Creation: Book 3: Strandbinder Complete!

Walker gathered the dimensional strand in the palm of his right hand and took a deep look at it.

Space was blue, and consciousness brown. Life came with a green color, while time was colorless, fitting the aspect of being a non-static phenomenon that danced its way across the fabric of existence. But Dimensional was different. It consistently shifted every few seconds from one color to the next, as if it were telling those who held it that they had no real control over the strand. Another thing he noticed was that there were shapes held within it. One moment, it morphed into a triangular-like shape; the next, it would be round.

Overall, it was very hard to look at for a long period of time.

Next was the hard part. With time, he would have to either apply it to a location or an object. That was the same with space; all three were within the Cosmic resources category within his overlay. That was an implication that they were all connected. He noticed when he connected time and space together, their sum was greater than their parts. Meaning, they would make something powerful, like a very controlled location in time, as he'd seen with the Nomads on Romulus. Did that mean that all of the strands could be combined for increased power? Walker looked at the resources again to better understand the possibilities.

Cyclical Resources

Life Resources: 3.39k Death Resources: 3.41k Karmic Resources: 1.7k

Cosmic Resources

Space Resources: 6.1k Temporal Resources: 14.35k Dimensional Resources: 7k

Energy Resources

Kinetic Resources: 2.3k Potential Energy Resources: 2.3k Essence Resources: 1.17k

Exotic Resources

Consciousness Resources: 6.5k Nullification Resources: 310.1 Causality Resources: 3.58k

Superior Resources

Primordial Resources: 5.2k Entropic Resources: 1

Nothing much had changed except the numbers. Walker found that the Life and Death strands gained resources at the same rate as each other, while Karmic was half as quick. Temporal resources obviously only came in when he earned them, or Virgil sold his bags, but he should have plenty for a long period of time unless something drastic occurred. Everything seemed somewhat connected, with the exception of Exotic resources. He'd used several consciousness strands over time for his Vaults, and some of his life strands for Mac and Caddy. But still, he had a lot of room to play with.

If combining Time and Space gave him control over a localized area, then what would combining Dimension's add? Was that the real secret to the power of the strands? Combinations? If he found a way to combine Space, Time, and Dimensions, what was next? Would it be different than combining Time and Dimensions? Would Symphony explode?

The last thought forced him to pause. Then, he decided to do something he'd he'd never done before. He took his hand and approached his overlay, attempting to push the Dimensional strand back into his resources. While Nullification likely would not work, he was hoping this would. Walker felt a skin of resistance, but through instinct, he knew it was a weak wall that could be bridged. Although it fought him at first, his numbers updated after a little hard pressing, and the confusing strand was gone from his hand.

Thinking back on the potential explosion, he realized that playing with strands on Sonata could be a quick way to destroy the moon, not to mention the people living on it. Making his decision, Walker stepped out of his little cabin and walked out to the portal. On his way, and to have a little fun as a way to burn off some stress, he pulled a few pranks. As he approached people, many of them in the middle of one action or another, he made a very slight change in their lives.

He found Luna just outside the Cabin. Gently lifting her, he planted the yellow Subsystem Assistant on top of it.

Walker found a group of Founders laughing as they walked beside each other on their way somewhere. He pulled a few of their pants down mid-stride, fully expecting them to trip and fall without understanding what had happened.

He performed a few more on the unsuspecting victims, always ensuring it was in good fun and nothing malicious. Of course, his best prank was on Virgil.

The large black squirrel stood beside the Evolution Chambers, speaking to Rimi about something. Walker lifted the Supreme Assistant, taking more effort than he expected, then flipped him over entirely. He walked towards the portal as his most helpful assistant was pointed head down, two inches off the ground. A snicker sounded out across the frozen time around him. Seeing a massive black squirrel fall facefirst into the ground was likely going to be very funny. He was just a little sad he wouldn't have the chance to see it. The only thing that confused him, was he swore that Virgil's eyes tracked him as he approached. Strange.

