Battle of the Gods: The Beginning of the Game

A little boy appears out of nowhere in a dusty wooden room.
"Hmm I guess I should clean up before I invite guests." he says.
Suddenly the room is sparkling clean and a small table appears in a corner. Couches and chairs appear around the room as well and a mini-fridge appears in a corner.
"That should do it. Now to send the invitations and set up the game."

Reginald awakes in a comfortable bed. He looks around and sees a large bay window sized painting, it is a living painting that seems to simulate a window. He also notes a large gilded chest, and several bookcases full of large, brand new tomes. He gets out of bed to look around some more, he finds he is in a rather large and opulent suite, everything about the room seems brand new. He opens the gilded mahogany chest and finds some expensive clothes and a note. The note reads

Dear Reginald,

Hello there. You don't know who I am but you have been recomended highly by one of my friends. That person said you did very well at the Time of Steam on the Plane of Therator.
I like playing games, do you like playing games? I have a game ready for you, if you want to play it. The rewards for winning can be very fun. As well as desirable.
I'll transport you to a house soon. If you don't want to play simply stay in the starting room for an hour, you will then be brought back home.
Explore the house as you wish if you want to play.
Instructions about how to play will be given to you when enough players are gathered.

Books are around the house to read. Some will be helpful to the game. Others are just entertaining. Some books record history. The books all have clasps that will open when the time is right for reading them.

I really hope you will play with me.
-Imun


Reginald sits there pondering, realizing he has no memories. He stays there sitting for about 45 minutes until he decides to open the door and take a step on a journey he won't soon forget. Reginald opens the door to see a familiar face, or rather feel a familiar presence, the one thing he can remember.

"Hello, friend. You recall our meeting, correct?" The radiant blue figure said.

"I remember you, but not our meeting. I don't actually remember anything else." Reginald replied.

"Ah yes, you will understand in time. This whole place can be quite confusing. My name is Balthazar, I will be your guide."

"So, where am I, exactly?"

"Do you ever dream, Reginald? More importantly, have you ever had a lucid dream?"

"I don't remember... I remember a vague dream last night, but it is too foggy to retell."

"Ah yes, hyperdimensional amnesia... Well anyway, in a lucid dream you have control over your dream. If you were to decide that you wanted to fly, you would. You have control over anything you want, though whatever details you idle on would be generated from your subconscious. That is what this place is, everyone sees the mansion differently, the layout even changes. Though when two are together, there is a sort of conflict, at this time details stick with one side or the other. This won't make sense now, but you will understand eventually."

"I have no idea what is happening."

Balthazar laughs, "Yes, Shallowsouls always have a hard time."

"Shallowsoul? What is that?"

"It is a... new recruit, of sorts."

"What am I a new recruit for?"

"You really need to talk to Imun about this, in the mean time I will show you around a bit."

"I don't like this." Reginald says, even though he is incredibly intrigued.

"Oh but you will, so few get to experience this so early! I am incredibly eager for Imun to return so that you can understand better!"

Balthazar begins to lead Reginald down the hallway to a door, he opens the door slowly. The room appears to Reginald to be a large observatory type room, with a domed roof showing brilliant celestial bodies both near and far. There are several balconies, going about 5 stories up, and the walls are lined with 1000's of tomes. The floor is polished marble with a slight beige tint, and there are large pillars holding up the balcony. In the center of the room is a large table surrounded by 6 chairs, the table was round and on it sat a large map. The chairs seemed incredibly comfortable, and in front of each is a glowing magical interface.

Balthazar approaches one of the interfaces and presses a button, the map springs from 2D to 3D. There are mountains, and oceans, forests, and everything. The land is completely untouched, there is no sign of civilization.

"What. The. Fuck." Reginald says awestruck.

Balthazar presses another button and the map scrolls to a dense and hilly forest. Woodland creatures can be seen scurrying about large oak trees and beautiful flowers. The map zooms out and then zooms in on a desert, there are vultures and cacti, still no sign of any intelligent life. The map zooms out farther than before, revealing a planet, only one side can be seen. Reginald looks up to realize that he can see the same planet through the domed skylight.

