Creation: Book 3: Strandbinder Complete!

"Did you explain everything Rimi?" Walker asked as he neared his two subsystem assistants.

The small blue squirrel saluted, "Yes Creator!"

Walker smiled, "Excellent, alright Cagna, your whole focus while being here is to work with the Milestone system." He said, clicking on System and starting up the process.

Welcome to the System Designer!

Please name your second System.

.....

The Milestone System is named!

Good luck Creator!

Walker spent some time going through the options he'd seen when creating the Monster system. He saw the mini-alpha protocol he'd viewed before and knew that it was how the Territory system would come about. He found a few pre-built systems that might work, but weren't exactly what he wanted. Some were built on having hundreds of monitors roaming Sonata, but that would never work because there'd be millions to potentially trillions of entities over time. Too many damn monitors and not enough subsystem assistants. Another couple focused on entities essentially "reporting" what was happening, but that wouldn't work either as poor Cagna would be overwhelmed incredibly fast.

Scrolling through several hundred options, he noticed that there were even more than he'd previously seen. Using his Awakened memory, he did a quick memory scan and found his thoughts to be correct. It seemed that each time he built a new system, more options would be unlocked for later use. He found a few that would work for a temporal anomaly system that he had in mind for that task and another that could work for creating a faster ground-traveling system, but he didn't want to get too slowed down in the wonders of the systems. Nodding to himself and with a quick mental slap for clarity, he continued scanning through. With a sudden thought, he quickly moved to the M's and found what he was looking for. The Monster system. Walker swore to himself internally but knew there was nothing he could do about it. It seemed anything he made wasn't his to keep for himself. He continued to scroll until he hit the T's and found the Tracking system. He clicked on its description.

The Tracking System:

A system designed by Creator Ju in the alpha protocol of 2BC.

This system is designed to track any entities of the Creator's choice within any filters they choose to create.

Flexibility: Extreme

Difficulty to modify: Low

Just for curiosities sake, Walker clicked back to the Monster System and clicked on the description:

The Monster System:

A system designed by Creator Dante in the alpha protocol of 4AA.

This system is designed to absorb ambient magic and use it to increase the combat capabilities of different entities through evolutionary traits.

Flexibility: High

Difficulty to modify: Medium

That seemed right, although he wasn't sure why the flexibility and modification difficulties were different. He went back to the Tracking system and clicked accept. And just like that, the Milestone system was in its beginnings. Walker moved his overlay out of his vision so he could explain what they would be doing for a very very long time.

"Okay guys here we go, and Rimi, I know there isn't much going on with the Monster system right now..."

"Incorrect." The blue squirrel instantly responded.

"Whatever, I know there isn't a TON of things going on with the Monster system right now, so please help out with any ideas you may have." Rimi nodded. "Here's the idea. I want to create a system wherein every single person, monster, city, item, and....basically everything else is tracked. I want to know anything from what they ate for breakfast to who they saved from a burning building. Milestones will be built so that as they're reached, a tracking notification will appear, notifying them that they have obtained a pre-determined point."

He started to pace in front of the two sub-assistants. "I want there to be specific powers, breakthroughs, and additions that can be unlocked by people and monsters purely based on what milestones they have hit." Walker paused for a moment. "I won't lie, this will be a very intrusive process. I can't imagine growing up in a world where how many steps I've taken or how many women I've slept with are tracked and up for review. Where I'm from, that would be considered a massive, unbelievable, and heinous breach of privacy. That's why we're not tracking things ourselves, but rather going it through a non-sapient and autonomous system. We will be able to review what they've done and how they've done it as we need to, but we specifically will not be tracking everyone personally. The Milestone system will." Walker began pacing again, "It will be very intrusive, which I hate to do, but I can't think of a different way to go about this. it is a fine line to walk, I won't lie, but I believe it is necessary for my other future plans to work."

"We already have everything we say and do tracked by the alpha protocol." Cagna said in encouragement.

Walker nodded in thanks, while Rimi raised a hand "How are you going to track what people say for these breakthroughs."

"What do you mean? It's built into the tracking system?"

