Grimfalk lowered his enormous bulk into the chair reserved for him at the enormous table that dominated the majority of GOD’s main conference room. The phoenix hide leather creaked as his backside slid the last few inches before finding stability, and the resulting sound elicited laughter from the theropod Deity’s neighbors.

  “It’s not funny,” he hissed. Whatever he might have said or done next was forestalled by the banging of a gavel, which penetrated to every corner of the conference room over the dull roar that accompanied thousands of chatting Deities.

  "The 534,933rd special conference of Earth's GOD is now in session. All rise in honor of President Brett!" Formua Integralis’ telepathic command echoed throughout the assembly.

  Grimfalk rose with the others, almost missing the moment when President Brett appeared through his personal entrance. Before his preternaturally keen eyes could adjust, the human Deity was already seated on the rainbow throne, ready to get down to business. The theropod Deity had never seen Brett in such a serious mood, and he had to fight down the urge to ask one of his neighbors if they knew what was going on. But doing so would get him into hot water with Formua, and he seriously doubted that he would get off with just a warning this time.

  “Please be seated," President Brett asked, his voice calm in a way that made it evident he was bottling up his true feelings.

  Instead of using the cover of thousands of bodies returning to a more or less recumbent position to gossip, the theropod Deity used his brain for once, trying to come up with every likely scenario that could have resulted in a special conference. Unfortunately, at least one of them involved the actions of his Champion, Charlemagne. After running through all the ways that the rooster could have been the impetus for a special session, Grimfalk kept brainstorming ideas. He came up with a total of three hundred and seventy-two possible reasons before Brett began to speak again.

  "Our first order of business is to deal with the minutes from our last special session. Our secretary, Louis, will read the minutes of our last session."

  "I motion we forgo the reading on the grounds that every member of GOD has a photographic memory,” a high-pitched voice called out from what looked like an enormous petri dish.

  “Second!” a multitude of voices rose in agreement.

  Thus, reading of the minutes was once again skipped over.

  “The President recognizes Formua Integralis, Vice President of GOD, to address today’s special agenda,” Brett intoned, following protocol to the letter. “Formua, if you please?”

  “Thank you, President Brett,” Formua responded, dipping her insectoid head in acknowledgment. “The first order of business is to share information about a mutual threat that has been discovered approaching Earth. Following the sharing of this information, there will be an hour for open debate, followed by a vote on GOD’s official response, if any, to the threat.”

  There were a few scattered gasps throughout the assembly as Formua shared the special conference’s agenda. In the entire history of GOD, there had only been nine previous sessions called explicitly to deal with “mutual threats”. Five of those sessions had resulted in a significant percentage of Deities losing all of their followers in a short amount of time.

  A tear rolled down the side of Grimfalk’s scaly snout as he thought back to the meeting where Teleostia, who was the President of GOD at the time, had announced the imminent impact of a massive asteroid that would wipe out most multicellular organisms on Earth.

  “A massive asteroid has been detected that will imminently impact the Earth and wipe out most multicellular life,” President Brett stated, his composed voice belying the awful news.

  Grimfalk’s jaw dropped as his brain stroked out for a moment. When the lights came back on, more tears welled up in his eyes, threatening to spill over at any time. For an instant, the theropod Deity was convinced that this was all somehow a colossal joke being played at his expense. He was about to spring up out of his seat to accuse the President of playing games when Brett spoke again.

  “I wish that were the worst news that I need to share with you. But there is a larger problem here, or, at least, a more insidious one.”

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  Brett spent a long moment looking out across the room, making sure that he had GOD’s full attention. He did.

  “The long and short of it is that we have no idea where this asteroid originated from. I have checked all of the records that humans made before the System’s arrival, and it’s not in any of them. Yes, I know that the records they made weren’t perfect, but this thing is too big to have been missed. On top of that, the composition of the object clearly shows that it is not native to our solar system, but it is not moving fast enough to have originated elsewhere. Although I yet lack definitive proof, I am convinced that there is some connection to the System here.

