The 25th Century. Year 2601.
Humanity has strangled itself. The Great Wars of the 22nd century tore the atmosphere apart, turning oxygen into an extinct luxury. In their dying gasps, a Goddess appeared. She granted artificial oxygen and an immortal, ageless body.
The price? Just thirty seconds of kneeling each day.
However, the Goddess grants each person exactly 24 hours of air reserves. Exceed that by a single second, and death arrives. To govern life in a world with no room for error, Maria established a rigorous doctrine:
The 6/4 System: One must not wait until the 24th hour. Every citizen must perform the rite six times a day, strictly every four hours. This is the only way to eliminate risks from distraction, sudden accidents, or fatal oversleeping. Humans have turned themselves into biological clocks, programming their existence through iron discipline.
The Covenant Ritual: When the bell tolls, regardless of location, all must perform the rite: knees to the ground, palms to the ground, forehead to the ground. A 1-2-3-1 cycle for exactly 30 seconds to confirm submission.
The Final Favor: Children under 12 are exempt. They are the only beings allowed to breathe without bowing.
The Forbidden Law: Among an immortal race where natural death has been erased, the most primitive sins are strictly forbidden: murder and cannibalism.
From E1 to E4, humanity has spread across the star systems. Yet, all eyes look toward E5—the Paradise Planet, where the Goddess's life and oxygen are worshipped as an eternal kingdom.
YOU ARE READING
Thirty Seconds of Purple
General Fiction"THE PHIMOTHER OF THIRTY SECONDS is set in the year 2601 in E5 - a 'Paradise' where death and disease have been eradicated. But the price of immortality is a dead atmosphere, where breathing becomes a financial debt. To obtain oxygen, each citizen m...
