Chapter 1: Well Shiiiiit
"Hey hey hey Cyberneticons! It's ya Boi!" Clifford grinned as he glanced at the active camera, flashing his dimpled smile.
"Now I know all…" glancing at the viewer count, his grin widening even more as he continued, "Five hundred and fifty four million of you are excited to be seeing what I'll be doing today after last week's livestream of me hacking into every government database on the planet." He leaned back, brushing off non-existent dirt from his shoulders.
"But today, today we test our bad boy with the real challenge." Cracking his knuckles and leaning forward as a romanticized pride, and possibly even lust, dripped into his voice as he began stroking his computer as he glanced dazedly back at the camera. "The true quantum computer I personally designed and built, after having passed the modular software system checks last week has now had all digital information downloaded and stored upon its hard drive. I'm talking about the modern era's New Library of Alexandria here. Like if shit hit the fan for the human race, you just need this bad boy to regain everything."
One dramatic pause later, "Or, any good ol' quantum computer should give y'all access to the records." With a little finagle and spin in his chair, he finally wiggled his eyebrows before opening the screen recording, allowing his viewers to see the quantum computer screen.
"Now follow along, ignore the memes, rule 34, and gif folders here and, Ah Hah! Here we go Cyberneticons!" … "No I'm not going to open my stash for you, Sleazypen. It's my precioouus." *Cough* *Cough* "Now then. The glorious games' file. When I tell you every game humanity has made is in this little bun, you better believe it!"
Clifford moved the cursor, passing the hundreds of visible folders on the screen before clicking onto the games' folder. As the program opened, the screen was immediately cluttered with a multitude of desktop icons, and as the viewers watched the continuously growing slide wheel on the side, and then continuously shrinking slide bar until the bar itself was no longer visible, their mouths dropped in pure jealous awe.
Glancing at the chat, Clifford coughed while scratching his nest. "What you mean, RichSugarDaddyNeeded?! Of course I didn't pay for all these games. What do you take me for? A Wizard? For your information, I am the proud age of 39 and your momma enjoyed the earth shattering, rear-ending pounding I gave her last night!"
He paused. "HEY CHAT! Stop distracting me! We need to complete the challenge to prove this beast has what it takes. Now then, let me just find it real quick."
%7 HOURS LATER%
"Ah, here we go! Finally found it. Hmm? God damn it Chat! It was not an hour long wait, stop spamming those antique SpongeBob memes! Here! Look! The glorious game to test if the mighty beast has what it takes to fulfill our deepest dreams and desires! I proudly present! Stellaris 3, 10.7. I'm telling you folks. The great Confederacy of Human Supremacy will finally make it to the late game. NO MORE LAG FOR US CHAT! WOOHOO!"
Taking a drink of his stale groda, Clifford took the time to read his chat once more. "Hell ya! No more having to cleanse the rest of the galaxy or throw my people into vassals to hide much of the galaxy just so the computer can chug a frame per minute. I'm telling you. With The Beast, I'll be the first one to complete the nine crises and one damner challenge. We'll finally be able to see the Hunters, even though Pdox did so hard to keep them bad boys hidden from us after deciding to finally add them to the game. I'm telling you folks. This is the RUN OF THE CENTURY!"
Clicking the desktop icon of Stellaris 3, Clifford chuckled. "I'm telling yall. We'll finally achieve the unachievable. Oh, and do keep in mind, I have all the mods installed as well, so I mean, this galaxy is Fuucked once everything starts coming in."
After several minutes of processing, Stellaris 3 finally loaded up, allowing Clifford to finally create his new run, setting everything to the largest and maxed settings he could, just to show how much of a beast The Beast was. The gargantuan galaxy that was added in Stellaris 2, creating a galaxy with 5,000 systems was flicked, with nearly 300 space empires immediately spawned. Clifford's chuckle as his chat cried out, warning against such a nightmare, was as smooth as a breeze, no "I'm in danger!" senses coming from him.
Upon clicking start, the now near one billion viewers all held their breath as they watched The Beast load the game, releasing it in shocked surprise as the star system appeared, allowing Clifford to begin his conquest. Twenty minutes passed as Clifford sped through the beginning of the game, claiming star systems, building up his planets, infrastructure, and his fleets as he prepared his empire for the supremacy of mankind. "Now remember folks, since The Beast can process everything late game, we won't be needing to waste the greatest resource of the game. Every xenos will be mankind's slave, toiling away to give us paradise!"
As he was excitedly laughing to himself, a popup appeared upon the screen. "Hmm?" Clifford looked at the anomaly pop up. "Oh shit folks! We have an entirely new anomaly! Man, in my seventeen years of playing Stellaris, I have never seen this anomaly, Purple Rift. Pause Pause! Gotta go check the dev logs real quick, I wanna know when this was added!"
As he paused the game and slid his mouse to move to his other screen and access the dev logs, his eyes widened as he realized in his excitement, he had accidentally clicked to accept his scientist beginning the research, leading to him losing the notification.
"NO!!! Damn it! Where was that bugger?" He forgot about his want to check the dev logs, beginning to search through his seven science ships, trying to find the star system that held this purple rift. Finally, upon looking at his last scientist, he found a twin star system with seven planets circling the two stars. Looking closely his eyes widened as he gazed upon one of the seven worlds being partially consumed within a vibrant, bright light purplish astral rift. "Holy shit guys, I may have just unlocked access to the Shroud itself earlier than I thought. Fuck ya, which Shroud daddy is waiting for me on the otherside? Let this little boy leech off you until I turn you and the others into a fine resource, For Humanity!"
However, his eyes widened as within a singular second, the notification popup appeared: Anomaly Completed, Enjoy YOUR New HELL! "Wait, what?" As the last word left his confused lips, a crack of thunder resonated within the room.
For those watching the stream. One minute, they were watching Clifford's large blobbed nose press closely to his camera interface as he tried to see the details going on within the game. The next second, flashing lights of various colors screamed through his camera. Reds, Greens, Purples, Golds, but most predominantly was the arcing Blue bolts of lightning surging through the camera screen until the camera fritzed and a black static screen took its place, followed by a secondary fritz as the stream hit a black screen as the game too, disappeared.
Excruciating pain flooded Clifford's mind as the bolts of pure energy tore through him, sparking from his quantum computer. As his mind lost the ability to process what was occurring he lost himself to it, not registering how much time passed before, like a blink to him, he found himself floating in a void.
Just as he processed the vibrant, maddening visions of flashing colors, arcs of energy, ungodly creatures of varying morphities and construct, including larger beings made of the circuiting energy, colors, and gasses; all clashing against each other as they tore one another apart before freezing to turn their gaze towards him. Then the sound came. The unintelligible shrieks, the chittering of teeth and other more insect-like bits as they clashed together. Madness surrounded him and Clifford only had one thought he could process before Hell itself set themselves upon him. "Well Shiiiiit!"