"Master, what are your needs?" Asked the hauntingly beautiful drider, a second after she stated that she had a suggestion for me. There was a sharp edge to her voice, a tremble audible at the word "needs" that made it clear that she hoped for opportunities to inflict violence.
It served as a needed reminder that for all of her beauty, she was a ghoul. That'd be an easy thing to forget if I wasn't careful.
I looked at her curiously and considered her question for a few moments. As I did so I was silent.
The truth was, there was only one thing I wanted, or at least one thing that she and the other undead could get me. And my thoughts about it were distorted by the part of me that was dark, tainted not just by the subdomain of corruption, but also now by the subdomain of necromancy.
Part of me wanted to order my undead minions to perform a ritual in my name. A ritual that involved them venturing into the forest and tracking down a powerful creature. That part of me wanted to order my worshippers to bring back whatever powerful creature they found and then sacrifice it to me, especially if I wasn't promised a reward for such brutal action.
Thankfully that urge was both not very strong and also so out of character for me that it was easy to spot as alien and reject outright. It was one thing for me to animate the dead that had died without my influence, but another thing altogether for me to order my followers to perform a sacrifice. I silenced the part of my mind that reveled a bit too much in the dark powers I now possessed and refocused.
I wasn't just influenced by the two twisted subdomains that I had a bit of influence over. I also felt the power and life-sustaining radiance of the subdomain of healing, and a smaller but equally life-affirming subdomain of agriculture. I didn't want something to die just to test my powers. I wouldn't let something die just for me to test my powers unless I was defending myself.
What I wanted was simpler than that. What I wanted was to get back to the task at hand, and inch towards enacting my plot to acquire living worshipers.
I looked at the drider and shook my head. "No, there isn't." I told them, lying so as to prevent unnecessary violence. I heard a soft chuckle in my mind as I said this, and wasn't surprised to hear a familiar voice in my mind seconds later.
[So you resisted temptation huh? Not bad Althos. Not bad at all. Especially because you have two dark subdomains working to influence you...] My companion remarked.
Internally I chuckled, but I didn't respond to the remark in a substantive way, or rather I didn't reply to the message in a substantive way. But it did make me think. For a second my mind turned to thoughts of Okig, who I knew I'd need to spend some time treating.
Breaking her mind wasn't my intention, even if it did award me a worshiper, and I needed to contend with that reality.
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For a moment I looked over at Okig. I studied her. I felt a pang of... something. This was the first time I focused on her in the wake of making her endure the odd and mind-breaking experience I put her through and now that I was doing it I recognized a few things.
Firstly, I recognized that it was an act of corruption. That wasn't an indictment of myself, it was an observation. The action was to test the powers over corruption, and over earth, that I possessed. And in that regard it was a success. An unabashed one at that.
I also recognized that it was excessive. It was me using my powers unnecessarily and irresponsibly. I had already won, and what I did was a form of violence. I needed to be careful to not do that.
And lastly, I knew that I either possessed the power to fix it, or I would gain the power to fix it. Fortunately, as I thought about that I learned something useful. It was more than likely that I possessed the power to fix her mind. I would fix it, if not today, then eventually.
[So you're working to maintain balance? Hmm... Well, we can't say that we hate that you're a neutral deity.] The system muttered, interrupting my moment of solemness and the vague sensation of regret that I felt.
[You do possess the power to heal Okig's mind. It's the result of you possessing power over both healing and minds. You can soften the damage her mind suffered, and that may just serve to endear her more to you. We'll teach you how to do it, if you can successfully enact your plot to bring the goblins to you.] The system promised, giving me more of a reason to exert my control over this situation.
I was a god, being in control was something I needed to master. It was time to act like a god.
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To get through the scene at hand I focused on navigating through the situation I found myself in. I'd have time to treat the ogress' mind soon enough but if I wasn't careful here I'd actively be responsible for deaths, which wasn't what I wanted. Not without a real cause.
