After dealing with the problem of the life stories, Dana had come to report to me about the incident. This was rather important, primarily because she revealed to me that the spell to improve Terra’s origin powers came with a rather serious side-effect. Because of how it temporarily turned her into a true Origin, it also removed the built-up time that she had saved for her pseudo-Origin mode.
In other words, the Origin of Fate was now able to operate at full power for single-day bursts, but would find it difficult to build up enough power to naturally enter her typical mode for any substantial period of time again. While this wasn’t strictly a terrible side-effect, I was glad that it was brought to my attention, just in case I decided that I needed the Origin of Fate for anything in the future.
As for what happened to Grey, it seems like they’re just leaving him alone. From what I can tell, nobody even told him that they were leaving him alone… or that the book he was carrying was no longer the same book that he thought it was.
When I projected my vision with World Sight to check up on him, he was still sitting on the sidewalk, leaning against the wall and clutching the book hidden in his baggy shirt. He had no idea that the situation had already been resolved, and likely wouldn’t for quite some time, given that he had no desire to open the book to read it.
After nearly one full day had passed since Terra’s incarnation took the ‘pill’ provided by Dana, she tilted her head to the side, a small smile forming on her face. “Looks like that’s all the time that I have now.” She muttered to herself, feeling that the transformation was ending.
Terra closed her eyes, her body flashing with black and gold energies, before separating into the twins. The two Terras looked at one another and let out a frustrated sigh. “Of course we got blocked out for an entire day. Why wouldn’t we?” The divine sister asked in a self-deprecating tone.
Meanwhile, the fallen sister chuckled. “Hey, it’s not all that bad. At least we’ll be able to play a more active role in future events?”
At that, the divine sister rolled her eyes. “You’re just saying that because you were about to lose earlier.”
“You can’t prove that!” The other said, before they both shared a laugh.
With the immediate crisis over, Lifre sat in her own room, at her desk. She was debating whether or not she wanted to immediately start her stream again. It had only been a day at this point since she ended her streaming marathon, claiming that she was going out on an adventure to Fyor.
While, admittedly, she did complete that adventure, it was a rather short one for her tastes. When she made that announcement, she had expected to be gone for up to a full week, exploring dense jungles and battling fierce monsters. Part of her even wanted to go back to Fyor and explore the seventy-fifth layer more fully, just to see what other secrets the floor had to offer.
“Gah!” She brought her hands up to her head, and then pounded it against the desk. “No! Bad Lifre! You made a promise! There are a lot of people waiting for you. A bunch of them would already know that the level cap of Fyor has increased by a bunch, so the adventure’s already over!”
She banged her head against the desk a few more times, until she lifted her head, her forehead seeming caved in at a weird angle. Thankfully, she was a slime, as well as an energy body, so her forehead immediately returned to normal. “Let’s just set up the next stream to be an even cooler adventure.” She muttered to herself, navigating to the streaming site.
As soon as she clicked the button to enter streaming mode, she disappeared from Olympus, appearing in an empty, black space. In front of her was a blue, holographic window asking her to set up her streaming environment. She had the option to return to the same stream world as the one that she had recently left, or to create a new one.
Naturally, Lifre created a new one. “I don’t want to customize too much right off the bat. Let’s leave plenty of room for viewer interaction. Also…” She looked around, before calling out into the emptiness. “Is there an option to reduce my mana affinity?”
Many people hadn’t realized yet, but the streaming system itself was intelligent. Really, this should have been obvious, since it created so many sentient creatures based on the viewer’s donations. Only a few had tried to speak with the system itself when establishing their stream. As the one that created the idea for this system, Lifre was well aware of its potential.
Rather than directly answer Lifre, a new window appeared in front of her, allowing her to adjust her affinity for various energy types. She could adjust everything from the four basic energies, all the way to divinity and the void. Of course, these changes would only persist during the stream, and would return to normal as soon as she returned to the real world.
Seeing this, Lifre smiled happily. “Please set all energy affinities to the level I possessed when I started my first stream.” It was great to have total mana affinity when a real crisis appeared. However, when she wanted to act as an entertainer, she needed to be able to convey a sense of struggle. Sure, there were plenty of ‘sandbox streamers’ who made themselves so overpowered that they could handle anything with ease. But, she didn’t find that fun! Lifre wanted her viewers to be able to set the difficulty as they wished, and that was only possible if their choices really mattered.
“Thank you, system!” She called out, seeing her mana affinity dropping from one hundred percent to just under eighty percent. “Next, please set my race to half-elf, half-halfling. No, don’t call it a Quarterling, that joke is way too old. I’d like to keep my pale skin and white hair, though. I just don’t want cheaty slime powers for where this is going.”
