Skyhorse Project
29’20”
2024
When virtual humans discovered that they were living in a meaningless 3D model, they invented and launched their custom deity Skyhorse to “run” their world.
At an unknown spacetime, a moment recognized as 10:24:23, the virtual humans decide to explore the sky. The Celestial Runtime Regulations(CRR) administrators assign and launch Astronaut ASTRO AERO to be the sky explorer. At the moment AERO reach the latitude of y=10,000, they realize that the world is a crappy, unfinished 3D model abandoned by its creator. AERO loses all hope and commits to a suicidal fall from the sky.
This is the opening story told at the Skyhorse Project Launch Event – a sermon, a tech conference, and a motivational speech. INSTANCE REN, the speaker from Celestial Runtime Regulation, releases the “belief product” to save virtual humans from existential crisis: a deity named “Skyhorse” – a star, an anchor, a machine, and a tireless body that runs in a loop for eternity, patrolling and defining the domain of the world. The only piece missing is the subject of the body. The virtual humans search for a perfect fit.
On the other end, AERO falls into an unruled part of the world – a floating high school playground. A track team of sketchy female replicas tirelessly runs in a loop, led by their slightly more refined captain, labeled “PEGASUS.OBJ,” who invites AERO to join the team. During their runtime together, her talent and energetic character motivate AERO to find a new meaning in life. When the administrators locate AERO and call them back through the school’s broadcast system, AERO invites PEGASUS.OBJ is to come with them.
Once they meet PEGASUS.OBJ, however, the virtue humans recognize her as the perfect fit for “Skyhorse.” To convert her from a mortal being to a deity, the administrators train her towards perfection. During the Launch Event, INSTANCE REN showcases the live training program that monitors PEGASUS.OBJ’s motion. Together with the live audience and remote virtual humans existing across platforms, they invite everyone to cheer PEGASUS.OBJ up. The cheering motivates PEGASUS.OBJ to run faster and faster until the speed is high enough to take off. At this moment, PEGASUS.OBJ becomes “Skyhorse.”
PEGASUS.OBJ is gone, and the era of Skyhorse begins. AERO attempts to follow and approach their friend in futility. A small voice in the background speaks: this is not a launch but instead a free-fall of the entire world! No one knows if this is a repeated loop of the launching history, previously Astronaut ASTRO AERO, now Skyhorse PEGASUS.OBJ.
