The Gifts of God: Omnilium is a Wonderful Thing

[Ahana Varma]

For a few moments I marvel at the strangeness of this situation. An otherwise perfectly ordinary stone arch, which seems to somehow contain that strange, white ‘room’, whilst everywhere else there is sand, interspersed with the odd bush or tree. Though out by the horizon it seems as if even those sparse decorations come to an end; after a certain point, this place would appear to be nothing but sand, sand and more sand.

It’s not exactly the most interesting of landscapes. It’s also hot. Really hot. I'll be okay for the time being, but the thought of having to trek through all this isn't exactly the most enticing, to put it lightly. I do consider leaving. Just turning back, heading through the arch again, and walking until I spot another of these strange arches, hoping to have better luck next time.

Assuming there even are any others, that is. It's entirely possible that this is the only one there is, and that I just got lucky by stumbling across it so quickly... or there could be dozens of them, who knows? I might be willing to go for it anyway, despite the chances of achieving nothing more than wasting time, if I thought that any of the other portals might lead somewhere better… but given what I've seen so far – first the black void that served as Omni’s entrance hall, then that empty, white room, and now this combination of sandy scrubland and sandy dunes – I'm not exactly super-impressed by this God’s creativity and imagination. What other shockingly inventive realities could perhaps be out there, on the other sides of some more of these archways? Forest World? Ice World? Swamp World? Midden World? Not necessarily anywhere better than this wasteland.

So, since there's no certainty of anything more promising elsewhere, I figure I might as well keep heading the way I'm going… hopefully there'll turn out to be something out here… somewhere.

I set off in a random direction, and it doesn't take long before I've worked up a sweat. The area I lived back in my own world was pretty warm, and I was used to marching about with an army and fighting in battles, so I’d hardly call myself out of shape… and as such, I wouldn't normally expect this level of perspiration from something as simple as an unhurried, casual stroll. But of course, being a desert, this place is unsurprisingly sweltering. Still, there's no use in complaining about it, so I head onwards resolutely.

Several hours of mind-numbing tedium later, I reach the first dunes. It’s certainly easier to keep track of the time with a proper sun in the sky than in that white void, now far behind me. I still can’t see any signs of civilised life, though. There seems to be little out here apart from the odd withered shrub, a few scattered cacti, and some bugs and small lizards. I keep going, though I do find myself eyeing a cactus in the rough general direction I'm headed, subtly altering my path to head towards it.

I don’t want to waste the little orb of Omnilium I was given, despite knowing that it should easily be enough to summon many, many glasses of fresh water… I have no idea how large this desert actually is, or if it ever ends at all, for that matter. So it would be best to be cautious. I've never tasted water from a cactus, though I've heard it’s pretty horrible… nevertheless, I'm willing to give it a shot if it will preserve my Omnilium, thereby potentially extending my life should the worst come to the worst. I even raise my hand, just a moment away from summoning one of my javelins to smash the thing, when I realise something strange.

I am now wealthier than I was earlier today. When Omni first handed me that Omnilium and my body absorbed it, there was less than there is now. It’s not a huge difference, but I can definitely feel it. Which means I was wrong about what Omni meant when He said I would need to gather more than what he gave me. It’s not that there are little balls of this stuff lying around in random spots… it really is everywhere, even in the air we breathe, it would seem… and what’s more, it appears to me as if it’s somehow drawn to people… or possibly to the Omnilium that we conveniently store inside our bodies.

Either way, it seems like I can almost certainly gather enough to keep myself hydrated simply by walking around. In fact, it’s possible I can even get ahold of a sufficient quantity to summon the food to keep myself from getting too hungry as well, which is a neat little bonus. It’s always a plus to not have to worry about dying of starvation.

I decide to celebrate this discovery with a glass of nice, cool, refreshing water, so I hold out my right hand before me, fingers curled as if holding a cup, and envisage my desire. It only takes a couple seconds before the Omnilium reacts, a bubble of chromatic light expanding around my hand, until it reaches about a foot in diameter, at which point it stops.

The roughly spherical mass is completely opaque, so I can’t make out what is happening within, though at one point I do feel what seems like a glass being pressed into my hand. It starts off extremely light, giving the impression of being so fragile that it could shatter were I to so much as flex my fingers, though, it quickly grows heavier. In just a few minutes, the Omnilium shell around my hand fades away, its job done.

I stand there, in the middle of a desert, surely miles from any form of civilisation – assuming this thus far bland reality even has any civilisation – with the sun glaring down at me from the centre of a cloudless sky, its warmth so tangible that the air is warped by a thick heat haze, and little tongues of golden fire flicker around my bare feet as my protective enchantments keep these burning sands from scorching my skin.

It’s fucking hot. Like, really fucking hot. Despite my light and airy garments, I'm soaked in sweat, and this place seems to have only the tiniest of breezes, which really isn't helping at all… and yet, despite this sweltering heat, I'm holding a pint glass of freezing-cold water out before me, actual lumps of ice floating on the surface of the chilled liquid within, and beads of condensation running down its sides.

I’ve only been out here in this barren place a scant few hours and already I’m finding myself thinking that whatever else I may be made for, aimless treks through boiling, arid wastelands are not among my specialities. Turning my back to the cactus without a thought for its pin-like spines, I lean against it and gently lower myself to the ground, the needles against my back snapping beneath my weight and dropping off, my impenetrable protections rendering me immune to the touch of the sharp thorns.

