The World We Live In

Genesis started the day grovelling out of his bed and having a shower in pristine water, after that he dashed down the stairs and looked in his fridge for something to eat.

There was nothing.

"I hate being poor!"

Genesis shouted.

Being poor was the worst thing you could be, other than being curious.

Being curious was the worst thing. Being curious gets you killed. Being curious gets you scarred. So Genesis would much rather be poor than curious because curiosity kills.

Genesis was not scared of curiosity for a personal reason, everybody hated it, once humanity got curious and it released plague upon the continents, once humanity got curious and there were bombs released upon all sides of the earth.

Genesis chuckled in madness about the world he lived in, as much as everyone was scared of the unknown, it helped twice as much. With discoveries for diseases and new forms of entertainment being released, Genesis thought maybe being curious isn't that bad after all but he would stick to being poor.

Genesis looked around the dimly lit room and the brown tearing wallpaper and familiarised the sound of the creaking wooden tiles. He sighed as there was work to be done, he had to sail across the seven seas and find the ultimate treasure of the gods and after all that he would be at school.

He smiled, safe to say his journey to school was a treachery and being poor made it even worse.

It was warm outside, the full spring of spring was in full effect, he stepped outside and smelt the dew of the grass, felt the sun on his dark skin, he move his void hair out of his line of sight and looked at the sun and he smiled.

***

After his walk to school and his long thoughts about whether humanity was leaching off of those that were curious enough to do something for the better he decided to walk to his desk and stay there.

Genesis lived for stimulation anything boring would kill him. That's why he hated school, no bullies, no fights and all the drama certainly did not involve him. He had heard guys and girls talking about him before, he was not ugly, put it simply he was above average but just averagely. But even when they did talk about him it was about his grades, top of the class in math and in the top 10 in every other subject.

Genesis is a genius. People started calling him the nickname Genius Genesis.

'How funny.'

He thought people only see me for a genius and they are too afraid of digging any deeper because of fear of curiosity.

***

Classes started and ended as Genesis easily and fluently achieved succes in all his classes, as an 18 year old broke boy this was his lifeline he was only here on a scholarship. After all if he tried to enter on loans he would be persecuted to the ends of the earth to pay it back which he couldn't.

But because he was broke he had to work harder than anyone so being top 10 wasn't enough, if he was number 1 in all his classes then they wouldn't give him a dorm 5 kilometers of campus.

"How unfortunate am I?"

Genesis muttered to himself.

***

On the walk home he saw a blonde haired, brown eyed girl entering the forest which was being curious, Genesis was just looking blankly at the act. He saw the girls white jacket and light blue jeans get tangled in the brambles before breaking through on the other side. He walked a few more steps before he heard a scream coming from the direction that the girl took when she was entering the woods.

Genesis stumbled in his thoughts for a bit and decided to run into the forest. His backpack got torn by some of the branches and his skin was scratched because he decided to wear a T-shirt today. He crawled through the branches and recoiled at the bright flashes of a camera.

Genesis stepped back, his neck getting scratched by the branches and vines. He saw 5 people standing there and laughing at him with cameras in the hand of 2 of them and the blond haired girl standing behind one of the boys with dark hair. A grizzly voice said in a sarcastic manner.

"Hey, look who is trying to save the princess."

Genesis like drama but not this type he hated clichés like this a girl leads a guy in the woods and the guy gets robbed by her friends, how original.

"If you're going to take my money why are you recording it?"

Genesis asked as his question pierced the laughter.

"Because we can."

A small girls voice said annoyed.

'What a great answer.'

Genesis thought. Genesis stepped back trying to escape from the forest but there was a sixth person behind him a very tall, muscular and scary sixth person. Genesis sighed and he chuckled.

Genesis did not chuckle because he wasn't scared, infant his legs were shaking and he barely managed to keep it unseen, infant he chuckled because how ever much they searched his pockets for money the most they would find is a cent.

Genesis also smiled he imagined the video title "Broke Loser Tries to Save Beauty Then Gets Beaten Up and Robbed of His 1 Cent"

He tried to talk with rationality making the path to the inevitable longer and more narrow.

"Look I don't want to do this. There's a reason I live off campus I don't have any money so please leave me alone."

The group of 5 people in front of him smiled and a the voice behind him said.

"Then get on your knees and beg like a good boy."

