-MAIN CAST-

~Arthur Gold~

Birthday: Just a few moments ago.

Likes: Developed talent.

Dislikes: Unearnt goods.

Description: An English robot, 2 Metres tall (6’6).

~Gi Cheong~ (Cheong Gi/정 기)

Birthday: ?, 29 years old.

Likes: Ethics, societal progress, magic, inventions (even unnecessary or dumb ones).

Dislikes: Sugar, fires.

Description: Korean human

male, 1.7 Metres tall (5’5).

~Arthur’s Inventor (Real name unknown)~

Birthday: ?, 50-70 years old.

Likes: Power, royalty, minions.

Dislikes: Weak people.

Description: Nobody knows what he looks like under that attire. 2 Metres tall (6’6).

~Arthur’s Pet Skunk~

Birthday: A few months ago.

Likes: Arthur, pets, doing nothing, delicious and juicy little bugs.

Dislikes: Aggressiveness, noise.

Description: Striped skunk. Is just a tiny little baby. 45 centimetres (18 inches).

Dedications:

The artwork has been made by the brazilian artist using the username “Chazster”

Special thanks to José “Squair” Sanchez who helped me revise this story and Polyester for helping me develop the concept of Light Realm as a whole. The font used is Roboto Slab.

-Light Realm: IF-

Part of what makes a person have a soul is the ability to think, whether emotionally or logically, or a balance of both. There are just as many emotionally ridden people as there are logical, yet each of these is bound to make an error at some point. Emotions will tell you, “I should’ve handled that differently!” where logic will instead say, “I should fix it this way.”

People and stories say the same thing over and over, like an old, broken record. “Think logically; don’t let your emotions get the best of you.” But emotions are part of what makes us what we are. Emotions are overwhelmingly powerful and may get the best of us; they aren’t as easy to control as we give them credit for. Not a chance.

Today, you will get to see the perspective of an emotional side. A “What If”, that is, where a person’s love was strong enough to power their soul into snapping and firing against something that was initially hopeless… Indeed… Love sure is a strong thing… Around a billion years ago, in a planet known as ‘Meex’, a planet that focused on gathering data and resources from other planets, a stereotypical mad scientist had just finished their newest invention. While Meex at this time was mere fields and ancient houses, they had obtained the best technology Earth had to offer, and put it in combination with his powerful magic and smarts.

An extremely powerful, cunning, yet gentle and diplomatic robot who would be the new ruler of an isolated kingdom full of mediocre peasants. The scientist exclaimed cheerfully, “Yes! Haha! Yes!” as the robot was all done. The strongest materials mixed with a powerful and strong artificial soul fabricated through some toughly trained magic the scientist had waited all their life for. This was the invention of his lifetime, a grand creation, and perhaps one of the best inventions this kingdom or even the entire planet had seen in its entire history.

He proceeded to turn on the robot. The robot then lifted himself up, examined himself, and stated, “I take it; I've just been built, right?” He seemed confused over having a beard despite being a robot. Usually robots don’t look human like this.

The scientist chuckled, answering the poor robot’s question. “Quite indeed, Mr. Arthur Gold. You are my new and most precious invention! Your purpose in this world is quite simple; as a robot, I expect you to follow orders without complaints, mhm?” He put his hands together and connected every finger one by one repeatedly. This ol’ chap had quite the terrible aura, even for the least smart of people. And yet: The robot had been programmed with the inability to disobey his inventor, for that was the biggest flaw of a robot: They were programmed to follow orders from their programming and their maker. The robot, Arthur Gold, had no choice other than to obey the man even if he didn’t like it. The scientist ordered him to become a ruler, as the previous king had passed away and they were tasked with making a new one.

After being introduced to his new room, the king heard the cries of a cub. He looked around, and very quickly after he saw a tiny skunk had snuck into the room through the window. The poor animal had gotten injured from the fall and cried for help, eeping. The new king quickly rushed to the animal and petted the baby with his hand, casting healing magic in the process. As he did, the skunk stopped crying and chirped, then licked the king to show its affection.