Leaning back my head and bringing the icy glass to my lips, I gulp down the wonderfully cold, life-giving fluid. Delicious. In my haste, I drink in a less than elegant fashion, and rivulets of water run down my chin. In moments, my glass is emptied.

If I can say one positive thing about these scorched badlands, it would have to be that they make it real easy to feel grateful to Omni for His gift of creation magic. It may be a little time consuming to use, but it’s nothing short of astounding to be able to create anything I might need, wherever and whenever I might need it.

I sit there for a few minutes, willing myself to get up and keep moving.

I fail.

The next thing I know I’m halfway through summoning another glass of water. I know I should preserve what little Omnilium I have, so that it might last me as long as possible… but I’m too tempted. I’ve never really been one for temperance and self-control anyway… not for years now, at least. In my younger, more naive days, maybe, I guess.

But what’s the point in living if you don’t live a little? So I down my second pint of ice water, then toss the empty glass in the sands beside the first. Feeling a bit more refreshed, I climb back to my feet and begin plodding onwards once more.

I only make it a few steps before something occurs to me, though, and I turn to glance back at the glasses. It’s a long shot, but… ah hell, it might be worth a try, right? It can’t hurt, surely… well, it could possibly cost me some of my precious stash of Omnilium if it somehow goes badly wrong, I suppose… but… eh. It’s worth a shot. I might regret this if I end up dying of thirst no more than a few hours’ walk from a city’s walls… but screw it, caution is for pussies.

I walk back and pick up the glasses. I’ve found that I can summon things from Omnilium… but what about the opposite? Omni did say that everything in His world was made up of Omnilium, and if it’s possible for me to accumulate more simply by wandering around aimlessly then it could be that it’s also possible to actively deconstruct existing objects, right? That makes sense in my head, at least, so I hold out each glass and focus. I want my Omnilium back. Give it back. I don’t need these anymore.

A few seconds into this, a bubble of Omnilium does actually form around each of my hands and the vessels they grasp. I don’t celebrate yet, though. For all I know, I might be accidentally spending more Omnilium, to… do something to the glasses. Make them bigger, maybe. It’s not like I know what’s supposed to happen when you wish for something impossible.

It's only minutes later, when the final frail shells of glass evaporate away, as the balls of shimmering light collapse in on themselves and are once more absorbed into my skin somehow, and when I feel the Omnilium reserves within me swelling just slightly, that I finally allow myself to believe that this can really be true.

I begin laughing immediately, and fall backwards into the sand a moment later, arms lying flung out to either side as I chortle uncontrollably. I feel like I've discovered an all new, heretofore unheard of, level of power. Omni may be a Deity, but I feel enough like a god myself right now. This is nothing short of miraculous.

I can absorb objects. I can absorb anything. It’s not that I can summon a few things a day, waiting for my Omnilium to build up again in the meantime; if ever I want anything, all I need do is deconstruct something nearby. And right now, there is a plethora of sand all around me, billions of granules, covering the earth for miles upon miles in every direction.

Kneeling and placing both palms on the burning grit beneath me, I envisage my desire; Omnilium. I want more. I need more. And gradually, reality takes notice of my petulant demands and deigns to move to accommodate them. This takes far longer than summoning a simple glass of water, though. A slick film of rainbow-hued stuff creeps across the granular ground, slowly, tediously advancing in all directions, its expansion centred on my location.

Almost ten minutes have passed when I feel the first changes around me. It’s just a little, but the sands are shifting beneath me. The shimmering light, though, is not. Very, very, slowly, I’m beginning to sink down into it. I decide to see how long I can keep this up, though, so I don’t stop. Not yet.

By the time almost twenty minutes of uninterrupted concentration have passed, I'm blinded. One last glimpse at the sun above tells me roughly how much time has elapsed so far, and then the flowing field of many-hued lights drifts smoothly over my eyes. It isn't just that I'm dropping in time with the sands as they are converted into Omnilum, though. As they move and shift, I'm pulled down deeper within this sinkhole I'm creating, falling just slightly faster than the grains are vanishing; the sand now reaches as high as my waist.

I keep at it a little longer… or a lot longer? I can no longer tell. There’s no more sun and I now have by eyes closed tight against the bright, harsh light of the immaterial Omnilium orb in which I currently dwell. When I've sunk down into the ground almost to my shoulders, I realise that I can’t sensibly keep this up any longer. Actually, I may have already left it later than I reasonably ought to have done.

So I relax my focus and allow the shining, chromatic construct to collapse around me. The light is drawn back within my body and I whistle softly. It’s not by any means an unfathomable level of wealth, but it’s a damn good start. Unfortunately, I soon realise that absorbing sand from directly beneath where I was kneeling was perhaps not the wisest of courses to take.

I’m stuck.

I struggle and wriggle about in a not-remotely-dignified manner, my new, 'godlike' powers being of absolutely no use in this situation, feeing immensely grateful that there's no one around to witness this embarrassing episode, and do – eventually – manage to squirm my way out of the hole I've dug myself into... even if I do end up getting entirely too much sand in my clothes in the process.