I took Genesis a while before deciding which was more expensive his washing machine or an almost guaranteed infection from the wounds he would receive. He wished the school would also have a nurses office that was covered with his scholarship, but it didn't so Genesis chose his decision. 'Hospitals cost way to much nowadays.'

Genesis thought as he went on his knees and begged... like a good boy.

***

After Genesis begged they let him off light with a few punches and kicks, leaving only a few sore spots. He walked home and thought about his miserable life, no parents, no money, no friends, no food and absolutely no social life. Normally he would just sigh and get on with it but Genesis couldn't imagine his mind surviving four more years of this. 

Genesis wishes the ground would split open and he would transmigrate into a new world, but that isn't how life is, especially not his life, no his life had to be rubbish stacked on top of rubbish and in the center of the garbage there would be his life, nothing but good grades, an empty stomach and getting robbed.

As Genesis walked down the road he looked around as the trees were twisting and the branches falling, the ground was shaking and the sky was splitting as the world flipped on its head as he saw people getting flung into the skies, as he himself was soaring to the atmosphere, Genesis realized what was going on and he smiled as he thought.

'The earth might not split but it might flip.'

The process was fast and only looked slow to Genesis because he was on an empty stomach. People, including himself were falling into the stars, once Genesis broke past the atmosphere he couldn't see anything causing this, but was he did see were the stars. He took a breath and realized that he couldn't, he was past the atmosphere and in the stars, his breath only shortened as he struggled to have any air in his lungs and then he fainted. 

***

Genesis was still reeling from the experience in space he felt his shut eyes being assaulted by bright lights from above and he heard voices. A male voice rung out.

"I think this one is waking up." 

Genesis awoke his eyes and saw 4 people standing over him one was a man with what looked to be army attire on him, his eyes were small as he had an epicanthic fold, and when you could see his eyes they were a happy grey, the man's hair was a sleek black and his hair style was, fabulous amazing actually, his dark hair was taking care off so dearly that Genesis wasn't even sure this man went to war, his skin was also a smooth white.

Along with the man with the amazing hair was another man he had a tan skin and he wasn't wearing a shirt and he looked like he was made for the screen, he had muscles upon muscle although he didn't look like he weighed more than Genesis himself, his hair was dyed yellow with streaks of many different colors flowing through them. The man had sand in his hair like he had been on a beach not too long ago and his eyes were a bright yellow and dark black respectively.

The woman next to the beach man had tired eyes, with eye bags under her dark brown eyes, her hair was an unkept mess of black, she was wearing a bright blue hoodie and grey sweatpants, the woman looked devoid of any life, joy or any emotion for that matter, she looked like emptiness itself, with her pale skin and dark sneakers.

The woman next to the other woman was so gorgeous that you would drop dead, come back to life to see if she was real or not and drop dead again, so gorgeous Genesis almost reached out to her like she was an angel. Her hair was a beautiful blonde, her eyes a jade green and her lip gloss made it look like she was made for modelling. Her attire only made her look more astonishing she was wearing a full black outfit that was tight against her skin which made her body features... look interesting, her shoes were as dark as her clothes as she wore combat boots, similar to the army man.

The man without a shirt caught his glance at the angel of a woman and said nothing but smirked. The man in the army attire was the first one to introduce himself, he looked to be in his late 20's and he had the same low voice that Genesis had first heard when he got here.

"Hello, my name is Im Sung Jae, you could call me Jae for short, since it would be easier for you to pronounce. I am 28 years old."

Genesis was surprised that even when the world flipped on its head people were still polite in introductions. Jae looked to the people next to him expecting something to happen, and he waited until the man with not attire finally looked liked he remembered something.

"Hey man, my name is Lautaro and I'm 19."

He had a thick Hispanic accent and the man's voice sounded excited and Genesis was surprised on how someone could be so excited when the world quite literally flipped on its head. Then it took a while for the girl with lifeless eyes to introduce herself as well.

"Hello, my name is Yana and I'm 25."

Her voice was louder than Genesis thought it would be, but only slightly so. Genesis wondered how someone could be so nonchalant after the world flipped on its head.

Finally it was the angels turn to introduce herself and her voice wasn't as Genesis expected as her voice wasn't light and cheerful instead it was bleak and dissipating.

"Hello, my name is Noel and I am 21 years old."

