The First Holy Book

"Oh my god, it's the Third Gift! We found the Third Gift!"

"Come on Julio, let's go. Quickly." said Midas while pacing forward rapidly in the direction of the Shrine. Julio followed him with a blank look on his face as if not understanding what's happening.

"What?? Where?" said someone by the side unbelievingly

"The Third Gift? What's that?" questioned someone with a puzzled expression on their face.

"Don't you remember what the green man said? There were Three Gifts. The first was the Index, the second was the Actualisation, and the Third was some Holy Book."

"Ooohhhh… I remember now."

"Let's go see what's up."

Conversations like these were springing up everywhere in the field. Luckily, Midas was already close to the shining statue, which he now knew was to be referred to as the Shrine. He saw people clamouring to touch it in any way they could, and then move away with a satisfied and excited expression and figured that was the way to get this Holy Book.

He stepped forwards and grabbed the statue and immediately a blue panel showed itself in front of him.

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| Announcement |

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[Congratulations! You have received the Third Gift]

[The First Holy Book has been received!]

[This can be viewed in the new section called Library under the Navigation Menu Bar at the top of the Index]

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Midas immediately swiped away the announcement after coming to an understanding of its contents.

Midas had already called away his Index, so he recalled it now, saying "Index!", and then he focused on the new section called Library which changed the page to an almost blank section

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| Index | Network | Statistics || Library ||

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[1. The First Holy Book]

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When Midas focused on the First Holy Book, a new Panel materialised in front of the Library panel.

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|The First Holy Book |

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Testament 0: The Language of Uzgiyesh

ኲኪኴኲሃኳኪኡኲ ጤኡኪ

ኲኪኴኲሃኳኪኡኲ ኲየየጤ

…

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Before reading on, Midas noticed that more and more people had been drawn in by the commotion as he had expected. He poked Julio's side, making Julio flinch with surprise, saying, "Ey! What the hell, Midas!!"

Midas merely pointed at the incoming hordes of people and said, "We should probably leave before we get squashed to death, don't you think? Did you get it already?"

"Yes, I got it." said Julio after noticing the hundreds of people that were coming towards the Shrine. Before Midas could start moving Julio had already pounced forward, making his way into the crowd.

"Move it!" screamed Julio while forcefully crashing into people. In actuality, people were crashing into him, and they couldn't stop his momentum at all. The people Julio bumped into lost their footing and fell on the floor with some getting stepped on and kicked around. After seeing this, the people who were slightly behind ended up making way for Julio.

Midas merely smiled while seeing this. Julio may actually be a monster. He followed in Julio's footsteps in a calm manner with a smile on his face and like that they made their way out of the stampede. He knew that would happen. Whenever benefits are involved, it's first come first served. It was annoying that he wasn't first, but he had contingencies.

If there was only one instance of the Holy Book, he would establish positive relations with whoever got the book. If there wasn't one, but a limited number of Holy Books, he would try his best to get his own and control some stock. If everyone could get a Holy Book, then he would just make sure he would be one of the first few and walk away.

All three of those options required him to be quick and impartial. This was why he also called Julio. In the case of a limited stock, Why have one rare item, when you can have two. As an added bonus, Julio's physicality was something he was bound to see on their way out of the stampede. And he was impressed so far.

"Haha Julio, you're crazy!", said Midas after getting out of the area of activity of the crowd. He should have atleast acted like he was going to get along with them before feigning difficulty and forcing them out of the way. But he just went ahead and forced all of them out of his way. It was comical at that moment, as they looked like pinballs bouncing off his chest.

"Haha, I'm not crazy, I'm strong. Very strong.", said Julio in the manner of a braggart. Midas could only shake his head. He was clearly very strong.

Midas looked behind him and from the back it seemed like everyone at the back was pushing everyone at the front forward. Soon enough there would be chaos, maybe even injuries. This was bad. Everyone was panicking.

"Everyone, don't panic. It seems like you can get it as long as you touch the Shrine at the front. Just stay calm and walk forward in an orderly fashion. Please. We don't want any injuries now do we?", said a Chinese American girl from the front. She was being squeezed in by all the incoming people and having difficulty finding her footing. But her eyes still shone with vigour as she voiced out her opinion.

And as if magic, people slowed down visibly and found themselves taking care to check on eachother. Some people had already gotten injured though, so it was already too late for them. But some found themselves almost injured and couldn't help but complain at the mindless hordes while profusely thanking the girl.

Having calmed everyone down, she smiled and said, "It's nothing much. We need to help each other guys. If anyone finds any information, please share it with the rest of the group as soon as possible."

"Yeah, guys. Let's calm down. We need to help each other as much as possible."

"Yeah!"

Midas shook his head imperceptibly at this display. 'Another mental manipulation skill user huh…'

As far as Midas was concerned, using skills on people without their knowledge or consent was a moral gray-zone. Even if one creates an altruistic reason behind the use of the skill, at the fundamental level, the real reason would always be self-serving, and thus in opposition to the rules of society. And yet here this woman was, using Skills on people and being thanked for it.

