I watched as Gnarl began to slowly stand back up. As he stood back up he slowly began to become conscious of the changes his body had both undergone and was undergoing. 

“Welcome back Gnarl.” I said, with a soft, confident grin on my face as I stared at the potent, newly evolved being. 

“Master… I feel different.” He told me, even as he slowly reached his full, now tremendous height. His new height was not much shorter than mine, allowing him to tower over even the greatest of his peers. 

I could now easily see through his eyes, as readily as I saw through my own. Our minds were interconnected, though calling his mind “his” was now a bit of an exaggeration. It was more accurate to now call Gnarl’s mind an extension of mine. We were unified in ways that defied explanation. I could command and control Gnarl, and anyone else I infected with eerie ease. 

“You are, Gnarl. You are now a shadow of what I am. An ‘Evolved’.” I explained, somehow telling him nothing at all despite the fact that I was being honest. Gnarl gazed at me in confusion and the smile on my face only widened. 

“This world’s understanding of illnesses is… lacking, but I am an incarnate illness. A physical manifestation of a disease. And an extremely potent one, at that.” I began, eager to explain my true nature to someone.

“I am a living virus, specifically the ‘Blacklight Virus’. I can infect other people with… well myself. Doing so connects them to me, and, among other things, grants them physical immortality, super strength, and a permanent connection with, and subservience to, myself.” I continued, before beginning to whisper into Gnarl’s mind.

“I am a truly fearsome overlord, Gnarl. One who can do many things. Such as this.” I explained, before causing my fingers to transform into potent, eerie claws, made of the same biomass that my hands were originally made from. And then with a smile, I allowed my face to morph and take on the appearance of Gnarl’s new form. 

“I seek to spread myself… Everywhere.” I explained, my voice replicating Gnarl’s perfectly. 

“That impression is… Weirdly unsettling.” The minion replied, his new voice much deeper than it had previously been. I smiled, impishly, while continuing to replicate Gnarl’s face. A second later I allowed my face to become my own again, my smile never fading. 

“So master, what would spreading yourself, infecting other living things, accomplish exactly?” The minion asked, curiously. I chuckled at his question and opted to demonstrate what it would mean through my actions. 

“Gnarl, grow a pair of wings.” I replied, causing Gnarl to fall to his knees in pain, and hiss and pant in agony as his bones contorted and his flesh shifted to obey my commands. The minion, despite the pain he was in, was smiling in dark delight, both masochistically and due to the fact that he was obeying me. He let out a, to the other minions anyway, startlingly ecstatic scream, as wings suddenly jutted out of his back. 

“So if I infect people, I can command them. By infecting people with myself I can create a reign that will last a truly long time. Not one that ends with me… trapped in some nether dimension, or slain by an army of upstart dogooders.” I said, offhandedly, and correctly. Those I infected were under my command. 

“Overlord, what a plan!” Gnarl exclaimed, excitedly. I chuckled, and then mentally ordered the sheep I had resurrected to surge forward and bite the minions. As the sheep began to bound forward, eager to infect my other servants, the minions noticed them creeping forward in unison and turned their weapons on them. I chuckled and motioned for the minions to stand down. 

“Minions… Unify with me. Join me.” I commanded, my eyes zeroing in on them. Some of them, those who already had spores within themselves, threw down their arms and dashed towards the sheep, while others did not frightened by the fact that they wanted to obey me. Nevertheless, I relaxed and smiled and forcefully activated the spores within the minions. A second later I felt the litany of sensory information in my mind forcefully explode, as their minds were subsumed and interconnected to mine, allowing me to see through dozens of eyes and speak with dozens of mouths. 

“Master…” The minions whispered as one, enthralled by my potent, dark powers, now totally under my control, able to be puppeted by myself with ease. 

“Yes, my minions. You will not suffer from the flaws of your predecessors. Or even your own flaws. There shall be no more stupidity among your kind. No more foolishness. Only cruel, ruthless efficiency, and the constant .” I explained, eagerly. My eyes, briefly, turned the same strange amber color as those of the minions. 

I knelt down and chuckled, evilly, as I touched the grass at the feet. I infected the grass with the disease, thus ensuring that my disease would continue to prosper and spread, and in doing so cause my illness to spread throughout the region unabated. But I still had a major goal here: I wanted to infect a human. Or, preferably, I wanted to infect multiple humans.

The Blacklight virus that walked the fields not far from the boundaries of Spree was a potent and powerful being in the shape of a handsome, evil man. The virus began to lead his newly unified minions out of the base of the hill that overlooked Spree, and as he did, he allowed his mind to adjust to the strangeness of his situation, all while ordering the rest of his minions to undergo the same sort of transformation that Gnarl had undergone. 

The walking, talking, shape-shifting virus was a potent demigod, a very minor divinity of illness, death, minds, magic, life, order, evil, madness, fertility, and most importantly; power. He possessed eerie, corruptive powers that would empower those who received his blessings but also slowly sap them of sanity, gradually robbing them of their free will, and slowly but surely seep into the very environment itself. And he was keenly aware of this. 

