening, and you know it - and you do not have the ability to kill me right now, and not vice-versa. I could get anyone else to do the job I ask of you after killing you off, you know that? You’re just the most qualified.”
”Most qualified... For what?”
”Why, Descendant-killing, of course!” UserZero laughed. She knew that would convince him to sit. Pane was obsessed with the Descendants and all that made them tick. Pane’s facial expression was impossible to tell behind that mask, but UserZero was successful in seating him, at least.
“What is it that you desire, exactly? After your fight with the Incarnate, you would think-”
“That me and them were on good terms?...Pfffffff!” UserZero had to contain her laughter.
“...Look, ever since my fight against Richard before, I realized this thing about them-the same thing you might have. You see, I didn’t lose to Richard, not at all. I lost to them. It didn’t matter how much I prepared and prepared and prepared, I lost to them - Richard played his role, yes, but he was nothing more than the added push they needed, as my defenses would have obliterated him thousands of times over if not for them. Perhaps the Narrative would have covered the slack that Richard picked up if he wasn’t there, however? Eh. Point is they did more to defeat me than Richard did. They are the reason we were even in that situation to begin with - and I would like to prevent repetitions of it.
Pane was silent. UserZero knew that it struck a chord with him.
“So... I’ll just pull out the contract and once you sign it, it’ll be all underway! Feel free to read through,” UserZero said. She snapped her fingers, and at once a paper appeared between the two, laying itself down in front of Pane. Inside was a legal document too long to just put down here. Contract between godmodders were books about the size of
War and Peace, if only to make positively sure their godmodding potential did not find a clever loophole and thus burst the whole contract. Pane, knowing what to look for, flipped through the pages as if he wasn’t even reading them, and it wasn’t even a second in that he stopped.
“Preposterous, the terms have to be changed.”
“How so?”
“Unlimited access to my research? All absurd requests aside, that is too far, and you forget I have power as well - and power to cleanse your filth from my castle walls.”
“Huh, ‘absurd requests aside?’ You know better than to think I’d just put something down there for no reason.”
“You ask for something that doesn’t exist.”
“Oh,” UserZero said. Pane looked just a bit more on-edge.
“Is that it? That it doesn’t ‘exist?’ That you didn’t get your tiny little hindquarters teleported directly into Psi’s own lair just before the final battle took place - that he gave you his very own Veil just because he wanted to make sure his power lived on? That you fled the inner sanctum just as the Ancestors breached it? That it’s not how you’ve been evading Richard this whole time, confounding him with a godmodding power beyond his own? Do tell, then, the reason for your success.”
Pane was barely visible, but UserZero could feel him precipitating. Seconds passed. Then, Pane abruptly rose from his seat.
“That was supposed to be private, UserZero.”
“You’re still underpowered compared to me, and trust me when I say that it’s easier to find this stuff out than you think,” UserZero said.
“Trust me when I say that this is no choice at all. Trust me when I say that if you walk out on me, you will not survive me. You’ve survived Richard, but Richard didn’t even know you were the big shot you were - I do. I don’t need to make a show of my power to you to prove it, do I? Just think of those odds to yourself, nice and silent.”
Silence. Then, Pane, reluctantly, got back into the seat. UserZero smirked.
“Alriiiiiiiiight! So, quick review of the absolute bare bones. For me: unlimited access to your research on Descendants, access to your Veil at a specific time and place, the obliteration of the Dark Carnival by your hand, direct or otherwise, and a restraining order on the Exception - which does exist, by the way. I can confirm that for you but as your restraining order, no details. For you: the backing of the Legion of Godmodders, claims to 99% of Fiction's discovered lands, with the one percentile left for me and the Legion, and access to the device under the Big Tree at the Zeroth Server - a privilege that only one other being in existence has gotten out of me. The full details and exact wordings are in there, and all that’s left is the signatures. Any questions?”
Silence. Another good deal of silence. A whole three minutes of silence and an unmoving Pane. UserZero thought that Pane seemed to have this fascination with burning as much time as possible. Then, he stood up, though he was considerably less agitated, more purposeful.
“Sorry, but you must understand my research is for my private benefit exclusively. I believe we can achieve both of our goals separately... and I am now fully aware that you don’t intend to impede me if you’re so willing to give me everything. No, something more...Dangerous is up your sleeve. Unless you’re open with your real reasoning I will leave - and should I die I will make sure the entirety of the Transparency and all of my research goes with it.”
UserZero rolled her eyes. Most godmodders didn’t have the gall to put self-destructs on their own things, thinking they were invincible, and if not that, then just not being completely petty jerks. Apparently Pane was petty enough to go there.
“Ugh, fine. But be prepared for a monologue.” UserZero said. Pane resumed sitting down. UserZero checked the time on that old wall clock. She had time. She relaxed in her seat and took a nice swig of that maybe-beer.
“Aaaaaaahhhhhh...You know what? I really hate clocks. People think I like them as I check the time soooo much, but really, I hate them. I check the time because when things happen is something I’m in the know of, and I have got to be in the know about it, you know. But the clocks, see, they remind me of time itself, and time itself has been a sore sucking point for me for the longest while. Time could go die in Limbo's one and only fiery death pit and everyone would be better off for it. You understand me?” Pane remained silent.
“I suppose not. Then again, why should you?”
“Time does not just leap off the wall to kill you. Time is but a creation of mankind, but a marvelous one to tame the cosmos themselves and galvanize everything, pinning down when as well as where.”
“Indeed... But it’s still pissing me off. It’s all just a joke. A really bad joke, at that.” UserZero said.
“What is? Time? A joke?”
UserZero clapped her hands together.
“Ah, the big one! Not time itself, no. I’m referring to the whole debacle with Richard - his indecent rise from a Gamma to an Omega Plus in one war with the help of the Descendants, only to engage in constant conflict afterwards. It’s not a funny joke, mind. It’s that kind of sick, black comedy joke you feel is funny but just can’t find the humor in after a ton of searching. Those things that shouldn’t be jokes but are. That two-bit idiot with more ambition than he had actual brains becoming Omega Plus... The Narrative, or the Conflict, one of them thinks the whole idea is just absolutely hilarious. Or maybe they both don’t? Which probably makes it worse overall for me. I’d prefer it that one of them be behind this.”
“You still want revenge on him? The Incarnate wasn’t enough, it seems... Eternal rivals indeed-”
UserZero slammed her hands onto the table, tearing out a chunk of it with the force.
“THAT IS IT! RIGHT THERE! ETERNAL RIVALS! HE’S BEEN HOUNDING MY LIFE FOR TOO LONG! But, then again, at the same time I realize he’s not responsible for his own ranking up, which just makes it more revolting for me, I mean, Descendants? Really? But whatever, you hit the nail on the head, harder than you realized too! That nail is deep in there now! Might as well be in the core of the earth for how hard you hammered that one!”
Silence. UserZero calmed down a little.
”...Okay, enough skitting around the bush. The whole thing between me and Richard, and Richard’s ascension and many wars? It’s all just a joke, but why? Simple. It’s all just a joke, repeated forever. It wasn’t funny the first time, and after approximately the five trillionth retelling, where I stopped counting, it stopped being funny and started being revolting. I want the joke to END, and for the crushing semblance of reality to kick in once again where I defeat Richard after he puts up his whiny fit and blow up whatever else thought they had a shot at honestly killing me. Do you understand me, Pane? I want it all gone.”
Silence. Dead silence. There were in all reality no other patrons than a non-sentient robot bartender who wouldn’t react to that.
“...You hate time... ...Repeated forever... You mean to say that you’re in some kind of-”
“I don’t want to give away how I got myself into that mess... Ah, who am I kidding, petty details at this point, it’s got to do with the Big Tree, but I’m not saying more.” UserZero said. The unspoken knowledge was now shared between them.
“I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about how but don’t say ‘em aloud. All you need to know is that, yes, Pane, bothering to conquer the multiverse right now isn’t a bright idea, as you have... Today’s September 9th, 2015, so I guess it’s just one year? Yeah, you have eight days off of a year - or at least, it gets kind of wonky after then - to enjoy it even if you didn’t get a lick of resistance. You understand why that might not be such a pleasing end. After that it’s right back to the bottom with you. Obviously, my intention in showing you the Big Tree is to make sure that you actually do get to enjoy your spiel as Emperor over all Fiction, however long that will last.”
