Collide Gamer

They stationed a couple of soldiers around the house, then returned from Yoshua’s home with some personal items of his. With them, Lorelei could get a clearer picture on his current location.

Though, a ‘clearer picture’ was still murky. The seer began to catch glimpses immediately, but her visual prophecies meant that there was an additional layer of deciphering. Lorelei saw stuff, she then told them that stuff, then they had to turn that into an approximate location, then they had to get there, and then they had to hope Yoshua wasn’t gone by the time they got there.

“Quite the… unfortunate set of limitations,” Devos remarked.

“Indeed,” John agreed and took a glance at the calendar. It was the morning of the 9th of January. His marriage festivities would start in 4 days. Aclysia and Rave had at least assured him he needed to have no more hand in the last preparations that remained. There was a related matter that he wished to take care of, but it wasn’t strictly necessary.

Devos moved quietly through the library. Now that they had the house, they no longer needed to pick his brain for location markers. In return, he had time to read and to wander. They always had some eyes on him, a measure the Mite King had expressively tolerated. They were still wary of each other, though a degree of trust had been earned.

The Mite King spent almost all of his time among the books. Occasionally, he would wander the parks, experiencing the nature of this world. They were short breaks between his constant reading. His existence was no secret anyhow, though John had refused to share details with anyone outside the Palace.

The library also remained their base of operation for the finding efforts. Computers had been brought in, covering several of the long tables by the entrance. Momo did not mind. It wasn’t the typical research done here, but it was as good a place as any to engage with it.

“You’re being awfully quiet,” John remarked.

“Am I?” Devos returned, his voice reflecting a deep ponderance. There was a slump to his posture, a pondering, internal strain that put weight on his spine.

“You’ve been a chatty individual, by and large,” the Gamer said.

“That is an understandable image of me. We had much to talk about.” The Mite King closed the book he was holding with a respectfully light motion, before returning it to its spot. “I am reflecting on the claim that this is the prime world.”

That he still framed it as a ‘claim’ told John where this conversation was being steered. “Have you found the proof to be insufficient?”

“I have.” Devos turned to John, gesturing for the fellow monarch to join him at a nearby table. “Motivated reasoning exists all over the place.”

“I could accuse you of the same,” John said.

Devos shook his head. “I have ultimately no stake in the claim whether this is the nexus of all Kingdoms or not.”

John did not believe that, but he didn’t have Lorelei there to verify. Even if Devos had nothing to gain or lose from the status of Earth as the centre point of the supernatural, he was a product of a culture that said differently. “Then let’s hear your refutation of the claims, I am happy to defend my understanding of supernatural cosmology.”

“First, the claim that Gaia is the supreme deity. What proof is there for this?”

“A simple truth of observation. You have heard her voice, haven’t you? Otherwise, you wouldn’t have known to avoid the mundane.”

“I have heard her voice, yes,” Devod agreed. “But could she not simply be an application of the Pareto principle? You and I are as gods to our subjects, our powers outstripping them a thousandfold. Why would there not be a pinnacle above us that applies the same?”

“Granted, that could be the case,” John said. “At that point, though, what difference does it make? A being that is the supreme deity or a being so powerful that it became the supreme deity – in effect it makes no difference, the laws of reality are still rewritten by her desire.”

“Perhaps… but we have our limits and so would she. Are you certain that it is her moral code that stays her hand, not fear of exhausting herself?”

John thought back to his mind shattering as he peered into splintering worlds. He thought about the void, the nothing that Gaia had shown him. The true nothing, the absence of thought, the unaware darkness of not having been born. He shuddered. “I have seen the truth, Devos.”

“Can you show it to me?” he asked, genuinely interested.

To that, John had to shake his head.

“Then I retain my doubts,” the Mite King said. “More absurd than that claim, frankly, is the declaration that humanity is the source of all magic.”

“That one has needed some revision,” John started. “Though we don’t know how the ancient Lorylim created their mana, they also had it. In modern day, however, all of Earth’s magic appears to be downstream from humans. It can be traced from our lower spines, where the energy of Faith feeds into the leylines.”

“I do not doubt the claim that humanity is a source of magic,” Devos clarified. “I doubt that it is the centre of all magic. The research of your species suggests that you are the centre of the nexus world. Your science has come to the conclusion that you are the chosen people. It appears… convenient.”

“Personally, I consider it inconvenient,” John said. “There’s an oddness that comes with that idea.”

