A Solitary God In A Dark Multiverse - 171 Learning About Htrae

The two Htreaian humans who just entered Geoffrey’s kitchen were his children. Geoffrey turned to them and began to smile happily, before speaking while also motioning for them to sit down in front of me.

“Good morning my children!” He said, sounding quite chipper. There was a brightness in his eyes that helped hide the bit of fanaticism in them that I could clearly see and feel radiating from him. My ability to detect emotions allowed me to detect the fanaticism he felt towards me which was a consequence of the powers I used on him moments after we met.

I turned to Geoffrey’s children, smiled, and activated two potent powers of mine at once: “Ascension”, and “Aura of Authority”. Both of these powers were significantly powerful law-based abilities that cemented my authority. One of them, “Ascension” was, in essence, an empowered version of one of my faith-domain abilities, and the other “Authority Aura” was an auric power that informed creatures that I was an incredibly powerful creature of law and authority.

I quietly performed a surface-level reading of their minds while their vision clouded over from the notification they received. Purely coincidentally I was able to read the notification as it filled their heads.

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[Alert: In The Presence Of A God

You are standing in front of a god, a supreme being who embodies power, creation, destruction, and more. You stand in front of Althos, a god of things as primordial as love, law, and nature.

Althos himself is a god who leans more towards embodying the “power” aspect of his species, and as such is a powerful being of law and change. He is capable of healing entire planets and civilizations that recognize his power need not fear starvation or defeat. He understands his innate position as a creature that exists at the top of hierarchies, and many of his powers help mortals quickly begin to recognize that as well.

He is also a primal entity and god of love and standing in his presence without feeling his powers tug at the mind and claim portions of the heart is impossible for mortals. Even now you can no doubt feel his proximity wearing away at you. Embrace it and surrender to the joy he can bring you.

If you submit to him, worship him, and vow to obey him, he shall protect your whole family. All who serve are protected and join an interplanetary faith that ensures that they and their families will live long and prosperous lives.

Submit.]

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I turned to Geoffrey and asked if he could give me some water, as I gave him the mug I had created. He joyfully turned back to me, accepted the mug, and got up out of his seat. When he turned his back to me, I turned back towards his two children and activated my powers in full.

I gazed at them as I turned on the full, unrestrained potential of a few of my abilities. But I had a plan in place. I intended to test the powers, but not permanently. And to do so in an impermanent way, I would need to test two of my other abilities, ones I had never used before.

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The entity that calmly sat at the kitchen was a creature of many things. He was a creature of vast power, of considerable curiosity, and a being who was filled with many truly terrifying abilities. And the moment he turned his gaze back at the children of Geoffrey Finigan, it was clear that he was momentarily allowing his curiosity to be at the forefront of his mind.

For a single brief instant, the young man and the young woman who gazed upon the god were subjected to the full and unrestrained effects of a few different abilities. The first was the potent ability known as “Absolute beauty”, which was a passive power of Althos’ that was always in effect but was usually more than a bit muted. But the one second it wasn’t, it’s true and sinister effects took hold in the minds of the human mortals who happened to be looking at the young god.

Saoirse Finagan, a bisexual woman, instantly felt her heart be snatched away from her and from her boyfriend. Althos’ potent powers washed over her and seeped into the deepest crevices of her soul. It was an irresistible, mind, and heart altering wave of divine force that didn’t care what relationships it destroyed. In some ways, it reflected Althos’ own cold attitudes towards mortals.

Althos ultimately favored negotiating and gaining the worship of mortals of their own volition, but he was more than willing to destroy their minds and then remake them in a way that suited him. He had done it in the past with creatures like Ygaynth, Glacial, and Milene, and was quietly getting over his reluctance to do it to more creatures, as this act of curiosity demonstrated.

That said, “Absolutely beauty” wasn’t the only power of his he freely unleashed here. Althos sensed Saoirse’s heart become his, and so he turned away from Geoffrey’s daughter and instead turned towards Geoffrey’s son, Seamus. His eyes coolly washed over the young man, and for a single moment, he wondered what to do with him. And then he began to smile cruelly.

The god was a man on a mission, and that mission involved making a cult in this world. To do that he needed loyal and fanatical followers. And so he started with Seamus.

As Geoffrey began to fill Althos’ mug with water, the god himself beckoned for Seamus to come forth. The mortal did so, happily. Althos placed one of his hands on the human’s chest and activated two of the new and dark powers he possessed: “Love negation” and “Relationship modification”. By fusing those powers Althos got a chance to gaze at the relationships Seamus had built over the course of his life. He got a chance to see all of the people that Seamus loved, including his family.