"There will come a time for us to test our strength, and even now we'll test it in little ways, but I shouldn't let us get overly active. There is work to do, and deceptions to pull off. Now, if one of you would like to help me with one final task..." I told the creatures, leaving an opportunity to volunteer up in the air.
I was responded too almost instantly. But it wasn't by one of the figures I anticipated it. The voice that spoke to me, via the mental link I created with her, was that of the she-wolf.
"Master, may I be of service?" She asked. Her voice was a quiet one, and it felt like she was straining to communicate with me, even though she was using a mental link.
I found this curious, and to address I considered blessing her with the power of the necromancy subdomain. That was my thought process for a few moments until I remembered that in addition to raising her intelligence it'd also make her a "champion of mine" according to the blessing's details which wasn't something I knew enough about to use properly.
Instead I quickly refocused on the matter at hand. "Can you retrieve the corpse of a deer for me?" I asked the she-wolf. I spoke out loud as I asked for the creature's assistance, for the sake of convenience. The she-wolf looked at me in confusion and so I sighed and readied myself to explain more fully what I planned to do.
"Today is the day I reveal myself, or a form of myself, to a nearby goblin tribe. I want to come bearing presents in the form of deer flesh. I already have two sources of deer flesh, I just want one more." I told the gathered creatures. They turned to the two stags in confusion for a moment after I was done talking.
And then their eyes widened as the realization hit them. I grinned as they turned back to me, surprised and displaying various emotions on their faces. The drider and the grave-giant, in particular, had contrasting emotions on their faces.
The drider was shocked, the emotion dazzling on her face. On the other hand, the grave-giant was delighted. Her face was alive with joy, and given her status as an undead creature, it was a particularly unusual sight.
"You want them to eat undead flesh?" The grave-giant asked me. I nodded at her. And then she began to laugh again, this time sounding both awed and delighted by the idea.
A hush fell over the party, aside from the sound of the giant's laughter. I chuckled and decided to use this time to inspect the stats of my new servants. I targeted all of the brand new undead creatures and triggered my ability with but a flex of my mind.
[Initiating creature analysis... Creature analysis complete.
Creature name(s) and species: Imbrosa Ravenfist (drider), Mof Winejug (satyr), Guskaxa (Silver wolf), Fungoid (Fungal Folks), Risa (Medusa), Nivar (grave giant). Nameless (Gug)]
What followed was an extensive list of skills, templates, and stats that ranged from subpar, in the cases of Guskaxa and Fungoid, to astounding in the cases of Nivar and Imbrosa.
Nivar had a strength score of 45, and Imbrosa had an intelligence score of 40. Those numbers set the numbers my other servants had to shame. And I knew that I'd need to rely on them in the future. I made a mental note to comb through the minds of both Imbrosa and Nivar sometime soon.
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It was at that moment, while I was studying the stats of my minions, that Guskaxa ran off in the direction of the stag I intended for her to bring me. There was an eagerness to her trot that prevented me from interrupting her, so instead, I silently began to guide her to the corpse.
It didn't take her long for her to bring me the thing, and it took me even less time to reanimate the corpse. And with that, after what felt like an eternity of distractions I was back on track.
A few more minutes passed, filled with idle chatter and the complaints of the living. But once I felt that I had heard enough of Okig and Iret complaining, I ordered us to finally stride towards the village of goblins and we began a casual stroll through the forest.
Reaching the goblin encampment didn't take long. We were a big party, but because of the scent of the ogresses mixing with the scent of the undead, no creature dared approach us. And soon enough we found ourselves within earshot of a gathering of goblins.
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I stopped us when we were just far enough from the goblins to not be detected by them. All of us came to a stop, not quite immediately, but fast enough that no goblins reacted to us. When all of us were still I wordlessly ordered my two zombie deer to move forward and to stride towards the heart of the encampment ahead of us.
I watched them begin to strut towards the goblins. And then as the goblins first noticed them I closed my eyes envisioned my form changing. I envisioned the bizarre omnielemental form I adopted when I spoke to the lucid dreamer named Alma. I shivered as my form changed.
