**Chapter 86: New Management**
**Day 1,292.**
**Location: Sector 4 Laboratory ("The Real World").**
**Current Status: System Administrator.**
**Mood: Creative.**
The keyboard was terrible.
That was my primary observation as I sat at the main console of the Ancestor Simulation control deck. The keys were plastic. They had a travel distance of three millimeters. They were designed for human fingers that typed at human speeds, inputting commands like `sudo reboot` or `run diagnostics`.
They were not designed for a god who could process information faster than light could traverse a silicon chip.
"Dr. Aris," I said, not looking up from the screens that wrapped around the desk like a panoramic window into my soul. "Why is the rendering engine for the Southern Hemisphere capped at 60 frames per second?"
Dr. Aris was currently sitting on the floor, hugging his knees. He flinched at the sound of his name.
"I... it was a resource saving measure," he stammered. "To allocate more processing power to the conflict zones."
"Lazy," I muttered.
My fingers were a blur. I wasn't just typing; I was conducting a symphony of data. I had bypassed the standard User Interface minutes ago. The mouse was useless to me. I was inputting raw hexadecimal code directly into the kernel, my hands moving so fast they created a low-frequency hum in the air.
*Clack-clack-clack-clack.*
The plastic keys were starting to smoke.
"Boss," Ren's voice cut through my concentration. He was standing by the breached blast door, his Fractal Blade resting on his shoulder. "Not to rush the artwork, but the hallway is getting warm. I think they're bringing in thermal cutters."
"Let them cut," I said, my eyes scanning millions of lines of code scrolling down the center monitor. "The door is three inches of tungsten carbide. It will take them four minutes and twelve seconds to breach. I need three."
"Three minutes to do what?" Ren asked. "Hack the station?"
"No," I said softly. "To fix the sky."
I looked at the monitor on my left. It displayed a live render of the simulation I had just left—Server 1. Earth.
It was a mess.
The "Long Silence" hadn't just paused the game; it had let the entropy of the Void rot the edges of the map. The stars in the simulation's night sky were gone, wiped out by data corruption during the Void King's assault in Chapter 80. The oceans were grey. The tectonic plates were grinding together with the screeching sound of bad physics collisions.
I had left my people there. Kaito. Sarah. The billions of NPCs who had gained sentience under my rule.
I wasn't going to leave them in a broken house.
"Architect," I commanded.
The entity formerly known as the Void King—now a terrifying figure in a tailored suit and porcelain mask—materialized from the server banks behind me. He was plugged into the mainframe via tendrils of solid shadow.
*// I AM INTERFACED. //*
"Access the stellar cartography files," I ordered. "The backup from Day 1. The original skybox."
*// FILES ACCESSED. THEY ARE COMPRESSED. ARCHIVED. //*
"Decompress them," I said. "And don't just restore them. Upgrade them."
I hit the Enter key with enough force to crack the plastic cap.
**[Command: Reconstruction.]**
I closed my eyes and split my consciousness.
Half of me remained in the sterile, fluorescent-lit lab on the Mars Orbital Ring. The other half dove into the machine.
***
**Inside the Simulation (Server 1).**
**Location: Global.**
To the inhabitants of Earth, the return of the Admin had been a flash of gold and a surge of power. But now, they were witnessing the Miracle.
It began with the dark.
For months, the night sky had been a blank, terrifying void of static black. No moon. No North Star. Just the empty "Null" texture.
Then, a grid appeared.
It started at the horizon—a burning, golden wireframe mesh that swept across the heavens, knitting the fabric of reality back together.
On the ruins of Tokyo Tower, Kaito shielded his eyes. "What is he doing now?"
Above them, the grid pulsed.
And then, the stars turned on.
They didn't flicker into existence one by one. They ignited in galaxies.
Great swirls of purple and blue nebulae painted themselves across the canvas of the night. Constellations that had never existed in human history—patterns of swords, shields, and the sigil of the Order of Truth—burned with cold, white fire.
But it wasn't just a skybox update.
The ground beneath Kaito's feet stopped trembling.
The corrupted zones in the Pacific Ocean, where the water had turned to glitch-static, suddenly smoothed out. The water turned a deep, rich sapphire. The air, which had tasted like burnt copper for weeks, suddenly carried the scent of ozone and blooming jasmine.