"This, is the game board." Balthazar says with pride.

"Wow... We are going to literally forge history, aren't we?" Reginald asks excitedly and rhetorically.

"Indeed, Imun will explain everything when you see him. For now though, this is the rule book." Balthazar hands Reginald a surprisingly small pamphlet. "A few things I should tell you now, each player will see his own 'screen' of the board. It works in a similar manner as the mansion. If you want to familiarize yourself with the controls feel free, try to scout where you want to start your civilization as well."

"So I will be like a god to the civilization, right?"

"You WILL be a god."

"Wow. What about the inhabitants, the animals and the people in the game world, are they real?"

"Oh yes, quite, they each have emotions and feel pain. They are also all volunteer souls, they chose to incarnate in this world."

"Holy shit this is incredible." Reginald says as he sits down in one of the large armchairs. He looks at the pamphlet and starts fiddling with the controls. The world zooms back in on a large valley. The valley has a large river that flows from the eastern mountains, it splits the valley in two and forks in roughly the middle. On one side is a large plain that is sparsely wooded, the other side is a very dense forest with trees that seem to be hundreds of years old. The hills that envelope the valley are rather steep and are fairly barren, the tallest are snowcapped.

"Balthazar, can I claim this land?"

"Sure, you are welcome to seed your race wherever you wish!"

Reginald glances at the pamphlet and presses more buttons on the interface. Suddenly a dirt road appears and three hovels spring up along it. 6 Gnomes are standing outside of the hovels. At the end of the dirt road is a small obelisk, it is dedicated to the Gnomic god of Creation, King Reginald.

"This is insane. I can't believe how incredible this game is!" Reginald exclaims.

"It is quite impressive, I got to test it out with Imun a few times." Balthazar says still rather proud.

The gnomes walk to the obelisk and kneel before it.

"Oh great Reginald, King of Gnomes, what do you wish of your humble servants?" A voice plays from the board.

"What is that voice?" Reginald asked, puzzled. "Are those the gnomes?"

"Yes, currently you are allowing any disciples to contact you directly through the obelisk, you can change your communication preferences if you desire. To respond, press the green button." Balthazar explains, as one of the purple interface buttons changes to green.

Reginald presses the button and speaks "Hear me, subjects, I am Reginald. It is my wish that you construct yourselves gardens for sustenance." The gnomes all nod and disperse from the obelisk. They gather some tools from the hovels and begin tilling some land for a garden.

"Now, Reginald, it is important that you treat your followers with kindness, so they respect you. Or cruelty, so they fear you. Of course you could find your own way of garnering their support, but those two are the most straight forward for now. It may also be beneficial to encourage them to form an organization amongst themselves, so that you don't have to order them to do everything. Also, a sort of church for communicating with you may be necessary eventually, but you should be able to manage 6 people for now."

"Wow, this is amazing. I am remembering the professions of farming, mining, woodcutting, and the like but not any context for them."

"Ah yes, the hyperdimensional amnesia is broken when familiar concepts are relearned. Though particular memories are harder to recall, and may cause mental instability if it remembered too soon."

"Wow, okay I think I understand."

"You should get some rest, important in-game events that require your presence will not be resolved without you."

"Okay, good night Balthazar."

"Good night."

Reginald exited through the door, back to his suite.

Here's a crude map of the main continent on the board. Northern areas are colder, southern areas are warmer.
Note that each tile is huge. Easily large enough to take an army months to travel across. Diagonal is around the same as orthogonal. Mountains look impassable. There are valleys through if you pay attention but some are dead ends and it will take a while to explore them enough to make a map to let you get through. Each tile can contain other stuff in them, like a forest can have a large plain in the middle. The map only shows general tendencies.
Other continents exist but the gods can start wherever they want on this continent. Even on one of the islands or volcanoes.
Oh and I forgot to put on there that the solid yellow area is desert.

Reginald has created an outpost at J10.

A book falls off a nearby shelf and falls to the floor. The gods look over. The book begins to bleed a black liquid which puddles on the floor. It begins to boil and a skeleton rises from it. Sty walks towards the table as his bones start to melt away into smoke and only his eyes and teeth remain. "Why have you brought me here?"

