72 Powers On Display

I took a second to mentally glance at my newly improved mini-map. It was considerably more active than before now that it could display flying creatures.

I saw a myriad of creatures that I hadn't seen before. Some were simple birds and things like butterflies. Others were a bit more complicated. In the subterranean area underneath my feet, I detected a number of creatures that I had previously seen, gigantic bats ridden by the dark elves.

It turns out that such creatures were called dire-bats. I could detect hundreds of them throughout the island's hollow interior. At any given time only a few of them were ever on the ground, and being able to detect them in mid-air was extremely helpful when it came to keeping an eye on them.

I turned my attention back to my new servants. Drow was back on the ground, and Lilith looked at her and then at me curiously. I chuckled at the two of them and began to explain what had just happened.

"I gain powers rapidly. Or at least... in the beginning, I do. I can gain degrees of control over these things called domains and subdomains. In order to do so, I need to do things related to the domain or subdomain in question and then complete a quest it assigns me. In letting Drow 'fly' I completed the quest for the subdomain of air." I told the two, explaining my circumstances rather casually.

Their eyes opened wide as they considered my words. As their eyes widened in reasonable shock I mentally targeted Drow and activated one of my new powers: "Flight mastery". I willed for my dark-elven servant to gain the power to fly. I registered his even bigger shock when he actually gained the ability to fly and grinned at him specifically. I continued to speak even through his shock.

"I am a very, very young god. But even if I had just been born yesterday, which I wasn't, I would still have immense power." I told the two. I fell silent for a moment as I considered how to properly explain my power.

"There are so many things I can do. I can grant someone classes. I can create buildings in an instant. I can collapse caverns. Even a cavern as big as that the city of Aronms is located within could be crushed in an instant if I willed it. But that's not the only way I could destroy Aronms." I told the pair of dark elves I had brought to my side.

"I could unleash an epidemic of unimaginable proportions. One that plagues every single person in Aronms, and leads to their death and eventual reanimation as an undead creature. Or I could just cause a famine that leads to the starvation of the city's residents, after walling off every entrance or exit out of the city." I explained to the pair. I sensed their impression of me shifting. Which I liked.

The part of me that almost feed on mortal emotions directed towards me, a quiet part of me that only really came out when I gained new worshipers, enjoyed this moment. I felt their awe for me increasing, even as the emotions that caused them to submit to me became slightly more fearful. They knew I wasn't lying about my powers.

Lilith looked at me and began to speak. "Althos, have you given any thought to how you plan to achieve your objectives?" She asked. I could hear the curiosity audible in her voice. For a moment I paused and considered her question.

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At the moment that I began to focus on Lilith's question, I intentionally focused and entered a new state of mind. It was one wherein time was slowed down, and I was able to gain more time to consider how to proceed.

The first time I did this I had done so unintentionally. It was when I was traveling through the tunnel I had used to enter Aronms for the first time. I had been able to travel down the tunnel at the speed of light, and while I did so I had time to think and reflect on my day, all while I moved at speeds beyond the minds of mortals to comprehend. And as I entered a light-speed state of mind I fully realized the untapped potential of using my power this way. All the time in the world.

"How should I do what I set out to do?" I asked myself. I knew my objectives with regard to the city. I knew that I wanted Aronms to join my empire. I wanted to connect it to my lair and to use my myrmekes ants to protect it as well as actually gain trading partners for my ants. But how should I go about doing that?

"I suppose I can start off by displaying my powers to the general public?" I figured, well aware of the potency and undeniability of my powers. If I wanted too I could even go about this with my usual display of power: a single usage of "Healing burst".

I knew that such a display of power would not only heal every resident of the place but I also suspected that such a large usage of the power would cover the city in radiant silver light. If it did, I'd be able to truly confirm that my power was responsible for that, which would explain what happened in the Rodan forest. But I also wanted to explore and mix which of the abilities at my disposal that I used.

"I could mix things up... If I wanted too I could take things a bit more slowly and target the city's nobility. I bet sending them powerful diseases and amplifying their effects for a day or two and then healing them would send a powerful message." I told myself, quite excited at the possibility of so rampantly using my powers.

I was normally somewhat cautious with my powers so a part of me that was rebellious wanted to unleash my powers fully on the Ardor family. I felt the deep and powerful dislike I had for them tempt me into unleashing my full wrath upon them. And now I had so many ways that I could do that.

I could blind every single member of their family if I wanted too. Or I could unleash the parasites that feasted on the slaves the family "owned" on the family's leaders. I could even create such creatures within the confines of the family's estate and pack them full of powerful diseases to unleash upon the leaders. As I thought about that over I realized something.