It seemed there were some interesting people here. She would most definitely make something of herself soon enough. It was worth keeping an eye on her.

Midas made a mental note of the woman's face and turned to continue walking away from the Shrine.

"Midas? Where are you going?"

"I'm trying to explore this place. Would you like to come with me?" said Midas without turning back.

Julio could only shake his head and follow along.

They started walking away from the centre and passed by some interesting sights. The grass was the same kind of height which came up to Midas' ankle. Every tree here was the same kind of Tree, which seemed like a hazel type tree that had broadleaf type leaves and small bulb like structures on it, which seemed like seeds. These trees stood at approximately 4 metres high.

Does a tree like this exist on Earth? The answer was No. And Midas knew that because he found himself having the ability to recall all the data nad information he had ever come across in his 60 million years of Life. This must have something to do with his Gift. Midas was excited to discover just what his Skills were and how they worked.

Midas picked up some of these bulb structures from a tree and attempted to break one open. He failed. Frowning, he thought 'Is my strength so low?'. Midas put the bulbs in his pants pocket and kept walking forward. He would just investigate the bulb later.

While Midas was walking around he was continuing his exploration of his Index.

He focused on his Gift section and Authority Section the same way he did earlier and another panel opened up.

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…

Authority: Authority of Omniscience (Ex Rank)

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| Authority of Omniscience |

[The Universe Resonates with You. You Know All. You Are All.]

Skills: [Eye of Truth (Lv. 1)], [Hidden Divinity (Lv. 1)], [Destiny Vision (Lv. 1)]

<—————

Gift: Gift of Knowledge (S Rank)

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| The Gift of Knowledge (S Rank) |

[The memory of the world is with you. This Gift enhances the ability to communicate with the Universe, receive knowledge from it, and give knowledge to it.]

Skills: [Eye of Judgment (Lv. 1)], [Divine Database (Lv. 1)], [Memory of the World (Lv. 1)]

<—————

…

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Midas smiled after viewing the panels. Since these skills were born from S and Ex rank Gifts, they should be incredibly powerful. Now that he had the opportunity to check them out fully, then he would do so. After seeing this much, he couldn't help but be excited. As long as he focused on a certian skill, a short description would come up. He vowed to explore all of them as soon as possible. If he could learn the fundamentals, he could reconstruct the logic and apply it to his own use cases.

There was something that made him incomparably excited. A description for a Skill that he just had to try no matter what.

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| Destiny Vision (Lv. 1) |

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[The ability to See the Destiny in all Creations relative to other Creations]

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What did this mean??

Some people think of destiny as some purpose. A Christian would tell you that as God's creation, they were set onto this Earth with some destiny to fulfil, some purpose to uphold. And as such, they should live their lives as one with God, and in doing so, God will lead them to their destiny in the most effortless way possible.

As long as Christians are living in God's Grace, they are fulfilling their Destiny and thus have some sense of direction and purpose.

In a sense, Destiny for a Christian is a sense of direction for the Grace of God.

No matter how simple that sounds, it is incredibly profound.

For example, a Daoist might say that Destiny is the sense of Direction for the Dao.

But the Dao can never be known, nor can it be called by name or defined fully, just like God's Grace.

Midas, as an Agnostic person or someone who believes that nothing real can be known about the existence and nature of a God, might think of God's Grace as the Laws of Nature instead. His idea of this would be "Destiny is a sense of direction for the Laws of Nature".

This Nature does not refer to the plants and the birds and the bees, but to all things. From the smallest subatomic particles to the largest Red Giants in the Universe. Everything is governed by Laws which we humans are still only stumbling to discover.

Now Midas, being given the ability to see Destiny itself, was incredibly excited. This was something beyond profound. And according to the description, the destiny he would be seeing would be relative to other destinies. Incredible.

He closed his eyes and thought to himself [Destiny Vision] and then when he opened them everything changed.

The world was grey. Pure grey. No more colourful trees in his surroundings, no more green grass, just greyness all around him. The outlines of objects and people were slightly darker, but all in all, everything was grey. Except for One place. In a direction to the South, there stood an object and it radiated a golden colour that was blinding. That golden colour seemed to be calling Midas, beckoning him to come closer.

Midas was shocked. He started moving towards the golden colour but then his world turned upside down and he found himself lying on the floor.

"Midas? Are you okay? You fell down just now, do you need anything?"

"I'm fine, thank you." said Midas with a bright smile on his face. But he currently had a splitting headache, making that smile a bit straining to put on. If it wasn't for his milk coffee coloured skin, he would be looking pale right now. Midas smiled, mocking himself, thinking 'It is said that if you see the secrets of the Heavens, your eyes would go blind. I'm lucky all I'm getting is a headache right now.'

"Are you sure?" asked Julio. He had noticed Midas' strange state earlier and then when Midas was about to fall, he hurriedly caught him and placed him on the floor. This little guy was so troublesome. Well, as his friend, He just had to help him out now and again.

"Yes. I'm sure. We need to go somewhere." said Midas while pushing himself to stand up. There was something in the South. He had to see it.

"Where are we going?"

"South. We're going to the South."