  To that end, I have asked a few key members of the System Integration Committee to look through our own records on the System to determine if this type of event had been provided for. You all know the excellent work that Rogier, the chair of the System Awareness for Fairness in Exploitation subcommittee, has performed. Rogier has performed a thorough if rather hasty analysis and has several determinations that he would like to present. The chair recognizes Rogier.”

  The space within the conference room warped subtly for a split second, leaving a coppery taste in Grimfalk’s mouth. He quickly swallowed as Rogier, who had suddenly appeared at the head of the enormous oval table, took his spot at the podium and cleared his throat.

  “My dear colleagues, I have analyzed all of our files related to the System’s implementation, paying careful attention to those that relate to random events, worldwide challenges, and other similar subroutines. While GOD did provide for some level of variety, none of the scripted challenges that were meant to be overcome collectively held such a steep penalty for failure. It was only through careful digging that I…”

  “GET TO THE POINT, POINDEXTER!” a voice shouted from near the back of the conference room. Roger, the deity representing all non-English badgers, had risen to his feet and was shaking a paw in anger at his relative.

  “If you interrupt these proceedings again, I shall shortly possess a new badger fur hat,” the icy voice of Formua Integralis rang through every assembled mind. Roger muttered something under his breath and sat back down.

  “As I was saying before the…disturbance,” Rogier continued. “It was only through careful digging that I was able to locate a set of circumstances that would allow the System to put the Earth in danger. The initial System rollout included a set of semi-random events known as “Challenges”, which are split into two different categories: individual and worldwide. Individual challenges are generally easier, which really goes without saying, but can appear when any given individual has reached a certain threshold of strength. The second category, worldwide, actually requires a number of individuals to be above a minimum value. Our projections indicated that it would take at least six months for either of the categories to be unlocked. Unfortunately, it appears that there is at least one individual out there that is breaking the curve, so to speak.”

  “What happens if I were to handle the Challenge myself,” Brett asked the badger deity.

  “I would not recommend doing that,” Rogier answered with a shake of his head. “You would likely unlock even harder Challenges if the System detects your true level of power. We could rush an emergency patch to try to fix this, but that will likely break something else. At the end of the day, though, it’s your call, President Brett. Just tell me what to do.”

  The human deity took a deep breath before opening the floor to the promised debate. The hour passed quickly as deities championed their preferred method for handling the asteroid. A sizable minority wanted Brett to handle it. An almost equally large group wanted to find out whose Champion had grown strong enough to trigger an individual Challenge with world-altering consequences and make that individual handle it. The rest wanted Rogier to install an emergency patch.

  Once open debate ended, voting began. As each measure was defeated by narrower and narrower margins, a cohesive plan began to emerge. Eventually, after seventeen rounds of voting, GOD had made a decision. It would tax each deity a small amount of DKP in order to offer a World Quest. All creatures across Earth would be eligible to receive the rewards, despite the fact that the Challenge was likely meant to be handled by an individual.

  But GOD wasn’t playing dice: they had a backup plan in case the asteroid remained intact. Brett would spend as much divinity as needed to intervene by warping space around the asteroid if it got too close to the Earth, causing it to miss entirely. Because the human deity could perform this action from his own demiplane, the intervention would carry the minimum amount of risk when it came to exposing himself to the System.

  Once the voting had concluded, the members of GOD all patted themselves on the back and prepared to implement the plan. Brett asked the members of the System Integration team to join him and Rogier in GOD’s System control room, where the adjustments would be made to trigger the World Quest.

  One by one, the deities filed out of the conference room and started making their way back to their demiplanes, already composing in their heads the messages that they would be sending to their Champions to alert them to the upcoming Quest and highlight the rich rewards that would certainly follow. Among them was Grimfalk, who was still shell-shocked from the repetition of the circumstances that had led to the extinction of the theropods. But despite having to deal with a sixty-six-million-year-old case of PTSD, the theropod Deity was slowly recovering his wits. By the time he reached an area of GOD headquarters that was not warded against dimensional travel, he had regained enough clarity to ask a very important question.

  “If my kind wasn’t able to survive the fallout of an asteroid at the height of their power, what are the creatures alive now going to be able to do?”