Cagna was nodding next to her sibling, "I see what you mean Rimi. Good job!" She high-fived him. "He means, how are you going to track that what they say is true?. Human beings are duplicitous, right?"

"Right...."

"Then, if they suddenly say, "I've defeated the most powerful of powerful monsters in this powerful place!" How are you to trust them?"

"Because a similar tracker in the most powerful of powerful monsters will show that they've died, and their magic will have been absorbed by the speaker."

"Okay, but what if there's a leadership milestone? How do you work with that? How do you "know" they're the leader? They could just say they're the leader of a group of a thousand, or a hundred-thousand, and the tracker would agree because they said so..."

Walker paused and thought that over. He could create a party or army system, but that would be quite some time away. Were they right? If they were, that would mean they wouldn't be able to track everything people say. That was a huge limitation he hadn't considered. Cagna interrupted his thought process.

"What's the point of all this?"

"Hrmm?"

"What's the point of the Milestone system? Why am I here?" Cagna asked in a serious tone. "Rimi told me about the speech you gave for the Monsters and his system, but I need to know why I'm here as well. He said this was probably the most important system in Symphony."

"It is..."

"Okay, then what's the purpose." She said while looking Walker directly in the eyes. "If you want me to run the Milestone system, I need to know what the goal is."

"You're right. The why is always important....how to explain this..it...umm..it...ummm." Walker's mind was blanking out. He'd thought long and hard on this, but now, when he needed to explain it, there was nothing there. "Give me a moment please." He said as he walked away quickly.

There were too many thoughts at once. Each time he tried to focus, a new one appeared. He knew what to do. Walker tried to just breathe and slow things down, but even with his awakened mind, it wasn't working. There was too much to explain and the timer in the corner of his vision was stressing him out.

Rather than get overwhelmed like he had in the past, Walker stopped pacing and sat down. When he first arrived here, he had a problem with too much happening at once and had done his old breathing exercise. That had worked in the past, but, this time, he had too much emotionally invested in this. Too many thoughts, too many feelings reaching out and trying to grab his attention. Walker needed something more. He reached into his memories, and after scrolling through them quickly, found one from his time in the military that should do the trick.

Just before he deployed, they taught everyone a basic exercise for meditation, stating it would help them manage and process PTSD before it became a bigger problem.

He remembered the instructor was wearing a pristine uniform as they sat in a chair at the front of the room. The lieutenant closed their eyes and explained, in a soft and soothing tone of voice, that they were now viewing their mind space as a deep and dark room. Inside of that dark room was a single white wax candle. He explained mentally picturing himself lighting the candle, and feeding it all of his emotions and thoughts. Everything. As the candle was fed, the flame would rise in strength before settling back down again to its standard size, and as each person meditated, any extra thoughts or emotions were to be ignored and fed to the candle. The instructors said you knew you were doing it right when the darkness and the candle were all that was left, and no more thoughts or emotions were intruding.

At the time, Walker thought it was a bunch of voodoo, but with his accelerated thoughts from the awakening, he could see the value in having a nice clear mind with no outside influences. He closed his eyes and performed his old breathing exercise to center himself and clear out any buzz his extra thoughts or emotions might have on him. Walker pictured a simple white wax candle and a lone flame in a dark room. He fed it any thoughts and emotions that appeared. Stress, anxiety, worry and that constant nugget of depression were isolated and thrown into the flame. Once he cleared out any emotions, which took some time, he started to work on the memories.

I need to do the primigenial tasks....into the flame.

What's happening on Earth? What has Mr. Harrison done?...It took a bit longer, but it also went into the flame.

Chipper, Symphony, the Unending Summit....into the flame.

It took quite a bit longer than he expected, but once he was done, he opened his eyes and had his answer.

"What did you just do?" Rimi asked.

"I meditated for a moment. They had taught it to us before I went off to war, but at the time I didn't take them seriously...now I do. I feel....much much better." Walker said with a bright smile.

"You should've done that before you spoke with the primigenials." Rimi said in a quiet voice, "You were quite mean to them."

"I don't think I was mean.."