The entity was something well and truly beyond mortal, something that would have been obvious to anyone familiar with actual divinities. Unfortunately for Gnarl, and the other minions, they were not familiar with any actual divinities, as not even the master they had more loved in the past, the unholy Third Overlord, was an actual, biological, and true divinity. Very, very few actual divinities lived in the world where The Dark One currently walked. That was precisely why it was such a wondrous place for a newborn divinity to rise in prominence, and to earn its first followers. 

As he took step after step, followed by his retinue of minions, he was hard at work. His exceptional mind was actively sorting through the countless abilities he possessed, and his knowledge was empowering him, causing his form to become ever more beautiful and fierce with every purpose-driven step. 

The deadly overlord strode forward, guided by his incredibly keen senses. With every passing second, those senses grew sharper and sharper and his eerie beauty grew crueler and crueler. And that perpetual evolution was the stuff of legends, a trait possessed only by the mythical and potent true deities.

The source of that constant evolution was the potent ability known as “Eternal Ascension”, which was itself fueled by the tiny spark of divinity nestled within the depths of his soul. It was the first, and currently the sole ability he possessed due to his nature as a potent living god that had manifested and made itself known to him but would eventually become just one of a litany of such powers. 

The group, guided by their fierce god, began to gently climb a small hill as they made their way on the long pathway to the distant town of Spree. As they did they began to see a small farm off at the top of the tiny hill they were climbing, bringing a small smile to the face of the dreadful being who was steadily stalking towards the first structure he’d ever see up close that wasn’t innately his.

The humble farmer who had, years ago, been lucky enough to receive the farmlands outside of the town of Spree was currently fast asleep in the wee hours of the morning. He was asleep on a straw bed in the back of his farmhouse. As a consequence of that, he was unable to hear the distant sounds of the tiny horde of intelligent, violent, goblin-like “Minions” steadily making their way towards his farmlands.

When the minions reached the farmlands they almost dashed forward to inflict mindless destruction, but they were reigned in before they could do by a single mental utterance from their master. He did not yearn for endless destruction or needless violence, instead, his sort of evil was something else entirely. Something more complex than that. 

The overlord commanded his minions and ordered them to stand in a potent formation which best utilized their mighty abilities. Browns stood in a line protecting both the reds and the blues with their bodies, allowing both colors to unleash arcane chaos if needed, while the greens invisibly waited, unseen and ready to inflict devastating physical damage to any enemies, if anyone dared to resist their potent lord. 

The Dark One, for his role in all of this, casually stroked the crops which were beginning to creep out of the dirt. He had plans for them, indeed he plans for an incredible number of things, and his plans often didn’t include violence. 

When he had laid his fingers on all of the crops that the farmer had planted weeks ago he silently approached the farmhouse. Despite the fact that he was clad in incredibly heavy armor, he was totally silent as he stepped towards the farmhouse. He did not make a sound, any at all, not just the usual noises of footsteps, but even the subtle, nearly inaudible noises of heartbeats did not emanate from him. And he could hear the steady, rhythmic beating of the heart of the man in the farmhouse.

Had any learned man studied the eerie figure, they’d quickly realize that to call The Dark One a “Living Being” was a bit of a challenge. If he was a living being, he was one deeply unlike the sorts of living beings the people of Spree had ever met. 

The Dark One rose his armored hand, the very same one that was sheathed in the gauntlet, and began to rap the gauntlet against the soft, wooden door which served as the entrance and exit to the simple farmhouse. As he did, he allowed his eyes to explore the simple structure.

Behind me, my minions stood in tight, surprisingly disciplined formation. They were fiercely protective of both each other and me, but I was using my powers to ensure they obeyed me. And to ensure that they didn’t mess with my plans, I subtly used my powers to keep them focused and calm, fixated on the farmhouse and the sleeping stranger inside of it. 

The figure himself was no one special, a simple farmer, but he’d play a surprisingly handy role in my schemes in the days to come. Because of him, I’d gain plausible means to spread my contagion far and wide, without doing anything more than just aiding a man who had very little ambition other than to live a life free of pain and of overly tyrannical dictators. He was perfect for playing the role of an unexpected courier of pestilence, a bringer of an apocalypse that he was ignorant of and would, if I had my way, likely never fully understand what he had done. 

I looked forward to meeting him, though the truth was that I already knew everything about the man, thanks to my increasingly potent psychic abilities. I was excited to utilize see the real potency of my psychic powers be unleashed since I could make use of the powers I possessed to willingly persuade people to join me, even without direct psychic control. In fact, that was I what intended to do to the isolated farmer who was about to wake up. 

I waited a moment after I had rapped the door, and then sighed impatiently. I mentally targeted the strange farmer sleeping in the back of the farmhouse and gave him a quick, mental, semi-electric shock to wake him up. A split second later, as the man recovered from his rather unpleasant way of waking up, I knocked on the door again. I could be patient, but sometimes I didn’t need to be. He’d choose to join me, but that didn’t mean I needed to wait for him to wake up on his own.