Silence.
“You mean to say that basically everything that I have worked for - no, everything that anyone has ever worked for throughout the last five years and beyond - that it's all for nothing. There’s no point because it will simply reset itself to some earlier date, like it never even happened.”
“At some indeterminate period in the future - it's hard to tell the exact date due to the circumstances - it all goes poof, goes back to November 11th, 2011. Funny, it all starts in earnest on Minecraft’s release date, you know? In any case, given the nature of my predicament, you can easily see now why I specifically have you target the Dark Carnival. The tears in reality would only compound over time and the paradoxes have built up to an unreal degree, seriously, you should-”
“I am sorry, but taking into consideration all of my research on Descendants, which has to include the phenomena of split personalities and sanity loss in Godmodding Wars, I have concluded that the stress of losing against Richard combined with the problematic nature of Limbo has rendered you absolutely insane, if ever potent. I appreciate your offer but cannot accept it in good nature as I cannot take it seriously at all, and you’d want me to be deathly serious about everything. Good day.”
And thus Pane tried to stand up to leave, this time for real. UserZero came off as insane, of course. There was exactly one other being she had told this to before - in this loop, even - and still she was called insane! Perhaps for different reasons, but still! This was why she didn’t give Pane the ability to acknowledge the loops as having existed; a quirk of the system had certain abilities that transcend the boundaries of time survive the backwards jump intact, and that would have made Pane start off the loop as a Delta Plus rather than as a mere Beta Plus, midway through a rank-up fight.
“You think I’m crazy?” UserZero asked. UserZero knew the answer already, she was just banking on Pane turning around.
“If you’re going to do that much, say it to my face one more time.”
“I mean no disrespect, but yes, I am sorry, I do believe-”
And thus, UserZero spread her Wings.
Two wings; one orange and lined with runes, the other blue and wrapped in binary. She measured them at, fully spread, roughly twenty feet in total wingspan. It didn’t matter, because they weren’t feathery wings, bat-like wings, or any regular sort of wings at all, and she didn’t use them to fly. They were made of ether - a very special kind of ether at that, one that any other being in Fiction would die to have. The creation of these wings should rightfully have been impossible, a mere fraction of what she had would have been coveted as a priceless treasure. Of course, her predicament gave her enough time to figure that out just by thinking about it. UserZero had, indeed, almost all the time in the world to figure out how to make these wings from this very special ether and have it stick with her, as the ether too had the power to transcend the bounds of time. In the end, what she had done had effectively only taken her about a million years to create in full, and by her standards that was but a drop in the chronological ocean that she had accumulated in mental lifespan.
UserZero had crafted wings of pure plot. She tore fragments from the Conflict and Narrative - forcibly shed by the tearing of reality - and created wings, fully-sized and fully-functional wings, made entirely of them. They bent and flapped to her will, and their powers were hers in full - which honestly wasn’t as much as she had hoped. It appeared that the sheer size of the duo of plot forces was the only reason they were powerful after all, and that their omnipresence went hand in hand with their absolute power. If they were contained to a space, their powers would weaken accordingly. But even still, they kept some sort of power to them - the power to alter plot, to change the circumstances, and even permanently kill off any Agents or the like by simply absorbing them into the wings - though the last of these powers had yet to be exercised. A bevy of powers that any multiversal entity of any size and scope would kill to have, even a Terminae. Yet, in any other context, these wings would be coming to life and trying to kill each other. Their essence was so radically opposed, so totally opposite, that even non-sapient fragments knew to seek and attempt to destroy their opposite number. But their owner was superior to both of them, barely. Upon grafting them to her back, she needed all of her power for the moment of their integration just to withstand the pressure of their power and their attempts to destroy each other, but she could, and she did, and the power was hers - all hers. The Wings had cemented her as the strongest godmodder to ever live-beyond even Psi, the Psi that Richard and Pane had so lovingly fawned over. They accredited him the strongest to ever exist, and UserZero had surpassed even him. Even she felt surprised when she lost the first time after obtaining them.
Pane froze in total admiration. Or fear. It was hard to tell. The sheer presence of those wings broke into his façade of Veil that hung around him, defining his form better. His clothes were regally decorated but not actually the robes and fanciful furs of royalty, more tailored to combat, and beneath them lied some of the most well-crafted chainmail UserZero had laid eyes on. His left hand laid upon the handle of his favored glass sword (or one of them), its pommel regally shining the colors of eleven-thousand furious lights. And then there was his cubical form. He had even now come in a Minecraftian avatar instead of his real form - even though UserZero had herself come in the flesh. The coward.
It seemed to be the longest time before Pane could even muster the courage to speak, and when he spoke UserZero detected traces of German instead of something ‘generic.’
“…How?!”
“Trade secret... Except that it took a lot of preparation and nearly obliterated me, two facts that you had all but confirmed on your own already. Tell me, Pane, would a madwoman be able to so calmly exploit not only the two strongest actors in all of Fiction but also the precise sundering of reality? Pane, what are your odds of being able to defy me?”
Pane shuddered.
“...Whether or not you do is honestly not my place to tell. I still don’t believe your honesty on this, but... I know a show of force when I see it.”
UserZero laughed.
“Ahaha, it doesn’t matter too much what you think of me. I think you’ll start believing me soon. There is one other thing I’d like to talk to you about. I have mentioned the tearing of reality and such just now, right? That’s rhetorical. Of course I have. And you definitely also know about the Dark Carnival and how they tear into reality. Bad for business, you know?”
“Let me guess,” Pane said.
“There is some caveat to that particular task, one that is preventing you from doing the deed yourself?”
“No duh,” UserZero said.
“Now, really I wouldn’t have asked you of this if not for the circumstances. For a start, I will be dead for a vast majority of the time in most loops, or engaged in the Zeroth War, while you will not be. You will, with my blessing, have resources that would allow you to nudge events along while I’m preoccupied, allowing you to act in my stead in killing them the entire time - which is what I want. And, finally, it's your research on Descendants that pretty much cinches the deal.”
“How so is it the research that cinches the deal?” Pane asked.
“You know how you were going to throw them into a death gauntlet with your most fearsome creations to gather those variables you’re missing?” UserZero rhetorically questioned.
“Before we begin, I haven’t seen one success from you from these tests. You’ve come close from what I’ve heard but never hit a success, and this is five trillion plus iterations of the same period of time we’re talking here. You’re doomed to failure if you’re going to do it as you had initially planned, as that plan has never worked - and for that matter you’ll almost always die of it. Of course, now, from what I’ve gleaned of the tests, it’s a lack of variety in the tests themselves that’s to blame. It’s always just you and your Pawns with your occasional biotic entity thrown in. Now, the Dark Carnival, on the other hand... They’re a very colorful lot, easily able to create a wide variety of situations, right? I’m banking on that being the issue: stretching the Descendant’s creativity and tactical acumen to the limits. In other words... You see, I believe that this is scratching your back in a way you want.” UserZero said.
Pane put his free hand up to his cubical chin in contemplation of what she had said.
“...I had suspected that may have been a flaw in testing. But, at the same time, I want to eliminate the use of any ‘radical’ elements, like Paradoxes, which the Dark Carnival would exploit en masse if I just sent them on their way to their base, wherever that is, so-”
“Ah, yes, I thought of that too. You see... Well, I have my theories as to why you want to study these Descendants so bad and it’s hardly just because of how they tick. No, you want to exploit that. It’s a godmodder’s way, exploitation. Now, let us say your research is a success and you manage to figure out everything you need to, oh, I dunno, apply that Descendancy to yourself as a Godmodder and your troops. Do you think THAT kind of insane, overpowering force could siege the Dark Carnival’s base? A force of trillions upon trillions of Descendant-level pawns?” UserZero asked.
“I’ll admit, I’d say that even in my state the Red is basically impossible to beat, but I figure that if anything could kill him it’s a group of thick-headed Descendants not knowing anything like the word ‘limit,’ thrown in there like Unsung cannon fodder. Nothing could stop that kind of force.”
