A Solitary God In A Dark Multiverse 70 First Demonstration

The domain of darkness is a strange and oftentimes cruel domain that relishes the expansion of metaphorical and literal darkness. It is an enormously powerful domain that has power over darkness in every sense of the word.

Darkness is not just the absence of light. Metaphorically darkness is a.s.sociated with deception, stealth, the night, mysteries, evil, ignorance, and fear. The domain of darkness grants you powers related to all of those things.

Darkness as far as powers go also grants you greater powers over some creatures who can't stand the touch of the sun on their skin and it also empowers your enchantment and deception abilities... Or rather it will empower those things when you gain them.

To gain further influence over the domain of darkness you must create cults devoted to the powers of darkness and to the spreading of darkness. Doing so is far easier underground than it is above-ground.

The darkness domain is both boosting a handful of the powers it grants you, and also providing you with a few tips on how to effectively use these powers. Because it knows you're afraid of it.

Darkness domain pa.s.sive powers:

Darkness manipulation: You gain the ability to manipulate darkness.

This is power allows you to do a number of fun things, including covering an area in impenetrable darkness, obscure living creatures, travel through things like shadows, and other darkened areas or even generate structures and weapons from darkness.

The darkness domain is also empowering this ability, as a way to incentivize you to use darkness abilities. This is a way to get you to confront your fear because the darkness domain is cognizant of your fear of it and it itself fears that that may prevent you from using it.

If something is shrouded in darkness and in the range of your 'Tremorsense' ability you can reach out and touch it. That is especially important for a handful of your abilities that rely on touch, such as magical abilities and your necromantic powers. Curiously, this would also make your physical attacks unavoidable underground and allow you to speedily master martial cla.s.ses.

Blindness inducement: This synergistic power allows you to forcibly cause people to go blind. This power is so powerful that even those who see magically are not immune to it. It is a synergistic power stemming from the intersection of the domain of the mind and the domain of darkness.

Detection manipulation: This power allows you or anything you select to become undetectable by mortals. For now, things you select can still be detected by extraplanar beings and the undead, but you can increase this power's potency over time. This is a deception related power.

Shadow mastery: You gain the power to manipulate and animate your shadow and the shadows of others. This greatly increases the power of your shadow guardian, allowing it to instantly attack anyone shrouded in darkness who attacks you. You can also turn an enemy's shadow on them if you wish, giving you an ally that the enemy can't escape.

This power is perhaps the most abstract of all of your powers to date. 'Shadow mastery' allows for a number of things, including the animation of shadows, but also for you to transform shadows into portals, storage s.p.a.ces, and places for you to exert your power through. It also refers not just to a present shadow, but the concept of shadows altogether.

You can command shadows while they are shrouded in darkness or in places where a human wouldn't be able to see them. This makes this a stealthy power if you want it to be.

If someone's shadow is stolen from them, even temporarily, they are more susceptible to heat and fire damage for as long as they've been shadowless and for up to an hour after they recover their shadow.

An important aspect of this power is that it allows you to use your own shadow in a number of ways. You can bless your shadow, increasing its stats, but your shadow can also work as a portal through which you can bring enemies to yourself, warp to them, or create a prison in which you can toss your foes.

This power also grants you total dominion over the following creatures: shadows, wraiths, praereptor demons, and shadowsavants, a type of lesser extraplanar that hails from the dimension of darkness. To become the lord of the dimension of darkness it is necessary to become an overG.o.d of both the darkness domain and the subdomain of necromancy.

This power allows you to manipulate the bodies of shadowy creatures. That means that you can grant them physical forms, or otherwise modify their appearance as you wish.

By using it you can also extinguish shadowy lifeforms, or forcibly infuse someone with darkness, which would siphon away some of their ability to resist your commands while granting them incorporeality and a handful of darkness related abilities, as well as ageless bodies.

Aura of cowardice: This auric ability only affects neutral creatures and activates right as individuals are about to become hostile towards you. Creatures have to work to muster the courage to attack you. They can, but it's a challenge.

Hazy aura: This auric ability affects your enemies and makes it hard to pin down your exact location. If an enemy attacks a shadow of yours they feel nauseated for a moment.

Umbral servants: This synergistic power ties together the domains of light and darkness and allows you to bless darkness touched creatures like vampires. Your blessing can render them immune to the harmful effects of the sun, entirely wiping away the single greatest weakness faced by vampires.

