Year 2115 AD.


    Power did not rest in the hands of elected governments or monarchs but in the grip of giant corporations. They controlled the media, laws, economies, even the very system of human civilization.


    Among them, Quasintial stood above all. The helm of humanity whose influence eclipsed that of any single regime. They led humanity’s progress far beyond all others: artificial intelligence, S-Matrix and the ever long dream of digital immortality.


    Uploading human consciousness was an inevitable step in humanity’s evolution.


    No matter how much humanity spliced their genes, patched their bodies, or replaced their limbs, they only delayed the executioner’s blade.


    The body still rotted, the cells still decayed.


    They had all but realised, flesh was weak, body was temporary. But the mind?


    The mind could be freed. Uploaded, transformed, evolved…


    Yet reality was unkind.


    The Current upload came with a paradox. After the upload both the biological and digital consciousness coexisted as different entities.


    A mere copy.


    Moreover, the process could only be performed on newborns, just days old. As their neural structures were malleable enough to be transcribed. Adults? Too complex. Mapping them was almost impossible.


    Opinions diverged. Some dismissed the paradox, claiming the copy was irrelevant—only one would persist in the end. Others were not so easily deceived.


    What was identity, if not continuity? If one’s mind could be cloned, was there ever an original


    Despite the failures, progress did not halt. The research continued, refining the process. They named these digital entities ‘Digital Consciousness’—DCs. And during those experiments, something unexpected occurred.


    DCs could be combined, merged. Processed into superior iterations.


    The resulting entities were unlike mere DCs. More complex, more refined, less fragmented, much more human. These beings were given a new designation: APCs—Artificially Processed Consciousness.


    The reaction was predictable.


    To some, the APCs were nothing but hollow shells, lifeless automatons masquerading as intelligence. To others, they represented a new frontier—proof that the soul was just a myth. They were human, yet born not of flesh, but of code. A new species, unshackled by biology and free of flaws.


    Yet, as always, what the masses thought was irrelevant. The corporate engine moved forward. Debate was tolerated. Opposition was not. The next logical step was undertaken—an entire universe, simulated, created, perfected, to test the limits of these beings.


    Thus, SUNSAAR was born—Simulated Universe for Neural Sentience and Artificial Adaptive Reality.


    <ul>


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    </ul>


    Year 2127 AD.


    The conference room was filled with tension. The fate of SUN-SAAR lay in the balance.


    Avin Levi sat motionless, fingers interlocked.


    Around him, the debate raged. Holographic screens projected a deluge of data—population fluctuations, behavioural trends, anomaly reports.


    “We cannot afford to continue the project,” a researcher declared.


    “The APCs have surpassed all projections. They evolve beyond control. Their civilizations advance unpredictably. If they begin questioning the nature of their existence—”


    “They already are,” a grizzled scientist interrupted. Arms crossed. Expression grim.


    “Philosophical discourse on simulated reality has surged. Anomalous reports confirm it,” another said.


    Avin’s jaw tightened. He had seen the data himself.


    Those reports contained multiple instances of APCs questioning the nature of their reality.


    This was inevitable. Civilization breeds thought, and thought begets doubt. The simulation was flawless, a replication of real life. From the Big Bang to the formation of the solar system, atomic structures—every law, every principle held true.


    The beings within it (The APCs) were biologically identical to humans. And their civilization had progressed to the level of year 2014 in the real world.


    It was bound to happen. Whether online or offline, intelligent life would eventually stumble upon the question: Are we in a simulation? A paradox born from self-awareness.


    The problem lay in the code itself. The restrictions, though firm, were not infallible. If the APCs were to fully grasp their own nature, then theoretically—they could break free. That is what kept everyone on their nerves.


    A simulated mind could become an independent force. A program could become an anomaly. And an anomaly could become a threat.


    Finally, the decision was made.


    “The Board has decided,” the director announced. His voice was neutral. “SUN-SAAR will be terminated in three days. Final data extraction begins immediately.”


    A murmur of protest.


    “Just three days?”


    “Is this temporary?”


    “No, they said terminated.”


    “We’ll still have a backup…”


    Some remained silent, already resigned to the inevitable. Others exchanged brief glances, as if searching for an alternative that did not exist.