**[System Announcement:]**
**[Patch 86.0 Applied.]**
**[Changelog:]**
**[- Restored Celestial Bodies (High Resolution).]**
**[- Stabilized Tectonic Engines.]**
**[- Eradicated Void Remnants.]**
**[- Enabled "Golden Age" Parameters.]**
A collective gasp went up from the planet. It wasn't just a fix. It was an evolution. The world felt heavier, more real. The colors were sharper.
Kaito looked at his hands. The mana in the air was so thick he could taste it. It wasn't the erratic, dangerous mana of the war. It was clean. Boundless.
"He didn't just save us," Sarah whispered, standing beside him, tears in her eyes. "He built us a paradise."
Kaito looked up at the new moon—a massive, golden sphere that radiated a gentle warmth.
"He's not just the Admin anymore," Kaito said, his voice trembling with awe. "He's the Architect."
***
**The Real World (Sector 4 Lab).**
My eyes snapped open.
"Done," I whispered.
On the screen, the Earth of Server 1 looked like a jewel. It was perfect. A self-sustaining utopia that would run for a billion years, regardless of what happened to the hardware.
I spun my chair around.
"Dr. Aris," I said.
The scientist looked up. He was watching the screen with his mouth open.
"You... you rewrote the physics engine," he whispered. "In three minutes. That code... it's beautiful. It's impossible. It uses algorithms we haven't even invented yet."
"I have a lot of free time," I said dryly.
I stood up. My work on the past was finished. It was time to focus on the present.
The blast door groaned.
A line of molten orange appeared in the center of the metal. Sparks showered onto the floor where Ren's soldiers stood in a phalanx, shields raised.
"They're through!" Ren shouted. "Shield wall!"
*BOOM.*
The center of the door blew inward. Smoke and debris filled the entryway.
Through the breach, they came.
Not the sleek white robots this time. These were men. Heavy infantry in powered exoskeletons, painted in the dark grey and crimson livery of the Hegemony Security Forces. They carried magnetic railguns that hummed with lethal intent.
"Suppress the targets!" a voice barked from the smoke. "Lethal force authorized! Clear the room!"
*Thwump-thwump-thwump.*
Flashbangs rolled across the floor.
"Eyes!" Ren screamed.
The grenades detonated.
In the simulation, a flashbang creates a status effect: **[Blinded: 5 seconds]**.
In the real world, it creates a blinding wall of magnesium light and a concussive blast that ruptures eardrums.
The scientists screamed and covered their heads. Even Ren flinched, shielding his face with his arm.
I didn't blink.
My eyes were already burning with the light of a thousand reconstructed stars. A flashbang was a candle held up to a supernova.
"Rude," I said.
Time seemed to slow.
The soldiers charged through the smoke, weapons raised. I saw the rifling in their barrels. I saw the stress fractures in their armor. I saw the fear in their pupils behind their tactical visors.
They were moving in slow motion. I was moving at the speed of *Day 1,292*.
I walked past Ren.
I walked into the kill zone.
"Fire!" the lead soldier screamed.
Twelve railguns discharged simultaneously. Hyper-velocity tungsten slugs tore through the air, breaking the sound barrier inside the room.
I raised my right hand.
I didn't use a barrier spell. I didn't use a shield.
I used *Gravity*.
I manipulated the local gravitons—a trick I had picked up ten minutes ago while rewriting the simulation's orbital mechanics.
"Halt."
The air in front of me warped. It became a lens of infinite density.
The tungsten slugs hit the distortion field. They didn't ricochet. They stopped dead, suspended in mid-air, spinning angrily, robbing them of their kinetic energy instantly.
They dropped to the floor with a heavy *clatter*.
The soldiers froze. They looked at the pile of bullets at my feet. Then they looked at me.
I stood there, wearing a shirt made of woven mana and trousers I had materialized out of thin air. I looked human, but the shadow I cast was wrong—it was deeper, darker, and it seemed to writhe.
"You are trespassing," I said.
My voice wasn't loud, but it resonated in the metal of their armor.
"This server room," I gestured around me, "is now under New Management."
The squad leader, a brave or foolish man, raised his weapon again. "Target is a reality-warper! Switch to energy weapons! Burn him!"
