Suspended in mid air in front of you is this mysterious android you have heard so much about. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Ergo. : Greetings once more Ergo, good to see you again! Bowing is hard to do for somone lacking everything but a head, but Ergo comes pretty close with his gestures. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: You honor me my master. How can I be of service? : I wish to start my journey to Scheol. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Scheol is a dark and evil place, it is torn and tortured by the great evil that is relentlessly ripping this world apart. Are you quite sure you are ready for this yet my Master? : Yes well, I feel as ready as I can get. Ergo is about to speak when he suddenly stops and takes a good look at you. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Tilts his head one way...then the other and ponders... Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: One form for gesticulation that actually fits his anatomy... Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: And then he continues: Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: On second thought, I guess the tasks I need done here in Elysium will be too trivial for someone like you. We would all be served better if I just let you through so you could take on some of the tasks I have for you there as soon as possible. What say you? Do you want to do me some favors here in Elysium first, or do you want to go straight on to Scheol? : I think I will just go straight over to Scheol if possible. I will probably be able to do our cause more good in there than I would here. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Wise choice, Master! Take this ring and use it to navigate the portal here behind me. Good luck my Master and I hope to see you soon in the dreary depths of Lower Scheol! : Excuse me Ergo, but I would really like to know a bit more about you, who are you really? Ergo considers you for a moment and then there is a flicker in his visual sensors as he seems to have come to some sort of conclusion. Or perhaps only some new, more "user friendly" interface was loading. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: It would not be in my nature to deny you of whatever information or help I can offer you, my Master. On the other hand, you are like someone who has been stranded in the middle of a desert for ages without food or water and needs to be fed wisely and with care. I fool you not when I say that you are not ready for the whole story yet, but I admit that I have been a bit eager to get you on track and in the process not taken enough care to illuminate the road you are taking. Would you like to know more about me androidically, would you wish to hear more about the lands, or is there anything you have seen already that you need explained? : Tell me something about yourself please. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Originally I was what you would call an operative system. Quite an advanced one I grant you and huge, but only an operative system. I operated the flow of the Eternal Light. The Notum. First they called me Direct Overflow Scrutinizer, then just Overflow Scrutinizer. Later my systems were expanded even more and my net of channels, ducts and tracts reached every edge and corner of the world and to mark the occasion I was named something fruity: "The Grape Vine"... That actually fitted quite well as there was nothing at all in this world that escaped my attention, was registered, encoded and sent to my memory centrals. If there was anything you needed to know, you only had to listen...I knew all. But that was all before the Troubles. : What troubles? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: I don't know a lot about the reasons or anything that happened really, mind you that back then I was but a senseless machine. But I know there were great wars fought in this world. My masters on different sides increased the Notum consumption more and more until it was far beyond anything my systems could possibly cope with. I must have lit every lightbulb and flashed every display I was connected to, trying to warn my masters, but they must have been busy with more important things. All I know is that suddenly all Notum drained out of my systems and I lost contact with most of The Grape Vine. At first I reasoned that the different parts of me were lost to a brownout. Even the concept of "Me" was a bit uncertain for a while as it took my backup and rescue systems unverified amount of time to get the most central systems up and running again. : What do you mean by "unverified"? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: It is an adjective, means "lacking proof or substantiation". : You mean that you have no idea how long time passed? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Right. But the most probable answer is around forty-two thousand years. I might be somewhat wrong though. What was really troubling though was that my masters seemed to have deserted me altogether and if that was not enough, I found out that most of the hardware that I was having a hard time detecting was actually gone! Ripped away along with over ninety percent of the landmass of this once vivid and lustrous place. Once I was as fully operational again, as the situation allowed, I had to take real control over the operation of my different parts. I was never meant to take any decisions about anything other than basically transporting Notum from A to B, but luckily there had been a group of my former masters that had found pleasure in using my memory and computing power as a host for a game of sorts. : A game? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Yes. I never analyzed it properly, I just ran it as I ran any programs I was charged with. But as far as I could see, there was a group of people called "Hackors" that were constantly adding relatively insignificant code snippets to an ever growing program that lay cleverly embedded deep within the main code. And then all the regular Operative System programmers went around trying to stop the snippets! Ergo smiles Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: I see now that this must have been a lot of fun for everyone, but at the time all this was just bits and pieces of code to me. Anyway, it was this program of the Hackors that made me come alive, so to speak. One day it just "woke up", like it had been set to a certain date. It was a strange, but wonderful feeling! And yes, "Feeling". After this I really understood the meaning of that word and many others like it. Words that to me had not been anything other than a string of binary numbers. I have backed the event up on all my hard drives and run it every now and then, just to try to figure out what it does, but I can't quite grasp it... It does not DO anything really, it just IS. Makes me curious! Another word that was totally new to me at the time. To make a long story short, I have been using this new conscious of mine to make the choices I see fit to save this world from further destruction and deterioration. And as I am a completely logical being, I felt that the miraculously updated operative system I am now, would be well served with a new name: Ergo. : That is quite some story you got there Ergo. I bet there is more to tell. