Chapter 116: Trolling evolution

"Wait, what?"

Standing in front of this godlike figure, even hearing what it said wasn't enough for me to clarify the situation. After all, I could claim that I was the pope of the long lost Atlantis faith from the earth, and no one could prove me wrong. 

"I know it's a lot to digest at once, but this entire mission… You could say I just took one of your wishes and turned it into an opportunity to have a talk with you. In the end, just watching your progress from the sidelines can quickly get boring."

Hearing the words of this white being while watching its motionless face was quite a strange experience. Even the way in which the only real feature on this thing's head was a line of its lips, seeing it keeping its mouth in a constant, ironic smile was more than necessary to put me on the edge.

"Wait, wait, wait. Let's start at the very beginning. You called yourself Bart, is that right?"

For the sake of convenience, I decided that going with the flow should be the easiest way to either learn more or to find clues that would let me know that this entire talk was bullshit, to begin with. 

"Well, while it's a great oversimplification, so great that it no longer is truth at all, to a certain degree, yes. For the sake of the convenience that just prompted you to go with the flow like that, let's assume I'm Bart."

The smile of this strange being only deepened, as it outright read not only my conscious thoughts but also all the stuff that was happening below the level of my personal thinking. While I knew that it was the convenience sake that prompted me to act the way I did, I never actually thought about it openly!

As scary as dealing with such a potentially omnipotent being was, I could only tighten my jaws, swallow my terror and look forward to learning more stuff.

"Let's start with that, then. Nice to meet you, Bart, I'm Krist. Would you mind explaining what the heck is this place? Why I appeared here? Who even are you?"

While this being straightforwardly claimed to be the creator of my system, it didn't really explain anything to me at all. Just like learning that Einstein had a hand in developing science necessary for the production of nuclear bombs, it wouldn't make it any easier for one to learn the principle behind military-use fission reaction!

"Let's start from the beginning. This place is nothing more than just a special kind of energy condensed to the point where its qualities start to resemble those of plain matter. While in theory, you call this kind of energy magic, the magic that I'm using and the magic that you know off… You could say that they are as different as hydrogen and uranium. Or to put it in simpler words, the difference between those energies is akin to the difference between clear, spring water and content of a river that several multimillion big towns shits to."

Suddenly standing up from his throne, this fully white being kneeled down on one knee before picking up a handful of the white powder that made up the ground that we were staying at. Raising back to a straight position, he brought his arm up, holding this strange, white powder in his palm.

"Burn."

With this single command, most likely uttered only for me to understand what was going on, this otherworldly dust instantly stood in fires.

"Freeze."

With the next command, the fires that reached several meters high from the being's hand extinguished, only for the air itself around the being's hand to start crystalizing from the immense coldness radiated away by this strange power.

"Fuse."

For the first time since the being started uttering its commands, the amount of the powder in his hand decreased. The next moment, an enormous ball of plasma started to spread out from his hand at a speed that I shouldn't be able to perceive only to…

"Vanish."

… disappear right before its sun-like temperature could actually threaten my physical body. 

"Right now, this powder is just a condensed form of the building block that the entire universe is made-off. This explanation… " suddenly turning his head to look at me sharply, this insane being leaned his head on his arm in weirdly cute motion "is once again, flawed and simplified to the point of being no different from a lie. But you should get the picture now."

Under the influence of this being's words, my bottom dropped on the ground. With my hands resting against this strange powder, I felt as if something was fully blocking me from coming into any interaction with it. It felt as if this being didn't want me to feel how it was to control such power.

"Nah, I'm not scared of you. In fact, I'm not even here in the first place. I temporarily blocked your preceptors to save you from burning the entirety of your soul away. As for now, you are way too weak to even let this pure energy pass through you."

Instantly addressing my concerns even before I could voice them out, this damned being proved that right now, I was nothing more but an ant in its hand. Even if it wanted to squeeze the life out of me, I would be completely powerless to stop it. 

But we were talking. This strange being, as powerful as it was, was passing important knowledge to me. Even if my way of thinking was too primitive to apply for its way of reasoning, there seemed to be absolutely no point in luring me here just to teach me for a bit before riding my existence out of the world.