Over the course of a few seconds I changed, my flesh fading away and transforming into the fusion of elements that made up the body I had chosen to give Cosecha. All in all the process took a handful of seconds and when it was done I was looked at by two different groups of creatures.
The living, gradually growing accustomed to my powers, were surprised by this but they reacted more quietly to it than they had to my other displays.
The undead, being the eerie and reverential creatures they were, quietly spoke to me using our mental link. Their words were a mixture of awed whispers, and ghoulish comments about the potential applications of my powers, to the creation of more undead. Though their views on creating more undead were a bit more active and usually more violent than mine were.
I closed my eyes and allowed my vision to be overwhelmed by the powerful and living map that I kept locked away in my brain. It responded to me by springing into view, boldly showing me a pristine view of the encampment just a few meters out of ear-shot.
The goblin encampment was a circular area in the middle of a group of trees. It consisted of a number of tiny tents, centered around a thin hole in the ground with a large number of goblins living in the cave that hole allowed entry into and out of. I wasn't focused on holistic statistics about the encampment though, I was looking for something more specific.
Mentally, I dashed into the encampment on the not-so-mini-map and began to look for specific individuals. I was determined to find and assemble the goblins I had already connected and interacted with. It was important that I do this right, and frankly, I had time. The goblins weren't prepared to attack the deer and even if they did I'd just reanimate the things.
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The composition of the encampment was fascinating. Only some of it was centered in this area, either around or just outside of a hole that my earlier, unupgraded tremorsense wasn't able to truly and meaningfully flesh out. Now that I could see the hole and was focused on encampment I allowed my mind to explore it.
I could have instantly tracked down my goblin companions, but I wanted to practice my powers. This moment was a low-risk moment for me to manually use my abilities and learn to navigate them expertly without relying on automated assistance. I wanted to be as self-sufficient when it came to divinity as I could be. And doing it this way would allow me to learn more, something I valued.
The entrance into the earth was thin. It was barely a sliver in the crust of the island I was on, only partially visible from where I was. Looking at it from the outside, if I had been limited to my physical eyes, I would have struggled to understand what I was looking at as it was in the ground and wasn't a cave. Thankfully, mortal limitations didn't apply to me.
Using my enhanced tremorsense, looking into the hole was a breeze. There was a thin ladder that clung to the side of the hole's lip, allowing goblins to safely descent what would otherwise be a sheer drop a few meters high. The ladder's loose, rope-tied connection to the earth at the top of the hole, and at the bottom of the hole was what gave it away physically.
Inside the hole itself, at the bottom of the thing, laired a number of goblins. Some of them were visible to me as sleeping outlines, their bodies laying on the floor motionlessly. They weren't the goblins I was looking for.
The interior of the hole was divided. It extended deep into the planet's eerie underground and so had room for many different areas. Some of those areas were chambers where goblins slept. Others were where goblins practiced for battle. Some were for waste-excrement. And others were for storing and preparing food. The latter two were often uncomfortably close.
And so I begun my manhunt. The tunnel I was mentally exploring was connected to the rest of the strange world beneath the world that existed underneath the island's surface, but goblins didn't inhabit this place that thoroughly and only a few chambers were inhabited by goblins.
It took me a few moments of searching to track down Mawby, Hagitha, Mianthus, and Troik. Those were the goblins who I had interacted with, even vaguely, in the past. Each of them happened to be located in different parts of the hole.
Troik was in another of the mass sleeping chambers. Mianthus and Hagitha were in separate training chambers. Mawby was in a chamber that served food to the goblins and also, at least according to what she was doing at the moment, served as a nursing area to heal injured or sick goblins.
When I found them I got to practice creating mind links, which as it turned out was easy to do. I just needed to envision forming a bridge that tied my mind and the mind of another creature. Once that was done I'd send them mental messages. Each of them got to hear a variation of the same message.