I hadn't realised how deep or wide this pit I’d carved into the dunes had gotten, though. Even after freeing myself from the clingy grasp of the ground, it takes me several more minutes to scramble out of the crater. The lightly packed, sloping ‘walls’ of the hole collapsing as soon as I make any attempt to scale them certainly not making this task any faster or easier.

Once done with that, though, I turn to admire my handiwork. I grin. It’s pretty satisfying, I have to say, to be able to cannibalise the landscape itself in order to make myself stronger and richer. Though likely too slow to be of use in combat, this magic certainly has far greater applications than anything I've seen back home. Being able to summon anything at all is just such a novel concept.

Still, coin left stored in vaults serves no purpose. The good thing about having money isn't just having money itself, it's the spending of money that makes it so great. So I hold out my hands before me and envisage my desire. Now that I know there is essentially an unlimited source of food and water all around me, I see no reason to hold back on using this stuff in excess.

This ‘purchase’ takes me around fifteen minutes... I can't really be any more specific than that without a clock or at least an hourglass; telling time by the passage of the sun is a helpful skill, but it has its limits. When the Omnilium shell folds in on itself and vanishes this time, before me sits a wooden cart. Its body and wheels are made of thick, dark mahogany, with an intricate web of flowing, silver runes carved all along its surfaces. An enchanted vehicle. A horseless carriage. Above the basic – if beautiful – foundation, four thick poles of the same wood rise from the four corners of the cart, supporting a white, silk canopy, to keep out the burning and hateful glare of the sun far above. Within the cart, carpets cover the wooden flooring, while pillows and cushions line the edges.

These magical conveyances were only ever owned by the richest of people back in my home city-state of Bhalaee, and in many of the other nations our armies ‘visited’ they weren't even present at all… and yet here I am, producing in a mere quarter of an hour something that ought really to have taken a team of skilled magi weeks to put together, as well as considerably greater expense than the value of the (albeit large) pile of sand which I consumed in order to generate the Omnilium needed for this summoning.

I had one of my own, just like this one I've made here, after the first wars ended, when those of us who had gained the most renown during the conflicts returned home to be showered with gifts and statuses. Even though they might be scarcely faster than jogging, these things are certainly much more enjoyable ways to travel than walking or horse-riding, especially with the glyphs of stability on the wheels, to provide a gentle ride across any type of terrain, as though driving down a smooth road.

Grinning, I hop inside and immediately sprawl amongst the pillows, barking a command at the automagical transport, “Forward!”

The wheels spin and sand swirls for a moment, before the runes awaken fully to life and find purchase where none should exist. And then it’s accelerating, headed forwards in a perfectly straight line, and I lean back, closing my eyes and enjoying the shade and the comparative coolness it bestows after so long traipsing around beneath the blazing eye of the sun.

[Ahana Varma]

At first, the journey is relaxing… soon, however, I begin to notice there being more turbulence than there really ought to be. I’m confused as to what can possibly be causing this, though my consternation lasts only for a second; one glance out at the desert speeding past tells me immediately that the cart is moving far faster than it would have been capable of back in my world… and it takes but a few moments more before I can be certain that it is still accelerating.

Unfortunately, with the stabilising magic seeming not to have been boosted along with the speed, I’m in for a bumpy ride. Pillows scatter and bounce around as I cling onto the wooden wall for dear life and the vehicle races over the dunes, moving faster and faster with each passing instant, the wood creaking worryingly beneath me.

Or at least, it would be worrying, without my Protections. I feel as if the vehicle could flip over or fall apart beneath me at any moment, but after the surprise wears off, I grin broadly and even whoop with joy. The wind, at this speed, is more than enough to cool me off, despite this land being as hot as it is. I clamber towards the front of the cart, still gripping the side with at least one hand at all times, until I reach where I was headed and can grab one of the poles – the one on the right – connecting the cart to its silken sunroof, at which point I manage to haul myself up into a standing position.

From here, I can see that the vehicle, as I would expect, has taken my command to head forwards literally; it is moving in a perfectly straight line, not bothering to drive around dunes or slow down at all for them. Of course, these are both commands I could give it, if I so desired… but I’m enjoying this too much to care.

Still holding on with all the strength my right hand possesses, I throw my left arm out to the side and laugh into the wind, glorying in this wonderful speed. I’ve seen the odd mage with speed-enhancement spells, of course, but I’d had no idea that they could feel so great. It’s amazingly liberating. The cart is tilting and caroming around dangerously and I know that were it not for the runes engraved in its sides, it surely would have crashed already…

But I just can’t bring myself to care. Despite my hold on the pole, I feel as if I’m being tossed about like a rag doll as the vehicle bounces crazily. But it’s just so. Much. Fun.

Laughing wildly, struggling to even remain standing, and feeling the winds in my hair and on my skin, I imagine that if the concept of freedom could be imagined as a physical sensation, it would be something like this: chaotic, utterly out of control, yet undeniably exhilarating.

And likely to end in disaster.

The cart speeds directly up the centre of one dune, much larger than any other it has driven across so far, and upon reaching the crest, it takes flight. I give a cry of elation. It doesn’t occur to me that there’s no way my rigid, wooden conveyance can possibly handle this landing, and that all that Omnilium I’ve spent on it is about to go to waste. I’m too enraptured in this sensation to pay much attention to such minor details as the realities of my situation.