Quickly making headway, Walker reached the site of the flat ground he'd compacted when first building the area. Reaching into a pocket, he palmed the bag he'd made not long ago and used his Pocket Dimension ability on it, with darkness covering his eyes. Watching the ability take effect gave him a further idea of how the Dimensional strand worked. He then placed some space and consciousness strands within it, considerably expanding the Vault's size.

"I need you to take on air," He said to the bag, not unkindly.

It didn't respond, even though he'd given it twenty of the mind strain. Walker added another thirty, slapped himself aside the head for not thinking clearly, and created a minuscule localized temporal zone while grumbling to himself about the wasted resources. He repeated his order, and a moment later, he felt a strong pull from the bag as it swallowed up a great amount of oxygen around him. After waiting for a minute, he nodded and tried another new strand that he was fairly certain wouldn't cause too much damage. Taking just one Kinetic strand from his resources, he cradled it and took a look.

While nullification looked like colorless sparks, Kinetic was yellow lightning, reminding him of a certain superhero from his home world. His favorite, in fact. He applied it gently to the bottom of each of his bare feet, his old shoes being destroyed long ago, and then braced his legs. Deciding on the part of wisdom to tap his feet gently, Walker shot into the sky like a rocket. To anyone watching from the outside, he'd have looked like a green and black comet flying out of Sonata, rather than toward it as comets were known to do.

Far and away, Walker flew through the stars. The Vacuum of space neither accelerating nor decelerating as Newton's first law came into effect in a wholly different universe.

"An object in motion, stays in motion, unless acted upon by an outside force." Walker said with a smile, knowing he didn't quote it exactly right but not caring in the slightest.

He arced out far, as very few planets in the area were big enough to pull him with their gravity. The sun, however, was a different matter. Once Walker floated for a few hundred miles, all in a matter of a dozen or so minutes, he began to notice his body slowing down in its path. Looking over at the direction tugging on him, he found his bright and cheery G-type main-sequence star blazing away. Applying a bit more kinetic force to his fists and aiming at the star, he punched out, believing this was the best course of action for his predicament.

When he applied one strand to his feet, it multiplied the force of his leap by a hundred times its original value. Therefore, a slight hop turned into a gravity-breaking leap. But he had overestimated the power of applying five resources to each fist. Not only did Walker shoot away from the sun faster than even his eyes could move, but he also spied, through watery vision, a light bit of yellow force shooting away from his hands.

"FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK," He screamed out as he shot away from his world and far, far out to the reaches of space.

Planets zoomed by his vision left and right as he continued on his unequaled path through the 4th rendition. A piece of icy comet, normally moving on its merry way, caught Walker on the shoulder. He felt immense pain as it dislocated before he was buffered on the other side by a bit of floating debris. Turning his head slightly as the gravitational forces of planets nearby began to slow his speed, he spied multiple worlds either destroyed, close to it, or sitting happily in the oblivious notice that with only a few inches to the left on his kinetic punch, they'd be done in as well.

Walker continued to slow down as on both sides of his body, two planets sat. One was hundreds of times larger than even his giant ice planet, Fortis, while the other was much smaller and covered in sand. Thinking quickly, as he was running low on oxygen from screaming for so long, he pulled out his Vault, creating another tiny temporal zone while ignoring the lost cost in resources. He commanded it to release some air and quickly sucked in as much as he was able to.

Looking at his shoulder and torn clothing, he noticed a great blot of purple. His mental library said that meant he had a large amount of internal damage. It was the first time he'd been truly injured since losing the Evolvers shield all that time ago, and while the pain was fierce, he appreciated the reminder of his own mortality. Recently his head had been blowing up, figuratively, and this was a good moment to sit and reflect.

"How do you sit in space?" He asked himself, before taking another great gulp of air.

As that thought occurred, he watched as the purple section slowly began to lighten.

