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Entelechy (Part 2 added 20/10)


Ozymandias

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Hi all, here's the first part of my second story: Entelechy. It's quite different from my first, Control; this story is set in futuristic universe. I won't spoil the details, but suffice it to say that I have conceived of the world in this story as a realistic future for humanity. It'll have plenty of growth, muscle worship and all that lovely stuff, alongside plenty of exploration of the psychology of muscle addiction, but some of the exposition is also designed to be thought-provoking about society, politics and what the future may hold. If you're more interested in the muscle, then fear not - you won't be disappointed! But if you like to be challenged, this story will have a little bit extra for you.

Part 1 doesn't have much growth; it's largely outlining our main character. But there will be a hell of a lot of muscle to come, I can tell you that. 😉

Entelechy: a word used by Aristotle, 'the state of something that is fully realised'.

----

Entelechy: Part 1

He stood amongst the heaving crowd, almost suffocated by the thronging masses. Blessed with neither notable height nor width, the Youth struggled to get a glimpse of the public screen. There was a ripple through the crowd; a fortunate shift in its arrangement afforded him an unbroken line of sight to watch the spectacle unfold. 

The screen - an anachronism, since it was actually a one-dimensional holographic projection - showed the Emperor seated upon the Eternal Throne. Clad in his usual impenetrable attire (mask, robes and cloak of black and red), he contrasted with the white, gold and ocean blue of the Throne. A ceremonial guard of Imperial Guardsmen, great staves held straight, lined the gilded walkway leading to the Throne. A number of attendants - various High Councillors and military officials - were clustered around the Throne. 

The crowd held its breath as the camera panned to show the great entrance doors to the Throne Room, which silently slid open to reveal an alien, surrounded by five Guardsmen arranged in a pentagon around him. The alien looked somewhat reptilian, dressed in fine armour...but the splendour did not conceal the humiliation readable in its posture.

“And there he is,” continued the commentator, “Val’syth, Sovereign of the now-subjugated Farith Empire, come to pay homage to our Immortal Emperor.”

The people around the Youth jeered at the defeated alien monarch, as his party walked towards the Throne. The camera panned behind them, showing the alien trudging towards the Emperor, who sat unmoved and impassive. The Guardsmen, and the alien, came to a halt at the base of the dais upon which the Throne sat. Two Guardsmen then tore off Val’syth’s ornate armour, throwing it to the floor, followed by his undergarments. In mere moments he stood naked before the Emperor. The crowd’s jeering came to a tense tense halt as they watched the defeated alien stand motionless...before erupting into jubilant cheers as he prostrated himself before the Emperor, forehead touching the cold metal floor.

“And there’s the proskynesis, the ceremonial submission before the Emperor,” resumed the commentator. “The act symbolises...”

He zoned out the both commentator and the cheers. He did belong amongst these mindless automatons who went about their life. He was different. He couldn’t quite place how, only that he was. He did not fit in the Grand Society; its norms and expectations were…restrictive to him. He would not - could not - conform. 

Instead, he would leave them all in the dust, revelling in his excess. 

Let the rebellion begin, he thought to himself.

***

He had never felt like he belonged. Not quite ostracised from the Society, but not quite part of it either. In creating the Society three centuries ago, the Emperor had adopted an effective organising framework: within set boundaries, you were free to do what you wished - but cross those boundaries, and the Society exiled you. Moderation was the ruling tenet: most ‘vices’ were acceptable, in moderation. Sex, drink, food, drugs, partying; as long as you kept the habits under control, it was not the Society’s concern. But indulge them to excess, and the Society would quickly sanction you. Assuming the legal order of the Society didn’t formally intervene to redeem you, that is.

But that moderation did not appeal to him. It was stale, lifeless - mass-produced. Moderation was easy, and boring. Where was the joy in moderation? Throughout his teenage years, this internal conflict had grown and festered, eventually crystallising into a need to break free, to rebel. His first act upon completing school had been to leave his home city of Copenhagen, crossing the sea to the much-larger Capital - the Eternal City. With a population of 25 million, it was the largest city on Terra. Surely he’d find ways to rebel there?

