So this is what it's like to use my powers on such a massive scale... I found myself thinking, within the gigantic dream I had created for General Ayla Syah. Just a few minutes ago I had used my powers on a massive scale in two ways: the first was that I had used new divine, magical powers to cast a single spell that caused the entire city to fall asleep. The second was that I drew everyone who fell asleep in the city into this dreamscape I had created for the purpose of fulfilling my deal with Ayla.

Everything around me was generated by me. In fact, the only things I didn't control were the other people in the dreamscape I had created to announce my support for Ayla and to introduce myself as a deity to the people of the city.

My mind was stretched further than ever before in this place. It was an incredibly odd feeling. Here, in this dreamscape, I was in control of the entirety of the world in ways that were only comparable to the influence I had over my own realm. I was also granted a weird sort of omnipresence that gifted me with a subconscious knowledge of who and what was where in this strange place.

My current surroundings were perhaps the strangest part of this whole experience. I was in a wholly original place, one not generated by copying a part of the city and pasting it into this dreamscape. One I had invented out of my own free-will, and placed in the dream to inspire Ayla. I was in a saray of my own design, one that I created instantly using ecomancy and based on my knowledge of Mahmud's memories and the history of Namira.

Ayla was next to me, her dream-self wearing the armor of ancient, warring desert-giants. She was lost in thought, still amazed by all of this. The whole time she had been in this place, what felt like three or so minutes though time was tricky in the place we were in, the strange realm of dreams, she had been quiet. She had only muttered words since we got here, and I could tell her mind was reacting to this in stride.

In fairness... it is a lot. Lucid dreaming can be intense the first time it happens. I thought, having gained a decent amount of knowledge of dreams during the last two months.

The first time I did something like this I gained over ten thousand worshipers instantly. And some dark-elves gained a new class. I thought, grinning as I recalling the last time I created a dream. But this is different. I reminded myself, with a grim expression on my face.

We'd be showing the people of Namira a number of things. And only one of them was a prerecorded scene. The majority of what we'd be saying to them would be things we'd be saying live. And at the end of this dream, I'd gift Ayla an army of sandmen to control. The same sandmen, and more, that she saw lay waste to an outpost not long ago.

She'd be in her odd, quiet state for a few more minutes.

Once five minutes, in dreamscape time anyway, had passed I placed a hand on Ayla's back. When she turned to face me I spoke to her.

"It's time. Are you ready?" I asked, gently. She looked at me, and her face was a mix of emotions. Her eyes glowed as a number of feelings clashed and fought for control. Eventually, excitement won out, and when she nodded at me there was a smile on her lips and pride in her eyes. She still didn't speak though. I nodded back at her and began to weave a complex web of spells in my mind.

It took me thirty seconds to finish the chain of spells that'd connect me and Ayla with the rest of the city. When the web was finished I activated it immediately. It flared to life. In front of Ayla and I nothing appeared to have changed. But the rest of the city was exposed to a prerecorded and fabricated vision.

The scene that the people of Namira got to witness was an amazing and false one. In it, Ayla and a few creatures I had designated to be her servants fought for their lives. The people of Namira saw a gigantic battlefield, where Ayla and her forces warred against a gigantic legion of sandmen.

"Worm riders! On me!" Ayla shouted as she dashed towards a wave of the sandmen. The desert giants' most hated enemies were gathered in a never-before-seen number and they were also dashing towards her.

Ayla was on foot, a gigantic hammer in one hand and a massive blade in another. She wore the armor of a traditional desert-giant warrior. It differed from the armor of the guards who protected the city from intrusion by civilized enemies in that it was meant for mobility. Such mobility was necessary when fighting the savage monsters that dwelled in the sandy wastes of the desert.

As she sprinted forward, fearlessly making herself a target for her hated enemies, the sands on her left and her right violently erupted as two powerful creatures surged out of them. This Ayla smiled as the fabricated massive worms exploded into the battlefield next to her. Both of the huge things had riders seated on their heads, riders who were desert giants.

The worms moved by burrowing through the sand, their bodies comfortable under tonnes of the stuff. When they emerged from its depths they did so violently, causing massive explosions of sand to fill the air as they temporarily showed themselves. They attacked by either outright devouring the sandmen, or by spitting globules of acid at them that rapidly dissolved them.

