An ability that was uniquely divine was the power to create life from nothing. Other creatures, including both higher and lesser lifeforms, possessed the power to convert life from one form to another, but the abilities to create bodies, souls, and minds, from nothing, was something that was well and truly divine. At the moment that ability was fully on display to an incredibly small and amazingly privileged audience.

A courtyard a few dozen meters wide and a few dozen meters long overlooked a vast city. The city was empty, impossibly silent and impossibly still. It was a beautiful, if haunting background for the temple which the courtyard guarded. The temple itself was built into a wall of stone, and owed its existence to the whims of a powerful, but inexperienced god, the same god who was hard at work creating new life.

The aforementioned audience for the display of life-creating power consisted of a small number of faith-devils, infernal creatures who had a zealous, utterly insane and warped devotion to the deity who had brought them here. They stood behind their dark lord, metaphorically and literally. The six of them watched the air in front of the ethereal form of their eldritch deity, and gasped when something happened.

The "something" that elicited a reaction from the devils was a display of divine might. The deity had walked to the courtyard overlooking the gigantic city he had created by hand and he had froze, several minutes ago. But now he came back to life right as numerous bodies came into existence close to him.

The bodies appeared abruptly, with no special or obvious fanfare, but as they appeared so too did life return to the spectral form of the god who was the tyrant that the six members of the "Tyrant's Hand" worshiped. They were over four dozen of them, and they filled up much of the once empty space of the courtyard.

The bodies themselves were bodies of a number of different humanoid races. They came in all sizes, many dark colors, and universally had a nobility to them that was often at odds with what other humanoid races thought of the members of the races the bodies belonged too.

The most numerous bodies were the bodies of dark elves, statuesque bodies that were universally attractive. The second most numerous of the humanoid races the bodies represented were of dark dwarves, small, dignified, and universally angry looking bodies that were filled with a plethora of negative emotions. The least numerous bodies created by the god were those of dwarves, a largely lawful and industrious race who tended to be talented craftsmen and craftswomen who just as often staunch traditionalists as they were craftspeople.

The bodies all had their eyes closed, and despite being alive they might as well have been dead at the moment. They lacked souls, something their creator was about to rectify. The god had busied himself doing numerous things while making the bodies, not the least of which was making the souls that would soon fill them.

The god gathered all of the souls he had created and for a split second they were safely ensconced inside of him. He closed his eyes as he allowed them to rest within himself, giving them a second of reprieve following the challenges that came with being created. Once the second passed he opened his eyes and released them, sending them hurtling into the bodies he had created for them to inhabit, each one flying into the body the deity had made for that specific soul without fail.

The souls entered their destined bodies, and in doing so they began to truly awaken for the first time. The souls gave the bodies and the minds of the creatures the spark of true consciousness, true self-awareness, and one by one the bodies began to awaken, their eyes slowly fluttering open for the first time. Or at least most of their eyes began to flutter open.

Some, or rather one, boldly chose to keep her eyes sealed shut, even as her other senses fully roared into life.

The very first thing I ever sensed was darkness. Intuitively I knew that I sensed this darkness as a result of my eyes being closed, but I didn't open them right away. I allowed this darkness to wash over me. And slowly I began to feel a natural kinship to the darkness that was all I could see. I didn't want to open my eyes. So instead, for now anyway, I chose to keep them closed.

I had more senses than just sight to guide me. Fearlessly, I opted to build an understanding of my surroundings by using my other senses.

I felt my nostrils flare as I tried to take in the things that surrounded me, without utilizing my eyes. The smells that filled my nostrils were astoundingly diverse. I could smell cobblestone, plants, rocks, and the assorted smells of other creatures nearby. I wasn't sure precisely "how" I knew how things smelled, but I did. The knowledge was embedded within my mind, just like the knowledge of my senses and even parts of my body were embedded there, without explanation.