And then it touches down. The ‘nose’ has dipped, so all of the cart’s weight lands on the front wheels. Suddenly, wood is splintering and shattering, fabric is tearing, and sand is everywhere. I’m thrown forwards, still clutching a sliver of the now-utterly-annihilated pole. Hitting the ground feels like being struck with dozens of sledgehammers simultaneously, and the air is knocked from my lungs before my laughter even has time to turn into a scream.

It’s been so long since I felt pain that I actually don’t recognise the sensation for a moment, as the remains of the cart pound against my body and pick it up, spinning and smashing against the ground again and again as momentum carries them on, and me along with them. The sand in the air is tinged with red now. Blood. My blood. My everything hurts so much that I can’t even determine which part or parts of my body have been dealt such harm as to be torn open like this. My depth-perception is gone, though, that much I can be sure of; my left eye is jammed shut and it hurts so bad that I'm sure there must be something impaled in there.

It isn’t until I finally stop tumbling – done being dashed against the sand – lying on my back, torn and broken, gazing up into the sky, struggling to breathe, incapable of moving a muscle, that I realise there are tears running from my intact eye…

I cough, almost choking on some liquid, before hacking it up. A metallic taste. Blood, of course. It hadn’t occurred to me that there might be some trade-off for all these amazing powers Omni bestowed upon me. He granted me the ability to summon anything I desire, but as payment He took my invulnerability from me. I can see my foolishness all too clearly now…

But I’m not done yet.

“Bah-” I’m cut off halfway through my agonised moaning of the spell-word by more coughing, more blood. I must surely have at least one burst lung. I need to do this, though. Just one word. Defence isn’t the only thing my flames are good for.

“Bahaal!” I immediately break into a fit of coughing, but it doesn’t matter, it’s done, I’m…

Exactly the same?

It slowly dawns on me that my Protections aren’t the only thing weakened by Omni. In fact, it would seem that another ability has been stripped away altogether.

Well…

Shit.

Feeling excessively sorry for myself, I close my eye and try to ignore the agony burning through every part of me like a lightning strike that somehow lasts an eternity. Fresh tears flow as I fret over whether Omni will even bother to bring back a woman so stupid she managed to kill herself not even a day after arriving in His Omniverse.

Eventually, the pain or the blood loss or the exertion of the day takes me, and I fall into a deep slumber, certain that the next time I wake – if there is a next time – will be when I return from the dead… however it is that that works.

Instead, I awaken to darkness. Not the darkness of the void, though, but regular, night-time darkness. Opening my eyes – both eyes, somehow – I see a clear, star-strewn sky, which I might have thought beautiful, if I were in the mood for appreciating the scenery. As it is, though, I have a few more pressing things on my mind. First and foremost amongst them being the cold.

I already know that deserts are supposed to get chilly at night, of course, even if I haven’t ever actually visited one myself before… but this is unbearable. All the sweat soaking my body probably doesn’t help. Every tiny motion sends lances of pain through my each and every muscle, but I do eventually manage to raise my head enough to get a good look at myself.

Honestly, the first thing that comes to mind is ‘How the fuck am I not dead?’. Ripped clothes, caved-in rib cage, shattered limbs, a few bones even protruding out of my torn flesh… much of my skin has a thick coating of dried blood. That which doesn’t is badly sunburnt.

I let my head thump back down into the sand and bright lights fill my vision as a flash of agony like the birth of a sun sears my brain from the inside out. I have no trouble screaming this time. I guess I’d better add ‘fractured or broken skull’ to that mental tally of injuries.

I do notice that I’m now able to breathe properly, though… somehow.

I’m not sure how long I lie there, exactly, drifting between sleep and wakefulness. At some point, it occurs to me that I’m thirsty. Extremely thirsty, actually. Using my arms is clearly out of the question, so I attempt summoning water directly into my mouth.

The first time, I fail. I’m too distracted by the pain and don’t manage to hold my concentration long enough to manifest my desire. On my next attempt, I get that far… but can’t manage to swallow without almost choking to death.

Coughing and spluttering, I roll onto my side a little – more lights bursting and flashing before my eyes in another wave of agony which elicits a weak sob as my shattered bones are jostled and twisted – and gag up the water.

On the third attempt, I have better luck.

I’m not not sure how long I spend on this, passing in and out of consciousness all night, summoning one more mouthful of liquid every few minutes (it seems that no matter how little water I make, the time taken to create something reaches a certain point after which it just doesn’t decrease any further), sure that if my wounds somehow aren’t the end of me, the cold surely will be. At some point, a breeze picks up, blowing sand in my eyes until I give up on keeping them open and chilling me further, leaving me shivering compulsively, despite the pain that wracks my broken body with every tiny motion.

I can tell immediately, as soon as I think of summoning one, that I don’t have enough Omnilium left to make up a sturdy shelter to keep me safe, so I try for a tent instead. This takes at least twice as long as creating a glass of water, but I somehow manage to keep my feverish mind on the task at hand until the shimmering, multicoloured bubble fades.