Sty hovers over the board, gazing upon it.

A loud knocking almost shakes the whole mansion. A follow up knock is interrupted by a the sound of a door slamming open. "It's a... door?", a small distant voice starts to echo on the mansion's hallways. A dusty human appears out of a shadowy hallway. Upon discovering that the house is not devoid of other inhabitants the human quickly gets rid of the dust. A misty cloud starts to shroud the figure as if it's flesh would have become free from the confines of the dust armor. "Doubly interesting, I better go and record this in my... in my..", totally ignoring the others present the arriver seems to have been lost in his own thoughts. "I can't seem to recall what. More than triply interesting".

As if the loss of train of thought would have empowered and even enlarged the arriver, the misty figure previously almost timid turns almost defiantly towards the inhabitants, "I am Razar. Tell me where this is."

In an adjacent room, a skylight suddenly breaks as a small figure falls through it. He lands on his back, swearing loudly. Rubbing at his injuries, he picks himself up.
"Ow... That was... something..." he mutters. There are a few doors leading out of this room. Somerley looks up to see where he just fell from, and nearly falls over again when he sees that the ceiling is solid, no windows. He checks his belt pockets; just the usual odds and ends, nothing particularly useful or valuable.

Selecting a door at random, he walks out into a large room with a high ceiling. Clustered around a game board are an orange dwarf of some sort, a cloud of smoke with white eyes, and a misty human. He shrugs; there's no accounting for taste when dealing with gods. "Hey. I'm Somerley. Nice to meet you gents." He nods at Sty, "I'm assuming you're male, anyway."
He takes a look at the board. It's a map of an island - or a continent? There's no way to measure scale. "What's this all about, then? Wait, what am I saying... Do any of you know how I got here and what this place is?"

A woman appears in the center of an empty room. Her form has been collapsed down to that of a three-dimensional human. Her hair is graying, and by her face you might guess she was in her late thirties.

When she first appears, she nearly loses her balance. It is several seconds before she is able to return to a standing position.

She remembers nothing. This is an error. The automatic correction system seems to be broken. She assumes control of the manual system. She is about to begin repairs when she realizes she doesn't recognize anything. She is overcome by a sensation not unlike vertigo, and nearly falls again. Artificial transistors mingle with what look like human neurons in a mess she couldn't even begin to comprehend. What if she was injured? She could die.

She wants to move toward the door, but cannot remember how to do so in only three dimensions. She cannot fly; this is also an error. But soon something in her brain takes control, and her body walks.

On the other side of the door is a group of things that might be people. She wants to communicate, but doesn't know how. Her brain takes a guess, and vibrations issue from her mouth. "Where am I? Are you all alive?"

"Ah, she speaks. I don't know where we are either, except that it's obviously some sort of mansion. Does anyone here know what this place is?"

Sty frowns slightly. Rastar shakes his head.

"That's a no to your first question, then. As for the second, I'm still alive despite a couple of nasty cuts. If this is supposed to be the afterlife, it's not making a good first impression."As he speaks, Somerset pulls a box of plasters from one of his pockets and applies a couple to the wounds on his arm and hip. "That's better. Anyway, I was just taking a look at this board here."

An explosion shakes the upper floors of the mansion and a small body is thrown from one of the higher balconies. The water in large ornamental fountain that may or may not have been in the center of the room a moment ago rushes up to cushion the fall of the seemingly unconscious child and slowly brings him to rest in the center of the fountain.

The boy stands up and removes his goggles revealing bright yellow eyes “well, I’ll be the first to say that pushing random buttons on a device you know nothing about was a bad idea, but I’ll be dammed if that wasn't the funnest way to start the day.”

Noticing that he is not alone, his eyes turn a pale shade of pink, “Oh, hi, um . . . Wow that must have been some party last night judging from my lack of memory.” He steps out of the fountain with its water trying desperately (and most of it succeeding) to stay with him.

Looking around the room his eyes turn a dark blue “as much fun as standing around looking at each other is, I should,” with bright green eyes he spies the map “what’s this, a living map? This place might not be as boring as I originally thought.” Placing the goggles back over his eyes he says “The name’s Siccus, how much fun are we going to have?”