"You were quite unbalanced." Virgil said by the evolution chambers where he continued working without a pause.

"Are you sure?"

"Indeed. Remember, I can see your memories from just before you entered. This isn't the first time."

"Okay then, I guess I uh...was. I'll um....have to go apologize to them when I get the chance." Walker tried to mentally shrug it off and re-focus, "Now, back to business, Cagna. You said you wanted to know the why, right?'

The pink squirrel nodded seriously.

"Because it is the start of everything. We're going to use the Milestone system to unlock all future systems. When we're done, it'll help sapients decide on their classes and professions, assist with managing cities and economies, and track the different types of growth monsters go through. It will be massively all-inclusive. Every other system will connect to this one system at the same time. And, we're going to do it with the kernels. Oh shit, the kernels!" Walker finished, eyeing the Milestone system in the corner of his eyes. The moment he had selected the tracking system, a notice had appeared that he'd kept in mind while talking to the two small squirrels.

In order for the tracking system to work, there must be a physical object for the system to connect to at all times within the entity's reach.

This connection will allow for a stream of data to continuously reach the Creator and update them on the current whereabouts and activities of the tracked entity.

Disconnection or a maximum distance of fifty feet from the selected object will disconnect the tracking updates of an entity.

"Hey Virgil!" Walker called over to the large squirrel.

"Yes, Walker. Please keep in mind I am doing many things at once." Virgil said in a testy voice.

"Gotcha, sorry. Can you find a place to put a kernel in the humans?"

"What?" Virgil said as he fully turned around to look at him.

"I need to put kernels into the humans." Walker replied slowly.

"Why?"

"Because that's how their classes, eventual monster system updates, and the milestone system will work. They're already in the monsters so it's easy to update them with the Milestone system, but I'll need them in all future sapients as well."

"That means your warclaws, who we cannot modify, and Raganoth, who is already seeded, will not have them."

Walker shrugged as he said, "Yep! The primigenials won't be seeded with them either, which is honestly their loss."

Virgil nodded, "I see. I'll look into what I can do, but it isn't simple. I'm assuming you do not want a group of very large human beings."

"Why?" Walker asked in confusion, "And how large?"

"At least ten feet tall at full growth, and because I need to find a place to put the kernel. You've built the monster system to allow for kernel growth. If the humans eventually reach the Monster system, as you said they would, and a kernel grows within them.."

"They'll explode as they level up?" Walker yelled out.

"Indeed." Virgil said with a shrug, "I just thought that may be of interest to you."

"umm....yeah! Well shit." Walker said as he began pacing. "Ten feet tall? That's like a race of small giants...." He continued to pace as he thought it through.

I don't know if I want giant human beings. Will they even respect me when I drop down for my avatar moments? Will I even want to drop in on Symphony if I look like a child next to everyone? The Battlefrogs aren't that big, same with Chipper and the Guardians. Walker slowed down his breathing and paused.

He searched through his memories to find if there was anything in there mentioning wide-open spaces within human beings that a kernel could grow within. They had made it work with the monsters by rearranging some of their internal organs and just overall making them larger. Bigger body means bigger space. Generally, a kernel started at the size of an olive, and ballooned up from there. But there had to be a better way. This was somehow all going to tie into the class system as well, and he didn't want to try to do any updates after he'd already seeded Sapients. Not if he could help it.

Memories of Iron Man's armor system popped into his mind before he discounted it. Human beings weren't toys to upgrade. Except for being resistant to diseases....but that was just super helpful, not a fundamental change to humanity's overall growth.

"You know," Virgil said as he watched Walker processing everything, "The Romans were only about five and a half feet tall. Humanity has already started evolving towards greater height in the last few millennia."

"Yeah, but I haven't."

"True, but you may have to adapt to the circumstances that you find yourself in. We could always shrink their brains and put it in their cranial cavity" Virgil suggested.

"Wouldn't that make all future human beings...dumber?" Walker asked in exasperation.

"Indeed. But it is a potential solution."

Walker snapped his fingers and pointed at both Rimi and Virgil, "We'll split it!"

Virgil nodded while Rimi asked, "What?"