This small act of kindness and heroism filled the robot’s CPU with a feeling of happiness. Happiness for the first time, and in the process of saving a life no less. He felt good and proud of himself, while at the same time happy to save such an adorable, precious little kit. The scientist yelled with all his might, calling for the bearded robot’s name. They had summoned him to the balcony to introduce himself to the villagers. They bowed, much to the robot’s uneasiness, just to be accepted by the king.

The king kept one eye on his inventor and the other on the skunk to take care of it. Filled with curiosity over the black and white fluffy animal, examining its behaviour, petting it, enjoying its happiness, and finding out how relaxing it felt to pet an animal… From that day on, he would spend most of his time fixated on the skunk. Raising it as a pet, which only led to strange comments from the people. Some even accused it of stinking up the place. But still, King Arthur didn’t care; all he wanted was to love his newly-met small animal friend.

The first month, the scientist kept asking questions and giving unsolicited ‘advice’ to the King. Do this, do that. The scientist ordered; it greatly annoyed the King, but he had no choice but to oblige. He quickly realised his programming was limiting him. He was influenced to listen to his orders, although he didn’t necessarily have to obey all of them. That much was clear.

The second month, an event occurred to him that would make him realise something shocking, which he would erase from his memory later on from how traumatising it was. He found his inventor looting the corpse of the previous king; he had gone to the local town’s graveyard to pay his monthly respects to the fallen ones. Confused, he approached the inventor, confronting him with a question perhaps a bit too informal for him. “Goodness gracious! The hell are you doing over there? He may be unable to object in death, but I object to this! You… explain yourself, please! Surely you have a reasonable and understandable excuse?!”

The inventor looked at him, laughed, and replied: “This king… his crown had a really nice gem… a gem that holds an immense great amount of power! I have to put it to use… How can we allow the waste of such a great artefact like this? To hell with the bloody dead, anyway! They can’t complain when they’re stuck in a coffin six feet under!” So he thought, ‘Not respecting the dead… Could this be the kind of person I’m dealing with? And to do it for power… I can’t… I can’t live with this memory! Absolutely not, for Pete’s sake!’ Not getting the stress get to his CPU, he walked to his castle room, making sure to not cause a scene for the townspeople nearby to not worry. When he arrived there, he looked into his own OS and scanned his own memory of the scene just now.

Yes, there was no doubt about it. From the short time he watched the corpse of that king, he noticed traces of poison… It didn’t make things any better. Not at all… Could this have been done on purpose? He pondered. And now he’s being given this huge responsibility? He felt so guilty… And couldn’t help it… From his OS, He had sudo access. He felt he had no other choice here. He deleted his memory of this event but left a note for himself for the future. ‘Be careful of that Inventor, don’t trust him completely without a second thought.’ “…Ah. What happened? I must have been lost in thought…”

King Arthur spent weeks pondering to himself over what happened, what he should do, and how to prepare himself for combat. He spent all nighters training himself magically; even if he knew he was supposed to be perfect, he couldn’t risk a single failure. Better to be safe than sorry, as they say. Eventually, one day, he got a visit from a strange source. “Hello, Mr. Gold! I am Gi Cheong, the Super Researcher. Could I perhaps have a quick chat with you?”

“Ah, of course. I am not very busy at the moment. What is it?” King Arthur replied to the young man, he had clear skin, long curly black hair, rounded glasses with a scar on one blind eye, steampunk arm and leg, long curly black/dyed hair… “I’ve been hearing about all the stuff you and your inventor have been going through. I am really excited that perhaps I could give some assistance with the research I’ve accumulated over the years. I think that’d help, right?”

“I’m sure I’ll be able to come up with an answer once I take a look at whatever you want to present to me, Mr. Cheong.” With that said, Gi showed King Arthur several documents that Arthur just as quickly scanned.

Gi excitedly said, “I have done a lot of research about souls. If there’s anything I’ve noticed the most, it’s that souls are bound by your emotions and both mental and physical health. The more happy you feel with yourself and the healthier you are, the stronger your soul is. In a way, love for someone is the strongest thing imaginable. Hehe.”

“Love, huh…” Arthur looked to his side, taking a glance at his pet skunk that was relaxedly taking a nap on the floor. His love for animals was something strong indeed, he had a strong desire to not only protect them, but also feed them and pet them.