"More than you think. As far as I can tell, there's only me, Sty, Rastar" he gestures as he names each person present, "and this lovely lady in the building. And you of course. But we all ended up in this room, next to this map. So I'd bet anything it's important to whatever is going on here. Either that or it's a hell of a coincidence."

Somerley glances around. "And I just realised I have no idea how big this mansion is. Huh." He fumbles around in his pockets, then gives up. "Maybe it doesn't obey the normal laws of geometry."

"Anyway, yeah, the map." He pulls a magnifying glass from an inside pocket and peers at it. "It's alive all right - or it's a portal of some sort, or a model, or an illusion. I have no idea how those things work. Good eyesight you have there, Siccus."

Suddenly a white robed figure appears in this place. He stretches his arms, appearing to be waking up. Seeing a computer, looking like a modern marvel he pounces upon it, not wishing to take part in the emerging conversation. He begins playing with it as though it were a toy.

The map of the continent appears (in ascii style), and his hands freeze as he suddenly realizes that this is all unfamiliar to him. "What is going on, and why do I feel a strange desire to play with the box?"

After a short intermission on the computer, playing a game to reveal some of his memories (like books for other characters, not the battle of the gods game), Rogue has something to show.

"Oh my, I can do magic! " - With two words and a gesture, a puff of purple smoke materializes around his hand and slowly disperses. "Everyone, we should experiment with our abilities as they may prove useful to figuring out why we are here."

"And this place is odd. Imun is the only thing that I remember, but I have an intuition that I had another life before this, as I can use this box."

Then, he responded publicly to his friends, using built-in functionality of the world-viewing devices.

(to Sara:) "Apparently, we ourselves are the best judge of whether we are alive or not. Although it may be hard whilist in the point of view of others. Make of it what you will, as I am doing an action right now."

(to Somerly:) "Apparently, the map is key to understanding why we are here. On my screen it appears small, but I can zoom inward, to minute detail. It reminds me of something called Dwarf Fortress."

(to Siccus:) "I wish I could remember what a party is. However, I am already having fun. I just died in my game again, since I waited around too much."

Then, Rogue gets back to exploring the Battle of the Gods game that had appeared shortly before.

A prompt appears on his roguelike interface: "What tile would you like to pick to seed your race?" He narrows the choice to a particularly thick area of the southern forest, in the worldmap tile U23. "What race would you like to choose?" He selects a body shape similar to humans, but makes them tiny and able to hide among trees. He also gives them wings, as an evasive measure. As he was entranced by his initial show of magic, he decided to heighten their magic to maximum levels. But, as he looked on that screen, realized that it would mean less access to technology like his computer. Rogue shrugged. Rogue created one of them calling it a pixie, and was satisfied to see a smiling face on the screen.

What is the name of this pixie? Rogue

He gave her plant magic, allowing her to harvest fruits from the forest and entangle any predatory animal she encountered within.

"Imun? That name sounds familiar to me too. I remember something... I think he promised me something, or we made a deal, or... aw, heck. It'll come back to me later, I'm sure."

Somerley peers over Rogue's shoulder. "That's a neat trick. Let's see if it'll let me do that."

Somerley perceives the game board as a flat glass window through which a world can be seen. Rogue appears to be using a computer connected to a port in its side. Somerley decides to take a more direct approach, and pulls a magnifying glass from his pocket. The handle has a dial and a couple of buttons on it. Somerley turns the dial, and the view zooms in until he can see individual trees. He manages to locate Rogue's pixies, and a small village of gnomes.

"I guess someone else is here, too. Well, since everyone is busy playing God on the Sixth Day, I might as well try it out." He ponders for a moment, then pulls out a 3D photograph. "Yes, I think I'll go with the Aquarians. Used to live in that Earth timeline whose name I forget. Got killed by time travellers after 400 years, if I remember correctly. Nice people overall, a real shame. I think they deserve another chance at life. Well, that and I can't be bothered to make a new species from scratch."