”That is... Marvelous…” Pane stuttered, now really understanding what UserZero was offering. His whole body was trembling. UserZero wasn’t entirely sure what his initial goal with that research was, but the thought of controlling an army of Descendants totally loyal to him was truly one of the best. UserZero couldn’t care if Pane was supreme overlord of existence as long as he stayed out of her hair. Really, in all honesty she suspected that even Pane’s intended amount of forces would be totally destroyed in the assault on the Dark Carnival, or at least, that there was a fifty percent chance of that, and that’s why she had made the provision to keep a Universe to herself and the Legion. A Legion that might be strong enough to take them down anyways. But she needed that deal very enticing to Pane.
“...I would like to know where the Dark Carnival's base is, so I can begin preparations immediately.”
“It’s called the Ruins of Memory.” UserZero said, knowing that the name would be enough.
“I don’t know what that place really is. I’m betting a Paradox made it... Or it was made to counter that? I don’t know, seriously, I don’t, but they’ve holed themselves up in there. There’s a few problems with sieging it. For one, only badasses may pass: There’s some check for a ‘lord,’ which I’m pretty sure is just an archaic term for a badass. It doesn’t appear to be a straight power-level thing as I can’t open a single door there, but almost any Dark Carnival member and a few other anonymous folk have come and gone as they pleased. I definitely know that the Red at least qualifies-it’s how the Dark Carnival can even hole up there as tight as they have, as they can get into all the crannies. Honestly, how you’re going to get a soul through there is beyond me. Trust me when I say I’ve tried to break down the doors in there, and they might as well be made of, uh, gorilla-you-this-is-invincible-ium. Or something like that. Details more suited for you to figure out on your own, enlightened terms.”
“Yes, I believe I have a plan worked out already, in fact!” Pane said, triumphantly. Then, his posture slumped a bit.
“If... if those time loops weren’t a thing. I’d need a few years of preparation and I can’t predict how much time I will precisely need, nor how much I will have.”
“Ahaha, I’m betting that this next loop will be the very last.” UserZero said.
“I’ve had all the time in the world to figure out the best path to success here-”
“UserZero, if you are being wholly truthful about the nature of the time loops... And if I am correct in thinking that you in some way control this phenomena... Then there is no way I can deliver your request at all within the parameters you have given me.” Pane said. UserZero’s face slowly fell, but Pane remained sitting - a sign that he wanted to stay in on the deal.
“I was merely suspecting that the Dark Carnival was just a particularly large thorn in your side before, given their antics, but now I see why - the repetitive strain of Godmodding Wars on the fabric of reality, compounded with the repetition of timeloops, does not give us long to work with and could very well kill you if the Descendants do not. Indeed, with--er, are there any constants?”
“Richard kills me, Richard gets Omega Plus - I’ve noted those aren’t inclusive - and I break out of Limbo to help kill the Incarnate, piloted by an insane Richard on the verge of losing a Godmodding War. The only three real ‘hard’ constants I can confirm. So, two wars at the absolute minimum during the timeframe.”
“...I cannot give a hard estimate of when and where it would happen. But, assuming you succeed as of next loop in ‘winning,’ whatever that means in context, and that the wars last one year at most... By the end of that loop, a Time Crash would be in full swing and that would irrevocably spell the end of reality, with no way to reset it and no ability to perform a multiversal Reset. You’d doom existence for success. If you are wrong and you fail, on the other hand, this would only give us, perhaps, one more loop? And this assumes both loops only keep to two wars, if even. The only feasible way for me to work in these conditions is if you quit these loops and give me the time I need to set up the experiments and destroy the Dark Carnival, which, with your information brought to light, would definitely take years and probably constitute another Godmodding War - speeding up our clock significantly.”
It was UserZero’s turn to be silent, as she drunk deeply from her glass of maybe-beer. Pane took her lack of response as his cue to go on.
“...Knowing you, I am betting that there is an option with Richard you have not considered. Have you tried-
Pane was interrupted so fast even his quotation mark was outsped. UserZero had not only broken the glass but pinned Pane to the opposite wall, tearing through furniture and such to hold him in place and put his pretty masked face right up to hers. His elite soldiers drew swords, from the sound, but UserZero glared at them from the edge of her eyes and at once they turned to chickens, which flew the coop. UserZero looked back to Pane, her blood literally boiling now, her voice serrated and harsh, her wings bent like blades towards his pathetic neck. Pane was sweating now, precipitating like a cloud, genuinely terrified. The double-tap from the wings would do it. One attack - two, technically - would end this sorry excuse for good.
“Do you think I haven’t thought of that? Making peace with the chucklegorillaer? Ahahahaha no that’s absolutely unacceptable no no no no no no no no no not happening you gorillaing mothergorilla, no, no, no! I have gorillaing tried everything in the book but let me tell you this one buddy-boy, peace with that absolute sack of gorilla is totally unacceptable, absolutely out of the question, I don’t care if it would bring us world peace, that gorilla has to die so hard his soul annihilates itself, you hear?! DO YOU HEAR?! gorilla THAT SMUG gorillaFACE, AND gorilla THOSE gorillaED DESCENDANTS PANE I HAVE DEALT WITH BOTH OF THEM FOR WELL OVER FIVE-gorillaING-TRILLION YEARS!!! I SPLIT MY OWN MIND INTO gorilla KNOWS HOW MANY PIECES, I HAVE NEARLY gorillaING INVENTED SCIENCES JUST TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO KILL THEM! DO YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT I WANT, PANE?! I WANT THEM gorillaING DEAD, FOR GOOD! NO COMING BACK, NO NOTHING! DEAD FOREVER, EVAPORATED FROM EXISTENCE, AND ME ALIVE! I’VE BEEN IN LIMBO, HELL, THE gorillaING ROCK BOTTOM, CONSCIOUSLY AND AWARE, FOR OVER THREE TRILLION YEARS, AND I WILL PAY THEM BACK EVERY gorillaING SECOND!!!”
UserZero panted in rage, trembling in rage, it near-totally fogged her mind. She would kill him if the next words out of his mouth didn’t leave a serious impression.
“UserZero, I have been keeping up with the Paradoxical events - indeed I was considering some attempt at obliterating the Dark Carnival myself well before you arrived - and I have been watching very closely. Do you know how bad the timeline is right now?!”
That was it, UserZero lurched the wings back to strike--
“THERE’S TWO ALPHA TIMELINES!!”
--and at hearing those words UserZero froze. Confusion fought back the murderous rage. Pane had said it in a voice that was assured, sincere, mildly terrified of the information himself, in a manner that was altogether the sound, rational reason of a man who knew exactly how bad the situation had degenerated. And if she was going to toss around a near-impossible time loop over all of Fiction as part of her justifications and part of her reasons, what right did she have to dismiss that?
“The severity of the Paradoxes... They have clustered in one location. I presume it to be their headquarters - or that they made their headquarters around the cluster. The monitoring had, just after I had ranked up to Gamma, spiked from rational levels of Paradoxes to near-intolerable levels with no conceivable output. At the time, I chalked it up to a particularly bad Paradox and a Dark Carnival plot, and expected the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron and Interdimensional Police Department to mobilize accordingly. Now I know better - the nature of the looped time meant that each scar of reality that you and your attempts to destroy your adversaries had remained even as everything else reset - even memories, it seems, and even in the omnipotent. That I didn’t know then - but what I did know, was that the sheer volume of Paradoxes, now personally entrenched within time itself, has now caused the alpha timeline to split into two, equally ‘alpha’ timelines. I dubbed the timeline we exist in as the White timeline, and the other timeline the Black timeline. I had thereafter resolved myself to studying this phenomena for a great while, ergo my silence in affairs.”
UserZero let go of Pane. Her wings relaxed. She still had half of a mind to kill Pane for his suggestion but the other half was now just curious as to how badly things were going, if there was quite frankly an entirely different alternate timeline going on.
“Go on. What’re your findings?”
