The scene in front of me was a rather fascinating one. I watched, eagerly, as a number of assorted "monstrous" beings convened and conversed in a large council chamber which I was gazing down at while accompanied by two rather devoted bodyguards. My bodyguards were two beautiful, curvaceous women who focused not on me but on my surroundings, quite professionally and carefully surveying where we were at, at all times.
In the council chamber a number of eldritch entities were gathered around a large table which served as the centerpiece of the room. I focused first on the strange mound of dark tentacles affixed to four, stumpy legs that was seated at the table. The tentacles were covered in mouths and eyes, and the mouths were capable of impressively intelligent speech, which I had learned when I first met members of that strange species.
The next entity I focused on was a member of the infamous "Great Race of Yith", one in one of their "native" forms rather than one that had swapped bodies with another being. It's current form was that of an impressively tall entity that was conical in shape and had a numerous limb-like tentacles that ended in sharp crustacean claws it could easily use to manipulate its environment, as well as one that ended in a strange set of trumpet-like organs it could use for physical speech.
I could also see other sorts of eldritch "monsters", a vaguer category of eldritch beings who had both terrorized mortals and also been terrorized in turn by them, leading to the beginning of a long-lasting cycle of mutal hatred that I was slowly healing, at least in the boundaries of my empire. What mortals considered to be eldritch "monsters" differed greatly from what greater beings considered "monsters", as the later camp tended to be lacking in intelligence and could be commanded by me quite easily if I utilized a number of abilities I possessed, whereas "eldritch monsters" tended to be sapient beings that mortals simply hated and who tended to hate them right back.
The conversation that the council was having was a heated one that I could easily hear and make sense of, something which appeared to not be possible for my servants. The pair of bodyguards, members of a fanatical order of highly loyal servants and worshipers of me in my aspect as the Anax of Anal Sex, did not react to what the council members were saying, which certainly suggested that they were unable to hear the exchange the passionate council people were having.
"The Great One is a divinity of life, purpose, and breeding. To properly honor him is to fill your fellow worshipers with life so that more beings may someday bask in the loving darkness he conjures every night! What is the purpose of lust if not to multiply one's own family?" The "Dark Young of the Black Goat" uttered, multiple voices speaking in sync, creating a rather unpleasant echo of the statement that the creature had been making. Seated across the vast table from the gigantic being sat an Elder Thing, a strange, impressively large, eldritch entity.
The strange and proudly named "Elder Thing" was the local high priest presiding over the meeting. Elder Things were among the foremost eldritch scientists within my formers, and as a race they were tall entities whose heads and feet were both starfish like appendages that ended in five digits or features, and whose bodies were shaped like oval-shaped barrels. They worshiped me as a god of perversion, experimentation, rampant lust, hedonism, happiness, fertility, and community, which made sense since they were spore-based lifeforms who did not reproduce sexually. Many of them were intrigued by my powers as the god of anal sex and were believers in pleasure in all of its forms, not just sexual pleasure.
The one seated across from the dark young rose out of its seat, the starfish like appendage that jutted out of its head turning to face the dark young. The voice that proceeded to emanate out of the strange creature was much higher in pitch than one would have thought such a menacing being would sound.
"The God of Bliss is a hedonistic god of self expression and shared joy. He delights when all of his children are living lives of maximal bliss, and sharing such joys with their fellows. To say that he demands and prioritizes reproductive acts is to reduce his nature to that of a rutting beast!" The strange, otherworldly being replied, anger seeping into its voice.
Both beings were, of course, talking about me. The two titles were different, but I suppose that made sense. With my powers I could control the fertility go all sorts of living beings and so beings like the frighteningly named "Dark Young" worshiped me as a powerful bringer of fertility, and provider of purpose. They worshiped me, along with their actual creator goddess the mysterious "Black Goat", a female fertility deity who, according to innate knowledge they all possessed, created them in the distant past and was revered as their mother and had long ago lost her mate under mysterious circumstances, who was himself an eldritch god, and the primordial father of the dark young as a species.
The Elder Things, on the other hand, were far more fascinated by my "higher" abilities, due to them having never really needed a fertility deity, thanks to their having always had some small measure of luck on their side throughout their existence that enabled them to survive and overcome any challenges they faced as a species. They saw me as a god of euphoric bliss, one who encouraged joy in any form so long as all involved parties were consenting adults, regardless of things like gender and species.
The council was busily discussing matters of faith related to worshipping me. They were one of many councils happening at the moment that were comparable, loosely, to the famed "First Council of Nicaea", a council that occurred on the world of Earth to attempt to iron out the precise details of worshipping the deity that Lunaria, who was herself a goddess of death and warfare, defeated centuries ago and usurped, whose followers now make up the most popular mortal religion on that world.
In fairness to the people and entities within the councils, the First Council of Nicaea was an attempt to attain a consensus that represented the will of most, if not all of the followers of that fallen god for the sake of organizing a single religion. I had no desire to lord over a single religion, and I actively wanted organic worship of me that was responsive and considerate of local traditions. I wanted to lord over any and all other gods, but beyond that I was actively happy to allow religious practices and traditions devoted to me to be diverse, especially since such diverse practices would eventually allow for me to become a more powerful god with a wider range of abilities.