Somerley retrieves four miniature models of Aquarians from a pocket, and places them on the board. That part isn't strictly necessary, but he finds it more fun. He focuses for a moment, and the pieces seem to shrink into the game board. At the end of the moment, four Aquarians are visible in his magnifying glass, wondering what just happened to them. Somerley conjures a microphone and addresses them.

"Hello, my Aquarians. I suspect this is all very confusing to you. You're going to build a civilisation on this new world. Well, not just you - it'll take a few generations. But we have to start somewhere, and that's right here, right now. I realise this is a lot to ask of you - if you need help with anything, just pray. Let's get started.
You, the female. You're the Explorer. Start looking for berries, firewood, and anything else you think might be useful; make a map if it doesn't slow you down too much. You, male, you're the Hunter; go swimming and see if you can catch any fish for tonight. Other female, you're the Protector; for now just build a fire and a temporary shelter, but later you'll be the one to guard the homes and raise the children. And other male, you're the Craftsman. Make whatever the others need out of the resources you have.
Leading the community is everyone's job."

Somerley turns off the microphone. "There, a new race and a creation myth in five minutes flat. That's got to be some sort of record."

"I still have no idea what this place is for, though. I hope we find out soon."

Somerley has created an outpost at I24.

“That looks like too much of a chore.”
Siccus walks lazily towards the map (appearing to him as painstakingly detailed model of a continent and the surrounding oceans) and is transfixed by the most minuscule details, trees blowing in the wind, creatures running after each other, the sound of water falls in the distance, the burning sensation on his bare feet, wait. . .
Siccus now stands at the top of a large sand dune, “Oh. . . Kay, from crazy mansion to middle of a desert, no big deal I’m prepared for things like this.” Unzipping his coat halfway Siccus reaches in and pulls out an aluminum sandboard with no feet bindings and throws it on the ground.
“Alright still don’t have the hang of this but what the heck.” He jumps on the board and starts heading down the side of the dune and in mere seconds hits a large rock and flies off the board, being one that takes things as they come he decides to roll down the rest of the way. He comes to a stop face up looking up at the sky in a moment of peace.
“You are a strange one traveler.” Tilting his head slightly Siccus sees something akin to a Perentie from another planet he is sure he must have been to once. What’s odd about this one was not its larger size or that it could talk, but that it is wearing clothing that is very similar to his own.
“Strange I may be, but I have fun doing it.” Siccus stands up and addresses the tall lizard cordially, “may I ask where you’re heading friend?”
“I am on my way to my burrow a days journey south of here.”
Siccus looks southward “oh, you mean this place here” pointing at a very well hidden hole in the ground.
“No I just said we are a day away from. . .” for a moment the beast stands confused as she notices the surrounding area has changed drastically. “Yes, this is, but how did you?”
“Don’t mind that one bit, just have a nice life and try not to harm other sentient life.” With that Siccus Brakes his gaze from the map, “there that was a much more fun way to go about all of that.”
Siccus has taken a liking to the Bellundinae located at U10

"Oi. Pulling random items out of coat pockets was my shtick."

Rogue examined the name modification tool, and added an underscore after Rogue the pixie's name, making her Rogue_ the pixie. This was so he could tell her apart from himself.

Some text appeared on the screen, as the pixie Rogue_ became used to her environment.

"Rogue, thank you for creating me and naming me after your image, what is your wish?"
\
@

"I don't know. Do as your wish." Rogue replied on the computer. To his suprise the pixie seemed to respond to his verbal comment, moving around on the minutely detailed map.. The characters representing tress grew vibrant, showing that the plant life became more vibrant with her presence. He wished, for a moment, that he could perceive the things that she felt, and suddenly, the mansion appeared to be no more. He was melded with her, feeling her joy as the forest bloomed with her delight into a dash of spring. She was the free spirit incarnate, and Rogue_ was an apt name, as they both shared this intense love.

He wished to be seperate, yet physically manifested, and a pixie appeared, right next to her. She darted slowly away as vines began to creep around this intruder, then chuckled as she realized it was her creator, in the form of a pixie.

"Sorry for interrupting you, but I have an important task." Rogue administered to the pixie. "I think there are limits to the beings I can create, so I would like help in making some friends for you to play with. Do you think you can help me birth more pixies with your magic."

