Welcome to the Program

[airlockedmods]

Good Morning, Champions. In the interest of maintaining healthy sleep patterns, a day/night cycle is in effect. Your presence is expected in the cafeteria in exactly one hour.

[The voice comes through not a large speaker, but through the device that's attached to each Champion's arm. Further investigation of the features of the device will reveal a list of profiles, a mini-map, and a list of rules. The hallways are shiny white and silver, with running lights along the floor and lights on the ceiling, and at the junction of the hallways is a sign with a knife and fork icon and an arrow pointing down the hall.

Welcome to the Excellence Program, Champions. Time to get to know your teammates.]

Comments

[voltrounds]

We must have been from pretty far apart, then. [Well technically!] Etria's whole economy is centered around Yggdrasil.

[tasteslikesurvival]

That sounds like a name out of a story.

[voltrounds]

Maybe it is. I know "Yggdrasil" is.

[tasteslikesurvival]

I think I've heard that name before, yeah... Maybe from one of my games.

[voltrounds]

It was a mythological tree that connects all the parts of the world together.

[tasteslikesurvival]

Something like that, yeah.

[She's not up on her Norse.]

[voltrounds]

This one was named after that one, since it was going to take the form of huge trees.

[tasteslikesurvival]

You created a bunch of trees.

[voltrounds]

Not just trees. They absorb pollutants and regenerate Earth's biosphere.

[tasteslikesurvival]

That's...one way to go green.

[voltrounds]

By that time, it was the only way. The ecosystem had completely collapsed.

[tasteslikesurvival]

That would be bad. [Yes, Kurumi.]

[voltrounds]

It was. We wouldn't have attempted the Yggdrasil Project if there'd been any other option.

[tasteslikesurvival]

So it's just trees that change things?

[voltrounds]

I guess you could put it that way.

[tasteslikesurvival]

I don't get it.

[voltrounds]

It's just that that makes it sound like something really minor, when they completely repaired all the damage to the environment.

[tasteslikesurvival]

It just...I can't really imagine it.

[voltrounds]

It is hard to picture if you haven't seen the results. There was an entire forest growing inside.

[tasteslikesurvival]

It's not trees but it has trees inside it?

[voltrounds]

City-sized trees with regular trees inside.

[tasteslikesurvival]

So many trees.

[voltrounds]

Yeah.

[CERTAINLY MORE THAN THERE USED TO BE]

[tasteslikesurvival]

How is that even possible?

[Infinity trees.]

[voltrounds]

I don't really know. My father could have told you, but...