The Society quickly provided him with an apartment (all housing was state-provided, of course), and he’d settled in, but then things had...stalled. Wanting to rebel was all well and good, but how does one go about actually doing it? He’d tried the Lower City, where all the ‘cultural establishments’ were. It had been fun at first, immersing himself in the permanent carnival-atmosphere of the clubs and bars, but it soon became clear that they too all worshipped at the altar of Moderation. He could have over-indulged in drink, drugs and sex but that was not rebellion - that was self-destruction and would achieve nothing. No, he had to be more subtle in his rebellion - and thus pose a far greater challenge to the Society. Undermine the tenet of Moderation, and be revered for it. Excess. But again: how?

Within weeks of arriving he felt as lost as ever, his ‘rebellion’ failing before it could even get started. It was depressing. He felt lonely and dejected. Perhaps this rebellion had, afterall, been a stupid idea borne of an immature mind. He could’ve got a job, perhaps (almost all menial or simple work was done by robots, but there were still plenty of jobs where a human touch was liked), but he felt no need to; the Basic Income more than covered his needs.

Thus it was that the Youth found himself wandering into a new establishment he had not yet visited, seeking inspiration. He was startled to realise he’d stumbled into a male orgy club, decorated like a Classical symposium: low couches and tables, carved stone columns and walls decorated with reliefs. A statue of Apollo and Hyacinthus, their hands intertwined, stood in the centre. He could make out another floor above. The patrons, in varying degrees of intoxication, were engaging in passionate group sex on the sumptuous couches. 

He walked through the establishment, studying the men he passed. All conventionally attractive and identically built in the Society’s ideal: athletic and toned, but not muscular or ponderous. Lithe, graceful: a useful body. The Youth himself had such a body. Some of the older men were more saggy, but still fit. This was, of course, simply the old Classical ideal...as part of the Society’s construction, many of the values and ideas of the Ancients had been studiously revived and systematically applied.

None of the men interested him. It was not that they were unattractive, but rather they screamed moderation. There was nothing deviant about them; body, hairstyles, clothes (where worn). Even this orgy was moderation; he doubted any of the patrons attended more than a couple of times a month. Everywhere was order; the establishment was a Temple to Self-Control. 

Credit to the Emperor, the Youth thought. His Society works.

Further into the establishment, there were numerous warmly-lit alcoves for more intimate encounters. They were likewise filled with oh-so-boring Servants of Moderation. He had just about given up hope of finding any trace deviance when he glanced into the final alcove. His breath caught in his throat and his stomach fluttered. 

At last.

Seated in the alcove was the biggest man the Youth has ever seen. Not in terms of height (he was ordinary in that regard), but of width. Of mass. Of muscle. His body hung heavy with bulging muscle; he was no longer athletic. No, most of that muscle was useless. An obstacle to human grace. It was instead the body of excess. A Servant of Moderation straddled the man’s crotch, taking his manhood inside of him, while he ravenously devoured the man’s flexed arm, savouring the swollen muscles with lips and tongue. The man’s head was thrown back in pleasure, eyes closed, softly moaning.

The Youth was rooted to the spot as a curious rush flowed through his mind. It was as if the disparate pieces of a previously hidden jigsaw puzzle had suddenly come together, inspired by the man of excess before him. In an instant, the fog cleared and his path became clear. The man of excess had shown him the way to rebel - how to subvert the Society. 

The next morning, he changed his gym routine.

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  • 3 weeks later...

And with apologies for the delay (life has been very busy), here's Part 2. A bit light on growth still; mainly setting the stage - both of the setting of the story and our protagonist's burgeoning mental state. Those of you who've read Control, my last story, will know that the growth definitely does come! 😉

Without further ado, here we go - enjoy!

Entelechy: Part 2

A fire had taken hold within him, providing the Youth with an energy which he had never before experienced. He would punish his body in the gym every day, and gorge it with food - but it would never tire. And his mind - his mind was positively alive, brimming with new potential. He had always been intelligent (his teachers has pushed him to go to University, which was most rare, but it held no appeal to him), but this was something new. Almost a kind of awareness of himself - his body - and the world around him. 