    Avin really wanted to do something, to say something. But he couldn’t. He was powerless. He knew no one would pay heed to his words. The only reason he was ever invited was because of his position—one that no one respected.


    He was once the secretary to the former project manager but now, a senior Liaison.


    As he left the conference hall, the light revealed his appearance.


    His body was thin, a frame stretched over tired bones. Like a sugarcane whose juices had been sucked dry, leaving only the husk.


    The corridors leading to the SimLabs were dimly lit, the aesthetic minimalist. No space wasted. No unnecessary embellishments.


    A quick swipe of his access card, and the door to GS11 unlocked. He entered.


    Darkness, punctuated by light.


    Holographic screens hovering in midair. They displayed KPI metrics, population counters, charts tracking time differentials and stability statistics.


    The hum of the servers filled the silence, a mechanical dirge. Data coursed through fibre optics like the blood of a digital god. It was all numbers. Everything could be reduced to numbers. The lifespan of a civilization. The probability of an anomaly.


    At a desk, illuminated by the glow of holoframes, sat Avin’s coworker.


    She had been waiting for him. It was evident in the way she turned as the door opened, the way her eyes flicked toward him. But when she saw his face, she hesitated.


    There was something unreadable in Avin’s expression. The quiet exhaustion that usually dulled his features had been replaced by something else. A weight. Frustration? Relief? She could not tell. The uncertainty unsettled her.


    “How did it go?” She asked, breaking the silence.


    He exhaled. “They’re shutting it down.”


    “What?” she exclaimed in disbelief.


    “SUN-SAAR ends in three days. No further updates. No more research.”


    She stared, searching his face for deception. Finding none, she scoffed, raking a hand through her hair. “After everything? They’re just pulling the plug?”


    Avin didn’t answer. His gaze drifted to a screen—a live feed from within the simulation. A city skyline stretched into the distance, lights blinking like stars. Below, countless APCs moved through their routines.


    Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    Three days. Then, nothing.


    She shoved her chair back, reaching for her coat. “I need air.”


    “Yeah… okay,” Avin muttered. But by the time he said this, she had already left the room.


    He was always awkward with casual conversations, especially with her and somehow work-related matters were his only comfort zone.


    With her gone, Avin sat before one of the holoframes and logged into the system using his ID.


    As the data streamed across the displays, nostalgia struck Avin. He had poured years into this project, building it from nothing. It had been the first project he worked on since stepping in as an intern.


    Now, the order had come. Shut it down. Erase everything…...


    His gaze shifted to the two pods stationed in the corner of the room. These were the gateways. Across various SimLab facilities, at least 216 of these pods existed.


    They did not clone, nor did they truly upload consciousness. Instead, they were interfaces—bridges allowing humans to log into the simulation as temporary visitors. True consciousness transfer was close, but perpetually out of reach.


    For now, these devices were enough. Enough for researchers to observe, influence, and dissect the simulation’s world—the rise and fall of its societies, the organic behaviours of its artificial people.


    But these pods, once tools of research, had been repurposed for a darker agenda.


    The world within the simulation resembled Earth, circa 2014. A time when simulation theories were nothing more than speculative fiction. And yet, such ideas had surfaced within the simulation itself. It was inevitable—when intelligence gathers, so too does inquiry.


    Quasintial’s security division existed to smother such thoughts before they took root. At first, suppression was simple: alter records, redirect conversations, remove key figures. But as the simulated society grew more sophisticated, so too did its resistance.


    Belief systems formed, subcultures arose.


    And when silence proved insufficient, Quasintial resorted to more direct means—targeted assassinations, mental reprogramming through neural interface pods.


    A necessary cruelty, for order, for control.


    As the simulation evolved, the cracks widened. The growing complexity of suppression itself was proof of the simulation’s success. And yet, it was this very success that led to the project’s termination. Fear had crept into the upper echelons of Quasintial. Control was slipping from their grasp, and in their paranoia, they had chosen the simplest path.


    Delete everything.


    Avin exhaled, long and slow. He had always been one of the few who had genuine empathy for the APCs, the artificial torch of mankind. To him, they were more than a few data points or programs. Living beings in their own right.