"We'll split the kernel into pieces. Virgil, what are the most open-spaced areas within the human body? Where can we find that too-valuable real estate."

Virgil actually had to think on that for a few moments, before saying, "The Thoracic and Abdominal cavities."

"Great, the stomach and the chest. If we split the kernel in half, would that be small enough?"

"Potentially." Virgil replied, and was quickly clicking through screens as he turned to the evolution chambers where Walker could just see two babies floating within. "Almost enough, you would need just a little more space to allow for potential growth past tier five."

"What do you suggest?"

"I would suggest the cranial cavity as it is quite cushioned. If the kernel piece is small, the space allowed would be just large enough to fit a growing kernel without detrimentally affecting the human brain."

"Great!"

"However," Virgil said, raining on his parade. "If you do this, they will have to be connected from the start otherwise the magical attunements will triple and not be interconnected. That could have large and lasting ramifications on the growth of all magic within human beings."

"Hrmm....Why not graft them together like we did with the Mana Tree?"

Virgil looked at his screens and nodded, "That will take some tweaking, as you like to say, but I believe it is possible. I can follow the arterial lines throughout the human body and connect the two larger kernels to the smaller one, allowing for simultaneous growth. However, the grafts will have to be heavily modified to not corrode or cause problems within the human body."

Walker snapped his fingers, "There we go! Do you need anything else?"

"No, Walker. I have quite enough to do already." Virgil replied quickly, before turning back to his work with a swish from his large brown tail. Walker liked to believe that, as much as he was complaining about the interruptions and how busy he was, he still enjoyed what he was doing.

"Okay, one large problem solved." Walker looked at Cagna, "We're going to use the kernels to track everything."

Cagna nodded, "Okay, so how will it all work?"

"Well, we need to find the best way to reward them, as they reach certain and specific milestones. In my mind, I think it would work best with points."

"Points?" Rimi asked.

"Yep! So, for instance, say you pet a squirrel, you get x amount of points. Now say you pet a Guardian....you get a ton of points, but surviving the experience of petting those entities is another matter. We could even name the milestones as they're obtained. Like, "Smart. Pet a Squirrel: 3 points." or, "Not Smart. Pet a Guardian. 50 points." The greater the difficulty, the greater the amount of points earned. Then, certain systems or abilities or even titles can be unlocked based upon your milestones or overall points."

"Mmmm, that feels like it will need to be ummm...standardized." Rimi said as he thought it over. Cagna nodded beside him as he continued speaking, "If you create a system that grants points for performing certain acts, you will want to create a q-quantified point system for different actions."

"I had the same thought, so lets do this real quick." Walker clicked on the Milestone system and dragged Cagna over to it, assigning the system to her.

"Oh?" She said as her screen lit up. "This is a lot of information Walker. Can I please have some time?"

Walker looked at his timer for the next battle.

Time remaining until the next battle: 111+ hours.

"How much time do you think you'll need?" Walker asked.

"Mmmm, a lot. I can see the option to connect it to a physical object, like you said, but to add so many different milestones....and to build a s-standardized system like Rimi here suggested. T-that will...umm...take a long long time."

"Shit!" Walker said as he pounded one of his hands with another and glared at the sky in frustration, causing the pink squirrel to jump back.

"I'm sorry!" Cagna yelled out as she looked at him with trembling legs. "Please don't yell at me!"

Walker was taken aback at her reaction. "What?" He asked as he looked at the pink squirrel in obvious terror of him. She put her hands on her face, and he watched as her shoulders began bobbing up and down.

He took a moment to look at her, as Rimi put a hand on her shoulder and quietly whispered what he assumed were kind words. Walker thought over what Cagna's first moments on Sonata were. She appeared, was thrown out onto the middle of his moonlet, and was instantly put to work. Sure she had a nice moment with her sibling, but then Walker said he didn't have time for her and ran over to yell at and threaten massive and powerful beings who were also quite combative. What must it have been like to appear and then see so much animosity? Most of her initial memories, that weren't supplied by the protocol, were probably harsh and anxiety-producing as she didn't know him. Rimi could tell her all about Walker and his goals, but it wasn't the same as experiencing them. Walker needed to mentally step back for a moment and consider how she must be feeling. He joined Rimi next to her as he took a knee.