I strained my hearing, trying to silence the quite noises I made such as breathing or the slightest shuffling of my feet to gain a sense of what was occurring near me. The sounds I could hear ambiently were the sounds one heard when many different creatures were bunched together in a small space. I heard the unmistakable sounds of surprised gasping, of quickened heart-rates, of creatures taking steps back in surprise.

I also felt gazes upon me. Somehow I could sense that some creatures were staring at me in particular, even though such a sense was impossible to explain. That said, their gazes felt odd. I felt like one set of eyes in particular could see right through me, as if it belonged to someone whose senses extended beyond the physical and were more esoteric in nature.

The devils who had been summoned to the temple silently admired the creations of their deity. Althos had an eye for beauty, if nothing else. Not a single one of his creations was ugly by any standard, though many of them were quite short for the tastes of the devils, who in every case at least among the present group of devils prefered to cavort and frolick with creatures of roughly human height.

Only one devil immediately noticed that one of his god's creations had kept her eyes shut. Althos also noticed this right away, but he observed it stoically, not revealing how the oddity made him feel, one way or another. The creature in question, the one who refused to open her eyes, was a dwarf.

She was a quiet brunette who had come into existence like the rest of her family: without any clothes. Her womanly body was on full display before the deity and everyone else whose bodies had been created at the same time as hers. Althos apathetically studied her, his eyes hiding his emotions as effectively as he hid his thoughts.

Over the course of the next few minutes the creations of the god began to truly come to life. They animated, "coming to life" in a more metaphorically sense than was usually meant when referring to creations of gods, and began to converse with each other. Dwarves, dark-dwarves, and dark-elfs began to fraternize freely, speaking to each other without regrd for their differences in species, despite being aware that they were clearly members of different races.

The sight of this was greatly amusing to the quiet god. He allowed it to proceed uninterrupted while he silently examined some of his newer abiities.

Soul Domain Primary Passive Abilities:

Soul Weapon: Your soul-weapon becomes an artifact of yours, including counting as such for quests. It's properties are unique to you and your innate powers as a god. You can also cause others to spontaneously generate soul-weapons, which are invariably unique weapons that are difficult to damage and can only be truly destroyed by a higher being.

Enhanced Soul Aura: You gain the power to manifest your soul as a shield that will protect you from harm from attacks that aren't capable of at least destroying cities. Alternatively this power can manifest as a suit of armor-like energy.

Empathetic Soul: You can inflict emotions directly onto someone's soul, causing them to experience a life-changing quantity of the emotion. This allows you to overwhelm people with love, or other emotions you can manipulate.

Mortal Soul Mastery: This power lets you create souls appropriate for any kind of mortal body. Souls for mortal bodies you create can also hijack corpses and as a consequence of your powers over memories and parasites even parasitize the abilities, thoughts, secrets, and more of the deceased, all while fooling those who grieve for them into thinking the deceased individuals have come back to life.

Undead Soul Expert: This power lets you create souls appropriate for even the greater rungs of undead-kind you can create, such as death kings, liches, grim-reapers, and flesh-titans. This means that if you wish for it you can create greater undead without killing creatures.

Soul Destruction: You can destroy souls, in the same way as you could before, but now as a passive power.

Worship Swap: By targeting a soul of a creature who worships you, you can change what they worship for, or rather what they worship you as the god of. This is an extremely handy ability for managing cults.

The new powers the god had acquired filled him with an immense amount of confidence. They were very potent abilities, especially ones like "Worship Swap", and "Soul Weapon", both of which gave him the means to take considerable shortcuts in his journey to acquire more power.

The god quietly generated a single new power, one that syngerzied his power over both music and minds. He then immediately activated it, and the creatures he had just created fell to their knees as a variety of songs began to play directly within their minds.

The deity was still as he allowed his power to wash over the creatures. He had given himself the power to create music that inflicted status effects and otherwise altered his targets, and was now allowing those tyrannical tunes to take hold of the minds of his creations.

