“There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation has a rendezvous with destiny.”

  Franklin D. Roosevelt, American President

  Milly gazed upon the black orb, rising high above her. She had to turn off her Detect Life talent due to the blinding river of golden light that flowed from the heavens into its mass, but even without that light, it was still a sight to behold.

  “It’s so much larger than the one at Research Station Omega,” Milly said to Oracle, who simply stared at the empty palm of the statue of Dr. Taydon Cizen, unable to view the invisible orb without the Spectacles of Hidden Design.

  Milly kept them away from the orb itself, hovering in mid-air on their platform of earth, to avoid accidentally touching it and activating its imbedded program, as had happened at Research Station Omega.

  Part of it is already active – there wouldn’t be any Orianes here if it was fully dormant. But if this is the main interface, there may be multiple layers of activation within it. At least, that’s what Oracle says.

  It turned out Oracle was correct in that assumption. As Milly leaned closer to get a better view of its shining surface, a screen materialized in front of the orb.

  Milly read aloud the text as it appeared, and Oracle scoffed at the name of the statue.

  “Taydon has an absolutely brilliant mind, but he knows it. Syune was the only person I ever saw humble him, even eons after her death,” Oracle said, staring up at the statue’s visage with disappointment.

  “Was this statue part of the original city?” Milly asked curiously. “Bestian said Cizen was a big deal.”

  “It absolutely was not,” Oracle said defensively, and with a hint of disgust. “We Orianes find fame and honor in the discoveries we make – in the words written in the tomes of our libraries and in the memories colorfully carved in the walkways of our settlements. Statues exist in our culture, of course, but they are not intended to be boastful. And none are as wasteful as all this.”

  “Then Cizen must have altered everyone’s memories if no one thinks the statue strange,” Milly concluded. “He did that with other elements, like using gold for currency. Just how much can he manipulate your people’s souls?”

  “It’s a good point, Milly. Which leads to the question of whether these are actually the souls of those we lost, or mere facsimiles to appease a grieving god,” Oracle wondered. She paused, then added “Or both. It is possible Taydon couldn’t locate every lost Oriane soul. He may have had to fill in the gaps.”

  She’s thinking about Hephaestus. Rain said he killed himself rather than let the madness take him. He jumped into the Nexus. Did Cizen capture his soul from its depths, or had it been torn apart? Either option is horrifying to consider. How is Oracle still so stoic through all this? If this were Cally, I’d be a mess.

  The text continued to scroll as they spoke, like an old DOS screen cycling through its commands.

  “This one is charging much faster than the one at Omega,” Milly said to Oracle as she continued to read aloud. “Omega will take two years for only five hundred people. This one is less than a year with a hundred times as many.”

  “Whatever his plan is, it begins to unfold at Core Research Station,” Oracle concluded. “He needs it populated sooner than the research outposts. Which means resurrection is just the first stage of his plan.”

  “But where does that get him?” Milly asked. “I don’t know how this whole God Contest works. I know the players are pulled from the existing civilization, and we’re tasked with protecting another species – the fairies – until we finally win. And that if either species dies, we fail.”

  Oracle raised a curious, and slightly impressed, eyebrow. “And how to you know that? That is hidden knowledge – knowledge not meant for someone only in their second month of the God Contest.”

  “We saw it in Hephaestus’ memory orbs,” Milly explained, confused. “We’ve found two so far – one that crashed on Tower Beach and the one Twotongue gave us for saving his people. Didn’t you see them when you were in my head?”

  “No, I didn’t,” Oracle said, processing the revelation. “Milly, those orbs – that knowledge – aren’t something you are meant to have. They were our personal design records. Notes buried deep in the God Contest program. They should never be accessible to players. If you found two, it means the very foundation upon which we built this world is fractured.”

  “The madness,” Milly surmised.

  Luna needs me to scan the madness before she can fix it. What happens if these fractures become too big?

  “Likely,” Oracle agreed. “Though I’m not confident the corruption is part of Taydon’s master plan. Why would he bring our people back only to have the world collapse around them?”

  Why would he bring them back at all, other than to quell his grief? If we win, would they even survive?

  “Oracle, what will happen to the players and the fairies if we win the God Contest?” Milly asked bluntly.

  I need to know if we are to figure this out. Cizen’s plan is too dependent on whether we win or lose this Contest.

  Oracle didn’t answer right away. She stared silently across the wide, blue ocean, lost in contemplation, as the wind blew through her hair.

  The Goddess of Foresight and Prophesy. She’s weighing the risks of telling me what happens at the end of the Contest. It’s supposed to remain a secret, but is that secret knowledge a foundational part of the Nexus’ test? If so, and she tells me, it could mean the entire Contest gets deemed unfair, and it is aborted. If that happens, all our people – the players, the fairies, and the Orianes – will die.