Althos didn’t modify how the man felt about his family, for he wanted the family to be the center of the cult, but he did modify the other relationships Geoffrey had made and his modifications weren’t subtle. Using “Love negation”, Althos destroyed the other relationships Seamus had made with people outside of his family, and he had to work to suppress a grin as he did so.

As Althos’ powers wrecked the relationships Seamus had made over the course of his life, he also activated a few particularly nasty abilities. He began to actively crush Seamus’ sanity using “Maddening touch” and began to turn the young man into a fanatic of his utilizing “Fanaticism Inducement”.

Seamus felt relief and gratitude surge into him even as the god’s touch actively corroded his sanity and bent his mind towards the god. The god coldly considered kissing the young man, but after a moment decided against it. It wasn’t necessary, and Althos knew that that was his ultimate power. He wanted to save it, even if it did have unlimited uses. That said, he did use one final power on Geoffrey: “Love inducement”.

He didn’t put another hand on him for this one. Instead, he just gazed into Seamus’ eyes. And then he activated the power and instilled in the human such an intense love for him that it made the love he felt towards his family feel like the passing fondness one had for a classmate who complimented them once.

This power was another of the love powers that completely transformed souls and hearts indifferently, with the same level of passion that a human might treat stomping an insect who made it into their living room. The powers of the love domain were utterly horrifying, and their ability to totally transform a mortal’s life made them handy tools of the gods but also cruel powers to utilize on mortals. Not that a power being cruel had ever really stopped Althos before. Especially since the god had a plan in place.

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Conducting my experiment took me a matter of seconds. Perhaps 10 seconds in total had passed since I first activated “Absolute beauty”. I silently shut it off or rather returned it to its default, restrained state. And that gave me enough time to target Saoirse with one of my new and potent abilities.

I turned my gaze towards her and studied her for a moment. She was a petite redhead, and was quite pretty. She wore an outfit not dissimilar to mine, jeans and a t-shirt. She had grass-colored eyes and was blushing at my gaze. I chuckled and targeted her with a single usage of “Rewind”, and as it took effect she suddenly closed her eyes and sighed in relief.

She was now as she before I unleashed “Absolute beauty” on her. I then immediately reapplied “Ascension” to her, since it was one of the effects that would have worn off when I used “Rewind”.

In the immediate aftermath of all of that, I sensed her sincere confusion, and even her slight fear, but more than anything else I sensed her relief. I chuckled as I watched her, and she began to blush again, but not to the same extent as before. I then turned my gaze back to Seamus and began to wonder what to do with him.

I could easily reverse what I had done to him, but I also had the power to do so even without using “rewind” on him. I gazed at him, my hand still sapping his sanity, and then chuckled. I would keep him this way. After all, he still loved his family, and I hadn’t really hurt him, I just cut down on the amount of time it would take for him to begin to worship me of his own volition.

Seamus himself was a muscular man with brown hair and dark eyes. He had an imperfect smile and a dimpled face, and of all of us, he looked the youngest. Which made sense since he was the second youngest one of us, after me, but I was a god with the ability to perfectly control my appearance and I favored my current appearance which was that of someone in his 20s.

Like me, he had sun-kissed skin, and until I inspected him using my “Apprisal” ability I thought that he had had an outdoor job, but in actuality, he was a prison guard. Saoirse was a teacher at a nearby high school. They both had intriguing jobs, ones which I could see myself using as a way to expand the cult I was going to build here.

At this point Geoffrey returned and the man didn’t question why I had a hand on his son’s chest. He quietly and easily accepted it, since when I had done it to him he got much younger and was also filled with love for me. He silently assumed I was doing something similar to his son, and was visibly pleased at the idea of that. And because of that I grew more fond of Geoffrey. At the same time I helped myself to copies of the family’s memories. None of them resisted, so I didn’t even need to drain their memories out of them. I appreciated that.

I motioned for the two humans to join their father and I at the table. And then I began to scheme.

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My powers over the mind and memories allowed me to instantly absorb memories. And as a consequence of that, coupled with the memories I had just gained from the Finagan family, I gained an intimate understanding of what it was like to grow up in Glendale, the community closest to this tiny farm.

Saoirse and Seamus had grown up there, gone to school there, and they even lived there. They just spent the weekends with their father, as a way to stay close to him. Today was actually the first day of the work-week, as understood by the majority of the people of Htrae, and so normally in a half-hour Saoirse and Seamus would be on their way back home, beginning the trek back in objects called “cars”, which were similar to pieces of technology found one world in my native solar system.

Physically I spoke with them with the family for a few minutes, even though most of my focus was in my own mind, scheming about how to best transform this world.