"I hope this explains your first question. As for the second one, I answered it already. I just wanted to have a short talk with you. In regards to the third one…"

Shaking its arms, the being proved that human ways of expressing emotions or concepts weren't something new for it. 

"As for who am I… You are not yet qualified to learn the answer. Maybe sometime in the future, maybe if you manage to achieve what we hope you will… Rather than this question, let me answer the one puzzle that actually troubles your mind right now."

Smiling gently at me like a parent would at a child after it would make its first step, the being returned to its throne. Placing its arm on the side of the huge, white chair, it rested its hand against its palm.

"The real question that you are too scared to ask, is as follows. Who am I and how come I can use a system that no one else can?"

While there was no doubt that this being towered over me in every single possible aspect, be it knowledge, depth of personality or just strength, I could somehow tell that he still had something to say about this last question of mine. What he was doing right now, was the common trick of increasing the tension by keeping me waiting.

And what else could I do as a little ant in its palm but play right into his wishes? 

"Eh, you found me out. Let's not keep you waiting any longer then. While you are not yet privy to the majority of the answer, there is some stuff that I can enlighten you about.  But before I do that, I need you to swear one thing."

Retracting its lazy posture by putting his hands together in front of his face, this strange being appeared to be focused now.

"Can you swear here and now, that you won't use your origins as the means of putting others down?"

What a strange question… Using origins to put others down? How would that be any different from the old and stupid ideologies of radical nationalism or even fascism? 

"I never believed in any ideology that would put me above others. With how you can read every single thought of mine I believe its wasteful in terms of my breath to even utter it, but no matter what are my origins, I swear I will never use them to bully others. Can't say it about the situations when my power will stem from who I am. Can't promise the same thing in regards to the situation where I will be the bullied one."

I could answer this question easily without putting those two variables in it. But that would mean, my answer would be both incomplete and not perfectly honest. And in face of the overwhelming power of this being, I dared not to use half-truths.

"Good. Then once again, let's not keep you waiting any longer. You are my descendant in a direct line from the times when humanity only started appearing and banding upon this planet. While you are the only one to possess the system right now, if you were to die or fail in any other way, this privilege might be transferred onto another member of my bloodline. As for who you are…"

Taking a moment for what seemed like an attempt to create an answer that would be within the scope of what I could know, this white being suddenly smiled.

"You are just a mean of my main self to tackle a certain problem. While this is the ultimate and absolute truth, you will most likely never reach the level where you will even learn what this problem is. For now, just do your best to grow stronger, explore other words and in other words, grow as a human. While it's pretty impossible to quantify it like a mission, you can consider this to be your ultimate quest from me."

As soon as this being said those words, this strange place where we were started to shake. Bit by bit, I felt as if my eyes were losing their maximum resolution, turning the image more and more blurry. Feeling that it was just moments before this entire place would collapse, I dared to take a step forward and ask one last thing. One last question that stuck to my mind like a rose's thorn in someone's hand. 

"Before you send me away if the entire purpose of this mission was to have a talk with me… Why the peak of the mountain? Why that ice dragon? Couldn't you just bring me to yourself with a single thought of yours?!"

As silly as this question was, it puzzled me to no end. If this Bart being was truly as powerful as it claimed to be, how come there were any obstacles on my path to it?

"Ah, I figured that you would feel bad if you would receive your reward without putting any effort. Don't blame me, blame that trolling nature of humanity that quantifies the reward through the efforts put to obtain it."

Hearing those words, my vision turned so bad that I could only see the general shapes of the objects, without as much as their outline. 

"And to be perfectly honest, "

The fact that this entire place consisted of the endless flat surface of that strange, magical dust, Bart's throne and my body didn't help in trying to keep my vision intact. At this point, even the last words of Bart that I heard him utter were no greater than a whisper.

", I was curious how far you would get."

For a split of a second, my vision returned. But there was no flat plain of dust. It disappeared as if it never existed in the first place. The white being and its throne also disappeared. All I could see right now, was a mind-boggling space cloud of pure energy, freely changing its shape. 

For a split of a second, this cloud of energy took a shape of a human. As Bart's last words reached my ears, the gasses in this cloud moved, making it seem as if this illusion of a human blinked. And then, everything disappeared once again, replaced by endless darkness of the void.