"Fucking kidding me." He said to himself with a shake of his head. He guessed he'd be healed soon enough, as the benefits of Origin and being Awakened were clear.

Looking back around, he spied the giant planet on his left. It had an odd maroon coloring he didn't like the look of. Like infected blood running just below a vein. To his right was a much more pleasant-seeming brown planet. He focused his eyes down below and thought he spied an odd coloration, likely an entity of the protocol.

Making his choice, Walker took out half a strain of Kinetic power and applied it to his feet, then oh so gently kicked himself out of space. He floated, still faster than he'd prefer, right down toward the surface until its small amount of gravity picked him up. But as he was about to touch down, he bounced off of something face first.

"Oh fuck, my nose!" He said to himself, looking for what he'd hit. Then he remembered that he, too, used to have an alpha protocol shield. Shaking his head, he tried to reach his hand out and grab hold of it, but there was nothing there. "....Oops." He said in realization. He'd likely just touched it with Temporal energy, and he knew from experience that it would destroy the protocol shields completely. He hoped that wouldn't have any lasting ramifications.

"Ummm....sorry?" He said to no one that would be able to hear him. Mentally shrugging while also thinking he'd just royally fucked someone over, Walker dropped down to the sandy planet to take a look around. What he saw was nothing he'd ever expected.

"What the fuck!" He said in exasperation.

Everywhere he looked were tiny, multi-headed anthropods. The creatures were no bigger than his thumb, but by his guess, millions were spread across the small sandy planet. Walker tried to step around them, but there was no use as they liberally covered every inch he turned. He tried hopping around, but his body's concussive impact on the sand seemed to cause almost as much damage in an area of effect as just walking would do. Eventually, as he continued to crunch his way across the sand and body parts, he spied what looked like a central area similar to what he'd first started with on Sonata.

There was a much larger creature standing there. It had a steel-grey carapace and a massive head three times the size of the rest of its body. Four long proboscises extended away from its head, with another four multi-faceted eyes pointed directly forward. It was staring at something on an oddly designed screen. A rectangle floated in front of it, with areas that were blue and others that were red. Walker was naturally curious, so making sure he didn't touch the creature in front of him, even as he destroyed countless ones below his feet, he grew closer to the screen. That's when he noticed what he was feeling coming off of it.

"That's a lot of heat," he said, waving a hand in front of the screen. The creature in front of him must see by infrared, so naturally, the system accommodated it by providing screens that allowed it to work. It was a unique solution he hadn't thought of, and like his mortality, it put his mind in check. He wasn't some super-genius. Far from it. And he needed to remember that.

Just beyond the screen were a couple of standard evolution chambers. Virgil had told him that they were unique and not given out too often, yet his point failed to land. What were the odds that he'd land here, of all places, and see an evolution chamber sitting right in front of him? And not just one, but two. He stepped over and quickly looked inside, but what he saw was a jumbled mess of blue goo, what looked like organs, and maybe a few pointy ends.

"Fuckin gross," He said to himself with a shudder. Was the other Creator, as that's what it had to be, making a weird super food for the anthropods? But then why the pointy bits? He searched his mind and found an article he'd read long ago. There were a lot of justifications for why humans liked to give dogs bones, but the main reason was to provide nutritional benefits. Bones hold nutrients like calcium, phosphorus, and other things that are necessary for a dog's development. Perhaps this Creator had realized the same and was trying to juice up all of their little helpers.

Stepping away from the organic slush in the chambers, he spied something that he hadn't seen before. A standard evolution chamber looked like a canister from one of his childhood shows, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Curved windows, a cylindrical shape, and a ridged twisty top. In front of Walker right now was something different. It was tall, standing at about ten feet, and incredibly thin. The bottom had multiple pipes connecting it to the ground, looking as if it would leap off of the sandy planet were they not there.

There was some odd writing in scratches on the front of it, and rather than get the basic information it presented, Walker just identified it.