"I'm sorry Cagna." He said as he took his hands and gently pulled her hands down so he could see her face. "I'm in such a rush to get everything done that I wasn't thinking about how you must be doing since arriving here. When Rimi joined us in that same special way you did, I took my time with him and we formed a bond, but you and I haven't had that chance. It just feels like things are moving so fast now and I'm constantly playing catch-up with everything happening. Can you forgive me?"

"Oh-okay. Yes. Ummm, yes, I can Creator." She said as she fully lowered her hands and looked at him. "I'm sorry for getting upset."

"Me too, and call me Walker." He said with a smile, watching as it broke out across her face as well. "I'm not perfect, and I'm doing my best. Sometimes I may get upset, but I'll try to be more aware of how I'm speaking and treating others, okay?"

"Okay, thank you." She said, and Walker had the instinctive feeling to pull her into a hug. Acting on the impulse, he put his arms around the tiny pink squirrel and felt her doing the same. Rimi joined in from the side, covering them both....as much as a tiny blue squirrel's arms could.

"Ugg." Virgil said from the side. "I am not looking, but I can already tell that you are doing something overly sentimental."

"Aren't you supposed to be working?" Walker asked as he continued to hug the two subsystem assistants without looking at him.

"Yes, and I am making great strides in a small amount of time, unlike you."

"Yeah well, I don't have enough time.....time to...." An amazing thought hit him. He gently released the two squirrels and stood up. "Virgil! The Battle timer! If I sped up Sonata for a year, what would happen to the battletimer?"

"Mmmm? Nothing except normal time passing. The protocol's timer cannot be sped up by Creators, or slowed down for that matter."

"Yeah! But if I sped up Sonata with all of us on it, wouldn't that make it so that we could gain time, a huge amount of time, and barely any hours would go by for the third battle timer?"

The large assistant began humming to himself, "Mmmmm.....mmmm....hold on." Virgil said as he looked away from the evolution chambers and at his screens. He tilted his head back and forth several times, with enough time passing that Walker and his two assistants had moved away, speaking on different systems and what they'd noticed worked well. Walker was just finishing up on how the Cosmic Genesis system worked when Virgil said, "I have your answer."

"What is it?"

"There are no rules disallowing you to speed up time, and no increased resource costs. In fact, a few Creators do this in each rendition, on average, and there is a direct connection to those who do succeeding in the final battle. I was reviewing everything at once, that is what took me so long."

"All right!" Walker said as he punched a fist in the air, the pink and blue squirrel joining him.

Walker called over to the primigenials to join him, making sure his voice sounded friendly so he didn't spook Cagna a second time. Dionysus stayed by the tree after Minos had a quick word with him.

"Okay, here's what is about to happen. I'm going to lock us all in here for about.....would a year be enough Cagna?" The pink squirrel nodded quickly as everyone focused on her. "For a year. A LOT is going to happen within this year, and I'm going to be getting everything ready for our forthcoming Sapients. But first, we need to advance Symphony by a week, and complete Minos's task at the same time." Virgil and Minos both nodded. "Okay, everyone pay attention because we're making big leaps!"

Walker clicked the monitor ability and moved it over to Chipper and Raganoth. It'd been a little over an hour since he'd last spoken to Chipper and he needed to ask him to do something. Once he found the two, they were lounging by the tree, Raganoth talking about his homeworld while Chipper wrote back his replies while chewing on a cyan leaf. Walker clicked his new broadcast ability and linked it to the monitor by dragging it over.

"Hello Chipper and Raganoth." A disembodied voice said from the air. The poison Wyvern jumped up while the Guardian spit out his leaf and began to scan his surroundings, looking left and right. "This is Walker, Symphony's Creator. Chipper, you and I spoke not too long ago."

Chipper paused for a few seconds, then wrote in the air, "Hello friend Walker. Where are you?"

"This is a new ability I gained from the second battle. I'm umm....on that green moon above you, looking down."

