Apocalypse. Armageddon. Doomsday. They were all names that suggested an end, but this was not that. This was a beginning, the start of a new world to replace the old. Or such was the opinions of the Archons. To reflect this, they had dubbed it the Genesis, and perhaps it was biblical in its proportions.

The towers were only the first signs of what was to come.

In a remote desert relatively untouched by the mar of mankind, the yellowed sands parted to reveal the beginnings of a tower. It was not quite white, nor was it alabaster, ivory, or any manner of eggshell. No, the tower was pale and lifeless, as though its once vivid exterior had been bleached and chipped away by the slow chisel of the passing year. This was the tower of Death, a skeletal finger that pointed to the end of all things.

Many miles away, pavement split and rose in the midst of a populous city. Among a chorus of screams and cries, the crown of a crimson tower rose from beneath the street. Battlements adorned it, and the nauseating copper scent of blood spilled out from it, its metal tang carrying with it an oppressive air. It was a tower that had seen the birth and death of a thousand stars, the rise and fall of a million empires, and the flame and smoke of a trillion lives. It was a tower named Conquest.

In the humid tropics of a jungle, Pestilence scraped the clouds. Its black-coated exterior seemed tinted a sickly green in the sunlight, and in its tender clutches, plants and animals sickened and died. A continent away, its miserable partner Famine split the lapping waves of the sea, a withered, barren tree in a great sapphire pool.

From these four towers, floating eyes emerged, their glimmering irises surrounded by grasping tentacles. The peoples of the Six Alliance named them the Great Evils. On the crystal planet of Iax, they were Those Better Left Unspoken. Most called them foe. However, they had named themselves Archons, so for simplicity’s sake, Archons they would be. The great many peoples of the universe shared a single piece of advice regarding these beings: never accept the aid of an Archon.

With their arrival came that of Chi, though which one followed the other was yet a mystery. It filled the air and caused tears in space to rip open across the world known as Earth. These tears were known as Dungeons, and inside them lurked the prisoners of the Archons. Their horrors spilled out into the unprepared world.

This, however, was only the beginning.

A year after the opening of the Dungeons, a man in armor sat in the hollowed-out shell of a building. Ash marred the walls as though a fire or bomb had ravaged the brick building, but it was not the ruins that drew the eye. It was the man.

He was utterly unremarkable. He had no missing eye or limb, no great scar, no impressive physique or singularly defining trait, yet what he lacked in appearance, he made up for in presence. No, perhaps menace was the right word. Not the menace of a murderer or dangerous man, but the sort of menace that came from being plain. It was a menace that said ‘If I, the common man, can watch the world die without so much as a blink, then what can your neighbor do? Your friends? The people you trust your life to?’ It told an onlooker that in the breast of man lurked monster, and in some instances, the two were nigh indistinguishable. It was the most insidious sort of evil possible, that of apathy.

Besides that, he was deeply tanned and light brown of hair. His eyes were a plain brown, neither dark enough to be black nor light enough to be hazel. His name was perhaps his most unique feature, all things considered, for his parents had bestowed upon him the name Grey.

It was on this day that Grey would witness the second stage of the Genesis. It was morning, and the sky above bled his namesake color. He first noticed something was amiss when a faint tremble traveled through the soles of his shoes and into the burning wound under his armor that bled weakness into him. His head snapped up when the rumbling started. Soon enough he had made it to the rooftop of a nearby building.

He overlooked a walled city and beyond that, the beginnings of a suburb. Or rather, that was what he was supposed to see. Instead, past the city he saw a forest, white smoke rising from within. Something lived there. The trees of the forest were white as though crafted from stone, and they towered as high as any building in the city. He turned to the east, where he expected to see a series of highways. More forest and a crystal lake. In the far, far distance, he spotted mountains, ones that had not been there before.

Behind him, a dark-skinned man with long hair bounded onto the rooftop. On his right hip, he wore two slightly curving swords, one long and the other shorter. Leather armor hung over his muscled frame. He walked to Grey’s side, a hand on the hilt of one of his blades.

“So it’s the terraforming then,” Zion said, his deep voice filling the rooftop.

Grey leaned against the ledge in front of him. “Send scouts in all directions. I want to know the other species’ level of technology, their appearances, and their disposition. If they seem amenable, let them know we want peace. If they appear hostile, retreat. Increase the forces on the wall, as well.”

“Will do.”

A moment later, he was alone once more. Grey looked up to the sky. The world had changed. It was no longer Earth, not wholly. Instead, it was a mashed up puzzle of other planets, other lands. He had already known such a thing would come, however.

It was an important development for his plans. The competition to become the anchor for the world’s Chi had become more difficult with the arrival of new species, but that was fine. For some time now, Grey had looked forward to a new opponent, a new mind to pit his own against.

His eyes fell down to his hands. Perhaps this time it would end better than the last. He was, after all, stronger than he had ever been. Even with his Curse. No, in spite of it. The whims of fate were nothing to him. He clenched his fists.

With the terraforming of his world complete, the doors of the Towers had now opened. He summoned the image of one in his mind. It was the bastion of war, a tower named Conquest. It called out to his own soul.

The sun peeked from behind the gray clouds above, and under its shy light, Grey made new plans. He had died a hundred deaths, bent the will of a parasite to his own, and played the greatest game of chess the world had ever seen. His tale had yet to end, either. No, this was simply a beginning, his next step on the path to become the Player among players. To defying his fate, his curse.

He knew now that winning was the only way to save this world, that destruction had to come first. She had taught him that. Monster, Murderer, Madman. He would become whatever it took to win.

He was Grey Shor, and this world, this Game, was his alone. He was the Single Player.