Their riders were skilled, also fabricated, desert giants who strapped countless spears to their backs. The riders wore suits emblazoned with the emblem of the army of the faction that once sought to take over Namira. The suits were designed to enable them to survive the heat and pressure of the sands while underneath it. And they had countless spears strapped to their backs, spears which they deftly grabbed and hurled at sandmen from vast distances away.

When Ayla got within range of the forces of the sandmen she began to lash out at her enemies. She was a whirlwind of fury and obsidian as her weapons struck her enemies and caused them to fall before her.

The next two minutes of the vision was a montage of scenes and moments from this entirely made-up battle. And the false narrative it created was an incredibly useful one, meant to fool the people of Namira into thinking Ayla was a heroine, a warrior who risked her life and her armies to save not only the wastes from certain destruction but in doing so also spare the lives of countless Namirians as well.

At the end of it, Ayla single-handedly faced down a massive sandman and cut the thing in half. When the creature perished it released a crystal that Alya picked up. The crystal immediately and painfully burned her flesh, scarring her and embedding within her a new power: the ability to control sandmen. Though that part wasn't explained in what we had shown the people of Namira.

And it worked wonderfully.

And so, it's my turn. I thought as the vision edged towards an end. I readied myself by shedding my desert giant form and taking on one not unlike the form I used to first interact with Ayla when she first appeared before me. She looked on as my form changed, becoming a slightly more sandy variant of the form she felt was my "default" form. When I finished my transformation she smiled at me, now far smaller than myself.

When the vision came to an end, a massive screen appeared in front of me. This screen reflected my appearance back to me for the sake of ensuring that I knew what I looked like while I spoke. It was a handy feature, but my face was an intentionally passive one in this form. Only my mouth moved, and even that only moved a bit.

I waited for a second to build tension before I began to speak. And when I began I began to weave the biggest lie I had ever told, one that was based in the folklore of the giants themselves and was concocted to make Ayla an even bigger hero, not just a protector but a liberator. The only person in the dream-scape who knew the full truth was Ayla herself, who had collaborated with me to concoct this falsehood.

"Good people of Namira, lend me your ears. I am an ancient desert spirit, the last and greatest of my kind, and I am here to tell you the truth regarding the ancient animosity my children, the sandmen, have had with your people." I said, beginning to harken back to the most ancient myths of the people of Namira.

I closed my eyes as if I were being overcome with emotion before continuing to speak. Ayla wasn't visible to the people I was addressing, and next to me she grinned as I weaved this tale.

"A long time ago the ancient devil Paimon made a deal with lesser desert spirits, a terrible and treacherous deal that preyed on their ambition and bloodthirst. You see they were jealous of my power and my kinship with our children, the sandmen. Paimon gained their souls, and their service, in exchange for sealing me away into a shell that resembled a massive sandman. For countless eons, I was trapped in that form, in the most remote wastes this desert has to offer." I told the captive audience.

"One of the terms and conditions of the deal Paimon made with my ancestors was that the sandmen, the children of my kind, be used as weapons against desert giants. This wasn't the original relationship between our two peoples, but it's been literally hundreds of thousands of years since we last had peace. That changes today." I declared, confidence surging into my earthy voice.

"My people will no longer be hostile towards desert giants. Sandmen will no longer be the terrors that parents tell their children about to scare them into good behavior." I told the dreamscape, and that was true. I'd need some time to make it totally true, but I was already formulating a plot in my mind to secure the worship and service of the few roving groups of sandmen, and those of them that became mine wouldn't be hostile towards the people of Namira.

This drew a reaction from the countless desert giants who were watching the vision. Both Ayla and I heard a thunderous cheer as the people of Namira realized the incredible difficulty of what Ayla had just done: she had built peace. Ayla was still as the realization dawned on her, and as she began to see her lifelong ambitions begin to come together. Her heartbeat was impossibly fast, as the enormity of this moment washed over her.

"To truly cement the new age of friendship between our two peoples, I am sending her a small force of sandmen that she can use against your enemies and anyone who would dare to threaten the safety of the people of Namira. They will obey her, much like how some of them obeyed Mahmud during his youth. They will help pave the way to a new age of friendship and peace between us." I said, explaining why a force of non-hostility sandmen would surge into the city soon.

"Ayla Syah is a hero whose actions have made the desert a safer place. And it is through my power that all of us are here, together, to share this moment and to learn that simple truth. Ayla has a big heart and because of that she has agreed to be here and to speak to us herself about her hopes for the future and about the truth of her actions that caused the Suti family to slander her and turn the public against her." I said, now done with my part of this deception.