I have no blankets, and I still rest upon the freezing sand – the tent has no floor – but the worst of the wind is kept out… though even these petty draughts cause my construction to shudder at their touch. It is abundantly clear that should a true sandstorm form, I won’t stand a chance.

I sleep, then.

At some points I wake and expend slightly more of my ever-diminishing supply of Omnilium to state my thirst, before sleeping again.

Eventually, I open my eyes to find that there is sunlight shining outside my tent, and that the breeze seems to have gone.

It isn’t long before I feel pangs of hunger gnawing at my belly and know that I’m starving. Food will be more costly to summon than water, though, and I still have dehydration to contend with.

I know I can’t hope to last long like this, but I hold on anyway… I’ve noticed something strange, which gives me a small amount of hope.

My wounded eye and what I assume must have been a punctured lung were the first signs, when I awoke some time ago to find them no longer bothering me, but now other, more visible, indications are slowly becoming apparent… it’s hard to say for certain, given that much of me is still covered in dried blood, but I could swear that my injuries are growing less severe… and even the sunburn from the previous day seems to be fading much faster than it ought to.

I continue to drift on the edges of consciousness, summoning more mouthfuls of water almost by habit or instinct by this point, whenever my mind is clear enough to manage the focus necessary for using Omnilium.

Time moves on in fits and starts, seeming to drag by interminably when I’m lucid, then rush forwards in a blur whenever my grasp on consciousness weakens.

Eventually, I awaken from a slumber I hadn’t realised I had fallen into to find myself once again shivering, soaked in cold sweat, with only the dim light of the stars peeking in at me and slightly brightening the interior of my tent.

This time, though, something is different. My body seems to have subconsciously curled into a foetal position in some attempt at losing less heat to the frigid air… and yet, surely it shouldn’t have been able to. Not with those injuries.

I slowly, cautiously straighten one arm, and wince in pain. Still sore, there’s no doubt about that… but I can move it now. As gently as I can manage, I experiment with moving around the rest of my body, pushing through the sharp pains that leave me all too aware that I’m not healed yet… I am improving, though. That’s beyond doubt now.

I might be more tempted to thank Omni if I wasn’t also freezing and starving, though. I manage to crawl to the entrance of my shelter, push aside the canvas flaps that serve as its ‘doors’ – dull green in colour normally, they seem almost black with so little illumination – and stare out at the sands beyond. I focus my mind on a patch of ground no different than any other, visualising an area a couple metres wide, just a short way from my tent, covered in a glistening kaleidoscope of Omnilium.

Seconds pass, and then – just as I’m beginning to think it won’t work – it begins. The moments and the minutes drag by, their crawl torpid enough to make slugs and snails look positively energetic by comparison. Eventually, the sand in my chosen spot has been broken down and can be reabsorbed as Omnilium. As soon as that’s done, I’m backing through the tent’s entrance.

Inside isn’t really any warmer than outside, but at least the thin walls mostly keep out the draughts. Immediately, I begin summoning food. hot food. It’s a struggle not to use every ounce of Omnilium at my disposal on food and water – can Omnilium even be measured in ounces? I have no idea – but I know there’s no point in stuffing myself until I’m sick, so the meal I make isn’t big, and it’s simple fare, nothing more than rice, chicken and some random, generic, tomato-based sauce. I’m no chef or gourmet. Food is food, and I’ve eaten a lot worse over the years.

There was a time, once, long ago, when I was vegetarian… most people back home were, before the wars broke out. By the time I’d slain my first few dozen people, though, it started to feel a little silly to turn down perfectly good food for ‘moral reasons’. Plus, for soldiers, good food isn’t always the easiest to come by, so it just made sense to eat what I could get.

As hungry as I am, it’s quite a trial to force myself not to shovel the meal down my gullet as fast as humanly possible, but I do manage to control myself, thankfully. Eating helps, a bit. It’s certainly a relief to put paid to the pains in my gut… at least one part of me is a little less sore, now, and the hot food does warm me a little… that won’t last long, though, as cold as this place is at night.

So the next thing I create, from what Omnilium I have left, is a thick, warm blanket. Wrapped up snugly in that, trying not to move too much, so as to avoid straining my bruised and battered body, I eventually drift off once more.

When I awake, I’m boiling. It’s bright out, the sun having risen whilst I slept, bringing with it the usual, unbearable heat… kicking off my sweat-soaked blanket with a disgusted moan, I jump to my feet.

Then pause... shouldn't that have hurt more?

Slowly, I stretch a little. Aside from a few small twinges, my body seems almost as good as new… it’s extraordinary… I mean, yes, back before I was stripped of much of my former power, I could probably have just healed myself with a single word… I was never actually injured in battle after mastering my defensive enchantments, so as I didn’t learn it until after that point, I never really had the opportunity to test that healing spell. In theory, though, it ought to have worked.

But even then, my body never had any sort of ‘built-in’ regenerative capabilities beyond that of a normal human. It’s so strange to think that life-threatening wounds could just… vanish, over the course of a couple days.

Still, I only stand around feeling awed for a moment before more pressing matters occur to me. First, lying wrapped in a big, warm blanket in the middle of a desert for hours has left me pretty damn dehydrated, to put it mildly… frankly, I’m lucky not to be suffering heatstroke. And on top of that, I feel fucking disgusting.