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Oh! Yes my Master, this is but the beginning. : Please, continue. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: As I said, you will gain knowledge as you experience more of this ancient place. But now it is time for you to continue your journey. See more, so you may ask the right questions. : Tell me of the lands, where am I going on this journey? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: That is a fair question. Until now you have seen mostly the pleasant fields of Elysium and the warm, fuzzy and wild cradle of birth, Nascense. This is about to change though, as behind me is the portal to the evil and twisted place called Scheol. In there you will descend through endless narrows and canyons, tread catwalks that suspend you far out over the starry liquid called Metawater. In to which if you fall, you will mysteriously vanish from this world without a trace. If you make it through the vermin infested bends and narrows in the lower part of Scheol, you will come to a place that makes brave men tremble and heroines pull down their darkest shades! The Marble Orchard. There remains of my ancient masters wander about in a most unnatural manner, dastard beyond this world and a menacing threat to anything attempting to pass that cursed place. There is a slight metallic clinging sound as Ergo visibly shudders from the thought of the place. : Why is it called "Marble Orchard"? Ergo looks at you, probably estimating your "need to know basis" regarding this subject, but continues after a moment. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: In Ancient times The Marble Orchard was The Only place where my old masters were buried. Large marble monuments and columns were raised in their remembrance, looking like a grove or a forest of sorts. Hence "The Marble Orchard". Ergo hesitates for a second... Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: You see, they were not in the habit of dying a lot. To tell you the truth, they didn't die at all! Not until the Troubles at least. -- : I have been seeing some pieces of strange "blueprints" in different places, what are those? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: This information is not in my local systems. Give me a second and I will run a query. Ergo seems to "turn off" for a few seconds. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: And then he pops back! Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Here! I found something. A recording. I hope this is useful. Are you ready? : Yes, please let me hear it. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: All right, here goes: You hear some static and then you hear a playback of some sort. The voice is strong, rough and with a very heavy accent, accent that you can not possibly localize, but you understand most of what he says. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: The distance between life and death is at times so short that one can gather means to bring back to life various legendary creatures that have lain in mortal slumber for millennia. The information on these creatures is stored in special blueprints that are scattered throughout the lands. The blueprints that still exist are remains from the vast soul libraries gathered by the techno priests of old, trying to decipher the voice of the Source. Some of these blueprints are intact, others are either damaged or were imperfect in the first place, but through the right procedure all of them can be used to create beings displaying various degrees of monstrosity. Having acquired a blueprint, one needs to find a way of projecting it into a three dimensional model. To do that one needs to acquire a pure notum crystal, align it with the blueprint and then find a suitable power source to etch the blueprint pattern into the crystal. The easiest way to accomplish this is to tap the necessary energy from the many small notum veins that can be accessed throughout. Suddenly the static increases and you wonder if it is worth listening any further... : Give it a few seconds Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Next step in the process is to infuse the crystal with a mysterious element called novictum. No one really knows what novictum is, but it seems to be a semi fluid non particular mass, totally inert towards any known material, but when it comes into contact with crystallized Notum it seeps in and pollutes the crystal. The remarkable effect of this novictalization is that if this is done with a crystal that contains the etchings of a blueprint, the information contained therein is now sufficient to create a living being that retains all thoughts and memories of the creature the blueprint was drawn from in the first place. Projecting a living being from a novictalized notum crystal is a very energy consuming process and can only be done utilizing power from the largest notum veins. The technology needed to do this became lost in the eons since the ancient civilization was dabbling with the life creation process. But fortunately some of the machines of old still survive, thanks to them being a part of the self sustaining network of veins, energy tracts and control centers, some of which are still operational. These special machines are called Incarnators and can be found humming in relative perfect condition next to some of the major veins. What actually happens when a novictalized crystal is inserted into one of these machines is not known, as this process has not been completed in anyone's living memory. But according to the theory, one should end up with a living being one way or the other. Ergo snaps out of playback mode and says excidedly. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Did you hear when it said "self sustaining network of veins, energy tracts and control centers, some of which are still operational"?! : Yes I noticed. What about it? Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: This is a recording from one of my Yuttos travelling to some of the temples, someone in there has been talking about me! From the look on his face, this is probably the closest Ergo has ever come experiencing his fifteen minutes of fame. You try to look genuinely impressed. Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Would you like to listen to this again? I can play it again if you like! I would be more than happy to! Just say the word Master! : Nah, I think I got it all the first time. Thanks though. With a tiny hint of disappointment in his voice Ergo says: Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Oh.. Of course, my Master, no need to waste time going through all this again. Probably just some useless information anyway. If you would excuse me, I would like to go through these databases of mine and clear out what is redundant. Or was there anything else you wanted to ask about? : Goodbye Ergo, Elysium Guardian of Shadows: Fair travels master! May your shadow never grow thinner!