As the cycle repeated day after day, the Youth’s indulgence began to bear fruit. His hunger for excess gave his body no choice but to accede to his demands. Once the epitome of Moderation, his previously athletic body began to thicken with new mass. His weight ticked upwards as his muscles expanded, tacking on a shape and weight of their own. Clothes fit differently as his shoulders broadened, chest pushed outwards and thighs expanded. His pecs jiggled when he jogged up stairs with a pump, while his larger glutes and quads more generously filled seats.

He had deviated from the norm, but he was not yet exceptional. Well-built, perhaps, the body of a professional athlete in some sports, but not the monument to extreme, grotesque excess he desired to be. He had much, much further to go. But that fact did not lessen the pleasure he felt as his body responded to his indulgence. His manhood raged during every workout as he pounded the weights, feeling the blood pumping through his muscles. He grew aroused as he force-fed himself, knowing that every piece of food he pushed past his lips was an act of excess that would produce a physical manifestation in his body. He pleasured himself every night gazing upon his naked self, as he felt and caressed the growing mounds beneath his skin.

His development had induced new feelings, new sensations - of euphoria, of awareness, of self-understanding. Things were clearer now. He finally knew his purpose, and the discovery had brought him to the heights of ecstasy. This was life. Growth was life. Everything before had been but a prelude, an introduction. Now he knew what true pleasure was: the actualisation of one’s purpose. He had begun to grasp how he, and his purpose, related to everyone else. Not just those in his vicinity, but all of the Society. By breaking the chains of Moderation that had enslaved him, he would show everyone else the Road to Freedom - a way to break their own chains.

But there was a lot more to do first.

***

There had once been a sport called ‘bodybuilding’, which had been popular in the Dark Days. It had grown more popular as the world had sunk deeper into disorder, perhaps a result of people foundering in a world without direction. Desperate to find meaning, unable to understand a world becoming exponentially more complex as it careened towards destruction, maybe the youth of that age had sought refuge in the one thing they could control: their bodies. He suspected it was no coincidence that body modification had exploded in popularity as people lost control of their destinies, in the nadir of the Dark Days. 

Then, of course, the Emperor had come. His shining light had burned away the darkness, and from it emerged a new world: the Grand Society. Superficial, useless activities like bodybuilding, ‘beauty pageants’ and ‘talent shows’ had soon died out, both officially discouraged (if not banned) and no longer necessary for people’s fulfilment. In truth, few had mourned their demise. No doubt those poor people of the Dark Days would’ve had described him as a ‘bodybuilder’, but the Youth would have been insulted to be called such a thing.

It was quite easy to find archaic footage of the ‘contests’ they used to hold. The Youth had even watched some out of curiosity. All he saw were sad men pumping themselves full of enhancing drugs (none of which existed anymore) and parading themselves on a stage in a pitiful attempt to feel valued, as if they had accomplished something. Unlike the Youth, who was growing his body to realise his greater purpose, those bodybuilders had merely been compensating for their own inadequacy.

He was to be something greater, and all the more magnificent for it. His body would be bigger than theirs, the biggest there had ever been. Moreover, he would achieve that without any of the sordid drugs or bodily prostitution they had succumbed to. The glory of his body would outshine them all, a monument to his bottomless appetite for excess and for the extreme. In his size he would display no self-control, and yet everything else would be perfectly controlled - perfectly moderate. The ultimate rebuke to the Society.

His manhood ached at the thought.

***

The blissful ecstasy of orgasm flowed through him as he came to the sight of his pumped and growing body reflected in the mirror. The Youth had resolved to only reveal his body in public once he was the most muscular man there had ever been. Accordingly, he had withdrawn from the clubs and only ever wore concealing, baggy clothing outside. Until it was time, only he would be able to see his naked muscles. Only he would experience the pleasure of his growth.