Magic Chamber

A chamber used in the production of unique magical effects and abilities. This allows Creator XI to discover new abilities for self-empowerment and new evolutions through research and development.

"Oh shit," Walker said, getting a little excited. So, the weird proboscis guy was named XI. Was that X and I or number eleven? He wasn't sure, but just seeing this thing gave him a mental erection. It would have huge ramifications if he could start to develop his own abilities without needing to use his soul. Plus, he could directly place static abilities in the monster tiers by using designer-built evolutions. Maybe he could even offer them as rewards for the event system. Remembering that when he developed the strain from the immortal jellyfish, the system said he could offer it in an unlimited fashion excited him even further. There'd be no more restrictions on what he could do with them.

But, immediately, he calmed down. What he was considering could have some very bad ramifications if anyone figured out what he was doing. First, he traveled to another Creator's planet, which is probably a big no-no. Then, he tore down his protocol shield, which the Evolvers likely thought impossible. And on top of that, he was considering taking said Creator's Magic Chamber away in an act of profound theft.

"Hrmm...." Walker hummed to himself as he looked back and forth between the weird alien guy behind him and the Magic Chamber in front of him. He needed to reason this out. So far, the Protocol hadn't tracked that he could mess with strands like he did. If it could, he'd likely have been attacked long ago. That meant they weren't omniscient, meaning they couldn't see every single thing that was happening. Also, they didn't really know about the Tree of the Gods. If they knew there was a planet filled with the Awakened, they'd likely have huffed and puffed their way over to blow his house down.

That implied quite a few things were hidden from them. Now, if one of them ever showed up on his planet, he and his people were well and truly fucked. But if they always kept their distance, that meant he'd have a chance of getting through the protocol with everyone none-the-wiser. It meant laying low and not doing anything too outstanding anymore. No more Primordial Colliders, and no more super inventions like the Vaults.

"Fuckkkk...." He said, taking his head in his hands. That meant the last thing he'd sold them, including the chest, was the last "great invention" he'd be able to do. It also meant he couldn't really rely on strands in the Creator Wars. If they spotted him using them, that'd probably be the last thing he did. His little touch-and-go with the Icy comet proved as much.

But for now, "I'm going to get me a Magic Chamber," Walker said with a smile.

I should feel bad about doing this, he thought to himself as he stepped toward the tall cylinder pointing at the sky. But I don't. This is a war of survival, and I will make sure my people survive. Sorry, little XI, or whatever. But this is where I take something away from you. With a smile to the unsuspecting Creator behind him, Walker turned and placed both hands easily around the object. A few minutes of gentle tugging later, which felt like a lifetime in his mind, it lifted easily. After he pulled it out of the ground, it was still stuck in standard time, so it just floated in the air. The pipes that stuck out of the sides were much longer than he'd thought, each half again as long as the Magic Chamber itself.

Lifting the fifteen-foot object and placing it on his back with one hand gripping it, Walker searched through his memories for the exact path and angle he'd taken to get here. It was hard, as a lot of the memory primarily came through as him screaming, but he felt he was able to understand the correct angle for return. Putting a few strands of kinetic energy, much less than the five he'd used to get here, he did his best to angle his body appropriately and then leaped off of the ground. He left a singular parting word as he vanished into the vacuum of space.

"Thanks!"

Unknown to Walker, he'd put a great amount of muscle into said leap. As the pressure struck the lightning covering the Kinetic Strand, multiplying its strength, it was like a bomb went off behind him. As Walker traversed the space of the fourth rendition, a Creator stood on a single piece of sand protected by his shield, staring at a screen while unknowingly stuck in time.

Only as Walker was halfway through his journey back to Sonata did two realizations hit him.

One: He still hadn't messed around with the Dimensional strand as he needed to.

And two: after he'd left Sonata, he'd only been under his own time dilation, while they had continued on as normal.

"Fuck!"