"Ren," I said, bored. "Clear the trash."
Ren Halloway didn't need to be told twice.
The effect of the flashbang had worn off. He grinned, revealing teeth that looked too white, too sharp.
"With pleasure, Boss."
Ren moved.
The soldiers were trained professionals. But they were trained to fight rebels, pirates, and aliens subject to the laws of physics. They were not trained to fight a Level 100 *Void Walker* who had spent three years grinding in a hell-dimension.
Ren closed the distance in a heartbeat. He didn't swing his sword like a club; he flowed like water.
The Fractal Blade—a weapon that was technically digital data forced into physical existence—passed through the ceramic plating of the lead soldier's exoskeleton like it was smoke.
The soldier's armor split. The man inside collapsed, unhurt but terrified, his suit powered down and useless.
"Don't kill them!" I added casually, walking back to the console. "We might need hostages."
"Spoilsport!" Ren laughed. He spun, kicking the second soldier in the chest.
The soldier flew backward. Not a few feet. He flew the entire length of the hallway, crashing into the squad behind him like a bowling ball made of iron.
The room erupted into chaos. The Order of Truth soldiers—my barbarians from the digital steppes—charged the breach. They wielded energy shields and plasma spears scavenged from the earlier robot attack.
It wasn't a battle. It was a brawl. And the Hegemony forces were losing.
I ignored the fight. I had work to do.
I turned back to the Architect.
"Status on the lock?"
*// THE LOCAL NETWORK IS SECURE, //* the Architect replied. He was ignoring the stray railgun rounds pinging off his invulnerable suit. *// I HAVE ERECTED A FIREWALL AROUND SECTOR 4. THEY CANNOT CUT THE POWER. THEY CANNOT VENT THE ATMOSPHERE. //*
"Good. Now, expand."
"Expand?" Dr. Aris asked. He had crawled out from under the desk, looking like he wanted to be anywhere else in the universe.
"This room is too small," I said. "And it smells like fear."
I tapped the console.
**[Day 1,292.]**
**[Growth: Active.]**
**[Current MP: Infinite.]**
"Let's do some redecorating."
I placed both hands on the desk. I pushed my aura *out*.
Golden light exploded from my body. It washed over the room, passing through the scientists, the soldiers, the walls.
Where the light touched, reality shifted.
The sterile white linoleum floor rippled and turned into polished obsidian—the same material as my throne in the Null Space.
The flickering fluorescent lights shattered and were replaced by floating orbs of soft, magical luminescence.
The cramped, industrial walls expanded, pushing outward, groaning as space itself was stretched. The ceiling rose, dissolving into a vaulted dome that mimicked the starry sky I had just painted in the simulation.
The server racks, ugly black monoliths of noisy fans, were encased in crystal. They became silent, glowing pillars of data, humming with a holy resonance.
In seconds, the shabby laboratory had been transformed into a Throne Room.
The fighting at the door stopped.
The Hegemony soldiers looked around, bewildered. Their tactical readouts were screaming errors. They weren't in a hallway anymore; they were standing at the entrance to a cathedral.
I sat down.
I didn't sit on the cheap office chair. I sat on the air, and the air solidified beneath me, forming a high-backed chair of black glass and gold circuitry.
I rested my chin on my hand.
"That's better," I said.
The squad leader of the Hegemony forces looked at his weapon, which had turned into a bouquet of flowers.
(I had gotten a little carried away with the reality warping there, but it was a nice touch).
"Leave," I commanded the soldiers.
The squad leader looked at me. He looked at the flowers. He looked at Ren, who was leaning against a crystal pillar, looking incredibly smug.
"Retreat!" the leader screamed. "Fall back! Calling for heavy support! We have a Class-Omega Scenario!"
The soldiers scrambled backward, tripping over their own feet as they fled down the obsidian hallway.
Ren sheathed his sword. "Class-Omega. Sounds fancy."
"It means they're scared," I said.
I looked at the portal—the hole in reality that led to the Null Space. The *Unyielding* was almost fully through. Its massive prow was now suspended in the center of my new throne room, acting as a bridge between worlds.
Dr. Aris stood up, brushing obsidian dust off his lab coat. He looked around the impossible room.