"If I willed it, diseases could become a powerful weapon under my control. And I could create entire societies wherein anyone infected with diseases was visibly marked as someone I was displeased with." I mentally remarked. Such a realization was a powerful one. It made me feel positively godly.

That realization also made me want to begin to work towards gaining true mastery over my disease-related powers. I wanted to become a god who well and truly possessed a mastery over health including and especially diseases. Which was when the route forward became visible to me.

"What precisely is the trigger for me to be able to target creatures with my disease-related abilities?" I asked, directing my question towards the system.

[The trigger for you to be able to infect someone using your passive powers, at the moment, is that you have interacted with them in some particular way. This has a lot of different meanings. If you have cast a spell on someone they become targetable for you. If you use your powers on someone they are targetable. If you have been in someone's presence then they are targetable.] Explained the system.

There was eagerness in its voice. I could tell that it was excited by what bits of my idea it was able to hear without me explicitly inviting it into my mind. I chuckled and decided to test out one of my new abilities.

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The Ardor family lived in an estate situated on the outskirts of the city of Aronms. Their estate was a massive one. It consisted of their homes, including the pens in which they forcibly housed the slaves they owned, and large fields where they grew massive subterranean crops.

The familial heads consisted of twelve people. Two couples and their eight oldest children. The youngest person in this twelve-person band was a dark elf who was over seventy years old. At the precise moment that the young god Althos reached out and targeted them with one of his brand new abilities, the couples were sleeping and their children were managing the day to day activities of their family.

The couples were the first to be targeted, as they were the oldest members of their family. All four dark elves were over eight-hundred years old. And in an instant, all four of them were forcibly awakened as the oxygen that filled their lungs was suddenly and to them inexplicably withdrawn from their lungs.

Both couples lived in the same building. They did sleep on opposite sides of it though so they didn't hear each other. Their eyes rocketed open as their lungs were suddenly stripped of the life-giving gas that filled it. One of the males and one of the females reacted so violently to the sudden attack on their persons that they fell out of their beds and crashed onto the floors of their rooms, coughing and in agonizing pain.

Althos kept this up for a few moments, sensing their discomfort. Though the god that was responsible for their discomfort was kilometers away from them he could sense the fear and anger that welled within the dark-elves he had targeted. This was his doing after all.

That said, the deity wasn't planning to kill any of them with this power and so he quietly stopped using it. Relief-giving oxygen quickly flooded into their lungs after the god ceased using his power on them. But their unknown enemy, the god who they had unknowingly infuriated, wasn't done yet.

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"What do dark-elves value?" I asked Lilith, even as I unleashed my "Suffocation" power upon the heads of the Ardor family. I knew they were the heads of their family because of my "Authority detection" power which I had used on all twelve of my targets shortly before targeting them.

It turned out that just using "Authority detection" on them was enough to target them. But I had fun using my ability to remotely suffocate someone on the family's senior leadership.

The half-demon half-dark-elf looked at me and considered my question. She was quiet for a second, before she gave me her answer.

"We value power, pleasure, and pride." She told me. There was an unspoken question in her words and in the gaze she met mine with. I chuckled and readied myself to answer it.

"As a god I can do... many things. And very importantly, I can do those things even when I'm here. With you. Right now I am unleashing my powers on some of the nobility of the city of Aronms. I am going to give you a task to do. You and Drow are to spend the rest of the day today going to the city's nobility and explaining that I am a god and that I am intent on ruling over Aronms." I told the two. They looked at me quizzically.

"Some of the city's nobility will be afflicted with terrible maladies. Others will gain new powers. The ones that gain new powers will be told to obey you. And the ones that suffer from maladies, like the Ardor family, will be told to pray with you. If a family doesn't obey I will strip them of everything." I informed the dark elven servants I had acquired.

"I am bestowing the family of Qu'Ren the evoker with powers. She is someone I have healed in the past and she prayed to me. The Ardor family, being the family with the largest estate of slaves, is an enemy of mine. They are being sickened as we speak." I told my newest followers. Their eyes went wide at that remark of mine and they didn't stay quiet.

"The Ardor family are your enemies? Why?" Lilith asked, taken aback by my remark. I looked at her and for a moment there was a flash of anger in my eyes.

"They are my enemies because they are a family of slavers. I loathe slavery and I will crush the institutions and families that uphold it. They are to be but the first symbol of that." I explained, revealing how I felt about slavery to the dark elves. And then Drow spoke up.

"Althos... If we don't have slaves how will we get labor done? Most drow can't handle the exhausting physical labor needed to maintain a city." Drow told me, speaking defensively. His words incensed me, causing me to feel a burst of heated rage. I turned my anger-filled gaze to him and then took a second to calm myself before speaking. I then attempted to make an argument based on both pride and what came next.