Genesis wondered how someone could be so abstract from others when the world flipped on its head. 

Finally Genesis introduced himself.

"Hello, my name is Genesis and I'm 18."

After a few long seconds Jae spoke up and said.

"We don't know where we are but, we have to stick together to find out when it looks like people are waking up introduce yourselves to them to get them acquainted with this place because if we are together we will be better."

His voice rung out like a command and Genesis followed looking around the massive and ivory floor for people who were falling out of their slumber. While searching Genesis took in his surroundings the white room was massive, big enough to hold thousands of people, almost half of the room was beds stacked upon each other, all looking like they were perfectly set up minutes ago. The other side of the room was mostly blank space and at the end of the massive room was a television screen that could be seen from the furthest reaches of the room and there was a gate, you could see a honey colored glow emitting from the other side of the black gate.

'Interesting.'

Genesis thought.

Suddenly Genesis heard a wail. Someone was waking up. Genesis heard the crying and quickly walked to the noise, he alerted the other 4 people in the room about the noise. Swiftly they searched for the source of the sound and it wasn't until Genesis moved the body of another unconscious person that he saw a child, an infant only about 1 or 2 years old, crying.

Lautaro looked at the baby and said.

"Hey, my names Lautaro. What's yours?"

Expectedly the baby did not reply. Lautaro kept on introducing himself until he grabbed the baby by its legs and viciously started throwing the baby up and down. When Jae had gotten him to stop Lautaro said.

"I don't think its working, he's not talking to me."

Lautaro had guessed the baby was a male which was completely obvious since it was wearing blue clothes, and the letters on his shirt were printed out in bright red colors, "Birthday Boy". Genesis felt bad for the child and his mother, because he did not know whether the child would see his mother or father again and vice versa. 

When Lautaro threw the child in the air viciously, the child started to giggle and had an illuminating smile on his face. Everyone saw the child sobbing face turn to a playful smile and it filled the room with sorrow, sorrow of a proper place to grow up in, sorrow and not just for the child for them too, as they were not sure they would find their parents in this white room. But alas there was work to be done as they went on waking people up and taking care of the child when he cried.

***

Dozens, no thousands of people were awake ten thousand perhaps, but the strangest thing is when a person woke whether by one of them or by their own will the room seemed to get bigger now it looked like it could fit a million people, the first 5 of them discussed it and they had no idea why it was happening. About 16 hours had passed when the lsat person was still awake there was a major crowd of people surrounding the last person, an elderly man in business attire and barely any hair on his head Genesis was tipped over the edge every hour the man didn't wake up, which was 2, but the thing that made Genesis the most angry was it looked like the man was having the time of his life, the man kept on smiling every time Genesis's stomach growled, this man was having the best dream of his life while Genesis was starving half to death. 

The man finally woke up a few minutes later the man woke up and looked confused after a few more minutes of people introducing themselves he introduced himself his name was Job. Genesis wanted to punch Job in the face for making him so hungry but he couldn't infront of all these people and the man also looked very strong.

After another long hour the television screen turned on showing a creature with fur on it ,a black suit and a cube shaped head. The creature looked very short but Genesis could feel something emanating from the creature, the creature was shrouded in a foul aura, an aura one could almost reach out and touch. 

The people were stricken with fear and the creature smiled as it said. 

"Hello humble people, I have come to introduce you to this world, this is a world of evolution based on a person's needs or wants you can be adaptable to any situation and become stronger, better with every trial that you face. My name is Kappa and I am one of the many teachers of this place. Anyway let us skip to the part where you become stronger right now you are in a different world you could say, an instance is what you call it. There are two types of instances, a minor instance and a major instance, a major instance can also be called an ACT, in fact you are in an ACT right now. You become stronger by entering instances and achieving victory in them. How? You can achieve in an instance by completing its quest, it may be resolving a conflict, achieving a specific goal, defeating a threat. The main point I am trying to get across is to survive in this world you have to sail across the stars into unknown territory that is why evolution takes trial and error, experience and most of all curiosity." 

When it spoke the dreaded "c" word people's eyes widened as they had to do what no else had done before to survive and thrive. A voice rung out from behind Genesis. 

"What if you just stay in here forever and why do we need to explore the stars to survive don't we just need food and water?"

"You can only get food and water from a major instance and you also age in a major instance so you cannot stay here forever or you will grow old and die doing nothing in your life."