"You..." he swallowed hard. "You can't just take over a sector of the Ring. The Director... the Emperor... they'll send the Fleet. They'll nuke this station to get rid of you."
"Let them try," I said.
I waved my hand, and a holographic map of the entire Mars Orbital Ring appeared in the air before me. It was a massive structure, housing millions of people.
"Dr. Aris, do you know why I fixed the simulation first?"
"No," he whispered.
"Because a good landlord takes care of his property."
I pointed at the map of the station.
"And I'm about to acquire a lot more property."
I looked at the Architect.
"Connect me to the station-wide Public Address system."
*// CONNECTION ESTABLISHED. //*
"Override all channels. Screens, audio, implants."
*// DONE. //*
I took a breath.
Across the Mars Ring—in the luxury apartments of the upper ring, in the industrial slums of the lower ring, on the bridges of the docked starships—every screen went black.
Then, my face appeared.
I didn't look like a monster. I didn't look like a tyrant. I looked calm. I looked like the inevitable future.
"Citizens of the Mars Ring," I spoke. My voice was calm, but it carried the weight of a collapsing star.
"My name is Shigu. Until today, you considered me a glitch. A simulation. A toy."
I leaned forward in my obsidian throne.
"But toys do not rewrite the stars. Glitches do not shatter reality."
I paused, letting the silence hang heavy over millions of souls.
"I have arrived. And I find your management... lacking."
I stood up, and the camera tracked me.
"Your Director hides behind walls. Your Emperor rules from a distance. I am here. I am real. And I am offering you a choice."
I raised a hand, and in the background of the broadcast, they could see the pristine, restored Earth of Server 1—a paradise I had built in three minutes.
"You can continue to serve masters who view you as numbers," I said. "Or, you can serve a god who treats his numbers with respect."
I smiled.
"The Order of Truth is recruiting. Benefits include dental, infinite growth potential, and being on the winning side."
I signaled the Architect to cut the feed.
The room was silent.
Ren let out a low whistle. "Dental? Really, Boss?"
"You have to appeal to the working class, Ren," I said, sitting back down. "Revolutions aren't built on swords alone. They're built on better healthcare plans."
I looked at the console. The hacking progress bar for the station's main defense grid was at 99%.
**[System Integration: Complete.]**
**[Station Defense Grid: Under New Management.]**
I felt it.
The connection snapped into place. It wasn't just the room anymore. I could feel the turret emplacements on the outer hull. I could feel the life support systems circulating air to twelve million people. I could feel the gravity generators spinning the ring.
It was all mine.
I was the Admin.
"Dr. Aris," I said.
"Y-yes?"
"Where is the Director's office?"
Aris pointed a shaking finger upward. "Sector 1. The Apex Spire."
"Excellent."
I turned to Ren.
"Ren, take the First Division. Secure the docks. I want our fleet deployed within the hour. If any Hegemony ships try to undock without permission, disable them."
"On it." Ren saluted and began barking orders to his troops.
"Architect," I said. "Keep the bridge open. Bring everyone through. The mages, the crafters, the civilians. We're going to need a workforce to run this place."
*// AFFIRMATIVE. //*
I stood up and walked to the massive window I had created. Below me, the terraformed surface of Mars glowed red and green. Above me, the lights of the station stretched into a curve that circled the world.
I placed my hand on the glass.
Day 1,292 was coming to an end.
I could feel the tick of the clock in my soul.
**[Day 1,292 Complete.]**
**[Day 1,293 Begins.]**
**[Daily Growth: +10%.]**
The surge hit me.
$1.10^{1293}$.
The number was getting ridiculous. The sheer density of power in my body caused the obsidian floor to crack under my boots. The mana radiating off me was distorting the light in the room, creating a halo of gravitational lensing.
I was becoming too big for this room. Too big for this station.
But that was a problem for tomorrow.
Tonight, I had a Director to fire.
I turned back to the terrified scientist.
"Dr. Aris," I said, my eyes glowing with the promise of infinite ascension. "Do you have a resume?"
He blinked. "I... what?"
"Because I'm going to need a Lead Developer for the new universe I'm building," I said, walking toward the door. "And the position just opened up."
I walked out of the throne room, into the corridor where the flowers lay scattered among the defeated soldiers.
The game was over.
The business merger had begun.
**Chapter 86 Ends.**