Wishing to be back, Rogue studied articles on magipedia, while Rogue_ consulted the trees and wrote runes on pieces of bark. Finally, they were prepared for a great ritual. Touching hands as two pixies, a tree began to grow out of the ground, only a sapling the size of a pixie currently. This tree would be the heart of the community, as new pixies would emerge from blossoms in the tree, and it would provide shelter and homes on its many branches. Exausted from this work, Rogue_ slept curled around the thin trunk and Rogue played some Nethack, a new game he just discovered.

While Imun was very helpful in Nethack, it was very difficult, and Rogue had to watch his character die repeated Yet Another Stupid Deaths. Much cursing could be heard as this happened.

Suddenly, an idea struck into his head. Why must other pixies that would soon be birthed know about his presence. Shouldn't they be free to play with Rogue_?

He switched to the battle of the gods game and typed an order. "Ensure that you keep the knowledge of what has happened about this to yourself."

A blossom began to bloom on the still growing tree...

In one corner of the main room there was a dim red flash and as it dissipated a humanoid figure materialized in its place. He was looking to his right and had what appeared to be a towel draped over one arm.
"And another thing" he was saying, as if in mid-conversation with someone "the subspace relays in the inter-dimensional transponder wouldn't be sufficient to..." he stopped talking, turned his head to the front, and blinked.
"Well, that's not supposed to happen" he said as he looked round the room. He noticed a group of...beings clustered around what appeared to him as an incredibly detailed multi-layered holographic projection of a world and walked towards them, draping the towel over a chair as he passed.
"Err, hello then. I'm Algeron, is any one else as confused as I am?"

A green trench coat appeared limp on the floor of the main room, it rose up and formed a human like structure which then stood with eagerness.
"Oh dear..." he mumbled. "Where am I?" he stroked his chin and pondered.

"Ah, more new people. We don't know where this is, we don't know how we got here, we don't know what we're supposed to do next, and my name is Somerley. I should write this on a sign or something, save my breath."

"More specifically, we're currently looking into this thingy here," says Somerley, indicating the map. "We've just worked out that we can make people appear on it, so we're having fun with that. It's probably very important for something."

"Right, I'm off. I want to explore this place. Yell if someone who knows what's going on shows up."

Somerley leaves the room through a random door. He perceives the mansion's style as that of an Earth house, probably European, circa 1950-2100. Narrowing it down further proves impossible, since different rooms seem to come from different buildings, different times, even different timelines. Some of the rooms have telephones, wireless internet, or psychic uplinks. Somerley soon finds that these don't allow communication with the outside, just within the mansion and the game world. So they can at least be useful for checking the game's status from anywhere in the building.
Some of the rooms seem a little out of place. All the kitchens are perfectly ordinary, designed to cook for an average family and the occasional wild party. Which is fine, until Somerley realises that if even one-tenth of the bedrooms he's seen so far were occupied, there would be no way to organise enough food for everyone. Not that it matters much; gods don't get hungry if they don't want to. It just hints that this building is not at all what it seems to be.
More confusing than the odd architecture, though, is the geometry. Somerley is fairly certain that at least three rooms are occupying the same space as each other, and there's a staircase which loops every five floors. Some of the rooms have windows, none of which show the same view and all of which show empty space where the rest of the mansion should be. That mystery is eventually solved when Somerley manages to prise a window off the wall. The landscape moves with the window; it's some sort of hologram or 3D picture. Maybe it shows a view of the game world.
There are also at least 21 doors into the game room, but only 16 doors out. Somerley decides not to investigate this too closely. The game room also looks different from the other rooms; in particular, the floor around the other gods changes as they move, to match whatever their perception of the mansion is. At one point, Siccus leans on a fountain which appears just as he touches it.
There is no obvious way out of the mansion; go far enough in any direction and you find yourself back here. Somerley wonders whether this part is the same for the others; he assumes so.

Out of curiosity, he polishes his magnifying glass and scans the game world for his Aquarians.

