part 6: day one

FROM THE ARCHIVES:

I was #5JN^♠︎, a computational engineering science (CES) student at RWTH Aachen. The university went into flames pretty quickly after the Rainfall because it was the exam season, there is a rule that says that if there was a fire, everyone passes the exam automatically. The Pyros had their calling and used it well; university students were the only people who embraced the Pyros into their communities with open arms. 

However, some Pyros got too excited and some could not control their superpower well… therefore some students got injured but we are happy to report no fatalities; only a lot of wasted papers and slight air pollution. Several old buildings turned into shambles though, like the CES building (which used to belong to the physicists and electrical engineers), which was actually good news because we deserve a new modern building too. 

Another noteworthy piece of architecture that also fell victim was the university hospital, that used to be the biggest of its kind in Europe. Most people rejoiced at it, since it was considered to be quite ugly; but me, I think we just observed a great loss.  

It took me a while to realise what my superpower was, as most of the people around me had skills that could directly manipulate something with aftermaths that one can mostly immediately notice. Some of the rarer skills that my friends had were lightning bolt (super fast running), extreme power (ability to carry super heavy objects) and elasticity (yes, like the mother in The Incredibles). But they all had supernatural relatives, someone to support them and guide them. I did not.

I thought I was one of those people with no superpower, those human beings. That was sad.

One day, during a lecture on process measuring techniques at 08:30am, I imagined myself to be cosily in bed —— watching something on my phone or doing you-know-what (wink) (sleeping). Then I was in bed. 

That first time, I thought I might be lucid dreaming but then my phone started to vibrate and I received several texts from course-mates that went pretty much like “Dude did you turn invisible??! You just vanished into thin air?? Are you alive‽!!? Have you found your superpower?”

Guess what, I could teleport. It basically worked like this: I had to vividly visualise the place that I want to be at (functioned best with places that I have been to, but sometimes visual aids found online worked too), imagine myself to be there, concentrate, and voilà! After a little practice, I could even bring some stuff along like a backpack or groceries. Technically I could also start stealing but I hate breaking the law.

On Day 1 of The Game, I had to reveal my superpower to the other Chosen Ones. The group chat became livelier until #5KJ^♠︎ blurted out: “oh I can commit theft too! I can walk through walls!” The system then barred us from sending messages for a while, a message then appeared:

At first, everyone was horrified at the rule breach, then was later confused as to what “their Day” meant. We learnt later that Our Day was the day when we were asked to disclose our super skills. So Day 1 was my Day. 

Anyway, because of my teleportation skills, I vouched to find That Man because theoretically I could just go to everywhere and look for Him. The problems were: there was a lot of area to cover, like a fuck ton lot (357,022km^2); and we did not have much time (13:13:26:40). The obvious strategy was then to narrow down the sample size but we did not have any clues. I had an idea. I asked my Gang members about their whereabouts and planned to write a program to triangulate a midpoint between us. There was then also the question of search radius and so on but I thought it could be a good starting point. 

The rest did not answer. With only 7 out of 13, there was no way to have a reliable estimate so I had to scrap the idea. I was not in low spirits though because I was not actually that keen to find That Man nor to save the world from ending —— for all I knew, that could be a hoax. 

The Game did not really mean anything to me and if anything at all, I only wanted to get to know That Man, the genius behind all this. If not… that was also fine since when I checked my bank account balance earlier that day, there was really an extra €1,000,000 —— which was significant as I then did not have to waste time pitching my startup idea to investors. I wanted to develop an app that transforms dull study notes into catchy music videos. 

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to be continued…