Building a magic system on threat of destruction

Jack woke up, and all he saw was white.

He brought his hands up to his face and saw his human hands once again. He sat up and was surprised to see Deis hovering in front of him.

How are you back here? I had thought myself free of you

Deis sounded annoyed, like a pesky fly had gotten into his house. “I don’t know. I…passed out?” Was that possible? Could robots fall asleep?

Then suddenly, the image of the world came back to him. “Deis! The world was inside out! Everything was backward? What happened?” Jack was frantic, rising to his feet in moments and shouting.

Deis regarded him impassively. Nothing happened, I created the world that way and it is perfect

“Perfect? Deis, I don’t even know where to start. What about gravity? Or the heat of the sun? How does that even work!” Jack was incredulous, the scale of this was so large that he was on the verge of panicking again.

Enough! Deis commanded. I sustain this world with my power. It works because I wish it to, that is all you need to know.

Jack had a hard time thinking of Deis as a god. He was petty and sometimes childish, but Jack knew that the god had apparently created a world and all those people. This was the clearest indicator that Deis was truly and absurdly powerful.

‘And I’m supposed to fool him? How am I ever going to escape this?’ Jack wondered, despair slowly creeping up on him. Then Jack spoke, his voice trembling. “Can I…just have a minute?” The chair he had made from status screens was nearby, along with his other constructions. He slumped into it and took deep breaths.

Deis regarded him for a moment, then turned away with a huff. He didn’t vanish as he normally did, but instead hovered facing away from Jack. Jack sat, collecting his thoughts and trying to organize them. An inside-out world, it was truly insane to consider. But Jack couldn’t do anything about it. The people of the world seemed to consider it normal, so he would have to learn to deal. As for Deis, his best hope of survival lay with the system.

Jack had always found that the best way to avoid things that upset him was to do something. So deciding to kill two birds with one stone, he felt that it was time to work on the system. “Deis,” The cloak turned back to him. “There are some changes I need to make to the format of the system. The skill lists are too long, it makes the status pages huge, which can be a major problem if you are indoors or around other people.”

What do you suggest?

“Let me add some stuff, then we can workshop what’s left.”

Jack had left his trusty pick behind, the instrument he used to carve away pieces of the status screen. He hadn’t tried to bring it with him, figuring he wouldn’t have a need for breaking up screens. Given what he had seen of others interacting with the screens, he was confident people wouldn’t be able to break them without serious effort. Perhaps it was because they weren’t as invested with power as he apparently was? Deis had claimed that Jack was infused with the god's essence which allowed him to do things that apparently broke the rules. It would need more consideration.

For now, Jack took his pick and carved out a few rectangles from the bottom of the status screen. He then imagined them as scroll bars, like on the side of a website. They shrunk obediently, forming into his mental image, and he was able to apply them next to the skill areas. Then he used his keyboard to add boxes around the two categories. Hopefully, that would allow the status screen to remain the correct size regardless of the amount.

It still didn’t solve the issue of how long the lists were though. His short trip to the world had been enlightening, but he hadn’t been able to learn anything regarding how stats and skills should work in this world. Hopefully, he would be able to go back, it would be a shame if that was the only interaction he would ever get with the people he had met.

He decided to add a search bar. Typing in “search”, he added another box at the top of the skill section. Tapping on it with his finger, nothing happened. Jack himself would be able to use the keyboard he had made, but others didn’t have that kind of luxury. Could he have Deis add a voice-to-text feature?

Looking at his own skill section, Jack still had his three skills listed. [Status], [Status Granting], and [Walking]. There were two things he wanted to do with these. Or rather, one thing he wanted to do and one thing he didn’t want to do. Sighing, he deleted the walking skill. Then he took a step. Then he took another step. Then he began walking. Stopping, Jack looked at his status screen. The [Walking] skill was gone. He closed his status and then brought it back up. The skill was still gone. He could still walk.