He finds them quite quickly; they haven't moved far from where he left them. In fact, they haven't moved at all; the place where they first arrived is marked with a crude altar, and a small village is built around it. Somerley pulls out a fobwatch from his pocket to see how much time has passed for them; two years. There are three houses, several storage buildings full of various useful materials and foods, and a city square with the ashes of frequent cooking fires in the middle. There are fish skeletons scattered around. The Craftsman is sitting in the yard, trying to make writing materials - he's nearly managed to make papyrus. The Protector is feeding two babies in the large house. The oldest one looks a year old. There's an attempt at a farm; the plants are stunted and a lot of the seeds were eaten by birds, but it will provide a more reliable source of food than foraging and fishing. Somerley gets a small packet of seeds and drops them into the world. He also makes the soil more fertile, and diverts a few rainclouds to help the plants grow - they need all the encouragement they can get. The Hunter is busy fishing with a flint knife; the Explorer is sitting under a tree 10 kilometers away drawing a map on a piece of bark. All in all, things are going better than expected.
Outside the settlement, there's a piece of rock with a name deeply scratched into it. It's the name of the village, the name the Aquarians chose for themselves.
"Genesia".

A young human child appears near the wall of the room, takes a microphone off the wall and speaks into it. His voice is broadcast throughout the mansion from the microphone.
"Hello to everybody who has come to play in the Battle of the Gods game! Many of you recognize me, even if vaguely. For those who don't, I am Imun. I'm sure you all have lots of questions but please try to wait until I'm done speaking before you ask anything.

First of all I would like to tell those of you with foggy memories that your memory will return over time.

Next I will tell you all that you have been brought here to participate in the Battle of the Gods. You have all seen the board in the middle of this room, I see that some of you have even made your starting move. Those of you who haven't yet done so, please invent a race or take one that already existed and place a starting colony on the board.

I will explain the full rules as the game goes on or as people ask me questions. One important thing to note is that normally you will need access to a forest tile in order to make ships big enough to travel across the oceans, so I recommend not starting on the volcano island area. Another thing to note is that mountains are generally impassable unless your civilization spends time mapping it out. Diagonal movement is possible for those of you whose view of the board shows it in squares.

The main goal for this game is to win. I know that sounds obvious but it is nonetheless true. One way to win would be to be the one with the last civilization left on the board. Others will be revealed during play. War is not the only option.

Each turn all of your cities will gain growth points. These growth points can be spent in may different ways during the game. I will stick a sign with the main possible options on the wall here when I'm done. The bigger the city, the faster it will gain growth points. Some of you may want to call it construction points instead of growth points, whatever makes you happy. Also please note that this is an abstraction done to decrease complexity.

I will explain movement and combat later on when someone actually has an army or colonist band.

You may perform minor miracles in the game world as you wish. Anything that is more major and might have an effect on the game will be changed to make it fair. I recommend you ask me if you are unsure if anything will work as intended or not.

This mansion will be your home during the duration of the game. You may find the layout and architecture strange, don't worry, this is intentional. I like strange things that confuse people.

Sometimes I will be here in this room, other times I will be in other rooms of the mansion or will leave the mansion. You will have to figure it out on your own if you can't find me as some of you did when placing your peoples.

Finally, a couple of you might find that you do not want to play. If that is so please inform me now and if I believe that you really don't want to play, I can send you out of the mansion."

"How long do turns usually last for?"

"What is one way to win without military domination?"

"Each turn lasts around a month on average. As for ways to win without military domination, most will be explained as the beginning of the road to it is reached. As you have asked, I will reveal one way to win without killing everything. Under the exact right circumstances and with a large amount of growth points, your race can invent a way to travel through time. This will cause an instant victory for the god of the race that invents time travel first."

"Actually, I have another question. How do we know when a turn has ended? And if there's not much going on, can we skip over a few turns?"

“Sorry, Somerley I didn’t know I was intruding on you ‘shtick’. Our informative years must have been very similar if we both store our sporting equipment and other miscellanies items of entertainment in a not so other dimension.”

Taking a step closer to Imun, removing his goggles as a sign respect, Siccus asks with green eyes. ”What limitations do we have when making a move, and as a similar question to Somerley’s, how do we know enough time has passed that we are able to take another turn?”