The creatures were stunned when music abruptly began to play in their minds, especially since even though the music was purely instrumental it still made them feel sensitive the powers and whims of their creator. His powers were akin to tidal waves that smashed against their wills, and weakened their ability to fend off his mental influence.

The god, still in the form of solidified darkness in the rough approximation of a man, began to issue orders to his minions and worshipers. As he did his voice was loaded with authority, and washed over those who heard it. His voice effortlessly crushed any and all attempts to resist him, shattering wills and overcoming any hint of rebellion that anyone in his presence may have felt, deep inside of themselves.

"I am Althos, your creator and lord. I have created you for one reason and one reason only: to take the world beneath the world of this little planet." The deity declared, his voice awe-inspiring and immediately causing them to fall to their knees. This was their god!

The god silently utilized his powers over souls to ensure that every one of the beings in his presence worshiped him as a god of law and of one of the seven virtues. This would allow him to gain a shortcut that finally grant him the second tier of influence over the law domain and the purity subdomain.

Althos' voice entered my mind and it was even more awe-inducing than the music that was ringing through my mind. It made me feel weak but in the most humbling of ways, and so upon being exposed to it I willingly fell to my knees. I kept my eyes closed, even as the god spoke once more.

"You all are the nobility of this city. You are to be its leaders and those responsible for guiding it." My god and creator, the deity Althos, declared authoritatively. His voice was tremendously powerful. None of us spoke back, but I could hear excited hearts near me, their hearts pounding in the presence of our maker. I could also sense that Althos was telling the truth, and his words left me no doubt of his majesty.

"For now my first true orders for you are simple: go to your homes and get dressed. When you do enter the portal that shall appear in your homes. When you do all of you shall taken to the same place. From there you are to elect a leader. The leader you elect shall be the leader of this community." Althos stated, speaking in his capacity as a god of law and empires. When he spoke in such a manner his voice was an indomitable force of nature that commanded obedience.

I heard portals whoosh into being, including one that appeared right in front of me. I could feel the heat emanating off of it, and it comforted me. It was a gentle warmth. I considered the god's words, but after a second's consideration I stepped into the portal and began my life.

The next few hours were busy. That said, they were also productive. Althos succeeded in acquiring considerable power by throwing himself into his work.

The dwarf who kept her eyes sealed shut was elected the leader of this particular community. Althos also built a magical academy in the city and staffed it with people from the magical planet of Retribution, acquiring their obedience by utilizing eldritch powers to drive them to insanity and filling them with a need to educate others in the ways of magic. This meant that over the course of a few hours Althos seamlessly acquired greater power over law, purity, and most importantly of all the domain of magic.

Just as importantly was the fact that whilst he was busy driving retributioners to insanity he acquired the quest to earn the second tier of influence over the terrifying eldritch domain. And it was far from the only quest he earned either.

When the god left the city he had created, he manifested the soul-staff-turned-artifact that was now his first true, personal-use artifact. It was in his hand as he quietly stepped through a portal that teleported him across dimensions and into the realm known as The Heart Of Darkness, where his body awaited him. He seamlessly reunited with his body, soul-staff in hand, empowered and ready to utterly dominate the war he was in with Agustino.

Pain Subdomain Passive Abilities:

Greater Pain Inducement: You can now induce extreme pain in anyone but vestiges. At will this pain can easily induce a painful state of unconsciousness. This can easily function as a greater form of your mental-blast power, if you desire for it too.

Pain Suppression: You can cause anyone you want to not feel pain. You can also take away someone's ability to not feel pain.

Pain Generation: You can generate pain that you store for the sake of the pain-transferral ability you possess.

Attitude Towards Pain: As per the active ability of the same name, but now it is a passive power.

Pain Aura: Creatures who come within range of your aura begin to feel excruciating pain, unless you allow them not too.

Pain Subdomain Active Abilities:

None at this tier of influence.