"Come outside." I whispered into in their minds. In each of their cases, I used Cosecha's voice to disguise that "Althos" was here. I wanted the goblins to see me as a powerful spirit who used its powers to bring them a gift. I put urgency and power in my voice, to ensure they came out quick.
All of them, but especially Mawby and Troik began a mad dash from the chambers they were in to the ladder that led out of the hole. With this I smiled and refocused on my physical surroundings.
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At the moment a decent number of goblins were located in the encampment and with each passing second, more of them looked to the trio of stags who boldly approached them. The goblins weren't brave though and so they did nothing to stop or repel the deer.
The trio of deer consisted of two zombified deer and the single skeletal deer. The skeletal creature was at the front, its intelligence-filled eye sockets watching and waiting for one of the goblins to try and attack either of its allies. It was an unnecessary but appreciated move on the thing's part and I made a mental note to thank it later.
The goblins, seemingly being quite skittish creatures, were paralyzed with indecision and fear. They all silently studied the trio of shambling corpses, and many backed away from where they were standing, but none of them approached the creatures.
I chuckled as I watched this display. I allowed it to occur for a few more seconds, before stepping forward to show myself to the goblins.
I took a few steps and moved close enough to the goblins that the tiny creatures could see me. And that caused them to actually begin to panic.
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The moment I stepped into view, displaying my odd form, the community of pint-sized pipsqueaks visibly reacted to me. Panicked voices filled the air around us and began to shout commands at each other, including ones that contradicted each other. As I watched this an annoyed frown formed on my face.
The panic occurred and even intensified for a few seconds since I was approaching and hadn't been deterred by the frightened reactions my appearance was causing. The intensification of the panic probably had to do with the fact that I wasn't scared to approach the tiny and cowardly creatures.
The encampment was a mess, even before my creatures and I showed up. The place existed, was clearly visible, and had inhabitants, but there was little to no organization of the tents, weapons, waste, and other detritus were strewn carelessly about, and few of the goblins had any sort of preparedness to address my companions and me.
The stags were able to calmly walk into the encampment, aided by my sudden appearance causing any goblins who may have otherwise had time to react to be further frightened and unable to form a coherent strategy that may have repelled us.
I took a few long steps, listening with annoyance as the goblins clashed and were unable to prevent me from entering their encampment. It was clear that they had no meaningful defensive strategy and no tools with which to repel invaders.
That was precisely when the first goblin to exit the chamber, the little goblin named Hagitha, poked her red-skinned head out of the hole. She had a cute face, with large green eyes, a hawkish nose, prominent cheekbones, and shockingly pretty electric yellow hair. She was clinging to the ladder leading out of the hole and hurling herself upwards at a truly shocking speed, which caused her to be too distracted to gain a real awareness of the fearful atmosphere of the encampment.
The encampment was in chaos while Hagitha threw herself upwards so that she may meet the bizarre creature who fed her a magical fruit once. As the woman was clearing the final rungs of the ladder, a pair of goblins actually managed to draw their bows and aim them at me. I could feel a wave of mental hostility coming from my undead servants and worshipers aimed at the goblins bold enough to raise a weapon in my direction.
I chuckled, noting that if nothing else the goblins were capable of mustering up the courage to defend themselves eventually. And then I willed the earth to lash out at the goblins who had taken arms against me by compelling the soil at the feet of the two goblins to soften to the point that the goblins began to sink into it.
The two goblins who were quick enough on their feet to attempt to threaten me were shocked and scared as they felt the grass they were standing on top of sink into the earth underneath them, an instant before their feet sank into the earth that was supposed to be beneath them.
It was enough to knock them off-balance, so when they sank for a single second I willed the earth to resolidify with their feet stuck in it, preventing them from aiming at my followers and me, without actually harming them.
This was when Hagitha successfully finished hurling herself out of the mouth of the hole around which the encampment was situated, and took stock of the situation in front of her. And she summarized the whole situation somewhat eloquently.
A look of bewilderment etched itself onto her face as she uttered a single, expressive word. "Shit."