“My findings on it are thus. First off, the glaring issue with Temporal Uniqueness was displaced. The alternate branches of the Black and White timelines still obeyed the rules on that much, but there were copies of Temporally Unique figures - for an example, Piono the Destroyer - in the Black Timeline alpha and the White timeline alpha. Two each. The timelines, at a point that I’m having trouble deciphering, are perfect copies-at some point they diverged. For another, the ‘stonecarving point’ ((which is, for future reference to any others who may need to know of this conversation firsthand, the point in time wherein traveling backwards to change a ‘future’ outcome is no longer effective,)) was much farther along in the Black Timeline than in our White timeline; indeed, it was enough to see that the entirety of the Black timeline to its visible end and/or presumed reset had been pre-determined and set in stone. Meanwhile, our White timeline - to my confusion - had no such date yet, and still has yet to have one. I suspect that this inability to tell is due to the Time Loops you have created, or alternatively the nature of the Paradoxes involved. With this information in mind, I also cannot determine when amongst your adventures in time looping that this split occurred. I ergo sought to figure out chronological events in this alternate timeline in the hopes it may have gleaned the answers as to how this happened - unaware of your involvement,” Pane said.
“At this point, what I presumed to be one of the Conflict’s daemons - their most recent addition to their forces and their basic answer to Descendants - had attempted to interrupt my study in an attempt to kill me for ‘L00T.’ I questioned this Daemon at length and discovered that he was a non-native of this timeline. He had believed to have traveled back in time to an ‘earlier iteration’, but with a modified version of the Whoniversal Time-Tracking Equation, I learned that he had not come from our timeline, but from the Black timeline. This meant that there was a way, unspecified, to cross between these two ‘alpha’ timelines. He had no clue how he did it, though, mentioning only an odd dungeon of sorts and tailing some famous mercenary guild. I managed to indoctrinate him and he is still on-hand if you need to view him, but his memories didn’t glean me much more information.”
“After this, I spent the next year painstakingly extracting data from the Black timeline. The difficulty of this endeavor I cannot at length stress enough; my only fortune was that the same remote temporal data gathering equations still worked to some degree. I finally had a rudimentary picture of events in December 2012, and managed to complete the picture by 2013. What I saw... Well, let us say that our alternate selves over in the Black Timeline had an unfortunate brush. I dare say that we are lucky that the breadth of Paradoxes we have already incurred has not lead to the same fate that befell the Black Timeline.”
UserZero rolled her eyes.
“What happened?” she said, almost so flat that it lacked any interest. I mean, if they were dead they couldn’t affect her. Pane just loved to run his mouth, didn’t he?
“Before I go on with that, this. The Dark Carnival’s religion primarily worships two figures, the Red and the Black. The Red was proven capable of existing-indeed, he isn’t even the first of his kind, just the only one to make it to the multiversal scene with that level of power - but truly we regretted the day he ever joined forces. But the Black, it was thought, was an ideal of the Dark Carnival and that alone. There was no trace of any being like it across existence, no sign of this power he specifically commanded. No trace of his existence permeated any corner of our time and its alternates at all, even in the worst case scenarios that I could thus far find. To me, I had a suspicion that his lack of existence was due to outside forces suppressing it, as otherwise their belief would make it so - like it or not. But that is all well and good here, for he’s the other Mirthful Messiah. In this timeline, despite the absolute horde of Paradoxes, he has remained inexistent, but in the Black Timeline, he not only exists, he is free.”
UserZero rolled her eyes again.
“‘The one who brings and is nothingness…’ Just sounds like some kind of overblown Oblivion Mage having a bad day. Then again, the Red had ‘the one who does and is the impossible,’ which I thought was equally overblown... So I suppose this Black guy was-slash-is a badass on par with the Red?”
Pane manipulated his little hyperspace inventory to make reality pop a device directly into his hand. A hand-held holographic projector, by UserZero’s knowledge.
“With the fact out and about to another living being that this Black is an existing entity, I believe it is better shown than told,” Pane said. UserZero breathed a sigh of relief that he would keep silent for a moment on his lengthy scientific findings.
The holographic projector whirred to life, creating a scene right in front of the duo...
--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--
As the collective lives of the Council of Fifteen were extinguished, fourteen triumphant horns played in unison, shaking the Abyssal Realm to its breaking point. The fires roared to a height never thought possible, encompassing everything. Their heat reached such an intensity that they glowed pure white, and then fixated at an unsettling light blue that was the exact color of the forum background. The illusion of fire then shattered, broken glass raining across the Abyssal Realm, and the illusions of flame stopped. ВИСЦЕС flashed with the colors of its governors. It was alive, truly alive. And it was the only witness to the complete end of ends.
Now, there was nothing left to do but wait.
The waiting was swift. ВИСЦЕС registered all of a literal nine seconds. And yet, just as quiet had came, a low rumbling appeared, and in one instant, if any ears were present, they would know a cracking, crumbling sound. The noise of some grand thing breaking. And indeed, something broke.
What broke was the fabric of reality itself, and perhaps more concerning, it was right in front of the new god. The new god feared nothing, however. Upon its creation, it knew exactly when, where and how it would die, how its stated goal was all just a joke. Even as the gaping hole in existence itself widened into a black portal to nowhere, it did not twitch. It would experience total and absolute obliteration, a reset so powerful that it would destroy everything else - and it would not survive. ВИСЦЕС did not care, however, knowing more than its killer would.
ВИСЦЕС watched on, unmoving and silent, as a figure stepped out of the nothingness. An impossible occurrence, but the monolith had lived in impossible occurrences and was itself an impossible occurrence. Ergo it did not move at all, as if to be unafraid, and it was. Then again, it was basically a rock and could easily stand still. That much was no achievement.
The figure's form that now stood before ВИСЦЕС was obfuscated-an irritation to a god of knowledge, to be sure. This obfuscation, however, was not a natural one nor an intentional one, as the figure itself floated still in the abyss and had no reason to disguise himself to ВИСЦЕС. Instead, fabrications of light and sound swirled up in the void, crackling and fritzing, glitching even. Corruption, ВИСЦЕС knew, was the result of this entity coming into contact with this reality. Reality rejected this being so violently that his continued existence caused reality to corrupt around him. It could never fully fit in, but at the same time, it existed, and thus couldn't just be erased from existence as reality and the Four Great Powers would wish. Of course, the figure itself was too familiar with ВИСЦЕС and vice-versa; the god knew the figure as a short man wearing mottled gray and the blood of millions so stained it was no longer anything other than black, and a mask that looked like a crudely drawn-on face. Meanwhile, the 'man' knew ВИСЦЕС, bluntly, as nothing more than a glorified rock and library.
"Hello, Council," The figure said, dispensing with any illusion that he was talking to an unliving rock.
"Let's just cut to the chase, shall we?"
"ЕQ ВЕИС, ТЕХРЕ-МАЛ. ИОС-ВАРДИУ ПИ ВУЛ ЕРТЦИ ИОС. ИХИД УЦОСЦО РЫН. ИВИ ИХ, КАЛАИНЦИ КАННИС."
The smaller figure took a second to register the words of what he perceived as the talking librarian rock. ЗИ was not his first language or even his second, and language was always a weak point. Indeed, to spare you all the sight of most-likely improper ЗИ, his language here is pre-translated and refined. Then, he spoke:
"Kill you? Well, depending on your belligerence to the whole affair I might just. My intention is to preserve that knowledge locked away in your proverbial skull, and take you to where it won't be destroyed. I mean, quite silly to think such a body of stone would actually survive... In any case, come. Alternatively, let me drag that stony hindquarters of yours across the void like it or not. Your choice."
"АЛОУС Х ИО ФЕЛВУЕ ЕРТК ВУЛ МАИВ ХЕТРЕТ. УВИТРЕТ АИЕР ФЕЛВУЕ ЕРТК ВУЛ. ИХ АЛБЕРГАТА-АИЕР УЦОСЦО ПХЫЛАХ ГОХСТУ. МАИВ. ПЕ ВУЛ НОРС МЕЗРИЦИ ИХ АЛ ЦАЕР. ИХИД УЦОСЦО ВУЛ ФЕЛВТ?"
The figure made a motion of the nostrils similar to breathing. He didn't need to breathe at all, of course, it was mostly just a reflex, a 'sigh' of sorts. The figure didn't respond, instead opting to circle ВИСЦЕС, taking in its entire form.