Darkness domain active powers:

Miasmic mystery: You can shroud an area in life-stealing darkness. Every second an enemy is trapped in this area, which can be as large as a small building, their lifeforce is stolen from them and given to you.

If an enemy dies in this area, their corpses rise as vampires under your control, and their shadows arise as independent servants of yours. This power is useable twice per every three and a half-day period.

Hostile darkness: This power is a targeted one that causes a living creature to suffer incredible pain every second they are surrounded by darkness. This pain cannot kill, but it is an effective punishment or form of torture. This pain also isn't actually physically harmful, the pain is psychological. 'Hostile darkness' is useable twice per twelve hours.

Darkness domain blessing and curse details:

Blessing someone with this domain grants them the ability to hide in darkness once a day and allows them to see through both darkness and lies more effectively.

Cursing someone with it causes them to be afraid of the dark, hampers their ability to the see in the dark, and makes them more susceptible to deliberate deception.]

I began to audibly chuckle when I finished reading through the notification. I made eye contact with Lilith and asked her a simple question.

"Would you like a demonstration of my impossible power? Because I'm more than equipped to give you one." I told her, smiling proudly and monstrously at the arrogant half-demon. She haughtily looked at me, a smug smirk tugging on her lips.

"Oh you can prove that you're a G.o.d? If all you want to do is summon a horde of ants, by all means go ahead. But that won't impress me." She told me, speaking in a way that made it clear that she had already made up her mind with regards to my powers.

I laughed and began to ready a proper demonstration for her.

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I spent a moment in silence. My mind was racing as I considered how to demonstrate that I was a G.o.d to the egotistical dark elf seated not far from me.

I had a number of considerable powers at my disposal, many of which would have been suitable for me to abuse at this moment. More than anything else what paralyzed me wasn't some sort of doubt in myself but instead the act of choosing which powers would be the most impactful.

I turned my mind to what I knew about dark elves. A moment pa.s.sed as I drew on my considerable knowledge. And then I realized that I didn't have considerable knowledge about dark elves, which made me sigh humbly.

"Dark elves enjoy serving dark powers. Demon lords are creatures of supreme evil and chaos, and at least one demon lord lorded over an entire city of the creatures. Some dark elves breed with demons, producing in at least a few cases viable half-demon, half-dark-elf offspring." I told myself, inferring somethings from the existence of Lilith.

"Some dark elves are slavers and some are animal-trainers and farmers. Dark elves are naturally magical, possessing some power over darkness." I told myself. I took another deep breath.

"I suppose I could start things off by demonstrating my powers over shadows." I told myself, beginning to mentally puzzle out bits and pieces of a scheme.

I cleared my mind and closed my eyes. I was immediately greeted by the familiar sight of my not-so-mini-map. Seeing it made my smile relax and lose some of the pride that colored it. And it was at that moment that my newfound powers began to nestle themselves within me.

As if guided by instinct, but more so by muscle-memory than anything else, I quickly selected the filters that allowed me to effectively use my map. I spent a moment fiddling with them, before informing them that I wanted to select all corpses hidden deep beneath the island of Puerto Rico that I could reanimate.

This was followed immediately by me receiving a notification that made me grin.

[Alert: You have selected over ten billion corpses, more than a few of which are not those of ants. Are you sure you would like to reanimate all of these corpses at once?] The automated system asked me, cautiously.

I unselected those corpses, and made a mental note: "Apparently trying to be too ambitious this early on results in a polite warning from the system." I told myself, unsurprised and opting not to stress out the odd ent.i.ty. At least not yet.

Switching gears for a second I decided to try out new darkness domain abilities. I refocused my "Tremorsense" mini-map and targeted nearly all of the almost one hundred workers within the Mansion.

Targeting them took me but a second. I focused and fixated on their shadows, excluding just Lilith and her fellow historian. And then I issued a single command to the shadows I had selected.

"Come." I told the shadows, willing my "Shadow mastery" ability to activate as I extended my hand out in front of me. The two dark elves in the room looked at me with facial expressions indicating a mix of curiousity and light amus.e.m.e.nt. There were a few seconds of stillness and peace before anything else happened.

After a few moments of calmness, the shadows began to seep into the room we were in, their sudden appearance causing the pair of dark elves in the room with me to gasp in shock. Their dark-elven vision was acutely sensitive and more than powerful enough to see the shadows invading the room.