“This may be true for you, an astute intellectual, but to the masses this fact would be reassuring, would it not?”

“That I don’t know… but if we’re talking from my gut instinct… I would affirm that.”

“I have studied human history and I have found it littered with such cases. I do not blame you for this. The Throthaxen have themselves been wrong many times and we encountered many species of greater delusions. You have a tendency to correct yourself, given a long enough time.”

“But…?” John asked.

“But.” The mandibles of the humanoid insect clicked. “All the same, you have been mistaken before. Your species had the illusion of being the centre of the universe before. They called it the geocentric model.”

John shifted his weight on the bench, to put his head on his knuckles. “A valid point, yet cherry-picked.”

“If your assertions were true,” Devos retorted. “If humanity were to go extinct, all Kingdoms would wither like grapes on a dead vine.”

“That is what our observations of fantastic races in isolation has shown.”

“Then how do Kingdoms continue to exist?”

“We don’t know,” John answered truthfully.

“Then how can you be this certain?”

“Because all other pieces fit.” John shook his head. “I can see your reasoning and it does have a logical throughline. I will not dishonour you by calling you too biased to see the truth of the matter, but on this one I have absolute certainty. You will not convince me otherwise. I have seen too much proof of the flow of Faith to doubt that it is the underlying current of magic. All stems from Gaia, in one form or another.”

The Mite King went silent. Was he disappointed with that answer or was he digesting it? For the first time since they had met, the born monarch appeared genuinely bothered. His fingers clacked on the tabletop in a steady staccato. He raised his hand up, then placed it flatly on the table.

“A lighter question, then… I do not understand your species life cycle.”

John snorted, the sudden change of topic amusing him deeply. “What’s the confusion?”

“You mate repeatedly with the females, yet there are no children.”

“YEAH, JOHN!” Eliana screamed across the room. “TELL HIM WHY THE FUCK THERE ARE NO CHILDREN!”

“11 days, my dear broken angel.”

“CALL ME THAT AGAIN AND THE ONLY THING YOU’LL BE CHOKING IS A BODY PILLOW, FUCKTARD!”

John wondered how she would make that threat real, but he didn’t test it. Instead, he turned back to Devos. “Humans have sex for pleasure, is the simple answer.”

“That seems to be a waste of time.”

“Time you enjoy wasting isn’t wasted time,” the Gamer responded with a shrug. “In any case, I am currently infertile, but I can toggle that on when I want it to change.”

“And then you only have one child per mating cycle?”

“Correct.”

“Fascinatingly… slow,” Devos said and scratched the side of his head, “…and none of you are related either?”

“Thank God, no,” John declared. “In humans, incest leads to birth defects.”

“What… oddities.”

Now curious, John couldn’t help but ask. “I assume then that you will only mate once to fertilize eggs? How does the Throthaxen reproduction work?”

“I carry my future wife with me, among the eggs that my grandmother laid,” the Mite King explained. “A princess egg is laid in every generation and passed to a Mite King two generations down.”

That was weird, very weird, but the insect kingdom was full of weird reproduction methods. It wasn’t any weirder than sharing the womb with a male that then impregnated the females before they were born.

“Well, it seems we are both biologically predisposed to consider the other an oddity on that front,” John joked. “So let’s be happy we have our preferences.”

“Quite so,” Devos agreed.

A neutral silence fell over the table. The room at large was still loud, the haremettes in the background chatting with one another as they worked out where to send the search party next. Lorelei was constantly on the phone with the gathered women. Scarlett, Qingmei, Momo and Delicia were interpreting her signals.

“I have a request,” the Mite King said.

“Speak it,” John invited.

“I would like to join the search party from now on.” Devos pulled his shoulders back. “I appreciate your generosity, Emperor Newman, but ultimately the man you are trying to find is my seneschal. I need him to live out my purpose.”

The Gamer stared at the glowing blue eyes of the alien entity. Whichever way he answered, there would be consequences that he could not predict. He still wasn’t entirely sure what the Mite King was truly about. What little he was certain of did paint a positive picture. All conversation they had so far pointed towards a philosopher king in a carapace.

“I only ask that you wait with approaching him until we’ve had a chance to calm him down,” John answered.

“My word on that one, I have no interest in having him scream and flee again.” Devos’ shoulders relaxed. “Tell me when the search party is ready to collect me, then.”

“I will.”

John rose from the bench. The tone of the Mite King had a finality to it that implied the end of their conversation. He had more geographic data to sift through.

Devos remained seated, lost in thought.