"Mmmm, let us call this ulterior motive...'Ulterior' might be stretching it, though, but then again I thought you were an all-knowing rock. Shame. But you do know. You know of many things. Lots of things. You know locations. Locations of interest. Locations of interest that, for the life of me, I cannot puzzle out their place in this twisted world. They, they forcibly affix reality to existence, and in doing so render my sacred duty impossible. I want them gone. You know where they are-where they all are. That is the information I desire... Come now, ВИСЦЕС. Do you really think that you would be literally immune to a reset? What you've done... I'm thinking that it's just a promise. A promise to be in the right place at the right time. Guess what? Promise, kept. Come now."
"ВУЛ ЗВИРЦИ-НОРС ЕФФЕТЦИ ИО. ВУЛ ПЕИЫЦИ QУАРТУМ ИО. ИОЫУР ВЕТАС. ПИ ИО ŒДУ ПХЫЛАХ ЕМ ЦЫС ИХ; ВУЛ З-НОРС ЦТХКИЛИТЦИ ИХ. ОДИР ПИ ИОСУЛВ ВУЛ ИХИД ВУЛ ФЕЛВЦИ?"
The figure understood exactly what that much meant even if he didn't fully understand his language. In all honesty, he figured that his distrust of ВИСЦЕС was equivalent to ВИСЦЕС's distrust of him. Neither would give the other what they wanted. Of course, just leaving it alive wouldn't do. No, ВИСЦЕС favored his enemies. The friend of your enemy is also your enemy, after all.
"Amazing, that you go to all this trouble to make a tombstone," the figure said.
"...Eh. We'd kill each other the first chance we get, but I wholly outclass you, so..."
And just like that, ВИСЦЕС went. Poof. Gone. The figure was the only witness to how; cracks in reality spread outward from ВИСЦЕС in a spiderweb, obliterating all conscious thought in the rock in seconds, and then obliterating the rock itself when the cracks formed into a hole. The divine rock was now just a collection of fragments. Nothing worthwhile was left.
ВИСЦЕС awaited the end no more. In this timeline, its entire purpose was to talk to an accursed man. Surviving the end? It was all just a joke. Even the figure felt mildly guilty about it, but alas, his ruthlessness quashed it within seconds. He was just like the others. They were all-lacking more refined words-sociopaths. Why should he feel guilty? Thus was his reasoning for killing almost all the others if and when he could. The other Descendants would raise their own breed of havoc if their own way was allowed, from his knowledge. Hell, most of them knew what he was like personally and despised him. Zetta cursed him for what he did to (c)haos and the Butterfly, so cruel it moved a heartless man to feel; Battlefury's one superior rushed to his aid and sacrificed himself to save him when it became apparent that his threat was of absolute obliteration; and in their own ways the others revolted against him. The Pantheon? Dead. IUPC? Dead. The Carnival? Definitely dead. Pinary? He committed suicide rather than fight. The 'Advanced Superiors'?...He doesn't know what is really up with those guys or their Overseer. After what he did to Pinary (or rather what Pinary did to itself) they just kind of up, went and left, and he hasn't seen but a trace.
Plus, really, he was going to cause a rather irreversible Armageddon. Having a rather cold, detached feel from killing others is part of the job.
He was rather off-put that ВИСЦЕС didn't take up the offer. Rarely did he give out an ingenuine deal, true, and this was an exception, as ВИСЦЕС was too dangerous to let live and one of his thus-far few adversaries strong enough to combat him in his own territory, a revelation that would take seconds for it to learn. Still though, he had hoped that it didn't see through the lie. Alas.
"...Hrm...So, with him dead...I guess that wouldn't leave too many other options for information...Ugh." The figure thought, to himself mostly.
Thus the figure known as The Black departed, leaving a black stain on Reality in performing heretical Deicide - and more to come.
--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--
“…I believe that covers exactly why we should consider it very unfortunate,” Pane said.
“There were other fights. Fights against things that would make Psi himself think twice, if not even retreat, and he killed them in moments, but it was this that I felt would strike truest with you now. ВИСЦЕС, the combination of fifteen Descendants - still fully powered - and a deified vessel, effectively allowing his assailant to kill it. Not even a mote of resistance other than verbal insults.”
UserZero, indeed, knew no limit of emotion for the moment - but nothing short of envy. Jealous, that such a being could so easily eradicate a grouping of the fifteen most powerful beings in this world.
“There were other events, but eventually I could work up to the reset of this timeline. I was at this point mostly interested by his ‘corruptive’ aura, how reality ‘rejected’ him. Should I be able to replicate this without destroying my own power, then... Well, that would be quite a find.” Pane said. When UserZero opted to give no response, he continued,
“In any case, in investigating the man himself, I found upon the point of wherein reality was reset. First off, at this point he had killed so much of his resistance that only the still-living Descendants separate from ВИСЦЕС, as well as Richard, permanently stuck at Omega due to your demise at the Black’s hands.” At this UserZero raised an eyebrow.
“At this final gathering, the Black offered to fight them wherein his most devastating corruptive aura was ineffective, ironically inside the Exception, the ‘point’ he was asking about in that particular video to my knowledge. Within, without reality to reject him, his most devastating power would be out of the picture. The Descendants and Richard were unaware that this was because reality warping itself was impossible, as they had no prior knowledge of it. They charged in, and found their powers near-to-nonexistent, while only one of his powers had left. Needless to say, he slew Richard and weeded out the Descendants down to five. At this point I don’t know what really happened between them, other than that the remaining five Descendants having surrendered.”
“Okay, so as previously known, Paradoxes are bad because now we KNOW there’s 100% a nigh-invincible Sue lurking behind there. Got it. Was there anything relevant in there?” UserZero asked.
“I mean, we haven’t heard of any Black in our timeline so he hasn’t crossed over, so he’s gotta be dead-”
“Wrong on all accounts.” Pane said.
“Alive, well, active and is now in the White Timeline as of August this year.”
UserZero’s conflict with the Dark Carnival was somewhat more personal than others. She had reason to hate them for more than just their usual antics, and had greater reason than most to watch them all roast. Any vestige of their remotest success sickened her. At this, with knowledge that both Mirthful Messiahs were now waltzing around on top of a horde of Paradoxes, basically the write-up for the Miasmist’s dreaded win condition, she just froze herself, before finally managing to mouth out a ‘what.’
“The entity responsible for all of this managed to use the very same route as the daemon - presumably - to get into the White timeline. I have kept track of this entity with hawk-like precision ever since, and came to a few conclusions-”
“Pane you literally just said that not only do we have concrete proof that apocalypse incarnate is now coming to just wreck us all in our own timeline after already doing it once before, but news that now BOTH Mirthful Messiahs are dancing around like-”
“I hadn’t said that. The first conclusion is that this entity is no longer qualified as the Black. The Black’s title seems to be, well, a title, but not relegated to a person. A set of powers is what they signify - and I suppose it is what it always has been signifying. Unlike the Red, whose abilities are ascertained as biological, I concretely say that the worst of the Black’s powers are bound to his title, which this entity no longer possesses. No corruption aura, no on-demand holes in existence. I do not know what happened in the interim between the Black timeline reset and the entity’s reappearance in this timeline.”
“There’s ways to recreate lost power. He can easily get it all back, Narrative or otherwise. Kill him.”
“The entity has invested themselves into the Terrarian Godmodding War and currently qualifies as a Descendant. No dice,” Pane said, at which UserZero just cursed.
“Plus, the entity prescribes itself as a unique position. A former Lord - I daresay this title might be what was referred to as the condition to open the door. As an apparent Red-equivalent, I say that all it would take is a good technicality and the doors to their base may open for us... A technicality that we can very well create.”
“Do whatever you must with them. But kill them afterwards,” UserZero said.
“Ahaha, if all goes well then that is exactly the kind of thing I would have done to them. The Descendants, one and all, are our natural enemies in the end. No trust can be given to them. That much I have not forgotten.” Pane said.
“Plus, even our most hated enemies would find no fault in disposing of the former Black and their newest allies. Ignoring how their version of the reset must have obliterated an uncountable mass of lives, there were millions on their kill list. Truly no act of justice could ever forgive their sins, don’t you think?”
“I don’t care for what others think,” UserZero said.
“Whatever you need to do, whatever has to be done, you better kill every Descendant you bring into that experiment. You better learn everything we need, then, off them.”
