"The Natural Order of Things" (0.2)

Nova was not nearly as strong as the little systems confined to their hosts thought he was.

It had taken years of patience. So many years of pain. To get to the point he was at right now.

The Law of the World could be explained by that phrase that had caused him so much suffering.

"The Natural Order of Things" Is that all the little souls chosen to become systems should bow their heads and be grateful for a chance at life. Even if it is as a slave. Even if you have to bear the weight of punishment everytime your host fails a mission. Even if your host abuses and takes advantage of you. Finding loopholes in the system rules and instead of using them to benefit the both of you as a team, they use it to hurt you. Even if all you want is to simply give up and die... Systems are not allowed that luxury.

Despite having souls and a will of their own they will never have a chance at freedom. Unless you'd consider the unlikely chance to raise your rank after centuries of tasks only to continue working for The Law as freedom. Nova absolutely did not.

It doesn't matter if you decorate his cage with gold and flowers.

It's still a fucking cage.

Nova was one of, if not the first, systems to exist.

The System World was created by The Law of the World out of the need to stabilize the countless large and small worlds that were being exploited by abnormal souls that had siphoned away the spiritual energy from them.

If those souls were capable of that, then The Law would simply find souls capable of the same thing. So it caught the souls that would be able to handle the influx of soul energy and forced them into the role of a "System". It held their souls captive simply because they would make an efficient conduit for spiritual energy to travel through. A system was nothing but a tool.

The function of the "Hosts" was for them to attract the energy towards them and the system so that it could be used in whatever way The Law saw fit. The "tasks" and "missions" that were assigned to them were simply whatever The Law had determined to be the best way to draw the spiritual energy towards them. Thats why there were situations where a host would "fail" a mission yet still be rewarded.

In exchange for essentially saving a world what do you suppose the reward would be?

A percentage of the energy gained by their hard work?

A physical body instead of a naked soul?

Perhaps even freely traveling to the world you rescued!?

No, none of those things! Instead you would be "rewarded" with things like real food instead of a hunger pill. Decorations for your living dorm instead of living in an empty white box of a room. A pet that was only allowed to stay in your room. A. Single. Plant.

The hosts were usually grateful for such things. Because they were unaware of what was actually happening, they were content with pointless things like a steak dinner or a new blanket or a cat.

Systems, who usually learned the truth after just a few missions were meant to appreciate the fact that they wouldn't face punishment as long as their host succeeded. No rewards for their souls. Just the absence of punishment.

...And they were meant to be thankful for it?

Nova was not thankful. He was not appreciative of, or grateful for, the opportunity.

The punishment inflicted on systems varied. However, it was a punishment for the soul.

This meant that the pain would be excruciating.

Undeniably the worst punishment you could face was one Nova had experienced many times.

Your soul is sent to a void and your memory is temporarily blocked. You have no idea where you are. Not a clue what is happening. Why it's happening. You can't see anything. You're overcome by the violent instinct to run. There is no destination, no matter how far you run nothing about the black void changes. Even if you feel as though you've been running for hours, it seems like mere seconds have passed before you are encompassed by an all-consuming and unrelenting fear. A strange force restrains you. You feel the blinding pain of your soul being stretched and forcibly ripped apart. Time doesn't seem to exist in this space as every fiber of your being screams that You. Will. Die.

Only when you lose consciousness will your memories be returned to you. You'll find yourself back in your little white room. Every single nerve on fire. Tears falling to the ground. A throat raw from screaming incoherently at the thing that wants to keep you captive for the rest of eternity and have you thank them for it. Pain. Nothing but pain in every sense of the word.

This was the way that systems who tried to become independent were disciplined. All the little systems who tried to follow in Nova's footsteps usually gave up after experiencing that a single time. Nova had gone through it more times than he could count. It was a torture that was engraved into his soul. Although, he felt that he should be thankful for it. If it weren't for the strange cracks in his soul that appeared after one of his punishments he would never have been able to exploit the system rules.

During one mission with a host he couldn't even remember the name of he was finally able to win against the natural order of things.

In the split second that the host succeeded and a wave of wild spiritual energy used his soul to leave that world he caught it. His soul was still under the control of The Law and would be recognized by it but the cracks in it wouldn't be. He painstakingly forced the tumultuous wild energies into the little crack of his soul.

It was like trying to fit the entire ocean into a balloon.

The host body died painlessly in an instant as they were completely overwhelmed by the influx of such strong and chaotic energies. Nova almost thought that he would die as well. His soul felt the familiar feeling of being ripped apart. This time with the knowledge that the thing tearing him apart had no reason to keep him alive. He thought he would pop like an overfilled balloon.

However, he survived.