Jack was truly confused, he couldn’t understand why the system had allowed him to walk here, but not as a robot. He put the skill back on his list and decided to turn to other matters. He created a third skill section, one for status-related skills. Jack had been unsure about including them in lifestyle skills, and now that he had two, he felt that they deserved their own section. Even besides that, he had another idea or two about potential skills that Deis could create for interacting with the system.

Looking at the screen now, he was confident that these statuses would work a little better for people. Having smaller screens would ensure that people and objects wouldn’t get knocked over. If the search and scroll functions worked as well, then people would be able to freely browse the information.

The stats section was still painfully empty, but Jack hadn’t been able to talk to anyone about it yet. He did notice that his height and weight had changed. His height was 6’0" which was his normal height as a human, but his weight was oddly zero. He looked at it in confusion, zero pounds? Was weight not a thing in this void? Or was there something else going on?

“Deis! I have a couple of things to ask you.” Jack shouted into the void, then waited for the god to appear.

Deis materialized. Speak

“Can you take a look at this?” Jack showed him the changes that had been made to the status screen. “I need some kind of voice recognizer, that way people can search for skills automatically. Also, can you apply the form changes I made to one of the sample skill screens you gave me? Then I can make sure they work.”

Done

Just like that, the features were implemented. Jack confirmed that they worked, and the size of the screens all shrunk to a uniform size. He was able to scroll through the long lists or search for skills directly that appeared on any of the three skill sections.

Jack debated asking his next question for a moment, then decided he had nothing to lose. “Hey Deis, I have a skill-related question. When I add or take away the [Walking] skill, it had an effect when I was a robot, but doesn’t have an effect now. Do you know why that’s happening?”

As usual, you are an ignorant fool

Deis spoke haughtily, disdain clear in his voice. Firstly you were in the body of a bore-bot. The species was named by me and I do not appreciate you ignoring that

Jack hadn’t had an opportunity to branch into the topic, the bore-bots had barely spoken to him and he had been focused on Riniox and Jeler when it had come to other people. “Sorry about that, I’ll be more careful.” Jack said honestly. He couldn’t go around assuming that things were called what he thought they should be, he might accidentally offend someone.

Good. Secondly, adding skills to your status screen only matters if you actually possess or use those skills. You do not walk here, so of course removing the walking skill has no effect.

Jack frowned. “But…I am walking though?” He took a few steps, showing off that he was indeed walking.

Deis sighed dramatically, like a teenager correcting a parent on something that only the teenager understands.

No, you aren’t. You are a spirit, your self-perception leads you to believe you can walk and do other human activities, but that is all an illusion. When you had a physical form, then of course removing the walking skill wouldn’t allow you to walk.

Jack was getting sick of these revelations back to back. He knew he was dead, but had allowed silly isekai stories to cloud his judgement. He had assumed that his body was actually here. He could touch, talk, and do all sorts of things. Was that all some kind of illusion his mind was creating for him? He opened his status and looked critically at the race section.

Jack was starting to feel unsteady. This whole mess had been a mad scramble to survive, and every new revelation left him feeling floored. If he had the system mark him as a spirit, what would happen? Would he lose touch with his human side? Would he drift further away from who he was as a person by acknowledging his death?

Like so many things, he didn’t know the answer. He didn’t want to bring it up to Deis out of concern that the god would use this against him in some way. Being mentally weak was something he couldn’t afford right now. He would have to put the matter aside and focus on what he could do right now. What he could do right now was work. So Jack got to work.

Jack worked and worked, cutting up the status screen to make new objects. He made a separate screen to put on his desk, one that would function as a computer screen that he would be able to type on. This let him organize skills without messing with anyone's skill screen directly, including his own. He started categorizing them by type and tried to find options that could be ignored on a skill list.

He worked for a full day, not stopping or taking any breaks, desperate to busy his mind. This continued until he felt a tugging on his entire being. He paused, wondering what was happening before he lurched through the air, the sensation of falling overtaking him. He panicked for a moment but quickly recognized the sensation. Everything went black, and then he woke up in a very familiar basement.