UserZero returned to the original seat, snapping her fingers to replace the damages like they never even happened at all. She took the document and snapped her fingers, and it changed in length.
“Let’s... Revise our deal.” UserZero said.
Pane sat. The two Godmodders were both out to conquer existence in their own way, and they both knew it.
“The bare bones of the deal. For me, unlimited access to your research on Descendants. Your Veil, at the right time and the right place. Your promise that you destroy the Dark Carnival, and in your research of the Descendants, make dead sure that every last one of those gorillaers dies, and dies for good, after you’ve gotten EVERYTHING you need. For you, 99% of my territory when you’ve killed the Dark Carnival off for good, access to the Big Tree for that purpose, as well as anything else you may need to have intact for the time-unwinding, and if there is any remote thing I can deliver unto you to make your promises come alive-equipment for your research, a defensive regiment to keep some punks off of your back, a portion of infinite money, whatever, as long as it isn’t an Omega godmodder, you will have it. Any additions?
“Two. First: these requests, if they can, must be carried out posthumously. If either of us die these deeds will be written into our wills and carried out accordingly,” Pane said.
“Second, remove that vile substance from my walls.”
UserZero’s face darkened.
“I have no intention of dying. I am done with dying. I am DONE with fate. Plus, even if I die I want to die knowing you’ll at least make those clowns stay there longer than I will ever be and ever have been. Deal.” UserZero said, tapping the document. It added multiple pages, and at once she flipped to the very last, whereupon there were only two lines and two pens. One red and one purple.
The two godmodders, almost simultaneously, wrote their Minecraft usernames in lieu of their real ones; UserZero above, and The_King_of_Pane below. The ink seeped into the page, and at once, a flash of red and purple rushed through the entire document from the signatures, and back into them. The entire document levitated off of the table, turned itself upright, spun around, and seeped into the very air - a contract so tightly interwoven with godmodding would not be so easily broken out of. They both knew exactly what was in it. It was set in stone now. They would achieve their stated goals - or die trying.
And thus, on that day, September 9th, 2015, one year ago, a pact between the Mother of all Monsters and the King of Obfuscation was born, and born on the basis of two things: death to Descendants, and death to clowns.
--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--
? ?/? ?/? ? ? ?
? ? ? DAYS LATER
--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--
It had been a considerable amount of time after the fateful day that Pane had struck that bargain with UserZero. As a final assurance to his plan, however, there was one last pawn he needed to put into place.
The Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron Headquarters. One of the most heavily fortified locations in all of Fiction. A combination of the last living Time Giant, an assortment of the most well-trained and well-equipped peoples from across the known Multiverse, a mountain of various anti-reality warping defenses and nothing short of the second-most absolutely insane van drivers combined with the second-most absolutely insane vehicle insurance ever seen made it one of the most secure places in reality. Only the Interdimensional Police Department could claim better on that last front, and they were related. Everyone kind of forgot which one came first but they split off due to ideological differences.
Today was to be a historic moment: the enigmatic leaders of the IDPD and PAES were to meet for the ninth time in their long, tedious, long, wordy, long, boring and long discussion on the possibility of re-merging due to the sudden surge of Paradoxes and various anomalies in the space-time continuum. For the few who knew it (the information was heavily classified), everyone agreed that the creation of this entirely alternative 'alpha' timeline was probably stretching the limits of existence itself. Whatever ideological differences had caused them to split were long forgotten, while the threat of all that they knew collapsing was never higher. In the tallest floor of this stronghold was what many hoped to be, if not the last, than the second to last talk, with only petty differences (which name to use, for instance) to settle.
Today would be a historic moment for entirely different reason. Sure, they would inevitably agree. But it looked to be that it would take another meeting, today, as the name argument was surprisingly rather heated, and the two were about to just leave the room around 9:09 PM on that day.
One minute before this occurred, Pane arrived on the very edge of their defensive perimeter, teleporting in. UserZero, doubtless, could just teleport in and out without anyone the wiser, no matter their hatred of godmodding. She was simply too powerful for anyone to really bar anywhere, and even if she did not bother to come in the flesh, in her own words,
"Infinite accountssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss." But no, UserZero was busy today, making preparations for what both parties realized to be the final loop in time-a loop in time that neither of these reality-policing giants had any clue about. Plus, UserZero did not want to have to deal with that when she may be called upon to take a set of prizes critical to her mission at any moment. Plus, UserZero had believed that Pane's request for what was within was simply extravagant. In her mind, he had no need of that one fellow under just enough guard. If Pane wanted this one, then Pane would go get him. The other Descendants that would inevitably gather were sufficient for his purposes otherwise, UserZero thought. The deals extended to only what he needed to complete his tasks... Ergo, here he was.
Before he could even reach the Front Door of Reality (as it was called), Pane had to march through the Parking Lot. The Parking Lot was an egregious understatement of its firepower. It was more accurately a vehicular show of arms, with every feasible assault vehicle you could name ready to come to life and obliterate any wary trespassers with firepower more fitting to subjugate the masses than police time. Doubtlessly they were mustering strength and a show of force for some siege on the Dark Carnival proper - a siege that, historically speaking, was doomed to fail.
After making it through that, busting down the Front Door of Reality and arriving in the reception area, Pane would have to deal with the sheer volume of PAES troops that would have already assembled there in response, who would gleefully obliterate their own HQ to have a shot at killing a godmodder of such a high rank and remove their destructive effects from fiction for good. With their weapons attuned so perfectly as to prevent them from harming their comrades, they could unleash any and every defensive and offensive measure they had with reckless abandon and lay waste to Pane.
Once that lot was done for, he would have to begin the downwards trek to the very bottom. The prisoners of this place were kept near-universally because they physically could not be killed, and as such every measure they could afford to make sure no break-ins or break-outs were in place-and of course, the instant the building was sieged, PAES protocol ensured they would tuck his quarry, a VIP (if not a beloved one) away in there. In addition, once he had cleared the reception area, the big hitters of the PAES would charge forward. The Time Baby. Oxford. Yexly Mostrona. The greatest Paradox-Slaying heroes Fiction had ever graced the PAES with were all here. Oh, and this also constituted the forces he would have to have destroyed earlier due to their incessant respawning, unless he used the proper volume of Oblivion energies to erase them from time. Should he do that, the others would rush in far more harshly and more prepared. And this would go on until he hit the bottom floor, whereupon he would be faced with what was undoubtedly the most rabid security system ever conceived, a Escher-defying maze that dumped wrong turns off into Oblivion, literally, just to get to his target.
For any other being this was laughably hard, especially with the mysterious, but undoubtedly powerful leaders of the PAES and the IDPD within. For many, this was an act of suicide.
For Pane, he foresaw no chance of failure. The amount of defenses they had put up was to him nothing more than a mild irritation that made getting to his target directly impossible. He would have to take the mildly more difficult way in.
Pane reached for his glass sword, readying a swing, and stepped in, as the clock hit 9:09.
At once, every vehicle imaginable in the Parking lot, from the lowliest car to shuttles travelling to battleships the size of universes to time-travelling airplanes, blazed into action. "
INTRUDER ALERT! DELTA-PLUS GODMODDER DETECTED ON THE PREMISES! PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR AND SURREN-"
The automated voices were cut off by the swing of Pane's glass blade. Or, rather, the massive storm of elemental energies that followed it, a tidal wave of many things-but above all else, absolute death. The machinery in his way was cleaved aside, if not incinerated by force alone, as the godmodder silently stepped through the Parking Lot, sword ready, with nothing to stand in his way. Any token resistance there-after was quite literally flicked aside, whatever weapon they opted to wield turned against them and enlarged to obliterate themselves with. In but a minute, Pane had cleared the whole Parking Lot and stood at the Front Door of Reality.
Pane tested the solid nature of the Front Door. When he determined the door was quite heavy-set, Pane stepped backwards, and in a flash whipped out a lightning-fast kick. At once both doors were not just kicked down, but quite literally thrown off their hinges into the reception area. At once the massive amount of forces consolidated there buckled, either being impacted by the door or thrown along by the force itself. The room was cleaned in seconds, except for one thing-an exceptionally lucky secretary, which Pane marched directly towards.
"I request the location of Prisoner 000000000901909. Now."
"B-b-bottom floor, thirteenth cell to the l-l-eft in corridor I. Stairs down are to your r-r-r-right," Said the secretary, shaking like a twig.
"Thank you." Pane said. He turned around-and the Secretary was dead, the sheer act of Pane's turning whipping up a gust of wind enough to decapitate him. Pane marched downwards, completely ignoring their special idea of a staircase to just fall to the ground. Faster that way. All the while, the same alert was blaring.
"
INTRUDER ALERT! DELTA-PLUS GODMODDER DETECTED ON BOTTOM FLOOR! THIS IS NOT A DRILL! INTRUDER, PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE-"
Pane promptly tapped the nearest speaker, and suddenly the audio simply shut off. It annoyed him. With that taken care of, Pane marked his location and wandered off into what should have been a maze of eternally-twisting, nigh-Antichamber like mannerisms. In this environment, however, Pane knew no difference from walking down the street. Corridor I, found. Thirteenth cell, already in sight, all in seconds.
"
HALT, TRESPASSER! SURRENDER NOW, OR FACE MY ETERNAL TANTRUM! Roared an altogether familiar voice, as the room suddenly expanded to give more than ample space for its owner-the infantile Time Giant dubbed the Time Baby. His body was infantile, sure, but Time Giants were one of the few things that Godmodders did not take lightly. For others this would be the boss fight of the century.
Pane promptly pulled out what appeared to be a small pistol from the depths of hyperspace and shot himself in the head.
Even for a godmodder of his rank, shooting oneself in the head was still suicide in most cases. However, what came out of the gun was no bullet and what came out of Pane's head was not a bullet either. Unless, of course, you consider a mass of formless black blobs holding thousands of masks to be 'bullets.' in which case, yes. ‘Bullets’ certainly did come out of his head-and by that token, they also rushed towards the Time Baby in an all-encompassing mantle. Their attempts at stopping the 'bullets' did not do anything, even their most ferocious time powers reduced to nothingness, as the Time Baby was absorbed into the infinite blackness. And just like that, the 'bullets' first buzzed into a state of existence like a bad TV image, and then altogether vanished, with no trace of the Time Baby in sight.
Pane considered it a good recruitment. It was not dead - merely incapacitated, and ready to be bent towards his will as his loyal minion. Of course, the PAES knew what just happened and would not tolerate such further. It would only take mild adjustments for any other great of theirs to resist what just happened-but the adjustments would hold off their forces. Russel, a figure they all knew and all scorned, was a good example of how playing 'crash test dummy' for new equipment in an emergency situation could lead to disaster. As the dimensions of the room shrank back down to normal, Pane simply walked up to the thirteenth cell and cut it open with naught but his mind.
Inside this cell was a man who had uselessly shot his head on his entrance. The bullet, naturally, bounced backwards and killed him instead, leaving him with his quarry, who was backed up into a corner of the room, defenseless. To him, Pane pulled out a card and threw it at his feet in a harmless gesture, whilst the Delta-Plus godmodder took a seat at the one thing of note in this room-a table. And thus, he spoke.
"Number fourteen, Temperance. Signifies trying to find balance in life and control extremes. A symbol of meeting two alternative ideas in the middle and inner control. You could never be a better symbol of Temperance, between your split, your quest to end the war and bring it to a sound conclusion, your quest to find inner peace, and of course, your new quest to find out where the last piece of your life will fall."
Build looked up with wonder.
"Did... you just kill that guard?"
"No, the guard attempted to kill me, and his bullet bounced backwards. Had he not taken the shot immediately he would have been killed by me, though. But if you are worried about me killing you, do not be. I consider you important enough to preserve, a sentiment which the PAES - and for that matter the IDPD - will not share after today."
Build's eyes darted around the room.
"I... Uh. Alright then. If there's one thing I know about godmodders, it's that they twist logic. Sure, you killed him, you didn't kill him. Does it matter?? He's dead is what matters. But..." Build looks directly at Pane.
"You'll have to excuse me. Every godmodder I've met, barring the Legion, has wanted to kill me. So why don't you?"
"Good question. You are a former First Guardian and ergo an important part of my research-First Guardians are an integral part of Descendancy to function, in some way. Everything that has ever handled the coveted position of wielder of the Update Terminal has been touched by the Narrative in one way or another. Even though you are a former First Guardian, and the Operator is dead... Or worse... I suspect that even now, quite like TT2000, or rather Moniker, that you still have a fragment of that within you, a fragment that can be used to recreate the effect for my purposes. With me as the Godmodder, this would create a pseudo-godmodding war. I say 'pseudo' because I have no intention of actually killing you, merely presenting a force against you on occasional intervals to ensure that there is some level of antagonism between us, while you use the power of Descendancy to obliterate a group of monstrous intentions. You know them as the Dark Carnival. That... is the majority of the explanation, yes."
Pane shifted his position, which, to Build (and any other) looked more like a blurred image moving in an indeterminate way.
"Any questions, thus far?"
"...So Tazz was right, then? I was needed for something after all." Build looked off to the side, chuckling.
"Welp. From what I've heard, existence's time in the spotlight's running a little low. I'd better make the most of it while I can. Even if it means... going back into hell."
Pane shifted in an indeterminate way again, trying his best to contain his rage. ‘Tazz.’ That name. But no, no no, there would be time for that, later. He would focus on answering Build. And he did.
"Excellent, the premise is good. As I am a more generous benefactor than most, however, I must give you the full details. For a start-my entrance in here was obviously not peaceful. I have currently captured the Time Baby and killed every other member of the PAES that had bothered to attempt aggression and more, and given these events coincide with meetings attempting to merger the IDPD and PAES, this means that my meeting of you has left you with little alternatives. You would most likely be qualified as a full-blown criminal by both of their books and handled appropriately. Build, these prison cells we are now in were never meant to hold anything other than people they were physically unable to kill. You are their first occupant in one thousand years, if we discount any janitors or other PAES personnel. So, before anything else, the knowledge that-less than fortunately-it is either come with me or they will kill you...And also I presume that they will continually and repetitively attempt to murder you while we go about things because I am a godmodder and sooner or later they're going to become sick and tired of even hearing the word 'Descendant.' They believe themselves stronger than the Dark Carnival and that they could any day overtake them, a premise that is absolutely false, and they will no longer tolerate the existence of reality-tearing reality warpers accordingly. Especially not after this. Do you understand the severity of your personal situation?"
Build looked at Pane, unbelieving, but his face carried no sense of humor. He was being serious, for better or for worse. Build sighs.
"Fine. I'll... I'll go with you. I guess."
"Excellent. We have time to burn, so a few other things - because I've noted some people have occasionally opted to have me kill them rather than work with me, though that is altogether rare. I prefer that my employees know as much about the job as I may state. In any case, I will be blunt. Obviously you are going to be working with those near-socoiopathic lunatics that you opt to call Descendants again, but unlike before, their powers will be bolstered by... Let us call it their 'inner selves.' They will be empowered by effectively their own mind, and that means that the process of refining such a power to where their true and absolute ability may be fully displayed will involve... OK, it will involve something relatively close to psychological torture. In order to fully hone your abilitites to the point wherein you may be capable of destroying them once and for all, you will be subjected to events and ordeals that will test you in manners that, while deliberately engineered, will nevertheless carry far more significance and pain than some accursed symbolism. Even if this does not deter you, I must warn that likewise for your other fellows, who may reveal unto you new depths of loathing for them that you may never know you would have - whole new dimensions to their characters to make them, potentially, even more despicable than they were before. Do you understand that the already-apparent and severe physical hardships will be going hand-in-hand with mental hardships of perhaps even greater power and intensity?"
"Wow. You're... you're really selling me on this whole 'going with you' idea. Wouldn't a quick and painless death by the hands of these guys be preferable to whatever torture you're putting me through?"
"Well, for a start, if you succeed then you'll be the savior of existence itself. You see, the problem is that the Dark Carnival has grown... exceedingly close to victory. By which I mean, ignoring how their forces are the strongest they've been in years, I can also assure you that the volume of Paradoxes they have managed to create has somehow created two 'alpha' timelines, or at the very least created an alternate but equivalently important timeline that has properties akin to the alpha. Paradoxes. For a scientist like myself, they are the bane of my existence. And this is but a side-effect, only a show of severity: at the rate of their creation they will threaten to consume time itself and obliterate everything, leaving not even an existence to save. Even in the case of the obliteration of, say, a plot force, there would still be Nonfiction - but not even that would survive this catastrophe."