Being covered in blood and sweat and grime may not have seemed like such a big deal by comparison back when I felt so bad as if I couldn't possibly have more than minutes left to live, but now that I’m on the mend, I want desperately to be clean.

I hold off on that thought for the time being, though. Not dying of thirst comes first. I don’t even restrict myself to a glass this time, knowing that I won’t be content with just a pint. Instead, I spend several minutes creating a large, ceramic pot – almost three feet tall, and about as wide – of the sort often used to carry water back from wells and streams, filled to the brim with icy water.

I gulp it down greedily; what I can, anyway. Of course I'm only able to get through a small portion of what I’ve summoned. That done, my thirst quenched, I finally leave the tent, squinting against the harsh light of day. The Omnilium I had built up while I rested was enough to cover the cost of the water, but for this next bit, I’m going to need more.

I kneel just in front of my tent, facing away from it, palms on the sand. My pose is similar to that which I took a couple days before, when extracting Omnilium from the sand to build my enchanted cart… but this time, I make sure to take from an area which isn’t directly beneath myself… I’d rather not almost bury myself alive again.

It’s as tedious a process as ever, but eventually, after something like fifteen or twenty minutes, I’ve successfully made a bigass hole in the ground and enriched myself somewhat. Next, it’s time to actually summon something, so now I repeat the process in reverse. And another twenty minutes or so later, I’m done with that as well.

Getting up, I admire my creation; my own little miniature oasis, roughly circular and about six metres wide. The base of the hole I’ve lined with a thin ceramic… like a giant bowl, which I’ve filled with cool water. And as an added bonus, I've even made myself some soaps and scented oils, along with a towel, a hairbrush and a few cloths.

After taking another drink from my probably unnecessarily large water pot, I peel off the torn and bloodied remains of my sari and get to bathing.

I take my time with this, partly because it’s the first chance I’ve had in… I’m not sure how long, to actually relax properly. Even before being granted access to Omni’s reality, I had been engaged in a military campaign for… for a while, to put it mildly. And those aren’t generally associated with long, luxurious baths.

My enjoyment is only a part of it, though. The other reason is that all the dried blood and sweat has turned my beautiful, hip-length hair into a revolting, matted lump, which takes an enormous amount of soaking and washing to restore to its usual lustre.

At long last, when I finally judge myself sufficiently clean, I summon another sari to replace my ruined one, then climb out of my oasis, dry off and dress, noticing as I do that the final aches seem to have vanished completely from my body. I take yet another drink, while I debate internally my next course of action.

Eventually, I reluctantly decide to give magical transportation another shot. Hopefully I can just order it to travel at a more reasonable speed this time… though if that doesn’t work, I’ll at least know to leap overboard before it crashes. Having to trust in another such contraption after the first proved such a failure is hardly ideal, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to trudge uncomfortably through a desert when I have the power to summon virtually anything at my fingertips.

So I gather yet more Omnilium, re-absorbing my tent, blanket, water carrier, oasis, bathing supplies and ruined clothes, as well as a whole lot of sand and, of course, the shattered remnants of my previous transport. This unsurprisingly takes a while, but when I’m finally done I have an identical replica of my first enchanted cart. Once more I climb inside and order it to move off in another completely random direction, in a perfectly straight line... though this time I take great care to stipulate in no uncertain terms that it should never exceed the pace of a leisurely jog.

For a time, I’m on edge, worrying that whatever strange phenomenon so greatly enhanced the accelerative capacity of the first cart might somehow infiltrate the workings of this one as well and increase its speed the moment I take my attention from it. Eventually, though, I manage to relax… convinced that my instructions have done the trick.

It isn’t long afterwards, however, that I find myself growing bored. Not wanting to risk going faster, but with no clue where I’m headed or where I should be headed in order to find any civilisations that might be out here, I’m well aware that I could potentially end up lost for a very long time… or for my entire life, perhaps, if these dunes truly are as endless as they seem.

So for the first time I bend my will towards summoning something with no specific form… I want information. I don’t care whether it comes in the shape of an illusion-projection crystal, a vocal-record runestone, a book, a scroll, hells, even a stone tablet… I have no idea how people in this Omniverse record information, and it doesn’t particularly matter to me how it’s presented. What’s important is that I get some indication of where I should be aiming to reach and how to get there, at the very least.

Better still, I need access to everything it’s possible to learn about this inexplicable plane of existence and its many peculiarities.

After several minutes of summoning, I’m confused to see a small, blank, perfectly plain, gold tablet appear on the thick rug that coats my wagon’s floor. At a glance, I’d say it’s somewhere about seven centimetres wide, fifteen centimetres long and one centimetre thick. It has no sharp edges, but the bottom corners are more rounded than those on the front face… I honestly don’t have the slightest clue what it’s supposed to do, but the moment I pick it up, countless miniscule, white runes flicker and flash and run across the front surface for a moment, before that entire area is subsumed in light.

Some sort of display appears. It seems this object is slightly reminiscent of one of the illusion crystals I’m used to, though rather than a three dimensional scene projected into the air around the viewer, this thing seems restricted to a single, two-dimensional plane. It’s no big loss, though, and after a few experimental taps on the object’s face, I find myself bringing up something called ‘the Dataverse’.