Throughout the impressive empire I ran countless organizations devoted to me existed. Many of these were religious orders, such as orders of nuns, paladins, monks, templars, and inquisitors, and these organizations were among my favorites.
I was openly fond of the religious orders devoted to me and to the other deities in my pantheon. Throughout my empire, virtually every inhabited world, including those solely inhabited by eldritch entities, vampires, or robots, had a fair number of abbeys, nunneries, and monasteries. These places were protected by all manner of arcane and divine protections and universally had at least three of the strange sentinels that protected my dominion from both foreign and domestic threats placed within them.
I was the chief deity of my pantheon and the most well-known, due to the intensely charismatic preachers who worshiped me and evangelized to the people of the empire about my glory and my power. Thanks to this countless nunneries, abbeys, and monasteries were fully devoted to me exclusively and could be found throughout my empire. These places housed my most fanatical devotees, people who had seen and felt my power and decided that their purpose in life was to serve me and to get to know me.
Each nunnery, abbey, and monastery housed people and creatures devoted to me who sought to know and serve me in unique ways. Most of these places were joyful yet contemplative places where those who came to worship me were free to practice their faith in ways that others might find unseemly, be it living lives of voluntary virginity or living lives filled with such decadent pleasure that it put even kingly harems to shame, or even living lives of self-flagellation and other practices that utilize pain to purify the soul or enhance pleasure.
I encouraged this diversity and rewarded it by filling the minds of the leaders of the more unique monasteries, abbeys, and nunneries with euphoric multi-sensory and short-lived visions that were keyed to them specifically. This practice filled them with far more devotion to me than they had previously had and were repeated whenever they prayed to me, which made them seek to spend more and more time praying to me. I even tended to turn them into oracles, individuals whose minds were attuned to mine and could receive my instructions more directly than other mortals could, which made them into leaders of communities, countries, and even entire worlds.
Those who resided in the more peace and life oriented abbeys, nunneries, and monasteries were often approached by people from throughout their local section of the empire, which in some cases included beings from distant parts of the same solar system, for a variety of purposes. The most common reasons why people sought out those who devoted themselves to me tended to include asking for aid with things like mediating conflicts, childbirth, or even impregnation, as those who devoted themselves to me were blessed with potent magic used for things like healing, peacefully ending conflicts, and the creation of new life.
That said as a god of lust and pleasure my followers were also quite open about pleasure and abbeys, nunneries, and monasteries often served as houses of pleasure wherein nightly sex rituals were performed by willing participants and involved members of every gender and every species, and every combination of every gender.
Obviously not every person who resided within the abbeys, nunneries, and monasteries participated, but more than a few of the nuns, monks, paladins, templars, and inquisitors who served me were tremendously lustful and eager to sate their carnal hunger as well as serve me using their bodies. I tended to heighten the pleasure they felt during these rituals, as a way to reward those who participated and ensure that everyone involved had a delightful time. From time to time I even sent an avatar of mine to where the rituals were taking place and participated "myself", enjoying the sensations of sex without having to worry about the raw, mind-bending power of sex, since my avatars could have sex freely without altering souls unless I wanted them too.
Rulers and leaders were also frequent visitors of temples, nunneries, abbeys, and monasteries devoted to me. They tended to commune with the more fanatical devotees of mine in the hopes of learning more about me, as well as so that they could have an escape from the troubles of daily life as a leader. If I noticed this happening in any specific temples, nunneries, abbeys, or monasteries repeatedly I tended to beautify the place to make it more fitting for visits from secular leaders, which in turn caused them to become even more popular. Since it had only been three weeks only a few places received this treatment so far, but I knew that that'd change soon.
There were different kinds of influence and power one could have. There was "hard" power, which was the sort of power that one wielded with militaries and economic coercion. And then there was "soft" power, which was the sort of power that one wielded through culture and information, a gentler approach to influence and manipulation.
My "hard" power was considerable, since I was a god of fertility and destruction, as well as possessed an expanding military and countless superpowers that allowed me to inflict devastating damage even without mobilizing my military. That said, I wasn't fond of my "hard" power, as befit my nature as a god of things like lust and life.
My "soft" power was every bit as formidable as my "hard" power. I had allowed empires, organizations, and even individuals committing espionage within my empire to learn of my victory over Stella, and various other things about me such as my triumphant victory over the dreaded archdemon Gorgomuth, and to spread news of those achievements to their masters and handlers which in turn had caused various foreign dignitaries to send me messages and to congratulate me on my "hard-fought" victory over the "despotic" and "belligerent" former empress.
I even allowed those same spies to observe and study the practices of those faithful to me and "encouraged" them through the subtle usage of telepathy to spread word of such practices to those they served, thus planting seeds that would eventually blossom into full, devoted faith to myself in places beyond my borders.
When possible I planned to acquire new territory through peaceful expansion and the proliferation of faith in myself to the point that the faithful demand that their communities become annexed by my empire. Even with my powers this wouldn't be a fast process but it was one that could be done carefully, and could be done in such a way that it ensured the peaceful spread of my empire, which was my greatest priority here. I knew that the spread of Raulism would be the thing that most successfully ensured my empire grew and flourished, since I was not just an emperor but also a god.