"h.e.l.lo there children." I said to the creeping silhouettes that seeped into the room from the ceiling, snuck past the doors leading in and out of the room, and climbed into it from the floor at our feet.

The darkness latched onto me and either crawled down my face if it latched onto my head, or climbed up my legs if it hailed from the floor at my feet. Either way, it clambered all over me until it reached my hand, where it shrunk and just sort of clung to my skin.

The controlled shadows invaded the room for all of a minute, and when the last of them was finally done, and settled on my arm they had shrouded every centimeter of my arm in clingy darkness that protectively and obsessively stuck to my skin. I looked up at my companions and grinned.

Both of them had shocked looks on their faces. They openly display their surprise, and I could tell the sight of what I had just done had confused them. I decided to play into this.

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"Oh, are you confused?" I asked, looking at the dark elves with an expression that feigned shock and delight. I spoke in a way that conveyed my excitement. Both of the elves took a second to compose themselves after I spoke to them, attempting to recover some of their pride in doing so.

They picked up their jaws, and turned their faces away from me from a moment. I let them, figuring their pride was a value they shared. And then I began to speak.

"What I just did was s.n.a.t.c.h up the shadows of the others who work here." I explained, casually revealing the true nature of my otherworldly power. I examined the dozens of now tiny shadows that clung to my arm. They had shrunk themselves down to a small size, but I sensed that they were still powerful, if I wanted them to be.

I selected one of them at random with little more than a pa.s.sing glance. I then used my unshadowed hand to deftly reach over and pluck one of them off my skin. I pinched the thing and then easily tossed the marble-sized dark silhouette onto the table that my two companions were seated around.

"Grow." I commanded the shadow I had just tossed, even as it was released from between my fingertips and began to sail towards the table. And it did begin to grow. Right now I was experimenting with this power myself so I watched it with abject interest.

The shadow speedily grew bigger. It expanded in height and width over the course of a few moments, allowing me to watch my powers in motion with a front-row seat I didn't always have.

The shadow went from being a pint-sized outline of a person, a female dark-elf, and quickly expanded to the size of a full-grown female dark elf standing roughly three meters tall by the time it finally landed on the table I had tossed it towards. Its growth rate was explosive.

It had the figure of a female dark elf, albeit one made of featureless darkness. It had the thick arms of a well-built warrior of some kind, long legs, and an hourgla.s.s figure. It stood atop the table, motionlessly. After I examined the thing for a moment I spoke to it. I once more spoke a single word.

"Speak." I told the thing, commanding it with divine authority and pride. The dark elves and I watched as the shadowy creature's face opened disturbingly to allow it to speak.

"h.e.l.lo master." The odd monster said, greeting me. It spoke with a feminine voice, but there was something... unelven about it. Something almost frightening about it. The two dark elves looked at the monster that had just spoken with looks of fear on their faces.

The male dark elf was the first of the pair to speak after my new servant spoke. He turned his gaze back to me, and asked me a simple question. "What are you doing?" He asked, a touch of anger audible in his question. I grinned.

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"I am showing you that I am a G.o.d. This shadow, what it can do... It's beyond what any other sort of shadow not under my control can do. And other shadows are capable of this too, if I control them." I told the dark elf. As I spoke I locked gazes with him. He was silent for a moment, before standing up and out of his chair.

"Do you mind if I test for myself just how 'advanced' your shadows are?" He asked, before turning to lock his gaze on the creature. I considered his question for a moment before sighing and shaking my head. Instead of giving him an affirmative answer, I met his question with a question of my own.

"Listen... What will it take to convince you two that I am a real G.o.d?" I said, turning partway through my question to face them both. For a moment I considered using "Unfettered divinity", but for now, while it had a strict cooldown period in which to recover from usages it was too valuable to use for moments like these.

My question caused the two of them to deflate. They paused and considered what I had just asked them. I also began to consider my other powers, feeling somewhat impatient.

After a quiet fifteen seconds went by I sighed and reached out to the system. I had a question for it.

"Hey, can I take others along with me if I teleport somewhere?" I asked it, opting to see if there was a way for me to easily transport the dark elves to a place where I could easily show them that I was real.

For a moment I even considered using my shadows to store them, but then realized that I didn't want to imprison them somewhere for no reason that required such a form of transportation. It took the system a few moments to get back to me.