The screen shifted and moved to be in front of Ayla. The bronze-skinned general smiled and began to speak without wasting a second.

"Hello. My name is Ayla Syah and I know that many people believe they know who I am." She said, confidently introducing herself to the countless viewers whose hearts had been rocked by the false revelations of the minutes I had spent speaking.

"I will begin by saying what about me is true. I believe the truth ought to be prioritized in moments like this. I was the leader of the army known as 'The Untamed Wastes'. We were an army made for the sake of defeating the sandmen that plagued our communities. We were never your foes, and the fact that the Suti family insisted on making me a villain is one of the greatest injustices of the recent era." Ayla said, her voice filling with faux-sadness. She was about to weave a lie almost as big as the one I had just weaved.

"A very long time ago I came to this great city to ask for aid. When I explained what my army sought the Suti family grew incensed and labeled me an enemy, and an invader. My army clashed with the army of Namira. And we lost. I was captured and taken to a secretive prison." She said, tears filling her eyes. This was a mixture of truths and falsehoods that when weaved together created a blanket that told a story that was more dramatically interesting than logical.

"I believe that the emperor at the time of my defeat made a deal with some enemy of mine to bring an end to our mission to make the desert a safe place. Fortunately, fate had a different idea in mind." She said, now beginning to smile slightly. She was about to explain one of the most important parts of the scheme we dreamed up together.

"Mahmud Suti wasn't my enemy. He was an unfortunate victim in all of this. He and I were lovers, and he freed me. And for that, he lost his life. But not before his own patron and ally, a god of all things, told me the truth about the reasons for the hostility the sandmen have shown us for so long. That god opposes Paimon, and seeks to unite and liberate the desert from Paimon's tyranny and terror." She told the people of Namira. Another sound reverberated throughout the city, the sound of shocked gasps.

"I believe Mahmud would want me to become the next empress of Namira. And I believe that I embody the spirit of Namira; a relentless pride, an ability to overcome opposition and even thrive in while staring it down." She confidently told her audience, growing more and more comfortable in front of the screen every second.

"I am asking you to vote for me in less than a week when we hold our election. The city of Namira has been leaderless for too long. It's time to get things back on track, and even unify our people now that our most dangerous foes are no longer our enemies. The time has come for progress, expansion, and unity." Ayla told the captive audience and in doing so inadvertently came up with her campaign slogan: "Progress, Expansion, and Unity".

When we heard cheers erupt throughout the city, a thought came to mind. We're really doing this... this is going to work. I thought both startled and amazed by what was happening in front of me.

"Thank you for your time. You're going to be waking up very soon. You have been a wonderful audience, and I hope to get to know you very soon." She told the city, a wide grin on her face. And then the screen vanished. I transformed again, taking on the tall desert giant form I had used when Ayla and I witnessed the sandmen destroy an outpost earlier in the day. I looked at her and smiled.

"I think that went well. Now... do you want to go walk around for a bit? How long has been it since you last walked the streets of Namira?" I asked her, already knowing the answer. It's been over an entire millennium. I bet she'd like to go for a walk. I thought, a grin on my face as I offered her my arm. She chuckled at me, and looked at my arm.

"I'm not from here, but I do think it'd be wise to go see the place I'm about to become the ruler of, so sure." She said while waving her hand to indicate that she wouldn't take my arm. I chuckled back and respected her choice, placing my arm down at my side again.

And it was at that moment that I received a significant domain-centric alert and a title that reminded me of events from over two months ago. Reading it brought a big smile to my face.

[Domain-centric Alert:

The actions you undertook just now have been deemed worthy of granting you influence over the relevant domains and subdomain they involved. Congratulations on gaining the first tier of influence over the domains of dreams, falsehoods, and the subdomain of lies.

The system is taking a second to process what all that entails and in a few moments you will receive a larger notification alerting you to the concrete rewards that those domains and subdomain provide you at their lowest tier of influence.]

[New Title Acquired: The Lord Of Lies

This potent title is a stronger version of a title you were previously known by, the Lover of Lies. You've acquired this title by becoming a god with influence over lies. This title inherently makes your lies stronger and increases the potency of all of your illusionary and deceitful powers.

It's also what all illusionists, rogues, and other deceptive or sneaky classes know you by automatically. They'll feel the title emblazon itself onto their souls when they meet you, or when they next see you.]