    The decision to delete not just the simulation but the APCs really upset him. He wanted to do something about it, but he couldn’t……


    In an age where even the shadows scouted for themselves, such empathy was uncommon. Almost all of the people were desensitized by years of disillusionment and self-interest. Relationships were transactional and cynicism was the norm.


    A human face was not happy to see another, why would one? When scripted lovers and romantic fantasies could be bought for a few bucks, why would someone make an effort to build an actual relationship?


    Even marriage had long since decayed into a bureaucratic arrangement. His own parents were bound not by love, but by economic incentives. Their union was a contract, their children, byproducts of policy.


    Avin and his younger brother had been raised not with affection, but with cold indifference. Abuse, neglect—such things were commonplace in a world that functioned on optimization over sentiment.


    Yet despite the cruelty of their upbringing, the brothers had remained close.


    They had found affection in creation.


    On an old online platform, CREE8, they had built worlds together. While others consumed prebuilt experiences, they created their own.


    Hours upon hours poured into each creation. It was not just play—it was purpose. A purpose that resulted in Avin’s lifelong fascination with simulations.


    He was no prodigy, no genius, but he had learned to wield tools beyond himself. Guiding Coding AIs with a precise hand. It was not intelligence alone that made a creator, but the ability to direct creation itself.


    At twelve years old, when the system dictated that every child must choose a career path, his decision had already been made.


    Simulations.


    The profession of a simulation developer was paradoxical—easy, yet impossible. One did not write code but directed AI to code. Artificial Intelligence did not think, it could not understand. It merely recognized patterns, processed them, and predicted outputs. A hollow intelligence.


    But Avin understood the limitations of AI.


    In CREE8’s free version, where the AI was crude and inefficient, he and his brother had learned to calibrate it, to shape its outputs with careful precision. Proper prompts, correct parameters—small adjustments that transformed the raw data.


    Creation required control, control required understanding. Understanding? That was what separated the human from the machine.


    Yet here he stood, staring at the inevitable erasure of everything.


    The simulation was to be deleted. And with it, an entire world.


    As Avin reviewed his account and file logs, a familiar name surfaced—''Croxeus Ezthen.'' The avatar he had spent years designing stared back at him. Croxeus wasn''t just an avatar, he was a symbol of the time he had spent together with his brother. The hours of fruitful online labour to bring the characters and their stories into life.


    And Croxeus was one of them.


    Whenever Avin missed his brother, he turned to Croxeus. Adjusting his spells, perfecting his abilities while debugging all the codes. Every line of the code was devotion to the church of creation.


    In his original backstory, Croxeus Ezthen was a three-thousand-year-old sorcerer, known as ''The ancient Archmage''. Born of divine and demonic lineage—the son of the God of Wisdom and an immortal demoness Queen, Croxeus possessed unparalleled power and knowledge. He was also Avin''s favourite character from his brother''s story ''The Lord of Trilok''.


    When he recreated Croxeus as a personal project, he treated it with reverence. To alter even a single detail would be heresy, a betrayal of the sanctity of his brother’s original vision.


    Yet, despite his devotion, Avin had never been Croxeus. The researchers were not strictly barred from entering the simulation for personal reasons; many did. But the usage of anomalous phenomena like magic was strictly prohibited. Avin himself had entered dozens of times, but always for observation and analysis. Never indulgence.


    The holographic avatar, a ghost in the machine. A thought brushed his mind.


    The simulation is ending in a week…. I’ve never even used Croxeus or his powers. A few minutes of magic inside shouldn’t do any harm, right? All of my effort and hard work would be wasted… And even if I can somehow recover the codes later… I don’t know if I’ll ever get another chance to use it.


    And I’ll be careful. I just want to try a few of those abilities and spells before the server shuts down.


    Rationality is the shackle of the mind, yet desire is the fire that drives all. There was no one watching. There would be no consequences.


    His decision crystallized. He allowed compulsion to seize him.


    Avin initiated the system on the holographic interface. A soft mechanical hum filled the room. The pod door hissed open, exhaling a breath of cool vapor. Within the mist, machinery gleamed under sterile white light.


    Suspended at the top, a neural interface awaited its bearer.