Chipper looked up, presumably at the moonlet, before saying, "Ahh. Okay." Walker thought the Guardian took that information surprisingly well, "Raganoth, this is my friend Walker who I told you about."

"Hello Raganoth."

"Hello Creator...." He growled for a moment, then said, "Thank you for bringing me here."

"My pleasure. So, Chipper, I need another, nother favor. I'm not asking you to become my disciple or follower, there's still plenty of time for that, but...how to say this...have you ever heard of sparring?"

White words appeared in the air, "No, what is it?"

Walker thought over what he wanted to say here. If he explained it wrong, the two newly minted friends may go overboard and accidentally kill each other. "Sparring is like...fighting without trying to kill."

"For what purpose?" Chipper wrote.

"I had never thought to do that." Raganoth said right after, "To fight is to kill, to grow, to consume. Why would you fight without killing."

That wasn't a good start, so Walker further expanded on the idea, "To get better at fighting! It's something friends do." He said, trying to use the unfamiliar situation to his advantage. "Raganoth, the favor would affect you as well."

"I see." The Poison Wyvern said after a moment, "I believe I owe you many favors for bringing me to this wondrous place. I haven't traveled the breadth of it as of yet, but just for the sheer fact that I have not been attacked, I already see it as a haven."

What fucked up place was his former world, Walker thought to himself.

"Okay, I will definitely call in favors from time to time with you. Maybe, like Chipper and I are, you and I can be friends at some point."

"Yes, yes." The wyvern said, nodding his massive and plated head, "I would like many friends."

"Outstanding. So, in a few minutes, I'm going to advance the world by seven days. If you can, please spar every so often as I need it for my work as a Creator. it's a little hard to explain, but just understand that by doing so, you're helping Symphony and myself. You don't have to go too hard, don't kill or seriously maim each other, but please also take it seriously. Is that okay?"

Chipper shrunk his writing down so it was hard to see for Walker, and he and Raganoth had a quick discussion. A few minutes later Chipper wrote, "We agreed to do this. It would be helpful for Raganoth to fight without killing, and I always like to improve my skills."

"Great!" Walker said, clapping his hands. Thankfully the broadcast ability only worked when he spoke or it'd have sounded like thunder cracking over the Mana Tree and it's two inhabitants. "You can start whenever you like, and don't be afraid to take breaks as needed."

"We understand." Raganoth said.

"Talk to you soon!" Chipper wrote in the air.

"Definetly."

Walker clicked the monitor off but kept the broadcast ability going. By leaving it on and disconnected from any other abilities, it would reach all of the citizens in Symphony at the same time. Some of the non-Guardians might understand him, while the vast majority of the more animal-like entities wouldn't. He hoped this wouldn't cause a mass panic world-wide.

"Hello citizens of Symphony. My name is Walker, and I am the Creator of this world. I reside on the small green moonlet you can see passing through the sky. I'm sorry I didn't warn you when the sun, that newly shining bright yellow star, appeared. I should've thought this over more and considered your feelings, but I didn't and I again apologize. In a few short hours, Symphony will rotate and the sun will become dark. This is normal, so please do not think that the world is suddenly ending. From time to time, I will speak to you across the world to explain any changes or additions that may be coming. Be on the lookout for my updates as we move forward together in this beautiful world. Thank you."

Walker clicked the broadcast ability again to turn it off, before asking "How'd I do?"

"For a first-time speech, I think it was quite well-done." Athena commented.

"It was okay." Zeus rumbled.

"Welp." Walker said as he moved the monitor back over to Chipper and Raganoth, "I taught English, not speech. Is everyone ready for seven days in a few seconds? Minos, you'll have to watch them carefully."

"I can also replay what you are about to see if you need." Virgil helped.

The bronze god nodded and Walker clicked on Time, before choosing to advance Symphony by seven days. His overlay lit up as Symphony quickly rotated multiple times.

.....Scanning.....

Optional Tasks Updated!

- - -

World task complete: Create a star that allows for a day and night cycle: Part 3

Continuous day and night cycles without calamity: 7/7 Days

Reward for completion: The Portal system

...