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“Htrea is an… interesting world.” I mused, speaking to the domains and subdomains that lurked “within” me. In my own head I heard a chorus of sinister laughter. Interestingly, one of the loudest peals came from the domain of magic. It was also the first to speak back after the laughter died down.

“Yes, it sure is. This world is a world that is fairly lacking in the supernatural.” The domain told me, reiterating something that I knew already. Not only had the system told me about this, back when I first met Andrea, it was something I realized through the cultural and historic knowledge I acquired, courtesy of the Finigan family, and then again when I first began to analyze the knowledge I had acquired through “Stellar awareness”.

Htrea was made up mostly of oceans and other bodies of water. Over 70% of its surface was covered in water. It had a number of sizeable continents, and if one counted the poles on the planet as a single continent then there were seven separate continents, with five of them being on two super landmasses, and one of them being a solitary island-continent that was utterly gigantic in comparison to other continents.

The nation I had been teleported too was named “New Sol”, and was a sort of super-nation made up of sixteen, much smaller, nation-like governing bodies. Interestingly enough, though Andrea lived in the same continent “New Sol” was located within, she did not live in the same nation. She also spoke a different language than the Finigan family did, which was unsurprisingly different than the language of the humans of Puerto Rico. Not that that mattered, I could easily teach anyone any language so long as I had heard it first. I was being introspective for a moment when a new voice caught my mental ear.

“This planet is very interesting. Its technology includes things like ‘Cell-phones’ and ‘Computers’, which allow for instantaneous, real-time communication across national or even continental borders!” Uttered a surprisingly robotic voice. It took me a moment to realize that the voice I had just heard was in all likeliness the voice of the domain of creation.

“This world also has planes! These metal contraptions are capable of flight and can travel across continents in hours or even minutes in the cases of the fastest planes.” The domain exclaimed, excitedly. The domain continued to babble on, for a moment before another domain spoke up. This one had a rigid, authoritarian voice.

“But this nation… ‘New Sol’… It is quite fond of bureaucracies and paperwork. There’s so much an adult needs. ‘I.D. cards’, ‘Birth registration forms’, ‘Social Identification Codes’, ‘Drivers licenses’, and more. I love this! Althos, you should learn from this for when you finally begin to interconnect your faith and form a distinctly unique empire of your own.” The voice excited exclaimed. Despite the sternness of its voice, it was clearly overjoyed. This speaker was the domain of law.

“Nations like this… Krawhaha, I love them. They are perfect for spreading infectious diseases. They have so many processes to go through before they can respond in full to a contagion that by the time they finally get to the place where they can ‘legally’ respond to me, I have infected millions of their citizens.” This voice was sickly sounding and had a laugh that was eerily like a cough. I immediately identified it as the voice of the domain of disease. Its words were intriguing to me, and a part of me made a mental note to put that to the test later on. As I did that, the domain continued to speak.

“Diseases could easily become a potent weapon of yours in this world. You could ravage this world with disease, and then appear and heal everyone when they are filled with despair, dramatically demonstrating your powers and saving this world, becoming hailed as a hero and a god of hope.” The disease domain whispered, its sickly voice infecting me with fun ideas. I mulled it over and had a fun idea of my own.

“Though I could also create a stealth cult of the diseased, modifying sicknesses so that the sick become attuned to me and begin to delight in their illnesses. I could steadily transform the discomfort they feel from diseases into pleasure and use that to make them enjoy being sick and see being sick as, if not their default state than at least their preferred state.” I whispered inwardly, delighting more than a few of the domains within me. The disease domain in particular was delighted at that suggestion and began to laugh loudly.

While I was having this purely mental conversation, events were transpiring around me. Saoirse and Seamus had to go to their jobs, and asked me if I’d like to go with them in their “cars” to see the community they came from. I politely declined the offer, since I now had the ability to teleport anywhere within this world. Geoffrey and I did walk them to their cars though. When they left, I bid the man adieu and I told him that I’d be going ahead and spending today in Glendale. This surprised him, but when I told him that I’d probably be coming back tonight he was delighted.

For now, I was going to do what I did when I first sprang to life: I was going to pretend to be a human, at least while I oriented myself. And I could have far more fun now than I could have when I was trapped in the tutorial, in a world with dangerous monsters and powerful entities. This world had humans, animals, plants, and a very small number of extraplanars. It was nowhere near as dangerous or as biologically diverse as Torus which was perfect for me.

This place was a playground for someone with the sheer number of powers at my disposal. And I intended to acquire more power, and to make this world a perfect little playground for me to rule however I felt like ruling it. Moments after I saw Geoffrey smile, I teleported myself to an unoccupied road just outside of Glendale, and I began to walk.