The creature voice said, the man doubled down saying.

"What if we just stay in a major instance in a place far from the quest?"

The creature visibly irritated retorted.

"If the system detects you are in a major instance and not doing a quest in a major instance it will punish you by rapidly aging you."

The man tripled down by bloating.

"What if the system doesn't detect me?"

The creature now speaking blankly spoke.

"Do you really want to test the system?"

The man said with pride.

"Sure."

As quick as blazing storm the creature snapped its fingers the man floating to the gate, now open he entered it and he came out screaming bloody murder. The man went mad and his eyes popped out of his head as he blew up into a pile of blood and bones. As it never happened the creature snapped its fingers again making the man bones and blood float into the portal and the gate closed.

"That is what happens when you exit a major instance when you have not finished it, but the death for a minor instance's disobedience is quicker but painful none the less."

The people in room saw as the man turned to blood and bones and the scarlet liquid floated up into the gate like a phantom. Not a single noise was made as the creature exuded his aura throughout the entire of the white room.

Kappa then read out the things they had to do to escape this "ACT".

"For this ACT it is called the "White Room" dubbed that by its appearance. For the completion of the ACT there will be two, recently uneven teams that will play a game of what you humans call it "Capture the Flag", for this flag will be animated and alive, the flag I talk about is the infant in the room."

As Kappa said that the baby was marked with a bright multicolored emblem. Light that could be seen from the entire of the colorless room, light as bright as an angel that penetrated every obstacle that was meant to keep from shining. As the child embraced the light he began to smile.

Suddenly crowed of people began to crawl over others just to be the one who could secure "The Flag" first. But a barrier stops them burning anyone who tried to cross it, killing someone even. Kappa's voice spoke from the television screen again.

"I haven't finished explaining. So will you all please listen. The game of Capture the Flag will last for 5 months, there will be weapons and armor provided but will only become lethal in the last 2 months there will be food and water provided for all months except for the fifth month any team that plans to just steal the flag at the last minute, oh how foolish are you. There will be a strict rule if a team hasn't touched the flag for 1 week and 1 fortnight you will be subdued the same way the person who burned was subdued, to be precise the baby's emblem would spread throughout the room burning anyone on the other team to death. There will be no cross teaming, if caught it would result in an immediate death by flame. The last rule is that there will be a border created in the night from the hours of 6:00pm to 5:00am anyone from the other that tries to cross the border into enemy territory in the night will be killed by flames and when I stop speaking the game will officially begin in 5 minutes. Let the tragedy of the white room unfold." 

As soon as the voice rung out the final words the television turned off and turned on again revealing a clock stating it was 6:00pm. A line a fire separated the two halves of the room splitting an unfortunate soul in half his body, bones and blood being turned to ashes that whisked away on the wind right into the gate. The teams were uneven once again and Genesis and the first 4 that were awake were on the team with just one less person.

'If that fool wasn't so cocky and asked a creature with such and ugly face those questions. We would have more of a chance to survive.'

Genesis gritted his teeth at the uneven odds but there was still a chance, he did not know whether Kappa was lying or not but he had try even if the information was false. The timer hit 3 minutes and in the same second that happened there were weapons behind them weapons that would be used to kill. Genesis turned his head backwards, he didn't know how to kill another person, sure he had killed rabbits on the streets to survive but the death of another person, maybe the burden was too heavy to heavy for him but he wanted to live, he really did. 

Everyone on his side were muttering to themselves, preparing to rush at the baby or hiding in a corner. The timer was slowly going down as people from both sides prepared for war a 5 month long war, crazy to think 5 minutes is enough time to prepare for slaughter, it wasn't for most people, but others, they were ready, they were ready to kill, they were ready to tear others limb from limb and it made Genesis sick seeing the looks in their eyes, their clouded eyes, their veiled eyes, eyes covered in malice and primal instinct the primal instinct to survive, this place, the white room was doing something to them making them mad with anger.

Genesis tried talking with the first 4 of the people who were awake, but he could see it their eyes too, minor but corrupting their souls, their being, Genesis felt it to but he had no protection against it except for his poor mind and soul. 

'The mind of a poor person shattering and being turned to the animal they are, woe is me.'

Genesis silently thought as he attempted to talk to the first 4 but the timer struck zero.