A narrow, empty, rectangular box fills the centre of the screen and when I tap it, another box shows up, this one covering the entire lower half of the display, and being filled with every letter of the alphabet. I hit some of these, writing out the word ‘desert’, then hitting a box labelled ‘Search’. A moment later, I’m astonished to see a huge list of entries describing a place called ‘the Endless Dunes’. This sounds about right, so I tap one of those – which sends me off to another page – and begin reading, determined that by the time I actually need to interact with anyone, I’ll know enough to keep from making a fool of myself...

[Ahana Varma]

Carrefore. The Town With No Name. Nippur.

Boring. Bland. Broken.

The first of the three is a city reduced to a mere shadow of its former glory, run by agents of some sort of evil empire… not that ‘evil’ is necessarily the worst thing ever, of course, but the fact that the rulers of Carrefore—the imaginatively named ‘Empire’—allowed this entire land (which if the Dataverse is to be believed, was once entirely under their control) to be so despoiled and drained of resources that it somehow became a desert… it doesn’t say a whole lot for their skill at governance.

Further investigation reveals to me that the Empire is based in a ‘Verse’ (which is what the people here call the various lands connected by that white crossroads… the ‘Nexus’) called Coruscant, which takes the form of a single, immense city, its upper ‘tiers’ patrolled constantly by the soldiers of the oppressive government, whilst those below are crime-ridden hellholes.

It doesn’t exactly inspire much in the way of confidence. Honestly, their situation sounds like a powderkeg that could go up at any moment. After all, in my experience, citizens forced to comply with the whims of leaders whom they believe to be unjust can be set off by the slightest of sparks and rise up in rebellion... I know that in the wars of my home world, we certainly made use of such malcontents ourselves on occasion. I have no intention of getting myself involved in anything like that here, though… not just after discovering how appallingly mortal I have become. Omni’s reassurance of rebirth is something positive, I suppose… though my studies of the Dataverse soon reveal another new thing to fear. A worse fate than even death itself; banishment.

It seems that somewhere ‘beneath’—for want of a better word—the rest of the Omniverse, there exists a place known as the ‘Underverse’... which is, as its name would suggest, a type of underworld, much like that spoken about in the legends, myths and stories of my own reality. The land of the demons. Though technically sealed off from the rest of the Omniverse, special items known as ‘Banishment Circles’ (or sometimes ‘Banishment Serums’... or something else altogether… for these things can apparently take many forms) can be used to send troublesome Primes down there. ‘Primes’, I discover, are what those of us summoned by Omni Himself are called, whilst people summoned with Omnilium by Primes are known as ‘Secondaries’.

The idea that losing a fight to someone carrying one of these Circles could potentially lead to finding myself banished there… to be tortured and tormented for the rest of my existence... is hardly a pleasant thought, to put it lightly. It does lead me to another interesting find, though; on the Dataverse there are rumours—mostly uncorroborated—of people who have somehow escaped the Underverse, despite many other claims that such a thing is impossible. The most recent of these stories relates to an individual calling himself ‘King Gilgamesh’; a man with the blood of gods, clad in armour of pure gold and supposedly in possession of his own private reality in which he can store his countless treasures and armaments of war until they are needed. It’s an impressive description, I must admit, and if anyone were to be able to be break free of the clutches of hell itself, it would make sense for it to be a demigod with the vastest arsenal in existence.

He also happens to be the ruler of Nippur.

Considering my lack of interest in Carrefore, and the fact that the Town With No Name sounds like little more than a gathering place for bandits and thugs, with its leadership—what there is of it—having no real ambitions or goals beyond maintaining what small semblance of order they can cling to… I’m not too keen on the thought of heading there either. The place is a hole, nothing more than a crude imitation of civilisation in the midst of an anarchic wasteland.

Which leaves Nippur. Once a great city, before falling to ruin when its master was cast into the abyss of the Underverse… now that he has returned, though, what will happen next? Will he be content to rule tyrannically over his starving populace, or will he seek to improve their lot in life? Will he aim to expand his domain, or be content with what he has? There’s certainly no certainty of entertainment for me there… but it could possibly prove to be interesting, depending on the decisions he makes... which is more than I can say for these other options.

With my mind now made up, I just need to actually make my way there, now. This turns out to be... easier said than done. I do eventually stumble across a strange looking track cutting through the sands, that my little golden tablet—which is apparently called a ‘Dataverse Device’—tells me is a ‘railway’; some sort of strange-looking road used exclusively by vehicles called ‘trains’, to quickly and safely transport large numbers of people from place to place. According to the Dataverse, this railway links Carrefore and the Town With No Name.

I follow it, figuring that once I reach one of those places I will at least know where I am, and so can look up a map and work out what direction I need to head to reach the place I actually want to get to.

As it transpires, I end up in the Town With No Name. Wooden houses. Mean-looking sorts who glare at me as I pass by them in my opulently adorned, rune-coated carriage. I make a show of paying them little heed and acting unconcerned, though I keep as many of them as I can just on the edge of my vision… if someone plans to attack me, I want to see them coming sometime before they’re right beside me.

No one does, though, and before long I’ve passed through that dump. Now that I have this landmark to base my position on, it is a trivial matter to plot a path between this town and the Ruins of Nippur. With my magical conveyance given its instructions it turns and continues on tirelessly. For my part, I summon myself a glass of chilled fruit juice, relax amongst the cushions and pillows lining the wagon, and entertain myself by watching random Omnitube videos.

