"I didn't say that, you're godmodding."
A common refrain on the notoriously bad Eumenides Services, (relatively speaking) today several people had had enough. In any normal case, they'd just call it off and hang up...but today, there was a conspicuous lack of hanging-up noises.
"That's because I'm a godmodder!" the sultry voice of a buxom blonde rang through countless phones and into text across space and time as the lady in question flipped through her hair. "Catch me if you can!"
Throwing off her sparkly red dress, and dropping her cellphone, she revealed...she was actually a bearded old man with the power to control the results of other people's actions! Armed with the power of conflict and fetishized transformation reality warping, he'd finally be able to achieve phenomenal cosmic power! Godmodders grew stronger much faster by the use of other people's actions and scenarios to mutate than they did without, so it was time for 'battle'.
Rather than hanging up, a small group of horny and dissatisfied people forced their way through their devices as if they were portals, putting lifetimes on hold, tapping into various cosmic sources of power they didn't know they had (been selected for, in some cases), and prepared for a battle that would shatter reality in dozens of directions if it meant higher quality erotic roleplaying from a so-called professional.
"Salutations, challengers!" the godmodder roared, flickering between countless animal forms and impossibly beautiful human configurations as they rose above a white featureless plane with a random suspiciously indestructible office cubicle. "I am Ciaran, the great godmodder of the furies! This battle is one of building lands and changing their people with the cosmic powers you now possess. Change me, define me, build me fragmented worlds, countless times until we reach the end! Or try to, given that I'll be editing the outcomes of your actions as we go, maybe even changing your inserts right back! No matter what horrors you array against me, they will rarely prune even a single of my endless iterations. Don't expect to get away with repeats, creativity is paramount. Even if you cast me into the role of a mortal, no matter the name or appearance, I'll still bend events in my favor from beyond if my character power proves insufficient. Fractal off a hundred of my lives to my satisfaction, and I will ascend with your aid. Crush me by force or throw me into bad endings a hundred successes first, and I shall dissipate into what remains to grant you a better...Sex Line Operator!"
Black bold text floated into existence above the cubicle, keeping track of the game statistics.
GOOD ENDS: 0/100
BAD ENDS: 0/100
The callers looked to each other first in vague confusion, then with some minor godmodding of 'you understand what's going on' later, debating what transformations to bring forth first even as a few latecomers wandered in after tidying up life matters. Whatever definitions and scenarios they came up with, they could fork off parallel battlefields to fight the boss on, trying to push any given story around for Ciaran of Many Forms to surrender, either accepting it as a good end or giving up as a bad end by physical defeat. Various parties began conjuring up random things with their newfound abilities, and Ciaran began messing with outcomes. Many of these first inclement attacks were a bit below par, a few direct attacks blocked with simple counters. "Ciaran rolls out of the way of that falling piano!", "Ciaran unhooks the bird cage and flies out!", and even "Ciaran blocks your bullets with thick walls of bulletproof glass!" followed by an unsatisfyingly confusing attempt to grope thousands of possible forms at once that while successful wasn't exactly a surrender-inducing termination. Generally a bit basic for things of this tier, maybe the godmodder would have to give clearer instructions. And add 'decent technique' to the search criteria for easily-incited reality warpers, effort that would be.
Ciaran facepalmed with one relatively-stable hand and parried a bunch of high-speed martial arts strikes with the other (shifting appearances with every blow), saying "Guys, this is on a transformation website. Right now I'm indeterminate, I could be anything and pretty much am. I need context, or I'll just keep switching between bodies and denying whatever you do to me."
Someone pied one of the godmodder's elegant ladylike bodies in the face: again a defeat, not exactly a finisher. Wiping aside delicious banana creme, they retreated again to the visage of an old man then said "See, that might have been enough to really embarrass me, put me into a corner, think my life was ruined enough to give up...if I was a high-society noble who direly needed to impress a bunch of meanies to get married or something and couldn't play it off as someone else's incompetence. Try that again with a context where it matters and it might even hit. Tell a story, set the scene a bit, put me somewhere and as some protagonist instead of just expecting a strike in the void to win. If I'm gonna be put down by something simple, I need it to be dramatic and funny!"
A laugh track played briefly, prompting a cross glare at the empty sky. But that didn't matter. Ciaran pushed away a bunch of mundane physical assaults in a burst of kinetic force and said "Gimme a setting, people! We'll make up the rules as we go!"
Ciaran had the advantage in power, defense, clarity of purpose, and knowledge. The callers had the advantages of numbers, creativity, not necessarily being enemies offhand, and being able to decide a lot more about the local settings actively instead of reactively. Who would win would perhaps be decided more by the latter than the former, but Ciaran could perhaps convince some people to come to their side by appeal instead of coercion or trickery.
True to command, someone leapt forward. They were telling a story and about to unleash a world that would coat the blankness. A jeweled orb formed in their hands from spilled words like a cartoonish bomb or a strangely overfilled bowl, primed to detonate into a great covering tale that would bias the unformed and formless into taking genre-appropriate shape about them. It was more a guideline than a binding, something that the callers could disrespect if they cared to, but for Ciaran? A definite shape could mean victory as well as defeat, finally resolving that unstable greater magic and providing the 'action' impetus to the great reaction that was godmodding. Once it was made, the first real battle was on.
With a booming sound and colorful flashes of life, genesis layered out and the history of a created land burst forward with force to match its progenitor explosive. Some callers took up couch seats in the peanut gallery of box seats someone had spawned by the cubicle to make a sort of home theatre, observing the events and issuing transformation orders as so many writers or people yelling at a TV (with the notable caveat their demands would actually be listened to and the world changed in response). Much of Ciaran joined them, an indeterminate form on the other side of the stage seated ominously and alone. Others descended into the world with Ciaran's avatar, choosing to cheat on the front lines and tell the story as direct actors instead of just playing a game. At the very least, they'd be able to make themselves get laid without repercussions, which is probably a significant portion of the callers' real goal in calling a sex line or analogous service. Of course, the callers could fall in or out of the story whenever they wanted, so it was more a choice of whether they wanted to personally feel whatever it was their characters were doing or suffering from in the end.
At least one question remains, of course. Two, most likely. Where is this genesis leading, and (if its scene-setter is choosing to remain an active executive over events writing to and around Ciaran, instead of handing off jurisdiction to the masses) who is telling it?