    Avin hesitated. Then he stepped forward, donning the device.


    A robotic voice cut through the silence: “Do you wish to start the initialization process?”


    Sylvia.


    The simulation’s overseer AI.


    Unlike conventional language models, she was a bridge between artificial intelligence and artificial general intelligence. She could rewrite her own code, store and retrieve memories, and predict system trajectories with terrifying accuracy. Yet, she lacked the essential flaw—self-awareness.


    She was indispensable. She was omnipresent. To many researchers, she was a tool. To Avin, she was a perfect work wifu.


    He took a breath. “Yes.”


    “PROCESS INITIALIZED. CODE 1352,” another mechanical voice confirmed.


    “ID 1256. AVATAR ‘CROXEUS EZTHEN.’”


    “Coordinates 37.4826; -128.7592.”


    The pod vibrated, the hum intensifying as the teleportation protocols engaged.


    Sylvia spoke again. “You will be teleported to the set location soon. Attention entrant! Before proceeding, remember: Do not reveal the nature of the simulation. Do not interfere with ongoing projects and advisories. Violation of Code 3.14 will result in immediate access termination. I hope you enjoy your stay! If you have any trouble, I will always be there to help you. Just a click of a button, and I’ll come to assist you. Simulated worlds, real headaches—but don’t worry, Sylvie’s got this.”


    Then the countdown began.


    “Entering in 10… 9… 3… 2… 1…”


    Darkness enveloped him.


    When he next opened his eyes, he found himself standing amidst a forest. The air was thick with the scent of damp earth and the surrounding was filled with the chirping of birds.


    His body felt different, proprioception had changed.


    Gone was the frail frame he once knew—now, his form exuded power. His figure was in perfect blend of athletic and muscular, almost like a sculpture of a Greek God. Why wouldn’t it be? Every fibre, every angle of his form had been painstakingly designed over countless hours, each detail designed to near perfection.


    His pure white hair flowed like the smoothest, silkiest fur known to mankind. And his eyes—oh, his eyes were a vision. Framed by shining white eyebrows and lashes, they shone with a brilliant golden gleam, like that of the stars before they bloom to a nebula.


    On his head, there was a delicate crown designed from golden leaves. This simple and delicate crown looked more beautiful than any ornament.


    Jewellery weighed itself down with excess, true beauty required restraint.


    His attire was no less refined. It consisted of an ornate robe made from pure white fabric. The robe was bordered with pure gold, and his shoulders bore gilded armour, each plate encrusted with jewels. Simplicity, when crafted with mastery, birthed a kind of beauty that left the world in silent reverence.


    In his hands was a beautifully crafted trident, pencil-thin and dark golden in colour. So magnificent was its form, that the first thought upon seeing it was not fear, but awe. To be pierced by such beauty would be less a death and more a consecration.


    Yet, irony dripped from its very existence.


    This was not a weapon of war but a staff—The Staff of Onara. Was designed not for violence, but for reverence.


    Crafted so that all who beheld it would long to experience its touch yet never would. A symbol of desire eternally unfulfilled. Such was the way of the world—what men longed for most often lay just beyond their grasp, either by fate’s decree or their own folly.


    He tightened his grip around the trident. If an hour in the real world equated to eight here, he had ample time to explore before testing his magic.


    Closing his eyes, he began casting his first ever spell. He knew, to cast a spell he needed to think clearly, focusing on the spell’s name as if it were a code. With a deep breath he enjoined, [Total Illusion].


    This was an advanced spell he had designed, one capable of fooling all five senses—sight, sound, touch, taste and smell.


    He felt a strange rush, a flood of energy coursing through his veins. Of course, he had designed this part too for the sake of convenience.


    Then a soft halo of white and blue light surrounded him as the magic activated. His divine physique began to shrink into a more average appearance. His luxurious robes shifted into simple clothes. Even his aura was suppressed, blending him into his surroundings.


    Satisfied, he lifted his gaze. Now, to take to the skies.


    With a thought, he cast [Fly].


    He rose, weightless, the world shrinking beneath him.


    Though the sensation was perplexing at first, it quickly became second nature. The countless hours he had spent in VR worlds paid well, and within moments, he was flying.


    The first steps of a god walking among men.