"Slaves are unnecessary and unbecoming of a civilization as grand as of that of the dark-elves. Slaves are rebellious and inefficient. I will replace the institution of slavery with a new institution: the institution of necromancy. I will replace living bodies with tireless undead laborers. Ones whose loyalties are never in question. Ones who don't cost resources to maintain." I announced to the creatures I had brought over to my service.

And then I began to devise a scheme to transition from labor done by slaves to labor done by untiring undead entities. It came to me quite naturally.

"Not only do I intend to give every noble family a number of undead laborers equal to the number of slaves they own, I also intend to open up an institution wherein dark elves can be taught necromancy. I have not come here to destroy the capabilities of this city, I have come here to convert this place into a center of my worship and to make it a better city." I told my two minions, speaking gently about the city.

"I will abolish slavery. That much is not in question. And I will do so without destroying the noble families of this city. Unless they resist me. If they resist me then it is their bodies I shall give to my most favored families." I whispered, speaking direly of any families who may one day decide not to obey me.

At that moment I aimed a disease that inflicted those infected with it with bleeding sores and decaying skin upon the four dark elves who ran the Ardor family. My dark elven servants fell quiet as I casually aimed potent diseases at creatures who had unknowingly infuriated me. And in the wake of that silence, I continued to explore my mini-map and target the heads of the family, inflicting them with various maladies. All twelve of them but one.

"It is your job, for now, to be my messengers. The city of Aronms is changing. And I am the cause of that change. The city is already mine. You are just here to help the city's inhabitants discover that. And in exchange for your aid, I shall elevate you. I shall empower you." I told Drow and Lilith. Both creatures looked at me solemnly for a moment, before nodding at me. I felt acceptance fill their hearts, and then quietly teleported them back to the chamber where I had first met them.

Eleven of the Ardor's family's head members were now severely sickened. All of them were physically ill, and covered in the physical marks of disease and decay. But I had left one unaffected. I wasn't doing this as an act of mercy. I was doing it to instantly gain the worship and devotion of a single member of the family. One that I could use as I see fit. I quietly targeted her.

And then I activated a power I had never activated before, taking aim at her and her alone. She was a centuries-old dark elf named Milene. In some ways what I was doing to her was cruel. But in a very real way I was paving the way for her to become the head of the family and I was being kinder to her than I had been to her other family members.

The power I had just activated was the dreadful power known as "Madness burst". It was an attack that fractured someone's mind and rearranged it so that all they wanted to was to serve me.

Milene was an alchemist. And she was one of great skill and cruelty. She was perhaps the most aggressive member of her family and experimented on slaves and lesser members of her family alike. I had targeted her because of that. My choice wasn't random, it was a calculated one meant to gain control over the most malicious member of the Ardor family.

As I felt her mind shatter the second I activated the power, my choice still felt somewhat right but there was a part of me that didn't like it. That said, it was probably a good thing that I felt that way. It was a sign I wasn't going to be okay abusing this power.

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Milene's mind was shattered while she sat at a desk in her room. She had been absent-mindedly writing a letter to her latest paramour, and her quill was dipped in a bottle of her own homemade "ink". The substance she used for ink was the blood of the creatures she experimented on, blood she routinely extracted from them.

The power that the alien deity Althos used on her was a terrifying one not just because of what it did but also because it was instantaneous and there was no resisting it if you were susceptible to it. Milene's mind had just moments ago been a cruel, prideful place and now it wasn't.

Her hand still gripped her quill when her mind became the property of her family's new enemy. Her gaze was still on the parchment she was using to write her letter. But her heart and mind were forever changed.

Her cruelty, once a focal point of her personality, was now replaced with devotion. Her ambition and arrogance were replaced with humility and an overwhelming desire to please her master. She had no way of knowing how she acquired this knowledge but for a moment all she could hear was the repetition of a single word. "Althos".

She knew instinctually that "Althos" was her master. She wanted to serve it. It was, in fact, all she wanted. All of her previous pride and ambitions faded and lost their appeal and she was now fully enthralled by her god. She wondered how she could serve it, and then it spoke to her for the first time.

"Hello Milene. How are you?" It asked. Milene smiled, her heart-rendingly beautiful face lighting up with genuine delight. The young dark elf wasn't sure how she recognized the voice, but she knew that it belonged to her master.

"Hello Althos. I am doing well now that I have heard you." She told it, mentally speaking truthfully. The power had instantly torn through her old self. A gentle chuckle resounded throughout Milene's mind.

"That is good to hear." Althos told her, as it proceeded to move on from the Ardor family and target other noble families throughout Aronms.

It would spend the next few hours focusing almost exclusively on that task, from within the safety of its tower-like lair deep underground.