“I’m not too sure what I’ll do if I were to lose something I’d love, I hope that time never comes.”, “Haha! You have nothing to worry about! OH, also! That reminds me… I was going to show you something else. Interested, my friend?”... “...Whatever gets you through the night, bloke.”

“Behold, King Arthur Gold! The research of my life! Or, err, well… the past few years actually! Bahaha…” His eccentric enthusiasm was oddly welcomed, helping the king calm down given the situation he was in. The bizarre researcher illustrated several images into the room through his soul. After excitingly giggling, he followed, “I’ve discovered something that nobody ever knew before! It turns out that after someone dies, their soul remains for several years, slowly decaying… This soul can have lots of uses…

It can be a spectator, or maybe its power can be absorbed or re-utilised into something else… Aahhh!! Just thinking about it makes me crazy!! The possibilities are endless… In fact, it’d open up quite the moral dilemma! Should we let the souls of the dead rest, or could we use them to advance as a society? You decide!”

“Ahh… erm…” King Arthur, uncomfortable by the situation, stood up and approached him. “That’s… quite the info-dump you got there, chap. But why are you sharing it with me?”

“Because I want somebody to listen to my breakthroughs, and then they can decide what to do with it! Please… Let me work under you, Mr. Gold!”

Gi got on his knees and bowed down to Arthur. He flinched, and extended his palms. “Stop it. We can talk this out without the unnecessary clownery. But I can’t let you in my castle yet, so this stuff will have to be done either here or at your place.”

“Okay! Fine by me!” The strange duo then went inside the steampunk-wearing researcher’s lab, in there, the robot’s eyes sparkled with curiosity as he discovered several gadgets he had never seen before. Those were, presumably, made by Gi himself. Gi clapped his hands with excitement. “Excellent! It seems we got ourselves a curious friendo!”

“What exactly do you plan to do with all this, anyway?” Said the intrigued robot. “I couldn’t see a reason you’d have all of this to yourself. No partners, no employees, are you perhaps planning something on a greater scale?”

“Hah… I guess so, Mr. Gold. The truth is that I want to gather as much research from these topics as possible, then make it accessible for everyone, perhaps so one day it can be put to use. Though; I’d like to keep royalties and that they’re all used ethically.”

Gi smiled and showed around the complexity of his own lab to the robot king, telling him tidbits of information and explaining several things about his work along with information that didn’t matter much anyway… Regardless, King Arthur listened all the way, he was finally genuinely interested in something for the first time in his life.

Gi then spread his arms, aiming at the sky. “Now let me explain to you some more cool things I’ve discovered!” The king and researcher would talk about their goals and motives, along with several other aspects of their own lives, even the mundane. They had grown to like each other's company, and this would follow for this second month and the following third month. One faithful day, they reunited after a week of not seeing each other at all.

Gi was excited to see Arthur. “Ah, Mr. Gold! Or should I say… Arthur? It’s so nice to see you.” He offered a hug, to which King Arthur didn’t follow. He then looked disappointed, and a bit sad. Arthur crossed his arms. “Sorry, I'm still not used to physical attention. How’s it going?”

“It’s going fine! I was thinking of what happened a couple weeks ago… how… you accidentally tripped on your pet skunk, haha…” “Ah… what? What are you talking about?”

“Huh?” Confused, the two talked a bit about the situation. It seemed the king was foolishly erasing his own bad memories.

“Arthur! You should absolutely and definitely NOT do that! Mistakes are how you learn how to do stuff, and you’re a royal! History allows us to learn what not to do.”

“Ah… I mean, surely a researcher like you doesn’t make as many mistakes as I possibly could (assuming I did so many)...”

“Not exactly.” Cheong Gi, the Super Researcher, used his artificial arm to slide a wall through telekinesis. There, he showed King Arthur a lot of broken artefacts and all kinds of junk. “This is where I store my mistakes in case I want to reuse them in another project in the future. Life’s not easy… plus, buddy!!! Look at my arm and leg!!!”

“Ah, right, erm…” King Arthur took a quick glance at his steampunk prosthetics, then looked aside embarrassed. “Perhaps my thinking and course of action were incredibly foolish… I apologise.”

“D-don’t worry about it!! Just don’t erase any more stuff, alright? Or, at least give the data to me. I mean… That’s not what I’d rather you pick, but I guess it’s an option.”