As she spoke, she saw various windows appearing, reflecting the changes that she requested. “Okay… for the starting environment of the stream, I want to be in a crashed escape pod on a large asteroid, drifting in space. Give me a suit that has… an hour and a half of oxygen, and basic construction and self defense tools. Use my preferred ‘blank slate’ system template, and apply my ‘space adventure’ template for donation prices.”
Lifre thought about it for a moment longer, tapping her chin. “Oh, and I want to include a default NPC with my stream. Make them a human male named Hank, and he only communicates via long-range voice transmissions. Hank will serve as a narrator NPC, announcing the effects of major donations, such as when an asteroid is about to collide with my location, or if another ship is detected approaching me.”
“Finally, I want to activate the hourly donation lottery, just like before. For a special prize, the first winner of the lottery will be allowed to customize Hank’s appearance, as long as he remains a human male.” Once those settings were applied, Lifre began her stream, closing her eyes.
When her eyes opened, she found herself in a black, skintight bodysuit. Similar to the typical style of modern spacesuits, this one did not have a proper helmet. Instead, there was a metallic ring around the neck, which projected a field of energy in a bubble shape around the head. This energy served to both contain the oxygen in the suit as well as normalize the lighting for the wearer, darkening or brightening their vision as needed for the environment.
Lifre turned her head from side to side, seeing the crashed escape pod behind her. When she went to explore it, she found a small backpack of tools, as well as a communicator pin that could be attached to her suit.
The light on the center of the pin was flashing, and Lifre heard a voice as soon as she fastened it in place on her suit. “-read me? I repeat, this is Hank Falcone of the Galactic Rescue Division, Sector Three-Eighteen. Do you read me?”
“This is Lifre, I read you, Hank.” Lifre spoke with a smile, and heard a sigh from the other end of the call.
“Good. We haven’t been able to make contact with anyone else from your ship so far. According to our scanners, you should be located on a drifting asteroid. Can you report your status?” He asked, and Lifre nodded her head, operating the suit’s interface to display its diagnostics on the energy field around her head.
“There are no problems with my suit. I have a basic landing kit, and ninety minutes of oxygen. Sending the live diagnostic now, please confirm.” She said, pressing a flashing button on her interface.
“Confirmed, Lifre. We have your suit data now, and will continue to monitor your condition until you are rescued. Given your current position, we can’t send a ship to reach you in time, so we will be attempting to contact vessels in your area and redirect them to your location. I’ll report back to you as soon as I have an update.”
With that, the communication channel went offline, and Lifre took a deep breath. Suddenly, her lips spread into a wide grin, and she spun around on her heels. “Alright, everyone! This is the start of our new adventure! As you all can tell, the theme of this stream is a more scientific journey through space!”
“I know a lot of you were disappointed by how powerful I became near the end of my last stream, so I would like to reassure you all. For this stream, I have lowered my natural talents back to what they were when I first began streaming for everyone! While I can still use Absurdity of Fate, it will no longer be with the same ease as previously, and I will not simply be a master magician right off the bat!”
“For my returning slimeballs, I have reset my system and character progression. We’re back at a blank slate! Feel free to suggest whatever systems you want to have included, and our generous viewers will choose what to put in! Also, given the theme of this stream, events related to magic and other fantasy elements will be more expensive, while those related to science will be cheaper than the previous stream.”
“If you’re just tuning in, feel free to go back and see the opening scene again to understand the current scenario. In the meantime, I’m going to see what I can do to prolong my stay on this unforgiving rock! Enjoy the stream, everyone!”
With that introduction out of the way, Lifre’s expression returned to normal, and she opened her landing kit to see what tools she had available. There was a simple mining laser, a portable refinery, and a construction wand. This construction wand only came with a few built-in blueprints deemed necessary to survive a crash landing, such as an emergency shelter or back-up oxygen tanks.
Of course, in order to build any of that, she first needed the materials. Thus, Lifre turned to the last item on her list, a short-range scanner. Pressing the button, she watched on her suit interface as a ripple spread out around her, mapping the asteroid. “Let’s see… It looks like this is a predominantly iron asteroid, with bits of copper. That’ll be good for construction, but I won’t be able to get any extra oxygen out of that.”
“I might be able to salvage an oxygen tank from my escape pod, if the tank is still intact. Otherwise, hopefully I can disassemble it to craft myself a jet pack or something to fly to an ice rock.” Naturally, she wasn’t saying all of this for her own benefit, but to give ideas to her viewers. They could either donate to help her plans, or to hinder them. They could even really throw a wrench into her plans by making one of her tools break.
For that reason, she immediately started mining out the ground beneath her, wanting to get enough basic resources before any viewers decided to make this an impossible challenge.