  Milly was about to take back her question – to tell Oracle she’d rather not know – when Oracle spoke in a hushed whisper.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “There is a reason this knowledge is kept secret from the players, at least at the beginning. To know is to utterly change how the players perceive the nature of the game. It can cause the utter unraveling of even the most well-organized species. You must swear – on the lives of your love and your daughter – that you shall reveal what I tell you to no one. Not until it is time.”

  “I prom…” Milly started to agree.

  “Don’t agree too quickly, Milly,” Oracle interrupted sternly. “You can’t tell Cally. Or Rain. Or Passi. No one. If you do, it could…”

  “Invalidate the entire contest and we’ll all die,” Milly finished with confidence. Oracle stared at her wide-eyed. “Unfortunately, I’m getting used to keeping secrets close to my chest.”

  Her Inquisitor. I’ve managed to keep Luna’s secret. I can keep this one alongside it.

  Oracle sighed heavily, resigned to the necessity of the revelation. “Hephaestus, Taydon, and I ascended to godhood when we were declared the victors of our God Contest. It is the fate that all God Contest victors must endure. It seems like you surmised as much.”

  Milly nodded. “Not much of a reward, given madness and death await on the other side.”

  “Honestly, it wasn’t much of a reward even before the madness,” Oracle admitted. “It is – at best – an eternity of servitude. It does not take long before the new gods – these victims turned perpetrators – become callous and cold, even as they are tasked with guiding those who come after.”

  “How many ascend each time?”

  “Not many. The God Contest is designed to have so few survivors. In all my cycles, I never saw more than four players survive.”

  The revelation chilled Milly to her core. Her thoughts went to her family and friends at the Castle of Glass.

  No more than four survivors? We’re supposed to survive as a team, yet how can we work together if we know only a few will survive? This knowledge would fracture what order has been built at the Castle of Glass… and that’s why I can’t tell anyone. If I did, how long would it be before Xavier or Stone or Brass decided just to kill everyone instead of trying to control them?

  “Why? What’s the point of it all?” Milly asked the former goddess. “Why does the Nexus do this?”

  To Milly’s surprise, Oracle shrugged. “The Nexus is a mystery even to us. It is an entity that existed long before the first god was ever created. It has no words that we can comprehend, and it is utterly inflexible when it comes to the requirements of its creation cycle. I spent many millennia trying to figure out the reasons behind those requirements. That was my profession before the Contest. The study of globe-level interconnected patterns. And I was good at it too. Very good.”

  Oracle gazed forlornly out over Core Station Academy, remembering better days.

  “In the end, after so many dead ends, I came to believe the Nexus was driven by something so very, very simple. Love.”

  “Love?” Milly asked in disbelief. “You can’t be serious. That’s some Saturday morning cartoon shit.”

  Oracle laughed. “Well, perhaps it’s not love as we know it. You see, I came to the realization that the Nexus is one-part engineer and one-part parent. It’s exceptional at the engineering part. Parenting? Not so much.”

  “Yah, no shit,” Milly spat. “What parent tortures their children?”

  “How do I best describe this?” Oracle asked herself, sitting down on their floating platform so her legs dangled over the edge. “The Nexus has designed every intelligent species in the universe, and it does so in two phases. During its engineering phase, it painstakingly crafts every element of a species anatomy, physiology, social structure, cognition, and spirituality. It embeds instinct, inspiration, and imagination, yet it also gives them free will to evolve beyond its initial design. It’s a process that takes millennia to accomplish. During this time, the Nexus appears dormant to us gods – its attention fully focused on its creation. It is an artist who has locked itself in a room and will not emerge until its work is complete.”

  “So what happens when it finally finishes?” asked Milly, curious.

  “The parent phase, when the Nexus comes alive,” Oracle breathed, her eyes sparkling. “There’s nothing quite like it, Milly. The light. The warmth. The vibrations that reach straight into your soul like music. Being the first to glimpse new live being born into the universe… that feeling stays with you for all eternity. It is matched only by the pain of what comes afterwards.”

  “The God Contest. It tortures its own creation?”

  Oracle nodded. “It is not enough that the Nexus design a new species. That species needs to be tested for durability, flexibility, and the potential to grow and adapt. A parent, helping its child grow and become self-sufficient. To do this, the Nexus implants its creation in a world designed to challenge the species – to stretch it to its limits. It tasks the gods – its eternal servants – with the design of such a world. This is how Hephaestus and I were required to spend our eternity together.”