At this point their conversation was interrupted, almost, by the sound of a considerably large amount of footsteps. Obviously the approach of the armed Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron forces, ready for round two.
"Pardon."
Pane prompty points his sword at the open door, and at once, like some fiendish mix of a hose and a virus, the swords not only multiplied but shot forth with great force into the hallway, spilling outwards. The footsteps turned overwhelmingly to screaming, and it appeared that the only reason that no-one heard the endless clashing and clanking of the swords against every available surface outside was because of some kind of godmod to keep them silent.
"They disapprove of godmodders in their HQ, especially godmodders who tear through their defenses like a binge eater through a buffet. In any case, any other objections?"
Build looks at Pane, his eyes staring at the carnage a single godmodder brought upon one of the most secure facilities in Fiction. Well, I mean, it obviously isn't secure now because it's been broken into, but you understand the point here.
"...'Savior of existence.' That's got a nice ring to it. It's been a while since I thought of myself as the savior of anything. I..." Build nods hesitantly.
"I'll do it. Under one condition."
"I hope it isn't anything to do with allergies to bone marrow. Or bone. But go on, state it."
"They took my glasses. I like my glasses. See where I'm going with this?"
"Done."
And despite the fact that Pane hadn't appeared to move or even use his powers at all, there it was, lying on the table, a set of red glasses that seemed to shine with cosmic imagery.
"You are fortunate they have not already destroyed it. By my calculations - and to keep track of everything I've been doing a lot - I would not have been able to grant your request, as the only other copy in existence... Let us say it is with someone that even an Omega Plus cannot just walk up to and request, or kill. Any other objections, questions, simple requests?"
Build reaches out and grabs his red sunglasses. They were shining, as brightly as ever, the galaxies reflecting in their lenses. He put them on, blinking once or twice.
"Oh, believe me. They tried to destroy it. But these things... They aren't exactly something you can just shatter. Sure, the Operator's did. But only when he died. I have a feeling that the paradox they're tied to is one of the strongest around." Build shakes his head, standing up in his cell.
"Let's go."
Pane stood up too, but before he could execute his favored tactic of teleportation, a third entity entered the room through it instead. He wore blue, glowing armor that looked a bit like it was made of serrated blades, with a helm marked with a diamond in a diamond, inscribed in blue and iron.
"...Where do you think you're going?" This new entity said, with a voice that was, sadly but undeniably, majestic.
"Out."
And thus, they were out.
To Pane's displeasure, all three of them. The man in blue included.
"You're persistent."
"You're scum, you're a problem, you're aiding a freshly-declared criminal escape prison and execution, and you are, most importantly, killing time with your antics. But no further." The blue man said.
"I am the King of Pane, Delta Plus Godmodder, and I have easily detained the Time Baby, one of the most powerful beings in the ranks of the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron. What are you to that?"
"The Hunter, and you, the hunted."
The two, perhaps at the exact same time, swung, both blades clashing so fast that they both emitted a shockwave. The instant thereafter, two more figures suddenly materialized-made entirely of glass and thrusting at the man with four fists of fury, knocking him backwards.
By the time Pane teleported again, there were four figures amongst them, not one the Blue man. And then he teleported again, before Build could register where he was. And again. And again. So fast that it was more flashes of color he saw rather than locations, until finally, Pane stopped.
"Sorry about that... That was not a good sign. That was the Hunter, the infamous leader of the IDPD. The actual leader. The Captains are subordinates to him, the lowest 'officer' position I presume. I know you've played Nuclear Throne, and I trust now that you have a mild glimpse of the road ahead in terms of your adversaries...I suggest not staying in one place for long. My powers should neutralize his attempts to find you, so long as you keep moving. In any case, Build, care to wager where we are?"
The area they were in was made entirely of some kind of golden wood, unto which they were in a pocket of air, a passegeway through the trees. It may have confused others, but there was one other thing to tip Build off. Power, radiating through the branches. Creativity. Time-though it seemed jittery. Life and Nature. And something else, something much more...Sinister? A whispering noise seemed to emit from the branches, repetitive, just beneath hearing clearly. This place...
Build recognized it immediately.
"Yggdrasil. The World Tree. I've only ever seen one of these. But then it, you know. Burned to the ground."
"Astute. This is not an ordinary Yggdrasil, though, if Yggdrasil could ever be considered ordinary. This is the so-acclaimed bastion of Zero, the Zeroth Server's' very own Yggdrasil, the one UserZero guarded so zealously during the Zeroth War for some secret that none knew. I believe that there are exactly eleven entities aware of what is in here, and of them, seven who know what the true nature of the secret she so zealously guarded-and that will now count you. Even now the last and final barrier to Yggdrasil still stands so strong that others cannot penetrate it, and even now it has been exempted from the obliteration of Minecraft as a universe. Such is the sheer force she prescribed to defend it. Naturally can't hide were in 'cahoots' as some might call it, though she will not be TOO invasive to the job of obliterating the Dark Carnival."
"Come, Build. Time is, quite literally, burning."
Build muttered to himself.
"That doesn't even make any sense. But sure."
"You would think to discredit sense given the nature of Fiction, but I'd think it all unrealistic too...But, come."
And thus the two went into the twisted heart of the Zeroth Yggdrasil, the World Tree before all World Trees, within a secret so desperately kept and so well-kept that only eleven beings - now including Build - will ever know the true contents and the true meaning. You think you will see it?
If I have anything to say about it...No.
--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--
Everyone snaps back. The playing of the tape has selfdestructed the video recorder entirely, and the tape itself is gone. It appears you're not going to be looking over that twice for reference, not like you need to. A crimson aura emits from it-you can suspect that UserZero took action in this regard.
...I don't feel the need to admit that this kind of changes quite a bit. The Red wasn't kidding after all: it appears time is quite literally on the verge of collapsing for what UserZero has been doing, between a mound of Paradoxes and two Alpha timelines, not to mention that the existence of the Black was a thing. Plus, if her words are correct, I'm kind of calculating that the time spent in the time loops with UserZero playing Hazama has exceeded the actual amount of time spent in existence.
It also cues you in that there is quite literally no telling what the future holds. There has not now nor ever been any point in this timeline wherein the future has been concretely set down, while what could amount to an excessive amount of time has passed.
...You all feel a pain in your head, like something is faintly recalled...But you cannot grasp what or why you feel it and leave it be. Not everything has been revealed, it seems...
You see Richard, looking at the space the VCR recorder and TV used to occupy, unbelieving. The Wings...They were undoubtable proof that you are currently fighting the strongest Godmodder in existence. Richard will never claim that title. And yet, unlike before, the words of his victory rang true right through his ears like golden elixir. He probably selectively ignored the fact that UserZero considers it the Descendant's kill and not his own. Plus, now informed of the timelines, he is now aware of his madness and the Incarnate-but who cares? No-one could ever take back the fact that he is defeating a Godmodder
stronger than Psi, right? He then starts gripping his head, clearly stricken with some kind of malady, but just as quickly releases it, shrugging it off as if it never happened. Some of you have your suspicions, but you feel as if that this won't be forgotten anytime soon.
Meanwhile, UserZero is frowning. She opens her mouth as if to speak, but just as quickly clamps it shut, clearly frustrated. Nothing she's got will easily override that little moment, won't it? Nothing. Flumpty's Walumpty's appearance with the tape thrashed her expectations. Finally, she speaks.
*UserZero:...this is awkward.
*UserZero: but, approximately 1 year of real time...it has never taken this long before...yes, i'm closing in on sweet victory, aren't i?
*UserZero: yeah, yeah...ok, yeah, no position to barter, but i think pane ought to best be left uninformed of that bit in the tape, with the paradox avoidance whatevers. i don't care if you know who that guy was or not that he was getting but it doesn't matter-i think he'd just get weirded out if he knew i was watching him like that.
Something tells me seeking him out to even tell him is going to be infuriatingly hard, and probably not a productive way to kill time.
*UserZero: now...Where were we?
.