His skin tingling post-orgasm, he walked over to the window of his apartment, and looked out to the Eternal City spread before him. Graceful spires rose like silver trees far into the air, with fine lines of ships flowing between them. The orange light of sunset made them shimmer and gleam, not dissimilar to a mirage. Lush gardens ringed the trees in intervals going downwards, and the trees which were joined together by thin, shimmering bridges. In the centre of the forest rose the tallest tree of all: the Great Spire, or simply ‘the Spire’ as everyone called it. At its apex was the Eternal Throne, the seat from which the Emperor watched over his people. 

The little over one billion inhabitants of Terra all lived in 60-odd similar cities, spread across the planet. The Youth’s home of Copenhagen was one such city, albeit one of the smaller. Each of the cities was surrounded by a great wall, beyond which lay The Wilds where nature had been given a free reign. To be expelled from the Society was to be exiled to The Wilds; exile was for life, and could never be commuted. It was a punishment reserved for menaces to the Society, and those deemed  beyond reform. There were tales of feral tribes of Exiles and their descendants roaming The Wilds, but such stories were fanciful considering most were exiled to the frozen wastes of the north where long-term survival was unlikely.

He lay down on the sofa by the window, and picked up the book he had been reading. It was by a man named Maslow, a psychologist who had been writing just under a century before the Ascension. He had written of something he termed ‘self-actualisation’ - a kind of higher mental state - and how it should be the goal for every individual. While Maslow’s ideas had become - and still were, it seemed - mainstream, no-one had ever been able to agree what ‘self-actualisation’ really was, meant or how it could be attained. 

But the Youth thought he may be on the way to answering that. What he had felt since he had begun growing accorded precisely with self-actualisation. He could feel everything in his body: blood pumping through his muscles, the fibres repairing and expanding, the pleasure emanating from his brain. Moreover, he had begun to develop a greater sensitivity to the world; he could appreciate all the small wonders of nature. A bird flying through the air, wind rustling the leaves of a tree, water flowing in a fountain. It was as if his mind was deepening and expanding. A higher state. 

Who knew that muscle growth could do so much? And more importantly, his growth had only been modest so far. How much further would it go? Where would it end? Was there even an end?

He was going to find out. The Youth was going to push both his body and his mind to their absolute, final limits.

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  • 3 months later...

I enjoy reading the seemingly post-apocalyptic setting of this story, the ambiguity of the Society (if it's utopian or dysopian), and then there's always the rebel in such totalitarian regimes. I'd like to understand his motives to rebel against the Society, which seems to cater to all aspects of human life. Is it just because he felt like he didn't fit in?

I love that short paragraph on how the gears finally clicked in his head when he saw someone getting worshipped, how he finally got inspiration on how to rebel in his own way. I also love your descriptions of the protagonist's process of muscle growth, and I hope that you're able to continue this story! 

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3 hours ago, thiccmuscle said:

I enjoy reading the seemingly post-apocalyptic setting of this story, the ambiguity of the Society (if it's utopian or dysopian), and then there's always the rebel in such totalitarian regimes. I'd like to understand his motives to rebel against the Society, which seems to cater to all aspects of human life. Is it just because he felt like he didn't fit in?

I love that short paragraph on how the gears finally clicked in his head when he saw someone getting worshipped, how he finally got inspiration on how to rebel in his own way. I also love your descriptions of the protagonist's process of muscle growth, and I hope that you're able to continue this story! 

Thanks for this - really appreciated. I’m glad you’re engaging with the story - and asking the right questions! The Society is deliberately ambiguous, a reflection on whether a utopia is really possible - and more deeply, what a utopia actually is.

I don’t know when I’ll have Part 3 ready. I’ve got the broad outline but a lot is going on for me at the moment, making it hard to get in the zone for writing. I definitely intend to continue this, however!

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  • 2 years later...
On 8/12/2022 at 5:13 PM, msclbldr said:

I hope that this will be continued........

 

I hope so too. Got sucked in and am fascinated/intrigued by the world. Would be awesome if you could continue this tale, @Ozymandias😁😍

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