Scribble 16: Under False Pretense.

Hello, Wanderers! Here again Respatih Drake brought you a Scribble, a short story about hidden world that is Edelfarat.

In case you haven't noticed, I've put pages describing recurring organizations' dossier in the right panel! Now when you find UNSED or Covert used in a scribble and you forgot who they are, you could refer to the corresponding dossier.

Today in Edelfarat, I'm trying to take something purely mental and turned it into physical condition, specifically the "god complex".

What is god complex? God complex is a condition where someone refuse to be wrong, somewhat like Dunning-Kruger syndrome in which someone overestimate their own capability and reject any statement that prove otherwise, despite the various citation and observation presented.

This Scribble introduces a new organization which, like UNSED and Covert, has their own universe and probably featured in another Scribbles as well. However, as you would soon find out, this new organization's universe has a fundamental difference than UNSED and Covert.

I'll put up its own dossier soon.

The Scribble will now start.

Scribble 16: Under False Pretense.

[SI-L2-FAS1]

FAS Briefing Log.

[Date Not Found]

Have you ever heard of the "god complex"?

You could search the network for that key phrase, someone should have written about it. Yes, you could do it now. A level one document on the subject isn't really different from the one in the outside world, after all.

For the rest of the world, Ernest Jones is the person who first coined the term as another word for Dunning-Kruger syndrome, but in the twisted society of Edelfarat, it wasn't something as cute as that. See, in the place where magic is commonplace, it's easy for a prideful individual to seek to become the strongest, the absolute monotheistic god, ruling over every possible reality.

The official name given by the Initiative is Ferling Ascension Syndrome, after George Ferling, the first Thaumatologist researching this tendency.

Surprisingly, becoming an existence with power comparable to a god isn't really hard to do, as every magic system apparently created with a method to achieve this in mind, as a last resort, abandoning the mortal shell in order to achieve an immense power comparable to miracle of gods in an instant. Some of the Magus with FAS would stop at this stage, content with their power and the goal they have achieved.

Some of them, however, would think that even that isn't enough. In order to be the god, the ultimate decision maker of all possible universes, or even to restart the Boltzmann Simulacrum itself, a new method must be created, outside the existing ones. Oftentimes, the Magus will self-destruct, sending minor ripple of reality with wavelength less than 12 Nm.

But some of them survive. Several of those monster that had cast even their own life aside for power had survived the Apotheosis, stepping into true divinity and threatening the existence of the multiverse, by creating a law out of chaos and connecting every single Magic Theorem into threads of existence itself.

The only thing we could do when an entity reached Apotheosis is to wish they destroy themselves, or to create one of them ourselves. Due to the unpredictability of such method, after the third emergence of such entity that decimated not only portion of Edelfarat but reality itself, new method was required to prevent and combat such existence, without relying on similar entities ourselves.

Thus, Sathariel Initiative was formed, to suppress the knowledge of Apotheosis, and suppressing even the slightest possibility of someone discovering the existence of such process, much less practicing it.

Despite Sathariel Initiative's effort to conceal the God, so to speak, it is inevitable that determined individual would be able to reach Apotheosis. Further information about the possibility of such entity already existing and the countermeasure developed, Project Astaroth, is available with Level 6 clearance [SI-L6-23PA].

It is the height of hubris for man to even consider confronting god. But it is possible. After all, these false gods was once human, and anything created by human could be destroyed by human.

Anyway, from now on, after understanding who we are and what we do, most of you would be tasked with harmless disinformation and censorship campaign, including modifying the existing documentation about Magical processes concerning reality alteration that affect areas larger than Edelfarat itself. I look forward to work with the lot of you.

Agent Geryos out.

The Scribble has been ended.

So, what do you think about it? The idea was "gods were all once humans, therefore humans could stand against gods without becoming something other than themselves."

Please leave a feedback if you want to, feel free to show me what you write too!

See you next Scribble!