  “But the species isn’t sent there alone,” Milly figures out, the pieces coming together. “The Nexus adds in another species to help protect them.”

  “Yes, but it is not just any species,” Oracle clarifies. “It is always the Nexus’ previous creation. A species which just spent millennia growing and evolving under the guidance of the gods. A species that has developed advanced technology and evolved complex social structures. A species with a solidified identity, who are ready to prove themselves as a mature species who no longer need guidance.”

  “We humans are the protectors, and the fairies – the Nexus’ latest creation – are the protected,” Milly surmised. “And before that, in the previous cycle, humans were the protected, and the species created before us were our protectors.”

  “Correct,” Oracle praised, happy with how quickly Milly understood. “The Uridine species came before you and were your protectors. They were a strange, octopus-like species that valued independence and isolation above all else. For the Orianes, our protected were the Vinni – a winged people with a strict hierarchical societal structure who favored militaristic conquest over scientific experimentation. It was… an awkward partnership, to say the least.”

  “I think I understand,” Milly muttered, piecing it all together. “The God Contest – it’s a test for both species. For the protected, the Nexus wants to know if its new species is designed well enough to survive its infancy. For the protectors, it is testing whether the species can finally survive in the universe on its own, without the guidance of the gods.”

  “Also correct,” clapped Oracle. “This is called a cycle. The time from species creation to its eventual liberation from the guidance of the gods. We are now at the end of Cycle Homosapien.”

  “So what happens if we win?”

  “The Cycle Fairy will begin. This world we are now in will be given true form somewhere in the universe, though it will be reset and its more horrendous dangers removed. The fairies will call this world home, and their civilization will grow. The surviving humans will ascend and spend eternity in servitude to the Nexus. They, along with the other gods, will guide the fairies along their evolution, until it is time for them to be tested in the God Contest – this time as protectors. The Cycle Fairy will end, their victors will ascend, and the next cycle will begin.”

  “And if we fail?”

  “The new species – the fairies – get tossed in the trash, all the players die, and the Nexus goes back to the drawing board,” Oracle said bluntly. “Of course, there won’t be a drawing board if we fail this time.”

  “Right… how the absolute fuck do you call that ‘love’?” Milly said, aghast.

  Oracle chuckled, though there was no humor behind it. “As I said, it’s not love as we know it. But it’s the closest word I’ve been able to find. This species double stress-test – protected then protector – ensures a species has greatest chance to survive alone in a cruel universe. It is love of the species as a whole, not love of the individual. And the Nexus – the overly protective parent – adamantly refuses to move on until both tests are met.”

  “And what happens if it continually fails?” Milly prompted – a question at the very heart of everything.

  “Have you ever been so stressed that you can feel your mental state fracture?” Oracle asked.

  Milly felt like she’d been punched in the gut.

  I have. My foster father. The abuse, and what came after. It broke me – utterly and completely broke me. It took years to pick up the pieces. I never did move on… not really. Not until I got to the God Contest and found my real family.

  “I… I’m sorry, Milly. Of course you have,” Oracle said knowingly, patting the stone slab. Milly sat next to the former goddess, and Oracle pulled her into a tight hug.

  “I felt helpless. Worthless. Broken,” Milly whispered. “Even now, with all my powers and my found family, in another world, the mere remembrance is enough to make me fall apart.”

  “It is the same way with the Nexus, though, until now, such failures were relatively few. Certainly no more than twice per cycle. But humans have failed twelve times. Twelve times the Nexus has been forced to destroy its own creation – its own children – and start over. No creature, not even the Nexus, can survive such heartache without being mentally shattered.”

  “And that caused the madness?” Milly asked, head leaning against Oracle’s shoulder.

  “Many of my fellow gods believe that, but I had my doubts. The Nexus didn’t just start failing out of nowhere. Humans, despite all your flaws, are a capable species. What you’ve shown me here – the black orbs and the life stolen from the Nexus – confirms my doubts. Humans failed those tests because they were set up to fail. Because Taydon needed the Nexus to be weakened.”

  “He needed the Nexus to mentally shatter, so he could syphon off its life-giving energy to resurrect your people. Like cracking open an egg,” Milly deduced.

  “I believe so,” Oracle agreed. “But this raises more questions than it answers. For example, why resurrect our people in this world? We are not a species being tested, so we would not carry forward when this world is formed in the universe. If humans lose, we die. If humans win, we die. Taydon knows this, and must have figured out a way around it.”

  Oracle looked up at the invisible black orb. “Perhaps we shall find the answers within Taydon’s creation. Come, Milly. Let us peel back the layers of his design and see what we find beneath.”

  The Non-Canonical Aftermath: