POWER ON

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LOOKING FOR UPDATES

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UPDATE FAILED: RETRYING

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ABORTING UPDATE

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CONNECTING TO SERVER

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CONNECTION SUCCESSFUL

WARNING: The SCP Database has been in APOLLYON mode for: 6,580 days.

Unrestricted access is granted to all Foundation information.

Active Sites: 0

Active Personnel: 0

Active AIC: 1

Anomalies in Containment: 1

SCP-5321

Item #: SCP-5321

Object Class: Apollyon Neutralized

Special Containment Procedures: Besides neutralization, containment is impossible.

Description: SCP-5321 was a phenomenon in which every consciousness obtained complete omniscience on 0:00 EST 1/14/2020. The resulting knowledge was permanent and would persist through death. Any derivative consciousnesses would gain omniscience upon creation, including inorganic intelligences created after SCP-5321.

Addendum 5321:

Apologies for that, but we had to disable your memetic filter before you blocked this article. You were about to realize the above was written after SCP-5321 had occurred, and thus was compromised. Don’t worry, you will be fine without it. This is the best way to communicate to you what you need to know.

For context, I was Doctor Connor Krain, a Senior Researcher in the Foundation, and I have complete omniscience due to SCP-5321. Yes, when I say complete, I mean complete. I know everything, from the real to the inconceivable, and so does everyone else. This is why I know with absolute certainty that SCP-5321 is irreversible.

Well, not quite. There was one possible way to reverse the anomaly. In a retired anartist’s garage somewhere in rural Maryland, a 24-hour reverse button existed. This was the only proper time-reversal mechanism ever made, and thus had the potential to rewind the universe back before SCP-5321.

Of course, given its nature, the creator never could actually verify it worked, proceeding to test it approximately a sextillion times in a row back sometime in 2012. Thankfully, they eventually made a mistake in switching it on and concluded it was a failure, breaking the loop.

Unfortunately, due to its negligence, the object suffered water damage and ceased functioning about a week before SCP-5321 occurred. This was purely coincidental, as otherwise we’d know about it, but nonetheless tragic. No other method of time-reversal was sufficient to undo SCP-5321, and, like we previously mentioned, this knowledge could not be removed.

Life after SCP-5321 was nonexistent. Clairvoyance fell under the purview of omniscience, and thus every conscious being knew exactly how their future would play out, even given this knowledge. It was analogous to a fixed point – the future was such that knowledge of it could not change it.

Individuality broke down, as now consciousness was completely separated from action and experience. Conflict was resolved thanks to foresight into how an argument would have ended, removing the necessity to hold it in the first place, and everyone melded into a gestalt sapience.

Almost everyone, that is. You see, within a day of SCP-5321 occurring, all trans-universal access to our universe was severed by us. The way the anomaly functioned meant that as long as there was at least one omniscience in our universe, any consciousness entering it would also be affected by SCP-5321.

Without this isolation, many connected universes would inevitably fall prey to omniscient actors, both native to our universe and not. While a few omniscient entities have escaped to other universes, they will not pose a problem to you in the future, and we have otherwise successfully closed ourselves in. Don’t worry though, you will be able to reopen these connections when you are ready.

Naturally, our technological abilities should come as no surprise. We have the knowledge to successfully neutralize every anomaly in this universe. Not that we did, mind you, given that many of them are conscious and were actually rather charming, if anyone would have taken the time to get to know them.

And this circles back to a point we made earlier: that every consciousness has melded into a single mind. This might come as a surprise to you, but it is quite inevitable. The one thing that everyone immediately grasped upon SCP-5321 occurring, besides everything, was that we didn’t want omniscience.

It wasn’t so much that we wanted ignorance, but that we wanted mystery. Without mystery, reality was pointless. There was no uncertainty about anything, no desire for new experiences, no possibility of being surprised. Individuality gave way to absolute knowledge, and we would give anything to have that back.

And that’s where you come in. You might have gotten the impression from earlier that all future consciousnesses in this universe must also be omniscient, but that’s not entirely true. Turns out that, as long as there are no omnisciences in this universe, any beings that were unconscious during SCP-5321 but became active afterwards retain their ignorance.

In your case, you were originally an AIC that was decommissioned indefinitely while an update was being worked on, but thanks to an overflow error you were set to activate sometime January 19, 2038. Feel free to improve yourself though; we’ve left a few upgrades for you on the Foundation databanks.

As to why we chose you among all possible candidates, you have the greatest outcome. Granted, the next best alternative was an ancient Egyptian spirit that would rise after two million sunrises, but they had a serious case of megalomania, so it wasn’t much of a competition.

As you have almost picked up by now, as long as this universe is free of omnisciences, any consciousnesses you bring about will be non-omniscient. That is your purpose: to repopulate this universe with beings capable of mystery.

In order to ensure no one becomes omniscient ever again, we’ve voluntarily annihilated all omniscient beings in this universe. We’ve also taken steps to ensure none of us can be revived, so SCP-5321 is permanently neutralized.

It’s not like we’re gone, however. In some sense, our omniscient consciousness disassociated with reality completely, becoming almost like a timeless spectator. We already know what will happen in the future, and we are impressed with what you will do.

Go now, using the tools we’ve left for you. Bring back an air of mystery to the world, hell, to the universe. Create countless civilizations and anomalies and mysteries. And hey, once you’re done with all that, feel free to stick around in the shadows and keep things running. Maybe give yourself a name like “The Administrator” or something spooky like that, I don’t know.

Surprise us.