New world Task given: Have a population of 10,000 or more entities on your world(s): Part 4

To the alpha protocol, size matters. Growth matters. Without a larger population, how will the Creator's world continue to evolve? To Strive? Build up the numbers of your world, and watch as great events unfold.

Entity population count: 3,874/10,000

Reward for completion: Creation Instrument Upgrade

Evolution task complete: Evolve an entity: Part 5

New evolved entities: 25/25

Reward for completion: Landmass system upgrade

...

New evolution task given: Evolve an entity: Part 6

They come. They yearn for the strength to continue. Evolve your entities to unseen heights, and reach the pinnacle of all Creators within the alpha protocol.

New evolved entities: 1/100

Reward for completion: Diverse

Walker looked to the left after he stopped reading his updates, and found Minos and Virgil talking. Virgil was showing a hologram of Chipper and Raganoth fighting, their battle moving around an empty field. Portions of the field bubbled and spat as a hazy yellow film covered the grass, but as Walker watched, pure white magic erupted and cleansed it as Chipper moved around, smothering the effects of Raganoth's poison.

"Diverse?" Walker said, ignoring everything else, including his newest rewards, as that word jumped out at him. "Why does it say diverse? It's always given me specific abilities or upgrades before."

Virgil finished showing Minos some slowed-down footage. The last scene showed chipper tail slapping Raganoth out of what had initially seemed an unstoppable charge. Minos quietly told him he'd seen enough.

"There are a couple of reasons for that," Virgil said as the hologram disappeared and he re-focused on what Walker had said, "But normally few Creators reach this stage of the evolutionary task series this early. After receiving the set and pre-defined awards of the initial series, the quality of the evolutions comes into play and changes what rewards you may receive."

"Okay, how far does the series go?" Walker asked.

"There is no hard limit for evolutions, entities, temporal tasks, or world tasks. They are not optional tasks like the ecology or system designer series were."

"So, I could potentially receive rewards forever?"

Virgil shrugged, "Correct."

Minos waved at Walker to get his attention, then slowly and deliberately nodded once.

.....Scanning.....

Optional Tasks Updated!

- - -

Primigenial task Complete: Find a great warrior:

Great warrior found: 1/1

Reward for completion: Toughness Modification

"Yes!" Walker celebrated, with only Virgil not looking confused.

The minor god looked up at the air for a moment, before moving his arms in an esoteric pattern.

.....Scanning.....

Optional Tasks Updated!

- - -

New Primigenial task: Establish a Blacksmith:

A great warrior doesn't need tools, but they never hurt.

Blacksmith Established: 0/1

Task giver: Minos, The Bronze Battler

Reward for completion: Minos added to the seeding system

"Okay, okay. I can do that. Thank you Minos." The Bronze Battler gave him a small wave before walking over to Echidna. Walker looked at the ignored rewards he'd skipped over earlier.

Reward for completing the third world task:

Congratulations Dante! You've unlocked the Portal system!

In the creation of the alpha protocol, it was understood that interdimensional, and often universal, travel may be needed. While the protocol's travel system is quite expansive and powerful, this is more limited in function. As the Creator's world grows, travel naturally becomes more and more difficult. The Creator is forced to come up with, through great difficulty, advanced traveling systems to compensate. With the portal system, the Creator can create locked portals that allow for travel between their landmasses, and in special circumstances, their worlds.

Reward for completing the fifth evolution task:

Congratulations Dante! Your Landmass System has upgraded!

There is a great amount of trial and error in the alpha protocol's landmass system. With this upgrade, the Creator will now have the ability to seed entities upon forming landmasses before placing them upon their world.

- - -

He smiled to himself. Things were definitely moving forward at a quick clip. Now, he just needed to slow it down for a bit.

"Is everyone ready for a year to pass by in a blink?" Walker asked the group around him. He didn't see anyone shaking their heads or speaking up, with the exception of Zeus's standard stormy mug of a face. Walker clicked Time, inched it over Sonata's edge, and set it for one year.

"Lets see where we end up." He said, as he pushed the button.