Hours pass, and at one point I doze off. When I awaken, there's a rough hand on my shoulder and someone is shaking me gently.

“Ugh...” I grumble, waving a hand lazily as if to swat the individual away. They release me and back off. Once, I would have been awake and alert in a heartbeat after being surprised like that, and in another heartbeat likely would have jammed a javelin into the windpipe of anyone who’d dared lay a hand on me without permission… but that was long ago, back when I was first getting used to the harsh realities of life as a soldier… back before I developed my Protections. Now, with my renewed mortality, perhaps I should work on renewing that paranoia.

It is only as I groggily wipe the sleep from my eyes that I realise I am no longer moving. My cart has stopped. Looking out, the first thing I see is a pair of soldiers—one male, one female—with shining, golden breastplates. Beyond them is a vast, sandstone wall, which would be impressive, were it not so crumbled. It would seem I’ve reached my destination. I give the soldiers a cheery smile.

“Morning, officers.” I stretch lazily and yawn, making sure to curve my back, so as to push my chest forwards a little as I do. And though I try to be surreptitious about it, I keep a close eye on them at the same time. The man—a rough-looking, middle-aged bloke whose dark hair is tinged with grey, but who’s still built like an ox despite his years—takes the bait immediately, his downturned gash of a mouth twitching upwards slightly in the beginnings of a leer as he ogles my body. A veteran soldier, to be sure, but apparently not the brightest.

By comparison, his female counterpart—younger than the man, in her mid-to-late twenties, I think, with shoulder-length hazel hair—simply glares at me. She may realise I’m trying to get a read on them, or she may have just think I’m a whore, and not be particularly fond of those sorts of people. She notices my gaze, but I don’t look away, and she won’t break eye contact either. I stare for a few more moments—long enough for the male guard to catch on that something is up and glance confusedly between us—before lowering my arms to my sides and sighing softly.

Behind the anger she wears like a shield, that woman has haunted eyes. I remember what I read on the Dataverse… their King was away for two years, and during that time, this place was overtaken by bandits… much like if the ‘sheriff’—whatever that title means—were to disappear from the Town With No Name, this place became a lawless hell, with the strong taking what they want and the weak having everything stolen from them.

I’m hardly soft-hearted enough to be bothered by it, but I’m not completely lacking in empathy either, I imagine this lady must have seen some dreadful things in her king’s absence… perhaps even endured some horrors of her own… so I don’t let her bad attitude bother me.

“It’s the middle of the afternoon.” she snaps, scowling at me. I simply smile back for a moment, before hopping out of the cart in a flutter of silken cloth.

“Details, details,” I wave one hand dismissively, while holding the other out towards my transport. From the vehicle’s centre, a kaleidoscopic orb of rainbow-hued light expands slowly outwards to cover the entire construct.

“Huh.” blurts the big guy.

“You’re a Prime.” the woman states coldly, pointing out the obvious.

“I sure am, cutie.” I give her a wink. She grits her teeth and clenches her fists, looking like she’s struggling to keep herself from drawing the sword scabbarded on the belt she wears slung around her hips. Hmm. Maybe best not to antagonise her anymore, unless I want my first act inside Nippur to be picking a fight with one of its God-King’s soldiers… which doesn’t exactly seem like a plan which would be especially conductive to my long-term wellbeing.

“The king wants to see all the Primes in Nippur.” the male guard grunts, a meaty palm landing on my shoulder once again, though this time his grip is much firmer than when he was shaking me, “We should take her to him.”

“Oh? He does now, does he?" I ask, "Well, I’d be honoured to meet the great King Gilgamesh… but can you give me a little while to finish extracting the Omnilium from this cart? Now that I’ve crossed the desert, I don’t really need it anymore, but it'd be a shame to just leave it lying around.”

“Fine. Get on with it then.” the woman folds her arms over her chest and the man removes his hand from my shoulder once more. It takes me about a quarter of an hour or so to re-absorb the wagon’s Omnilium into myself. With that over and done, I spin lightly around to face the soldiers again.

“All finished. Will you two splendid soldiers be escorting me to your king now?” I clasp my hands behind my back and endeavour to look as innocent as I possibly can. The man smirks, the woman scowls.

“Well... one of us has to stay behind to guard the gate, but I’d be more than willing to take you to the palace myself.” the guy says, puffing out his chest… not that he really needs to do anything to make himself look big to me; the top of his head is almost a foot higher than mine (even if my rabbit-like ears do technically add quite a bit to my height, I tend to not really count them).

“You okay with that?” he speaks to his fellow soldier this time, rather than me.

“Sure. Be my guest.” she looks away, out onto the rolling dunes of the desert. Almost the moment her eyes are averted, the large man grins and slips an arm around my waist. I must admit, I’m a bit taken aback by the unsolicited physical contact… but, eh, it’s not like I should really have anything to worry about. According to the Dataverse, Primes are generally much more powerful than Secondaries, so if Mr Muscles here decides to try anything, he’ll only have himself to blame when he gets one of my spears rammed through his eye socket.

For the time being, though, I simply smile brightly and let him lead me into the city...